Tag Archives: music

Personally Me

You’re from the 70′s, but I’m a 90′s Bitch!

I am going to do a little experiment. I am going to see if forcing myself to write a post-a-day will help me eradicate this blogger’s block. I also am going to be writing to music. Maybe if my brain is halved it will help. Or I am just talking shit on a Thursday evening.

I’m finding myself gravitating toward pop music thanks to the “I Love It“ song by Icona Pop. This is unheard of as I am huge on anti-pop music.

Writing with music playing is harder than I thought. But silence has become hard also. OK I need to change this station now. I heard my song and the rest is giving me the ills.

Aah, Nirvana. The band everyone despises and I love all the more so. I think most people would despise my musical taste and question if it is taste in the first place. You can just suck it though.

So expect a lot of crap posts in your reader from me for a while. And when I say a lot, I mean one a day. I also think it’s what’s halting my flow. I don’t think what I am going to post will be worthy enough for your reader. I need to get over that shit. This is my blog after all. I can’t please everyone.

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Personally Me

I Can’t Be With You. I’m Discovering New Music.

i want to do with you what spring does with th...

i want to do with you what spring does with the cherry cheese? isn’t that how it goes? (Photo credit: jamelah)

I have a fantastic memory for sequential numbers. Tell me a number to remember while you’re doing your bills, a phone number to remember that someone is reciting to you from the phone and you lack a pen and paper. Before cell phones, I knew every phone number to every friend’s house. I am a social butterfly, so that indeed was a lot of numbers. Ask me to give a chronological form of events from a certain time period of my life and I will fail miserably. I remember events and people in relation to. I know I discovered Breaking Benjamin through Jorge’s sister. With Jorge I was introduced to Tech 9. I know I discovered Metric the time I was dating Jorge. I know I watched the movie Garden State with Myra when we were friends. I know I was with Catreena when I first heard the song Earthquake by Lil’ Wayne. I listened to Orgy, Garbage, No Doubt, Placebo, HIM all around the times I knew Greg, Cassie, David, Trisha, and Lou. I introduced Erykah Badu to Brianna when I was listening to her, The Fugees, Common, The Roots, Tupac, Marley, etc.

Ask me the years of the times and I would have to think about it and narrow it down to possibly “these years” and usually I would be off. In the late 80′s and 90′s about thanks to MTV and my sister I remember Madonna, Mariah Carey, PM Dawn, Boyz II Men, MC Hammer, Salt N’ Pepa, La Bouche, En Vogue, Ace of Base, and many more.

Some artists and songs I have a hard time listening to because they take me back to times I don’t want to relive. That techno song Castles in the Sky comes on and I want to hurl. I was rolling for the first time one night and they looped that song the entire time. I am not a fan of drugs that take over my body and mind. It freaks me out and I think I am going to die. I’m not yet OK with dying so until I am, I want to maintain living.

This time in my life I want to discover new music on my own volition. Yes, I have friendships in my life now, like Alice, but I want to be without major strings like boyfriends attached or people I can easily no longer consider a part of my life. So I am going to discover new music on my own and share it only with myself.

I want music that only relates to me, my thoughts, my emotions, my everything. That may seem impossible to others, but I like impossible. My childhood friend in Virginia, Tasha, we used to play a game called “The Impossible!” on the neighborhood playground that was a lot like “Lava” except you weren’t really trying to catch one another and you could only place your feet on the slides and rails, never on the brown floor.

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The Labyrinth
Debatable, Personally Me

It’s Not Fair

The LabyrinthWhenever I say this phrase or hear it from someone else, instantaneously I think of Sarah from ‘The Labyrinth’—which is part of my top 4 favorite movies, the others (I know you can be as insanely curious as I) being ‘Sleepless in Seattle’, ‘Nana 1 & 2′, and ‘The Notebook’. The top 4 list being from my chick-flick movies. I went to film school so I really have an abundantly long list, most foreign as I’m not big on America’s blockbuster hits.

I’m also not a Nicholas Sparks fan as every single nauseatingly romantic book he puts out, one of the main characters dies in the end. If you’re reading ‘At First Sight’, ‘Message in a Bottle’, ‘Nights in Rodanthe’, ‘Dear John’ etc. I just ruined it for you. So off topic yet again.

