During my time spent denouncing God (Christianity), I would often ask "why does God categorize homosexuality as a sin?" The answer I would get most of the time is something like: it takes the focus off of God. In that case, listening to music or watching movies that are not about God would be sinful. In fact, since having the curse of sin wihin us is the reason we're not able to live out our days as He intended, in total communion with Him, prayer is the only thing a person can do that isn't sinful; that and reading The Bible and going to church and talking about God.
98% of my day (at least) is spent doing "nothing"; listening to music, watching movies, hanging around upstairs talking with my Mom about random this & that, eating.......
If I had been more concerned with the future of my soul than making sense of the political agendas of this nation, I would have spent all that time asking people "Why does God categorize masturbation as a sin?" Furthermore "Why is masturbation punishable by death?" I actually haven't gotten far enough in The Bible to see that being written, but my World History teacher in high school, who seemed pretty smart, both then and in hindsight, despite clearly stating he does not believe there is a one true religion (it's possible he changed his mind since those 15 years I attended his class), seemed to at least think The Bible said that...idk...anyway.
I can see why He'd want to deter people from such things. After all, like The Dad in AMERICAN PIE says, "It's like throwing a ball against a wall; it can be fun, but it's not a game. You want a partner right?" The problem here is I become a nervous wreck when conversations die. That awkward moment in between a conversation when nothing is being said, but you know damn well something could be said, but you don't want to be rude and force a conversation...conversations are boring enough as is, but then when they END? rrrrrr....The whole process of "being social" is such a waste of time! I trust my pastor enough to believe he wasn't being dumb when he quoted a verse of The Bible about 'iron sharpening iron' in reference to accountability partnerships / friendships...but A) Do I even count as "iron"? I often hear people quote something about lukewarm hearts being spat out...my heart is a like a cold slab of meat! If not for all the wires going off in my mind, I'd be dead, it seems. Who's going to benefit from my lackluster, if not non-existent, life experience? Furthermore, how do I get an opportunity to sharpen and be sharpened? Nothing goes in in The Church building and arranging any kind of gathering...What shall we do? I'm sure even the most daft attendee would ask. "Let's just sit and do nothing!" I don't like board games. I don't like games of any kind. A game is when you make up some meaningless goal that the players are supposed to meet. Seriously!: How desperate can one be to fill up time?? Listening to music works with me. Well, not always. I'm listening to this one CD on Google Play Music, and it's mostly boring. But then again, I'm not exactly listening to it, but anyway...Most of the time I more or less "try" to listen to music...I spent 77 minutes listening to a live CD by prog-poppers Genesis and only 6 or so minutes of that experience was truly invigorating. The rest of it was interesting, as Genesis' music always is, but I still felt a little bit of "meh". I guess the fact that it's arranged makes it less uncomfortable. A conversation is a train wreck waiting to happen.
But anyway; to extend that in connection with what I was saying prior to getting off course, so to speak -- If it isn't clear, I have a hard time making friends. I don't even think it's fair to say I ever make friends. I don't even know if you could say I ever had friends. In the virtual world - internet - I used to chat with this one dude pretty regularly, but then he got increasingly annoyed with my welfare receiving, and I kept scoring minuses by being all "goody good" and pointing out obvious mistakes in his communicating, which sometimes was needed b/c he kept saying things that didn't make sense immediately. And then his schedule became overloaded and now that I no longer share his disgruntled feelings about God/Christianity, I find it that much harder to call him a friend...I mean, I haven't talked to him in over a year...prior to him, there was this guy I hang'ed out with in high school, during school hours, never hang out afterward. Both ppl struck up friendships, if you can call them that, with me, not the other way around.
& since I have no friends, where will I find a wife? Am I supposed to not want sex? Or am I supposed to seriously view sex as a mean's to God's plan and nothing more? Am I supposed to be disgusted with the way sexual 'pleasure' makes a person feel?
I guess for now all I can do is hope I'm making a mountain out of a molehill...
Monday, March 30, 2015
Tuesday, March 17, 2015
It's black, it's white...but is it remastered? Or is it Memorex? (take that, haha!)
REMEMBER THE TIME...
when Michael Jackson's BAD (1987) was on CD, with no bonus tracks except for an "exclusive to CD" (back when cassette tapes and vinyl were still popular) song titled "Leave Me Alone"? Remember it had a back cover-art of a B&W pic of Michael in a sweater with his arms crossed? Remember the front had an image of Michael standing confident wearing a crazy biker-belt-buckle-chain-link-fence-gang uniform thingy?
