5 of the mostly now

I've been a bit lax in posting any 5 of the now music recently, so some of these tracks are finely aged at this point. All still good though. A nice mix of some mainstream, and some really fine remixes.

1. Cage the Elephant - Ain't No Rest For The Wicked - Ain't No Rest For The Wicked
Good, solid rock. I thought for sure this was a hair metal track that I somehow missed, only to learn it was brand new. I've only heard this on KRNA on rare terrestrial radio listening occasions, so I don't know if it has gotten much airplay or not. I dig it.

2. Lateef & Z-Trip - Ahead of the Curve - Time (Freestyle)
Z-Trip is hands-down one of my favorite DJ's, and I've been a fan of Lateef's since his work with Lyrics Born. This track is the current favorite off of what is a great mixtape.

3. Rhianna - Umbrella (Travis Barker Remix)
Since becoming more interesting in drums, I've been even more amazed with what Travis can do. His work with DJ AM was incredible. This track is very much along those lines.

4. DJ Earworm - Heartless (In a Bottle). I first came across DJ Earworm after his "United State of Pop 2008 (Viva La Pop)" mashup of the top 25 pop songs of 2008. He has a number of other very smooth mashups, with this one being one of my favorites. The Fray doing Kanye + The Police + Black-Eyed Peas + others. Fabulous.

5. Toby Keith - American Ride - American Ride
Toby Keith is often hit or miss for me. This one nails it though.

Albums of 2009

For the past few years (initially started by Ryan, I believe) at the end of the year I have assembled a list of my favorite albums that I purchased during the year. These are not individual songs, instead they are whole albums that ended up getting lots of play during the year.

This year proved to be particularly challenging. First, in something that should be a sign to the ignorant record companies, I did not buy a single, silver, shiny disc this year. Not one. I didn't do this to purposely not buy CD's any longer. Instead, I have just found that price, convenience, and ease of use by me all lead to me buying nearly all of my music as Amazon MP3 downloads. Second, I also greatly loaded up on the amount of free music I was finding, and a healthy dose of Pandora. All of this lead to a rather small list of possible albums. However, out of that list, I was able to find 4 albums that had significantly more listening mileage than others.

These are in no particular order. They are simply 4 albums that I purchased this year and found to be the most interesting of 2009:

1. Kid Cudi - Man On The Moon: The End Of Day [Explicit]
I was first pulled in by "Day and Night", and the "Make Her Say" remix was far better than the original. Good stuff overall.

2. LMFAO - Party Rock (Amazon MP3 Exclusive Version) [Explicit]
Raw fun. That's really all you need to know. This stuff never gets old, it just perks up your day when you hear it. "I am not a whore" remains my favorite.

3. Shinedown - The Sound Of Madness
Yes, this album got a significant amount of standard radio airplay. Despite that, this is the real deal. These guys are how I want my rock to sound. The title track still kicks me in the rear when I need it.

4. Steinski - What Does It All Mean? - 1983-2006 Retrospective
If you dig people such as Girl Talk, DJ Shadow, etc., you need to give Steinski a listen. In my mind, he's the Grand Wizard Theodore of the mashup/sampling movement. He's the originator who almost nobody knows - he doesn't have the mainstream name. However, this stuff is top-notch. More info on Steinski is here.

5 for July

Billy Currington - People Are Crazy - Little Bit of Everything
I've been in the mood recently some simple, feel-good country music. This is a really light track, but I have yet to get tired of it. "God is great, beer is good, and people are crazy." I can't disagree with that.

Rodney Atkins - It's America - It's America
More simple country goodness. Not really a good explanation on this one, but I enjoy it.

Primus - The Toys Go Winding Down - Frizzle Fry
"This isn't even AC/DC - it's just some techno band". Yeah - true that. Les Claypool and Primus have been beyond cool since I was in high school. Couple that with AC/DC, and I'm sold. I can't believe I didn't know about this until I got it as a free track somewhere. Free music FTW!

Ben Harper & Relentless7 - Keep It Together (So I Can Fall Apart) - White Lies for Dark Times
This is the BEST SONG EVER. That comes straight from my son's drum teacher. I don't disagree. The intro, the heavy metal yell, the drum, and the bad-ass guitar. Listen to it at high volume. Do not resist.

