Links in the chain
Dec. 16th, 2008 01:41 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dolorosa_12Since I'm a bit bored, and want to write, but don't really know what to write about, I thought I'd just share a few funny/interesting links. They're mostly from BoingBoing.
It's nice to see that the shoe tosser guy is already achieving his 15 minutes of internet fame.
Here's an interesting article about the effect of the internet on people's mental health. I suppose I'm a product of what's being discussed there, but I can't help feeling that for all the harm (and the effects on the 'lost generation' or Generation Z or whatever you want to call them) the internet has caused and will cause, it's also an incredibly liberating thing. There are some people out there on the internet (you know who you are) who basically saved my life last year. I suppose here would be an appropriate place to thank you.
In other news, Canberrans are crazy, but then, what's new?
I saw Keating! The Musical a couple of years ago, but I was watching clips with K. the other day and it reminded me how brilliant it was. This song (below) is pretty much the most astute piece of political commentary on the Howard years. I remember talking about this with one of my friends, and he said that watching Keating! was too much. It was too close, too true, and rather than laughing, he just got really angry at the iniquities of the Howard years. When I look at this song, I can see his point.
I'm still enjoying the same music as always. I'm adoring the lyrics of Paul Kelly's songs To Her Door and Look So Fine, Feel So Low.
To Her Door (all the sites seem to miss the best line, which is 'His heart was singing like a lovelorn guitar')
They got married early, never had no money
Then when he got laid off they really hit the skids
He started up his drinking, then they started fighting
He took it pretty badly, she took both the kids
She said: "I'm not standing by, to watch you slowly die
So watch me walking, out the door, out the door, out the door"
She said, "Shove it, Jack, I'm walking out the fucking door"
She went to her brother's, got a little bar work
He went to the Buttery, stayed about a year
Then he wrote a letter, said I want to see you
She thought he sounded better, she sent him up the fare
He was riding through the cane in the pouring rain
On Olympic to her door
To her door
To her door
He came in on a Sunday, every muscle aching
Walking in slow motion like he'd just been hit
Did they have a future?
Would he know his children?
Could he make a picture and get them all to fit?
He was shaking in his seat riding through the streets
In a silvertop to her....
Shaking in his seat riding through the streets
In a silvertop to her door
To her door
To her door
To her door
Look So Fine, Feel So Low
I've been seen on the street
Wearing brand new clothes
I guess I've landed on my feet
I'm a lucky guy I suppose
She tells me that she loves me
She buys me things
She wants to take care of me
And all I gotta do is sing sing sing sing
Well I look so fine but I feel so low
She takes me by the arm
She takes me all around
She knows all her friends are talking
Saying look what our good girl's found
One thing she's got on you
she's so easy to impress
When she asks me dumb questions
All I gotta do is say yes yes yes yes
Yeah I look so fine but I feel so low
As usual, I'm obsessing over Calexico's lyrics. At the moment it's Cruel. A beautiful, bitter, angry song about the Bush years.
Cruel, cruel grounds
Leak truths never found
Torturous ways
Whisper from the grave
A slow spun song of distortion
Bitter, bitter mouth
Spitin' out seeds of doubt
Rituals seek root
Razed before they're told
Stories break like branches in the cold
Seasons trial finds man's mistakes fair game
Careless hand
Lay and law of the land
Falls by the side
Silenced sentient cries
All within the lines of divine right
Better bury the tracks in an unclosed case
Weeds of discontent choke a broken ghost landscape
Cruel, heartless reign
Chasing short term gains
Right down to the warning signs
Birds refuse to fly
No longer trust the sky
Drifting out beyond the signals
Even the horizon is gone
Weather flees underground
Future's left to wallow in fortune's waste
Sometimes I wonder why no-one else seems to obsess over song lyrics the way I do. Every time I've asked people, they always say that they listen to songs for the sound, not the words. I've never been able to do that. (My exception that proves the rule is my obsession with electronica and '90s Europop.) I love songs with clever lyrics. I love the intricate metaphors of Calexico, the beautiful stories of Paul Kelly, The Pogues, Steeleye Span and Elvis Costello, the mazed-out hallucinations of Massive Attack, the cheery cynicism of Regurgitator and MGMT, the quotable quirkiness of Darren Hanlon and Van She, the dark beauty of Strawpeople, the poetry of Gram Parsons and Emmylou Harris and Lucinda Williams and Paul Simon. It's why I've never been able to listen to rap written any later than about 1999. It took an atrocious turn around that time, emphasising aspects with which I was unable to identify.
