Pete's Log: lots o' music

Entry #435, (Music)
(posted when I was 22 years old.)

Perk has apparently experienced a less than ideal day. Sorry perk. Today's been decent for me. I woke up in a panic, thinking I was going to be real late for class, but discovered that I had somehow managed to set my alarm clock forward an hour while half asleep. The rest of the day was mediocre, although I did get arla running on realloc. Then the day took a significant swing towards good: my CD's came. I now have eight new cd's. On the other hand, our microwave we inherited from Squyres died yesterday, but we've already picked up a replacement. We also went shopping and got egg roll wraps! yay!

Now I'm playing the excellent "trying to get stuff done" game. But it's slow going because it took 20 or so minutes to finally get dialed into nd. grrrr... but I'm listening to my new music. And so it goes:

"Reggae Dancer" by Inner Circle. This CD was a complete impulse buy. I've been meaning to increase the amount of Reggae I own, but all I knew about Inner Circle was that they were responsible for the theme song for the television show Cops. This cd doesn't feature that song, but I was initially excited to see a track called "Whip It" but it turned out not to be a cover of the Devo song of the same name. But the CD is a nice collection of mellowish Reggae. A good buy. I don't really have much more to say about it.

"Ska Island" ... a compilation by Island Records that I knew little about. It features The Skatalites, The Toasters, Fishbone, Hepcat, The Trojans, and many more. A good mix of ska. It's pretty mellow, but you need some mellow ska from time to time. There are several songs with interesting non-language vocal effects.

"Tragic Kingdom" by No Doubt. I already have a lot of the songs off this CD on mp3 and have been meaning to buy it for quite some time. I like a lot of the songs on this one... I also have their first CD, which is good, but I have a hard time listening to, it somehow fails to hold my attention. But this one doesn't have that problem. I do feel rather concerned for the band, tho. Their latest album, off of which I've only heard a couple songs, shows signs of musical maturing, which is rarely a good thing. But that doesn't affect the quality of this CD.

"Modified" by Save Ferris. This CD gave me a serious scare. Track one starts out with some scratching. Next, I see in the credits something about "Strings arranged by..." Am I imagining this? strings? scratching? Has Save Ferris done the whole musically maturing thing? Say it ain't so! But although their style has changed some since "It Means Everything" (a VERY good CD), I think I can deal with it. There are a few songs that aren't really ska (or reggae) at all, and their beat on the ones that are is in general more reggae-ish. I think a few more listens and I will really like this CD. I mainly just need to overcome the shock. It has some really good songs that I liked immediately, and some songs that should grow on me.

"Enema of the State" by Blink 182. Wow, popular music. But as usual, I don't want to let popular culture effect my choices, and to that effect, I won't like something because it's popular, but I also won't dislike something because it's popular. Or at least that's what I try to do. This is a fun CD. Good punk, tho frequently "mellow." Some songs with lyrics that may actually have significance, a lot of songs that are just kinda fun and silly. Mamie has this CD, and I've got several songs off it on mp3, so I already know it pretty well, but I'm glad to finally own it myself. "What's My Age Again" is just a brilliant song. It cracks me up.

it's sleepy time. so a quick summary of what's left: The singles collection by The Specials. Good CD. Haven't listened to this one yet, but I've already heard it before. It's good second-wave ska. mmm... two-tone. "Slowly Going the Way of the Buffalo" by MxPx. More fine MxPx music. They never disappoint. Rhyme, Rhythm, and Reggae ... this one was a freebie, and I have no idea what to expect from it. Only time will tell...