A Perfect Circle - The Noose - Thirteenth Step
Possibly the smoothest song ever. Maynard has unparalleled vocals, and the production on this is amazing. One of my favorites for a long time. Here's looking at you, Cheney and Bush.

5 of the now

Wow - haven't touched the blog since February. Unfortunately (maybe), Twitter has mostly replaced blogging for me it appears. The 140 character bursts fit my available time better.

However, the blog still provides a great place for 5 of the now to land.

Charlie Robison - Good Times - Good Times
True Blood has one of the best mixes of music I have ever heard on a TV series. An eclectic mix of primarily swamp rock, country, and folk. Charlie Robison brings the perfect stoner band song to the mix. Mellow out and enjoy.

Lyrics Born - Funky Hit Records - As U Were
I already knew Lyrics Born was badass. This track just blew the lid off the place though. Just try listening to this and not nodding your head and rocking out. It's free to boot.

Shinedown - Sound of Madness - The Sound of Madness
Shinedown was on the last 5 of the now, and here they crank up the rock. This thing rocks out hard, and has a chorus that is beyond catchy. There is a hint of vintage Metallica running through the beginning, and then they make it their own. Definitely my favorite rock group of the moment.

I'm Just Raw (Remix) (feat. Del The Funky Homosapien & Pigeon John) - Lyrics Born - Overnite Encore: Lyrics Born Live!
Yes - a 2nd appearance by Lyrics Born. Until I saw him live in Iowa City, I actually didn't get this song. Now I do. One of the single best performances I have seen. This track isn't actually live, and you can now get it on his 3rd mixtape album, but Del puts this one over the top.

A Little Bit Of Riddim (featuring Cherine Anderson) - Michael Franti - All Rebel Rockers
Now for something completely different. Open up wide and enjoy some music that is different than anything you have been hearing. This entire album is great, but this is probably my favorite.

5 of the now

2NU - The Best of 2NU - Crossroads (Chaos)
Great flashback to the early 1990's (for me at least). I was a huge fan of 2NU and "This is Ponderous" back in the day, and one of few people to actually own their CD it turns out. This track came out on one of their later discs, but I find it very cool still. A bit of spoken-word mixed with odd humor, so not for everyone.

Shinedown - The Sound of Madness - Second Chance
This is one of the best songs I have heard in years. I really liked Shinedown's previous album with "45", and I picked up this album before this track really started getting a lot of airplay.

Team 9 vs. Stereogum - Stereogum & team9 Present... MySplice The Third - Lockdown Shelter
Team9 makes some of the best mashups I have heard this side of Z-Trip. Pairing Kanye with the Stones is an unusual and completely fantastic mix. This might be the best mashup I have heard to date. Plus it's free!

The Flying Burrito Brothers - Hot Burritos! The Flying Burrito Bros: Anthology 1969-1972 - Christine's Tune (A.K.A. Devil In Disguise)
This one was picked up by watching True Blood. This plays on the radio during the final episode of the 1st season. A catchy little number, especially if you have the show context behind it. Once I found out that Gram Parsons wrote it, I understood why I liked it so much.

Tom Morello The Nightwatchman - The Fabled City - The Iron Wheel
I admit - I got this track (and album) originally because Shooter Jennings is on this track with Tom. They go way back to when Tom actually produced albums for Stargunn. However, I enjoyed this particular track much more than expected. The Nightwatchman is Tom's folk/country alter-ego for those who don't know, or can't believe it.

Albums of 2008

Ryan nudged me to say that it was time to post my favorite albums of the last year. I actually had this done in time for the New Year, but never posted. So here it is now. As with him, I bought almost no physical CD's in the past year. In fact, the ACDC (no other choice) and Waylon CD's on this list are the only ones I bought all year. Amazon is now my drink of choice over iTunes, but they are both where I get 99% of my purchased music.

Also of interest - this year my free vs. purchased ratio was far in favor of free. I think that is the first year for that.

These are in no particular order, they were simply the 5 albums that I own and found to be the most interesting of 2008.

1. AC/DC - Black Ice
Surprisingly, as AC/DC is one of my absolute favorite bands of all time (XM channel 53 is really the only XM channel I need), I didn't buy this CD right away. Partially because I could only get it at WalMart or ACDC.com (yeah - I got it from the latter). Partially because I wasn't sure how good it would be given their last effort. I'm now mad at myself for waiting. This is the best stuff since Razor's Edge, if not Back in Black. As good of hard rock and blues as there has ever been.

