Good Morning. Hello. How are you? #1333
Walmart run, squirt bottles for cooking oils as a metaphor for capitalism, big music day, a lot of parentheticals surrounding a report on a Buzzcocks gig.
Hello! Good morning! How are you? All well? Holding up in these trying times? Remember when I started every one of these alluding to trying times and how hard it was for all of us to endure? Is that still true? This fact checker rates it: mostly true. But a change is on the wind, a delicate breath, barely alive. It is up to us to nurture it and turn it into something beautiful.
Sorry I was explaining what hippies were to Jane this morning. Hard to keep it simple but not a cliche. Hard to allude to the dark side of hippiedom (domestic abuse and abandonment masquerading as free love anyone?) without, you know, selling short the very true message of peace and love at the core. Explaining why hippies lived in the woods was kinda sad. But we managed, we managed.
Programing note: In explaining my backup methodology yesterday, I forgot to add that in addition to going to the NAS via Time Machine, and the NAS going to Backblaze, I also back up my entire home folder — including the photo archive — to Dropbox every night. I do this because, in theory, Dropbox adds the ability to access everything from my phone, if I want to show someone a photo, or listen to some obscure music. But in practice, it never works when I try it: mobile search and file retrieval sucks in Dropbox, as does, you know, playing MP3s. It IS a nice mental backup to the inevitable failure of Time Machine, which, after more than a decade, still only backs up to NASs under duress god they need to make that better.
Also, Miranda pointed out that the photo organizing article is now paywalled, because Medium decided to paywall all my old writing, which is funny because that’s where most of my remaining “writing with a topic” lives on the internet since BI and the Observer both seem to have nuked their archives, or at least my shit in them. I am going to either re-publish that here with a permalink or figure out how to unpaywall my shit on Medium. Hopefully this weekend. Will let you know. Miranda, I printed a PDF for you, I will email it to you now. Done.
Walmart run this morning. I am currently very into squirt bottles for my cooking oils. Three models at Walmart: the in-house Mainstays brand (really want a Mainstays t-shirt) for $0.97. Some two-bottles-combo set for $4, but one of the bottles had a basting brush on it. Not a bad idea, actually. might go back and pick one of those up, but.. I dunno. Seems complex. And then the seven dollar Oxo “chef professional” cooking oil squirt bottle. I am unsure this recent domestic obsession with squirt bottles for oil is gonna stick (stick, get it?) I mean, all the Youtube stir fry chefs use them, they do seem easier but… also you gotta clean them and refill them and stuff. So I bought a cheap one as an experiment. But what if the habit hinges on the satisfying-nees, the hand-feel of the act of squirting the bottle? What if the Mainstays brand does not provide as satisfying a squirting experience, and I end up ditching them for the $7 Oxo Chef Professional bottles, and then I created more plastic waste and I will go to hell (Good Place reference) oh god oh god.
Also gonna give ultra-clarified, tasteless, organic coconut oil a whirl for my stir fry. It is hard to find a good stir fry cooking oil that is healthy. I suck it up and use olive oil, despite its low smoke point, and it mostly works but I do occasionally get some burning and I can only get the wok to 400. So… we’ll try something else. Is there even such a thing as healthy cooking oil? Man. Man.
Also, wife, if you’re reading this, they are about 75% done rolling out their Halloween stuff and I suspect you could go back like late this weekend/early next week and it will be resplendently spooky.
(N.B. the rest of this is going to be about music again today, I AM SORRY. I have so many other topics to write about that are really going to tickle your fancy like band-aid organization oh man it is so good. But they’re gonna have to wait, because, as you will see, big music day.)
Listening to my Release Radar this morning, so much new music coming out today, it is a little overwhelming. There is a new Jesus and Mary Chain single — a song not on their recent 2024 album Glasgow Eyes. It is great. Better than anything on the album. I bet there is a story behind that. There is a new The The and the first two singles were kinda meh and I am trying to maintain my enthusiasm until they come and play here in a month or two. Hopefully the album is better. New Pan·American: the spooky ambient post rock outfit born from the ashes of Labradford. There is a new Mercury Rev and I am very excited about that.
Then we have Bandcamp Friday, lotta stuff there. Missed the boat on the new signed Warren Ellis 7” - two songs from the documentary about his amazing work in Africa. But i got the new Galaxie 500 t-shirt based on their bass drum logo, and I pre-ordered the new Medicine album, their 11th, a self-titled work. What else will arrive in my inbox this morning, tough to say, tough to say.
“To Investigate” playlist was down to 49 hours, 15 minutes this morning before I added a bunch of new albums. I am happy about that. We knocked 20 hours off of it this week and added a bunch of new music to it.
Listening to music, man. Is there anything better?
Speaking of which, we went to see the Buzzcocks last night. Now, I should clarify: there is only one remaining original Buzzcock, Steve Diggle, and he was not the singer. He was the bassist. But now he is the singer, and a guitarist, because the long-standing, best-known vocalist (though not the original!) singer for the Buzzcocks, Pete Shelley, has died.
Now, you may call this a nostalgia act and you may dismiss it. BUT. I will say a few things. First, most importantly, the show ruled, and the current incarnation of the Buzzcocks is just a great band.
