Gnumoon's Stuff

Phil & Flickr

Phil & Friends Flickr pics here.

Still working on that show review- I should ask my dad to guest-author it.
I was at the "regular job" until 11:30 tonight, and I have to be back in the office around 6:30 am....yaaaaaawn.  At this point yawning and whining seem to be all I'm good for- time for b-e-d.

Phil & Friends

Last night it was Phil & Friends in Asheville. Recognize the woman? That's Joan Osbourne, who helped write the soundtrack to the early 90's...I bet she gets a sweet royalty check every time they show "Austin Powers" on TV as well.

It was a great time- I have to get around to writing a concert review sometime today...which is of course one of the busiest days ever here at "real" work. Look who else was at the show.

Currently Listening to: The Squirming Coil (Live), by Phish (This version from "A Live One" is one of the greatest concert recordings of a show I've ever heard. The long piano part at the end is worth the price of the 2-CD set.)

Strange

This is the surely the oddest instance of something from my site showing up somewhere else. It was originally from this post about insomnia.

I see you.

Who is that peeking through my ferns?

Today has been one of the worst in recent memory. Where is that damn reset button? I wish it would just get a smidgen worse than it is so that the floodgates would open and I could have a good cathartic cry (This happens about once every 8-12 months). But it just isn't happening.

Currently Listening to: Vanishing, by APC

Be well, do good work, and keep in touch.

This weekend we helped ‘Stal pack up and move out. (This was after we’d helped someone else move in…someone who’d brought their own PIANO. No shit. A full-sized piano.)

Anyway, back to Stal- I’m going to miss her so much. I’ve discovered that after a certain age (specifically the age when people are no longer smashed together in classes for long amounts of time and are forced to meet likeminded folks to avoid going nuts) it becomes harder and harder to form close friendships. Marriage, career, family obligations- all these things make it hard to carve out “hangout” time with buddies, but that doesn’t make those bonds any less important.

Stal and I are very different, but we see the strengths in each other and don’t point out the weaknesses. That’s what friends do/do not do. She has accepted her first bigtime head coaching job, and I am so very proud of her, even though it means that she has to move away. She doesn’t quite “get” the music photography dream, but she has always supported it and has called after every gig to see how everything went, and is always high on the list of who sees my shots first. I don’t know jack about volleyball, and she doesn’t know jack about photography, but we care about each other, and being a part of a true friend’s life means supporting them in something even if you don’t quite “get” it. 

She has her best friends from forever and I have mine. I would never try to take Rachel’s place, and she would never dream of one-upping Otis in the friend department. That crap doesn’t fly outside of middle school and Sweet Valley High books anyway. But we can be GFF without being BFF, so I’m very sad to see her go.

So Stal, best of luck next season, may your spikes reign down terror all over the Big South, may Carbon Leaf always come to visit your quaint little mountain town, may you always think of silly girls’ nights in the hot tub when you see a mimosa, may you always think of the divinity that is the Boone roll when you chopstick your sushi in some other town, and may you always laugh at the memory of me wearing that ridiculous mascot head. I miss you already. Take care, and best of luck.

Currently Listening to: The falling of the rain. Flash-flooding all day and now all night...any bets on if the river will take the road?
Quote OTD:
You and I will meet again
When were least expecting it
One day in some far off place
I will recognize your face-
I won't say good-bye my friend
For you and I will meet again
-You & I WIll Meet Again, by Tom Petty

Argh.

Aw Gawd, I forgot this was today. It is the annual bane of my mountaintop-living existence.
My SUV...is so big...it's so.....tempting...to give a little nudge.

Still just a rat in a cage

I finally figured out how to stop being a dumbass and add a Flickr badge to my site.  Check out the  nougatty goodness over there on the right sidebar.

Work basically is sucking my will to live these days. So many endless meetings, so few actual accomplishments. I guess it's all just part of that "American Dream" Bill Hicks was always bitching about. I'd throw in a rant of my own about a certain douchebag asshat I was stuck meeting with for eternity today, but I just don't have the energy to do so right now. It's a sad day when I'm too tired to get riled up about self-aggrandizing dipshits.

On the upside, new deck construction is almost done, and it looks great!

Currently Listening to: Optimistic, by radiohead
Currently Reading: Handling Sin, by Michael Malone (This book makes me LOL. How's that for an intellectual, in-depth review?)

Shorty McShorterson post

Sorry for the non-post, but lots is going on here, both very good and very stressful. I wanted to link to this new Tom Petty mp3 for you guys- it's very bluesy and catchy. Check it out and let me know what you think. All the reports from my friends at Bonnaroo were that the Heartbreakers were a complete smash hit (but they also all agree that the festival-stealer was My Morning Jacket).

Also, I just ran across this video (does anyone watch videos anymore on TV? If so, where?) on Youtube, which pretty much is the raison d'etre for a nerdlet like me. Anyway, so this has Jack Black and Dave Grohl, so it has to be good. Forgive that it's not super-new- like I said, I don't watch a lot of music videos anymore. Amusingly, one guy I know always refers to the band as "Eagles of the Stone Age."

Ps- Lo, thanks again!
Currently Listening to: Blood Sugar Sex Magik, by RHCP

Paper covers rock.

