la musique et la technologie

here is a comment i wrote recently for a class of mine that i thought i would share…

En effet, la musique est devenu quelque chose de largement technologique et n’est plus très tangible. C’est dommage, parce que ça pourrait signifier qu’on apprécie moins la musique, qu’on zap d’artiste en artiste, et que eux aussi ils gagnent beaucoup moins d’argent à cause du téléchargement.

Par contre, la technologie donne aussi la possibilité aux petits groupes pas connus de devenir très célèbres en très peu de temps, à travers Myspace, Facebook, Soundcloud, Purevolume et pleins d’autres sites web. Et même s’ils ne gardent pas la popularité, au moins ils ont eu leur “15 minutes de célébrité”, comme dirait Andy Warhol.

En faite, quelques groupes laissent diffuser leur album avant qu’il parte en vente, pour créer de la publicité entre ceux qui téléchargent la musique. Ils savent que ça ne va pas empêcher aux gens qui veulent l’acheter de faire justement ça, mais leur sous proviennent avant tout des concerts.

Cela m’aide dans mon prochain point: même si la musique est vachement plus accessible et même gratuite, on cherche toujours que la musique laisse une empreinte, nous touche d’une certaine manière. C’est pour ça que même si tu as écouté un album des milliers de fois, tu voudrais toujours voir le groupe en live. Des fois les voir même plusieurs fois. On veut que la musique ai une sorte de signification, ça nous aide à nous exprimer d’une certaine manière. C’est évident aux concerts ou tout le monde est complètement différent de l’un à l’autre, mais tous sont unis par les paroles de leur chanson préférée.

Il y a même un mouvement avec les mélomanes, de retourner à la musique pure. Les gens refusent d’écouter de la musique avec des écouteurs ou hauts-parleurs de mauvaise qualité, parce qu’ils veulent absorber la musique comme elle a été faite. Quelques uns ne téléchargent pas mais achètent des CD, des cassettes et parfois des anciens disques pour pouvoir toucher et mieux apprécier ce que c’est la musique.

En conclusion, je dirais que oui, la technologie a complètement changé l’industrie et la manière dont on interagit avec la musique. Mais, je pense que tout le monde cherche toujours à ce que la musique qu’ils écoutent exprime une partie d’eux qu’ils sont incapables de communiquer autrement. La musique a seulement vu le changement des achats de disques vers les achats de billets de concerts.

if that’s what you’re into

i’m really into this song off of broken social scene’s new album, forgiveness rock record.

it’s called “sweetest kill” – check it out:

drama

there is a teenage soap opera unfolding outside of my kitchen window. first of all, let me set the scene. i live in a corner house, bordering a busy street and a smaller residential street. the window i am seated at overlooks the smaller street in this lower class area in brussels, that is mostly populated by immigrants of moroccan and turkish origin. there is noise made by cars, motorcycles, trams and buses that create the soundtrack on the busy street, and sometimes you can even hear people yelling or talking loudly outside our thin glass windows. this is not to say that i understand them all, because as previously stated, many are immigrants and speak arabic with each other – not french. needless to say, it is a noisy part of town but filled with character… and characters.

it is very satisfying to human curiosity to sit at the kitchen windows and spy on the people outside walking down the street. however, today it was the screaming of a young girl that caught my attention. she looked about 14 or 15 and was talking with a boy maybe a year or so older. i’m telling the story in past tense, but the truth is that they are still outside as i am writing this – at least half an hour after i first became aware of the situation.

i noticed that the girl was crying hysterically – obviously i immediately assumed it was the guy’s fault. i took my station at the window and saw that he was trying to shush her by putting his hand over her mouth every other minute, rather violently it seemed to me. i decided to take action: if he was harming her, i had to let him know he couldn’t get away with it. i opened the window and shouted down to them in french, asking her if she was okay, if he was hurting her. she was fine, well, in the sense that he wasn’t abusing her, so i left them to sort themselves out while staying close to the window.

they parted ways soon after, her crying loudly as she walked down the residential street, and him onto the busy street. a few minutes later she returned, crying and yelling at an even higher decibel to someone on the phone. he, too, came back, but this time with a friend. they attempted conversation but he got extremely frustrated with her, i heard a slap (i didn’t see who from) and then he tried to walk away but she wouldn’t let him. she continued her sobbing, sitting on the ground, obviously very upset about something that could only be a problem of the heart.

eventually he tried to calm her down and pick her up off the street. they are no longer outside my kitchen window, so it would seem that they have now left to find a more suitable place to work out their issues. hopefully this real-life soap opera ends well for both of them, whatever the outcome.

re:stacks

“your love will be safe with me”

just take a beat to contemplate that lyric.

i think it is possibly one of the best promises you could make to another person. giving your love, sharing your heart, opening up to another person is just about the most vulnerable you will ever feel. they know you, inside and out. the good and the bad. your quirks, how to make you mad, how to make you laugh, what food you hate. what you look like in the morning after three hours’ sleep. they can tell whether you’re actually listening or just nodding your head.

and after seeing all different sides of you, they still want to stick around and discover even more. your love is safe.

so much is encompassed in just that short sentence. it implies a mutual love, first of all, because the recipient of the love couldn’t have enough respect for the other to truly take care of that love without it being returned. you have two people who have given themselves to each other wholeheartedly, unabashedly, without holding back. they have made themselves vulnerable, yet there is the promise that this love will be cherished. it will be cared for, treasured.

nothing compares with the feeling of being the completely honest and open and raw version of yourself, and yet not being rejected for it. even experiencing the very opposite of that – being loved because of your faults and quirks and moods and fears and that tiny little chip in your tooth. and you feeling the exact same way towards the other person, knowing that they will never cease to impress you and that no one else even compares. in fact, you stop comparing altogether.

