Top 10 Spiritual Songs by U2

This article from the @U2 website is an interesting look at the spiritual nature of U2's music and lyrics. A few of my top choices are left off ("Where the Streets Have No Name," "All Because of You," "Until the End of the World") but it is an interesting list with some nice commentary. I have to find a copy of the song "Mercy" somewhere - anyone have it that they can send me?

What if the Beatles were Irish?

The singer here is satirist Roy Zimmerman. Thanks to Abbey Road for the link.

From the Department of Redundancy Department

This was the headline in the on-line version of my local paper this afternoon. It was on the first page 1.

Red Alert!

I'm trying to be calm about this but ....

Pictures from the new Star Trek movie are posted here!!!

More cool free music

This offer expires on Nov 15 so don't miss your chance.

More on U2 remasters

I have had a chance to spend more time with all four of the U2 remasters that have come out in the past year (and I’m anxiously waiting for the fifth to arrive this week) and I realize that these are pretty much everything I’d like to have in a remaster series. Here is why.

1. Don’t mess with the album. Good albums have a flow to them that, while it could theoretically be improved on, generally I get used to the album the way it is and I want to experience the original. By all means, improve the sound, but don’t add tracks. That just messes up the end.
2. Add tracks to a second CD. What I really want is a second CD full of cool stuff like EVERY non-album single and b-side that connects to the album and unreleased live tracks from the era. I am a completist and I expect a good remaster to help me complete. I’m not looking for demos (although they can be fun,) I’m looking for something that I actually will want to listen to, not just have for historical purposes.
3. Make the art count. I want to have the original album art but also let me see the covers of all the singles and what else was on them. Basically I want the complete story of this album and this era in the band’s life.
4. Add cool liner notes. Include a critical essay, complete credits and a description, preferably by a key member of the band, of the b-sides. Lyrics are a nice touch too.
   

The U2 remasters delivers on all counts. And here’s what else they did to make it cool. The Joshua Tree has an extra deluxe edition that includes a video of a concert from that era. Since Under a Blood Red Sky is already a live album – and a really really good one – more live tracks aren’t really called for so they leave the album just as it is but added tracks to the live concert video, which has never been released on DVD. Yeah, U2 got it right with The Joshua Tree, Boy, October, War and Under A Blood Red Sky.

Jill Phillips - Nobody's Got It All Together

I have mentioned NoiseTrade.com before but I recently listened again to one of the first albums I downloaded there, Jill Phillips' Nobody's Got It All Together. It's a really fine album and well worth the FREE download.

U2 and word play

This morning I was listening to the Joshua Tree by U2 in the car on the drive in to work and looked out at the eastern sky as the sun was starting to make it purple and orange. I could see the horizon which, as a any good former math teacher knows, is the root of the word "horizontal."

That lead me to put the word "horizon" together with U2 and think about the rumored title of their forthcoming album "No Line On the Horizon." I thought more about the relationship between the words "horizontal" and "horizon" and wondered if there was a word which relates to "vertical" the same way.

Then the U2 connection came full circle and I realized the word I was looking for was "Vertigo."

Hello, Hello, I thought - I wonder if they were thinking of Vertigo and vertical when they decided to write a song about horizontal. hmmmm.

the ipod album shuffle

When I got my new mac computer it once again reset all of the playcounts on my itunes back to zero making all of the carefully planned playlists that I used obsolete. This was the second time in a month so I was a little disconcerted.

So, on a whim, I changed my way of listening to music on itunes and my ipod. (This actually first occurred to me on an airplane during 3 and a half hours on the tarmac at Newark Airport.) I switched from song shuffle to album shuffle. Now when I listen to either my ipod or itunes it starts at the first song on a random album that I had not heard in x days (right now x is set to 150 but once I get through everything I'll reset it to a number that works better.) If I stop before the album is finished it picks it up at some other time.

This way I'm hearing albums the way that the artists intended but I'm also having the fun of randomly hearing things. This morning, for example, I turned on my computer at work and started playing Led Zeppelin II - not exactly morning music but it got me going! I would not have picked it but by the time I was up to the third song I was into it.

I have a lot of random songs that have been downloaded over time so I get individual songs interspersed with albums so I never really know what I'm going to get when I listen. I also mix newly acquired albums in more frequently.

I have completely embraced my inner geek - just in case you haven't figured that out.

Phil Keaggy – Phantasmagorical

Phil Keaggy has had a wide variety of releases in his long career. Some instrumental, some vocal. Some electric, some acoustic. And, of course, some that are really good and some that are not as good. In almost any artist’s career there are high points and low points and there are also albums that really stand out. Phil Keaggy has had a couple that have really stood out over the years. One of those was The Master and the Musician, his first instrumental album. Phil recently toured to support the 30th Anniversary of that album so as he prepared his latest album he had M&M on his mind and in saw some similarities between Master and Musician and his latest album, Phantasmagorical. He mentioned those similarities when talking about the album before it’s release creating some buzz among his fans. In fact, it even has, as it’s subtitle, Master and Musician 2.

