The ninety-seventh TV show: #501 The Fast Show I know we're ahead on comedies, but this worked as a great show over the Christmas break and our other options was a bit less workable after going through our random draw options. While I am still lacking in many shows to compare it to, it feels like (as the name implies) this show focuses on the faster pace of sketches and cuts, not sticking around for longer than is needed. While the show was focused on Paul Whitehouse - and he still appears more than the other performers - it feels like an ensemble show and becomes it more as time goes on. It means the later seasons work better, as they've figured out more what characters work. While there are some less interesting sketches, most of them still hold up quite well and there's some decent pay offs to jokes - it's unfortunate the first season sometimes spends more time setting them up in the early episodes without as much pay off, but it's worth powering through them.
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The three hundred and ninety-seventh song: Evie - Stevie Wright As a song in three parts, this is a number you have to judge in three parts. The first, a passionate rocker from the start of a relationship, really sounds like AC/DC and sounds great - it is catchy and energetic. The ballad that follows is weaker, Stevie Wright's sound doesn't seemq utie right for it, but it leads nicely into the disco song that is in odd contrast to the lyrics about the loss of Evie. It's interesting how it sets up a story in three parts like that, as a decent experiment in story telling through song. The three hundred and ninety-eighth song: Free Man in Paris - Joni Mitchell There's a happy tone to this jazz song about a record executive, taking a holiday in Paris - an upcoming destination for us, and here it sounds like a land of freedom, away from the buzz of everyday life. It's happy, grateful and enjoyable, as the holiday would be. The three hundred and ninety-ninth song: I Will Always Love You…
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The fifty-fifth classical recording: #248 Franz Schubert - Winterreise As we're in the depths of winter, relatively speaking, the songs of the Winter Journey seem appropriate to cover. With just a tenor and a piano, the suite stays fairly simple and through that more able to tell a story. One that I needed a list for to get the German lyrics, but it works well and shows a lot of emotion throughout. It's a beautiful piece to listen to,
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The three hundred and ninetieth song: Essiniya - Nass El Ghiwane While in other lists, we get entries that are there because of the unique viewpoint they represent, in this list we usually get hits (relatively speaking) that stand out and are often more generally known. This makes an entry like Essiniya more special, because it's not as international - instead, it's an example of Moroccan music, popular in the Arabic world but not really known here. It's a different sound, fitting the region, but quite different from the rock and pop we've been dealing with, and the a capella introduction (which runs for the first two and a half minutes) really gives us that feeling, I assume inspired by what was around them. Even when the drums kick in, the mostly choral singing feels traditional, even as the lyrics are radical for their day and they would have been the rebels in the country at the time. It's an interesting example, which feels like it deserves its own place on the list. The three…
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The fifty-fourth classical recording: #802 Silvestre Revueltas - Sensemaya Another shorter piece, and another based on a poem, this time surrounding Afro-Cuban rites, Sensemaya is threatening from the start. There's something frightening in the short sounds of the brass instruments and there's a definite threat in there. Perhaps because of a warrior going out or because of an animal being slaughtered, but the why of it doesn't matter as much. It goes between this and moments of calm, whipping you up every time it builds and everything is set up to support that. While the piece is short, is stays intense throughout, which is what works best here.
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The fifty-third classical recording: #516 Paul Dukas - The Sorcerer's Apprentice Did you know we rewatched Fantasia yesterday? Because we did, and it made us realise we hadn't covered this piece yet. Written with a clear story in mind, later reproduced in that movie. This means the leitmotifs and changes in pace are a lot more vivid than you would have without that aid. At the same time, the speed and intention is still there and you can place parts even where they don't necessarily match up. The chaos is especially present in this rendition, played up by the instruments but also feeling more aggressive throughout.
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The ninety-sixth TV show: #953 Orange is the New Black There are a lot of problems with the prison system - not just in the US, where this show is set, but also around the world. Seeing all of this on a TV show, based on a real stay, shows the power imbalance, the cliques, and how little the world cares. The show mixes a fair amount of comedy with some at times intense drama, a combination that's compelling to watch if at times exhausting. With that, the performances are amazing with some interesting characters - pulling from stereotypes but building on them, there's more to these people. Piper, the main character, starts off slow but her arc becomes more interesting towards the end of the first season. Beyond that the wacky character may stand out, but it's where they get or are grounded that they get interesting, with fights about who ends up on top in prison, a more than expected amount of religious infighting (with a rare atheist protagonist) and otherwise dark outcomes for plots…
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The sixty-second book: #51 Anton Reiser - Karl Philipp Moritz The psychological novel, as it's described here, is a biography of sorts - Anton Reiser is fictional, but is based on the writer's life - but it focused more on the protagonist's troubles, how he's mentally dealing with what happens in his life, and how that influences what follows, dragging himself down. It's a more engaging approach than using the factual accounts - not as much happens, but it flows better and makes more sense, while the protagonist is flawed enough that so much can make it through internally. In the end, despite this book having been somewhat forgotten, it is a decent read and an actual page turned - not something I usually get with books this old.
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The one hundred nineteenth album: #118 The Byrds - The Notorious Byrd Brothers There's a nice change in contrast when I get some folk on the list, and the psychedelic folk rock of the Byrds strangely fits with the time of year - something gentle and flowing rather than the hard rock we saw last time. I'd never class the Byrds as a favourite of mine, but they hit these beats incredibly well, adding a deeper message to a decent set of songs.
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The one hundred and eighteenth album: #118 Blue Cheer - Vincebus Eruptum Today we're covering one of the first heavy metal albums. Fitting six track in half an hour means the tracks are generally longer, which feels suitable for this era of hard rock - longer pieces that don't feel the need to fit in the pop music lengths, I guess not even necessarily intended for main radio play. That's only for a few of the tracks, of course, while it starts off with the single worthy Summertime Blues. Though far from a major hit, it's a cover that has a more upbeat melody that is overlaid with screechy guitars and generally a loud sound. Rock Me Baby, too, feels like the music has to hold back as the bluesy number doesn't allow for really rocking out. The tracks penned by Peterson feel more appropriate, louder rockers that lead you on through, and I feel they're the more appropriate songs - maybe not as technically perfect, but what I actually want from this band.
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The one hundred and seventeenth album: #117 Aretha Franklin - Aretha: Lady Soul The second list album of the Queen of Soul isn't as high energy as the first one, while still having a punch to it. Natural Woman plays like a soulful ballad, with some additional flourishes and generally feeling quite upbeat. It sounds good, but by being less abundant, I think it showcases some smaller emotions better, which come across really well in this set of songs. This is a more sentimental, toned down album, but it makes Franklin's voice shine all the more and it all sounds great.
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The ninety-fifth TV show: #874 Twenty Twelve While there are a bunch of these mockumentaries, it feels like there aren't many that cover an (at the time) major event like the 2012 London Olympics. That might be more so because we were watching this live as the event was being set up almost around us. Twenty Twelve uses that by putting in a bunch of British comedy heavyweights playing the members of the deliverance committee, most of whom aren't necessarily the best at the job, are at least narrow minded and focused, while the game date creeps up. Clearly, the outcome is that everyone went well, but here it feels like the head of the committee, Ian, played by Hugh Bonneville, is the only one really holding it together. Jessica Hynes, the head of PR, is another clear stand out, coming across as absent, but with the right tone and twisted logic to keep things moving. Olivia Coleman, as Ian's PA, does a lot with very little - few lines, no big personality, but her care for Ian really…
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The one hundred sixteenth album: #116 Laura Nyro - Eli And The Thirteenth Confession This album contains a number of jazz-influenced R&B songs - plenty of brass in swinging soul songs, moving around that area throughout, with a song like Sweet Blindness moving more towards the soul end, but also switching between them. Between that and the more ballady numbers, there's a nice mix of styles that work together quite well and the whole of the album is a pleasant, refreshing listen.
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The sixty-first book: #50 The 120 Days of Sodom - Marquis de Sade Let's start today's write ups with something salacious. The story of 120 days of libertine entertainment is legendary enough to be banned in several countries. Despite that reputation, only the first thirty days were actually written, the rest mostly only existing in notes, as the Marquis de Sade was moved out of the Bastille before he could finish it and he couldn't take the work with him. It took a century for it to be found and it gives a weird insight into the excesses at the time. While I'm sure this was, in places, exaggerated, the Marquis writes about the extravagances in such a way that he's at least heard of people enjoying some of them and some people would at least have been interested in the worst parts. While there's some disdain in the tone about the novel's protagonist, the details and care of the writing make it feel like he also gets some thrill out of it. As a reader, it gets too much real quick - I…
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The fifty-second classical recording: #640 Manuel Falla - Nights in the Gardens of Spain There is a sense of magic in this piece, the music carrying you away to different gardens as it plays. There are three distinct stages, meant to invoke different gardens, but also creating different atmospheres, a spring time lively first part, a darker night time second and something that feels more tragic in the third half. It's a perfectly tuned piece of music that I want to play during a walk now, rather than being stuck in an office, but this felt enough to carry me away.
