Space Taker
Several years ago I was bored while doing a radio show, so I asked for requests. Usually when you do this, lots of people call in, because there is some as yet undiscovered gene which makes people want to force an audience to listen to songs of their choosing. But on this night, nobody called in so I had to resort to making threats. I looked around for the worst album I could find and vowed on the air to play only this one album over and over if I didn't start getting requests. The album was by The Marshall Tucker Band and it only took a couple songs for the requests to start rolling in.
I wasn't getting very may votes last week, so I considered making this post (and several succeeding ones) a tedious description of the work of Marshall Tucker. There were at least a few suggestions, but anybody that knows me knows that I'm not going to give you some childhood story about how music changed my life. Everybody has those stories, so let's get over thinking that there's anything unique about them. Moreover, music doesn't change anything, despite what Bono might tell you.
My iPod did indeed die last week and I've been unable to revive it, but I do still have the music in iTunes, so at Doug's suggestion, I kept track of the songs that came up today while I listened at work.
1. "Small Rooms" by Papas Fritas--By chance, I parked in front of the bass player's dad's architecture office today.
2. "Children's Crusade" Sting--I was a big Police fan in middle school, but I mostly hate Sting. Except for this album, which is the only good thing in his solo catalog.
3. "Ears to the Ground" Josh Rouse--This comes up so often, it makes me question how random the random setting is. As I don't really like it that much, I skip.
4. "Madonna of the Wasps" Robyn Hitchcock--This is the live version, which is the other side of the version of "One Long Pair of Eyes" with the long spoken intro.
5. "Dollars and Cents" Radiohead
6. "Presidential Suite" Super Furry Animals--Something about this song reminds me of a Burt Bacharach composition.
7. "Alone, Alone, Alone" Wilco--This is from the Yankee Hotel Foxtrot demos and it sounds a bit like Doug Sahm. Years ago I saw Wilco live just after their first album came out and Jeff Tweedy said something like, "I love playing in Texas because we can just play a whole mess of Doug Sahm songs."
8. "Fire" The Crazy World of Arthur Brown--You may remember this from last week's Podcast. Does anybody else remember the video for this that used to appear as one of MTV's "Closet Classics?"
9. "Living with Reptiles" Glass Eye--This album was the only one that featured Dave Cameron on drums, who had previously played with Brave Combo. Last I heard he was playing with Three Day Stubble. He's an awesome drummer and can you think of a more interesting career path?
10. "Brass in Pocket" Pretenders
11. "Back in Black" AC/DC--This album has what are, I think, the best sounding recorded guitars ever. I understand that the Neve board they were recorded on now lives at Pachyderm studios in Minnesota.
12. "Come to Me" Bjork
13. "59 to 1" Tuxedomoon--I think I initially liked this song because the bass line reminds me a bit of the bass line from the Fat Albert theme. Also, I just put this in iTunes last week, along with the Arthur Brown song. iTunes must be weighting new stuff heavier. It must be.
14. "Fishsticks" Twang Twang Shock-a-Boom--This band was an Austin phenomenon in the early nineties. This is much less annoying than the later output of their singer, David (that's pronounced "Dah-veed") Garza.
15. "Walkabout" Sugarcubes--I try to make it a rule never to listen to the same artist twice in a sitting, so I'm skipping this.
16. "Moonage Daydream" David Bowie--Contains the lyric "Come on you mothers/Far out."
17. "War Dance" Don Byron--This is an album of songs by Duke Ellington and Raymond Scott. I don't think I ever would have thought to pick songs from those two and put them on the same album, but here they are. I saw Don Byron and group perform these live and he claimed they were some of the hardest songs he had played.
18. "Heart Beat" Big Black
19. "Queen Elvis" Robyn Hitchcock--Forget what I said about the multiple songs in one sitting by the same artist. Eye is my favorite of his albums.
20. Song ten from Lucky Motors' ktru appearance
21. "All Your Way" Morphine
22. "It's So Easy" Buddy Holly
23. "Garota de Ipanema" Getz-Gilberto--This is live at Carnegie Hall.
24. "One Line" PJ Harvey
25. "Epitaph" Badly Drawn Boy--I saw him play at Stubb's during SXSW and was less than impressed. More like bored.
26. "Obviously 5 Believers" Bob Dylan
27. "Henry Miller is Dead" Mommyheads
28. "Heaven is a Truck" Pavement--I like Pavement less every time I hear them.
29. "There is a Number of Small Things" Mum
30. "Once Upon a Time There Was an Ocean" Paul Simon
31. "Tumbling Dice" Rolling Stones--I've said many times that I think that Exile on Main Street is an unlistenable album. It has far too much filler, but this song is not one of those.
32. "Palms" Jana Hunter
33. "This is a Low" Blur
34. "What is and What Should Never Be" Led Zeppelin
35. "Burnin' and Lootin'" Bob Marley--I'm not the world's biggest Marley fan, but this is about looting.
36. "Seeing Other People" Belle and Sebastian
37. "Paperbag Writer" Radiohead
38. "I've Got to See You Again" Norah Jones
39. "Truth Hits Everybody" Police
40. "Dylan in the Movies" Belle and Sebastian--Again.
41. "Violence" Low
42. "The Hole" Townes Van Zandt--One of you is responsible for this.
43. "Sweet Georgia Brown" Ethel Waters
44. "Ladies and Gentlemen We Are Floating in Space" Spiritualized--Spiritualized was one of the highlights of the Primavera festival. I hadn't even intended to see them, but I'm glad I did.
45. "I Didn't Know About You" Thelonious Monk--Anything from this album reminds me of being 22 and sitting behind the counter of the upstairs coffee bar at the River Oaks Theatre, while this CD was set to reapeat.
46. "Over Fire Island" Brian Eno
47. "Seattle" PIL
48. "Hummingbird" Wilco
49. "Baby One More Time" Travis--Somehow they make a song originally done by Britney Spears touching and funny.
50. "Doctor Robert" Beatles
51. "Monkey Trick" Jesus Lizard
52. "Bebel" Antonio Carlos Jobim
53. "Valkyries" Jana Hunter
54. "It Beats 4 U" My Morning Jacket
55. "We Are the Underused" Pavement--And less.
56. "Blank Generation" Whiskeytown--Countrified version of the Richard Hell song.
