Friday Music

This week:

I wanted to track down the song used in the new Ford Flex commercials, as it sounded familiar to me. Sure enough, it’s a 2000 track from Poe, from her album Haunted: Poe – “Hey Pretty.”

…but wait! There’s more. Turns out that there was a remix of the song done in 2001, where most of her vocals are replaced by a recording of Poe’s brother, Mark Danielewski, reading from his brilliant novel House of Leaves. I’m not sure which version I liked more, so I’m posting both. Poe (feat. Mark Danielewski) – “Hey Pretty (Drive-By Remix).”

I haven’t posted any French hip-hop for in a long while. So, here we go. I discovered this via the excellent Yo La La French Hip-hop Podcast. Calogero et Passi – “Face à la mer.”

One of my favorite Cure tracks, which often gets forgotten amid their more well-known stuff. This was the lead track from 1987’s Kiss Me, Kiss Me, Kiss Me, quickly overshadowed by the hit single “Just Like Heaven”, but I love the agonized guitar riff of this song far, far more — The Cure – “The Kiss.”

The brilliantly-named Austin band Ringo Deathstarr has an EP coming out this March. In the meantime, you can check them out on Myspace, or via this song: Ringo Deathstarr – “Some Kind of Sad.”

I posted this long ago, but it’s too brilliant to post only once. Jurassic 5 DJ Cut Chemist, before he ever released his solo work, cutting up some 30s jazz in a brilliant display of turntablism: Jurassic 5 (feat. Cut Chemist) – “Swing Set.”

This song will always make me think of Jonathan Rhys Meyers in purple glitter. Sometimes, you just need that mental image, and sometimes you just need to hear this: Brian Eno – “Needle In The Camel’s Eye.”

Enjoy.

More Tech Fun

Wow. 2009 appears to be the year of technical trouble.

My Wireless Router is officially BRICKED. It’s about 2 years old (conveniently placing it outside of Netgear’s warranty period), and it apparently is a fairly common issue (all lights stay lit, which apparently means that it’s getting stuck on diagnostic boot-up, and even a hard reset isn’t fixing it).

Not a huge inconvenience. The main reason for the wireless was so that The Minion could connect from her bedroom (with the added luxury of and I being able to connect via laptops from downstairs), and she’s off at school. Most of my internet time is spent on the desktop, anyway.

Still, though — annoying. Chalk it up to the list of things I need to purchase when some spare funds come in.

25 Things

Several members of my family tagged me over at Facebook, and since I import my notes from LJ, I’m posting this here.

Once you’ve been tagged, you are supposed to write a note with 25 random things, facts, habits, or goals about you. At the end, choose people to be tagged. You have to tag the person who tagged you. If I tagged you, it’s because I want to know more about you.

1. I own and operate a small publishing company that specializes in role-playing games, but will be expanding this year into other forms of “geek entertainment.”

2. (Related to #1) Most of my time is spent managing, planning, marketing, editing, and doing graphic design and layout. I don’t spend nearly as much time writing as I’d like to be. I need to change this.

3. I have a large (about 4 to 5 inches in diameter) crater-like scar on my left thigh, the result of having a cancerous mole and the surrounding tissue removed two years ago.

4. I’m a rabid fan of Football — the real kind. I’m a supporter of Manchester United, because those were the games that were shown on the YES network when I lived in NYC, which made them feel like my “home team.”

5. I’m a fully-brainwashed adherent of the Cult of Mac. Apple or nothing, baby.

6. I have a tendency to “devour” subjects or skills that I’m interested in — I grab anything I can related to it, absorb it all, and then move on to the next thing.

7. I credit my late grandmother for setting me on the Path of Geek, having introduced me to Star Trek (via the various “Log” books by Alan Dean Foster and re-runs on TV) and Tolkien (via “The Hobbit” and a copy of “The Tolkien Bestiary” — which I still own).

8. Laura and I are sticking around here in Lawrence for a couple more years (for several reasons, too long to go into), but after that, who knows — I’m itching to move.

9. I often feel pulled in a thousand different directions, creatively. Not enough time in the day to work on all of the projects that I have in mind.

10. I turn 40 this year, and I’m feeling every second of it.

11. I used to go to work on an Aircraft Carrier. (The USS Intrepid, docked in NYC.)

12. I’ve fought in full-armor, non-choreographed, live-steel (not SCA rattan) matches.

13. I’m horribly claustrophobic. Getting a PET scan during my cancer treatment was torture.

14. I’m a father of three kids, all of whom are now teenagers. Yikes!

15. I’ve known my best friend for 25 years. We still try to hang out weekly.

16. I’ve recently been on a kick of watching old UK television shows. Just finished Children of the Stones, a creepy SF/Horror serial, designed to traumatize British children in the 1970s.

17. Contrary to conventional wisdom, I’ve actually grown *more* liberal as I’ve grown older.

18. Despite the number of things I’ve written that have been released, I’ve yet to have a novel published, and so sometimes I don’t feel like I’m a “real” writer.

19. I have an extensive music collection, but some things I’m still searching for — for example, I need to find a copy of Andy Summers’ 1984 single of the theme to “2010”, yet it has eluded me.

20. Of all the places I’ve lived, my favorite is NYC.

21. There is a dog lying on the futon here in my office, giving me the “stop typing and take me out” look.

22. I compose and record music, but I haven’t done it in a while. Need to make some time to do that.

23. I’m currently reading “The Living Dead”, an anthology of zombie stories edited by John Joseph Adams. Zombies are pretty much the only type of horror that I find genuinely frightening.

24. Sometimes the games industry feels like a bit of a “career cul-de-sac”, but then I look at friends and family who took traditional paths to success, and see them worrying about gutted pensions, lay-offs and downsizing, and I’m thankful that I’m doing this.

25. The best sandwich I’ve ever had is a roast beef and swiss, with double swiss, shredded lettuce, tomatoes, banana peppers, oil & vinegar, made by the Copper Kettle Deli in Basking Ridge, NJ. That is the platonic ideal that I’ve been continually trying to reach ever since.

There ya go — I’ll tag the folks who tagged me on Facebook. For those of you on LJ, if you feel like doing it, do it. I generally don’t tag.