Humble verging on Absurd.

"If the human mind were simple enough for us to understand,
we would be too simple-minded to understand it."

This sentence is the introductory quote to a website on Neurocognitive Linguistics. I always like it when scholars are aware of the futility of their endeavours.




Inbetween my own futile academic endeavours, I have found, or should I say, stolen me the time to listen into Lightspeed Champion which effected a very pleasant aha experience, as I had not expected that sort of music and lyrical prowess (well) from a former Test Icicle. That being said, I have to admit that I never actively listened to the Test Icicles, so my idea of their music was based entirely on an untested prejudice, founded on the name and the overwhelming presence of the colour neon pink in their artwork. But, compared to the arty-farty weaky-geeky image of himself that Dev Hynes still trumpets out into the world in a rather ostentatious manner (or so it seems), the music is refreshingly unpretentious and meanders along Saddle Creek style in Tilly & The Wall tapdance shoes. With girl-sung country choruses and backy vocals.
What really got me however - although I haven't really listened in depth yet - are the lyrics. Especially, I fell in love with All My Friends Are Listening To Crunk, which is richly furnished with a Maccabees-like view of romance and (sad) young love. Perhaps they're not really that special, the lyrics. I can just sorta relate to the sentiment. And that sort of thing gets me every time.


(I should not look at too many pictures
of that myspace gaze peeking out from under that
NME hair.
Red ukulele, however - very nice.)

My drawings are starting to suck
My best friends are all listening to crunk
I feel like the world`s cone crazy
Sometimes, in the cold night
My phone rings, but it`s not you
And even, when the buzzer to my pager rings
still not you
A stranger on the night bus
With a checked coat, is not you
And in one hand, hold me so close
But deep down, it's not you

PS: When will Emmy the Great FINALLY release an album?

Word of the Day, Pt. I

English Word Of The Day

to elope

intr.v. e·loped, e·lop·ing, e·lopes

1. To run away with a lover, especially with the intention of getting married.

2. To run away; abscond.

---

[Perhaps Anglo-Norman aloper, to run away from one's husband with a lover, from Middle Dutch ontlopen, to run away : ont-, away from, along; see ant- in Indo-European roots + lopen, to run.]

---

e·lopement n.

e·loper n.

---

elope

verb run away, leave, escape, disappear, bolt, run off, slip away, abscond, decamp, sneak off, steal away, do a bunk (informal)

From an old diary, Part 1

Tuesday, March 13th, 2007



A "comic" drawn to commemorate a curious incident and conversation that happened in our college's laundry room on that day. A bumblebee had flown in & I simultaneously rescued it and the panicky woman who was in the laundry with me by escorting it out of the window with a piece of crumpled up paper. Apparently the woman was quite in awe at what I did and postulated that I had no experience whatsoever with the common emotion of fear. In fact, I am well acquainted with it. I simply don't count bumblebees among our scariest contemporaries.

Gravity always wins.

"What took you so long?"
The melody and the simplistic but poignant lyrics combine with this melancholy variation of the ubiquitous Britpop video theme "supermarket" and continue to excite.

Wir werden schmelzen.

It looks enchanting.
I'm ready for a new out-of-city adventure.

Eighties Dance Music ???

Celebrations - Club 2 is back at the B72 every first Monday of the month. It's hard to even express how happy this makes me.


Our musical project will probably soon attempt to play this song:



Oh my God, the eighties. This is such a ridiculous video. I watched it with Eva & Lisa yesterday and we were wondering to what extent people were serious about this sort of ... er, aesthetics. I mean, there are many videos now that are in a similar vein but they're all tongue-in-cheek to the n-th power. Of course, the rule book for the 21st century states that you can't be truly bad if you're not serious. Hence no one is serious, because no one is self-confident enough - apart from maybe Muse and other complete dickheads. Most of them turn out looking completely ridiculous as a result. Oh the sweet irony.

And here's another video to be filed under "fabulously eighties". Alright, it's not really a video, but just listen to the song!



I love this song. They should play it at the club. I would!
The best line has to be ... "I'm so afraid I'll lose you, if I can't seduce you." Precious.

Yailbird for your music

I've just ordered this CD for my birthday. (Yes, I do this sad thing that is buying my own presents with my mother's money). The main reason why it caught my attention is that its artwork is apparently based on the same gift wrapping paper that one of my favourite diaries ever was bound in:



This diary had pages in different shades of blue and I wrote in it during one of the most romantically transfigured phases of my life (January - August 2005), when I idolised the Libertines & decorated my life with tea stains and cigarette burns. I sometimes miss the naivety I had back then, because it enabled me to see & believe beauty, where now I can only relativise and cynicise.

