music, for the soul...

"All my lies are always wishes / I know that I would die if I could come back new."

a brief thought(s)...

1. It feels good to be passionate, especially to be passionate about the right things.

2. Honesty is refreshing to hear, and freeing to be.

Thanks for the light, Don...

skeletons in my cabinet

I live in this house. It's a little bit haphazard as far as houses go. Four people (myself included) live in this house. We sometimes call it the Yuca, Sucka! b/c we have a big yuca plant out front, and sucka is one of the few words in the English language that rhymes with yuca (as we pronounce it). In addition to being made almost entirely of tile, our house has a number of nooks and crannies. It also has cabinets, which most of you have in your various residences, but who looks in all of their cabinets all of the time? We sure don't, and I submit this recent discovery as evidence:



Who knew that potatoes could grow small shrubbery? I did not, but my interest is for sure piqued. I always thought plants required one part sunlight, one part water, and one part sweet-talking to grow. A college education just isn't worth what it used to be I guess.

a brief thought...

Upon saying something insulting, accidentally or on purpose (to be funny), I find that the quickest and most painless way to smooth things over is to follow up the remark with:

"That's a Beatles song, it's a compliment."

cardinal rule

I sometimes worry that I talk about Ryan Adams too much. Talk tends to ruin things. Take Napoleon Dynamite for example, the mention of which has a definite fingernails on a chalkboard affect on my soul.



You could call too much talk of a single thing hype. You could also go the whole too much of a good thing route. Regardless, talk of old experiences tends to keep new experiences at bay. Memories, while inspiring and worth treasuring, are never quite recorded as is... leaving everything too rose-tinted or painful or hilarious or lovey-dovey.

I don't want to hype Ryan Adams to the point where you cannot appreciate the subtleties, to the point where you cannot give his music the time it needs to sink in. I also don't want to spill my past memories or experiences out on you, expecting you to have the same ones.

I'll just say this: Ryan Adams & The Cardinals - Cold Roses - 5.3.2005

Also this: you can hear some and imagine the rest here.

I have a feeling good times afresh and new are in the works...

eisley for sale free

If you are plugging along on all cylinders you should have picked up Eisley's Room Noises by now. It's quite the marvelous thing.



If you haven't, though, be sure and be aware of the fact that Eisley's current single Telescope Eyes is this week's free iTunes download. Check it out.

It's not my favorite song on the album, but it's still very good. And free. Consider this a little fortaste of Eisley divine.

ryan adams & c.s. lewis

"Today is yesterday when you don't know / how to rebuild the walls that someone has knocked down / To tell the truth it's hard enough without a lover / who you want to hide your darkness from so you won't let 'em down."
- Ryan Adams, If I'm a Stranger


"On re-reading this book ten years after I wrote it, I find it's chief faults to be those which I myself least easily forgive in the books of other men: needless obscuity, and an uncharitable temper"
-C.S. Lewis, on The Pilgrim's Regress

a brief thought...

Bob Schneider (and Lonelyland) covering The Police is good as gold.

fiona on the loose

Fiona Apple's new album Extraordinary Machine has been leaked in its entirety. You can get it here.



Normally I wouldn't advocate downloading music without paying; some might construe that as stealing. This album is unreleased, though, and has remained unreleased for several years due to Sony's desire for a more commercial product. You can read more about that here.

mr. jones and me

Fame is a mad scientist... snatching up those who can garner enough public approval to garner enough of the public's money, and shining the spotlight squarely on them as long as they keep garnering. All of a sudden everyone knows about these people (care of the spotlight), or at least knows the things about these people worth knowing (the money making aspects worth marketing).



It's weird being around a celebrity, especially around ones that you like a lot. It's not unlike being the nerdy kid that scores a locker right next to the captain of the cheerleading team. You get all jittery around them, and they scarcely notice you.

I can't say that I'd really like to be a big time celebrity. The way I see it, the only way to respond to being fawned over by people you don't know would be to: [1] Let your ego inflate until it explodes. [2] Loathe the day you ever became famous and get bitter about all the money you're making off of being popular. [3] Move to New York or LA and try to hide among other people as or more famous than you.

It would seem that Adam Duritz (of Counting Crows fame) has gone for blending in, as much as is possible. He lives in New York now, making frequent visits to LA. On my way back to Austin from NYC on Friday, I had my very own airport encounter with this particular famous one.