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The one-hundred fifteenth album: #115 Johnny Cash - At Folsom Prison Every once in a while, we get these live albums, and they do have a different atmosphere from the originals. As much as you might try to power up the studio sound, the live reaction of the crowd gives a recording a different feel, while also letting you get a recording that might not be as perfect - you're not going to do multiple rerecordings if it's not quite right. This shows clearly on Dark As the Dungeon, where Johnny Cash comments on a prisoner laughing and distracting him. This being recorded in a prison creates a different feeling too. It's not as rowdy as other recorded albums, when the club is a bit more active. Here, it feels like while there's some loud applause and hollering, they're still feeling a bit constrained and were probably just sitting there instead. It works fine for the blues being performed here, a quieter sound working well with the sometimes downer numbers, and the crowd properly responds…
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The three hundred and eighty-second song: Child’s Christmas in Wales - John Cale Moving on from the Velvet Underground, this rather accessible pop song feels a bit out of reach. There's maybe something vaguely off about the lyrics, but on the whole it feels quite gentle, focused on a more orchestral sound that creates a more accessible sound. The three hundred and eighty-third song: Solid Air - John Martyn When I see folk mentioned, I have specific expectations, but Solid Air defies them. While bluesy and ethereal in its sounds, Martyn's vocals and stretched in a disconcerting way, creating that disconnect between reality and his sound. There's a s ong to Nick Drake, his troubled friend, and the sound here feels a bit disconnected and alien, as it's likely intended to be. It doesn't quite work, though, as I found it more repulsive rather than actually enchanting. The three hundred and eighty-fourth song: I Know What I Like (in Your Wardrobe) - Genesis Another example of how rock…
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The fifty-fifth comic: #260 Cheech Wizard This has been an interesting comic. Focused on the anarchic side of comics and comedy in the 1960s (this was published in the National Lampoon), we have a weird hat-covered wizard who lives in a semi-fantasy world. A lot of the story revolves around the wizard chasing voluptuous girls, as well as following other darker subjects. While it looks rather cartoony, the contents doesn't always go there. It wasn't an amazing hit with me. The comics are occasionally funny, but just as often disappoint and it doesn't feel like there's necessarily that much to them in the end. A fine diversion, but not much more.
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The fifty-fourth comic: #367 American Splendor The (initially) yearly issues of American Splendor are a set of slice of life stories, sometimes somewhat humorous but all just telling a tale of things happening in the cartoonist Harvey Pekar's life. It's somewhat depressing - perhaps more grim than depressing, but never really that friendly. Life goes on and is bearable, but the real sunshine in the stories is rare and bleak. It's not something to inspire big emotions, but it's a fascinating insight into a simple life that I enjoyed reading.
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The ninety-fourth TV show: #699 It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia We've been watching Sunny for a long time now, although we took a break for a while from getting through it. Coming back to it, though, has been a delight, and it's amazing how fresh the show is in its thirteenth season. It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia takes the "no lessons learned" philosophy of Seinfeld to the extreme, creating a show around four, and later five flawed characters to its messed up extremes, between psychopathic and vile behaviour of them as they descend further into madness throughout the seasons and take those around them with them - something seen especially well in the fate of Rickety Cricket, a friend of the gang who not only can't get his life together, but makes it worse at every turn. While you want to follow the adventures of the gang, the show threads things well enough that you never sympathize with the characters. Bad things happen to them, but they deserve it, and the way of…
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The ninety-third TV show: #849 Downton Abbey There is a group of historical dramas that focuses on the early 1900s, including the fall of the British aristocracy. Previously, Brideshead Revisited covered that, through time jumps that showed how times changed and why it would have fallen. Bleak House covered an earlier period, but the focus on the class system is still there. Downton Abbey starts off examining some of this as well. Starting at the sinking of the Titanic, there is an older generation that clings on to the known ways while others are seeing how it cannot be maintained. It starts to feel, however, that after the first season got succesful, it got to glamorizing this era, as something to look back on as something better. It doesn't connect with me on that level and feels weird sometimes. The tension that was underlying the first season dissipates and the second season feels a bit toothless because of that. It's a shame, because the underlying concept might have been nicer…
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The fifty-third comic: #605 Madam & Eve Today's comic is on the list in part (I'm sure) because of the time it embodies. A South African newspaper comic, started as apartheid came to an end, starring a white woman and her black maid, touches the zeitgeist in its own way. I don't think I'm qualified to entirely pass judgement on the contents of these - some concepts feel off, but this goes both ways and as this is about these characters adjusting to a new world, perhaps it's right that they're not always comfortable. The jokes themselves are a mixed bag, as you get with most of these, with some hitting well and others falling flat. This probably happens more because we don't know the politics and situations as well. Still, it's decent, and the way it can be more cutting than others feels telling in itself.
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The fifty-first Classical Recording: #17 Thomas Tallis - Spem In Alium Going back to older motets, this was written for 40 voices, which especially reveals itself as the different parts go their own way, the different vocals mixing more masterfully than you'd expect for a situation where several lyrics are sang together. This creates an effect of all of them mixing and in my head an effect of these parts of prayer ascending together.
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The one hundred fourteenth album: #114 Leonard Cohen - The Songs Of Leonard Cohen A contemporary folk album feels like it suits the slightly melancholic mood I have at the moment. Starting off with the famous Suzanne (which I more know from the Dutch version), there's something comforting in the sweet and soft lyrics. It's basically incredibly well executed and a treat to listen to throughout. The various instruments and harmonies help with this and I feel I had a lovely folk album here.
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The fiftieth classical recording: #894 Aram Khachaturian - Spartacus Part of our trip to Athens gave us a special treat - a performance of the Spartacus ballet in an ancient Greek theatre. We were sitting in the shadow of the Parthenon as a ballet was performed on a stage that was about 1800 years old, thankfully with some cushions to alleviate the trouble from sitting on a stone bench all day. The ballet itself, then, sort of fit the environment - the events aren't that far off from when the theatre was built - and performed by leading Russian dancers really felt amazingly polished. The whole is a lot more modern than Sleeping Beauty, with some jazz influences in the music and the percussion from the dancer (very clearly heard on the wooden stage). The music is a big contributor to it - it's swelling and big in the right places, tender sometimes but mostly supports a lot of the military elements well. It's a case where the music benefits from being more contemporary even where it…
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The sixtieth book: #1012 Cecilia Halfway through, I gave up on this. It’s another story of a woman too good for this world, surviving in society, being wooed by multiple men. It feels overdone and I don’t feel this adds anything, except for too much length. The writing is becoming more readable, but it stops really providing anything that was worth it.
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The fourty-ninth classical recording: #564 Richard Strauss - Salome Recently we went to see ENO's interesting version of Salome. If you've read the reviews, you might have seen that the production is misguided - an effort to modernize it without making use of the modernization and a haphazardly thrown together set of elements that never quite comes off. The music was still great and the performances good, but I do feel the staging may have distracted me from time to time. The music sounded good, following the emotions of the (original) piece well. The dance of the seven veils sounds good, a nicely middle eastern influenced piece that creates its own images. It's clearly the highlight of the show and works as an amazing centre piece. The vocals weren't always as powerful in this version, but did well to tell its story - wtih some specific settings - which created a great piece of music.
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The fourty-eighth classical recording: #119 Joseph Haydn - Symphonies nos. 6-8 A set of three pieces representing morning, day and evening, the pieces represent those times of day well. The morning is an upbeat, active piece, quite exciting and enticing. The second piece is larger, but slower, more leisurely, the evening is calmer. It's a good combination, the three pieces suit each other even if they are mostly separate. There's a liveliness to this that really helps set the mood and creates something to follow along to.
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The one hundred thirteenth album: Jimi Hendrix - Electric Ladyland After enjoying the previous Jimi Hendrix entry on the list, I had half forgotten what this was like by the time I got to it - life's been busy, delays happened, and an extra length album can be harder to fit into my days. Yet listening to it now, it's clear that what struck me before is there. A bluesy rock, the album has several long songs that let the improvisation stand and improve, as well as a number of standard length tracks. There are the psychedelic influences, but again in a way that enhance the song rather than dominating, and it turns into a slow journey through that stays quite gentle. This might well be one of my favourite albums so far, something I wouldn't have expected before starting this list.
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The fifty-ninth book: #49 Confessions - Jean-Jacques Rousseau One of the first autobiographies, Confessions feels like it works okay there from the start - better than Rousseau's other works. He's a decent storyteller, willing to make light of himself and with a bunch of interesting events described. I struggled with names sometimes, but it's mostly decently easy to follow and it feels more accepting to just jumping in. It sounds like a lot of this was fabricated, but really, for the most part that doesn't actually matter. Not having any philosophical questions to focus on, the result here feels like a better novel.
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The ninety-second TV show: #828 Garrow's Law I've struggled with historical drama before and have found that a lot of it comes down to the performance - mostly that they can become a bit too theatrical and over the top, which I can find more annoying than interesting. I've seen some on the list by now that don't do that, and play it at a more interesting level - sounding more natural, rather than an exaggerated Shakespeare play. Of course, Garrow's law falls into the more listenable camp, moving at a more modern pace in a way that makes sense. There are, of course, many formal courtroom proceedings, as a historical legal drama, but it makes sense. Andrew Buchan does a lot for this. He's a compelling actor, imbuing Garrow with a spirit that remains compelling throughout. He cares, he's flawed but he wants to change a system that's not working for everyone and he's amazing at playing that passion. The cast that surrounds him does so as well - Southouse as the barrister keeping him on…
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The fourty-seventh classical recording: #53 John Blow - Venus and Adonis Today's piece is an early opera, something we would have expected but I didn't quite expect to hear. The differences - English language, using older instruments - are surprising and it took me a while to realise that I could understand the lyrics. Still, it's the music that requires the bigger adjustment - operas so far have always seemed a bit more bombastic, but this makes it sound gentler. The story is fairly straight forward, but translates well to the music and the more delicate score really reflects that well.
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The one hundred twelfth album: #112 Os Mutantes - Os Mutantes Listening to this, I feel like I'm still trying to define where tropicalia fits in. It has elements of samba in it, but with more rock influences and a larger soundscape. Not to the point that psychedelic rock has it, but there are more effects in the album, distortion from guitars and other weird sounds that make it sound like far more than a recording of a concert like samba would be. It's not just a party, there's more in here and the experiments pay off. There are also parts where it gets more gentle, O Relogio already getting calmer and gentler. It's surprising how that doesn't actually stand out, but there's a spectrum where there might be weird sounds, but it's not full on party. It made for a better than if I were to have the samba-inspired rock playing the whole time. That variety, coming from the many different sources the music draws from, makes for a great, varied album with a good mix of songs.