It has finally arrived (you can order it on his website) and I've now had a couple of weeks to digest it. While it is clearly not the sequel to M&M (and I don't know if Phil ever really intended it to be - decisions about titles like this are sometimes driven more by management than by the artist) it is also a very good album. As I mentioned in a recent review of The Song Within, Phil seems to be in a great creative space right now and has released a couple of very strong albums in a row. One of the things that strikes me about Phantasmagorical is how often a song will begin and I’ll find myself wondering who it is – not realizing it is Phil because he is experimenting with some new sounds – slide guitar, for example in the first track, “Like Snow Before the Sun” or the horns at the beginning of "Cascading." There is a lot of variety in this album and, of course, stellar playing throughout. But one of Phil's strengths is as a composer and arranger and he does that well on Phantasmagorical. Yes, there are times when it sounds like parts of it could have been on M&M but there are also parts that sound more like the sequel to Beyond Nature, (perhaps my favorite of Phil's instrumental albums) and there are parts that I'm hard-pressed to say if they'd fit on any of his previous albums.

Perhaps the best track on the album is the one that Phil previewed for us on the M&M tour, “Forever to Joy,” one of the songs that actually most sounds like the Master and Musician album with its strong melody and the delicate use of flute. It’s a great end to a great album. Phantasmagorical is one of the better PK albums of the last decade and it ranks nicely up there with his best ever.

George Harrison playlist

Here is another of my playlists. This one features the solo music of George Harrison. Once again, my rules are that it had to fit on a CD and that I wanted it to give both a good general intro to George's music and also include some of my own quirky choices.

Name / Artist / Album
01 My Sweet Lord / George Harrison / All Things Must Pass
02 Don't Let Me Wait Too Long / George Harrison / Living In The Material World
03 What Is Life / George Harrison / All Things Must Pass
04 Give Me Love (Give Me Peace On Earth) / George Harrison / Living In The Material World
05 Crackerbox Palace / George Harrison / Thirty Three & 1/3
06 Love Comes To Everyone / George Harrison / George Harrison
07 Wake Up My Love / George Harrison / Gone Troppo
08 Got My Mind Set on You / George Harrison / Cloud 9
09 Cheer Down / George Harrison / Best Of Dark Horse 1976-1989
10 Any Road / George Harrison / Brainwashed
11 Horse To The Water (with George Harrison) / Jools Holland and His Rhythm and Blues Orchestra / Small World Big Band, Vol. 1
12 When We Was Fab / George Harrison / Cloud 9
13 All Those Years Ago / George Harrison / Somewhere In England
14 Blow Away / George Harrison / George Harrison
15 This Song / George Harrison / Thirty Three & 1/3
16 Baby Don't Run Away / George Harrison / Gone Troppo
17 Never Get Over You / George Harrison / Brainwashed
18 Living In The Material World / George Harrison / Living In The Material World
19 All Things Must Pass / George Harrison / All Things Must Pass

Notice that I included the Jools Holland cut which is basically a George cut - it was released only a few months before his death and was, apparently, the last thing he recorded. (By the way, feel free to let me know if you like this format for showing the playlist more or less than the tables I had before. I have a new computer and it isn't as easy to do the tables.)

Why I like my new mac

I recently wrote about my new apple macbook and I really don’t want to be that guy who jabbers on about how cool his mac is and how relatively uncool PCs are but, basically – it's true. Now, granted, there are a few things that that mac doesn’t do as well – for example, the MS Word version for mac doesn’t post directly to my blog like the windows version does. It also won’t do mail merge to email (which I actually used occasionally.) It doesn’t sync my palm to my groupwise and groupwise isn’t as nice on a mac as it is on a PC.

BUT I’m really glad I switched. Here is a short list why.