2. Waylon Jennings & The 357's - Waylon Forever (The Final Recordings)
Waylon sends us some tunes from the great beyond, courtesy of Shooter. This was an effort of Shooter's nearly 10 years in the making. In the end, we get an eerie reminder of Waylon's greatness as he re-imagines stripped-down versions of some of his great songs. A fantastic original collaboration with Shooter is included as well.

3. Girl Talk - Feed the Animals
I don't think this needs any more accolades, although it deserves them all. There's a reason this is overlapped with Ryan's list. I know I said these weren't in a particular order, but this album takes #1 for this year hands down. The most original and incredible work I have come across in years - possibly ever.

4. Jamey Johnson - That Lonesome Song
I originally got a sampler song from this for free, and then my wife told me about another on the radio. I bought the whole album, and was amazed at how good it was in its entirety, especially for a freshman effort. A great new country voice I hope to hear continue.

5. Various Artists - Music from the Motion Picture 21
This CD got a ton of play this year. It has an assortment of great songs and acts. The LCD Soundsystem track was good, as always. More importantly, this album introduced me to MGMT, who I had somehow managed to not stumble upon. Correcting that mistake makes this album worthwhile by itself.

iTunes Store Gripe

I could expound on this to include bad metadata that has plagued digital music from the beginning. I won't - I'll keep this succinct for now.

iTunes (Apple) - why the hell do you feel it necessary to change the name of the album for your free songs each week? You have the song, you list the correct album it is from, but then you tack on " - single of the week" and label it as track 1 of 1. NO!

Actually, it's worse than that in some cases. Sometimes the real name of the album instead becomes "song title - single of the week". But, it's not an actual single, and the album art will still of course be for the full album.

This came from a real album, with a real title, and it had a specific track number. STOP CHANGING IT!

OCD

"3 posts in one day - he must be sick, or deranged."

I recently picked up a TON of great Aesop Rock singles and bootlegs, and many of them are incredible. However, since I don't happen to live near somewhere where you can easily find a lot of the stuff Def Jux put out on 12" easily, I tend to resort to a little bit of ARRRRRRRRRRRRR.

I pay for my regular music - I feel that bootlegs and such are the spoils for those able to find them on the Internet.

The only trouble with obtaining this music in this fashion, is that it messes with my OCD-like need to get my iTunes library to be pristine and complete. I usually turn to my good friend, wiki, but this stuff is a bit too obscure for even wiki to be of help.

I now have a new friend in this battle. google site:rateyourmusic.com ALBUM_NAME ARTIST

At least in the case of Aesop Rock, I found every one of his obscure singles and common boots out there. Fantastic.

Genius!

I really didn't think I would find much use for the new "Genius" feature in iTunes 8. It seemed like a gimmick, and primarily to push more stuff from the iTunes store in my mind.

However, after playing with it for less than a night I'm pretty happy with it now. I was a bit concerned when my iTunes memory usage climbed to 800 MB while it was first compiling my genius information (and if you still care about privacy of your data it will disturb you as well). After that completed though, it was pretty cool seeing it group together songs from my library based on a given song.

After playing with that for a bit, I decided to turn on the sidebar and let it show songs from the store as well. The related songs portion is only mildly interesting to me -- what I really liked was the list of other songs I might be missing from that same artist.

It was while browsing an artist I happen to have nearly everything ever made, that I noticed something else that I found amusing. It claimed there was a song I didn't have, and that it was on an album that I physically own and had ripped to my library. After being thoroughly stumped for a bit (keep in mind it's the wee hours of the morning, and I have all sound muted), I realized that it was actually a hidden track. It turns out that if you buy the album from iTunes, the last song is broken into 2 separate songs, rather than one long track. Interesting. Also cool - because I now know the title to what was previously an untitled hidden track to me.

How to make music fun

I know - it looks like I'm just padding my posts count at this point. I'm on track to have as many posts this month as I have the entire rest of the year. Have to take advantage of it when the ambition is there.

Parts of the music industry (mostly the evil parts who hide behind a shell company known as the RIAA) are bemoaning the fact that people are not buying their music anymore, and that interest in their manufactured crap is on the decline. [completely wacky sidenote: I realized yesterday you can't say "Fiduciary Duty" without saying "douche"]. This zombified race of former humans can't figure out what they should do to get people to enjoy music again, so they err on the side of suing everyone and introducing painful and ugly DRM into their music.