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The one hundred eleventh album: #111 Ravi Shankar - The Sounds of India For a real change, today I listened to an album of Indian music. Ravi Shankar introduces each piece explaining the music, how it evolves and how it changes, and the context helps me appreciate a bit more what they're actually doing. With the focus of the music being different, it sounds more supporting - not background music, but not something I felt I focused on as a single thing. It would work as a performance and worked to get me in a mind set - more energetic than that might imply, because of the speed and rhythm changes. The improvisations are compared, to some extent, to jazz on the album, and it does feel similar to that - a basic number that they play around with and extrapolate from. It's good to hear some different music and this was especially worth it, even aside from the influence it has on psychedelic rock after this.
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The fifty-eighth book: #48 Dangerous Liaisons - Pierre Choderlos de Laclos While I've enjoyed plenty of early books, it does feel like at the moment, a lot of styles are still evolving for the better. Epistolaries have not been my favourite, but they have been getting better and while Dangerous Liaisons has its faults, it was a lot more readable. The shorter letters help a lot from me getting too lost if I have to stop halfway during my commute. They also keep the narrative focused, it was nice not to have too many digressions and allowing for a more linear action, rather than the letters dealing with multiple events (possibly out of order). By focusing on the duplicitous characters, the story becomes a lot clearer as well. Still, there's a focus on skipping over the action, which means events get lost sometimes and the gaps seem longer than they really do. Still, it was very readable and I'm happy to feel them getting better. The ninety-first TV show: #630 I'm a Celebrity... Get Me…
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The ninetieth TV show: #611 Six Feet Under A TV show about a family whose family business is an undertaker has to start, by dramatic necessity, with the death of a family member. I believe it also ends with one. I'm not sure I could imagine another way in a series where death plays such a major part. There is usually one per week, and aside from the procedures surrounding that, like the service and the body being prepared, often it feeds into the themes of the episode and the problems the other characters face. While they have a number of standard conflicts, they feel like they got a bit more complex than they would have been. One of the brothers is in a gay relationship that has shades of internalised homophobia that feels right for that era. The playboy settling is dealing with health problems and the troubled daughter feels more developed than mostly any other one I've seen. It's helped by a formidable cast that can handle everything admirably well, with a lot of charm that makes…
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The fourty-sixth classical recording: #239 Felix Mendelssohn - Octet Continuing in my journey to learn and appreciate more classical music, I think this is the first time I've encountered an (instrumental) octet. Not having the full body of an orchestra removed some of the force, which worked well with the energy this piece has. At time menacing, the speed of play feels more important, the franticness of forte sections contrasting with the quieter, more delicate parts that bring out the individual voices more clearly. While I am, of course, listening to recordings here, it feels like the effect in the room would have been even better, feeling more personal as you can get swept up in these sections. It's uplifting, more intense to listen to than I expected, but (it turns out) great to get some energy to start the day.
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The one hundred tenth album: #110 The Kinks - The Kinks Are The Village Green Preservation Society Where many albums of this time are rather varied, throwing several ideas in with perhaps a musical link between songs, but not necessarily a theme. The Village Green Preservation Society instead has a lyrical theme, mostly harkening back to memories of childhood and older traditions - being able to play on that village green, the feeling of what things used to be like, and wondering what happened to the people at the time. It builds out from there, with the music following suit. It's a bit slow, the instruments packing a punch but all of it adding up to a gentler rock that fit in with that theme. There's no high energy rock here, but more music that feels like it drifts you there without becoming psychedelic - it stays grounded through all of this, perhaps with the exception of fairy tale Phenomenal Cat and the calypso Monica, but it feel like both still fit into the same 'story'.
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The fifty-second comic: #574 Frank Here's the first comic listed as being 'funny animal', although we've seen parodies of the genre before while I suppose the likes of Garfield are just humor comics. Here it's a longer story, several pages of this strange animal (vaguely cat-like) called Frank who lives in this bizarre world. Frank has a small house-shaped pet and meets several other bizarre creatures hwo live in this world. Some of these are colourful (when applicable) nightmare creatures of strange designs, who are probably the most visually stunning parts, but in the end it's all down to these small adventures and encounters in the world, even when they involve plucking weird creatures out of the sky.
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The fifty-first comic: #150 Frontline Combat A sister publication to Shock SuspenStories, Frontline Combat follows the same format of four stories in an issue that cover a topic - in this case, stories about war. These are brutal, showing the real horror of war, and involve plenty of people dying, running away like cowards and being horribly maimed. There's a jingoistic bend to it, where the American troups win, being a coward gets punished and collaborators end up in trouble. Considering this was published during the Korean war, that's not a big surprise, but it feels very moralizing now. Still, when ignoring that the series is quite informative and you really get a feeling for how terrible it is on the frontline. I'm sure war has changed somewhat, but it feels more like what you expect than the perfection other places sometimes have. It's dirty and dark. The series probably ended at the right time - not just because the war was over, but the stories became stale and the increased…
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The fourty-fifth classical recording: #780 George Gershwin - Porgy and Bess After a number of shorter pieces, we're listening to a three hour opera. Unlike the others, it's in English, set in more modern times and so more comprehensible on multiple levels.Still, it's odd to hear classic songs with an operatic bend (and it does sound more impressive that way). There's a contemporary feel to it beyond that, though, more musical-like with a story still (mostly) told through song, but feeling more modern. This seems to extend everywhere and it makes for an amazing soundtrack that way. Even that is enough to tell the (at the time controversial) story, a tragic love story made more complex through the circumstances in which they happen.
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The one hundred ninth album: #109 The Incredible String Band - The Hangman's Beautiful Daughter Scottish psychedelic folk sounds like it should be interesting - once again something different. And it's hard to ignore that it's trying to be different. At times it works - the lyrics are always interesting, thoughtful and though eccentric, the way it tries to talk about other things works really well. The melodies are lovely, the experiments with different instruments working out well. The thirteen minute Very Cellular Song shows this well. There are - as you'd probably expect from the era - a lot of Indian influences, too much sometimes, but mostly the album keeps it well balanced. Sometimes, though, it doesn't quite work. And it's not musically, but the attitude being different. It feels like they try to be funny - and while it might be intended as a parody, it can come across as too self indulgent and... well, just stupid. It isn't a joke I feel in on and it feels unnecessary…
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The fourty-fourth classical recording: #67 Antonio Vivaldi - Concerto for Two Trumpets We hadn't yet featured Vivaldi, despite his works being quite famous ones. With it we have a work that focuses, obviously, on two trumpets, and that sets the piece apart. It sounds jubilant and as the brass instruments are allowed to shine, they create their own sound that feels more excited and exuberant - no wonder that trumpets are used to hail arriving royalty, they have that big sound that attracts your attention.
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The fiftieth comic: #407 You Are There There is something really compelling about worlds that are a step away from our reality. While Mornemont's technology and buildings seem real, there's something odd about an island full of walls dividing properties and the owner of the walls (but not the land in between anymore) charging people to open the gates in the walls. It's how he makes money and stays in some sort of control. Partially the comic covers his life, dealing with the people on the island who aren't happy with his presence, the insanity and weirdness of the situation. It's magical realism of sorts - not as much magical, but weirdness that intrudes in the world. It could be real, but doesn't feel it and probably wouldn't actually work. It's an interesting if bewildering insight into this odd world. Then there's the storyline of this man, Albert There, regaining the island. It involves some political commentary, but just as much social commentary. It doesn't quite finish, it…
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The fourty-third classical recording: #631 Erno Dohnányi - Variations on a Nursery Song While this piece starts with a big introduction, grandiose and described as Wagnerian (which makes sense), it moves into just a piano playing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. As variations then do, it starts to vary how the tune - or at this point, theme - is played, The reason it works so well is because the theme is so much better known, it seems easier to latch on to it and really appreciate the variations. While it feels like a nice exercise for the composer and musician, as a novice listener I appreciate the examples even more. The one hundred eighth album: #108 Traffic - Traffic Folk rock is another genre that seems to have been ignored recently. Here, we start with a call and response number and a blues rhytm rock song that feels out of place in the era. And while it experiments a bit, it feels like this gentler rock does need another hook, which I couldn't find in these songs. It's what it is…
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The one hundred seventh album: #107 The Rolling Stones - Beggars Banquet Starting off with Sympathy of the Devil, the expectation for Beggars Banquet is set as something high energy, dark and feeding into the aggressive nature the Rolling Stones would stand to promote. Following up with No Expectations, that gets squashed as it's a quieter blues number, a ballad that takes that quieter direction. And that's the contradiction at the heart of this album - while the songs the Stones became most famous for (at least in my mind) are like the first track, they seem at their most comfortable moving towards blues (often blues rock) and mixing in these heavier songs where they seem right - often followed by a lighter ballad. The fourty-ninth comic: #497 Zot! Superhero comics can often end up in a pretty repetitive structure, like Captain America, where the characters move on enough but the world doesn't change that much - all of that to create an ongoing monthly storyline that can last decades…
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The three hundred and seventy-fourth song: Personality Crisis - New York Dolls The New York Dolls are a new entry to the hard/glam rock arena, and here Personality Crisis has the screeching guitars, the scream-singing that was the reason parents got turned off and even some whistling. While it might set up the genre, it's hard to see what this brings and I feel the genre really needs a bit more development to be interesting, to be more than shouting over the song. The book describes this as being influential on punk rock, with other bands taking up the torch, but for me it's quite clear that those bands need to jump in to make it more worthwhile. The three hundred and seventy-fifth song: The Ballroom Blitz - The Sweet Here's an example of glam rock that works better. It's not hard rock, there's a lot of Bowie's work in here, but there's a melody and musical sound here that brings in a chorus, something catchy, giving you something to latch on to through the song. It sounds good and…
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The one hundred sixth album: #106 Aretha Franklin - I Never Loved A Man The Way I Loved You We've reached the first album of the Queen of Soul, even if this was Aretha Franklin's eleventh album. It starts off with the still sensational Respect, setting a tone for the album that feels like it pushes existing songs to a more R&B sound, a loud soul that moves away from the blues origins into something more lively. The energy shifts through the album, but it mostly stays on the up, and the slower soul songs still sound good and move along nicely still. It's well produced, but not over produced, and Aretha's voice dominates it all. She sounds perfect, with great emotion in there but always in control of the songs.