57. "La Madragada" Los Super Seven
58. "Midnight Ride" Stan Getz
59. "President of What" Death Cab for Cutie
60. "Strangers" Portishead
61. "Kind of Girl" Low
62. "In the Pines" The Louvin Brothers--Kurt Cobain said this song was by Leadbelly before performing it on MTV Unplugged. He was wrong. It's a traditional song that lots of people did.
63. "Straight to the Top" Tom Waits
64. "In Metal" Low--A song about keeping things you love preserved in metal like shoes. Sorta creepy.
65. "Buffalo Soldier" Bob Marley--Gah. Skip.
66. "Crippled Inside" John Lennon--F for creativity, Lennon.
67. "Street of Dreams" Wynton Marsalis
68. "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" Bill Cosby--Yes, that Bill Cosby.
69. "Nothing Lasts" Matthew Sweet
70. "Sonic Reducer" Humungus with Cheetah Chrome
71. "Glass Hotel" Robyn Hitchcock--I didn't even have any Robyn Hitchcock in iTunes until about a month ago. Now, three times in one day.
72. "Higher Ground" Stevie Wonder
73. "An Exhortation" Lozenge
74. "How to Fight Loneliness" Jeff Tweedy--Live solo version
75. "Why Does It Always Rain on Me" Travis
I wasn't getting very may votes last week, so I considered making this post (and several succeeding ones) a tedious description of the work of Marshall Tucker. There were at least a few suggestions, but anybody that knows me knows that I'm not going to give you some childhood story about how music changed my life. Everybody has those stories, so let's get over thinking that there's anything unique about them. Moreover, music doesn't change anything, despite what Bono might tell you.
My iPod did indeed die last week and I've been unable to revive it, but I do still have the music in iTunes, so at Doug's suggestion, I kept track of the songs that came up today while I listened at work.
1. "Small Rooms" by Papas Fritas--By chance, I parked in front of the bass player's dad's architecture office today.
2. "Children's Crusade" Sting--I was a big Police fan in middle school, but I mostly hate Sting. Except for this album, which is the only good thing in his solo catalog.
3. "Ears to the Ground" Josh Rouse--This comes up so often, it makes me question how random the random setting is. As I don't really like it that much, I skip.
4. "Madonna of the Wasps" Robyn Hitchcock--This is the live version, which is the other side of the version of "One Long Pair of Eyes" with the long spoken intro.
5. "Dollars and Cents" Radiohead
6. "Presidential Suite" Super Furry Animals--Something about this song reminds me of a Burt Bacharach composition.
7. "Alone, Alone, Alone" Wilco--This is from the Yankee Hotel Foxtrot demos and it sounds a bit like Doug Sahm. Years ago I saw Wilco live just after their first album came out and Jeff Tweedy said something like, "I love playing in Texas because we can just play a whole mess of Doug Sahm songs."
8. "Fire" The Crazy World of Arthur Brown--You may remember this from last week's Podcast. Does anybody else remember the video for this that used to appear as one of MTV's "Closet Classics?"
9. "Living with Reptiles" Glass Eye--This album was the only one that featured Dave Cameron on drums, who had previously played with Brave Combo. Last I heard he was playing with Three Day Stubble. He's an awesome drummer and can you think of a more interesting career path?
10. "Brass in Pocket" Pretenders
11. "Back in Black" AC/DC--This album has what are, I think, the best sounding recorded guitars ever. I understand that the Neve board they were recorded on now lives at Pachyderm studios in Minnesota.
12. "Come to Me" Bjork
13. "59 to 1" Tuxedomoon--I think I initially liked this song because the bass line reminds me a bit of the bass line from the Fat Albert theme. Also, I just put this in iTunes last week, along with the Arthur Brown song. iTunes must be weighting new stuff heavier. It must be.
14. "Fishsticks" Twang Twang Shock-a-Boom--This band was an Austin phenomenon in the early nineties. This is much less annoying than the later output of their singer, David (that's pronounced "Dah-veed") Garza.
15. "Walkabout" Sugarcubes--I try to make it a rule never to listen to the same artist twice in a sitting, so I'm skipping this.
16. "Moonage Daydream" David Bowie--Contains the lyric "Come on you mothers/Far out."
17. "War Dance" Don Byron--This is an album of songs by Duke Ellington and Raymond Scott. I don't think I ever would have thought to pick songs from those two and put them on the same album, but here they are. I saw Don Byron and group perform these live and he claimed they were some of the hardest songs he had played.
18. "Heart Beat" Big Black
19. "Queen Elvis" Robyn Hitchcock--Forget what I said about the multiple songs in one sitting by the same artist. Eye is my favorite of his albums.
20. Song ten from Lucky Motors' ktru appearance
21. "All Your Way" Morphine
22. "It's So Easy" Buddy Holly
23. "Garota de Ipanema" Getz-Gilberto--This is live at Carnegie Hall.
24. "One Line" PJ Harvey
25. "Epitaph" Badly Drawn Boy--I saw him play at Stubb's during SXSW and was less than impressed. More like bored.
26. "Obviously 5 Believers" Bob Dylan
27. "Henry Miller is Dead" Mommyheads
28. "Heaven is a Truck" Pavement--I like Pavement less every time I hear them.
29. "There is a Number of Small Things" Mum
30. "Once Upon a Time There Was an Ocean" Paul Simon
31. "Tumbling Dice" Rolling Stones--I've said many times that I think that Exile on Main Street is an unlistenable album. It has far too much filler, but this song is not one of those.
32. "Palms" Jana Hunter
33. "This is a Low" Blur
34. "What is and What Should Never Be" Led Zeppelin
35. "Burnin' and Lootin'" Bob Marley--I'm not the world's biggest Marley fan, but this is about looting.
36. "Seeing Other People" Belle and Sebastian
37. "Paperbag Writer" Radiohead
38. "I've Got to See You Again" Norah Jones
39. "Truth Hits Everybody" Police
40. "Dylan in the Movies" Belle and Sebastian--Again.
41. "Violence" Low
42. "The Hole" Townes Van Zandt--One of you is responsible for this.
43. "Sweet Georgia Brown" Ethel Waters
44. "Ladies and Gentlemen We Are Floating in Space" Spiritualized--Spiritualized was one of the highlights of the Primavera festival. I hadn't even intended to see them, but I'm glad I did.
45. "I Didn't Know About You" Thelonious Monk--Anything from this album reminds me of being 22 and sitting behind the counter of the upstairs coffee bar at the River Oaks Theatre, while this CD was set to reapeat.
46. "Over Fire Island" Brian Eno
47. "Seattle" PIL
48. "Hummingbird" Wilco
49. "Baby One More Time" Travis--Somehow they make a song originally done by Britney Spears touching and funny.