Well, as I again realized over the past few days, that's completely the opposite direction to go. Music is a social creature. Just like the scorpion, that it's nature. Music is not really appreciated until it shared and experienced by many people. The RIAA is running scared and doing exactly the wrong approach.

I've enjoyed some fantastic musical sharing over the past few days, and I haven't even been to any concerts. My daughter loves all kinds of music, and I have been making CDs for her lately. There's not much more fun than doing that. It started with some bedtime music. Initially I started pretty mainstream, but more recently we ended up with a Marley (Bob and Ziggy) CD that she loves. Yesterday and today we created a "rock" CD for her. It turns out she has inherited her dad's wide range of musical taste - we have everything from pop, to 70's hard rock, to some modern and classic country.

The other sharing dropped in the form of a new 5 of the now from Ryan. Ryan came up with the 5 of the now a few years ago on his blog, and it's great both from the creating and listening perspective.

As his post and my previous post demonstrate, there is no lack of free music out there. Have no fear - music wants to be free and always will be in the end. Wise up RIAA.

Digital Battlefield

It's too bad other companies did not have the foresight and unique position of Apple to make their online music stores truly succeed. I say this not because I don't like iTunes, I've said before how it is pretty much my primary source if at all possible. However, some other companies are starting to do some good things and it is just a nearly insurmountable obstacle for them to overcome, which I think limits some progress that we should be seeing.

Okay - that was a long run-on way of getting to my real point. Amazon continues to improve and add to their excellent MP3 download service - yet I still basically forget about them entirely unless something pokes me to remind me. This is especially weird given that for almost all of my other online shopping, I prefer to use them first.

I received an email pointing out that Amazon has weekly album deals that are really good. We're talking $5 or $7 full album, non-DRM downloads of some really good artists. I assumed these would be pop radio schlock, but they actually have a good assortment of some good music.

Then, on top of that, I find out that Amazon has weekly free songs, just like iTunes, except again they are DRM-free of course. These songs change weekly (and possibly daily, some that I saw yesterday are no longer featured). Here is a link where you can find some, or signup for their weekly newsletter if you're like me and need a poke to look outside the iTunes garden and see the other music all around.

iTunes is still the simplest path around for me, without question. Nobody else can yet pull off having a single app where I can search their store, manage my music, and drop it on my device all in a well-designed interface. Amazon's downloader does a decent job, but I still consider it somewhat of a hack. However, low-priced DRM-free music is a good way to at least get me looking at them.

Adding on quick - here's another link to 30 free hip-hop/R&B songs courtesy of AllHipHop.com. A bit of a pain, you have to get your iTunes code via email - but some pretty good songs.

Albums of 07

Ryan switched up a bit from our 5 of the now format, and gave us his favorite full albums of last year.

I'll admit, I'm as big of an album fan as him. As much as I like just finding new music, and skipping around in my playlist, I'm still thoroughly impressed and amazed when I find an album that truly works from start to stop. This should be obvious I guess, Floyd never put out anything as a single that wasn't ten times better within the context of the album.

I had to stretch a bit to figure out my 5 favorite of last year. I can't say it was the best year for the album, but these were all at least ones that earned repeat from me. Also, this is a list of albums I enjoyed this year, not necessarily albums released this year.

1. Shooter Jennings - The Wolf
Yeah, this probably seems obvious, I'm a huge Shooter fan. That said, even I was amazed how much I liked this album. It just grew even better over time. Hands down his best effort yet. See you in August, Shooter.

2. Timbaland - Timbaland Presents Shock Value
This stretches the concept of album a bit. The amount of collaboration here makes it difficult to get a consistent theme going...or does it? The consistent theme here is Timbaland's continued incredible production value. That and the fact that I kept finding a new track to be my favorite. "Bounce" is the current one - Missy and Dre along with JT, that's just good business.

3. Z-Trip - All Pro
Old-school hip-hop masters, with some nice metal behind it. Where was this in high school?

4. Aesop Rock - Fast Cars, Danger, Fire, and Knives
This album and I had some difficult times. I often referred to this as the devil album, due to it having superhuman DRM from iTunes somehow. I also thought that it wasn't nearly as good as some of his former or his current album. I was wrong, it just took some time.

