For a period which felt like two years, beginning for me around 2007, almost any conversation was likely to be graced by someone describing — and in some cases, showing — the latest thing they'd seen on YouTube.
At some point, this phenomenon hit some kind of supersaturation, where it felt like we all stopped talking about YouTube videos. This isn't to say that there aren't many thousands of videos I've shared since then, just that it no longer felt important or essential to be relaying these video discoveries in person.
So it was with some surprise that I found myself evangilizing for "Healthy Snacks" this year. Originally found by Mister AOK, this video has two young men describing the healthy snacks they enjoy and love in a Whole Foods parking lot in Oakland. I think I've muttered almost every line of this video to myself at some point this year (in a grocery store). Here's the video:
Here's a photo of Bennett at the Whole Foods parking lot in question, with a very healthy snack:
By way of the continuing & excellent Reggae on the Boardwalk events in coney island this summer, several mixes of dancehall and Volcano Records releases. Some highlights: a dancehall version of One Bourbon One Scotch One Beer, a Scientist dub "Uppercut", Yellowman Getting Married and Yellowman Getting Divorced, Universal Love / Johnny Osbourne and companion evil version Another World War 1981.
Something about this YouTube ad felt uniquely "of the internet" in a way that seemed new (and grim). It's a long video, and is mostly just him chewing while describing his eating regimen. Occasionally he exhorts you to click the button, then goes in for another mouthful. At the end, there are several minutes where it's just the sound of him eating with the metal muzak playing in the background.
I got a lot of mileage out of this across-the-board mix from Bennett. It felt like an "all weather" mp3. I remember a morning where I was caffeinated & listening to the mix when Jumping Master came on and I went wild — pulled up the tune like 10 or 20 times and was literally jumping off the walls.
Also on the mix: Conan Mockasin's "I'm The Man, That Will Find You". The music video is worth checking out — Kathryn described it as "Julian Assange pop alter ego", which adds up to a weirdly transfixing thing.
This novel, which is actually three novels combined into an omnibus edition, was the one I sank into the deepest. The book traces the history of a group of people scouring the 20th century for humans who have something trapped in their hearts, where the only way to free their hearts is by constructing elaborate hammers made of ice. The translation from Russian is phenomenal — many of the characters have a totally bug-eyed voice, sprinkled with ALL CAPS, making the book read like a primary text. This is also the most recent recommendation I've read coming via DJ Rupture's "Mudd Up Book Clubb", whose selections are helpfully posted online for all to follow.
This video of bumpers and promos from a top 40 radio DJ in 1987 is energizing. It's exciting to watch someone so clearly at the top of that particular game. It was recorded on a Friday, so there's an onslaught of "pre-weekend" sound effects and energy. I'm reminded of the classic rock radio station in Omaha where "Everybody's Workin For The Weekend" was played consistently every Friday at 8AM. I've had a longstanding hypothesis that "Friday music" has a big enough musical canon to stand on its own as a genre. This video would seem to support that claim. (via Bennett)
"Wait for it" via Jivko
This one via Ricky, who originally "found it while cruising Zazzle". It feels like we only get one of these insane / wonderful personal homepages a year. This particular one has a fresh illustration style, wild use of -is as a suffix, some "heads-only" podcasts with muffled call-ins, and a true cast of characters (REBAZAR TARZS, PAUL TWITCHELL, YAUBLE SACABI, GOPAL DAS, FUBBI QUANTZ).
A circus-style one man band totally jamming off the box. I played this at a party once thinking that it had the potential to create chaos, but instead everyone became transfixed and attentive. Use at your own discretion. via Thomas
Two Bee Gees "genre benders" that Jordan found. "Giant Steps The BeeGees" feels especially timeless: I am certain that I will be humming or mumbling this version of the tune forever.
A barnstormer of an article: Google Translate's reliance on texts found on the web lead it to be used as a secret message passing mechanism. And how the text used to seed the translations was Lorem Ipsum, dummy copy found everywhere on the internet. Specifically, that different combinations of Lorem Ipsum, with differently capitalized first letters, produced nefarious-seeming english text (CHINA, NATO, SEXY, SEXY) when translated from Latin (!).
After opting out of streaming music services for a few years, I started using Spotify again this year in an effort to listen to more classical music. My methodology so far involves finding the dumbest-sounding classical compilation title, and listening until I find a composer or recording or performance that seems worth exploring further.
I enjoy that many of these "albums" ("Two Hours with Bach", "50 Commuter Classics", "Unwind with Classical", "Breathtaking Beethoven") feel very fly-by-night, with a slippery or fuzzy sense authorship/copyright. There's also a lot of them: any given recording might appear on many different compilations. I've recently been thinking about "Classical" as a musical camouflage — I'm tempted to think that there are people releasing non-classical music with classical titles as a way of doing something illegal or unusual in a deceptively public place.
This quest has paired well with "The 168 best classical music recordings" from the Telegraph. The list begins with a Dogma 95 style set of rules ("Buy British", "Be sure to have something by each of three British Bs", "Names dont matter") but the music which follows has been uniformly good.
Some findings: "CLEMENS KRAUSS RARITIES -1944/1945", Clement Krauss New Year's Concert 1954, Louange à l'Éternité de Jésus, Kurt Weill's symphonies, Bach / St. Matthew's Passion "Amsterdam Concertgebouw", Bach's Goldberg Variations.
Twas also the year of "garbagio", a term for which we should thank Tom Bubul