Back to ‘The Labyrinth’ and Sarah, on a personal note I always thought it was cool that Jennifer Connelly played Sarah as my sister’s name is Jennifer and mine of course is Sarah. I was but a child when I noticed this so it’s been cool to me ever since, I can see you smirking.

Sarah says on a myriad amount of events and how things work in the Labyrinth and in her own life, “It’s not fair!!” Well, now I am saying that on something that has changed so much in our day and age I’m not sure if I’ll ever realize that it’s something I will just have to accept.

The music industry. I’m only 27 years young so I’ll only be basing my experience from as a child to now. Also, this idea was sparked by a post written by Heather (I had a dream I was hanging out with her the other night so now we’re on a first name basis) from Dooce.com writing about going with her friends to see Madonna in concert from her recent tour. She mentions briefly how it saddens her that Leta (daughter) will not grow up with a musical icon that she will be watching in concert 20 years from now, unless of course she is undermining Katy Perry’s career. That was paraphrased so if Dooce ever stumbles here, hopefully I won’t get nabbed for copyright infringement. Just a sentence or two that she humorously brushed upon, struck me. It’s not fair that our musical culture is turning to shit.

There really are no musical icons being brought out today. When I was growing up (previous to my birth are some, but they were still recording and are today unless they’re dead), it was Madonna, Michael Jackson, The Rolling Stones, Aerosmith, David Bowie, Aretha Franklin, Diana Ross, Paula Abdul. Then Mariah Carey, Snoop Dogg, Tupac, Biggie Smalls, No Doubt/Gwen Stefani, Missy Elliot, Timbaland, hopefully you get the picture by now. On top of that though, is that there are more than what I’ve listed.

I remember going into the record stores in Soho and it felt so good. In fact, Soho is the most cultural place I have been (my kind of culture as there is an abundance of culture in the streets of New York) and I loved it more than any area of New York. Maybe the day the music died is the day it all digitized. Why record in a studio when you have the computer at your fingertips. Some claim you cannot tell the difference between a computer made guitar riff and the real thing. I’ve never compared, but to me, what is music without the musical instruments? Maybe that’s why I don’t like Pop and Dance and Electro very much. I like old school Pop and R&B, but today it all sounds like garbage. It makes me a little underwhelmed and despondent.

What if I have a child and her world is like my nephew’s if not worse with the PSP, Wii, Computer, 20 minute television shows, all that creates little patience in learning and school and homework because “Mom! I have to kill this guy in Grand Theft Auto who’s on a scooter that’s faster than my car so I can have the scooter!”/”Good Luck Charlie is on in 5 minutes, so what if #4 is wrong on my homework!”

OK he never really says these things, at least not all the time, but I know he’s thinking them. He has the least amount of patience I have seen. I love my nephew, I love my sister, I love my mom, but I would not raise my child this way. Everything is so fast today and if you ask him about school or anything that he doesn’t want to talk about he gets huffy and says you are asking him hard questions. I didn’t know asking him how he did on his spelling test was such a hard question.

The music industry, the way the world works today now that I am an adult and can see with with my own eyes, the way I myself quit school to get a GED and get it over with. I don’t want my currently imaginary child subjected to this. People may ask, well what can you do? I can do a lot, I could travel and learn and create and do and change myself. That is what I can do. So if one day by chance I do have a child, I can let them have luxuries as well as help them teach themselves discipline. To want to learn and be the best they can. And maybe I can gear them into the love of music and art where they can make their mark on the world, big or small.

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A Perfect Circle - Mer de Noms
Debatable, Personally Me

Crimson & Clover Over & Over

I went to Plinky because I wanted something thought provoking to write about that made me analyze what something means to me. The prompt that struck me was “What song can you listen to over an over again? Why?”. Three songs came to mind, but I am sure I have several more.

1. ‘Vermillion Pt. 2′ by Slipknot

2. ’3 Libras’ by A Perfect Circle

3. ‘Judith’ by A Perfect Circle

Yes, there is a Pt. 1 to Vermillion, but it’s more lyrically grotesque than I like. Now that we’ve got that out of the way, on to the reasons.