50. "Doctor Robert" Beatles
51. "Monkey Trick" Jesus Lizard
52. "Bebel" Antonio Carlos Jobim
53. "Valkyries" Jana Hunter
54. "It Beats 4 U" My Morning Jacket
55. "We Are the Underused" Pavement--And less.
56. "Blank Generation" Whiskeytown--Countrified version of the Richard Hell song.
57. "La Madragada" Los Super Seven
58. "Midnight Ride" Stan Getz
59. "President of What" Death Cab for Cutie
60. "Strangers" Portishead
61. "Kind of Girl" Low
62. "In the Pines" The Louvin Brothers--Kurt Cobain said this song was by Leadbelly before performing it on MTV Unplugged. He was wrong. It's a traditional song that lots of people did.
63. "Straight to the Top" Tom Waits
64. "In Metal" Low--A song about keeping things you love preserved in metal like shoes. Sorta creepy.
65. "Buffalo Soldier" Bob Marley--Gah. Skip.
66. "Crippled Inside" John Lennon--F for creativity, Lennon.
67. "Street of Dreams" Wynton Marsalis
68. "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" Bill Cosby--Yes, that Bill Cosby.
69. "Nothing Lasts" Matthew Sweet
70. "Sonic Reducer" Humungus with Cheetah Chrome
71. "Glass Hotel" Robyn Hitchcock--I didn't even have any Robyn Hitchcock in iTunes until about a month ago. Now, three times in one day.
72. "Higher Ground" Stevie Wonder
73. "An Exhortation" Lozenge
74. "How to Fight Loneliness" Jeff Tweedy--Live solo version
75. "Why Does It Always Rain on Me" Travis
70 Comments:
justin, the masses are not impressed with your procrastination antics.
Does 3 count as several?
Since when were there masses?
Ah something about opinions and assholes or something. I LOVE "Exile on Main Street". Might well be my favorite Rolling Stones album, though "Let it Bleed" is another close contender. For me, "Exile" is up there with the White Album for being a couple of the best arguments for why double albums are so damn COOL. It's the antithesis of the focused lean album, and I like that. Sprawl, breadth, self-indulgence, experimentation, all that... all stuff that makes me smile, and love an album.
I am stoked about the Marshall Tucker series!!!!!!!!!!
Your Pavement theory seems odd considering that you've listented to them twice in this, your single jaunt through shuffle. That probably means you've heard them tens of thousands of times. That's a long time to decide you don't care for something. I think that means you actually like do Pavement, a lot.
I second the Marshall Tucker.
I think it's also funny that you don't think personal stories about music changing your life are unique, so therefore you won't write one. They're no less unique than an iPod shuffle list, and they're a lot more interesting.
Sorry, I'm not as cranky as that sounded.
Bring on the Tucker.
I'm with John. And crankier.
ipod shuffle is a ruse to make you think you have an interesting collection of music. here's a better way to shuffle you ipod whores: sort your music by track number. now play all your track 6s. have fun i'm gonna go out and enjoy the 77 degree weather.
i love double albums too (which, i might point out, still only clock-in at an hour of music)! i just got a Sweet double album - one record is studio and the other is live. if you think this is redundant, go back to sleep you 22 year old, the world will be just as dull when you awake.
haha about childhood music stories. justin that made me snarf!
I think this is fun. I might do a shuffle post at some point. If you're feeling not so creative, the shuffle is a good exercise.
May I suggest a post about why you are feel so strongly about originality and what that means to you? Warning: holding any opinion will only make you a hypocrite so you better just keep your mouth shut. Or don't give a poot about it and write something just for friggin' jollies.
Okay here's this...
1. I like those guys. Gram Lebron told me the name Papas Fritas is a twist on "Pop has freed us." That guy Keith Gendel is from H-town and apparently he was a de Schmog fan as a kid. He and I went sea-kayaking on the bayous and across the ship channel once. I swear I saw two beavers.
8. I mentioned in a comment having seen Arthur Brown at Rudz in the late 90's or maybe even early 00's. What a friggin' trip. It wasn't an announced show and he was playing with a hodge podge of local ghost musicians. That song Fire really got hold of me when I was younger. I recorded it off the radio to cassette and listened to it a lot. Also on that tape, Squeeze If I Didn't Love You and Aztec Camera covering Van Halen's Jump
9. I have the album in question, Bent By Nature and I had not noticed (or forgot) that was a different drummer. Some great tunes on there, Christine and Dimsey Naish. Texas Guinness Lovers tried to cover the latter. I think we might have also worked on Christine. I know how to play it anyway. I think that Tyler from Brown Whornet is playing drums for Three Day Stubble these days.
20. If/when I do a shuffle post it will probably have a lot of "song ten from" posts because I have a lot of stuff without meta data.
27. The Mommyheads. Those guys were interesting, friends with Sprawl's Nick Cooper. Stayed on Lexington a couple of times. They had a lot of energy. After shows they'd come back to the street and we'd make noise until all hours. In these sessions the drummer would never play a proper instrument. He'd make noise with something in the house though. I remember the head guy was sort of no nonsense. To get an edge with booking he used a fake name and a fictitious booking company called Black Widow.
51. Did you know David Yao has a new band? They're playing here next week, part of a pretty freeeking cool Empty Bottle Festival with Pere Ubu, Boris...
55. I can't get into Pavement either but maybe I'm like you. If it comes on, I leave it on and try to figure out why I don't like it.
65. I like Bob Marley more and more but I don't care for this song much. However someday I might tell the story about how Buffalo Soldier blew my mind when I was twelve.
The Pavement is a recent acquisition. Previously, the only time I would hear Pavement was through somebody else--or if I went to see Bring Back the Guns. Like Kilian, I'm just trying to figure out what people see in it, because it does nothing for me.
I don't know why people insist on crediting music with changing them. If I change, only I am responsible for that. Music is, at best, a weak catalyst. Why not take credit for being the real agent of change?
Speaking of Three Day Stubble, here's a talk that John "Mr. Hungry" Alderman gave at Google.
Every time I hear "Bridge Over Troubled Waters" (the song), I am moved. Never cared for any other S@G songs though. My mom used to play it on dad's bachelor hi-fi set. I think Brian Eno said that song took like 350 studio hours to record and mix. I'm never in the studio but that seems like a lot of time for a four minute track. I don't really have a point here so whatever. Oh, I didn't mean to imply that Eno was the engineer or anything.