I generally shy away from talking to famous people. The way I figure it, I'm not their friend even if I do like their music/acting/writing/what have you, and any conversation with them would be all about me taking while giving nothing in return. I just want to talk to this person so that I can tell my friends that I talked to this person, and said person probably just wants me to leave them alone.

With all of these sentiments and ideals in mind, I avoided any conversation with Mr. Duritz while in line behind him at airport security and while walking next to him down the terminal. Unfortunately, my friends coaxed me into saying something to him, as I fell for the overused "You'll always regret it if you don't."

I went up to him, sitting at his gate, and had this exchange:

me: Adam.
adam: little to no response
me: Adam Duritz?
adam: eye contact, head nod
me: shaking his hand Sorry to bug you, but I'm a big fan of your music.
adam: Thanks.
me: trying to think of something to say, trying to gain some street cred You guys should really come to Austin sometime soon.
adam: Well, we're not going to be anywhere anytime soon.
me: not sure how to respond Oh so you guys are taking a break or something?
adam: Yeah.
me: completely out of conversational fodder Well, alright, see yah.
adam: at 6:30am Alright, have a good night.

Wow. That was brutal, for both of us. Why did I do that? Oh yeah, b/c I was going to regret it if I didn't say anything to him. It seems, though, that regret can also come into play while making a fool of oneself.

The whole time I was standing there, I couldn't help but think that Adam Duritz was a lonely guy waiting to fly elsewhere and be lonely. Granted it was early, and he was probably sleepy (as I would have been if I weren't jittery)... but I was struck with just how lonely being famous might be. You're accepted by everyone, but only at a distance. People get nervous around you, so they're not really themselves. You have to be constantly wondering if your friends are just your friends to bolster their own popularity. You've achieved the whole money/fame/success thing, and most likely found that to be somewhat of an empty pursuit. That carrot's no longer dangling.

So Adam, I hope you're not lonely and that you find true happiness and I hope you keep making music that allows people to identify with their own emotions in ways they wouldn't be able to otherwise.

By the way, New York was great... more on that later.

the big apple of my eye

I'm going to New York (they of Pace Pecante Sauce fame, NEW YORK CITY!?!) tomorrow. It should be fun. I mean a lot of people live there and we live in the United States where people can pretty much live wherever they want, so it can't be all bad.

I've never been to New York though, and I'm afraid the hype might kill it for me. Everyone's always filming their movies there, talking about how much better pizza is there, riding around on the back of a flat bed truck performing their music there. Everyone's hearting NY.

This concerns me. For a good portion of my life I happily played the role of social outcast. Currently, I find myself sometimes playing the role of hipster. Being a hipster is pretty much the same thing as being an outcast, except people eventually like the things that you like, just after you're through liking them.

Playing the role of hipster in NYC gets confusing, because people already like New York and people already hate New York. The only outcast ground to lay claim to is in either only kind of liking New York or in appreciating the unappreciated aspects of the city. The problem is there are a host of people there already doing that. New York is full of hipsters.

While I might feel confused about this venture, I do want to figure out what this is, b/c it looks cool:



I read this today and it made me laugh:

"I think [a metaphor] should be called a lie because a pig is not like a day and people do not have skeletons in their cupboards. And when I try and make a picture of the phrase in my head it just confuses me because imagining an apple in someone's eye doesn't have anything to do with liking someone a lot and it makes you forget what the person was talking about."

I'm going on a blog hiatus... on account of me being in New York and not feeling the role of "New York blogger" to be all that original, and on account of me wanting you to miss me from time to time.

don't sneeze on me.

You might remember how I was sick(ly) the other week. Well I'm feeling great now, but it seems being sick continues to make the rounds, with consequences both devastating and slightly amusing. My friend Jimmy Miller came down with the flu about the same time I was feeling less than stellar. This flu bout of his is best seen in his attempt to write down both the name and phone number of a kind person subbing for him on his radio show :



First of all, I find it extremely interesting (weird) that of all of the possible places to write down a person's name and phone number that Jimmy chose the sticky part of a film processing drop-off envelope. Now, the actual name he was attempting to write down was Kelly Greene. Jimmy definitely wrote down Kekeklllyy Graneeneep, and only about half of her phone number. All that to say, don't get sick.