5. Various Artists - Lost in Translation Soundtrack
Yes, this is fairly old at this point. I just finally got around to watching this movie this year though, and then getting the soundtrack. RZA is a master minimalist.

Potpourri

It's been a while since I did a post with several interesting items, so here goes:

• Completely Missing the Point
  I'm to the point where I'm almost entirely paperless with my monthly bills. I think the city water bill is the sole holdout at this point; everything else is either delivered directly to my email (fantastic), or I download from the web (better, but still not the best). I can now use email tags or folders of PDFs to store all of this data very succinctly, and in a searchable and usable manner.
  
  Maybe the biggest benefit though was time savings and reduction of effort. Quite simply, especially with automatically tagged email, there is little to no interaction with these bills any longer. I check them over and archive them.
  
  So, I was highly disappointed to receive the following email after downloading my latest telephone statement from the local co-op:

  eLation@southslope.com

  Data concerning your account was recently made available offline.
  If you didn't download this data, it may indicate an unauthorized individual has accessed your account.
  
  A PDF version of invoice 10224020 was downloaded.
  
  In accordance with an FCC ruling, you are being notified that data from your online account was downloaded.
  The text of this ruling can be viewed at http://hraunfoss.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/FCC-07-22A1.pdf

  
  Needless to say, I was not "elated" about seeing this. What a pointless email. I can only hope they are taking this ruling too far, and that I won't start seeing this everywhere.
  
  
• Missing iTunes Feature
  Here's a sentence I'm pretty sure I've never said before: "Man, I wish iTunes had this feature I heard about in Windows Media Player." That changed after seeing a post on lifehacker today though.
  
  Basically, this is a way to put media player into a full screen mode and have it locked with a numeric password. So, the theory is that you can throw the player into party mode and go full screen with some cool visualizations. Now, somebody bumping or trying to use the computer won't kill the tunes. Simple, but cool.
  
  
• Reduce, Reuse, Recycle
  As always, this is a great mantra for living your life. Lately, near the holiday time especially, I have been very interested in the first. Looking at all of the pure excess and junk in the stores just leads me to believe we are wasting effort and resources on pointless junk.
  
  Without leaning too heavily into the preachy category, I thought I would share an interesting article about reducing the number of useless gifts given simply out of expectation and replacing them with things that are thoughtful and simple. In other words, something original and practical, not something overpriced and grabbed from an end cap.
  

5 of the Now

You'll notice a definite hip-hop flavor to this list. That's been the majority of my listening lately...perhaps MTV is to blame.

Queen & Wyclef Jean - The Platinum Collection - Another One Bites the Dust
This track rocks hard. Queen was hands down my favorite group as I was getting into Classic Rock back in high school, and Freddie's stripped-down vocals own the track here. Couple that with Wyclef's smooth production, and the seriously amped-up bass, and it's a winner.

KRS-One, Kanye West, Nas & Rakim - Classic (Better Than I've Ever Been) [DJ Premier Remix]
I like Kanye, but I bought this for the wealth of original hip-hop talent that he brought along. KRS-One alone would have been enough to intrigue me, but bringing along Rakim and Nas just improves it all. Good stuff. Thanks to Blender for pointing me in the direction of this track.

Rihanna featuring Jay-Z - Umbrella - Good Girl Gone Bad
This track has grown on me a ton, and is now my favorite track that she has done. Smooth, good beat, all-around great track. This was obtained at the request of Shannon who wanted it for driving music on a trip we were taking. I would give an iTunes link, but this won't actually be released until June. If you listen, make sure you have XM, as the crap that passes for FM radio cuts Jay-Z off the track entirely.

Busta Rhymes, DMX, Lloyd Banks, Mary J. Blige, Missy Elliott, Papoose & Rah Digga - Touch It Remixes (Explicit Version) - Single
Music tips can come from unusual places. This was on Nelly Furtado's Summer Top 10 list on MTV Hits recently. I liked her quite a bit (at least her music), but man she came off dumber than hell on that show. However, her pick of this is impeccable. The video trots out an endless lip of hip-hop celebs, and Mary J throws down with some force. The whole track has a very Missy-Timbaland influenced feel to it. Great track. Welcome back Busta.

