January 30th, 2009 / January 31st: Saturday Edition

MUSIC:

Pill's new mixtape is bursting at the seams with talent. He touches on some great beats (he really tears it up with one of my favorite backing tracks, the one from "I Got 5 On It") and he kicks some really strong verses. This is one of my weekly albums, so I'll be listening to it more and have a more thorough write-up a week from tomorrow.

I'm a few days late to the game on this one, but the Free Yr Radio compilation on Insound has a few nice treats wrapped in a feel-good charity cause. Naturally, Dan Deacon's bit is hella fun and frantic, and as Pitchfork noted, it's worth the price of admission just to access some new No Age.

With news of a freeloadin' remix of Q-Tip's rad "Renaissance," I was just looking forward to hearing Q-Tip on my 2009 shuffled playlist; it was just a bonus (albeit a fantastic one) that the guest verses are top-notch. Also worth your bandwidth, they're freeloading a painfully gorgeous cover via CFCF, a few good tracks from Busy Signal, and an incredible track by Francis and the Lights.

You'll want to listen to them in that order, because finally, Discodust has updated with a truly rad track, (plus blog drama! Read those fiery comments!) and Francis and the Lights funnels peculiarly well into their Moon Unit MP3.

Kanye's blog has yet another N.A.S.A. track. At this rate, I'll have the whole album before it drops. Verdict: throw this one in the "love it" pile.

Pitchfork summed up the YACHT drama.

FILM:

Year One looks like a lot of fun, as does Up, and Super Bowl exposure will likely hurt neither. GI Joe looks like crap though.

Black Freighter stills! And... uh... they don't look legit. I can't overstate how upset I am.

Movies the IFC blog makes me really want to see:
The Missing Person
The Class
And, especially, Medicine for Melancholy

Movies I want to see despite what IFC's aggregate reviews had to say:
Still want to see The Carter, despite the countless critics who are using it as a platform to suggest that Weezy is a fad.
Want to see Adam, because I tend to go the complete opposite of anything the AV Club has to say.

WEIRD:

This detail-hunt gets excruciating, but it's a cool use of youtube.

WORLD:

Obama signed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay legislation.

A massive strike is underway in France.

At a panel discussion with Israeli president Shimon Peres, Turkish PM Recep Tayyip Erdogan walked off the stage in fury. BBC News tracks some of the fallout, and googling has brought me to the thorough coverage from Taiwan News.

EDITORIAL:

I used to belong completely to the "live in the moment" camp. Throughout high school, I dreamed of getting to college, when I would (theoretically) be able to just live for the day instead of constructing futures doomed not to pass. After all, I'd mention, John Lennon said it himself: "Life is what happens while you're making other plans."
Truth be told, I don't think I was listening to Lennon the right way, because living only for the moment sucks.
I'm not saying you shouldn't seize the day, because you should, and I'm not saying you should assume your dreams will go off without a hitch, because they won't, but it's crucial to have some sort of future plan.
See, when you don't have any idea of where to go next, life becomes peculiarly fatalistic. Since you're not really counting on being anywhere or doing anything in five years, or even five days, you have this feeling that the moment you're in is the end all be all. That's cool enough when the moment is staring into beautiful eyes or dancing in a field, but what about waking up with a throbbing headache or being bored on the couch? Simply put, much like any relationship, The Moment loses its glamour as soon as you start living for it.
For the first few months of college, I tried - really, really tried - to live for the moment. Sometimes it was fun, but I missed dreaming and planning, and I missed the results of a great and well-conceived plan. I really can't stress how much I missed the results: I'd wake up and realize I was out of food, I'd come home to a filthy room, I'd be frantically cranking out an essay that, given time to think, could have been special. I hate to overdose on t-shirt ready catch phrases, but living for today ends up sucking tomorrow.
Now, I honestly enjoy planning. I'm planning for an apartment, for a career, for who I want to be in ten years. Maybe all of that will work, and maybe it won't. But while there's still truth to Lennon's assertion, I'll turn instead to another quote, one from my favorite film of 2008: "You gotta give 'em hope."

PERSONAL:

Los Campesinos! last night at the Parish was one of my favorite shows ever, and a great way to start the year in shows. Openers Titus Andronicus were thoroughly invigorating, and Los Campesinos! were incredible. Oh, and there was crowd surfing. A lot of crowd surfing. Gareth (frontman of Los Campesinos!) even descended into the audience, grasped my friend Jara by the head, and sang to him, on Jara's favorite song no less. (Picture pending) They were all great guys, as was Howard, the down-on-his-luck man we met at the bus stop.

The downside is, after such an energetic and late night, I am feeling well under the weather, hoping it's just exhaustion and not a cold. I skipped album day today for the sake of staying home, napping, and recovering. Oh, and I skipped an incredible concert tonight that... I don't even want to name the band. But I knew I needed to rest.

Side Note: How the hell did "Blame It" grow on me so much?

2009 FILMS SEEN: 1.5
2009 SONGS ON MY ITUNES: 170
Current Computer Situation: MacBook Pro, a little bit confrontational.