I like pavement more every time i hear them. i second the robyn hitchcock though . . . i think madonna of the wasps is also on queen elvis, a super great record if you ever come across it.
Yeah, I think it's fair to say that listening to music never changed anything about your life.
You are personally and entirely responsible for all change in your life in every way. Music has no bearing on the direction of your life.
Hmm... not buying it.
I think you need to clarify this idea in order to make it bear a bit more weight. I'm sure you don't actually mean it that way.
Ok, I'm not sure of that, but I sure do hope it.
John, I humbly suggest that you may be wrong about music influencing a person's life.
I can say that Twang Twang Shockaboom changed my life. I was another dumbass Houston kid who thought Austin was the shiz-nizzle for all things musical growing up, and it played no small part in influencing me to finish my troubled undergraduate career at The University. Anyway, while I was there doing my part to tip the trade deficit between Austin, Tx and Shiner, Tx, I saw Twang Twang Shockaboom. Like there was any alternative...it was impossible to take a crap in Austin without hearing some peace corps reject waxing poetic about the wonderfully quirky, yet amazingly tuneless, soulless, and uninteresting eclectic ethno-pop that came from Twang Twang Shockaboom.
Now don't get me wrong - I WANTED to like these guys, because all the hot little experimental free thinking chickies in Austin thought the sun shone out of their asses, and well, let's be honest here...what a 20 year old lad wants more than anything is hot little experimental free thinking chickies.
Anyway, Twang Twang Shockaboom sucked donkey balls. To this day, I don't know that I have ever hated a band more, for less reason, than I hated Twang Twang Shockaboom. They stood for everything that I hated about the Austin music scene in the late 80s... sanctimonious, assholish politics, faux multiculturalism, fun, danceability, lack of substance, quirkiness... they were insufferable. I realized that no matter how much I wanted to, or how much I tried, I could never, ever make music that would sway the hot little experimental free thinking chickies to my side because it was simply against my personal laws of physics. And so I came back to Houston, where the ugly and chimplike can roam in freedom and peace, and the sincere and cheerful and glib are sent packing. I realized that a town that could pretend to like Daveeeeeeed Garza was a place I could never stay for long, and even as he strummed so earnestly on the West Mall I knew that my days in A-town were numbered, and that I had never before wanted so badly to wrest a guitar from another human being and crack it over his pointed skull, right in front of the Amnesty International booth.
Justin, is it just music that hasnt changed you, or are you immune to all outside influences?
hehe, i just imagined you having an its a wonderful life moment where you get to experience what your life would've been like without ever having heard any music and how you would've turned out. maybe exactly the same?
Umm, Sparrows, great story, but I think you missed my sarcasm.
I think you need to clarify this idea in order to make it bear a bit more weight. I'm sure you don't actually mean it that way.
I do mean it that way. Music is nothing more than patterns in sound. Any meaning it has is something that you give it. Any emotion you get from it is based on things that you already have in you. Music doesn't change people. People seek out the things they need to reinforce what is already in them, whether that's a political party or a lifestyle associated with sound patterns. If you need change in your life, you will find that. Why attribute it to compression waves? Why not realize that meaning is literally you?
As an example, I point you to Sparrows' anecdote above. There was nothing about the faux multiculti sounds that came from Twang Twang's instruments that changed his life. What changed his life was the reaction that he had to all the fuss surrounding the music. Seeing that fuss reinforced ideas that he already had. You could almost substitute any fuss there. It could have been a speech or a movie, but it just happened to be music.
And here I'll pick up the Bob Dylan thread that will make Head Stapler go all glassy-eyed. I don't understand why people listen to Dylan's oblique lyrics and see genius in them. They create the meaning there and then give the credit to Dylan. They are the geniuses, not Dylan. Except that reinforcing your own beliefs isn't exactly genius. This is why Dylanologists annoy me. It's like they are saying, "I'm right because I'm right!"
I guess you could say that you like Dylan because he embodies the tradition of American music, as Kilian did, but I really don't think that Dylan ever had that in mind. Initially, he wanted to be Woody Guthrie. The itinerant musician hopping from town to town with nothing but a guitar and a song is a notion that appeals to lots of teenaged boys. But once he became that, the wind started to blow in another direction (to borrow his metaphor). Suddenly rock stars overshadowed the folkies, so Dylan went electric to keep up with the Joneses. Had he not done that, he would have just ended up a lonely and mostly ignored troubadour like Ramblin' Jack Elliott. Much later, Greil Marcus decided to justify his own obsession with Dylan by trying to find elements of the "Old Weird America" in Dylan's output. It seems that Dylan read the book that resulted from all this cogitation and came to the same conclusions, deciding that Protector of American music is an acceptable legacy. Suddenly Dylan was exploring rockabilly and various other long dead forms of which he was apparently the curator.
And that is the story of how music changed Bob Dylan's life.
I think I was responsible for the Townes VZ track being on your player.... or .. wait, was it actually YOU that was responsible for that?
Thanks for kicking Dylan around. Always love to see that.
Justin,
I think you should invest in a nice light table, a top of the line magnifying glass, some civil war miniatures and quality paints. I think you would be really good at it. Just an idea.
I agree with you Justin. Good food for thought, however you're playing games with us just a bit because you're making us define music either too generally or too specifically.
You could tell us, for example, what was the catalyst for joining that crazy 80's outfit we saw you pictured with. Or perhaps what inspired you to get involved with the University of Houston Cultural Affairs Department and help put on some really great shows. Or why you were the reigning dj of local music in Houston for years. Or you could tell us where you live perhaps (just a suggestion, I don't really care).
Right on the money with Sparrow. I think he actually loves Twang Twang Shock a Boom and would like to take some Twang Twang in the boom boom.
As for Dylan, at first I thought your problem here was with people who think he's a genius but now I think you have a problem with the actual person. Now that's going too far!
But even with the people who think he is a genius...Most of the people I know who are avid Dylan fans, well they are some of the snappier people I know so I don't have such a problem with them though theoretically I could. The people I know who are really in to Dylan recognize that his lyrics are oblique (which I think is a great word for it). They are more than willing to accept that he has his finger on nothing really. And that's part of what may make his lyrics timeless.
Now as for the people back in the day who wanted to make him sort of a folk saviour. Well, he was damn smart not to get on that pedestal. And those guys were grasping at straws. They are fools. And also, boring.