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The one hundred fifth album: #105 Jimi Hendrix - Axis: Bold As Love While this album is classed as psychedelic rock, it doesn't feel as psychedelic - as over the top - as other albums of the era. There's the touches, but mostly this feels like classic rock, possibly with some weirder lyrics, but they feel well written and on the whole there's a classic Hendrix sound here that simply sounds good as that, no other tricks needed. It's well judged in applying what it has, using enough but not more than that
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The eighty-ninth TV show: #492 Cadfael Before we picked this series, we were talking about the need to do a crime show. A monk in the 12th century investigating crimes felt like a good twist on it - and as I loved Umberto Eco's In the Name of the Rose (the book - apparently the movie doesn't hold up), it felt like a good pick. Sadly, it turned out that wasn't quite right. While the dialogue was good in places, the world is interesting and the regulars are amazing, the writing doesn't live up to it. Perhaps it's because all of these were based on books, but they drag - not in old show dragging, where it's not as tightly edited, but lots of filler dragging where the characters and world are meant to build on, but it doesn't actually manage to do so. Instead, it just plots - some definite third act problems, and it's hard to not feel like this would have been better as a standard hour rather than the feature length these episodes are. They turned it into a boring series, where the good…
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The fourty-second classical recording: #16 Giovanni Pierluigi de Palestrina - Missa Papae Marcelli Masses haven't always gone over well listening to it, but here I feel they work out better than previous ones. As polyphony is explored further, we're getting more interesting mixes with more actual "instruments" in them. Here they work nicely together, flowing and creating something calming that we don't always get. There's more variation than in other masses and the work takes on its own identity more than we get in others.
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The eighty-eighth TV show: #727 Infinite Challenge When we were watching some bits of this show as a preview, when we were trying to set up some of the shows to make sure they worked, this seemed like quite an odd thing - different enough that it'd be interesting, but would it really keep us engaged? Starting at a different point though, in an extreme jobs special, we saw the group of the time both do jobs that were wearing them out, but also staying entertaining through it. Jumping through a lot of different types of episodes (and there is a large variety), the chemistry between the hosts stands out. There's a lot of banter, digs at each other, and some of the best moments are when they're competing with each other trying to get one over each other. They're good performers who do their best to work in any situation, but also dorky enough to have great reactions. It just cheers us up, watching it and seeing them going big and at times silly. It's good fun, with characters you quickly…
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The fifty-seventh book: #47 Reveries of the Solitary Walker - jean-Jacques Rousseau So after a long story of family life, my next book is a shorter, unfinished work of Jean-Jacques Rousseau's musings while he was walking around Paris. These are mostly philosophical musings about life and society, I can't really find much interest in such high ideas and my attention drifts quite quickly when it keeps going, so this didn't feel worth it - there wasn't enough substance to it and I would rather have heard more of the actual work, observing and commenting on the world around him rather than theorizing. For those interested, I'm sure this would work better, but not for me as a casual reader.
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The one hundred fourth album: #104 The Velvet Underground - White Light/White Heat While we've previously listened to the Velvet Underground when paired with Nico, this album is them on their own, taking their own direction. The absence of Nico creates a rougher sound, and the longer songs have a looser feel to them. The second song already takes an unexpected turn - an eight minute long short story read out over a rock track. It's an interesting idea, certainly fitting with the art scene they were in, but it starts to drag halfway through, not giving anything extra. After that, the album falls into a more predictable rhythm, a wall of rock music with the same raw vocals and distortion that comes out stronger in the 17 minute long Sister Ray, a part improvised single take piece of music that drones on in a constant and consistent tone. It's noise, but in a way that sounds good, at least for the genre this is in.
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The fifty-sixth book: #1011 Amelia - Henry Fielding Have I ever mentioned how tired I'm getting of the "perfect woman" narrative? The recent picaresque novels strayed away from it a bit, but Henry Fielding goes back into it. The titular Amelia resists all temptations and bears her bad fortunes gracefully, while her husband (from a marriage against her mother's wishes) joins the army, gets arrested, loses their money through gambling and cheats on her. Yeah, it's a bad life, but she weathers it, gets a big inheritance and they retire together. It's written in the overblown style that I disliked before, it's not quite readable. It's literature... but perhaps I wish I could get an edit that works a bit better for me.
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The fourty-first classical recording: #474 Ernest Chausson - Poeme de l'amour et de la mer So far, most of our vocal performances have been either operas, with a specific setting, or choral performances that have started to feel repetitive. Getting a poem set to music makes for a gentler performance. There's something calming in the performance, a restrained orchestra set to make vocals shine as it takes you away. It's obviously affected by the mood I'm in, but the music is just right when you need some relaxation after a busy day and taking you to the waterfront or leave you dreaming of love.
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The three hundred and sixty-fourth song: Most People I Know… - Billy Thorpe & The Aztecs I'm not sure to what extent this song is Australian rock or just its own variant on rock, but there's something especially melodic song to this, bringing back the stronger vocal performances from earlier rock that's gotten lost, with some of the tricks of modern rock but none of the at times over the top psychedelia. It's seventies, yet harkens back to a time when rock wasn't about volume or being out there. Instead it's smaller and more natural, more personal than rock songs sometimes feel. If David Bowie is one side of the reinvention of rock, this is trying to modernize its roots. The three hundred and sixty-fifth song: Taj Mahal - Jorge Ben Although Wikipedia describes this as samba rock, it feels like you could take that a step further. The 'black' influences merges in a bit of soul at the start and pushes it towards disco. It's something that doesn't quite hold up - and the heavy guitar…
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The eighty-seventh TV show: #139 Whistle and I'll Come for You Regardless of the reasons, it's fair to say that our sense of pacing for TV has changed over time. While this is often seen as something that is seen in the length of shots, it's also a structural thing. In a horror story like this, we want to get to the mystery sooner - not fully, but with some hints and pointers. Alternatively, having some smaller thing go on at the side helps. The Tractate Middoth showed how things go if that doesn't work - a story that feels like it cuts off after the second act. Here, the first act establishing. normality drags a bit and, for all that has it happen naturally, leaves it a bit too long to establish something is going on. It takes off once the whistle is found, but doesn't feel like it builds up any tension to get there. Once you realise that something is going on, it does start to increase it, while still keeping the whole thing small. There's something weird going on, but the show…
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The one hundred third album: #103 Shivkumar Sharma - Call of the Valley Following on with weirder genres, this feels like one of the more unexpected entries on the list. We have, of course, covered a lot of classical music for the other list, and I believe this one generally avoids it. Call of the Valley, however, is a light classical album of Indian music, likely to have inspired many western artists.And it's different from both categories, taking what seems like a more minimalist approach. You get simpler music in other places too, but here it's especially sparse, in a way that made me appreciate each individual instrument more. The album is relaxing and enchanting in a way that stands out in this era and makes me want to investigate the genre a bit more, to at least get a few more samples of it.
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The eighty-sixth TV show: #420 Dekalog For this entry, we watched a ten part series set in a tower block in Warsow, focused on the ten commandments. It's an anthology with some overlapping characters, but independent stories. It means the stories differe a lot in where they go and what happens, but there's this vague link in themes. The stories are usually quite small and human. Some about an affair that barely gets resolved, or searching for a missing lover. Others take it a bit larger, dealing with death and depression, but it always stay local, with a few characters involved, in situations that could - and probably are - real life. It makes them that much more relatable and through that more effective. This is helped by the cinematography. While the writer and director is the same for all of them, this probably being one of his big works, the cinematographer changes for nearly each episode (there are nine, one of them handled two episodes). It shows in how different the episodes…
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The fifty-fifth book: #1010 Tobias George Smollett - Roderick Random There are a lot of picaresque novels from this era on the list - it was clearly a popular genre at the time. However, they feel like often they hit some similar beats, especially in the early story (abandoned or forced to leave) and at the end (they're wealthy after all!). To that point, I find it hard to distinguish at least some of them. This one has some good moments though, a nice focus on some of the naval experiences and mostly far more decent conversations that a lot of these books. There have been some good passages - even if I missed out on some of the connecting material, I think I got more of the story than it most of these.
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The fourtieth classical recording: #947 Einojuhani Rautavaara - Cantus Arcticus Here's another modern classical pieces making use of recorded sounds, after Different Trains, and the mood it creates couldn't be more different. Including recorded bird song, this, more than ever, gives you the feeling of walking through nature filled with birds that take priority over the instruments. In the first movement it creates a setting, a slow trod that suits the walk through a bog. It changes a bit in the second, as Melancholy has some clearer instruments in places that build it up a bit more, while the third movement moves towards being mostly instrumental, with bird sounds in the background filling the music. It's interesting to hear these new sounds mixed in, especially as music so often tries to imitate nature. Here it embraces the natural sound and builds around it, which is just as succesful at creating that atmosphere of nature.
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The one hundred second album: #102 Loretta Lynn - Don't Come Home A Drinkin' (With Lovin' On Your Mind) While it seems like I've been doing mostly rock albums lately (although that impression might be coloured by the gaps between them sometimes), country has been far less common and make for somewhat of a change. I never connected with country as much - while I can feel some of the appeal, it also takes me the wrong way sometimes - too much longing and sadness, where aggression or happiness always work better with me. It's something later country takes on as well, but here we're still stuck with the blues references. And so, while the music is well sung, the songs are good and the story is told, I keep hoping this gets pushed a bit further. Some songs hint at this - and Get Whatcha Got and Go really makes up for it and perked me up immensely - but I was hoping this would come back more often.
