2018 Music

Albums

This list gets smaller each year which makes me sad, but I still think there is a place for a coherent set of songs released together.

• Haley Heynderickx - I Need To Start A Garden
  • This was soo soo good. She has this weirdo voice and does this folky/punky/warped garden elf music that sounds old, but totally fresh. Also my favorite live show this year.
  • Standout Track: Oom Sha La La
• Beach Slang (Quiet Slang) - Everything Matters But No One Is Listening
  • Apparently they are divisive but whatever - they are super fun, and unapologetic about being bombastic, pretentious art school poseurs. Quiet Slang is James Alex’s acoustic-ish solo-ish version of Beach Slang stuff.
  • Standout Track - Future Mixtape for the Art Kids
• Instant Music - Instant Music
  • A 1981 reissue that never got due credit back in the day. Minimal Synthy Post-Punk. Dark Entries is a really nice label for these kinds of reissues. A bit like Young Marble Giants.
  • Standout track - My Boy

Random Songs

• Travis Scott - Sicko Mode (I guess I didn’t listen to much rap this year. But you should also watch the Warriors listening to a “special version“ of this. Dray and Steph are the best)
• Migos - Motorsport (I guess I didn’t listen to much rap this year pt. 2)
• Parquet Courts - Total Football (Socialism, Soccer, and a “Fuck Tom Brady” Drop in the end - so I’m required to like it!)
• Death and the Maiden - Wisteria (Reminds me a bit of that Primitive Radio Gods song)
• Iron & Wine - What Hurts Worse

Pre-2018 Stuff I found

• Psychic TV - Orchids
  • OMG - This might become my favorite song ever. It is that good. If you listen to one thing in this post, listen to this.
• Snail Mail - Thinning
  • This track is way better than their new album which made its way into everyone’s lists, because people found this track and then felt like they needed to recognize them post-fact. It’s cool. I’ve done this too.
• William Onyeabor - Atomic Bomb and Fantastic Man
  • I kinda knew about him, but I didn’t really give him a listen until now. Oh wow. This is so much fun, and intersects nicely with old bollywood and afro-funk.

small wins

it has been a couple of weeks. failed attempt at adopting a dog. fires. smoke from the fires. being cooped up in the house from the smoke. a stir-crazy 11 year old not excited about being stuck in the house. took the week off, but felt myself on edge the whole time. plus my usual release - deriving joy from our local world-beating basketball team, has turned into its own form of angst, bickering and ugly losses. these are all temporary things. the rains are here. steph will be back. our new house is finally emerging from a sea of boxes. but i need some small wins - now! i'm tempted to ... gasp ... go for a run, just to count that as a small win.

football's coming home

based purely on their name, and knowing nothing else about them, huddersfield town seems like the team most likely to be relegated in the premier league. in other news i'm a bandwagon football fan now. i just need to find a wagon to band to.

world cup edition

Dear World Cup 2018,

I have some questions.

Why do teams seem to be taking so many short corners, when the set-piece has been shown to be the biggest statistically underutilized xG inefficiency? Bend it in for the inswinger and let probability do its work. (Note: It is also entirely possible that I don't actually know what I'm talking about, and I'm saying this because I read a book and now I'm basically a Blog Boy)

Why are sliding tackles ok again? I seem to remember there being a concerted effort to get rid of them in the 90s. Not sure if this is just confirmation bias, but it does seem like injuries are up this year. I really want to see some transcendent Messi/Neymar shit, dribbling fools out of existence, and mostly all we get are these ugly fouls.

Why aren't yellow cards reset after the group stage? It really sucks to watch teams playing without their top dudes. The 2 yellow cards = suspension rule seems a little too low of a bar. My solution for these last two questions: Just hand out more reds for dangerous tackles and do away with suspensions, unless they are for really flagrant fouls or non-football shenanigans. The NBA gets this right.

Why are most of the Fox commentators so awful? I am so done with all the "as it stands" commentary. We all know that if the score is Uruguay 2 Portugal 1, "as  it stands" Portugal and Ronaldo will out of the tournament. And can we please ditch the guy that sounds like Troy Aikman?


(To be continued ... )

open src

When I retire I want to spend my time curating a tiny but useful open source tool. I mean, I could theoretically do this right now, but I do plenty of ((mostly) satisfying) software work in my day job and I'd rather spend my free time doing other life things. Eric Raymond's excellent The Cathedral and the Bazaar and this great interview with the creator of curl* got me thinking about this, but really, I've kinda had this as my retirement plan pretty much since I graduated from college.

Other things I want to do when I retire:

• Do a longish bike ride.
• Actually finish a Coursera course.
• Play one-on-one basketball with my daughter (this is more of a waiting until she gets big enough/skilled enough for this to be a contest thing).
• Move to a fancy loft space.
• Spend several months in a totally new country.
• Join a beer brewing co-op**.

Maybe what I'm after isn't retirement so much as Keynes' fabled 15 hour work-week.

*What is the correct form of capitalization for UNIX utilities like "ls" or "curl"? The English language doesn't seem well equipped to handle computer commands.
**I don't have the patience/dedication/knowledge to be a solo homebrewer, but it seems like a fun group activity.