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Running Out of Steam

When Business Week, hardly a partisan of left wing environmental concerns, is not afraid to headline with a searing indictment of the president’s lack of leadership on the issue of energy, accusing him and his administration of Blowing Smoke on Energy Policy, people should start taking serious notice.

When the official answer to gasoline and oil prices sky rocketing through the roof produces a Tommy Flanagan-like punch line of, "Yeah… that’s it, technology’s the ticket," people should start getting concerned.

When it is suggested that the road to energy "independence" is paved with building oil refineries on old military bases and making nuclear plants more prominent and less regulated, without any mention of how to deal with the inevitable increase of hazardous waste, nor any mention of clean
alternatives such as wind or solar energy, you can bet your sweet ass that your leader has sold you off for somebody else’s profit.

Whazza?!!! Adobe buys Macromedia

It would be patently wrong of me not to mention today that Adobe just bought out Macromedia. It feels a bit naive to say this out loud, but I never saw it coming. My less than controversial guess as to what this means to the software industry is that it will be very, very significant. At the very least, the creative side of the software industry should expect to have a big spot light shining on it for the next couple of years.

Passionate discussions of Dreamweaver vs. GoLive, FreeHand vs. Illustrator, Flash vs. (no way, I won’t even make the comparison) … will emerge, but until the fuzziness of “integration” as the primary goal is sorted out by Adobe, Macromedia, and possibly US regulatory authorities, my other guess is that passionate disscussions will be the only thing we as consumers have to look forward to in the near future.

They got a lot to sort out.

Raw Poetry

The Book of Seth reviews Iggy and the Stooges’ seminal album Raw Power, and examines it’s long strange history (respectively including both Bowie and Iggy’s remixes).

Of course, this is over three decades shy of the actually recording, but I don’t suppose anybody counts that far back, especially considering that the material is still being lifted today. And I gotta love a review that states an untangible musical breakthrough such as it exactly as it is in my mind.

When I listen to “Raw Power”, it’s like… (how can I phrase this) WHY THE F**K DID I EVER BUY ANOTHER ALBUM? It’s never been surpassed, and at this late a date I have the creeping sensation it never will because (oh, I just remembered) it can’t. It’s the summation of so much wedged into such a short duration and cut so damn hot, recorded so damn wrong it was too right on so many levels, I can’t count them. It’s a kaleidoscopic riot running through the sexual to the ridiculous and sublime from start to finish. The entire Class of ‘76 along with several successive non-graduating classes of dum-dums was built on it and yet not one offering from that assorted stew of froot‘n’nutz from New York, London [, or at] any points in-between came close to topping it on any level, album or single. Not that they didn’t try from time to time — which was at least encouraging – and got extremely close at times, but this ain’t a game of horseshoes or hand grenades and besides, I seem to be out of cigars. Sorry.

When I listen to “Raw Power”, the whole playing field of records, reality and everything in-between is stilted and about as retardedly tilted as the original mix of the album itself. Which, by the by: only FIVE tracks out of eight are so-called “guilty” of the lame duck “no bass and drums, waah, boo hoo, barely audible” claim leveled at its lopsided, aggressive glee. “Barely audible”? That excuse is barely laudable, so turn it up louder so you can hear them, Candy Ass so stop your sobbing and work with what you got. Which is a lot like “Raw Power,” come to think of it.

Personally, I prefer Funhouse from all of the Stooges stuff, but Raw Power did, and still does, hit a nerve with me. This T-shirt can’t be topped either (hmm, there’s an early hint for my birthday).

Sunday Morning (Cole’s Music)

I put the following playlist together for when my baby boy’s born and have shared it (most of it, anyway) on iTunes Other than to demonstrate that I’m turning into an old softy, there’s no particular reason I’m sharing this information.

Yes, accusations of my sentimentality will be—from here on out—entirely accurate.

1. Sunday Morning – The Velvet Undergrond
2. Sweet Jane -Cowboy Junkies
3. Kalamazoo – Luna
4. Wholy Holy – Marvin Gaye
5. Northern Sky – Nick Drake
6. Youth – Love and Rockets
7. Kooks – David Bowie
8. Asleep on a Sunbeam – Belle & Sebastian
9. Chinese Envoy – The Jazz Butcher Conspiracy (not found on iTunes)
10. When the Stars Go Blue – Ryan Adams
11. Mona Lisas and Mad Hatters – Elton John
12. Just Pretend – The Bens
13. Morning Has Broken – Cat Stevens
14. Corpus Christi Carol – Jeff Buckley
15. Grace – U2
16. Hallelujah – Leonard Cohen (although I used the Rufus Wainwright version, also not found on iTunes)

Update: It would probably be pretty rude of me not to mention the excellent playlist that our childbirthing buddies, Brenda and Mike, have put together. Their son, Isaac, should be popping up any time too.

Now With Gravatar

Inspired by the picture perfect commenting over at Scott’s website, I found some time over the weekend to add Gravatar support to my comments section and made some general improvements to the theme as well.

Now you can leave comments with style. If you haven’t tried Gravatar yet, what are you waiting for?