Vermillion Pt. 2

She seemed dressed in all of me, stretched across my shame
All the torment and the pain, leaked through and covered me
I’d do anything to have her to myself, just to have her for myself
Now I don’t know what to do, I don’t know what to do when she makes me sane.

This first verse of Vermilion Pt. 2 is amazing to me. When it comes on it makes me think of someone I once held too dear to me. “Dressed in all of me” about how I was always caring for her and her needs. “All the torment and the pain leaked through and covered me” I took on all of her troubles, I always wanted to fix her and every time she healed, I hurt. “I’d do anything to have her to myself” sounds creepy as hell, let’s be honest, but when I was hanging out with her I always wanted to build her up and make her feel smart and pretty and protect her from any negativity because to be really honest, she was extremely thin-skinned.

She is everything to me, the unrequited dream
The song that no one sings, the unattainable
She’s a myth that I have to believe in
All I need to make it real is one more reason
I don’t know what to do, I don’t know what to do when she makes me sad.

The friendship was very one sided where I mostly catered to her and her well-being. Everyone always asked why I was friends with her and didn’t understand our friendship. I cared a lot about her, more than I had really for any of my other friends at the time. I was always there when she needed me and would pick her up in any instance that her and her boyfriend turned husband were arguing. She had some downfalls, but she was my best friend.

But I won’t let this build up inside of me I won’t let this build up inside of me I won’t let this build up inside of me I won’t let this build up inside of me
A catch in my throat, choke, torn into pieces I won’t, no!
I don’t wanna be this…
But I won’t let this build up inside of me I won’t let this build up inside of me I won’t let this build up inside of me I won’t let this build up inside of me
She isn’t real I can’t make her real
She isn’t real I can’t make her real

We had a falling out and it happened to be when I was in the middle of a shit-storm of mania. I don’t remember all the details, but these last pieces of the song help me realize that as much as I put her up on a pedestal, she should have returned the same kind of love and friendship. And when he says, “I don’t wanna be this..” it’s like me saying I don’t want to be so co-dependent. And when sang, “She isn’t real, I can’t make her real” means my friend that I have created to be in my head, she never was and I couldn’t make her.

3 Libras

I threw you the obvious and you flew with it on your back,
A name in your recollection, thrown down among a million same. Difficult not to feel a little bit disappointed and passed over
When I’ve looked right through to see you naked and oblivious
And you don’t. See. Me…

I was sexually abused at 14, but it didn’t involve rape since I was lucky enough to have been menstruating on the day, he did touch and do something else down there, but no penetration thank God. Not even a year later I met Greg. Well I knew him in Middle School, but now he lived 2 doors down from me. We became pretty close friends and I had a mad crush on him because suffice to say he was fucking hot. I liked our friendship, I could go to him with anything and he was just as much as a disturbed teen as I was. Actually maybe more so. He started dating another friend of mine and damn it if I am not territorial. He’d only been dating her like a week or two when Greg and I decided to have sex. Yes, it’s cheating, but we were basically kids I think we deserve a little slack—& I know having sex and being ‘basically’ a kid do not go hand in hand, but that was what it was—it was October 6th, one day after my birthday and 2 days after the chick he was seeing’s birthday.

He’s tall and well endowed so it freaking hurt, but we got accustomed and a whole Orgy album later we were done. I didn’t realize how emotional it would be for me until I got into his shower. I cried. I don’t know if I was crying because I really liked him and I felt cheap now or if I felt as if I indeed lost something. Or if I felt dirty like I did after that creep asshole molested me. Maybe it was all the above. I came back to his room and he asked me if I was OK 15 times and I said I was fine and that I had to go.

But I threw you the obvious
Just to see if there’s more behind the
Eyes of a fallen angel, Eyes of a tragedy
Here I am expecting just a little bit
Too much from the wounded
But I see, see through it all
See through, see you

Greg’s situation was a little much at the time, a little meaning that a girl had trapped (I was her friend so I know for a fact she did since she told me the same story he had) him into having a child with her. Greg changed a lot from that. He harbored more anger than I’ve seen in anyone. Even when he was experiencing different emotions, it was there festering inside. So yes, he was wounded and more so a tragedy.

