Iron Maiden & Vexillum

Two of my favorite LEGO builders are Nannan and Tyler. As if their work wasn't amazing enough when they built solo, they have been known to collaborate on conceptual projects where each of them contribute a series of models with storylines that weave together. Every day, they'd each post at the same time a model from their part of the storyline. I wanted to share their latest collaborative project. Nannan's models are on the left and Tyler's are on the right. Click on the thumbnails to see bigger images and to read their captions, which have some really interesting details themselves.

Ben Folds and Nick Hornby

Ben Folds' new album Lonely Avenue is a collaboration between he and novelist Nick Hornby. Hornby wrote the lyrics, e-mailing them to Folds, who made them into songs.

I've read several articles about the album, but I was surprised that none of the articles mentioned a past collaboration of theirs, because it seems pretty obvious to me to mention that. There's a song from William Shatner's album Has Been called "That's Me Trying".



Ben Folds was the producer and arranger of Shatner's album, which was written in a similar way to how most of Lonely Avenue was written. For most of the songs, Shatner wrote prose poetry and Ben Folds made songs out of it, however, for "That's Me Trying", Nick Hornby wrote the lyrics.

Has Been is an amazing album, and I really love Nick Hornby's lyrics in "That's Me Trying". If that song is any indication of how Lonely Avenue is, I think I'm going to need to check it out.

Was losing all my friends, but I got 'em back.

Although I think people pay far too much attention to lyrics in music compared to how much attention they pay to the actual music, I love lyrics and the art of lyric writing. I love interpreting the meaning behind lyrics.

I'm a few years late with this one, but I was just thinking about it again today. I've been a fan of the band Brand New for about 9 years. Fans of the band often cite Jesse Lacey's lyrics as their favorite aspect of their music. I've heard many people say that he's their favorite lyricist. I think the lyrics in Brand New's second and third albums are particularly good.

When their third album, The Devil And God Are Raging Inside Me came out, I was struck by the first few lines of the very first song, "Sowing Season (Yeah)". The reason I said I'm a few years late is because the album came out in 2006. Here's the song:



Was losing all my friends.
Was losing them to drinking and to driving.
Was losing all my friends, but I got 'em back.

They made me think "Ah, that's clever." because I thought I saw something he did, which I still believe is a possibility, despite the fact that I've never heard anyone else mention it.

Ignore the fact that the second line makes it sound like "drinking" and "driving" are separate actions, because I do believe he is talking about drunk driving. It is probably just worded that way to fit the melody he created. Stuff like that happens in songwriting all the time.

Now, most people who hear the lyrics seem to think he's talking about literally losing friends to drunk driving, which doesn't really make sense if he got his friends back. I, however, think there is a rather clever double meaning which references an older song of theirs called "Seventy Times 7". Here's the song:



"Seventy Times 7" is about betrayal, Jesse Lacey's reaction to the betrayal, and his message to the person that betrayed him. The lyrics in one particular section of the song say,

Have another drink and drive yourself home.
I hope there's ice on all the roads,
And you can think of me when you forget your seatbelt,
And again when your head goes through the windshield.

It seems to me that in "Sowing Season (Yeah)", the friends he lost to drinking and to driving aren't people he literally lost to drunk driving. He's talking about friendships that were ended over betrayal. Not only does the line "but I got 'em back" make much more sense that way, but it then acquires two different possible meanings. The first is that he and the friends made up, so he gained his friends back. The second is that he got them back, meaning got revenge on them. I think the first one is more likely. It's a sign of maturity, getting rid of grudges. It's kind of a way of saying "Remember that first album we made, and that song where I was really pissed off? Well I've grown up since then." That's an especially fitting statement for the first lines of the first song of a more mature album.

That's the way I interpreted the lyrics the first time I listened to the song. I don't know if that's what Jesse Lacey had in mind, but I think it's possible. I like that it's ambiguous that way, so the listener doesn't know if he's speaking literally or if he's talking about betrayal. I'm just surprised I've never heard anyone else interpret the lyrics that way, especially considering the popularity of the song "Seventy Times 7" and people's love for over-thinking lyrics.

I'm quite curious to know if there's anyone else who has interpreted the lyrics the same way that I did.

The Patience And Productions Of Alan Moulder

Maybe about a year ago now I came across a great little biography about Alan Moulder on triple j. I just listened to it again, and I decided I wanted to post it.

A while back I posted an entry about Steve Albini, and mentioned that I'd love to work with him someday. There's kind of a long list of people I'd like to work with. One of them is Alan Moulder.

Alan Moulder is kind of known for being able to work with musicians that have difficult personalities. He must be really easygoing. Apparently, I like several musicians with difficult personalities, because Moulder has worked on some of my favorite albums.

He produced and engineered The Fragile by Nine Inch Nails. Here's a song from The Fragile called "Just Like You Imagined".

He engineered Loveless by My Bloody Valentine. Here's a song from Loveless called "Sometimes".

And though it's not one of my favorite albums, I think it's worth mentioning he co-produced Mellon Collie And The Infinite Sadness by The Smashing Pumpkins with his semi-frequent collaborator Flood (another producer I really like). Here's a song from Mellon Collie And The Infinite Sadness called "Tonight, Tonight".

