Let's Dance To Joy Division

I should be writing a paper but instead I thought that I would talk at ether. How is everyone? Did you have a nice Thanksgiving? I did. There was a chance of Hippy-inflected tofurkey but I dodged the bullet and made it through Thursday full and soy-free. I got to sit next to my aunt's nephew (which would be me but its the other side of the family). He's a philosophy doctoral student at City College in New York. I was enthralled/babbling to him most of the night. He was nice to me, when I misspoke about analytic philosophy he didn't correct me. I thought that was decent of him.

Anyway, Friday I went down to Salisbury to visit the Grandparents an the horde of people I'm technically related to. It was surprisingly painless. I actually had a good time. My cousins are all in their teens now, mostly in high school. I'm able to carry on conversations with them. Like I had an hour conversation with on about the merits of California weed versus East Coast. With another I got to talk Second wave Ska, which wierded me out. He even had the Two-Tone comp, which I thought would impress him. More proof that I was inherently lame in high school. I thought people got cool once the went off the college. Eh... Then I had a thirty minute lecture from the eldest cousin, now going to school in New York, about absurdist theater and the benefit one can derive from reading Becket while tripping. They are all a lot more interesting than I am.

There was also Guitar Hero III. More on that in a moment. We wet to see the Mist at about 10:30, which I thought was a little late, and only served as more proof that I'm a geezer. The movie was good. I thought Thank-You-For-Smoking-guy and Mystic-River-lady did great jobs. The ending was a little predictable and the monsters all looked like 3D Jim Henson puppets from The Dark Crystal but all in all I would recommend it to Stephen King fans. We left a day early and got back in the early evening on Saturday. I got to hang with Nando for a bit that night and watch his favorite show-- Dexter, a Showtime (I think) series on a serial killer. Its honestly one of the more interesting shows on T.V. I've seen this season (even if I am watching last season's episodes). The protagonist is a serial killer, and you manage to empathize with him. Its sort of a bizarre felling to root for the homicidal maniac but it works. Another "Greg-recommended" production.

I bought Guitar Hero 3 a little while back. I have been playing less routinely that when I purchased the others, mainly because of papers and whatnot at school, but it is a great game. I have a few complaints about the changes in look but on the whole its a solid release from the Guitar Hero franchise. The characters you can choose from are a bit of a let down. My favorite, Pandora, a white belt-wearing, leather jumpsuit clad, hardcore indie chick was dropped from the game. And Johnny Napalm, the punk guitarist, now looks like a Casualties casualty. Not that he didn't before but it’s accentuated by the lack of shirt and Mohawk-to-body ratio that exceeds the bonding properties of even the toughest mouse. Aside from a few graphic missteps the songs are top notch. Getting to play "Bulls On Parade" by Rage Against The Machine, "My Name Is Jonas" by Weezer, "Anarchy In The U.K." as re-recorded by the remaining Sex Pistols (since the master tape has been lost) are only a few of the highlights. I could go on and on but I'll shift gears a little now.

Not a lot mind you... I need to get an XBox 360, or barring that a PS3. I don't really want either of these systems, they aren't bad but I have lots of friends who have the XBox and from everything I've heard the PS3 is not a great console, but I still need to buy one. "Why," you ask? Because of a little game called Rock Band. The makers of the original Guitar Hero teamed up with MTV to create a full band experience, with drums, bass and guitar and karaoke vocals. It comes out for PS2, don't get me wrong, but it doesn't get released for my console of choice until December 11th or something. I can wait. Don't think I'm that childish. My main reason for wanting the XBox 360 version is the downloadable content. You can actually download full albums to play in the game. The two that kick off the Rock Band release are Nevermind by Nirvana and The Who's Next by the Who. I love Nirvana but being able to play every track of The Who's Next would be... well, to put it plainly, kick ass.

Since my last post I've had a one year anniversary. Elizabeth and I are great, for those who dot know. I think she, Shah and Nando are the only ones who read this, its really only you Shah, since she knows and Nando gets told most everything important. While assembling her anniversary mix-tape (mix-CD, whatever, tape sounds better) I happened upon a couple of new bands worth checking out. Cut Off Your Hands, The Wombats and The Moths! top my list of new favorites. The Wombats, in particular, are in heavy rotation. I'll cut this short, since I really do have to get this paper done but I want to leave you with what might be the greatest summation of what I fell like every time I think my life is going horribly awry. Or at least once someone stops me from hyperventilating and cracks a joke about how silly I'm being. At that point this is the song that should be playing in the movie version of my life:

I'm back in Liverpool
and everything seems the same
but I worked something out last night
that changed this little boy's brain
a small piece of advice that took 22 years in the make
and i will break it for you now
please learn from my mistakes
please learn from my mistakes

let's dance to joy division
and celebrate the irony
everything is going wrong
but we're so happy

let's dance to joy division
and raise our glass to the ceiling
'cos this could all go so wrong
but we're just so happy
yeah, we're so happy

so if you're ever feeling down
grab your purse and take a taxi
to the darkest side of town
that's where we'll be
and we will wait for you
and lead you through the dancefloor
up to the dj booth
you know what to ask for
you know what to ask for

go ask for joy division
and celebrate the irony
everything is going wrong
but we're so happy

go ask for joy divison
and raise your glass to the ceiling
cos this could all go so wrong
but we're so happy
so happy

so let the love tear us apart
I found the cure for a broken heart
let it tear us apart

let it tear us apart

let's dance to joy division
and raise our glass to the ceiling
cos this could all go so wrong
but we're so happy
yeah, we're so happy

so happy, yeah, we're so happy
so happy, yeah, we're so happy
- "Let's Dance To Joy Division"
by The Wombats

Big Casino

If I were an ancient Roman I would be siked right now. While walking to class this morning I passed by a hawk feeding of a pigeon. It was right there on the grass, maybe four feet from the path. The Roman loved their omens and I don’t think they would have passed up the chance to read way too much into this. They would either be siked or terrified about the coming week. I’m not superstitious but I really hope I’m the hawk.

Midterms went well. I mean, I’ve only gotten one back but it was good. I’m judging the rest on this standard. Well see how that pans out. In other life affirming news I found my glasses. Back to being a hipster douche bag. Hooray!

My weekend was nice. Elizabeth was in Miami so I had it to myself for the most part. Boring school stuff on Friday, then out for a bit with Nando. Saturday was Panos’ belated birthday party at Clyde’s in Tower Oaks. I had oysters and Blue Moon. Both were satisfactory. My parents were away this weekend so I took care of the muppet. She survived, even though when they’re away she wont eat anything…

The new Jimmy Eat World Album is really good. I would say as good as the last one, which is not quite as good as "Bleed America" and three rungs down from "Clarity." Or at least that's my scientific opinion.

I need to get out to Baltimore and see people, and St. Mary’s. I also need to write three papers and clone myself. Maybe next week?

Until then I’ll leave you with this:
“Aquila fortuna iuvat”
-Fortune favors the hawks.

The Reckoner

The new Radiohead is surprisingly good. The album has a very different quality to it than previous releases by the fugly-turned-popular dwarf that is Thom Yorke. In all honesty, I am both a Radiohead fan but its just too easy to make fun of them… It is, shockingly consumable, and possibly a stroke marketing genius, both of which may alienate your average Radiohead fan, but you have to take chances in the music industry! The bittersweet pop confection (and I mean that as the highest praise) is just ten songs but all of them are at least decent. Highlights include the heart-wrenching “All I Need Is You,” an evolved live favorite, “Nude” and “The Reckoner” a masterpiece in my mind and sublime in its simplicity. God its like you can’t fucking avoid using hyperbole like that when you talk about these guys. I didn’t even mean for this to come off as a pro-Radioead paragraph. I guess I like what the New York Times said about the album (though it might have been Pitchfork); “While In Rainbows like Radiohead coming back to earth, it isn’t anything to be afraid of.” And if that doesn’t convince you: its free!

Exams start up this week (yes, the title does have a double meaning and you’re right, I’m not really that clever). I’ve got my first one in about six hours. Its in Cinema and Colonialism. The things I’ve learned about in Cinema and Colonialism are as follows:

1.) Apocalypse Now! isn’t about the Vietnam war. It’s actually about suicide.
2.) The Searchers isn’t about miscegenation so much as it is about the Other and why we must become the Other to be American.
3.) King Kong is not about a big monkey, its about how lame the Smithsonian is and why Vaudeville is responsible for the Animal Planet
4.) Beau Geste isn’t about honor but rather domestic spaces and why they often don’t work when presided over by crazy Russians in search of jewels.
5.) Gunga Din is what you think its about, only in a bad way.

Thanks for letting me review with you!

After that is my Medieval History final. She is giving us the essay topic today in class (the exam is next Wednesday) and we are allowed to bring in a piece of paper with notes on it… They didn’t even make it this easy in high school.

Lastly: I had something stuck in my head yesterday. I’ve recently finished Killing Yourself To Live by Chuck Klosterman and he uses the Who lyric “the kids are alright” a few times in the course of the work. I tend to disagree with that sentiment but never the less I liked the way he used it in the book. Well, while sitting in the library yesterday a young girl asked if she could borrow a pen. I told her sure. Why a young girl was in a college library I am not sure but there were others there also. I suspect it was some sort of class trip or something. Anywho… when she returned it to me she must have seen what I was writing in a notebook and told me very nicely that I had spelled Manichean wrong. I got two things out of this: the first is that nine-year-old girls can kick my ass in spelling and that “the kids are alright.”

Screaming At The Wall (?)