Forgive this LONGASS post- apparently to get the nifty "post continuation" feature, I'd have to upgrade my Typepad account. Boooo.

Anyway. I just iTunesed the new "Plagiarism" album by Dillinger Escape Plan, and it got me thinking about bands covering and remaking other songs. I love some, I hate some, but I will always listen to a cover, just to see what how a new take on an old song comes across.  Then it occurred to me that cover tunes fall into categories, and this post was born. As usual, it is Rush-heavy.
Feel free to add songs/categories in the comments, or to point out that my lists are ridiculously full of shit.

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Band says: “We love/are influenced by/would sooo fellate this other band - we had to cover them”
Description: Bands covering songs that it makes sense for them to cover.
Examples:
Dream Theater does Rush
Dillinger Escape Plan does “Wish” by NIN
Staind does “Sober,” by Tool
Oasis does "Helter Skelter," by The Beatles
NIN does "Get Down, Make Love," by Queen

Band says: “We want to eff with our fans by playing against type”
Description: The intended result of this type of cover is a “WTF?” reaction by the unsuspecting fanbase. (aka "the ironic cover")
Examples:
Nickel Creek does “Toxic” by Britney Spears and “Spit on a Stranger” by Pavement
Maxwell does “Closer” by NIN
Dillinger Escape Plan does “Like I Love You” by Justin Timberlake
Violet Island does “Afterimage” by Rush
Dolly Parton does “Stairway to Heaven” by Zep
Carbon Leaf does “Crazy Train,” by Ozzy

Band says: “We are contractually obligated to put out a new CD, but have no new material”
Description: Just what it says.
Examples:
The entire trainwreck of A Perfect Circle’s Emotive. Please don’t ever do that to John Lennon again.
Hootie’s Scattered, Smothered and Covered. Please don’t ever do that to Michael Stipe again.
I’m going to include Feedback by Rush in this category, although I think they did it for fun more than for money.  (ps- I HATE the song “Summertime Blues,” and not even my most beloved trio of prog-rocks gods will change that.)

Band says: “Let’s do a cover in concert only, so that it goes down in history as ‘that time we covered that one song!’”
Description: Live covers; fans in attendance hold it over non-attending fans' heads for eternity.
Examples:
“Like a Rolling Stone” and “Kashmir” as covered by Bob Weir, Gillian Welch, and The Waybacks. (haha, I saw this performance and y’all didn’t. neener, neener)
“Ashes to Ashes,” as covered by A Perfect Circle (David Bowie tune…APC redeems themselves a tad in the covers department with this one)
Every cover Phish ever did live, including “Gin and Juice” and “Get Jiggy Wit It”

Band says: “Let’s do a cover that is EXACTLY the same as the original!”
Description: Not so much a cover as a blatant rip-off.
Examples:
“Personal Jesus,” as covered by Marilyn Manson (Original by Depeche Mode)
“Lovesong,” as covered by 311 (Original by The Cure)

Fans say: “Wait, this is a cover? (Insert cover band name) didn’t write it?”
Description: This category covers covers the public believes to be the original songs.
Examples:
“Cum on Feel the Noize,” as covered by Quiet Riot (Original by Slade)
“Smooth Criminal,” as covered by Alien Ant Farm (Original by Michael Jackson)
“Hang on to Your Ego,” as covered by Pixies (Original by The Beach Boys)
“Heroes,” as covered by The Wallflowers (Original by David Bowie)
“Dead Souls,” as covered by NIN (Original by Joy Division)
“Last Kiss,” as covered by Pearl Jam (Original by Wilson Frank and the Cavaliers)

Fans say: “Whoa- is that that one song?”
Description: Covers that really differ from the originals, almost to the point of being completely new songs.
Examples:
“Don’t Fear the Reaper,” as covered by Gus (Original by Blue Oyster Cult)
“Tom Sawyer,” as covered by Mindles Self Indulgence (Original by Rush)
“Dancing Queen,” as covered by Glow (Original by Abba)

“The Boneyard - covered to death"
Description: Songs that have been covered incessantly, so that only a few people in the universe remember the original artist.  In most cases, Leonard Cohen is the original artist (I read somewhere that there are about 1,000 published Cohen covers):
“Everybody Knows,” as covered by Concrete Blonde (YAY!), The Duhks, and Don Henley (BOO!)
“Hallelujah,” as covered by everyone and their musically-inclined dogs. Jeff Buckley, Rufus Wainright, Bono, k.d. Lang, Bob Dylan, ad nauseum…
“Bizarre Love Triangle” (by New Order) as covered by Frente!, Stabbing Westward, and Commercial Breakup.
“Cinnamon Girl” (by Neil Young) as covered by Smashing Pumpkins, Replicants, Type O Neg, and most recently Matthew Sweet
ps - “Yesterday” and “Come Together” are allegedly the most-covered songs ever.

What else is in the teaches of Peaches?

Dark indeed are the days when one can see a picture of Danni Minogue and think, "Wow, Peaches really cleans up well." That may actually be one of the signs of the Apocalypse.
(sing with me..."Huuuuuh?.... Whaaaaat?")
Advice to Danni: Don't wear your hair like that. Unless you want people to think that Peaches is your sister instead of Kylie.
Advice to Peaches: Hell, I certainly don't have any advice for the woman. Do your thing, you beautiful freak.