title, what title?

I've been fascinated by the Zen belief that most important decisions are to be made within 7 breaths. Of course this rich historical Philosophy is not urging us to rush our decisions. Rather, what it contends is that our first reaction to important decisions, which happen in 7 breaths, are usually the ones that we make and spend the rest of our long decision process for convincing ourselves of. This is not some magic happening in our brains, or attributing some metaphysical importance to our instincts. The decision that we make in the first seven breaths are actually the manifestation of our long time thoughts that have been "boiling" for a long time.  What I have experienced in the last few years is that songs or everything related to songs are excellent facilitators of becoming aware of such decisions that we have made but not were aware of. When I think of few important decisions I've taken in the last few years are all associated with a song that made everything...

I turned 26 the other day, and as with every birthday had some time to reflect on life. I normally don't like birthdays, but this time it was a very nice one. I have come to realize that the concept of "home" -finding it, building it, destroying it, rebuilding it, losing it, re-finding it, I am not sure- has become the defining struggle/yearning/searching of my life currently. It makes me hopeful and pessimistic at the same time, that two of my favorite singer/song writers have written about "home" the same age as I am. Scorsese's recollection of Dylan's wild beginnings is named "No Direction Home" for a reason. It's a reference to one of his signature recordings from that era, Like a Rolling Stone. The song is sung to a woman, who used to "let other people get her kicks for her," who "used to ride on the chrome horse with her diplomat, who carried on his shoulder a Siamese cat" and after all this glory has to "g...

Idiomag is the best thing I found on the net after Google and Last.fm . If you are not familiar with Last.fm, it is a service that tracks the mp3s that you listen on your computer -and ipod, my new mp3 player doesn’t unfortunately support it- and gives you recommendations on music, events you might like, and lets you meet people of the same music taste. Idiomag basically gets this information and prepares you a daily online journal from news about your favorite music artists. I admit this kills the inherent treasure hunt feeling associated with listening to music, but it is a very helpful service. I came across this song that Bright Eyes did 3 years ago when George W. Bush was the most “evil” person in the media, which is one of the sharpest protest songs that I listened to so far. It coincided with The Economist’s briefing this week on the possible -or impossible- changes in US foreign policy. Summarized, don’t expect the winds to change direction, America has a tradition of bi-part...

Spent the Monday home. Devoted the the whole day (well almost the whole, I woke up at 2pm) to spring clean-up. I did not know my apartment could house so much garbage without me knowing. Anyway I found some time to surf the web for interesting music news. I wanna share two... Queen is my first musical obsession, to whom I owe a great deal for the appreciation for multi-layered polyphonic music I grew by listening to them, and helped me appreciating music across the spectrum. Dubbed the first "Stadium Rock"ers, their stage performances had always been great. More than their show on the stage, thanks to flamboyance of Freddie Mercury, they distinguished themselves by getting through to the guy sitting on the last row. People could relate to Queen, composed of the only true male rock diva, the scientist turned guitarist Brian May, the true rocker Roger Taylor and the shy guy on the street John Deacon who plays most of his sets facing Roger Taylor... Their brilliance on stage pea...

Shouting from Austin, the Texan post-rock group Explosions in the Sky have released a new album titled "All of a Sudden I Miss Everyone" and they are going on a world tour. Pitchfork magazine have released a great review about their last album, and almost stole my feelings about the band: "While alphabetized post-rock record collections find Explosions in the Sky slotted neatly between Do Make Say Think and Godspeed You Black Emperor!, and although the music is suited to the same contemplative mood, these Texans are more workmanlike than their Canadian peers, more like artisans than artists." Anyway, if you are interested they have a free mp3 from the album here . BBC Radio 3's " Tchaikovsky Experience " ended with a great performance of the composer's 1812 Overture at the Imperial War Museum. They are airing the whole performance online until 5th of March here . I was never really into pre-1900's classical music but this performance change...

i don't know where i am i don't know where i've been but i know where i want to go so i thought i'd let you know PS: The song has one of the most touching video's I've ever watched. Yes I used "touching", I guess I am really growing up.