this comes from john updike's short piece 'metro gate,' from january 1959.
pretty lame, i know. if its any credit to me, it took a lot of work and fiddling to turn out such a lame product. the photo, i think, has the look of those shots in forty and fifty year old national geographics found in every thrift store youve ever perused. the original photo is from a pretty neat red cross psa/campaign about chernobyl, which is the setting.
thats enough for me tonight, ive psyched myself up enough to brush my teeth. ace troubleshooter helped. thanks ace!
thanks to an evening at the local starbucks and steven runciman's 'byzantine civilization,' i have a new entry, one which isn't even in my new 2500 page unabridged dictionary, or even on the internet. that's right-google came up empty. that rare. or, quite possibly, that made up. regardless, here she goes:
i took the liberty of adding to the definition. it has to keep in proportion to the size of the word. [or somesuch excuse]
i dearly love john manuel garcia, firstly for his homemade salsa, and secondly for letting me borrow b.b. king's 'this is why i sing the blues' on cassette. i'm nothing less than astounded, and i am one hundred percent certain that 'so excited' was heard while the crusaders sacked constantinople in 1204. read about it and play that song, i dare you. but the song to extol is, without a doubt, 'chains and things.' mmmmmmm.....
i have two versions of the latest headword. the first is based upon the sentry edition of archibald macleish's 'j.b.' the mid-sixties printing features a mesmerizing cover design by walter lorraine, which is made all the more pleasing by the rough texture of that era's sentry editions. the second version was also inspired by lorraine's design, which features a photograph of two men with a slew of balloons and was made for the original broadway performance of 'j.b.' anyway, credit where credit is due. so, i guess, props to the random turkish guy holding the balloons in this one.
the headword comes from garrett mattingly's 'the armada,' a history of the defeat of the spanish armada and the several years of events which led to that occurrence. my copy of 'the armada' is also a sentry edition, though without such a striking cover design. enough of the [surely] boring babbling. the headword, in both glories:
in retrospect, i find the first to be really shitty; it simply can't hold a candle to its inspiration. oh well. the second:
'the chills' by peter bjorn and john & 'the con' by tegan and sara
ps, in a related note, i really want to finish reading 'istanbul: memories and the city' by orhan pamuk. started it a barnes and noble one night, in the starbucks cafe. read for several hours, and then bought a different book...go figure.... i should really just read the books i have...
here is the latest headword in the SED, which comes from daniel dennett's 'breaking the spell.'
its form, as encountered, was the last definition [which leads to another word i suppose]. but that will have to wait until tomorrow, as it is late, ive work early in the morn, and i havent read anything since my lunchbreak. and how can i encounter new words without reading?
im listening to 'way out' by the yeah yeah yeahs, and the new tegan and sara album. mmmmm
heres my fairly lackluster idea: as i read, the words which i must look up in a dictionary will go into a list. this list will provide my fodder, simultaneously giving me the opportunity to both adorn the definition and further familiarize myself with it. the first definition comes from flannery o'connor's 'wise blood.'
stay tuned to further enrich your vocabulary with the mundane, arcane, archaic, and sesquipedalian.
im bored, and feel like piddling on paintshop, so i am. heres take one. i have no subject for my doodlings. if the collective exists, fine for it/them. i just felt like putting some text to it and that popped in my mind. someone, ahhhemmm, should provide me with a subject upon which i might semiartfully ralph.
let me first take a moment to apologize to all my readers out there for my prolonged absence from the blogosphere, as i know these multitudes were very nearly lost without me. and oh yeah, i feel like a total tool when i use a word like 'blogosphere.' knowing full well that you, perkibird, are probably the only living soul with an interest in these words, i will spare the life update which i so mysteriously feel obligated to post. you know that ive worked and played and had some fun in the garden state. but...
did you know that ive decided that when i finally get around to writing the great american novel [when im in my thirties and unemployed, most likely], it will be in the second person? ill bet you didnt. theres just something all-together appetizing about writing in the second person. im a sucker for anything so written.