Cause I threw you the obvious
To see what occurs behind the
Eyes of a fallen angel, Eyes of a tragedy

Oh well, oh well
Apparently nothing,
Apparently nothing at all

You don’t, you don’t
You don’t see me
You don’t, you don’t
You don’t see me at all…

We tried to have a relationship for the first time when we were young adults, before I went off to college and before he moved away. It was oil and water. I drove to see him a couple times when I was back from college and we tried to maintain our friendship. Then he came back here for a visit and for a weird reason wanted to tell me that he had feelings for another girl that had lived on our street and gone to school with us. He was hurt and mad because he had seen her first and she laughed in his face. I tried to explain maybe she was just taken back since when he dated her once when we were young, he cheated on her bad (not with me). He told me not to tell her that he told me this, but her and I hung out and when I was tipsy with a few girlfriends it came out and Greg dropped completely out of my life. He was my first real crush and this song is my song to him because I first heard it when I was hanging out with him in his old room.

Judith

As much as many people say that Maynard is against religion, he sure makes a lot of songs that touch on it, in fact this whole album that ’3 Libras’ and ‘Judith’ is on, each song kind of brushes topics of religion. He could very well be against organized religion, hell he may be anti-Christian. But his songs almost question the ideas of following such faith and you have to have questions in your faith or you are walking blind. This song is the one that challenges the whole idea of Jesus and religion.

You’re such an inspiration
For the ways that I will Never ever choose to be
Oh so many ways for me to show you
How your savior has abandoned you

That beginning, “you’re such an inspiration for the ways that I will never ever choose to be” is strong. I truly love this song when I am pissed off or need to vent through music which I do a lot. My opinion on this song meaning would be he is talking to those devout believers that walk blindly and question nothing. The close minded, the non-seekers.

Fuck your God, your Lord, your Christ
He did this, took all you had and
Left you this way,
Still you pray, never stray, never
Taste of the fruit, never thought to question “Why?”
It’s not like you killed someone
It’s not like you drove a hateful spear into his side
Praise the one who left you broken down and paralyzed

The first testament of the Bible is supposed to give the history of the way it was before Jesus came down to spread the word of God. Well if you focus on the first testament, which a lot of the Christians don’t, God was very different. He seemed more spiteful. His first spiteful deed being The Tree of Knowledge. The garden of Eden was supposed to be lovely and Adam and Eve true followers of God as they were his creation. If the garden is so wonderful, why would God allow a serpent who is supposedly the fallen angel into the garden to seduce Eve. Why would he create the tree of Knowledge and tell Adam and Eve they could not eat from it. He wanted them to do so. It created free will, but then again he punished them for doing so because it went against his word. It pisses me off that as humans today we still get the painful menstruation and labor for something Eve did. All Adam got was hard work in the fields, I don’t see every man now days working in the fields. The Bible is sexist and created by man and this is why Maynard is saying fuck YOUR God, YOUR Lord, YOUR Christ because the God I believe in (more me speaking than him now) would not be this way. In Leviticus alone, we were allowed to have slaves. That sounds more of a man back then than any Creator telling the man that. Another part that matches the Bible like the Tree of Knowledge is Judith and Jesus. Judith turned on Jesus and Jesus knew it was coming all along and he even said at this last supper that one of his disciples was going to turn on him. It is also being studied to see if Mary Magdalen really was a prostitute that Jesus helped or if she was actually one of his disciples. Wouldn’t that throw the Catholic Church through a loop?

Oh so many ways for me to show you
How your dogma has abandoned you
Pray to your Christ, to your God
Never taste of the fruit, never stray, never break,
Never choke on a lie even though he’s the one who
Did this to you, you never thought to question “Why?”

It’s not like you killed someone
It’s not like you drove a spiteful spear into his side
Talk to Jesus Christ as if he knows the reasons why

He did it all for you…

Music is my life. I don’t play it and when I sing I don’t have the best voice but it helps me to feel all my emotions freely without judgment. What’s better than that?

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