Dylan may not be a genius, I really don't like that word, but he is smart, well read, and all that stuff - and very clever. He writes great songs, still does and has a very interesting career span that includes being treated almost like a god at an early age. Most huge stars don't come out of that sort of phase as well as he did.
I don't recall saying that he "embodies the tradition of American music" but maybe out of context it sounds strange now. Anyway as long as that isn't too exact a statement I don't mind it. But I also like Dylan because he kept experimenting, trying on different hats and taking things in stride and now he's on eternal tour which is also pretty darn impressive to me. And his book's good.
Okay I might start filling up the podcast. Watch it!
Stapler, Yes, the TVZ is from you. As is, I think, the Big Black.
Answers to Kilian's questions:
1. I became involved with the high school band that you saw the picture of because they were friends and playing music with them seemed like it would be fun. And it was fun, but it was also frustrating a lot of the time.
2. I got involved with the UH Student Program Board because I had just moved back to Houston from Austin and my roommate was also involved with it. Once again, these seemed like interesting people (I still see many of them pretty regularly) so I thought it would be fun. I tried to make the shows as high quality as I could, but that was really just me imposing my taste on everybody and the result was that most of the shows were sparsely attended.
3. I first became involved with ktru because a different roommate was a good friend of the station manager and once again, I thought it would be fun. I began doing the local show because I was able to use the live sound engineering that I learned while doing shows at UH to put bands live on the air at ktru. I did live music every week for a long time, until it became too much of a chore to deal with the always broken equipment. When I stopped doing live music, I just played local music, but even that got tedious after a while. I did meet lots of really great people there, though.
4. I live in a city in Texas.
My problem is mostly with the Dylanologists. I don't hate Dylan's music, I just don't think there's anything great about it. But he's free to make whatever music suits him, which is what I suspect he will continue doing, because the hardcore fans, who are constantly looking for breadcrumbs, will continue buying everything he puts out and that support pays for whatever tangent he decides to pursue. Speaking of tangents, I started Chronicles a couple years ago, but only got about a third of the way through, because even though he is dealing with things I might want to hear about, he's not a good enough writer to make any of it very interesting.
I have to get back to painting my civil war action figures now. I call them action figures because they are more than just miniatures to me. They are larger than life, even though they are, you know, literally smaller than life.
Justin, i dont think you answered my question. Though you did expand on your point so i will rephrase it. If music is only patterns of sound, then painting is just patterns of light and things are just patterns of molecules. So again, do you claim that change only comes from within you, who are really nothing more than patterns of cells?
Anaconda, I do claim that change only comes from you. It's true that paintings are patterns of light, just as music is patterns of sound, but those patterns don't have anything like consciousness, even if they were created by a person who does have consciousness. We are patterns of cells, but our particular pattern allows us to act. Paintings don't have that luxury--or not the ones I've seen, at least.
One dry cell floating along with fate, in the current of an endless gelatinous void.... Bumping into billions of powerless images and audio. Nervy.
Good god you guys are boring me with this science.
Anyway, I found your answers interesting but of course lead to more questions like
1. Why did you think it would be fun? and why was it frustrating?
2. Why did these people seem interesting to you? And how does you imposing your interest on others make you feel? Is it wrong? Is it wrong for these musicians to want to perform then? Or for others to put functions together?
3. Okay I don't really have any questions here but I've enjoyed that little bits of your past life at KTRU have come out in NAP from time to time.
4. Really? Which city? I think it's Houston. But I really don't care. Really. Makes no difference to me. I mean if you don't want to tellme that's your business. Really it's not on my mind at all. No worries over here about that one bit. Nope. Houston, huh?
I pretty much find myself agreeing with you about Dylan except when you sort of put yourself in his head. I just don't quite see him thinking like that. Plus I find a lot of his songs pretty great. And of course I enjoyed reading Chronicles all the way through even though it might not be good writing. It's kind of conversational and rambling.
Maybe if you and I co-wrote a book about Dylan. You write a sentence and then I re-write it to my liking and then vice versa. We would come to the true Dylan.
This makes me wonder what disillusionments Julie's dad has with literary criticism. Because my own, obviously naive criticism is that we're always being taught to see the greatness of certain authors rather than pick a part what works and what doesn't work and whether or not things are great. This would be my problem with the study of Dylan as well.
Now you don't have to answer these questions. I was just playing into the pandora suggestion box you opened last week. My main point is to point out that even if the how music changed my life theme isn't unique, you have a rarified perspective. Really I don't care if you do it or not but I think it's worth telling you that I enjoy your perspective on things and you have added weight because you have participated.
ok, justin, so then you're saying that consciousness is a strictly individual trait, and there is no such thing as any kind of collective, social or cultural conscience?
you dont ahve to keep answering these questions if you dont want. I just find your position on this to be one i might have had at one point, but no longer hold. not necessarily out of any rational enlightment, i think more out of having been in an intimate relationship for many years and now with a baby and all. So you might say I let myself be changed, but i wouldnt say that. I would say, once i realized that there is less separation between us that at first i though, then the me that is being changed by myself includes more than just me. something like that. Your position to me now sounds extremely lonesome, though at another time it might have sounded like nothing but the truth.
1. Initially, the high school band was two Vietnamese brothers, two black guys--one new wave and totally in denial about his sexuality, the other looking like Kurtis Blow and playing guitar like Jimi Hendrix (left handed Strat and all), a rotating cast of flaky singers, and me. Who wouldn't want to see that train wreck when it happened? We were so multiculti, it was painful. Sparrow would have hated us. We entered a talent show once put on by The People's Workshop, a community arts organization, where "people" really meant "black people." I remember going to sign up for said talent show and noticing there was a piano with only the Steely Dan songbook on it. That amused me because I couldn't think of anything whiter than Steely Dan (this was years before Pavement). Anyway, they must have been impressed by our rainbow coalition because they gave us the "most promising new act" award. I was pretty sure they were just feeling sorry for us.
The band was frustrating the way all bands are frustrating--it's hard to spend a lot of time with the same people and not get tired of them.
2. The UH people were putting on shows. You know, it's fun putting on shows. At first. And when the school is giving you the money to do it, it's even more fun, because you don't have to worry about breaking even.
Somebody has to impose their interests on people; might as well be me. I don't think it's wrong at all. I'm sure the school would have liked to see more students at my shows, but the students were only interested in the people that were on TV and we couldn't afford those people on a regular basis. Though we did book them once in a while.