did you also know that i quite recently had my watch repaired? shane and i broke it while wrestling sometime in march or april, and it had been out of commission ever since. my dad has proven to be quite the handyman in the throes of his midlife crisis, so i was able to earn a watchband tan in the few short days i vacationed.
or how about this tidbit--i listened to jimi hendrix's 'castles made of sand' on my new old [newly broken] phonograph just before leaving jersey, and consequently had the urge to buy a bandanna at a gas station somewhere in rural virginia, which i am currently wearing.
did you know im jealous of your big ol' brain? you know so many things around which i dont think i could ever wrap my noggin. and yes i just made a conscious effort to avoid leaving a preposition at the end of that sentence. that sort of thing requires such effort from me. philosophy is a bunch of gobbledy goop to me, so if ever you and i have the time, you should impart some of the wisdom of the ages to me.
also, if ever you and i have the time, we should grab a nice dinner in a nice place and pretend to be grown ups. the art of pretending to pretend might just make us feel young again...until we point out all the grey hairs to each other.
who decides whether grey or gray is more acceptable? i prefer grey, thinking it the more distinguished of the two, yet spell checker has underlined it. my big paper dictionary claims both are kosher, though the definition appears under gray only. i think the tastemaker in the sky got this one wrong. and while im at it, theres another thing weve gotten wrong along the way: whilst. why no one uses it, ill never be able to fathom. so classy. speaks of autumn leaves and repp ties to me.
and by now you shouldve forgotten that you dont understand the title of this post. well let me remind you--youre completely at a loss. i found an old postcard showing the interior of a restaurant in philly saturated in, you guessed it, mahogany tones. i hear postsecret calling...
and i will post no music today, mainly because im working on a mixtape anyhow, but also because im lazy. i will post a video, however.
sups to bigstereo for the video
YOU KNOW THE DRILL!
MANGO OUT!
sorry couldnt help myself. this guy i met in jersey, he runs a celebrity blog, mango out, and hes basically the most ridiculous human being ive ever met. he knows more about lindsay lohan than her own mother does.
i lifted this pic from the wurst gallery's wurstminster dog show, and it shows jason vivona's take on the maltese. or whatever. i was bored and saw it and thought 'oh boy what a pair of trippy motherlovin dogs.'
i think that goodweatherforairstrikes might be onto something with their promotion of HADOUKEN! from everything ive heard so far, theyre fun folk, so ill drop the same video that can be found at gwfas. this is HADOUKEN!'s first single, 'that boy that girl':
the first track here is admittedly old. with cuts from the kitsune maison comp 4 darting back and forth across the music blogs, it probably seems odd to drop something from kitsune maison 3. the thing to remember that as much as this blog is for me to share new music, its also to document my current musical flavors, whatever they may be. that said, heres the sweet METRONOMY remix of that pure sex kitten trio DEAD DISCO's 'the treatment.' that low-end guitar strumming + lush vocals = hott. so i dont care if its old. id never heard it until today, which is my fault assuredly, but im busting it out.
and because theyre gorgeous, ill provide them as eyecandy.
enough sex now. well not quite. i have to post more FEIST. im awful, i know. behind the times, totally. so without further ado, something i found this evening, you probably found a year ago:
i was listening to the above track and thinking 'what makes this a POSTAL SERVICE remix? why isnt it just a DNTEL remix?' when lo and behold i hear ben gibbard's tenderness. so i guess im just impatient. i like the play between his and leslie feist's voices, very right on. lately ive been just digging her though. i apologize and assure you that i will get over her soon, promise.
so as usual, these tracks are promotional and temporary. if the artists or labels would like them removed ahead of schedule, ask and ye shall receive. go buy this shit!
this was lifted from the iran graffiti and urban art report. just thought it was hot, and would make an interesting header for the post.
so my internet was broken all weekend, forcing me to a coffeeshop. its now fixed, but im utterly exhausted. today was my first day off crutches and was spent at the hardware store busting ass. the point is that i have limited fare for today.