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The one hundred and first album: #101 The Electric Prunes - I Had Too Much To Dream (Last Night) Waving in the direction of surf rock, with some psychedelia involved, this album goes, at times, a bit rougher than that, but it's a real mix of influences, shifting from song to song to appeal to different moods. The fairly happy Onie is followed by the darker Are You Lovin' Me More (But Enjoying It Less) and the mood shifts feel a bit much. There's not much of a consistent sound in here and while they're well written, it feels like something with a bit more consistency would have been good. It feels like the writers are responsible for this - forced on the band and seeming to want to experiment more than create a sound that suits the band. Sold To The Highest Bidder feels like a big offender in this regard - loud, experimental, but not in a way that suits the band. It leaves me wondering why they bothered.
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The thirty-ninth classical recording: #853 Benjamin Britten - The Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra I realise we didn't listen to the full version of this work, as apparently narration can be used to introduce the different instruments as they come in, each playing a variation of the theme suited for that instrument. It lets you understand where the various instruments fit in and how they can be used in different ways. It feels like a more unique structure, but one that works by showcasing individual parts, rather than building on each other as we normally, often, see.
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The thirty-eighth classical recording: #15 Orlande de Lassus - Motets It's tricky to hear sometimes what separates one motet from the other and while de Lassus is credited with some specific innovations, but I can't say I detected them in the album mentioned - instead they were fairly staid, perhaps at time a bit faster than others, but not greatly so. There are probably good examples of his sense of humor, but I'm not good enough to find them in here.
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The eighty-fifth TV show: #407 Mystery Science Theater 3000 MST3k has been a mainstay of our viewing for nearly a decade now, though not at great speed - we're still not past season five and so haven't seen all the different groups of actors. I have seen a lot of bad movies be made most bearable through the commentaries of Joel, Tom Servo and Crow, together with some bizarre sketches filling time around commercial breaks. Aside from licensing, the original concept feels cheap - put a few people (or their puppet representation) in front of a film and have them comment. Improvised at first, but for the most part prewritten (and it's better that it was, so there weren't the quiet periods that punctate "season 0"). Somehow, these personalities connected, especially when you share the pop culture knowledge, and it feels like you're watching and riffing a movie with your friends - even if they are far more quick witted and funnier than you'd be. It's a great formula that's worked…
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The eighty-fourth TV show: #79 Doctor Who (1963) When doing a rewatch, it can be hard to pick a set of twenty episodes to watch of a show. More so when it ran for over twenty years, with several format changes, and stories are almost all multi parters. I tried to go with a four parter for each of the first five doctors - probably containing the better eras of the show. And for quality, it will of course be a mixed bag - 26 seasons, with several stories each and several production crew changes, means that it goes up and down. It has endured though, and left an impact. There are a few factors in play: they have cast good Doctors, the one considered worst (Colin Baker) being led down by material, but shining when he got a chance to work with better (mostly after he left the show). Regeneration plays a big part as well - because they came up with a way to replace William Hartnell without ending the show, the doctor can change every few years, often in a way that reacts against what the…
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The fifty-fourth book: #1009 Roxana - Daniel DeFoe All these comics have distracted me from reading novels recently, not helped by the at times mixed quality of these. Still, Daniel DeFoe has delivered on these stories with most of these stories - Robinson Crusoe might, in the end, be one of his weakest. Roxana is certainly mixed in that sense. Quite a bit of it is engaging, but there are several areas with descriptions that don't hold up for me. I'm not as interested in the details of the household or how they live their lives - it's the drama and the stories that interest me. Luckily, there are several places where that holds up, and while, similarly, dialogue is still somewhat stilted, it feels a lot more readable in the places where they don't have paragraph long discussions. It's an interesting ascent and descent through social ranks, although they are themes he's explored before. It's readable, but by now I'm looking forward to something that's a bit different.
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The three hundred and fifty-fourth song: Silver Machine - Hawkwind Wikipedia describes Silver Machine as "space rock" and Hawkwind as a space rock band, a subgenre I'd never heard of (but evidently that's just me). The minute long intro contains enough effects that I would have had that idea anyway and we get a fairly simple rocksong, uplifted by the odd intro. It's subdued, considering where Lemmy went afterwards, but it works well here to emphasize the weirdness of some of the music. The three hundred and fifty-fifth song: Tumbling Dice - The Rolling Stones Having just covered Jimi Hendrix for the album list, falling into the Stones' blues rock helps bring some things back around. It rocks more, but it feels loose, a bit more disjointed and not as produced - it feels like just the band hanging around recording a song (which is how it went). The appeal is in there, a song aimed at just the right tempo and working well to create a mood and feeling, one that isn't too hard…
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The thirty-seventh classical recording: #471 Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky - The Sleeping Beauty This was a late birthday present - my first trip to the ballet. We went to watch Sleeping Beauty, the last of the Tchaikovsky baleets we still needed to cover. And the skill of daners, on which the entire performance is focused, means that the music wasn't what I was paying as much attention to. Then again, it mixes, and one wouldn't exist without the other. What we get is a good set of music, with some recognisable motifs but mostly giving the dances enough room to breathe. Seeing the dancers improves the visibility of the motifs a lot more - by seeing who's on stage, it's clearer who they are for. The variations do the same, and they do well, in places, to (for example) establish the different faeries. Although not what the list is for, this way of listening and watching really pulls it together - we'll see whether we can keep affording to do that. The fourty-eighth comic: #95 Captain America…
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The one hundredth album: Jimi Hendrix - Are You Experienced Listening to this album, Jimi Hendrix's blues background comes through a lot. Whlie the guitars make the songs sound like rock, and a lot of it surrounding fit that mold, it also has a speed that takes it closer to blues, and the vocals feel like a mix of blues and rock as well. The best songs are a mix between the two, creating this blues sound with a kick to it. We've heard the Rolling Stones do similar things in the past, this fits into that pattern. But then May This Be Love pops up, a gentle ballad that sounds different from the other songs. The vocals are still there, but everything is softer and gentler, completely creating a different atmosphere. It's a welcome change, at a good point in the album, and shows the versatility of the entire thing.
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The eighty-third TV show: #764 Outnumbered I've been struggling how to approach this series. We've watched it before and enjoyed it. There are a bunch of good moments and it's quite recognisable - this is what life with kids looks like. At the same time, I've not been overly enthusiastic about watching it either. Why? I think part of it is that the show has a tendency to repeat similar beats and doesn't always bring something original to the table. That's fine in shorter stretches, but not when you binge a bunch of them. That's not because of the parents' plots. Claire Skinner and Hugh Dennis are good, as expected, carrying whatever they need to do while having the right level of exasperation at the kids and their actions, while dealing with their grown up problems. Tyger Drew-Honey, as he's slightly older at the start of the series, gets more to do as well and continues to be a delight to watch. The level of awareness is greater, which means he's as game as any of the adults, which…
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The eighty-second TV show: #591 Waking The Dead When this came out of our bucket, we were quite excited by getting a show we've been looking to (re)watch for a long time. Waking the Dead follows a squad that investigates cold cases (often, but not always murder) that have had new leads discovered. They investigate, following a bunch of standard procedural leads, but as often eschewing the standards for other options. What helps is that we have a team with distinct disciplines here, a forensic scientist and psychological profiler who both work as major parts of the team (rather than being called in, as on so many other shows, or their work being done by regular detectives. Now, for spoiler reasons, I've only covered the first team from the first four seasons - the change at the end of the fourth season (which I don't know about) is apparently a big change that I wouldn't want to know yet. This initial team, however, feel strong. Boyd feels like the tough cop at times, as the lead…
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The thirty-sixth classical recording: #279 Frederic Chopin - Ballades Here's a different way of approaching it. Where we mostly listen to these songs online, often through Spotify, on a recent holiday to Chopin's homeland of Poland we went to a live concert. A talented pianist played a selection of works including Chopin's four ballades. The atmosphere of such a concert, with about 30 people in the room, felt quite different, more intimate as the pianist got into the music completely. The ballades made this even more impressive, as they sound complicated, mixing speeds and generally seeming full on. There are breaks in the music, but they're quite deliberate to lead up to a further theme. It's a wonderful variety in sounds that lead to amazing music that's enough to carry you away. I'm glad I got to see this live - it made it even more impressive.
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The ninety-ninth album: Merle Haggard - I'm A Lonesome Fugitive In between the different rock albums I feel I've been covering lately (with a Frank Sinatra diversion), country has gotten lost. I have, in fact, been expecting one more often than I've had one actulaly play. Here we really have one, though, the title track immediately dumping you in a country blues song, describng life on the run as an escaped convict. The songs continue in that vein, with different levels of energy, but it's country, and mostly good country for me at that. Sure, there's a lot that blurs together - but it gave a good background to my day, while being impactful enough. I don't expect to ever really love country, but this was decent, especially with the mood it was trying to invoke.
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The ninety-eighth album: Donovan - Sunshine Superman For the songs list, I covered Season of the Witch, the sixth song on this album. I feel this song might not have been the most representative, as the album won me over a lot sooner, with the folk rock music of these songs being amended by psychedelic rock elements, introducing different instruments and sounds to enhance the song and the story it tells. Legend of a Girl Child Linda, the second track, was enough to do that, and it both sounds really good and tells its story well. Even Season of the Witch works better in context, although it doesn't feel like the strongest on the album.