So I had a great day in class yesterday. We discussed King Kong and how museums are the Patriarchal West’s version of the dominate gaze directed to indigenous people, how the camera is actually a gun and that Naturalism is the direct descendant of Vaudeville. My mind was suitably blown. My girlfriend remains unimpressed.

Anyway, this is by way of telling you that the funk may have passed. We’ll see. I have to move my office this weekend but I did get a new wardrobe out of it, so I can’t complain too much. Thanks mom!

I was browsing the Facebook this morning and I saw the status feature of a friend of mine that piqued my interest. It said that he was close to Denise Kucinich on politicalcompass.com. I figured I’d give it a shot and answer as honestly as I could. Now my political evolution has taken some turns in the past few years, but I wasn’t quiet ready for the results. I started my political formation while attending Catholic Boys school to receive religious formation. So I was a little on the conservative side of things. As Junior year approached however I saw myself more as a Moderate. I wanted to hear both parties and attempt a reasoned and informed vote (once I could that is). Upon entering college and, I won’t lie, watching a crap-ton of The West Wing I suppose I styled myself as fully fledged Old Left Democrat. Strong on Defense but with compassion and a fiscal budget that while not balanced would provide “essential services”…whatever that means. More recently I’ve stopped actually finding my voice in any politician really. Biden is close on the war but otherwise nobody really encapsulates by wishes for government.

After taking the test this morning I know why: there isn’t too much ink about people farther left economically than Mike Gavel and on the scale of power I fall somewhere more libertarian than the Dalai Lama…

I know what you’re thinking: Greg’s a fucking pinko-commie bastard. Well I’ll stop you right there. You see Stalin is actually quiet the Authoritarian and Marx is probably more left economically so you’d be wrong! Gandhi and I are close too. I’m just a bleeding heart Emo kid. Nothing to really worry about.

Listening to Brahms (who apparently was quite the Conservative according the website)

I Think Your Train Is Leaving

Settling in. At long last. Sort of. Maybe I’m just getting used to doing everything last minute again. I seem to have a lot of time when I don’t need it and never enough when I do. I waste so much of my day in waiting around for things to start you would almost think it was some sort of profound metaphor for my life…or something.

Musically I’ve been dull. My life’s playlist has gone something like this for the past two months with slight variation:
1.) New Romance by Pretty Girls Make Graves
It’s a good piece of rock-pop-synth but lyrically dull to the point of distraction. Its also been out for ages and the band has broken up. This in and of itself means nothing but I want something to listen to that will either let me go to a concert or at least have hope of hearing songs at said concert.
2.) The Jam – Best Of Compilation
I love the Jam, their mod, British, from the early eighties and they play great punky rock-pop but there is something in the later compositions that reminds me that everyone eventually gets lazy and tired and that trying to break out of that in one fell swoop never fucking works. Just listen to “Going Underground” side by side with “Tales Of The Riverbank.”
3.) JR Ewing – Maelstrom
They were Swedish hardcore band and are now some sort of AFI like pop group. This is not why I dislike them, on the contrary, that could entice me to like them even more. No, the reason that Maelstrom seems bereft to me these days is the track called Pitch Black Blonde. It’s the best on the album, by far I think. Mike and I have agreed that it goes up there with Party of Helicopters’ “Brutal Enigma.” The song’s crescendo is so close to sublime that its maddening. You can taste the sonic release that might occur in that build up. The anticipation is almost sexual. But when the notes grow too big to contain and the song seems to give you the pay off to all that build up it just doesn’t satisfy.

Movies have also been somewhat drear of late. Across the Universe was entertaining but hacky in too many places to make it great or even all the way good. You have the most (socially) tumultuous decade in the century as your subject matter and the Beatles for your soundtrack and you tell a simple, albeit sweet, love story? Bobby did better, which I also saw not too long ago. It was good but disjointed. I can’t think of any other way to tell that kind of narrative but it seemed like Emilio Estevez was trying to keep too many balls in the air and ended up producing a tone that I liked quite a lot but hollow characters. Hot Fuzz was funny. The Searchers was depressing and good. I can’t wait for Darjeeling Limited to come out. Wes Andersen better come through. That movie alone could probably cure this mood. And I’m still waiting for Control. That’s it for movies.

Socially: Elizabeth’s birthday was fun, and six flags was great once I opened my eyes on the roller coasters. I do not, as many could imagine, scream like a little girl. Its more of a dignified grimace and a look of abject horror that I alternate in affecting. I’ve hung out with Nando some, which has been good. I worked on a weekend for the first time in a log time. I think that’s about it.

School is school and work is work. I don’t know why I’m feeling so existentially adrift but I am. Not all the time. Just in the four and a half hour between Law class and Medieval History when I should be doing something productive but never do.

Alright that’s enough. Go back to your lives.

PS I almost forgot, in music there has been one miracle: Mike and I found a copy of the live recording of Indian Summer that’s so impossible to find. The quality is shit but the experience is rather comforting. Indian Summer isn’t really the Band to get you out of a funk though…