The first nineteen minutes of the biography or whatever you want to call it is really good because he talks about all three of those albums. Some of the most interesting parts are where Moulder talks about working with Kevin Shields, Billy Corgan, and Trent Reznor, all of whom are known to have rather difficult personalities. There's a lot of great little bits about the making of The Fragile and having to deal with Reznor, and there are little clips of Reznor talking about working with Moulder. I loved hearing about how Reznor had issues when it came to his singing voice, because I do too. It's motivating in a weird way learning that someone you're inspired by has struggled with the same things you struggle with. Anyway, it's a really cool listen if you like any of those albums.

Firearms & Frozen Treats

I have been sick the past several days with a sore throat. I really wanted popsicles, but we didn't have any, so I had to make some Jell-O popsicles. That entry is from a little over a year ago. Anyway, I made strawberry banana ones with chunks of banana.

On the 12th my dad and I went to a shooting range with Patrick and his parents (my aunt and uncle). I've shot guns only a few times in my life. Although I very much hate the idea of hunting in this day and age, and am generally kind of weirded out by gun nuts, I am really quite interested in guns. Maybe it's the survivalist in me, but I think it's probably a good idea to know how to use a gun, just in case you ever need to use one. You never know when there's going to be a zombie outbreak, or when Skynet is going to attack, or when a group of cowboys or a biker gang is going to ride into town and start causing trouble.


I started with a .22 caliber rifle, which is the only gun I've ever shot in the past. I spent most of the time shooting .22 caliber and .357 caliber revolvers. I loved those. They made me feel like Doc Holliday or something. My dad kept saying I looked like Clint Eastwood. I was hesitant to shoot any of the semi-automatics, but I ended up shooting a 9mm Hi-Point, an AR-15, and an AK-47. I didn't really enjoy shooting the AR-15 or the AK-47 because of the recoil, but I actually liked the 9mm Hi-Point quite a bit. I wasn't a bad shot either. I was no Deadshot or Martin Riggs or anything, but I wasn't bad.

My aunt took some photos of us, but I haven't seen them yet. If and when I do, and if I like them, I'll post some here.

Halloween is coming up. So this is my...

Spooky, isn't it?

This year's X-Entertainment Halloween Countdown started yesterday. Sometimes I go for long periods of time where I seem to completely forget that X-Entertainment exists, but I've been a fan of the site for probably a decade. It's not necessarily hard to believe, but it's a little bit crazy that it's been over a decade since Matt ate Nad's hair removal gel. That remains, in my mind, one of the highlights of internet culture.

Even before Matt started doing Halloween Countdowns, the holiday was celebrated extravagantly on the site. Sometimes he wouldn't even wait until the month of October to start the extravagance, so it seemed like the countdowns were created as a way to rationalize starting to celebrate early every year. I used to love Madd Matt.

He is not afraid of the dark. He is the dark.

The Halloween Countdown has just started, but it already seems more exciting than the past several years' countdowns did. It seems like Matt's putting more enthusiasm into it than he previously did. Witnessing it is probably not unlike a new parent witnessing their young children experiencing their first few Halloweens and Christmas's. It makes visiting the X-Entertainment site feel like it felt years ago. It's fun. It's making me in the mood for Halloween.

The past few years I had plans for Halloween, but I was let down at the last minute each time, and ended up sitting in my room, watching John Carpenter's Halloween (I'm forced to make that distinction now since Rob Zombie decided to make a terrible remake a few years ago) or Ghostbusters.

I have no plans this year, so I can't be let down. Suddenly the idea of sitting around that night and watching movies by myself sounds fun, when it's not in the context of broken plans. I'm going to go buy some exquisitely delicious Halloween candy, and watch movies, and have a wonderful time. And I'll be counting down the days until that night with X-Entertainment.

Reformatting the planet, and going overboard with links.

The first season of Penny Arcade: The Series is over, and they haven't started the new season yet, so they've been putting up other programs on PATV.

2 Player Productions (actually comprised of four people. Weird, I know.), the production company that produced the first season of Penny Arcade, produced a documentary about chip music called Reformat The Planet. I originally saw it on Pitchfork TV a while back, but now it's on PATV.

I talked about Tristan Perich in my last entry. He has a few scenes in Reformat The Planet.

Jesse Novak is also in Reformat The Planet. I know of him from the comedy group Olde English. His brother is BJ Novak, the writer of, producer of, and actor that plays Ryan Howard on the U.S. version of The Office. I believe Jesse has written music for The Office at least once. One of the Dunder Mifflin jingles in that episode where the office makes a commercial for the company.

I love the concept of chip music, but I rarely hear any I like. Reformat The Planet is an interesting movie, but I didn't really hear any music that interested me in it. There's a very gimmicky aspect to chip music where regardless of how well composed a piece of music is, as long as someone uses that medium to make music, it's automatically considered as valid as any other chip music. I rarely hear what I consider to be interesting compositions and textures in the medium of chip music. I'm not saying any music is invalid, but I wish people would be more daring. I think that the reason old video game music is so memorable and moving has more to do with the interesting compositions rather than the 8-bit sound.