What's with folk singers producing electroacoustics? The other week I downloaded one of Leafcutter John's albums, which was awesome, in the way that only the sound of giant rusty robots playing tennis, in central park, at night, can be awesome. Then I find out John is actually a folk singer. http://us.i1.yimg.com/us.yimg.com/i/mesg/emoticons7/23.gif

Then yesterday I downloaded Sufjan Stevens' Year of the Asthmatic Cat. This is truly awesome. This is electroacoustics that only a folk singer could produce (or rather, Illinois is a folk album that only an electroacoustician could produce).

My Sufjan Stevens counter is about to get…

Which is really friggin annoying, because my start menu is on the other monitor. Yet I refuse to unplug it, because it's my <3 Samsung LCD, and occassionally… *occassionally* it comes back on. Goddamnit.

So anyway yesterday I bought $280 pants. Today I started feeling bad about it–guilt about starving children and stuff–so I went out and spent $100 on my new fish. Then I bought more clothes. I'm a pretty fucking terrible person =(

Also, I'm starting to like Architecture In Helsinki. Took about 10 listens to the album, but it's happened. I like how good music always…

Yay!

Also, Death From Above 1979 - Romance Bloody Romance (a.k.a. the remix album) is really really good. Pitchfork gave it a 0.5, but then they also gave Bloc Party - Silent Alarm Remixed an 8.0 and think Black History Month is DFA79's worst track. Someone over there is obviously smoking crystal meth.

It's rainy. I need a nap.

So last week I went out and bought my first pair of nouveau-tight jeans. Now don't get me wrong, I haven't worn the "phat" pants of yesteryear in a long, long time. But, up until now, I've been enjoying what I like to call medium-pants. Those are the ones that you can't quite fit an entire vietnamese family into, but neither do they dislocate your kneecaps when you bend your leg.

So anyway, when I tried these on I thought, "well these are kind of tight… but this is what all the kids are wearing, plus I'm sure they'll stretch".…

Been listening to some stuff I used to listen to six or seven years ago. Considering the shitfaced retard I used to be when I was 18, I'm kind of surprised how some of this is actually pretty decent:

Goldie - Timeless
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/0/04/Goldie_Timeless.jpg/200px-Goldie_Timeless.jpg
The best drum & bass album of EVER. It came out in 1995 but no one's topped it since within the genre. Still sounds as good today as it did when I was a wee lad 10 years ago. I always wondered if Goldie was kind of a hack, because the later albums are all kind of…

Assignment due tomorrow, so time to do anything but the assignment. wheeeee!

Here's what I've downloaded lately:

Speak for Yourself
This one's gonna have to be my dirty little secret. It's totally over the top, borderline britney spears cheeze production, ala Toxic. I would've probably trashed this if not for the fact that 1) it's really really pretty, or at least some of it is, and 2) even though it's pop, this record wasn't engineered by high-end producers and "marked tested" in focus groups. It's borderline cheeze, but at least it's honest. This is Imogen really giving it her all…

Went to my first "indie show" last night. Very polite bunch of kids they are. All sitting around quietly, occassionally bobbing their heads. Is this really what kids do nowdays? Man, what happened?! If this is their idea of being young and rebellious then… wow. This makes my formative years look like Sodom and Gomorrah. Is this some sort of counterreaction to the drug-infested late 90's/early 00's? The pendulum swinging the other way, or something.

Ah poor kids… it's just a matter of time before one drug or another infests their scene like all others and the whole thing turns…

… or at least in a coma. Seriously, the city is boring as fuck right now. Somebody needs to turn on the generators that used to put that "electricity" in the air, cuz it's aaall gone .

Here are some pictures:

http://roughest.net/photos/nyc2005/smaller/karina-brooklyn.jpg
Karina, scared of the brooklyn J train.

http://roughest.net/photos/nyc2005/smaller/erkel-bum.jpg
Steve Erkel in bum form.

http://roughest.net/photos/nyc2005/smaller/moma-lobby.jpg
MoMA lobby.

http://roughest.net/photos/nyc2005/smaller/jackson-pollock.jpg
Jackson Pollock exhibit at the MoMA.

http://roughest.net/photos/nyc2005/smaller/matt-central-park-east.jpg
Me, near central park, looking like I'm about to slap Karina for taking blurry pictures.

http://roughest.net/photos/nyc2005/smaller/budget-hostel.jpg
Our extremely budget hotel room. My walk-in closet is bigger than this. :|

A few more, but not…

I see some of you coming back here every once in a while, which I think means you are vaguely interested in my music listening preferences. Either that or you just want to see my magnificently fantastic avatar. Regardless, I always need new music to listen to, and Last.fm's recommendations right now are not cutting it. It says I should listen to the Pixies, who I saw live this summer and left early due to boringess, and to Wilco, who's last album I have and never listen to, also due to boringness.

So.. next time you're listening to…