I have bought an underwhelming Christmas album on iTunes. I like Christmas music. For being a godless heathen, I enjoy listening to it year ’round. I have many different Christmas albums. Medieval and Renaissance-styled. Vince Guaraldi and other jazz standards. Celtic. Even some Beatle-esque Christmas albums, which I wrote about here a few years ago.Continue reading “On Oddball Christmas Albums”
Tag Archives: Music
On the Oasis Break-Up
It’s been a week since Noel Gallagher announced he was leaving Oasis. A week. And I’m not just depressed about it. I’m downright gutted. Oasis has personal meaning for me. They did. “Don’t Look Back in Anger” was part of a time and a place. “D’You Know What I Mean?” was part of a timeContinue reading “On the Oasis Break-Up”
On the Things I’ve Been Reading
So, here’s the situation. I’ve hit a minor lull in my day, so I’m reading comics. Specifically, I’m reading Phonogram: The Singles Club #4. As long-time readers know, I’ve raved about Phonogram before; it’s a cool comic about the power of music and magic. The Singles Club, the second series, takes place on a singleContinue reading “On the Things I’ve Been Reading”
On This Week’s Musical Discovery
I’ve learned over the years that writing is occasionally less a planned activity than it is a series of serendipitous accidents. Consider the BBC’s Scotland Introducing podcast. I can’t tell you why, over a year ago, I started listening to this podcast. But I do. Every Friday, I download the new episode and give itContinue reading “On This Week’s Musical Discovery”
On the New Jaydiohead EP
Last month, when my friends Natalie and Beau got married, I made a couple of music requests at the wedding reception. The deejay, unfortunately, couldn’t fill any of them. The first? Elbow’s “Mirrorball.” It’s one of my favorite songs of theirs, as it tells the romantic story of two souls finding one another. (I thinkContinue reading “On the New Jaydiohead EP”
On Today’s Musical Discovery
This morning I downloaded the latest episode of Vic Galloway’s Scotland Introducing podcast. It’s one of the things I look forward every Friday, to see what unsigned Scottish bands Vic is going to profile this particular week. I wasn’t that taken with this week’s episode. There were some live session tracks, and they were justContinue reading “On Today’s Musical Discovery”
On the Ivor Novello Awards
Winners for the Ivor Novello Awards, which celebrate songwriting, have been announced. Though Elbow was nominated for Best Song Musically and Lyrically for “One Day Like This,” I really was pulling for The Leisure Society’s “Last of the Melting Snow.” They’re an unsigned band, and the song is just brilliant. I love that song It’sContinue reading “On the Ivor Novello Awards”
On Joining Last.fm
A scouring of the Opera website, looking for new and cool widgets to trick out the Opera 10 Alpha this afternoon, led me to a realization — there are all sorts of social networking music sites out there, and I’ve never, ever looked at them. So, I went and signed up with last.fm. Here’s myContinue reading “On Joining Last.fm”
On Random Songs On The Mind
On the train this morning, apropos of nothing, a song affixed itself in my head. Magic and mystery Are part of their history, Along with the secret Of gummi berry juice. The magic is growing, They take pride in knowing They fight for what’s right In whatever they do! Gummi Bears! Bouncing here and thereContinue reading “On Random Songs On The Mind”
On the Ultimate Time Waster
I learned to do something amazing and remarkable last weekend. I figured out how to use Audacity to create OOPS music tracks. OOPS? you say. What’s that? you ask. OOPS stands for “Out of Phase Stereo.” It’s a way of flipping one channel of a stereo music track, to create a new, third stereo musicContinue reading “On the Ultimate Time Waster”