As to Get Well Soon: I listened to some of the tracks on myspace and the music sounds nice. Not completely mindblowing, but we'll see how much it grows on me.

I also ordered the 2 Joanna Newsom albums & the Ys Street Band EP on Vinyl (major obsession), the vinyl single of The Skin Of My Yellow Country Teeth & Let The Snakes Crinkle Their Heads To Death by Felt & The Glasgow School by Orange Juice.
Buying CDs is another thing that makes me feel accomplished. Be still my heart. <3

I should've known that you didn't have the time my dear.

If there was one category of place where I'd have to spend the rest of my life, it would be on a rural railway platform, in the sunshine. There's just something about these platforms that instantly puts me in a mood that sometimes comes close to serene.
Maybe it is the fact, that when you're waiting on a railway platform, you're usually expecting to go somewhere - and going somewhere is almost always a good feeling (considering, that, of course, happiness lurks wherever you are not) ... and the time spent on the platform is a short break, a breather, a pause that doesn't make you feel bad about pausing, because you know that very soon, you'll be on your way. It's this reassuring impression of surrendering everything to a higher power - even though it be something as unreliable as public transport - not being responsible for what happens & still not having to expect a catastrophe. It's good that you can sometimes do this - let go of the strings - in as harmless a context as travelling into the country on a Friday afternoon, because normally the neurotic need for being in control and simultaneous frustration at not being able to control anything is strong enough.

I took a train out of the city to seek some solitude and escape the loneliness.

May 5th.

Looks as if I'll be travelling to Munich in July to see the Magnetic Fields. Lisa asked me to accompany her, and I love taking intercity trains for the sake of musical experiences, so naturally I said yes. The list of concerts that are coming up is ever growing longer, and it pleases me. For some reason, going to concerts is one of the few activities that make me feel really accomplished. And, apart from getting hold of the money for the tickets, it's really the easiest from the list. It takes considerably more effort to get As, or find the man of your dreams AND get him to love you, or even just to read a book. There must be other things that make me feel accomplished, but at the moment they don't seem to come to my mind.

I dread to think of my birthday which is coming up next week. It is silly, but of course these dates, these "occasions" always feel like dead lines, and oh. I haven't achieved enough yet, by far. There's nothing like a birthday to make you feel like a loser. Man-of-my-dreams had better hurry. But I suspect that he's a bit of an idiot, so what can you expect.

Music from the Eighties.

"Felt, Felt, FELT!!!"

Dear Lord, they're really good. I can't imagine why I didn't think of giving them a listen earlier. The idea was there and all, but like so many ideas it was just never transformed into action.
One look at this album cover alone should be enough incentive for me to surrender my heart to them for the next 20 years.



It's a good think that my birthday is coming up and that I get to work more often now, because it's just unbearable how desperately I need to go record shopping. No matter how practical illegal downloading is, it's just not the real thing. I never feel like I really own a record unless I can hold some physical manifestation of the music in my hands, can leaf through the booklet, lying on my stomach on the floor with my head phones on, listening for a second first time and can afterwards put it on the shelf, clearly visible, as a reassuring reminder that it is always there in case it is needed.
As much as I am a child of the 21st century - and I think I am just realising how much I am, despite my disposition towards nostalgia - and as much as I depend on technology, there's still some basic distrust in the permanence of "data". And as much as the ephemeral nature of everything complies with the zeitgeist, and as reassuring the thought that nothing lasts for ever can be - I do sometimes crave permanence. Especially when it comes to things I really really like.

Thoughts that happen to me on laundry days.

Listen to Bunny Gamer by Xiu Xiu.




"It's silly likening this thing (the name of which I dare not speak) to a lamp that you can switch on and off even in joke. It's more like a noise that is impossible to switch off or even turn down. All you can try to do is drown it in more noise and different sounds and maybe get headphones. But as soon as all the other noises die down, there it'll be again. Like a never-ending tinnitus - in your head, but spreading fast through the body."


"But tights are just tights, no matter what happened on the day I last wore them. I can wear them again without anything devastating happening to my heart. I should stitch the little hole above the knee, because nobody but me will remember that it has been the subject of a conversation. And I should really stop inventing a sentimental value for every object and all the pavements, buildings and trees. Considering the miles we walked, we sowed memories all over town. More memories than a single person can reap in a hundred lonely nights."