From the archives of incomplete posts Pt. 2

Most Propagandhi albums end with something that brings a tear to my eye.  Whether it's Less Talk, More Rock's "Refusing to be a Man" or Today's Empires, Tomorrow's Ashes's "Purina Hall of Fame," they're songs that just hit me in the gut.  Propagandhi's latest album ends with the song "Adventures in Zoochosis."  Similar to "Purina," which started with the sounds of someone literally beating the life out of a pig, "Zoochosis" starts with the sounds of children, overlayed with some of Donald Trump's most despicable phrases. 

"Zoochosis," mind you, is the term for the repetitive and self-damaging behavior of captive animals.  Relating this to the modern political climate, you get a song of immense defeat, with a trickle of hope at the end. 

[Edit: Another unfinished idea.  The lyrics here are incredible, and I wanted to go through them in more detail, but never got around to it.  Having spent the last decade thinking about poverty and politics, I thought it'd be fun to play with the more abstract thoughts.  But in reality the actual impetus was that I was supposed to be working on my dissertation and was using this as a distraction.]

I hold out for consensus

Give the masses the benefit of the doubt

Insist the democratic process will bear this population out

I think my only fear of death is that it may not be the end

That we may be eternal beings and must do all of this again

Oh, please lord, let no such thing be true

Though I suspect if I slink back to my enclosure

Safe and warm and adequately lit

Sufficiently plumbed and ventilated

Well, let's just say I would not shake a stick

And if pressed, I'll admit

I'm ecstatic about the enrichment programs

Implemented to extend our captive lifespans

I'm excited to see what our keepers have planned

Perhaps a bigger cage? Longer chains?

Some compelling, novel reasons to remain?

"Dad, are we gonna die?"

Yes son, both you and I

But maybe not today

Boys, I've bowed to the keeper's whip for so damn long

I think the sad truth is this enclosure

is where your old man belongs

But you, your hearts are pure

When the operant conditioners come to break you in

I'll sink my squandered teeth

You grab your little brother's hand, run like the wind

And if I'm not there, don't look back

Just go

I don't give a fuck about the enrichment programs

Implemented to extend our captive lifespans

Motherfucker gonna get a load of what I got planned

From the archives of incomplete posts

Oh, Malkie. He's been a co-chair to my mental health for many, many years now.  In times of sadness, he lifts me up through commiseration, and in times of happiness he gives me perspective.  

His music has been the hardest for me to describe.  Simply, his albums tend to be guitar-focused pop and acoustic folk with some electronic elements, what you might expect to come out of the greater UK area.  They're catchy songs and Malcolm's Scottish accent comes across as invariant, but central to each song.  His lyrics are dark, often self-deprecating, with occasional funny non-sequiturs.

That's a drastic simplification.  Indeed, there's a brilliant musicianship to all his albums - this is a masterful songwriter, where the songs are catchy, but complex, a blending of styles into unique non-composite forms.  The last two albums Malcolm's put out have been explicitly electronic, a kind of in-depth exploration of form that he mostly danced around for the past two decades with his previous solo and Arab Strap albums.  If anything, these albums seemed to be an expression of boredom and a desire to reclaim what he loved about making music.  I get the impression that if he's not pushing the limits of his music, he's not enjoying it.  Even though he may enjoy having fans, I don't get the impression he's doing this for us.  

Oddly, I find that when I try to describe Malcolm's music that I tend to think more about Malcolm the person, instead of, say, 'Bananas' the album.  There's more in each album than the style or musicianship.  There's a brutal honesty to his expression.  An honest-to-god low-level depression.  The kind that would keep a man from getting too cocky, yet let him remain kind of an asshole.

We might say Malcolm writes pop songs about sadness, but, like a true Scotsman, the sadness comes from within.  There are no grains of salt to the lyrics, but an appreciable self-deprecating wit that helps to keep an even keel.  From the man who brought you "Fuck It, I Love You" comes "Love is a Momentary Lapse in Self-Loathing," with lyrics like, "Fuck off with your happiness" set to an upkey stomping piano.

........

[Edit: I found this unpublished post from 2+ years ago.  I think I never posted it because I never finished it.  The main point was to try to describe this artist that I've been struggling to describe for like a decade.  Hilarious that I didn't finish it.  But I like my writing here, and don't think tacking on some half-assed ending in my current state of mind would do it any justice, so here ya go, here's half an idea.]