Secondly, when you are the last remaining member of a band that is alive (look, ignore Howard for a minute, we’ll get there), you should be allowed to use the name. That should just be a rock and roll rule. This is not New Order continuing on without Peter Hook (though that is pretty good, I gotta admit). Pete Shelley is dead, Steve wrote the songs with them, played on all the hits. It’s his live band now.
And look, all of your rock idols are old, and they are going to die. It is incumbent upon us younger rockers to a) go see whomever is left in these bands that wants to tour and bring the joy to your small town and b) join their band as swarthy, sexy session musicians who keep the band fresh (see Paul McCartney, Chameleons, and… Buzzcocks). They’re all disappearing, man. See them while you can.
Now, I never actually even really liked the Buzzcocks. Early on I got it into my head that Howard Devoto was the cool one, and Howard left the Buzzcocks after their first EP to go form the much cooler (in my teenage opinion) art rock outfit Magazine. Magazine was the serious band, my teenage brain told me, and the Buzzcocks were the dumb punk one.
(And Magazine were great! And I wish wish wish I got to see the DevotoShelley shows that would have been amazing why did I skip that I am an idiot oh right I skipped it because I stupidly discounted the Buzzcocks for forty years).
(Now, granted, it would be hilarious if 72-year-old Howard Devoto joined a Pete-less Buzzcocks with Steve Diggle but this is reality here. )
(Oh shit I am listening to a new Mercury Rev track in Release Radar and it is so good and I am so relieved).
But then last month at Real Wild Child some twelve year-old kid requested “What do I Get” and, as a request made by a twelve year-old at a New Wave Goth night, that is pretty solid. And I try to spin any night-appropriate requests by the kids. So I played it. And hearing that song on a giant, excellent, night club sound system made me love it anew. My god, those guitars, those vocals.
(Also, my wife pointed out last night during “Falling in Love with Somebody (You Shouldn’t Fall in Love With)” that Pete’s point-of-view in that song is actually very mature, and ahead of its time in sensitivity. Dude doesn’t want to impose his shit on his lady friend. He respects her feelings.)
(So many Buzzcocks parentheticals).
Anyway, the show was super fun, What do I Get was the first song, Orgasm Addict was the second to last, and Falling in Love With Somebody was in the encore. Spread out the hits. There were new songs too and you wouldn’t know which were which if you are not a hardcore fan. N.B. I am not a hardcore fan. But I might be becoming one. I did not buy a shirt but I seriously thought about it.
Hi I am Rick and I am becoming a Buzzcocks fan in my 50s.
(Oh shit new Tycho today too this really might be the best record release day of the year).
Anyway I thought for a while I was done with live shows but I see now I was just tired from parenting a young kid and we didn’t have a good babysitter after Sydney disappeared (still think about her constantly, so sad). But now we have, at least for now, a good babysitter and Jane likes her and she is not quite the burden of babydom and toddlerdom and so now I am super into going to shows again. I want to go to them all.
I am ready for a show that isn’t classic rock, too. This one same as Love & Rockets/Jane’s Addiction. Lotta olds. And old people, man, they wear band shirts but they are all old bands. Just keep up with the times! There is good new music!
Hi I am Rick and I am on the planet to bring you old people the message that there is good new music.
Next show is Sigur Ros is that new music? Probably not. Not quite classic rock yet but getting there. I think the next “new music” show on my radar is Kate Bollinger on Oct 21. And that’ll be fun, if I feel too old I can go to the main room at Cat’s Cradle, next door, where Bob Mould is playing yeah I am going to have to get tickets for both of those. Except Bob is seated. Will he have a band? I like noisy Bob, I like synth Bob a lot, but I don’t love solo-with-a-guitar Bob, because he does that thing I have a phobia of: solo man with electric guitar. Can’t handle it.
But I digress.
It is Friday, second week of school behind us, Jane has not done school refusal once, she seems to really like it. She gets ready in the morning on her own, brushes her teeth, gets dressed, makes her own bed and comes down while I am making breakfast. It allows for an extra 30 minutes of sleep for me, and for that I am deeply grateful. All is well. I am amazing. Parenting is pretty fun at the moment.
Except bedtimes. Which I have one tonight.
Gulp.
Looks like, with the two songs added from Release Radar, that a Moody and Quiet playlist is ready for your perusal today. Oh look, the aforementioned Labradford. Oh shit, two Labradford songs well that is embarrassing but I don’t have time to fix it I gotta go to the elbow doctor. Still bummed those Gillian Welch shows sold out on me I gotta figure that one out somehow. Very into this Hana Stretton record. And the not-super-new-now Thor Harris record is great a concept album about someone named Bonnie. A mystery.
Olay have a lovely weekend. I think we are getting visitors this weekend which is very exciting. Hope you have some good times. Even just a second of bliss what more can we ask for amirite?
to throw some sand in your previously (olive-)oiled gears, let me present a third option for squirting: the graza set, sizzle and drizzle (the former for cooking and the latter for finishing). they come in their own branded squirt bottles, an they sell refills of each now IN CANS. more expensive than your walmart-brand OO, for sure—but what can i say, i'm a sucker for a decent product in cute packaging!
also: COSIGN on your note about there being good new music! (saw the other day that you've discovered nilüfer yanya—i love her and am seeing her again on october 2!