DJ Khaled featuring Akon, T.I., Rick Ross, Fat Joe, Baby & Lil' Wayne - We Takin' Over - Single (USA)
I can't say I condone the theme of this song, but screw it, I like Fat Joe and his gang. Akon's unique vocals are a great contrast to people like Joe and Rick Ross. Still can't stand Lil' Wayne, but I'll let it slide this time. This and "Make it Rain" by Fat Joe are both incredible.

Now, one last tidbit to leave you with. It turns out MTV.com has tons of music videos that you can watch on your computer. Who knew? http://www.mtv.com/music/video/

I was impressed to see they had both new and old videos on there. I also did not expect Aesop Rock to look anything like this: http://www.mtv.com/overdrive/?artist=1225460&vid=65229

New Music Found

I really enjoy finding entirely new music, both new artists and new forms of music. This is usually especially good when found in the context of a live show. The energy and sound from a live show is still unmatched by any recording medium I have found.

Last night, I took Shannon to a concert by Patty Griffin. I have discussed her recently in my 5 of the now album post. Her portion of the show was tremendous. Her band was awesome, the Englert Theater in Iowa City is a great place to hear a small show, and her voice made perfect use of that setting. They ranged from slow, bluesy numbers, to soft folk ballads, to some rocking guitar licks. All great stuff.

Her drummer for the evening happened to be a member of her opening act, Terremoto. I knew absolutely nothing about these guys coming into the night, but they were awesome as well. The band is just 2 guys, but they play a wide assortment of instruments, ranging from the stand-up bass to bongo drums. Their music is primarily Latin and Cuban, with strong Brazilian influences. They also did a very cool New Orleans Jazz number. Primarily their songs are instrumental, but both members also have vocal portions for several of the songs. Great stuff, definitely worth a listen.

Update: Ryan nicely points out that their music is available from iTunes.
I believe their next album will be on CDBaby as is their current one, so I may go that route to try to pad their pockets a bit more.

5 of the Now - Long and Varied

Something different this time. 5 albums rather than songs (that's the long part), and in a progressively different range of music (that's the varied).

This will start with rock-influenced rap, to rap, to rap + orchestra, to folk. Dig? (I aplogize, I can't get iTunes to very elegantly link to just an album. I did try to link to my favorite songs on each of these.)

1. Lyrics Born - Overnite Encore: Lyrics Born Live!
It's no secret that this guy is hands down one of my favorite performers. This performance blows the doors off about anything else you might hear too. Find somebody else with more energy in their performance. Seriously, because I want to hear them if they exist.
I would suggest listening to some of his other stuff first though, as this is almost better as you hear him improvise with his existing material. Rock/rap cannot be combined better than this.

2. Dilated Peoples - Expansion Team LP
I discussed in a previous 5 of the now track how I found out about Dilated thanks to Evidence being on a track with Lyrics Born (check out that smooth segway..). Shortly after that, I actually bought all 4 of their albums, mostly unheard. I liked their stuff that much.
I'm actually recommending their initial release from 2000 as the one to get if you can get only one. Check out the final track, "War", especially. The 'Dubya should be required to have this as his bedtime music (or the asshole from Diebold...but I digress).

3. Nuttin But Stringz - Struggle from the Subway to the Charts
This stuff is crazy good. These brothers are equally adept at rapping or playing classical violin. I first saw them while watching Noggin with the kids, but it turns out they were recently in the movie "Step Up" which I watched as well. Fantastic stuff.

4. Phish - The Story of the Ghost
Time to chill. Most people would not be surprised in the slightest to see a Phish album pop up on the blog of somebody with some pretty obvious interest in Pink Floyd. However, I'm actually not a big Phish fan. This is one of the few exceptions. I recently found this CD buried in a box, and began listening to it again. Smooth, flowing tracks.

5. Patty Griffin - Flaming Red
Shannon was the one who found this, which makes sense because this is very much her style of music. A cross between Sheryl Crow and more folk-influenced singers such as Loreena McKennitt. Very mellow music. The track, "One Big Love" was the one I originally helped her track down, and is probably my favorite as well.


Let it never be said that I don't listen to a wide range of music...

Needle in the haystack (aka the ballad of strstr)

Slashdot over the years has degenerated to the point where I expect nearly no value any longer. However, I keep it around just for the rare times where it finds a gem. This is one of those cases.

Any readers of this blog should already have a pretty good idea what I think about Digital Rights Management (DRM). (sidenote - what a nice spin of words to try to make it sound like something non-evil, was Digital Handcuffs (DH) already taken?).