I'm probably doing with the song lyrics what I seem to do with everything in my life: reaching out to some external Elsewhere to give meaning to Here, searching for a Republic of Heaven in the words and actions of others because it's always been too hard to build one for myself.
It's nice to see that the shoe tosser guy is already achieving his 15 minutes of internet fame.
Here's an interesting article about the effect of the internet on people's mental health. I suppose I'm a product of what's being discussed there, but I can't help feeling that for all the harm (and the effects on the 'lost generation' or Generation Z or whatever you want to call them) the internet has caused and will cause, it's also an incredibly liberating thing. There are some people out there on the internet (you know who you are) who basically saved my life last year. I suppose here would be an appropriate place to thank you.
In other news, Canberrans are crazy, but then, what's new?
I saw Keating! The Musical a couple of years ago, but I was watching clips with K. the other day and it reminded me how brilliant it was. This song (below) is pretty much the most astute piece of political commentary on the Howard years. I remember talking about this with one of my friends, and he said that watching Keating! was too much. It was too close, too true, and rather than laughing, he just got really angry at the iniquities of the Howard years. When I look at this song, I can see his point.
I'm still enjoying the same music as always. I'm adoring the lyrics of Paul Kelly's songs To Her Door and Look So Fine, Feel So Low.
To Her Door (all the sites seem to miss the best line, which is 'His heart was singing like a lovelorn guitar')
They got married early, never had no money
Then when he got laid off they really hit the skids
He started up his drinking, then they started fighting
He took it pretty badly, she took both the kids
She said: "I'm not standing by, to watch you slowly die
So watch me walking, out the door, out the door, out the door"
She said, "Shove it, Jack, I'm walking out the fucking door"
She went to her brother's, got a little bar work
He went to the Buttery, stayed about a year
Then he wrote a letter, said I want to see you
She thought he sounded better, she sent him up the fare
He was riding through the cane in the pouring rain
On Olympic to her door
To her door
To her door
He came in on a Sunday, every muscle aching
Walking in slow motion like he'd just been hit
Did they have a future?
Would he know his children?
Could he make a picture and get them all to fit?
He was shaking in his seat riding through the streets
In a silvertop to her....
Shaking in his seat riding through the streets
In a silvertop to her door
To her door
To her door
To her door
Look So Fine, Feel So Low
I've been seen on the street
Wearing brand new clothes
I guess I've landed on my feet
I'm a lucky guy I suppose
She tells me that she loves me
She buys me things
She wants to take care of me
And all I gotta do is sing sing sing sing
Well I look so fine but I feel so low
She takes me by the arm
She takes me all around
She knows all her friends are talking
Saying look what our good girl's found
One thing she's got on you
she's so easy to impress
When she asks me dumb questions
All I gotta do is say yes yes yes yes
Yeah I look so fine but I feel so low
As usual, I'm obsessing over Calexico's lyrics. At the moment it's Cruel. A beautiful, bitter, angry song about the Bush years.
Cruel, cruel grounds
Leak truths never found
Torturous ways
Whisper from the grave
A slow spun song of distortion
Bitter, bitter mouth
Spitin' out seeds of doubt
Rituals seek root
Razed before they're told
Stories break like branches in the cold
Seasons trial finds man's mistakes fair game
Careless hand
Lay and law of the land
Falls by the side
Silenced sentient cries
All within the lines of divine right
Better bury the tracks in an unclosed case
Weeds of discontent choke a broken ghost landscape
Cruel, heartless reign
Chasing short term gains
Right down to the warning signs
Birds refuse to fly
No longer trust the sky
Drifting out beyond the signals
Even the horizon is gone
Weather flees underground
Future's left to wallow in fortune's waste
Sometimes I wonder why no-one else seems to obsess over song lyrics the way I do. Every time I've asked people, they always say that they listen to songs for the sound, not the words. I've never been able to do that. (My exception that proves the rule is my obsession with electronica and '90s Europop.) I love songs with clever lyrics. I love the intricate metaphors of Calexico, the beautiful stories of Paul Kelly, The Pogues, Steeleye Span and Elvis Costello, the mazed-out hallucinations of Massive Attack, the cheery cynicism of Regurgitator and MGMT, the quotable quirkiness of Darren Hanlon and Van She, the dark beauty of Strawpeople, the poetry of Gram Parsons and Emmylou Harris and Lucinda Williams and Paul Simon. It's why I've never been able to listen to rap written any later than about 1999. It took an atrocious turn around that time, emphasising aspects with which I was unable to identify.
I'm probably doing with the song lyrics what I seem to do with everything in my life: reaching out to some external Elsewhere to give meaning to Here, searching for a Republic of Heaven in the words and actions of others because it's always been too hard to build one for myself.