Remember in 2001 when the "special edition" was released and it DID NOT have the back cover-art referred to above and was replaced with an image of Michael jumping into a moshpit(???)??!! Remember in 2012 when the "25th Anniversary" edition was released and it re-put the back cover like it had once been BUT CHANGED THE FRONT COVER-ART??? Yeah, I know it's the "same basic" image, but for crying out loud, that front cover-art was ICONIC, not just the uniform but EEEEVERY-thing!!
Well, the one very good thing about MJ's BAD since 2001 is the remastered sound. I don't know if this 2014 copyrighted re-issue is remastered like it's 2001/2012 or if it's got entirely new remastering altogether or if it's the EXACT SAME disc that I saw at The Warehouse in California for $16.99 + tax circa 1996...heck, even the print on the disc is almost identical to the basic style pre-2001 pressings that you could buy just about anywhere, except it has an added "FBI Anit-Piracy Warning" logo and a Michael ballet dance feet logo that was used for his "MJJ Productions" etched/lasered(?) onto the disc...
I'll have to listen to find out. Just thought I'd release this excitement before it gets stale and dissipates.
And yes, I know I'm WAAAY too informed about Michael Jackson's BAD. I have, had, am slowly getting rid of a stupid bad habit of owning, selling, and re-buying. I think in the year 1998 alone I owned MJ's BAD three times. The same can probably be said of 1996 before I moved to Missouri.
The bonus tracks on the 2001 S.E. are good, not exactly essential except for maybe (maybe) "Streetwalker", which doesn't really fit in with the rest of the album, IMO, what I really liked about the S.E. was the interview footage w/ Quincy Jones. I had no idea "Bad" was envisioned as a duet w/ Prince. Damn it, Prince, why do you have to be so damn prissy! He said no, supposedly having cited "it'll be a hit without me", but obviously the guy was missing the entire point of the whole thing or he's too proud to put his differences aside and work for the Greater Good! (the greater good in this case being the need to put on a dynamic spectacle of epic proportions to wow the masses!)
So...this is the...17th?...time I've owned it. I'm getting better tho, I'm not lying! I could give examples...like the last time I bought SKELETONS IN THE CLOSET: THE BEST OF OINGO BOINGO was over 2 years ago! And the copy I presently own isn't even in "mint condition" (although it's close enough for most dayz).
I sold a DVD I bought for $2 at a pawn shop for $5.50!!! And I picked up a clearance rental of BLUE CAPRICE at Family Video here in Cape Gr., which I had a while ago tried watching via rental ($3 or thereabouts), and wasn't too impressed with, but knew it could be resold for close to or more than double what Family Video was charging me(?) to "own" it b/c I went home 1st and looked at Amazon to see what the mnm price was/is. I don't know exactly how much I got for BC, but I sold a mass market paperback of Dr. Crichton's JURASSIC PARK, an old BMG Music Club CD (no barcode), and the pawn shop DVD + BLUE CAPRICE and a Kate Bush CD (HOUNDS OF LOVE) for a whopping $12. The Kate Bush CD might've been worth $2 or $3, doubt it tho, and the BMG Music Club CD was only given $0.25 and I don't even wanna discuss the possibility of having gotten more than $1 for a mass market paperback of an old book, even if it is soon to be the center of attention of those casually revisiting the pages of semi-recent history...so, do the math doofus, it's got to be at least $4 they gave me for BLUE CAPRICE. I made money on it! The exact profit margin is hard to determine tho.
when Michael Jackson's BAD (1987) was on CD, with no bonus tracks except for an "exclusive to CD" (back when cassette tapes and vinyl were still popular) song titled "Leave Me Alone"? Remember it had a back cover-art of a B&W pic of Michael in a sweater with his arms crossed? Remember the front had an image of Michael standing confident wearing a crazy biker-belt-buckle-chain-link-fence-gang uniform thingy?
Remember in 2001 when the "special edition" was released and it DID NOT have the back cover-art referred to above and was replaced with an image of Michael jumping into a moshpit(???)??!! Remember in 2012 when the "25th Anniversary" edition was released and it re-put the back cover like it had once been BUT CHANGED THE FRONT COVER-ART??? Yeah, I know it's the "same basic" image, but for crying out loud, that front cover-art was ICONIC, not just the uniform but EEEEVERY-thing!!