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The ninety-seventh album: #97 The Kinks - Something Else By The Kinks With the Kinks moving towards a poppier rock - without too much psychedelia or hard rock, this album feels inclined towards easier listening - we get a friendly list of songs with diverse, smart lyrics, somewhat of a variety of styles, but all staying within a 'normal' sound, aimed at a wider audience. I'm not sure whether this is intended or the sound they wanted just felt this way, but there's some good pop songs in here, even if they have a rock bend. Even then, Love Me Till The Sun Shines takes it the other way, mixing in more psychedelic sounds - I guess we get a lot of different influences here and Dave Davies seems to lean more towards that while Ray goes for the poppier songs. I prefer these songs though. I've mentioned my appreciation of Waterloo Sunset before and it still is as good, and the other songs that draw on this are the ones that are best to listen to. There's some Beach Boys influence, but it…
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The eighty-first TV show: #435 Twin Peaks Man, that was a ride. We watched the full original run of the series (minus the movie) and it was an amazing treat. The world of Twin Peaks feels so realised, it's easy to slip in, which allows for a heightened mystery - it's a soap opera with a mystic crime story mixed in. It's fascinating and, ignoring the less interesting second half of the second season, has many things to hold your attention. What's going on, how will it resolve, but also, what weird thing does it come up with next? And the season finales steadfastly refuse to tie up plotlines, to the point where we got the big reveal partway through the second season, to help with the outrage. I hate to call this Lynchian. While elements of his work are present and have a noticeable influence, a lot of other notable elements come from Mark Frost (the soap-within-a-soap being one of the meta elements that is such) and people imitating Lynch's style - and in the best cases putting their…
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The ninety-sixth album: #96 Jefferson Airplane - Surrealistic Pillow I'm sure I've said this before, but the songs list has primed me for the innovations in rock that are about to happen, and these psychedelic rock albums really tell me how we're still stuck somewhere before that. I'm not sure this is the most psychedelic fare out there, but it takes the gentler sounds that we've seen come from folk rock and the Beatles and plays with that. The first recognisable song here is Somebody to Love, a rock classic that I can only imagine successors would want to play with. It's not necessarily ambitious (although this might be hindsight speaking) but it's solid music.
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The fourty-seventh comic: #417 Kampung Boy Now to a somewhat sweeter story. Kampung Boy is the story of a boy growing up in a kampung, a village, in Malaysia. It covers his parents, his education (mostly religious, at least initially) and his friends. There's stories about his daily life, but also how the modern world enters this life, both by the machines mining for tin and traveling in cars. It's a story of life that doesn't exist much anymore and the story ends as the protagonist leaves the village, both because his parents sell their rubber plantation and because he goes to boarding school - as he leaves the kampung, he is no longer a kampung boy. It's a small, simple story. There are no big threats or adventures, but they are parts of life, combined into a narrative. It's a fast, satisfying read that entertains and enlightens well.
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The fourty-sixth comic: #169 The Marsupilami Robbers Spirou (or Robbedoes as I know the character) is a comics character I've been aware of for ages, and the Marsupilami might have been going around me for even longer. I never was a big fan of the character, either in comics or TV series - too goody-good and not enough interesting stuff going on there. Fantasio (or Kwabbernoot) was more interesting as the sidekick, but others were more of a favourite. Here, it doesn't quite land for me. I don't hate it, but not all of the gags landed and the timing felt off - the story seemed rushed by putting in a few too many things. The Marsipulami is a nice idea, but doesn't come off well here and I'm not quite sure why this story, in particular, would be chosen. It's fine, but doesn't feel that great.
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The fourty-fifth comic: #498 The 110 Pills We have to cover a couple of erotic comics during these adventures, which is somewhat awkward considering most of my comics reading is on the train. I bit the bullet for 110 Pills and was happy that the black and white lineart somewhat obfuscated what I'm reading to the casual observer. 110 Pills got explicit, with drawn nudity and sexual acts, as, in a way, suits the story. It revolves around a leader (I want to say a Chinese nobleman, but I'm not sure that's intended) with several concubines. To help his sexual prowess, he gets pills from a monk that help him out - 110 pills of Viagra, you could say. He is told to take them only once every full moon, but of course he doesn't stick to that and it leads to his end. There are a bunch of gratuitious scenes, embracing the concept to show off, but the art is done quite well and the story and characterization is strong enough to take it beyond that. It's been a good read - while I wasn't trying to…
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The thirty-fifth classical recording: Aaron Copland - Rodeo Looking at some sources, this is described as Broadway influenced - and indeed the ballet is abundant and loud in a way most aren't. It's, indeed, a play in the form of a ballet, and the two styles are an interesting mix - a traditional instrumentation with what feels like a more modern score (by the standards of the 1940s, of course. Can't go too far). There's also an old west influence, about a cowgirl trying to impress the cowboys. It's an unexpected mix, but it works - it's special and more than you might expect from a ballet at first.
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The three hundred and fourty-fifth song: Papa Was a Rollin’ Stone - The Temptations There are two parts to this song. Thanks to its lengthy musical introduction (two minutes in the single version we listened to, four in the full 12 minute version), the electronic soul music dominates, creating a tension in its music that has its source in the Theme from Shaft from a while ago. Then there are the vocals, subdued for a soul group, more grim than you normally get. It's angry, with a lot of accusations in its tone, something that appears to have been a consequence of the studio atmosphere. There's an edge to this that moves it beyond normal soul, adding an energy that benefits the song immensely. The three hundred and fourty-sixth song: I’ll Take You There - The Staple Singers In contrast, this feels like more jubilant soul, but in a way that feels more put together, It get repetitive quickly enough, but there's a rhythm in the early song that catches your attention. It's optimistic about…
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The fourty-fourth comic: #967 Attack on Titan One of the big manga of the moment, Attack on Titan desolate world is worrying on its own. A world roamed by giant (but somewhat mindless) humanoids called titans have driven humanity to live in a corner of the world - little more than a large city and its surrounding fields. At the start, they've had a form of peace for the past century - they're on guard, but the titans have been unable to get to them. As the usual start to a series like this, it all changes one day. They break through one of the walls and it's a disaster for humanity. They rally by giving up a large part of their territory and the comic is about the fight back. That comes with its twists, as we find out more about what the titans are and where they came from, a story I'm still figuring out as I read this. It's draw with an interesting detail, the humans looking fairly standard for manga but with exquisite, horrid detail put in the titans. They look human, sure, but…
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The ninety-fifth album: #95 Young Rascals - Groovin' Am I used to too much? This album feels quite light, with the happy go lucky sound of something like early Beach Boys, gentle rock, R&B influenced but quite light and fun. And I guess it works, but it's just not standing out as special, more just fairly generic. There are some interesting experiments (although the stereo switching between audio channels were more making me feel queasy). It's early Beatles... at a time where we had Sgt Pepper, Revolver and the others
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The ninety-fourth album: #94 The Byrds - Younger Than Yesterday Today's stop on this tour of sixties rock drops us off with folk/country rock, the Byrds including some psychedelia in their music but staying true to those roots. C.T.A.-102 is a revelation in that sense - having a standard folk riff that involves weird sound effects and an alien invading the song about a minute and a half in. I'm not quite sure what happens, but it shows that there is more to this album than might seem at first. It nicely interrupts the easy listening songs. They're nicely put together, easy to listen to, a bit sentimental but suitable for the album. Then songs like that heighten the stakes, showing they're aware of what's out there and not avoiding it.
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The ninety-third album: #93 The Doors - The Doors It's been a bit of a bad couple of weeks and some rock goes down like a treat - some hard guitars, loud vocals and aggression. The organs are still out there, reminding us we're in the psychedelic sixities (doing the songs list messes with my perception of time here). It's also haunting at times, to sink away into, and that mood really gets invoked as I listen. Still, it's not quite as hard as the bands the Doors would inspire. Light My Fire feels really slow - apparently an issue with the album recording, which is slowed down from the original recording, but also in how it's put together.
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The eightieth TV show: #109 Thunderbirds I was a fan of Thunderbirds growing up. My father watched it when he was young and the excitement was carried over - probably helped by the mechanical wonders seen (some of which are now, and only now, becoming reality) and the exciting stories they told. The franchise is a kid friendly action show, the Thunderbirds machines from the title used to rescue people who end up in different emergencies (and some other stories). This is done using Supermarionation, advanced marionettes that look impressive. They are not realistic - having oversized heads to focus your attention on where the action is - and it's amazing how much they portray with three different static expressions (done by swapping heads), moving mouths and subtle movements. The wires show - literally - and the tricks don't always work, but a lot of the time it's amazing how much moving eyes and eyelids can tell. The series moves at a pace that still works today - apparently, short…
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The fifty-third book: #1008 A Tale of a Tub - Jonathan Swift Satirical works always rely a bit on the reader understanding what's going on. The best don't necessarily do so - which is why Gulliver's Travels has some good sections - but it means that works that were relevant and entertaining in their day (this was considered Swift's best) are lacklustre these day. The parable of the three brothers comments on the development of protestant religion and how none met Swift's puritan vision. It doesn't feel as relevant today - a few hundred years making a difference in how these religions are perceived and mixed - and I don't really care about the point it's trying to make in the first place. The long philosophical digressions didn't help either - they always bore me - and on the whole that left me with a novel that had some interesting passages, but bored me just as often. Sorry to disappoint, your best doesn't seem as good to me.
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The fourty-third comic: #26 The Gumps Today we're covering a 1917 newspaper comic about an inventor (although that barely comes up in the ones we read) and his family. Constrained to the Sunday comics as we are (availability is limited), it feels like the setup is too long and the pay off too little, with most punchlines just not that funny. It might have been special at the time, but it feels like it all bypassed me here.
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The ninety-second album: #92 Frank Sinatra - Frank Albert Sinatra And Antonio Carlos Jobim Old Blue Eyes is back, moving from his show tunes to cover more bossa nova songs as well, starting with the now famous Girl from Ipenima. We've not covered his songs in quite a while and it feels like music has taken over Sinatra's music, but here he's showing more flexibility. He's staying where he's comfortable, but there's a modern twist here that shows him trying to evolve. It won't have set the youth aflame, but probably appealed to older audiences. For the most part it's all standard, though, and while it sounds incredibly good, there isn't actually much news here. The bossa nova influence changes the music somewhat, but there's not loads that would have been different a decade or two ago. Now it feels a bit boring and stale and while other later singers go in this direction too, it feels like here it's missing some energy that really grabs me. Perhaps it's because Sinatra doesn't swing…
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The thirty-fourth classical recording: #606 Igor Stravinsky - The Firebird While it can be quite difficult at times to write down a specific interpretation for a piece, the magic of the enchanted garden and the firebird came through quite clearly in the music for me. It stays evocative throughout, a lot of emotions running through at different speeds and in different places, creating a story you can start to visualize.