Also, you should not get me sick. I learned a new trick last night to avoid a sneeze when you feel one coming on: look at a bright light. Of course you can also hold your finger under your nose and apply a slight amount of pressure. There. No reason whatsoever to sneeze on me.

It turns out that today is my birthday. The tenth day of March back in the one-thousand and eighty-second year of our Lord marked the beginning of this one. I don't tend to publicize my birthday; I mean what's in a day? A day by any other name would still be as sweet, I figure. I guess though that some sort of good times are in order, which I will provide to all:

Ryan Adams - Miss Sunflower

This is an unreleased song off of an unreleased album entitled Suicide Handbook. I woke up this morning with this song in my head, and I'm not really sure why b/c I can't have listened to it more than three times, none more recent than a month ago... I'm going to chalk it up as birthday destiny.

ring, ring sing,sing

I, like most of the rest of you, have a cell phone. Sometimes I talk on my phone. Sometimes I use my phone as an alarm to wake me up from power naps. Sometimes I open and close my phone (it's a flip-phone) when I feel like fidgetting (which is often). I have not, however, fallen prey to the ridiculous cultural pheonomena known as the ring-tone. "Hey look, when someone calls me, my phone rejoices by blaring the latest in pop music or some sort of sambata." My phone rings, almost as if it were, that's right, a phone!

I'm getting up on this structurally unsound soapbox of mine so I can fall right off of it. That's right, yesterday I joined the rank and file. It's their fault:



Instead of ringing, my phone now blares a 14 second portion of the Guster song Careful: Ringing all the warning bells / careful you don't hurt yourself / others lie, lie, lie / they adore you. PLAY. REPEAT. REPEAT. VOICEMAIL.

I figure if everyone else is going to polute the air with their Toxic's and their Rock Your Body's that I should fight back with some positive reinforcement. Don't consider this an annoying ringtone, consider this a good music education.

So far this whole Guster - Careful ring, ring thing is working out pretty well for me. Every time my phone rings it makes my day way better. I do tend to miss a fair number of calls, because I tend to like listening to my ring a bit more than answering my phone. Plus there's the whole good music education thing... so don't feel bad about my not answering.

In other pop news, it turns out that musicians I like tend to cover pop songs I like. A smattering:

Ted Leo: Since You've Been Gone (Kelly Clarkson) [MP3, care of Stereogum]
Ben Gibbard: Complicated (Avril Lavigne) [MP3, care of being green]
Wilco: Love Will Keep Us Together (Captain & Tennille) [MOV, care of via chicago]

A Toast to Buckman...

...you sir, are both a gentleman and a scholar.



27 points, 9 rebounds, 3 of 5 three-point shooting, 37 minutes.

Texas 74 - Oklahoma State 73

Hook 'em? Um, yes!

The English Language: I hardly know ye...

The Point/Counterpoint of the other day really has me questioning what I had up until now assumed mastery over: the english language.

Am I saying what I really mean to say? When people laugh at something I say is it b/c I said something witty or b/c I'm unwittingly tripping over my tongue like there's no tomorrow? Am I just flat out making a buffoon out of myself? Is buffoon even a real word?

Today's second-guessing of the very foundation of my ability to interact with others included:

1. Rhetorical. Is the use of rhetorical soley valid when used in describing a type of question, or is it the proper adjective for describing any type of rhetoric technique. Example - The repetition of the phrase "I have a dream" in Dr. King's speech was rhetorical. Correct or incorrect?

2. Over/underachiever. I know that overachieving means achieving beyond what was expected, and that underachieving means not living up to expectations. What I don't know all of a sudden is if calling someone an overachiever is a backhanded insult (I wouldn't expect something this good from someone as untalented as yourself) or a simple good job compliment. On the flip-side, is calling someone an underachiever always a bad thing or is that a label one should secretly hope for (you're super talented, you're just choosing to be a little aloof/modest right now). I'm going to have to stick to just calling people achievers from now on.

In other phrase-ology news, Will and I are busy introducing a hilarious but entirely useful term into our everyday vocabulary. It fits in quite well with such statements as "thinking outside the box", "that's a both/and", and "getting under the rock" and has yet to be picked up on as weird/new/unusual by any of the 10 or so people who have heard it. You'll learn of the phrase only after it's far too ingrained in your vocabulary to weed out.