Well, the one very good thing about MJ's BAD since 2001 is the remastered sound. I don't know if this 2014 copyrighted re-issue is remastered like it's 2001/2012 or if it's got entirely new remastering altogether or if it's the EXACT SAME disc that I saw at The Warehouse in California for $16.99 + tax circa 1996...heck, even the print on the disc is almost identical to the basic style pre-2001 pressings that you could buy just about anywhere, except it has an added "FBI Anit-Piracy Warning" logo and a Michael ballet dance feet logo that was used for his "MJJ Productions" etched/lasered(?) onto the disc...
I'll have to listen to find out. Just thought I'd release this excitement before it gets stale and dissipates.
And yes, I know I'm WAAAY too informed about Michael Jackson's BAD. I have, had, am slowly getting rid of a stupid bad habit of owning, selling, and re-buying. I think in the year 1998 alone I owned MJ's BAD three times. The same can probably be said of 1996 before I moved to Missouri.
The bonus tracks on the 2001 S.E. are good, not exactly essential except for maybe (maybe) "Streetwalker", which doesn't really fit in with the rest of the album, IMO, what I really liked about the S.E. was the interview footage w/ Quincy Jones. I had no idea "Bad" was envisioned as a duet w/ Prince. Damn it, Prince, why do you have to be so damn prissy! He said no, supposedly having cited "it'll be a hit without me", but obviously the guy was missing the entire point of the whole thing or he's too proud to put his differences aside and work for the Greater Good! (the greater good in this case being the need to put on a dynamic spectacle of epic proportions to wow the masses!)
So...this is the...17th?...time I've owned it. I'm getting better tho, I'm not lying! I could give examples...like the last time I bought SKELETONS IN THE CLOSET: THE BEST OF OINGO BOINGO was over 2 years ago! And the copy I presently own isn't even in "mint condition" (although it's close enough for most dayz).
I sold a DVD I bought for $2 at a pawn shop for $5.50!!! And I picked up a clearance rental of BLUE CAPRICE at Family Video here in Cape Gr., which I had a while ago tried watching via rental ($3 or thereabouts), and wasn't too impressed with, but knew it could be resold for close to or more than double what Family Video was charging me(?) to "own" it b/c I went home 1st and looked at Amazon to see what the mnm price was/is. I don't know exactly how much I got for BC, but I sold a mass market paperback of Dr. Crichton's JURASSIC PARK, an old BMG Music Club CD (no barcode), and the pawn shop DVD + BLUE CAPRICE and a Kate Bush CD (HOUNDS OF LOVE) for a whopping $12. The Kate Bush CD might've been worth $2 or $3, doubt it tho, and the BMG Music Club CD was only given $0.25 and I don't even wanna discuss the possibility of having gotten more than $1 for a mass market paperback of an old book, even if it is soon to be the center of attention of those casually revisiting the pages of semi-recent history...so, do the math doofus, it's got to be at least $4 they gave me for BLUE CAPRICE. I made money on it! The exact profit margin is hard to determine tho.
Monday, March 16, 2015
No, but seriously...
I guess his take on "You Can't Hurry Love" was his first happy pop song...less emphasis on the word "his" of course (I don't know or care who originally performed/wrote it, b/c it's not one of my favorite songs, Phil Collins or not).
But I don't think he really got pegged as the "I want to marry you!" type until "One More Night" came out in 1985. I mean, I guess the AGAINST ALL ODDS theme song began the slant, and then "One More Night" pretty much cemented it...idk...
The crazy thing is he'd been a drummer in Genesis since 1971. He was a backup vocalist too, singing lead on "For Absent Friends" on the first album by Genesis that he participated in.
He got a little more notoriety in 1976 when the radio edit of "Your Own Special Way" became a semi-big hit in the UK...I don't think The USA audiences really heard the song, not much anyway...I myself have NEVER heard that song on the radio and I've been actively engaged with music since I was 11 or so, primarily listening to "classic rock" radio, which would have been the most likely to play such a song...except for the fact that classic rock radio is known for playing the same 10 or 20 songs over and over and over and over...basically time-travelling Top 40? Except it's Top 40 Rock, not Top 40 general (Pop).