• Size and weight – I like the size of the macbook and also how light it is. It is really a much more portable computer than either the IBM or the Dell that I had – certainly a lot more portable than the recent Dell I got from work.
• Style – let’s face it, these folks at apple know how to design stuff. They just look so cool!
• Ports and connections – all the ports are on the side so when I tip it back I don’t bend the power cord connection. Speaking of which, it’s magnetic so it just comes off without breaking (not that I ever had any problem with my old one, but this design just makes it less of a possibility.)
• Speed – there are two ways the mac is faster. It starts up and shuts down faster. A lot faster. But it also opens up programs faster. Not that I’m impatient or anything but, well, let’s move on.
• Searching for things – finding files is a lot easier and faster – you type into the little search window in the finder and you get results instantly instead of the five minute wait for windows search to do it’s thing. I used windows search only when I had to because it was such a pain – I search for things on the mac all the time.
• Preview – thanks for Bryan for pointing this one out to me. If you think you have the right file but you’re not sure you highlight the file and click the spacebar – it shows you the file instantly so you can see if it’s the one you want. It also works as a great way to view photos.
• Video chatting – with the camera above the screen I can chat with people and see them. I don’t use it much but I get to chat with Bethany face to face occasionallyy in Georgia and I finally got to see Father Ron Hatton, an internet friend who’d voice I had heard and who’s pictures I had seen. I feel like we’ve actually met now. Yeah, I know you can buy a camera for a PC and do the same thing – this is built in, easy and seamless. Oh, and the camera let me quickly take this picture showing my new t-shirt.

So, there it is. Why I like my Mac. I’m that guy now. And I’m OK with that.

New music from NoiseTrade by the Allens

I downloaded this album this morning and I've listened twice already - I like it a lot. Go get it for free.

A Beatles sampler

In another posting I posted a McCartney playlist. Here is my shot at distilling an intro to the Beatles for those who need an introduction. Again, it had to fit on one 80 min CD. I used the versions from 1 and Yellow Submarine when possible because they sound better. I also tried to make it flow well so that it was a good listening experience.

	Name	Album
1	I Should Have Known Better	A Hard Day's Night
2	Back In The U.S.S.R.	The Beatles [White Album]
3	Dear Prudence	The Beatles [White Album]
4	And Your Bird Can Sing	Revolver
5	Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band	Yellow Submarine
6	With A Little Help From My Friends	Yellow Submarine
7	Things We Said Today	A Hard Day's Night
8	Come Together	1
9	Let It Be	1
10	Can't Buy Me Love	1
11	I Feel Fine	1
12	Birthday	The Beatles [White Album]
13	Lady Madonna	1
14	All My Loving	With The Beatles
15	Penny Lane	1
16	Strawberry Fields Forever	Magical Mystery Tour
17	It Won't Be Long	With The Beatles
18	Paperback Writer	1
19	We Can Work It Out	1
20	The Inner Light	Past Masters, Vol. 2
21	Eight Days A Week	1
22	Something	1
23	Yesterday	1
24	All You Need Is Love	1
25	Hey Jude	1
26	I Want To Hold Your Hand	1
27	Across The Universe	Let It Be... Naked

Switching to Mac

Over the past few months I’ve been more and more intrigued with macs. I think it started just about two years ago when I got my first iPod. I realized that the design was SO elegant that it was really really well made. I still think that the iPod is an incredibly well designed music listening device – just think about the controls on it – very simple but yet it does everything you want it to. And the learning curve is not steep at all. It just makes sense and it works well.
My son, Bryan, told me that this is true of the mac computers too and so I started paying attention more. Now about ten years ago when I started teaching at Calvin they had just stopped requiring PCs for everyone because macs are particularly good for certain things and they were allowing them again but I wanted nothing to do with them. The classroom in which I taught, though, had a mac so I learned quickly that the windows interface and the mac OS were really quite close. I made the transition with little problem. My anti-mac bias started to crack.

My kids’ school, Holland Christian, is now part of a program in which every student, grades 6-12, has their own laptop computer – a mac. I went to visit the school to specifically look at this project with an IT friend from Calvin and we were very impressed. Also, this sumer, when Bethany came home for vacation for a week and a half she had her new mac and I was quite impressed with the way she could just lug it around and how quickly it would start up and work. It was very very cool. That made me think that I should try a mac but one thing was stopping me – I use GroupWise for my email, calendar and to-do list all the time and I couldn’t live with just the web interface.
Lo and behold, last week I discovered that I didn’t have to – I found out that there is a GroupWise client for mac that Calvin uses. I borrowed a mac from Calvin’s A/V and tried it out. I loved it.
So, Monday I get my own mac. I’m already starting to feel a little bit like “that guy” who is always talking about how cool macs are – I’ll try to resist but they are pretty cool.

A McCartney playlist

I recently found a Beatles blog which had a George Harrison playlist by someone who used the same rules that I recently used to make a couple of setlists so I thought I'd post mine and see what people think.

So here is my Post-Beatles McCartney setlist. There aren't many rules – it just needs to be able to fit onto one CD. That's the tricky part because that forces you to trim it down quite a bit. I also wanted this to be a good introduction to McCartney's music for someone who wasn't familiar with it and I wanted it to be a good listening experience so the order took some thought. Here's what I came up with.