Enjoying uncertainty.

I have an iPod. It's from a while back so it doesn't have the click-wheel or the 12-hour battery (more like 7 or 8 hour). I like it though. I would actually go so far as to say I love it.

Recently I upgraded my iPod's software and now it has a Shuffle Songs feature on the main menu. This is kind of like letting your iPod pick your music for you. Hit Shuffle Songs, kick back with a cup of coffee (and possibly a crossword puzzle if it's Monday-Wednesday) and hope for the best.

Usually my iPod is a little shaky on its selection. Third Eye Blind slotted between Patty Griffin and one of the 2004 Presidential Debates... randomly bad. Monday, though, my iPod came through in the clutch with a stellar playlist which I have preserved for posterity:



1. You Will Always Be The Same - Ryan Adams - The Swedish Sessions
2. Mr. Brightside - The Killers - Hot Fuss [US]
3. Bonus Reprise - Brooks Williams - Skiffle Bop
4. Come Let Us Worship - Chris Tomlin - Not to Us
5. This Room - The Notwist - Neon Golden [Bonus Tracks]
6. Terrible Vision - Rhett Miller - The Instigator
7. Not To Us - Chris Tomlin - Passion, Sacred Revolution
8. Mona Lisas & Mad Hatters - Elton John - Honky Chateau
9. Kamera (alternate version) - Wilco - Yankee Hotel Foxtrot Demos

That's impressive. A few current favorites (1,2,9) a few old favorites (6,8) a few really good songs I'd never gotten into (3,5) some well placed worship since I was reading my Bible (4,7).

It was at this point that I had to leave Peet's to go to a meeting. I'd like to think my iPod was about to throw in Guster - Two Points for Honesty - Lost and Gone Forever and Eisley - Trolly Wood - Room Noises to get the official Brett playlist stamp of approval, but I guess I'll never know.

I'd love to hear about your own suprisingly good iPod sequenced moments, so if you have any shuffle miracles post the playlist in my comments. If you don't have an iPod, I don't want you to feel excluded... so maybe drop all of your CDs on the ground and tell me what order you pick them up in.

Cup of Joe Peet's

Yesterday's coffee of the day at Peet's was the Sumatra blend:



"Sumatra is the classic Indonesian coffee. Sumatra's coffees are grown by small landholders who may only have a few trees on their property, and the coffee is processed by the dry method. The ripe coffee cherries are pulped by hand and spread in the sun to dry rather than being rinsed in water overnight. Dry-processed coffee yields very heavy body and very full flavor. In the case of Sumatra, the flavors are sweet and somewhat earthy with pronounced herbal nuances. Sumatra is one of our best-selling coffees, and it's not hard to understand why. The complex flavors and full body brought out by Peet's roast make for an exceptional, gutsy, richly seductive cup."

Who knew that coffee could be richly seductive? That makes me a little bit uncomfortable, I'm not even kidding. If you want to freak yourself out, try saying "Sumatra" in a richly seductive voice.

Moving on... this was actually a really good blend. I had this particular cup during the beginning of the TexasCru meeting, and must say that my experience was significantly heightened by the fact that there was both the watching of and the dancing along to this taking place.

Point Taken...

So it would appear from comments both in the blog-o-sphere and in person, that I have soundly lost the Point/Counterpoint on the term "brutally honest."

Maybe my remarks weren't witty enough. ("A house divided..." is getting to be a little cliche at this point.) Maybe I just didn't get out the vote like Tracy did. Maybe associating myself with the UT basketball team at such a fragile time was a negative strategy. (No one likes to associate with the down and out.) Maybe I needed a slogan that people could latch on to like "Brutal honesty: the truth 'til it hurts today, a bright future tomorrow."

Of course it's also possible that I was wrong. That's right, you're hearing me admit it: I was wrong. I've been accused in the past (yesterday) by certain someones (Melody) of arguing for the sake of arguing. Of valuing my own rightness over what is really true.

I'm almost 23 now, and feel that it's time to mature in this not-being-wrong area of my life. Earlier, I made a conciliatory phone call to Tracy. I'm not waiting for every last vote to be counted, I'm realizing my mistake right now. From now on, you'll only hear me say the phrase "brutally honest" when someone says something truthful that is, in and of itself, painful.

Tracy 1, Brett 0.