Self-Congratulations

I was visiting Baines up in Portland so we took a drive up to Seattle. I'd never been up in the Space Needle, so we decided to check it out. It was actually a beautiful day by Seattle standards and we had a wonderful view of the Puget Sound--over our shoulder there is where they filmed part of Sleepless in Seattle. As with all great attractions, you exit through the gift shop. I was particularly taken by these hats:
I almost bought one. But I didn't think anybody else would understand the humor. You see, you ride an elevator to the top of the Space Needle. That's right, a hat that brags about your accomplishment of riding an elevator. Beautiful.

2007 Has Left the Building

What happened to December? Time flies, oh well. Here's my Top Albums for 2007. Looking back it was a pretty good year for music, and this list generated much internal debate. Here it is, in no particular order:
Andrew Bird: Armchair Apocrypha
Wilco: Sky Blue Sky
Kanye West: Graduation
Modest Mouse: We Were Dead Before the Ship Even Sank
Arcade Fire: Neon Bible
Shout Out Louds: Our Ill Wills
Field Music: Tones of Town
Ryan Adams: Easy Tiger
Radiohead: In Rainbows
Band of Horses: Cease to Begin

Runners up include: Stars: In Our Bedroom After the War
New Pornographers: Challengers
Iron and Wine: The Sheperd's Dog
The Thrills: Teenager
The Shins: Wincing the Night Away
And Honorable Mention goes to:
Aqueduct: Or Give Me Death
Dinosaur Jr.: Beyond
Rogue Wave: Asleep at Heaven's Gate
Crowded House: Time on Earth
The National: Boxer
Jens Lekman: Night Falls Over Kortedala
Cloud Cult: Meaning of 8
Clap Your Hands Say Yeah: Some Loud Thunder

Highlights included seeing Arcade Fire in San Francisco (okay, it was actually in Berkeley and I stayed in Oakland), and of course Wilco's first visit to the Rock to play Robinson Auditorium. Lucked out and got to see a free In-Store concert by Andrew Bird at Amoeba Records in Los Angeles while on a business trip. Heading to Portland later this month to see Ryan Adams with Baines.
Oddly enough, perhaps the best album I heard in 2007 won't be released until 2008, but more on that later.
A look around the web at my friend's blogs yields some interesting bits.
Baines lists his Top 25 songs of the year (and my list would be nothing without his influence). Be sure to check out his most recent musical discoveries along with the new track from Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks.
Joe Adams looks to be well on the road to recovery from his stroke--certainly his humor is back in fine form, check out his hilarious posting about joining a gym.
Dick Cavett finishes out the year with a look at his reader's comments. But not to be missed is his reference to this hilarious clip from "Late Night with David Letterman" with Eddie Murphy and Cavett. I guarantee it is worth your time and will make you laugh. And let's face it, going into an election year, couldn't we all use a good laugh?
Best wishes for 2008, and check back often, I've resolved to be more regular (and got the prunes to prove it).

Happy Birthday, iPod

Last week, that beautiful little life-changing device turned all of six years old. Sadly, like poor Molly Ringwald in Sixteen Candles, nobody paid much attention. We all took it for granted that we could carry an immense personal library of music in our pockets, flicking or scrolling our way through the thousands of songs that have become the soundtracks to a life, whether it sucks or not.
I'm embarrassed to admit that I did not own a first generation iPod--the 5GB model. I know it seems shocking coming from someone who spent this past Saturday installing the new Mac OS onto their computer the day after it was released. Not to mention the fact that a mere couple of months ago I stood in line to be the 20th person to purchase an iPhone at the AT&T store in West Little Rock (for $200 more than it could be acquired today). But it's true. However, I already HAD an MP3 player, lest you think I was woefully behind the times. It was a 128MB piece of shit manufactured by Rio. At the time I was self-employed and the hefty price of the iPod seemed an extravagance I couldn't afford. A few months later I was visiting my friend Chope in Santa Monica and he was proudly showing off his 10GB iPod. In fact, at that time, Chope was more of a poster boy for Apple than I was, what with his brand new iMac and his mastering of the iLife suite of applications (I still can't use iMovie--it seems contrary to my theories of editing, whereas I look at it as putting pieces together, iMovie is more about removing what you don't want). On that visit, Chope shamed me into purchasing my first iPod--I splurged on the 20GB. It was one of the best purchases I ever made. A few months later that iPod provided the soundtrack to my road trip back to L.A. for my second life in Southern California, 10 blocks down California Avenue from Chope and his iMac (and of course, his lovely wife Ali). I'd go running with that iPod, but I had to learn when to slow down and hold it steady so the buffer could reload, otherwise it would crash.
By the time they came out with the 60GB iPod, I was back living in Little Rock. And then fast-forward to the introduction of the iPod Nano--I got the 4GB which was the biggest at the time, and I got it in black, to contrast my traditional white iPod. That was on January 11, 2006. I know because I had the date engraved on the back, along with Apple's stock price at the time, a high of $83.90.
That was really the big news last week, when Apple released their quarterly report and the stock shot up over $186. The continued sales of the iPhone, the release of Leopard, and iMacs newer and sexier than that one Chope had on California Avenue, along with all of the other Apple computers had sent profits soaring. As a long time stock holder and Apple user, that is a good thing. At six years old, the company itself has already renamed it iPod Classic to distinguish it from the all of the other incarnations. Just six and it's a classic--it took Coca-Cola a hundred years to achieve that.
But that's not what is important or what is to be celebrated on the iPod's birthday. It's the music that fills each individual iPod, and the way that music influences our lives, comforts, and lifts us. There is nothing like a song to trigger a memory for me--a full-fledged three dimensional memory where I can literally look around and what was going on in 360 degrees.  It is as if I was there, present again at the moment, hearing THAT song in THAT place. Old photos don't do that for me. The only thing I remember is what is there in the frame. Video is worse--it replaces the reality, the tape becomes the only memories I have of the moment. But a song can sneak up on me and trigger a memory or remember where I was at a certain time. But those memories are for a future posting.
I would like to bring your attention to a new addition to the links. Mr. Coco Suave himself, Jeff Baines is doing a weekly music blog, complete with a song of the week that you should not miss. I doubt anyone has influenced my musical taste or turned me on to new bands in the past 15 years more than Baines. I can still remember the exact moment he told me to check out Belle & Sebastian. I hadn't even gotten home, listening to "The Boy With the Arab Strap" (on CD), before I had to turn around and return to buy their previous CD "If You're Feeling Sinister". I needed that more than you could possibly imagine. In fact, there must have been strains of "Get me away from here, I'm dying" fading into the night as I drove West five years ago.