4. It's not Austin.
I think if we wrote a Dylan book, it would mostly be about us, so we probably shouldn't call it a Dylan book. Besides, does the world really need another one of those?
ok, justin, so then you're saying that consciousness is a strictly individual trait, and there is no such thing as any kind of collective, social or cultural conscience?
I am absolutely saying that there is no collective consciousness. I'm perfectly willing to believe in it, though, if you can prove it to me. The idea of any sort of group consciousness always struck me as too easy. We don't want to believe that we are the lonely beings that we are, so we invent things that make us all one. Some of us take things even further and invent whole fantasies of mysticism. And that's fine--whatever floats your boat. But my boat is powered by what I can prove.
This is not to say that we are all completely different. We are all made of the same meat, so we have much more in common than we have differences. So it's not surprising that two people with similar circumstances would come to the same conclusions. That doesn't mean that there is any sort of mystical connection between them, though. But again, if that's what you believe, I don't want to rain on your parade. I don't know what this has to do with music, though, which is how we got to this topic in the first place. Music doesn't draw any conclusions.
Damn, it got all Oprah in here again.
I'm pretty in to this first band story now. The Vietnamese community in Houston has always fascinated me to begin with. You got a guy on the verge of sexual awakening. Backed by some phat licks.
My first band might have been the most multiculti I've been in too - we had a black drummer, a jewish bassist and a guy who still hasn't figured out his sexual identity, oh and Greg Beets.
Sure bandmates get sick and tired of one another but I never get sick and tired of hearing how bandmates get sick and tired of one another. People don't tell these stories because they can be painful and the teller might come across in a bad light.
4. So it's not Austin and it's not not Houston.
Your answer to the Dylan book kind of ties into the collective conscience bit because of course it would be more about us than Dylan just like all of our interests in other people are about a fascination with ourself.
I didn't read any mysticism into Carlos' comment. Maybe it's there or there in his essence to a degree I don't know but it seems like you projected it in the comment. I mean, without any sort of magic/mysticism to it there is collective conscience. Like the way a group of Mexican immigrants can act towards one another differently than the way they act in mixed company. The way gangbangers shoot or at least usually only mean to shoot other gangbangers. The way a family interacts or the employees of a company or bandmates. Maybe the way we on NAP talk more about certain music genres than others. We could be building a collective conscience.
Kilian said "just like all of our interests in other people are about a fascination with ourself."
I was wondering if you wouldn't mind elaborating on that.
Wouldn't there need to be working definition of a collective consciousness in order to prove or disprove it?
Justin, I guess your statements about music not changing anyone are of more of a philosphical nature than I intend when I write about the way I feel about music in my formative years. I didn't realize this required the assistance of Richard Feynman, and Sartre. It's almost as though you are trying to claim that whenever someone says that music changed their life, you are challenging them to stand by the idea that music is an entity which came over, kicked the door in, and forced them to take money out of a pulse machine at gunpoint.
Who the fuck would actually argue, sanely, that music is literally a consicous being?
Saying "my life took a different course after hearing Slayer's Reign in Blood," is a perfectly reasonable thing to say. Well, maybe not. But still, that shouldn't be the sort of thing that is followed by a staid, academic denunciation in the form of a dry, skeptical dismemberment. Seems a little stiff to me.
"We are edged by mist, we make an insubstantial space." Virginia Woolf
I do mean it that way. Music is nothing more than patterns in sound. Any meaning it has is something that you give it. Any emotion you get from it is based on things that you already have in you. Music doesn't change people. People seek out the things they need to reinforce what is already in them, whether that's a political party or a lifestyle associated with sound patterns. If you need change in your life, you will find that. Why attribute it to compression waves? Why not realize that meaning is literally you?
Has your opinion never been changed by reading something someone wrote? I suppose that when your eyes perceived the ink dots making up characters, organized into words, and you translated this information into words of the English language already residing in your brain, that rather than combining into sentences you had never before heard, indicating thoughts you had never before thought, you were simply ready for a change in your life, your brain had actually thought these very thoughts in advance, and searched out for a text to confirm your newly preconceived notions?
This is an analogy, but I think that most of us would agree that music is more than patterns in sound, just as literature is more than patterns of ink spots. The means by which we perceive each is not the limit of our experience of it. Further, our systems for understanding and giving meaning to each enable us to have new experiences given new input, despite, for instance, having previously seen all 26 characters of the alphabet. Sometimes these new experiences cause emotions which lead one to make changes in actual real life. One small example of which might be selling off all one's Marshall Tucker Band LP's after hearing The Clash. It would be odd if everyone happened to do this in 1977 and it had more do to with them all "needing a change in their life" than with hearing punk rock for the first time.
This is all about defining terminology. Music is whatever you want it to be, us having invented it. I totally agree with you, Justin, about ourselves being the instruments of change. The only actions are our own. But there are other ways to view things, and there are other ways to describe experience, and they don't always have to be dry (thank god). I apologize for being a bit smarmy, it's not helpful. Stories can be endearing for many reasons, including poetic stories as well. Does all communication need empirical evidence in order to be entertaining? You don't mean that, do you?
Has your opinion never been changed by reading something someone wrote?
I don't think we were talking about a mere change of opinion. We're talking about changing a life. Also, literature as a format allows the author to make a well argued point that could change an opinion, this is a format that music doesn't really have.
Like the way a group of Mexican immigrants can act towards one another differently than the way they act in mixed company.
These are just social mores. There's no connection between the people, no matter how alike they dress.
Wouldn't there need to be working definition of a collective consciousness in order to prove or disprove it?
Excellent point. We could use this definition which is more like the social mores that Kilian was talking about. Or we could use this one, which is more mystical. Then, of course, there's this one, but nobody wants to talk about that.
I didn't realize this required the assistance of Richard Feynman
Not until we bring math into the equation.
Not until we bring math into the equation.
Well, I promise not to if you don't.
Justin - that bmol cover is certainly very slanted and enchanted isn't it?
The human brain does react differently to the human voice than to other sounds. I think you do have to address this in the opinion that music is merely vibrations at least with regard to vocals.
The examples I give are a tad beyond conscience because they are actions but I'd say that the way people are acting in my examples has to do with conscience by a certain definition.
HS - I think there is selfishness in selfless acts too. As an example of what I was saying about fascination with ourselves through others - when I watch Nanook of the North what's fascinating about it is trying to imagine living like that, putting myself in that place. Actually I haven't watched Nanook of the North yet but same goes for my wonderment with your life on the Aleutian Islands not that I don't care for you as an individual...
