Sunday, March 29, 2009

That summer bookended by British hip hop

I spent the summer of 2004 at the University of Minnesota as part of an undergraduate research program. I drove from San Luis Obispo to Minneapolis in June, and then back again in August, both times listening to these two albums over and over. They still remind me of that summer, as does minor league baseball, Mt. Rushmore, and nanowires.

"Could Well Be In"
from The Streets "A Grand Don't Come for Free"

And yeah, I'm a little in love with Mike Skinner.



"Dream"
from Dizzee Rascal's "Showtime"

This video is effing adorable. I love the puppet police brutality at about one minute in.

Thursday, March 26, 2009

More social networking.


I discovered Blip.fm, today, which is basically Twitter only with songs. You "blip" a song and your friends & followers can click and listen to it instantly. I set up a profile as Katebot.

I will be posting Blip song of the day on my regular Twitter account, DeeJayKate.

Monday, March 23, 2009

I am officially recommending


Vetiver's "Tight Knit"

Vetiver is one of those bands who've been around for a few years but I never really gave them a fair listen. Like, if someone asked me "Have you heard of Vetiver?" I'd say "I've heard of them, but I haven't heard them." I got a copy of their new album from the station last week and have been playing it nonstop. Seriously amazing, pretty, indie-folk.

Here's a silly video for one of their more upbeat tracks...


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Grizzly Bear's "Veckatimest"

I want to move to Brooklyn and marry Grizzly Bear. A friend sent me a copy of their newest album last week and it blows me away. So pretty and good.

Here's them performing track #2 on Letterman a few months back. Jesus, can they be more perfect?



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Neko Case's "Middle Cyclone"

I can't get enough Neko. This is her third solo album. I'm not yet convinced I'll love it as much as 2006's "Fox Confessor Brings the Flood," but perhaps it's just a matter of time.

Here's a little making-of...

Thursday, March 12, 2009

Blog is word

I'm totally obsessed with my Google Reader. I'm subscribed to enough RSS feeds to require separating them into the following categories:
  • Research (work-related technical journals)
  • Comics (17 total! So many!)
  • Artsy (poetry, photography)
  • Humor
  • Life (food, fashion, happiness)
  • Music (I have 246 unread articles this week, mostly Pitchfork.)

Some recent additions to my feed:

Garfield minus Garfield



Fuck You Penguin
Hey Baby Flamingo, where did you get those giant ass legs, THE OVERSIZED LEG DEPARTMENT.

Printmatic's blog "More Music, Less Bullshit"

Tuesday, March 3, 2009

February 20, 1979

My 30th birthday was amazing. I'm so grateful for all my friends who came to Vegas to help celebrate. I felt so loved.

IMG taken by the lovely Bonzai Aphrodite

My therapist told me to use my birthday as an excuse to reflect on my life: where it is, where it's going. I was stuck at home with a chest cold last week trying to reflect on things and really struggling to find something positive. There's nothing like an illness to make you feel worse about yourself.

I keep waiting for the lightbulb. Something to click. My friends keep telling me "You are amazing! If only you realized how amazing you are! We're going to keep saying it until you believe it!"

Depression is hard. I can't sit back and wait for the right words to snap me out of it. The only thing that will work is HARD WORK. If I want things to be different, I need to force myself to do things differently. Action precedes motivation, or so they say.

Right now the only thing that makes sense is to throw myself into research work for a while.

And I could possibly benefit from a wardrobe update. I swear I have socks that are eight years old. I'm 30. I deserve new socks.