im dropping three tracks tonight. the first is hot off the presses from the hood internet, who unveiled their mixtape volume one today! lots of fun ideas bouncing around in their heads, which are artfully played out in the tape. my fave was a mashup of KHIA's 'snatch the cat back,' a ridiculously dirty song that couldnt possibly suck any harder than it already does [making it ideal for a mashup], with DAN DEACON's 'the crystal cat,' a thick and rad one with vocals actually approaching feline levels. i mainly like the mashup for the inclusion of 'the crystal cat' thickness. you should decide for yourself what the best track is, by heading over to the hood internet and checking out the mixtape. also worked in are BROKEN SOCIAL SCENE, LCD SOUNDSYSTEM, BATTLES, M83, MODEST MOUSE, CYNDI LAUPER, HOT CHIP, CRYSTAL CASTLES, JUSTICE, FEIST, CSS, !!!, THE SHINS, THE KNIFE, ARCHITECTURE IN HELSINKI, etc. but enough wankering, and on with the track:
next up: my current goddess, FEIST. i am in love with this fair canadian belle. please marry me? anyway, there is a BOYS NOIZE remix of 'my man my moon' floating around and making the rounds. i can dig it, most definitely, and you know im not just giving love to the feistmeister, because i called shenanigans on the chromeo remix of 'sea lion woman.' its slow in the becoming, but it works once it hits the sweet spot, that spot being the voice of leslie [0:57 mark]. dont worry if a minute seems appallingly long to wait for gold, because the track clocks in at 6:41, so theres plenty on which to groove. [and yes i just edited that sentence to avoid a preposition at the end, with a certain friend friend in mind. if the rest of the post is sinfully ungrammatical, forgive me, im tired.] one thing i do miss about the track is the prominence given to that driving low-end piano from the original, which comes in here and there on the remix, replaced by synths and co. the overall effect is good, and i think it works. works for me, hope it works for you:
the last track is a remix between friends. jona bechtolt [YACHT] tried his hand at khaela maricich's [THE BLOW] 'hock it,' producing a sexy hypnotic sexy piece of dancing baby. the two one man bands prove the old saying, two heads are better than one. ok corny, i admit. going to bed so whatever.
where to find this and more? on ruckus, for those who can taste its drm-laced .wma fruits. YACHT, THE BLOW, FEIST, & DAN DEACON can all be found on ruckus.
so ive been keeping a blog for a few weeks on my virb, and today i decided to start a blog here on blogger, supposing that would make a little more professional, if such a term can be applied to such a diy process. anyway, this is it, and moreforeplay is the name. i worked all day, then got home to discover that my cable modem needs replacing, which cant happen until monday. so ive been at a coffee shop the last few hours, figuring out how i want this thing and designing the header and favicon, which i someday hope to use for this page. if anyone knows how i can do that, please drop me a line. so the point here is that i really havent rooted around much today for musical gems. i found some items which seemed promising at first glance, but which were rather disappointing given my high hopes. for what theyre worth, ill share them, with a promise that tomorrow will be better, as i have the day off.
this first track nearly made me jump out of my seat with joy when i saw it. i actually clapped. remember, im in a public place today. so what is it, you ask? only my favorite FEIST song, sea lion woman, remixed. i thought 'perfect!' but eh, so so. i mean its fun, it just wasnt the all out romp i had immediately imagined upon discovery.
heres another track which seemed huge on potential, but was unable to meet my lofty expectations. i think its a live cut from the quality, which could give it more life in a studio version. i hear NELLY FURTADO's 'say it right' like three times a day everyday at work, and it has become a guilty pleasure to some measure. damn ruckus doesnt have the track, so ive had to make do with the radio at work to fill my needs. so when i saw the track covered by BLOC PARTY of all people, i shat my britches on the spot. something hott made hotter was the thought, but you decide, as i have:
and finally, a track about which i know next to nothing. im unfamiliar with the artist, niyi, and too lazy/pressed for time to learn more. but i like it. so take it. and did i mention that this ones good? [how can it not be? look at the bloke]
so thats it for now. this shop closes in twenty minutes. no internet all night. pray for me. hope the downloads work all right, and theyll be gone in a week, so enjoy now, and buy the artists' shit!