	Name	Album
1	The Lovely Linda	Wingspan: Hits and History
2	Big Barn Bed	Red Rose Speedway
3	Jet	Wingspan: Hits and History
4	English Tea	Chaos and Creation in the Backyard
5	Pipes Of Peace	Wingspan: Hits and History
6	Live And Let Die	Wingspan: Hits and History
7	Motor Of Love	Flowers in the Dirt
8	Band On The Run	Wingspan: Hits and History
9	Ever Present Past	Memory Almost Full
10	Another Day	Wingspan: Hits and History
11	Mull Of Kintyre	Wingspan: Hits and History
12	Uncle Albert/Admiral Halsey	Wingspan: Hits and History
13	Only Mama Knows	Memory Almost Full
14	Beautiful Night	Flaming Pie
15	Venus And Mars / Rockshow (Single Edit)	Wingspan: Hits and History
16	Dance Tonight	Memory Almost Full
17	Maybe I'm Amazed	Wingspan: Hits and History
18	Every Night	Wingspan: Hits and History
19	Tug Of War	Wingspan: Hits and History
20	My Brave Face	Flowers in the Dirt
21	Your Loving Flame	Driving Rain

There are three big ballads on here – McCartney often ends his album with one of these – and I like them a lot but I needed to somehow put them on here in a way that made sense. So I split the 21 songs into three parts and ended each part with one of the ballads – that helped me give the list some flow. My daughter Bethany questioned the inclusion of "English Tea." Feel free to suggest other options.

A Great Headline

Every day I check my local paper on line to see what the local news is. Today's headline really impressed me as hard-hitting journalism.


Now, in fairness, there was concern that another city's water treatment plant had been the major contributor so it really is a worthwhile story but the headline made me wonder,

This Means War

As I mentioned in my previous post, U2 is going to be getting a few more of my bucks over the next couple of months and it started last week when I picked up the deluxe remastered edition of their third album, War. I am getting all three but I had to order the other two because they weren't in – which actually might be a good thing – it will spread them out for me.

First of all, the packaging is very nice. I liked the big box deluxe version of Joshua Tree very much and this, while it is a smaller (and cheaper) version it complements that one well – there is a booklet inside a slipcase which holds the two CDs as well as a number of pages of pictures, essays and information. Edge has notes on many of the tracks from the bonus CD and there are lyrics along with any notes about single releases. The sound on the remastered version of the original is fine – although there was nothing revelatory.

The bonus CD, though, is much better that I anticipated. Of the three bonus CDs this is the one I was least excited about because a look at the setlist indicates that four versions of "New Year's Day" and three of "Two Hearts Beat As One." I wasn't real excited about that. But it turns out that I really like them – the dance mixes are actually quite different and have a cool vibe to them. The other tracks are OK. One was already on the b-sides from 1980-1990 and the others are interesting but far from essential.

But the real find is the two live tracks that close out the CD, "I Threw A Brick Through a Window/A Day Without Me" and "Fire." These show a youthful U2 in full force back when they opened shows for others and had to proves themselves to the crowd in 30 minutes – and they do a fabulous job.

If you're a U2 fan then this is a must – a great version of a great album. I'm looking forward to the other two CDs more than ever now – I hope they arrive soon!

A great time for U2 fans

As I write this on my new Palm Centro as I'm sitting in an airplane somewhere between Michigan and New Jersey on a quick trip to visit my mom. Ever since I got an iPod and noise-cancelling headphones I've enjoyed listening in planes and in airports. I don't read well in moving vehicles so listening is just right.

It also gives me a bit of time to reflect on some of the listening I've been doing lately. It's been a while since we've had new U2 to listen to but that will soon change. This is going to be an exciting fall for U2 fans. This week the band released remasters of their first three albums each with a bonus disc of extras (which I won't be able to get until I return home.). But those of us who check iTunes on Tuesday mornings were surprised to find the audio from the Joshua Tree Bonus DVD now available as an album on iTunes called Live From Paris. Many of those on the internet who follow the band suggest that this is what they should have released instead of Rattle and Hum. They may be right. I listened on this flight and it's great.

All this should be enough to keep us happy until September when the long awaited DVD and CD remaster release of Under a Blood Red Sky happens.

Then, in November the NEW album hits - their first since How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb in 2004! The has been little news about it except for a few hints here and there but I've enjoyed every one of their albums before so I'm really looking forward to it.

More free music

If you like free music - and who doesn't? - then you need to go check out Derek Webb's Noisetrade.com website. Derek discovered that giving music away in exchange for email addressed increased attendence at his shows, merchandise sales and even sales of the albums he is giving away.

So he created NoiseTrade to showcase lesser-known artists - in the past two weeks they've gone from just over 20 albums to over 40, including ones by Derek, Sandra McCracken and Sixpence None the Richer.