I had never heard of this brand until recently.

About a week ago, I spent a Saturday evening drinking scotch, telling stories and having some laughs with a small group of people who all happen to be smarter than I am. Our hosts had some music on in the background, and I recognized a particular piece. In my typical self-deprecating manner, I pointed out how I loved the piece (Ravel’s String Quartet in F major), but my primary association with it was that it signified the title sequence of The Royal Tenenbaums. So as opposed to, you know, being a genuinely cultured person and knowing specific compositions by name, I only recognized the piece because of a movie. I didn’t have to make that connection out loud for everyone– as I said, they’re smart people– so our host, being a good natured person, smiled at my idiocy and proceeded to tell us a bit about Ravel’s history, alluding to some criticism he’d received as a composer and telling us that he’d died a virgin. Which was cool– I love that she knows stuff like that.

When I think about the evening, I think about it in two ways. First, as I said, it was lovely, and I went home glad I’d chosen to go. It was warm and cozy, the conversation was good, I laughed a lot, and I got to know one of the people a little better. But now that I’m writing about it, it’s changed. That’s what happens, right? We make decisions about how to convey scenes. As I’m thinking about the night through the filter of the music conversation, I can point to the various moments that exemplify my opening comment about the others being more intelligent than me. Two people were bantering in Russian, someone alluded to their time teaching at an Ivy League school, someone quoted an obscure passage from a Vonnegut novel I’ve never read, so on and so forth. Now, that doesn’t mean there weren’t penis jokes– even classy people like those– but as I drove home, the moment of noticing the music, and particularly noticing why I noticed the music, caused my mind to travel down a little rabbit hole and land in a room where all I could think about was why I like the art and pop culture that I do.

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I’m not yet sure if the Germans will vouch for me here, don’t know if they’ll go to the trouble to convince their government that I have a worthy skill. This is a common plight for writers and other creative people who pour so much time into artistic pursuits, most of which don’t have a clear monetary correlative. But the truth is, I’m loving the challenge of making my way in a new, more-foreign-than-I-anticipated place.

Meanwhile, a little taste of home now and then is delicious. This morning I got it from a music video that is a big bro-fest in that my three brothers collaborated on it. Ian is the musician featured in the video and it’s his song being played (by him); Devin made the video, meaning he filmed it, directed it, and edited it; and Colin provided the apartment, which is beautifully put together and is in a building Tracy and I used to live in on Seattle’s Capitol Hill.

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anyone listening to the greatest radio dj of all time (a.k.a. john richards on kexp) in this new year is undoubtedly already familiar with this song.  he’s wasted no time in declaring it the best song of 2012 (which is precisely six days old now), and has even taken to playing the song twice, back to back, on the air.  but there are no complaints here.

“ho hey” is the kind of simple/happy pop song that makes people tune into the radio in the first place.  i remember when matthew sweet’s “girlfriend” was all over the charts back in the day, and how at the time sweet said something to the effect of how it was just a dumb pop song, and of course the dumbest pop songs turn out to be the biggest hits.

i don’t know if “ho hey” qualifies as a dumb pop song or not. but anyone can see from the video below (or from this performance in denver, or just about any other video you dig up on youtube) that this band plays this song with unabashed joy.  no ironic detachment.  no hiding behind, well, anything.  they’re just happy to be singing—and sometimes that’s enough.

but next time i promise i’ll write either a real post, or put up a video of this great chipmunk-cheerleader-death metal-banjo funk band i heard playing under a sewer grate the other day.

i’ve been meaning to write a post for a while now about the secondhand books one finds in a shop.  the guardian had a nice piece over the summer that i hoped to replicate on bark, and thus learn all about your favorite discoveries, dear reader(s).  then i had to go and fucking ruin it by not writing that post.  not to mention that jonathan and cathie wrote such lovely posts about used books that my original idea just seems stupid by comparison.  so now i’m gonna do something totally, totally different.  i’m gonna write about used cds instead.

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This post goes out to KEXP, TuneIn, and YouTube. Many of you probably knew this, but during my first week in Germany I discovered that Pandora, Spotify, NetFlix, and Hulu don’t work here. The limitations have to do with licenses and copyrights and other fascinating particulars.

When you want to watch a little something while eating dinner and you don’t want it to be Reese Witherspoon, Sandra Bullock, or Amy Poehler films dubbed in German, that’s when you turn to Joan Rivers for comfort.

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if you asked my friends to identify the parcel of pop culture they think is most meaningful for me, you’d probably get a few (not totally inaccurate) responses: star wars (3-PO is atop my x-mas tree right now); batman (a frequently misunderstood/brilliant character); the music of the national, radiohead, or pearl jam; the mid-career novels of don delillo; or even the muppets.  but there is one pop culture touchstone which seems to trump them all: high fidelity.

it’s unconscionable how much time i’ve spent watching that movie.  yeah, i’ve read the nick hornby novel, too, but the movie (coincidentally?) set in chicago is the one i keep going back to:  when i learn something about actual relationships that i should have learned waaaaay back on my 57th viewing.  when i’m happily drunk.  when i’ve just been dumped by a girl.  when i want to hear to hear lisa bonet’s character cover peter frampton (the absence of which is a tragic oversight on the soundtrack album).

anyway, this week i returned once more to the adventures of my hapless hero, rob gordon (as played by john cusack)—primarily for his thoughts on what makes a good mix tape.  primarily because this past week i made a pretty damn good mix for someone, but (in the words of rob himself) “did not give it to them for personal reasons.”

