Music is My Radar

Hi all. I wouldn’t ordinarily use this blog to endorse non-music related products, but I have to give a shout-out to a service I’ve been using for nearly a year with very positive results. Like many music aficionados, much of my collection is stored on the hard drive of my home computer. True, many of the mp3s to which I listen on my iPod come from CDs I’ve purchased, but in the event of a house fire or similar catastrophe, likely none of my media would survive, whether electronic or physical in nature. So, some time ago I began to investigate a back-up solution for my electronic media.

One common solution for electronic back-up needs is to purchase an external hard drive, whether networked or physically connected to the computer needing duplication. This does cover one variety of risk, that which comes from the likelihood that a computer crash will wipe out months or years of
accumulated files. However, an external drive does not address the “house fire” possibility, unless the drive is located off-site. And since I don’t have a secure location at which to store a back-up drive, nor the technical expertise necessary to create and maintain such a configuration, the easiest solution was to pay someone else to do it for me. Which brings us to the market for on-line back-up services.

I looked into many such services, most of which allow the subscriber to upload files to the service’s servers at some distant location for a nominal fee. Many services offer a limited amount of free storage - Google, for example, offers users on-line storage for documents, photos, and so on at no charge. But I didn’t want 2 gigs or 5 gigs or even 10 gigs of free storage. I wanted a service that would allow me to back-up my music library - currently almost 175 gigs in size - plus all my documents, applications, and settings. Ultimately, my search lead me to one solution: Mozy.

Continue Reading »

Sorry for the lack of posts recently. I have a few in various stages of completion, but I’ve been busy lately with that thing that pays my bills and allows me to have free time to write this blog - you know, work. Soon enough I’ll get back to it.

Anyway, I purchased a few CDs this weekend. I didn’t succeed in my ongoing effort to support local business - local record stores in particular - as I was passing the nearest big chain store and really wanted to take advantage of their ginormous selection. And while they didn’t have what I wanted to buy, I did find a few goodies. Here they are.

1. “Ego Tripping at the Gates of Hell,” by The Flaming Lips.
2. “The W.A.N.D.,” by The Flaming Lips.
3. “In the Future,” by Black Mountain.
4. “Odelay” deluxe rerelease by Beck.

Yummy yum yum.

Back in my days of subscribing to music downloading site emusic, before it went to a pay-per-song fee structure, I amassed quite a few songs to which I have not yet spent much time listening. Among those multitudinous songs were several albums by the seminal Australian jangle-pop band The Go-Betweens. One of the many bands first introduced to me by my friend Paul, The Go-Betweens passed under the radar of many American music fans during their first incarnation in the 1980s, in favor of such kindred souls as R.E.M. and Yo La Tengo. After breaking up in 1989, the band was dormant for years before regrouping in 2000 with two original members and for a time, the members of Sleater-Kinney (yet another band with whom I’ve been meaning to spend more time.)

Anyway, I was at work recently and, having loaded my iPod with the entirety of my Go-Betweens library, decided to have a TGB listening party. Suffice to say, I was impressed.

I remember listening to their 2003 record Bright Yellow Bright Orange and being immediately blown away by how many other of my favorite bands I could hear in those songs. The first song, “Caroline and I,” could easily have been a late-period Velvet Underground song (especially considering that it shares a name with a Lou Reed/VU song). The guitar lead on the second song, “Poison in the Wall,” sounded right off Bewitched by Luna. The vocal on the fourth track, “In Her Diary,” could easily have been delivered by Ira Kaplan of Yo La Tengo.

Go-Betweens purists might object that I’m selecting songs from the second incarnation of the band, one with only two original members. Duly noted. I do in fact have 16 Lover’s Lane and Tallulah, both released in 1987, before the split, but I haven’t spent much time with them. (Although, I just realized that Tallulah was rereleased in 2004 with a bonus CD. To the record store!!) To be honest, I can’t stand the use of violins, cellos, and other “classical” instruments in rock music (with one notable exception), and at the time the band had a violin player. It doesn’t destroy the music for me, but it does sound a little earnest, and I hate earnest music. But that’s another post. (Side note - for further proof that violins in rock music is a bad idea, read here and here.)

Anyway, before I go off on a tangent about College Republican jam band music, let me conclude by saying that I am very happy to have been introduced to the Go-Betweens, and that while I don’t listen to jangle pop nearly as much as I did in college, I still like it. And so for the many influences I hear in their music, the nostalgic sound of 1980s alternative, and their pop song craft, the Go-Betweens are my Crush of the Moment.

Go have a Foster’s, boys … it’s on me.