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The seventy-ninth TV show: #4 The George Burns and Gracie Allen Show Green Acres has shown us that old comedies aren't necessarily hokey and stale as they imagine to be, even if some of the tropes are there because they started them. Still, Green Acres was ahead of its time and so when this comedy came up, I did wonder. And while it's not as weird as Green Acres, the George Burns and Gracie Allen Show has it's moments of weirdness. First, George Burns is here often as a narrator, getting involved in plots, but rarely really being the focus. Gracie Allen gets the attention, playing her role as dimwitted wife whose leap of logic don't always make sense, but it's somewhat understandable where they come from. Her patter stands out in these episodes, creating a delightful bizarre set of situations that sets up and resolves the plot, but just works well on its own. They came into this from their radio act, and their double act works well from the start, including the interactions with their…
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The three hundred and thirty-seventh song: Tired of Being Alone - Al Green I must admit I'm not quite sure where we ended up in the last eight, but I think the variation continues in the next eight. We're in the era where R&B has established itself and that's what we're getting here, a soul song that feels like it adds the rhythm - and that reminds me of the easy listening music from my days working at the supermarket. It's not bad for that, it just sticks to a very definite sound that works quite well but may not always suit the subject. It's upbeat and feel good and in the end I do appreciate that here. The three hundred and thirty-eighth song: Won’t Get Fooled Again - The Who Whereas the previous song may have felt like a throwback, The Who bring a step forward. We're not quite at metal, we're moving towards punk and hard rock, but we're leaving psychedelia for a heavier guitar sound, possibly with some other influences, but in taking a step back to rock's origins, it drives…
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The thirty-third classical recording: #200 Ludwig von Beethoven - Symphony no 6 "Pastoral" A symphony inspirred by the feeling of being in and walking through nature, it immediately starts off on this note, filled with movement but with some of the serenity of being out in nature. There are places where bird songs are involved, others where the sounds of water flowing come up and rain storms. It's an active nature, loud and varied, wtih humans intruding, and evoking the feeling rather well.
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The thirty-second classical recording: #486 Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky - The Nutcracker It can be hard to judge a ballet on its music alone. There are, of course, some very famous sequences in here, but the link to the visuals is lost. And with a piece as varied at this, the specific dances partway through the second act get lost. It still feels thematically consistent, though, even in places where it varies. It carries you through and creates its own arc, from big and warm to smaller and lighter, sometimes creepier, until its happier waltz at the end. It's a good piece, and I feel I really should seek it out for a live performance rather than just the music I could cover now.
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The fifty-first book: #1007 The Pilgrim's Progress - John Bunyan Meh. Look, I know this is ont he list because it's the first English novel. But a religious allegory would never sit well with me, especially one as blunt as this. And I don't see many redeeming features in how it's creative. I guess some of its imagery is creative, but it's not very effective, especially with the names being as obvious as they are. When you put people in boxes and don't allow them out of it, you're not making your point well enough and there's little that feels redeeming.
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The fiftieth book: #1006 Euphues: The Anatomy of Wit - John Lyly I didn't get Euphues. I just never did. Some books on this list are written to show off how smart the author is, The edition I had was littered with footnotes to explain everything, and the book felt impenetrable because of that. It's mostly more letters and lengthy conversations, without much of a point that I can see. I felt bored and annoyed as nothing happened for most of it and I lost track if anything happened other than a visit to England from Greece. I just didn't see the point.
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The thirty-first classical recording: #115 George Frideric Handel - Music for the Royal Fireworks The overture of this piece is one of the longest, in percentage, probably because it was leading up to the important main event. There's almost a bit of encouragement in there, getting people's excitement up while waiting. The main music, in comparisonm feels a bit tame, and that's probably because the fireworks bangs would punctuate and add aggression to the atmosphere. It's hard to blame it for not having as much oomph here. Instead it's a gentler piece, but one that doesn't emphasize it. I'd say it has confidence in its sound, if that makes sense. The allegro La Réjouissance does speed up (even if that's relative), bringing in some more speed and support. The wind instruments add a different throughline that support some more exciting playing. It either follows or is followed by the menuet, which are more impressive, heavier pieces. They feel like they would go with fireworks better…
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The seventy-eighth TV show: #589 Black Books It's freezing outside right now and I am working from home. My commute time? Let's finish another show. We've watched Black Books before, but I have been looking forward to a rewatch, especially of the later seasons that we don't get to in a rewatch. Following Graham Lineham's work, this is as much if not (after the first season) more driven by Dylan Moran, who plays Bernard, one of the main characters and the owner of the titular book shop. He's a grumpy shopkeeper who's perpetually inebriated and unlikeable. Tamsin Greig plays Fran, the awkward neighbour, first as fellow shop owner, but later just hanging out. Manny, played by Bill Bailey, is hired in the first episode to help Bernard out in the shop, and tries to improve the shop and their life. The show's comedy gets nihilistic, but veers towards the absurd rather than dark comedy, the latter initially following from what I've seen of other Graham Lineham show, but with its own feel…
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The seventy-seventh TV show: #443 Have I Got News For You Here'sa gameshow, of sorts, that I've seen plenty of before. The British panel shows often mostly ignore the game aspect of it, using as a structure to hang jokes and conversations on. Here it's done using the news, and this is probably part of the reason for its longevity. In my experience, it can be a mixed bag these days - the rotating hosts and up and down energy of the regulars makes it, at times, tiring to watch. With the right guests and stories, this is a helpful way of making sense of the news, but with other shows doing the same, there are times where this can feel staid and at times, with Ian Hislop and Paul Merton being old hands at it, feeling a bit out of touch with the younger audience. The right guests change this... but it can be mixed. Still, watching older episodes, there are a lot of good episodes and the show stays funny. I've been lucky enough to be able to watch the show live and everything feels like it…
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The ninety-first album: #91 The Velvet Underground - The Velvet Underground & Nico This album starts with Sunday Morning, a quiet ballad that I wouldn't immediatley have expected from the band - I'm Waiting for the Man is the first song that feels like it's theirs, but the album stays calmer than I thought it would be, more haunting than I would sometimes expect. This also allows the album to make use of moments where it speeds up - Heroin especially makes good use of it, both the tempo and harshness of the sounds enforces the journey the song takes.It's experimental in places, very interesting there, but never off putting, which is useful here.
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The seventy-sixth TV show: #32 The Price Is Right Let's be clear here, while the book starts this in 1956, we really want to look at what was known as "The New Price Is Right" for a few years starting in 1972 - the rework starring Bob Barker that is still ongoing, Drew Carey having taken over a decade ago. All shows revolve around the prices of items - a selection game on small items, "price is right rules" of who gets closest without going over. We then get different games each time for other prices, followed by spinnings of the great wheel to decide who gets to the end game - all about prices and winning money if you get close. There's a lot of variety to it, which keeps the show watchable. The enthusiasm is incredibly loud (although not in the first episode of the format), with Bob Barker moderating it slightly, and it's easy to be swept up in it yourself. It's fun, but also such a sign of its times from both the prices you see and fashion. It's the presenting…
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The thirtieth classical recording: #450 Camille Saint-Saëns - Carnival of the Animals This piece written "for fun" sets itself an interesting challenge: 14 movements representing fourteen animals, which should sound like a single work but have to represent different animals. Elephants sound heavy, tortoises are slow, and there's hopping in the kangaroo section. It's fun, it's amusing to listen to and it really is evocative enough to give you an impression of the animal - I might not get them without help, but I could probably match a list of animals to the movements. There are injokes we're starting to recognise too - Fossils imitates, appropriately, the Danse Macabre, as well aas older pieces. The final movement summarizes it all, bringing together the previous movements into a whole that works it out. On the whole this was great to listen to and a lot of fun - so good to have in here.
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The ninetieth album: #90 The Who - The Who Sell Out An album with radio station and commercial jingles mixed in. It's hard to argue The Who are trying to make a point here somewhere, although I'm not sure it's always that convincing, but as a concept it's a neat idea. The songs are closer to ballads than I was expecting, occasionally wearing out my patience a bit, and possibly not the best for a quiet Friday afternoon. The lyrics tell more of a story, taking you through stages and often trying to impart more of a message than other rock albums - even when it comes from a fake deodorant adveret. There is a fair amount of production in the tracks, but they don't override the music or vocals. The balance of the latter two is right, stilly bringing across what's being set while it's more than a backing track, it sounds good and interesting. It's not the most experimental, but they are solid.
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The fourty-ninth book: #1005 Aithiopika - Heliodorus Another Greek/Roman story, here's an early one that starts in media res, with the kidnap of Chariclea to become a slave, her subsequent adventures and explanations of how they got there. It's a fairly compelling story (marred a bit by the bad quality of the Google PDF I used) and moves along decently well. It's still also taken down by its age and it feels like it doesn't quite get its sound right - it's not been quite appealing enough to me.
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The seventy-fifth TV show: #560 Sports Night I believe this might be the first Aaron Sorking show that I've fully watched, and in a way that did not disappoint. The writing is strong, and clear, not fully natural but close to it. There are the infamous Sorkin monologues. Not everyone pulls them off and I felt they got a bit preachy sometimes, but there aren't too many of those, and outside it, the dialogue works well. The great cast helps a lot with that. Josh Charles and Peter Krause, the on air talent of the fictional Sports Night, have amazing chemistry that shows throughtout. Banter, discussions, but no forced conflict, but it seems like they get along effortlessly. Felicity Huffman as the main female lead pulls off her role incredibly well and anchors everything else going on around her. It's funny, not forcing the dramatic moments but addressing plenty. There are faults with it, but on the whole it's such an enjoyable time that it's a shame it ended this soon, while promising so…
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The fourty-eighth book: #45 The Sorrows of Young Werther - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe I wonder whether epistolaries are just not the genre for me. I mean, this one was pretty good - snappy and on point, but the most memorable bit was at the end, where the format is broken and the compiler tells the story of Werther's end. The start of the book shows the start of a three way relationship between Werther, Charlotte, the woman he loves, and her husband Albert. The beats beyond that are familiar, but mostly well described. They drag on a bit once you get to the middle, though, and I feel I was unfortunately snagging in places. Still, it feels like there's progress.