...but even there...
Oh I forgot about this...
I don't think we were talking about a mere change of opinion. We're talking about changing a life.
What can change other than opinion? Your body is changing whether you like it or not.
There's a world of difference between "Oh yeah, I guess I do like strawberries" and "I think I'm going to grow my hair out and follow Phish around the country."
Kilian,
Nanook of the North... In the beginning 15 natives crawl out of a kayak like a clown car. IT's an interesting piece of film. Tedious in places, but interesting.
Justin - There's no difference. I do see your point. And anyway, enter the Nazis right?
HS - Nanook is in my netflix queue.
You know Justin, the burden of proof falls upon the person making the statement. You are making the major statement that we each are alone in the universe and have no way of being changed by others or their expression. I suspect you wont be able to prove that, anymore than I could prove the opposite, which i wouldnt cause i dont believe the opposite either.
Myself, I don't believe in a priori concepts such as that there is or there isn't any "collective" consciousness, or that change only comes from the inside. If you were to force me to express my belief, I would say i believe in context which means the answer could go either way depending on the situation.
I brought up the idea of a collective consc. as a question to you, trying to get you to expand on your statement.
So to continue with the questions. If only you control the state of your person, then when you are bored, or when you perceive things as unoriginal, then these are just the results of the choices you've made, is that correct?
(and again, dont feel like you have to answer my absurd questions, i'm just trying to pass the time while bugging you).
Well, you can't prove a negative, so there's no way I can say with any certainty that there is no collecive consciousness, but I also can't prove that tigers have a secret civilization in the middle of the Indian Ocean. But if I go on evidence, I'd say there should be an awful lot of wet tigers. Since there aren't I have nothing to conclude that my hypothesis about the tiger civilization is correct other than the hypothesis itself.
And if I am bored then, yes, it's my fault because I can surely find something better to do. On the other hand, if I perceive something as unorginal, that is not the result of a choice that I am making, it is the result of having the data to compare the unoriginal thing to. I suppose collecting that data would have been a choice, so maybe in a roundabout way it's all my doing.
The statements you made that I thought might need some backing up are not negatives, but positives.
If you feel up to the task of proving them, i've listed them below. They're pretty close, though not exactly the same. On one you claim responsibility for change, in the other you claim to be the source. Waddaya say, you game?
Here's your statements I'd love to see proof for:
1. "If I change, only I am responsible for that."
or
2. "I do claim that change only comes from you."
>> Has your opinion never been changed by reading something someone wrote?
> I don't think we were talking about a mere change of opinion. We're talking about changing a life. Also, literature as a format allows the author to make a well argued point that could change an opinion, this is a format that music doesn't really have.
A change of opinion can cause you to change your life in a major way. You can argue that you are still the one changing your life, but that's just a pointless semantic exercise. The only reason you're changing your life is because you changed your opinion. The only reason you changed your opinion is because you heard the music.
Here's your statements I'd love to see proof for:
1. "If I change, only I am responsible for that."
or
2. "I do claim that change only comes from you."
This is pretty easy. When I make a change in my life, it's me making that decision. There is no outside force making that decision for me. But perhaps you believe that it's possible for somebody to control you? I had a high school friend that later began believing that one of his college professors was controlling him through his roommate's speech patterns. That's a pretty elaborate conspiracy theory. Most people would call it crazy, including his doctors. But I'll turn this around on you: Prove to me that something else is making decisions for you.
The only reason you're changing your life is because you changed your opinion.
So every time you change your opinion you make a life change? C'mon. There are lots of factors that go into making a decision like that. Music may be the last of the factors, but it's not the only one. In fact, music being much of an influence at all seems far fetched. Can you give me an example of music being a factor of change in your life?
Wait Justin, aren't you having it both ways by claiming that unoriginality imposes itself on you through your analysis of available data? I thought all the change came from within? You are still deciding if it's unoriginal or not. I mean, as long as were being philosophical here, isn't everything unoriginal and completely unique at the same time?
Justin, i was thinking along the lines of you're walking in the woods, a tree branch fall on your head, leaving you in a wheelchair for the rest of your life. You might still be bored, but i think you would be changed in some ways, and by an outside influence. Now granted, music and human expression hardly ever has such physical effects on us, but it seems to me the line is not as clearly drawn as you seem to think.
So I occasionally babysit this kid, she's only two and a half. More susceptible to change than the thirty something crowd. She responds well to Pete Seeger. Not so well to Tiny Tim.
I put the PS CD on and several songs into it, I hear her singing a previous song I didn't even know she had acknowledged. It was about a farmer. Me and this kid never discussed agriculture but I assume she has with her mom or dad. It's exciting to her I think to have this idea reinforced in a world outside her house. The chorus goes "I want to be a farmer" and later she is singing it.
So that doesn't prove anything but there's another song called "I know a little girl with red pajamas." Being a little girl, she latches on to this song. The little girl in the song likes to sniff flowers. The little girl I babysit likes to sniff flowers.
Now, would it be a surprise to you if she suddenly wants a pair of red pajamas?
Btw, the Nazis are coming soon and I know from where they will arrive.
Wait Justin, aren't you having it both ways by claiming that unoriginality imposes itself on you through your analysis of available data? I thought all the change came from within?
I'm not sure what an analysis of whether something is original has to do with change. This kind of analysis is just pattern matching and doesn't involve any sort of change.
i was thinking along the lines of you're walking in the woods, a tree branch fall on your head, leaving you in a wheelchair for the rest of your life.
Well, music isn't going to fall out of any trees, but I was at a show last night where the strong bass vibrations coming out of the PA speaker rattled my guts and for a few minutes I thought I might puke. So I guess you got me. Music can act on you; it can make you puke. I'll leave it up to you to decide whether that's going to be a life changing experience.
Now, would it be a surprise to you if she suddenly wants a pair of red pajamas?
This is the old argument of whether advertising works. There are a lot of variables there, but again, is wanting a pair of red pajamas a life changing experience?
I'm starting to wonder what you mean by a life changing experience. It almost sounds like that's not even possible for you. If its you that's making the change, then how much is it really a change? how much of a change does it need to be before it qualifies as "life changing"?
Please describe what you consider life changing? Lke deciding to move to another town? Deciding you will no longer eat meat? are those life changing? poking out your eyes cause you dont want to see that you killed your father and married your mother? deciding you will no longer listen to metal?
