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To some people, music doesn't make any sense. There's a name for that: amusia. Auntie Beeb 'splains it to us.
I forgot to mention something else that the Musical Fidelity pieces seem to add to my system's performance: depth.
In his Audio Glossary, J. Gordon Holt defines "depth" as:
The illusion of acoustical distance receding behind the loudspeaker plane, giving the impression of listening through the loudspeakers into the original performing space, rather than to them. See "layering," "transparency." Compare "flat."
Yes, that's exactly what I'm talking about. Thanks J. Gordon. If there was one thing that bothered me about the musical presentation offered by my system with the…
One of the best reads I've had in the last few years was Mark Haddon's The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, a story written in the first-person voice of Christopher Boone, an autistic 15-year-old.
The triumph of this little novel is that you completely understand Christopher, who gets upset if touched and who calms himself down by moaning and doing math in his head. All of the chapters are numbered with prime numbers, because they are Christopher's favorites, and he won't eat yellow or brown food. He can't tell jokes, because "I do not understand them."
Haddon makes…
What song was top o' the charts when you were born? (Or, if you're older than the pop charts like me, on your 18th birthday?)
When Jim Wier told Wal-Mart he wanted them to stop selling his lawnmowers, was he being a good businessman or was he "the dumbest CEO ever to live"?
An interesting piece, because it isn't knee-jerk Wal-Mart bashing, but a look at how companies choose to present themselves.
One of my favorites was left out. From Anthony Burgess' Earthly Powers: "It was the afternoon of my eighty-first birthday, and I was in bed with my catamite when Ali announced that the archbishop had come to see me."
A Nielsen/Netratings survey suggests they might. Favorite alcoholic beveridge? Hard cider. Favorite car? VW. Favorite TV network? Cartoon Network, followed by BBC America and HBO.
So I guess that Super Bowl ad isn't really necessary, eh?
Turns out the theories about this have changed over time. This fascinating article reminds me of the great Simon Frith essay, "Why Do Songs Have Words?" Frith posited that pop song lyrics teach the young men of our decidedly unpoetic era the language of courtship.
The music samples should not be skipped.
Mark Levinson has thick, black eyebrows and big, beautiful hands which flutter with energy and something more.
And ruffle through invisible pages. And fret at imaginary strings. As he speaks.
And when he speaks, he takes deep pauses that seem to ask: "Which is the best word?" And "What do I really mean to say?" And "Is there a right way to convey this feeling, this thing?" And when he pauses, his body sways, as though he is under warm water — yes, it must be warm because he seems too comfortable for it to be anything else — as though he is being taken by the kindest waves…