[Second edit: I don't know why this starts with Track 10, which is a B-Side, but the player contains the whole album, and I highly suggest starting with Track 1.]

Wanting to see for myself again

I'm supposed to be prepping for an interview, so I thought I'd share this song I absolutely love.

I have a lot of words about Hum, as I've been a fan for 25 years and this is their first album in 20, but I'll have to save that due to the aforementioned lame reason.  Generally, though, this was my favorite release of the last year.  It took me entirely by surprise, having found out about it about a month after its release.

This is a complex album with some really amazing moments, but this song is the first one that really grabbed me.  I'm kind of beyond the point of telling if an album is "good" or not, but for Hum that's kind of irrelevant to me anyway.  This song hit me like I'd unearthed a favorite song of mine from childhood.  It's just so immediately familiar and personal.  It literally feels like it was lifted from Hum in 1995.  

Amazing.

I'm obsessed with this whole thing.

Max Richter - "Richter: On the Nature of Daylight"

Snowblind

...or next May. Whatever. Just sharing music into the void at this point. Clearly don't have much to say lately. Hope y'all passersby are hanging in there.

Or even thriving! Nothing like extended isolation to breathe new life into the introverts and socially awkward among us.  I'm not great at the social stuff and I often work at home anyway, so I'm doing just fine.  Doing some extra gardening, though.  Gonna paint a bench later.  I guess middle age is nigh.

Speaking of the passage of time, here are some songs by a band I really got into this year because they sound like the music I enjoyed at 22 or 23.  That's what this blog is, right?  A few words about mortality and some songs that make me remember when I was young?  Wonder what that means.  No, I don't care what it means, I care if it matters.  It probably doesn't.

Hmm.  Sounds like middle age is going to be existentialist for your friend here.  Time to go stare at a chestnut tree, I guess.

 

 Other songs after the jump.

Gut Feeling (demo)

Here's a demo of a song I like.



I rule at blogging.

Midnight in the garden

Sometimes the evil wins.  Been thinking that a lot lately.  Sometimes the evil wins for a long time.  Sometimes the evil wins the battles.  Sometimes the evil wins for so long that we can't even know a life without evil.  What we call "evil" can be a lot of things.  It can be violence.  Hate.  Depression.  Addiction.  Not holding a door open for someone else.  Trolling on the internet.  Stubbing your toe?

I'm not sure I believe in any sort of otherworldly, non-corporeal Evil that underlies all these different evils.  I'm not sure I believe in an a priori dichotomy of evil and good.  I can't quite get behind the concept of karma.  I do believe to some degree that we get from the world what we put into it, but some get more and some get less, so it's an unjust karma, if at all, and that doesn't seem trustworthy as Spiritual Principle.

Regardless, my orientation to the world, to knowledge, and my ability to obtain knowledge, is one that is inherently value-laden, and that value says that good exists in all and that good can, and does, ultimately overcome evil.

Like evil, I'm not sure I can bracket it, but I do know that good is lots of things.  Good can be given.  Good can be received.  It can be planned.  It can be random.  Good is warmth.  Love.  Happiness.  Freedom.  A kind deed.  A random statement of support from a stranger.  Good is also walking in the park.  Patting a kind dog.  Creating.  Laughing.  Adventure.  New friends.  A long chat.  A cool, humid night at the beach.  Reconnecting.  Feeling accomplished.  A rightful deed.  Acknowledgement.  Prayers.  Hugs.  Beliefs.  Strengths.  Common and uncommon goods.  A baby, or a pet, napping on you.  A flower.  A creek for exploring.  A champion.  A kid who tries hard.  A kid who's lucky.  A memory.  A warm day.  A story.  Truth and justice.

There are a lot of little goods in the day to day.  There are some that take longer.  There are some we may never know.  But it's hard to keep a good unknown.  Good always overwhelms an evil in the long-run.  Think of all the evil we've righted in the decades we've been alive.  Even the struggle itself is a kind of good.  Sometimes, knowing the struggle is good is all that we need to keep going.

It's been a long few days.  I thought about this album and how, without words, it tells me about the magic of exploring in the forest.  I don't have any nearby childhood forests at the moment, but I feel this is a Good to share with the world and that's a pretty similar feeling.