You're driving along. A song you can't stand comes on the radio. You fidget with the controls not paying attention to the road. You don't see the big ass truck delivering cymbals to Guitar Center swerve into your lane... killing you. Wait! Before the truck swerves into your lane, you clip the back tire of a cyclist, who crashes into a wall, never delivering the opus in his worn leather pouch, and crushing the family kazoo he was to hand down to his unborn son.
This really has nothing to offer the argument here, but it was fun to write.
Justin, why can't you just admit that you are influenced?
Please describe what you consider life changing
I would say that most of that list qualifies as life changing. Nearly all of those examples are the sorts of things that would have an impact on multiple aspects of a person's daily life. But not listening to metal? Is that any more life changing than deciding you no longer want to watch 24?
Justin, why can't you just admit that you are influenced?
Again, I'm not arguing that there is no such thing as influence or the ability of one person to change another's opinion. The argument is that a life change is a decision that an individual makes for himself. Influence is not life change.
I just got stung by a wasp in the garage after two days of playing cat and mouse with the bastards. I felt something funny under my shirt and pulled it up to see that sob right on my belly. Ouch.
Well my last comment was sort of pointless because you already acquiesced (sort of) with the strawberries comment. Anyway trying to keep the argument small and manageable to stock up against the Nazis.
The main point being that if you can accept that small change is possible then it's not so big a step to see it on a bigger scale.
Now let's see...we've established here that music, being vibrations and therefor a physical thing, does have the ability to physically change things.
Another small step really.
Not that I'm actually trying to change you because what I think is actually happening is that we are all leaning towards a mutual understanding. Also back to my accusation that you are playing games with us just a little bit.
Some thoughts about music and change...
music is used theatrically to change the viewers opinion of a scene.
music is used on the field of battle to change soldiers, both positively and negatively.
I can't have sex with music on. It changes my ability to do it.
Justin,
My mother has this to say...
"I think Justin doesn't believe that we live in a world that has consequences - he may be living in a vacuum, and right now I wished that I did - no pain or discomfort! Anyway, what I kept thinking of when I was reading everyone's "comments" was osmosis. See the link below."
Osmosis
The main point being that if you can accept that small change is possible then it's not so big a step to see it on a bigger scale.
It's quite a big step. Maybe it would help to put this in more tangible terms: Give me an example of an instance where music prompted a life change that was not influenced by some other factor. Go ahead. I dare you.
I think Justin doesn't believe that we live in a world that has consequences
I don't know where this comes from. I'm not sure how you get from my saying that you have the ultimate responsibility for your life changes to her saying that means that we live in a world with no consequences.
I'm familiar with osmosis, but despite the term's loose usage to describe absorbing ideas, that's just figurative. It's not actually a documented process.
I passed your comment on to Moms.
Not a documented process? You're a madman.
Shit. I really just wanted to mention that 88 is the most comments a post has had. You might do it with this one, if you can keep us from banging our heads against the wall.
To be clear, I mean assimilating ideas by "osmosis" is not a documented process.
Justin, seems you are blurring two issues. 1. taking responsiblity for your choices and 2. being the source of "major" change in ones life. you can be the source and still not take responsibility and you can take responsibility without being the source.
I didn't have the patience to read all the posts, but I would argue that if you played Twang Twang Shockaboom for a bunch of apes, who had no context to put them in at all, that they would kick your ass.
Give me an example of an instance where music prompted a life change that was not influenced by some other factor.
I don't think your challenge is even that specific. Your challenge is "...an instance where any outside force prompted a life change..."
If I could prove the above, then it would be simple to stick music in there.
If someone said that reading Animal Farm convinced them to become vegan. I would find that reasonable, except that AF doesn't really have anything to do with veganism.
You'd say "what the fuck? and then George Orwell may have inspired but ultimately you did it."
And I get that too.
Now that we've discussed it though I think that music can be the pure catalyst of change. I'm not sure how to prove it though. Let me think about it. Give me ten years.
seems you are blurring two issues. 1. taking responsiblity for your choices and 2. being the source of "major" change in ones life
I'm saying take responsibility for having made the choice to change your life. You did it, not the music, so you should own that choice.
I think Carlos is right on with his recognition of your piss-taking in this interminable thread, Justin. Writing a post about how some piece of music has "changed your life," may not be interesting to you, and then again it may, but god know it is probably more interesting than iPod lists. But beyond all of that is a joker enjoying his ruse. That much is obvious. I would have to reiterate that the poetic quality of relinquising an element of self control over to the romantic notion of compelling music is not only interesting, it's vital. That's a world I'll live in anyday. I would venture to guess you might too, and do, in fact. And above all, strong writing takes precedent in any story. You are an entertaining writer, so even your indie laden iPod lists is amusing in your voice. Tales of impressionable young mister Crane and his introduction to _________ would be cool too as far as I'm concerned.
Ok, and with that comment John, I feel we can leave this thread on a high note and let it die it own lonely boring death. I, for one, am done.
I know i said i was done, but oh well. Apparently I'm not.
Here's what occured to me, life changing decisions can only be made based on the choices you have. it's difficult to choose an option you dont know exists. So for example, if you dont know that christ is an option, you can't make the life changing decision to be a chrisitian. Same with music, someone could not have made the life changing decision to follow the Greatful Dead around for 10 years and immerse themselves in that lifestyle had they never known the Greatful Dead existed.
By communicating with each other (thru music, art, literature, etc) we show each other what is possible, we give each other choices we might have never considered had we not seen the movie, read the book, heard the music.
So therefore its not so much a matter of music controlling you and telling you what to do (of course we all know thats just a silly idea used to blame Marilyn Manson or Ozzy for whatever), but its a matter of music offering you options you might have never had available otherwise. for example I might say that without the Butthole Surfers I might have never imagined that it was possible to ride feedback like a surfer rides a wave. Realizing that was an option made possible all kinds of life changing decisions for me.
So you could say the decision is ultimately mine, but i dont think so, the decision is made as part of a group effort, and as a group we share responsibility.
So in this sense i'm definining 'decision' as a process by which change happens, and not as an instantaneous 'eureka' moment where suddenly you realize out of nowhere that the world is round and so you make the life changing decisoin to be a sailor and try to sail around it.
I think both are possible, but what would be the options of our life if they were based solely on the 'eureka' type of decisions? what where Kaspar Hauser's options in Herzog's movie? Rolling a toy horse back and forth on the dirt? Utlimately you might convince yourself that you are the ultimate maker of every one of your decisions, but really... what other choices do you have?
gah, ok, now i'm done.
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