This blog post, courtesy of Slashdot, is just about perfect. Fantastic read. Macrovision sucks.

Fun Task for the Day

Music by color.

Go into your iTunes collection, type a color into the search box, and hit play.

Tonight's playlist for me: Green.

The Unholy Trinity

One of these things is not like the other...

The unholy trinity I speak of in the title is a combination I stumbled upon tonight with much glee on my part. Apple iTunes COM SDK + JavaScript + Windows Scripting Host. I know, you're probably wondering what the hell kind of medicine I am on, playing with Windows scripting. I had never touched it before tonight either. JavaScript and I have a longterm love/hate relationship as well. I love to swear at it endlessly for its annoyances and lack of ease of debugging, while hating how often it ends up getting the job done for me.

That all said, this combination has just allowed me to do some kick-ass things with iTunes. I had the SDK downloaded for some time, and I wrote some sample C++ apps when I first got it. However, after seeing the Apple JavaScript examples I decided to experiment with them a bit. I'm thoroughly impressed now, similar to Unix shell scripts (although orders of magnitude less powerful), I find that I can just get a task done very quickly, as opposed to writing a full application. Quick and dirty is the key here.

I currently have some scripts to perform some actions I had been meaning to do. Remove any dead tracks from my library, and cleanup bogus comments on some of my tracks. If anyone is interested, I can give them the scripts.

Now, for the challenge. Come up with some task/feature that you would like to do with your iTunes library that you can't quite seem to make happen with playlists. I'll see what I can do about getting it done in a script.

5 of the Now

Here you go, your first holiday five of the now...

Side Two - DJ Ese, Aesop Rock, and Babbletron - Side Two

This was actually a free track that I got somewhere. I don't recall it being the free song of the week from iTunes (go here for keeping track of that BTW), so I think it must have been from when the Apple group on Facebook gave away some songs each week.
Regardless, this has a fantastic hook that sticks in your head. With Aesop Rock on it, how can you go wrong?

Welcome to the Black Parade - My Chemical Romance - The Black Parade

At first my intense, burning hatred for Emo would not let me give this a listen. Thankfully, I like to at least give most music a chance. That, coupled with a resounding recommendation from the SO led me to listening and watching the video. These guys are not Emo. They just haven't quite realized that they just plain rock hard, and don't need the mascara.
This song just plain rocks. At times they evoke an image of Queen at their height in the late 70's. Coming from me, that's a resounding recommendation.

(Check out the video too, not as trippy balls as The Fountain, but cool nonetheless)

U + Ur Hand - P!nk - I'm Not Dead

Poor grammar aside, this songs kicks. I had found Pink a bit too mainstream for a while, but with this album, and this song especially, I think she is back in her own niche. This is way too raw and powerful to be classified as pop, but still a bit more polished than rock.
This is again a song where the video got me into the song as much as the music. It turns out having a bajillion channels can be good, MTV Hits actually plays music videos all of the time still.

Pack Up (Remix) - Lyrics Born with KRS-One and Evidence - Same !@#$, Different Day

Lyrics Born is almost too simple of a choice for a 5otn. The guy can do no wrong in my book. I have specifically been giving this track some additional listening lately though. Anyone interested in this better already know who KRS-One is, so I don't need to preach on that.
However, Evidence is the reason I have really included this track. I have picked up a few tracks from Dilated Peoples recently, and they are fantastic. "Neighborhood Watch" is the album I have been liking lately.

My My, Hey Hey (Out of the Blue) - Neil Young and Crazy Horse - Rust Never Sleeps

Reaching back to the classics here. Neil and Crazy Horse blurred the lines between folk and rock, birthing grunge in the process. I got back into this song as part of a pseudo-obsession with tracking down some obscure bootlegs a few weeks ago.
Specifically, there was a version of Daughter by Pearl Jam performed on Saturday Night Live back on April 16, 1994. This version was performed very shortly after the death of Kurt Cobain. Eddie Vedder segwayed from Daughter into "My My, Hey Hey", in a very cool performance (I would post it here, but unfortunately it isn't all that easy to find a live link for it).
Instead, I submit the original from Neil.
To really do this justice, make sure to follow it up with, "Hey Hey, My My (Into the Black)" from the same album. The two songs represent one of the best "bookend" set of songs ever.