“your love will be safe with me”

that is all anyone could ever ask for.

(if you haven’t yet, check out ‘re:stacks’ by bon iver… and pretty much everything else justin vernon has laid a finger on.)

tonsillitis

so far i have:

-gargled warm salt water

-gargled warm salt water with lemon

-drunk cups and cups of green tea with lemon

-eaten half a pack of honey & lemon throat lozenges

-taken countless tylenols

-been put on antibiotics

the worst part, more than the fact that i can’t eat or drink anything without experiencing a shooting pain, is that i cannot speak! it is amazing how much of life is based around communication. without the spoken word you feel utterly cut off from the world… at least i still have the ability to post my thoughts online!

i have two friends who, in the name of charity, went an entire week without speaking or making any sound with their vocal chords. that means no laughing, no sighing, no coughing unless absolutely necessary. i have a huge amount of respect for these two, to choose not to speak is extremely difficult as it automatically separates you from people around you.

tonight i am meant to go out with some friends i haven’t seen in a while – i promised. i literally signed a paper saying i would, seeing as i have cancelled plans a lot lately and they didn’t believe me! it is frustrating now that i have an actual excuse not to meet up but i cannot break the promise.

these tonsils better behave themselves and go away before friday for my interpreting exam. or else i’m sending them to the guillotine.

study…or not

it is incredible how mundane chores become the most exciting thing when you are avoiding studying. your room is suddenly clean (and hoovered for the first time in months), you found the matching sock you though you’d lost ages ago, and you even decide you have time to write a few cards to some friends… anything not to sit down and study.

i’ve tried to counter this tendency of mine (one quite common among the university crowd) by establishing my desk chair as ‘work area’ and my bed as ‘play area’ (no inuendo intended). this would be a great idea except that my room is pretty much 2mx3m so those are my only two options. failure#1.

the library was another option, but then i discovered that i only really liked to sit in one particular spot – on the silent study level, next to the window, sitting in the sun, overlooking the grassy lawn. the problem there is that those are obviously the first spots snagged by ambitious exam-prepping students, or, more annoyingly, they are snagged but then the so-called ambitious student wanders off and nothing but unopened books and notes sit at the desk for hours. if i decide to become nocturnal it is relatively empty come 2am, but by then it is dark outside and there is no point to be sitting at the window with the view – i might as well be back at my ‘work area’ in my 2mx3m cubby hole. failure#2.

the tactic that seems to work quite well in getting me to work is, first of all, signing out of facebook, then turning off my music. i then proceed to make a pot of green tea and sit, sipping at the 3 1/2 cupfuls, for the next hour or so until i run out and make another pot. the main issue that i run into here is my shrew-sized bladder. frequent trips to the toilet are necessary, bringing me away from the books and dangerously close to the kitchen where i am likely to be distracted for at least 10 minutes while i look in the fridge, realise i have nothing i want to eat, close it again. then i open the cupboards, realise i’m not actually hungry, forget to close it again, and go back to my room. this happens at least once per every cup of tea i drink (i had 11 on monday). success-ish.

moving away from bladders and other less appealing topics, i have now gone through two exams and have one in an hour’s time (i’m not prepared… yet). two more next week then i’m DONE. with second year, anyway.

sun sun sun

other than this flu/cold/fever (i don’t know what i’m dealing with here), life is grrrrreat! it’s amazing how few words it takes to make you sublimely happy… plus the sun is shining! could i ask for more?

control

i have none of it. control, that is. it is astounding how vulnerable you have to be in a relationship if you want to truly commit yourself to them.

jónsi’s new album, ‘go’, is mostly what is keeping me sane in these unforeseeable days. it has the magical sigur rós quality about it, just with a little more rhythm and build to the songs. they somehow harmonise with the rest of the world around you, whatever state it or you is in, and puts you into a trance where life feels stable and optimistic again. it is imperative to watch the video for ‘go do’, the opening track of the album, which brings all of the most beautiful images and colours of the world into one 5-minute sequence (see below).

decisions are difficult. they make you so grateful for your friends who support you through the process and even afterwards, with words of wisdom or even a loving shoulder to cry on. it is the worst feeling in the world, though, when it is someone else’s decision to make and you can see the pain that they are going through… yet you can do nothing. about. it. you feel so helpless, inadequate, lonely, powerless, exposed, the list goes on.

it is one of the toughest things to have faith that the other will reach the right decision, even if it is one that you do not like or agree with. it takes all the strength you can muster (which is probably why i am now coming down with a flu). thankfully i have jónsi to make it all better.

cats

…the cats’ faces say it all. thanks awkward family photos.

egg shower

eggs are being thrown at speakers in parliament. what next?? will barack obama suddenly decide to give a speech in his underwear? will a whoopee cushion be placed under david cameron’s chair at the next 2010 election debate? (actually, either of those would be quite amusing.)

i don’t understand why it was decided to throw eggs, anyway. i thought the typical throwing food mean to be rotten tomatoes! perhaps not in ukraine. apparently this mess arose “during a debate over the extension of the lease on a russian naval base in ukraine.” (bbc) but not only eggs! oh no, some deputies also thought it also necessary to punch out other politicians and the mp’s opposed to this extension even released smoke bombs. (better than stink bombs.)

the whole scene must have been so ridiculous that some deputies probably stepped back and just watched the chaos that ensued thinking to themselves, “ha ha, these guys are going to look so stupid when the bbc/the times put a video of them up online.”

and that is exactly what happened. check out the egging madness here (bbc) and here (times).