The Hook Brings You Back
Yesterday, I wrote about rediscovering old music and for some reason, one of them- Blues Traveler's Hook stayed in my head all day. Around 2 am, I woke up dying of thirst (common here at this altitude) and still had the damn melody in my head. I knew that I knew the melody from somewhere else besides this song but I just couldn't place it. Slowly dissecting it in my head, I had a hunch and Googled it. I was right!
Take a listen and tell me what classical music this song is based on. You can try Googling, but you won't find it unless you have the composer in the query as well. And that's cheating anyway. Don't let John Popper's vocals distract you, just listen to the rhythm guitar and you'll recognize the "hook."
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
I was so excited because I suck at playing or recognizing specific notes and can't believe it took me almost 13 years (the song was released in September 1994) to figure this out. My subconscious mind was hard at work and all those years of being a classical music geek finally paid off.
Rediscovering Great Music
Last night I watched NBC's Saturday Night Live in the 90's special and though I loved seeing the best of Carvey, Spade, Farley, Sandler and of course Farrell, I enjoyed the brief snippets of live performances over the years. All the popular bands were featured, Pearl Jam, Nirvana, Dave Matthews Band and more but I heard two songs that I'd forgotten about how good they were.
First was Macy Gray's I Try, a song that reminds me of someone back in Columbus whenever I hear it, no matter when, where or whatever mood I'm in. And damn, those lyrics are good but the delivery was even better. She introduced me to the song LONG before it ever hit the radio and I was kinda bummed when it finally became so popular.
I play it off but I'm dreamin' of you I try to say good bye and I choke
I'll keep it cool but I'm fiendin'
I try to walk away and I stumble
Though I try to hide it, it's clear:
My world crumbles when you are not near
Second was Blues Traveler's Hook, a self referential ditty that is so clever that I get goose bumps every time I hear it. I'm a big lyrics person and these are, ironically, some of the best I've ever heard.
It doesn't matter what I say Because the hook brings you back
So long as I sing with inflection
That makes you feel that I'll convey
Some inner truth of vast reflection
But I've said nothing so far
And I can keep it up for as long as it takes
And it don't matter who you are
If I'm doing my job then it's your resolve that breaks
I ain't tellin' you no lie
The hook brings you back
On that you can rely
The song is obviously a rant about the shallow lyrics a lot of musicians use and the lemmings that follow them over the cliff and buy their albums year after year. John Popper was a genius.
Sure the above songs aren't cool anymore to have blasting out your car radio but they're timeless and I think it's even more fun to rediscover something old than something new. You gain a new respect for the memories you had and can look back with a new perspective with the experiences you've had in the years since.
In other music news, you can check out what I'm listening to at my Last.fm page- every song I listen to is automatically logged (7,559 songs logged since 8/12/2006).
Dell Starts Selling Machines with Linux Pre-Installed Today
At 2 PM PST, Dell will start selling desktops and laptops with Ubuntu Linux pre-installed. I never actually thought I'd see this day to be honest. Sure, Linux is more than ready for the desktop, but not quite ready for me to install it for Mom. Still, this is huge and must have caused some serious riffs with the folks in Redmond. 
Though I've used Linux on servers since late 1998, I've only been using it on my desktop for the past couple of years and never once thought of putting it on a laptop because if the lack of quality open source drivers for wireless cards. That all changed with the release of Ubuntu 7.04, Feisty Fawn. Prior to relocating to Colorado Springs, I purchased a laptop with Windows Vista Premium on it for the road trip and found that the laptop was not ready for Vista. The drivers for the screen, keyboard and wireless card never worked properly and it was only out of a troubleshooting session that I decided to install Linux to see if the blank screen was the fault of the OS.
Not only did Ubuntu install beautifully, but it recognized my wireless card and I only had to put in my WPA key to make it work. Hibernation also works incredibly well whereas if I did that in Vista, I'd have to start in safe mode and reboot. 
I'm incredibly excited about Dell's move and it kills me to not buy one today to support the cause and reward a company for finally getting it. But I don't think the boss (Amy) really cares about the FOSS movement so it will have to wait for a few days. Ok, weeks. You're right honey, years.
New Job + Old Material= New Laughs
I think one of the main reasons I've moved around so much career-wise is that I constantly struggle with writing new comedic material.
During a very stressful conference call at work where one of the projects that can't fail is failing (and that I'm 100% responsible for) I uttered and very nonchalantly "It looks like I picked the wrong week to quit sniffing glue." I'd say in a room of 20, half got the semi-obscure reference and the other half just wrote me off forever professionally.
If you've never seen Airplane, I highly recommend it. It's given me so much material over the years that I feel guilty I don't send monthly royalty checks to the Zucker brothers. I can only say that line once so I make sure it's in a very stressful situation with lots of people who are scared stiff. Sometimes it loosens everyone up and sometimes it gets me written up (as happened at AT&T Wireless) where I was forced to take a drug test that some week (I passed). It's always been a winner though.
A few of my others are:
1) "Jesus, that's more than I make in a whole week" (uttered quietly but just loud enough for someone close to me can hear after hearing a shocking dollar amount for a hardware purchase- more effective if you have lower paid subordinates around you).
2) Can we meet on Wednesday instead? I have to meet with my parole officer instead. (said in a muted tone when a boss or superior is listening a little too closely to my cell phone conversation).
3) "I haven't felt that awful since we watched that John Holmes film" (Another slightly altered line from Airplane again and uttered after I've come back from a sick day and tired of people asking me how I felt. I've never seen a John Holmes film (no, I'm not linking- google yourself...) but it always gets me some very strange looks.
Often, it's not about the material but more about the delivery. The second someone thinks your trying to be funny, you're not. And never, ever, laugh, smile or make contact after jokes like these. 90% of the joke is making people think you're serious and really like that. Seriously though, I need to get some new material...
