Old School Album of the Day: In The Aeroplane Over The Sea

Now, I call this old school because the album was released in 1998. The truth is, however, I only heard it for the first time about 3 weeks ago. This band is called Neutral Milk Hotel and this album is called In The Aeroplane Over The Sea. I just want to say fuck you to everyone on Earth for not telling me about this album for the last 12 years. (This is especially true for Open Bar if he has heard of them before just now. I can't expect Side or LJT to keep me appraised of indie music happenings.) It's a little bit like how no one watched The Wire until the show had actually ended its run, but now that you've seen it you know how the world actually works (incidentally, that post about how The Wire is the greatest show in the history of television is noticeably missing from this blog. Although at this point the entirety of the post might just consist of the sentence "The Wire is the greatest show in the history of television." To be honest, I would write the post, but something inside me really wants to hear what Open Bar has to say about it.)

Anyway, this Neutral Milk Hotel album is genuinely one of the most beautiful records ever released. The lyrics are so strange and interesting and really stand out while at the same time blending in really well to the music. They also make really great use of the trumpet throughout the whole album. I don't know that I've ever really heard the trumpet used in such an interesting way. Especially in rock type music. Relatedly, you can definitely hear how this band would go on to influence Arcade Fire in the following years. Arcade Fire also has some strange instrumentation and ear filling sounds and awkward lyrics that somehow weave into the songs.

But this isn't really like Arcade Fire. Kathy says it reminds her of Bob Dylan. I can see that, although I don't know if I neccessarily agree. It definitely reminds me of Arcade Fire, as mentioned. It's a bit like Radiohead's quieter stuff, but at the same time not really. But it also really kindof stands out on its own. I would suggest that everyone go and download this on iTunes right now. It's that good. (YP, MP, I don't know all this industry jargon. What movie? Open Bar don't ruin it for everyone.)

There are lots of Open Bar shout outs in this post.

Things That Are Still Awesome

A few years back my wife bought a Super Nintendo on eBay. Now we have a 3 year old who likes to play Super Mario World but, quite frankly, sucks at it. I guess it's not his fault, he's only 3. The upshot here is that he asks to play Mario except what he means is that he wants to watch while my wife or I play. And he holds the extra controller and gets excited when each board is finished.

So I was playing Super Mario World yesterday and I'm happy to report that it is still freaking awesome. This is one of the best video games ever made. I'm amazed at how entertaining it still is. And it's actually still somewhat challenging. Not challenging in the sense that I'd ever lose. I played like 5 boards and collected 22 lives and I don't think I ever died once. But challenging in the sense that a lot of the boards have secret exits and you ahve to find the switch palaces of different colors.

In my opinion, the biggest leap forward in Mario gaming was from Super Mario Bros. 3 to Super Mario World. It is basically the same foundation of a game, except it's way better. It's more expansive, takes advantage of the greater capabilities of the Super Nintendo, and really doesn't have many, if any, flaws. Now I can't really speak for Mario games after this one. If you have a Nintendo 64 or if there are Mario games for the Wii, I don't know about any of that. But Super Mario World is still awesome.

Old School Album of the Day: August and Everything After

The Counting Crows are a good band. I like a lot of their stuff, including many of the things they put out after their first album (particularly their second album), but I'm gonna focus now on this album, which is probably (definitely) their best. August and Everything After is just a really beautiful record. Can you still call albums "records"? For that matter, can you still call them "albums"? I'm missing my point. The point is that I wanted to highlight this album because I'm not sure if it really got much play back in the day, and it's definitely worth getting if you don't have it.

This album for me just packs a huge emotional punch. The songs are really catchy and the lyrics are really deep. It's an interesting combination. You get hooked in by the tune, but then you start thinking about the lyrics and it hits you all over again. It's a bit like hearing the album again for the first time once you start to listen to the lyrics.

I'm not really sure where to go from here. I could definitely talk about each song individually and why I like it, but that seems unnecessary. All of us know (and love?) Mr. Jones and 'Round Here. Imagine a whole album of songs as catchy as Mr. Jones, and then also really meaningful in retrospect. I particularly like "Sullivan Street" and "A Murder of One".

The one song I do want to talk about specifically is "Anna Begins". It's easily one of my favorite songs ever. It never gets old. I could listen to it over and over again for the remainder of eternity. Beautiful song, intriguing lyrics (should be a good game). If you don't know this song, then download it today.

It's Been Quiet, Let's Kick It Old School

I'm pretty confident this happened in 6th grade. Back in 6th grade we had a class called "cycle" where we would rotate an elective course every 6 weeks. If I remember correctly (and I can't believe this was in 1989, by the way) we would take Spanish, French, Latin, Health, Computers, and a Music cycle.

Anyway, back before I was the fashion maven I am today, I could not have cared less about fashion. In elementary school Notorious and I essentially had contests over who could come up with the best combination of sweatpants and t-shirts. In order to win the contest you had to have the brightest sweatpants and the best pop culture reference on your t-shirt. Matching or coordinating the colors did not make a difference. For example, I would win on the days when I would wear my bright orange sweatpants along with my "avoid the noid" t-shirt. As Diesal will tell you (whenever you're making fun of him and he wants to deflect the attention away from himself) I didn't even own a pair of jeans until 7th grade. I was generally sweatpants all the way through then, although I did have some of those interesting Bugle Boy pants with the zippers and stuff all over them '80s style.

So this happened in 6th grade, during middle school, but before I decided to actually put any thought into my outfits aside from which company's witty t-shirt expressed my mood that day. If I'm remembering correctly on that day I was wearing cargo sweatpants (because really I was just way ahead of my time, rather than a fashion misfit) and a t-shirt that said PennState-asaurus (do you remember those -asaurus t-shirts? Those were weird.) that was most likely an XL size even though I think I was 5'1" at the time. The shirt came down to my knees, which for some reason was also fashionable back then, or else I was just a huge dork. Probably both.

Here's the actual story. This is one of LJT's favorites, so I hope he will add or amend the story as necessary. We were in the music cycle and in the music room with Mr. Streckfuss. This was before he nearly killed our bass drummer for playing the song incorrectly. And also this was just a introduction to music class, so he couldn't be all that mean. I had taken my 3 years of piano lessons and so when he asked if someone could play some notes on the piano in order for him to demonstrate something or another, I volunteered.

So I'm wearing my cargo sweatpants, and my shirt that comes down to my knees, and I had been sitting, and most likely fidgeting in this chair for a while now. I get up to walk to the piano and wouldn't you know it, the now famous mother of all embarrassment, the shirt wedgie. I had a wedgie so big, that not only my underwear, not only my sweatpants, but also my XL t-shirt had jammed its way all up into my buttcrack. All I really remember is the 6th grade Notorious LJT, who was only slightly more uncouth than he is now and who had been sitting next to me, laughing hysterically as I tried to play off the nonchalant wedgie pull as I walked to the piano. I like to think that I redeemed myself by playing the notes on the piano correctly, but in retrospect, that probably just made me look like an even bigger nerd.

It was awesome.