(coincidentally?) a friend of mine who is a teacher recently received a mix cd from one of their students.  as in, the student presented the cd in the course of asking this teacher out to dinner.  before grades were finalized.  yeah—i know, right?  kids these days… nevertheless, i couldn’t help but reflect on the legitimacy of music mixes as a companion piece to communicating (like, you know, grown-ups do).  especially when using rob gordon’s opinion as a starting point:

the making of a good compilation is a very subtle art—many do’s and don’ts.  you’re using someone else’s poetry to express how you feel.  this is a delicate thing.

obviously, even the best curated setlist is no replacement for real dialogue between people.  but is there still a place for a good mix when you’re talking about a developing adult relationship?  can a mix be thoughtfully compiled and presented as a meaningful aide to communicating?  or is it hopelessly juvenile to try sketching out real emotion by simply putting pop songs in a particular order?  maybe it should just be a nice gift to give to friends as they drive off into the sunset?

let’s take a poll.  use the comments section to describe the last time you made a mix for someone, including the relationship you had to this person, the occasion for the giving, and (if ye be so bold) the tracklist itself.  put it all out there for the world to see, you pathetic bastards.

so you go to see a show.  and you’ve been looking forward to this show for, like, ever.  because you love this band.  ever since you saw them for the first time at the double door, in 2006, when your little brother dragged you to see some dudes you’d never heard of—you’ve been obsessed with this band for reasons you can’t even fathom.  you had to see them again that summer at pitchfork, and again two years later at lollapalooza, and the year after that at pitchfork again, and the summer after that at mfnw in portland.  you’re totally retarded for this band.  because they do that thing for you that lydia millet talks about, even if you don’t know why.

and you’ve been trapped inside your head of late, can’t mentally escape the non-stop, 24-hour, dance-til-you-drop marathon that is your completely unbearable/obscenely comfortable middle class life in america.  you’re just looking to forget that you even exist on earth for a couple hours while this band takes you to magical places heretofore unseen (excepting, of course, the times this band took you to those exact places before).  you want it to be exciting & invigorating & great just like it was before, but new, all at the same time.  you’re banking on this band coming through for you, and saving your life from another bullshit night in suck city (which really doesn’t suck at all)(but kinda).  and you’ve already had one jack&coke, but you’re not feelin’ it yet, and so you have another because you think maybe that’ll help you stop fucking thinking already about that stupid errand you have to run at old navy tomorrow.

and then the lights go down in this tiny ballroom that sold out ages ago, and the giant screen on stage is showing live images of the band in the green room, and the crowd was already ecstatic for both the openers, and you’re really to be obliterated.  but the band is, well, only okay.

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At a Dave Matthews Band Concert in 2007

MFA Land is a place where we refine our tastes. Here we talk Alice Munro and the Writer at the Desk. We like Bon Iver, Micro Brews and making disparaging comments about hipsters despite the pair of skinny jeans hanging up in our closet, the Sasquatch tickets we’re waiting to order and the American Apparel email updates we receive every other week. We use words like Kafkaesque, Sestina, and Media en Res far too often, and to us, the outside world is so fucking cliche.

I’m not here to argue that there’s something aesthetically pleasing about St. Vincent’s new album, or that Murakami is a fucking genius. However, I do think that higher learning in some way demands we give up old pleasures, or at least hide them from the light of world where no one can see them. It’s why during a break in classes you have a copy of “The Gunslinger” tucked inside of “In Our Time,” why the songs you once loved in the 1990′s have long since been deleted from your itunes library. In academia, maybe as a defense mechanism we bury these little, embarrassing pieces of ourselves and replace them with a sort of uniform grad school sensibility.

In talking to Sam Edmonds at the bar, who told me his guilty pleasure was listening to the Gin Blossoms (Sorry Sam, I love you), hearing an interview where Edward P. Jones admitted to watching Judge Judy religiously, or in driving with my girlfriend who listens to trashy dance music with the volume turned up high, these moments gave me the strength to come forward with some of my hidden pleasures.

Below I’ve included a full list of embarrassing music, television, movies and life decisions that don’t entirely cohere with high-brow sensibilities but that I very much love. What are some of your hidden pleasures?

1. I’ve seen the Dave Matthews Band in concert. Twice.

2. I know every word to the Nora Jones album, Come Away with Me, The Weepies, Say I am you, as well as several albums by Jack Johnson, John Mayer, and Trapt. That one hurt a little to write.

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Maybe it’s because of Tanya’s recent and very smart post, or the analysis I have my students do on contemporary advertisements, but I stumbled across an unpleasant realization tonight . . .
One of my favorite holiday tunes is sort of bad. Not quite fall-in-the-shower bad, but more cut-yourself-shaving bad. What’s worse is it took me over 20yrs to figure this out. Read more »

One of my favorite things to do is make mixtapes. Even though they usually aren’t in the classic mixtape format (I usually make playlists on iTunes and burn them to CD) the sentiment remains the same. (If I had a tape deck, I’d make actual mixtapes. There’s a drawer in my kitchen filled with blank cassettes. I just can’t use them.) Anyway, I’m not going to dive into the purist argument of what a mixtape is. Point is, it’s a great gift that requires a lot of time and thought, but not a lot of money. It’s difficult to survive today. It’s hard to scrape by. And with Christmas and all of that nonsense coming up, the wallet can be extra tender this time of year.

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