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09/29/2004 Entry: "Music discoveries" My quest for music is always taking strange turns. A few days ago, my old friend Seth sent me some of his remix CDs. I knew him back when he was "Commander" back in the old BBS days. He was part of a "wave" of FanTek newbies that came in the early 90s, and included some people like Lije, Hilary, Anne, and Kai. Many of them went to the West coast for some reason, and have been involved in the "alternate scene." Seth's remix CDs are very good. I know a lot of it is generic techno with remixes that last 62 minutes, but the beat and mix are good, so I can see these being VERY popular in Euro-pop dance clubs. After listening to them at work (I got headphones), I was definitely in an altered state where I wanted to order imported beer and talk on my Czech retro-cell phone the size of a brick (because, currently, big is the new small). "Daaaahling, kiss kiss, you MUST introduce me to your new friend. Did I ever tell you painted in Amster-dahm? Stedelijk is the NEW Paris, you know..." Anyway, Travis IMs me with some girl named Lederhosen Lucil, and I have been listening to her MP3s. She reminds me a lot of the early B-52s, and I think I like her style. A little new wave, a little lounge, and very German girl eclectic. He also linked me to "The Planet Smashers," a kind of ska band (NB: punk has its roots in ska, which is related musically to reggae with tempo on the upbeat). I need new music, because I "go through" music pretty quickly, only visiting the past once in a while once I have left it behind. "Oh, Siouxsie and the Banshees... I remember them... Nothing or no-one will ever make me let you down...Kiss them for me...I may be delayed..." "ROSE, dahhling, how do you stay so THIN? I must have the number for your spa, you look absolutely gorgeous and I love you and your new look, it's like the freshest milk... MWAH!" My music tastes cater into the techno-industrial-goth-punk end of the "spectrum," as it were, which isn't for everyone. In fact, even when I was a kid, I listened to weird stuff no one else "got" like some of the bands that would make it to Dr. Demento, a.k.a., "Novelty Bands." Barnes and Barnes was a good example. Some of the albums you could only get by direct mail-order, which got me on a mailing list with questionable material like "Mellow Mail," which I got some of my first gag tee-shirts. They also sold bongs for a while, with descriptions of, "It looks like a lighter, but slide this here and here, and fill the mesh screen bowl with your favorite smoking matter..." Favorite smoking matter. But I digress. Most of my old albums are on cassette tape, because they took up less room than record albums, although their performance degraded with time. Thank God for CDs and mp3/ogg collections. "Tell the Asian deejay he's more hip than a Russian gun holster, I mean SERiously... his style is like a breath of fresh cold air tinted with the heartbeat of a giant hummingbird, and his knitted cap and dyed Fu Man Chu braid is just aDORable... if I didn't have to sit on this stool and finish my $40 beer, I would be dancing like a rock star on crack AND heroin. Just listen to me, I am so BAD...!" God, that guy is annoying.