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The eighty-ninth album: #89 Pink Floyd - The Piper at the Gates of Dawn With more psychedelic rock/proto punk, we can an early Pink Floyd album. I certainly know them from their later songs, but here I feel I hear elements of those performances already (Syd Barrett is still a part of the group here, doing most of the writing, but I guess a lot of it still carries over). There's something dark in them, a bass riff driving songs like Lucifer Sam relentlessly forward. While a lot of the lyrics and musinc steers into the fantastic, there is a dark undertone driving it all that really set up the layers for me. This bcomes more apparent in the instrumental pieces, which seem to emphasize the dark undertones and weird sounds, making them unnerving and at times barely songs. It's creepy, it's weird and unsettling, and the idea that these were made from LSD trips is clearer than ever - even if most of the time, that wasn't true. By Interstellar Overdrive, I felt some of these were upsetting…
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The twenty-ninth classical recording: #14 Thomas Tallis - Lamentations of Jeremiah Going back in time once more, we get a collection of choral numbers - bible texts set to music. Their contents are reverent, set in a time where reformation changed churches, and as the book says - they sound best with one voice per line, creating something intimate and enforcing the loneliness in the lamentations. The emotion comes across well, as the music suits the mood more than other choral pieces of the time felt like they do to me.
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The eighty-eighth album: #88 Cream - Disraeli Gears Our next album stays in psychedelic rock - the big thing at the time - now coming in from a blues angle. Both sounds are in there for sure - the blues guitar with the audio experiments that we get from other psychedelic albums. What's nice is how the blues doesn't get overshadowed - it feels dominant, with the psychedelic elements added where appropriate to make it sound better. The core dominates, which really makes it feel better. Tales of Brave Ulysses is a good showcase as well. The lyrics are more interesting than most and are easy to follow. There's apparently one of the earliest uses of a wah wah pedal in here - something that doesn't stand out until you pay attention to it, but it does make the song sound more modern. It's modern, but the blues influence stays throughout. It works so well, and that goes for the entire album. The fourty-second comic: #744 Nana Romance mangas (they have a special name, but I don't remember what…
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The three hundred and twenty-ninth song: Imagine - John Lennon Imagine can feel a bit like an overplayed anthem - the message is worn on its sleeve and continues to apply as it feels the world doesn't get better. There's a lot of hope here in a Phil Spector produced track, obviously aimed at a larger audience, and enhanced by Lennon's myth after his death. Does it work? It feels a bit too much sometimes, a bit too big, but it does connect with me enough to work. The three hundred and thirtieth song: Laughing - David Crosby Maybe it's because I'm tired as I'm sitting hiere, feeling more sensitive, but for some reason the steel guitar really grated on me - it overwhelmed in an unpleasant way. I'm not getting the message or the mood of the song, and it just didn't do anything but make me feel unpleasant. On a less tired relisten, there's a gentle song and meldoy here with a sweet sound, but a guitar that still won't quite go away. The three hundred and thirty-first song: When The Levee…
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The seventy-fourth TV show: #39 Zorro While older adventure shows like this can be good fun - especially as they appeal to the young boy in me - in the end their story telling and world is often limited enough that they struggle to hold our interest. There's some interesting struggles here set in Spanish California, but they do tend to lead up to the obligatory fight scene as well as some cleverness as everyone runs around trying to see who Zorro is and needing his help while not wanting to ask for it. There's something satisfying about that, but on the whole it didn't appeal to us to really make it feel that fun.
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The seventy-third TV show: #58 Coronation Street So here we go. The second soap opera, and the first that feels traditional, a near daily show that runs continously without real breaks. There's a big cast, some of whom seem to show up in a scene or two each week while they don't have an ongoing storyline, I guess also to divide the work. I've not been bothered to get deep into the backstory - after all, we're looking at over 50 years of TV here - but it's set on the titular Coronation street in England's north west (with the show being filmed in Manchester - I've seen a corner of the set before). The Barlow familiy has a bit of a focus that - as these shows go - everything emanates from. It seems to follow the standard soap stories - I'm sure that there are some specific bits, but a lot of the character beats will be familiar. Love stories, betrayals, break ups, everything that's needed to keep things going. What makes it stand out a bit from other soaps I've watched is the sense of…
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The eighty-seventh album: #87 Love - Forever Changes Forever Changes starts with Alone Again Or, a well produced larger song that I enjoyed the first time I listened as part of the songs list. And although the mariachi elements disappear slightly, the sound stays more consistent than I was expecting. There's a definite baroque sound to the entire album, making for a pleasant listening experience that feels like it crosses genres and styles enough to also stay interesting.
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The fourty-seventh book: #1004 Chaireas and Kallirhoe - Chariton This ancient love story is possibly the first real novel - according to some of the introduction I read almost their Harlequin style novel. And it starts with the married couple splitting because they think of each other that they're dead, with Callirhoe mostly being followed on her life, as she's so beautiful every man wants her. It's a lot of adventures, near misses and desires, going partially the way you expect, but going for some grander than most of these stories do. It feels different, especially as it's more about reunification, creating a story that has a more interesting plot than most of these.
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The eighty-sixth album: Tim Buckley - Goodbye and Hello We're getting another folk rock album today., leading into psychedelic rock as well as the folk voice is overlaid with electronic sounds that add to an ethereal feel in a lot of the album. The lyrics, in the mean time, are dreamlike in places, supporting the music where it is so, but I also don't feel they often feel quite as evocative as they could be. Compared to other, possibly more pure folk musicians, some of the songs feature more energy, with a faster, louder guitar and a 'rockier' sound, going a bit harder, which helps keep interest, but I don't find myself getting too much out of the album.
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The eighty-fifth album: #85 The Monkees - Headquarters We'll be watching the Monkees TV show at some point in the future. Today we get their first real album - the third to be published from the band, but the first they played on and wrote themselves. Of course, from my perspective, I'm now comparing that with the Beatles' album released a week later, Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. And while that may not be perfection, this feels like it harkens back so much more to old Beatles material (which I think the Monkees were meant to at least somewhat invoke). It's not until Shades of Gray that it went beyond that, a soft, wistful ballad that sounds a lot more unique - the folk direction working for Jones' and Tork's voices. The second side of the album works better for that reason. Abandoning the love songs, we get more interesting songs, relying on Dolensz as another strong vocalist who gets more focus and more of a mix of styles. They feel like they show more skill and interest…
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The twenty-eighth classical recording: #629 Igor Stravinsky - Rite of Spring First performed as a ballet in 1913, this piece of music caused a riot, in part due to its weird sounds. These days, we're used to the relative aggression, although that was not unheard of, but also the lack of standard keys as normally used. It's slightly disharmonious, and that's a sound we need to learn to listen to. With rock and the like, we perhaps already have, but I understand it was new at the time. It still sounds mad and maddening at times, a big mess that coheres into an aggressive setup, working especially well to evoke the pagen rites it's trying to evoke. There are a lot of more restful moments in there, in between the aggressive sounds. It evokes emotions in a way where I can really imagine how a ballet would give shape to these.
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The seventy-second TV show: #701 The Colbert Report When I covered the Daily Show a while ago, it was to come back to a show I'd seen before, trying to get a bit of a sense of its history. I had not really watched The Colbert Report though, so this was to really get me a new insight. It takes a lot of work and daring to hang a daily news comedy show off a fake news pundit's imaginary show while skewering those views while staying believable. I believe he's currently doing great in his late night talk show (one I haven't seen yet) where he plays himself, but here the character helps. Where Jon Stewart is the annoyed and weary observer, Colbert is actively in the middle of the news, directing you to observe these views more closely instead of getting annoyed at a distance. It feels unique and centering the conversation work in a way that later follow ups didn't quite manage. By sending up these personalities, their rhetorical tricks become more obvious. Colbert stays funny all the way…
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The fourty-first comic: #947 Giraffes in my Hair Here's a semi-road strip story, of a hippy in the 60s kicked out of his house and going on a road trip and other adventures. This leads to Disneyland on acid (well, not quite), reaching to all corners of the US and slightly beyond and there's a rebellious streak in him through a lot of this - mostly drug based and some relatively minor crimes. At the same time, and I'm not sure whether this is intentional, it feels a bit petty - trying to defend a rock star image that doesn't really come through. The stories are entertaining, but I'm not sure my sympathy was always quite there. One of the things it helps is that it's a good setting for the art, which isn't overly detailed. The charcoal art is simple but expressive enough to tell the story, giving it a more memorable look. It works, here, and makes it more pleasant to read. It's a shame the lettering doesn't hold up near the end - one of those things you just don't notice until it goes…
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The seventy-first TV show: #669 Veronica Mars We've just watched the first season of this show and it's been a revelation - we expected we'd enjoy the show, but not to the extent that we did. There's this stereotype of the CW show - good looking teens dealing with their teen problems, a bit formulaic and not usually high quality. It's meant to pander to the (smaller) audiences that watch it. Regularly, though, it comes through with good series - the Arrowverse shows and Crazy Ex-Girlfriend are two of those examples now, while shows like Supernatural and Vampire Diaries are in the past. This is another one of those. While there's some teen drama in here, Kristen Bell and the cast around her are good at elevating their roles and adding more nuances to it. The central mysteries of the first season slowly get expanded on, with a lot of pay offs in the final two episodes - the penultimate one through a lot of recurring guest characters and the final one through a more serious…