Anyway. It was 3/4 of a decade after he jumped in the water w/ Tony Banks & co. that his voice became public knowledge with "Follow You, Follow Me", from 1978's ...AND THEN THERE WERE THREE...the first bonafide HIT by Genesis!
It seems surreal to me to think that it took so long for him to become what he did. And then he got bogged down by all the criticisms he's received for being a pop music celebrity...I had no idea he'd been taking it all so hard until I read this article from 2014 or late 2013...I can't remember where it was from, SPIN or Rolling Stone or something, I can't remember...Of course, that guy from Oasis hates everything that eclipses him in popularity and makes it well known with utmost arrogance. And since Oasis had a lot more clout in 1994-1995 than they do now, they got a lot of support in hating Phil Collins.
F*** you, Mr. Gallagher. Just when he's released the best album of his career (1993's BOTH SIDES) you have to go and hurt his feelings. He hasn't quite regained his footing. 1996's DANCE INTO THE LIGHT I guess was an attempt to remain upbeat and poppy while ripping off Paul Simon's GRACELAND/Peter Gabriel/etc...after all, P.G. and P.S.'s GRACELAND are pop but have a lot more respect from prestigious rock listeners/critics than st8 up pop music does. And then he made 2002's TESTIFY which was him appealing soley to his adult contemporary/soft rock listeners, with little to none of the flair that made his music so interesting (IMO).
Since then all we've got is a album full of his childhood favorites (Motown era music) re-done by Phil Collins.
Damn it.
Wednesday, March 11, 2015
I wish the real world...
Days like today were made for Matchbox 20's YOURSELF OR SOMEONE LIKE YOU. Days like today even remind me of what it was like to be 15 living in the latter portion of the 1990s. Wow.
Friday, March 6, 2015
The Poltergiest is Dead
The Sceptre sound bar I referenced in a older post seems to be a POS...might be good...somebody wrote a mostly favorable review citing great high and low range but highly lacking in the mid range, which makes $54 not only a lot of money (for me) but a waste of money. If I can't get a GOOD quality sound bar for $60 or whatever, I'll simply need to wait. My TVs sound isn't intolerable. I just want something that will make it more tolerable. Adding a few notches to the tolerability spectrum is pointless.
I had in mind to try this thing that's a little bit cheaper, it's a wireless (Bluetooth) speaker, but it has a 3.5mm slot to connect other devices. I auditioned portable speakers at Radio Shack awhile back, one of the ones they had was fairly large but I could hear this crackling within the music and the guy at the store didn't seem to know what I was talking about. So I'll probably need to remove that from my Amazon shopping list/wish list.
I'd hate to spend $200 on a sound bar or some HTiB alternative, but if I never have "premium" sound, then I guess I'll still be a miserable sod with a huge lack of appreciation of music in general. My life is rather dull, so music that doesn't explicitly make its point clear and is told from a "let's party" perspective is not going to do the trick. Music needs to hit pretty hard to win over my heart. There's this one song by Pianos Become The Teeth titled "April". Damn, that song is heavy. The band was specializing in primitive emo/screammo type music, but I guess like the '70's punk rockers, they got bored with pretending to be gorillas and have expanded their horizons. I don't think a sound bar would really make the song better. Or at least that's what I tell myself.
I had in mind to try this thing that's a little bit cheaper, it's a wireless (Bluetooth) speaker, but it has a 3.5mm slot to connect other devices. I auditioned portable speakers at Radio Shack awhile back, one of the ones they had was fairly large but I could hear this crackling within the music and the guy at the store didn't seem to know what I was talking about. So I'll probably need to remove that from my Amazon shopping list/wish list.
I'd hate to spend $200 on a sound bar or some HTiB alternative, but if I never have "premium" sound, then I guess I'll still be a miserable sod with a huge lack of appreciation of music in general. My life is rather dull, so music that doesn't explicitly make its point clear and is told from a "let's party" perspective is not going to do the trick. Music needs to hit pretty hard to win over my heart. There's this one song by Pianos Become The Teeth titled "April". Damn, that song is heavy. The band was specializing in primitive emo/screammo type music, but I guess like the '70's punk rockers, they got bored with pretending to be gorillas and have expanded their horizons. I don't think a sound bar would really make the song better. Or at least that's what I tell myself.
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