Category: Music

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A Soundtrack for Our Times

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The Summer Mix, 2008

Twelve years ago, just a scant few months before Ben entered my life, I created this two-disk playlist.

Admittedly this is an odd collection, but listening to it this afternoon sent me back to providing tech support at the hospital where I made friends that grace my life to this day, learned technical skills that propelled my career, and celebrated my 5-year cancer free anniversary. Both my folks were still alive, Mom hadn't yet begun the precipitous decline into Alzheimers, I was indulging myself in short, yet extensive road trips, and making more money than I would see again for the next decade. And yet, as I've told Ben, while my life prior to meeting him was okay, something was missing. I was happy, but I wasn't happy. Of course, unbeknownst to me at time, all that was about to change for the better.

Sequestered in my private office in the bowels of the hospital (Why is I.T. always in the basement?) I had the luxury (yet to be repeated) of a locking door and—since the rest of the floor consisted of rarely-used conference rooms and two other unoccupied offices—of cranking tunes when the mood struck me, and these were but a few items on my playlist from that period in my life.

Do the tunes say anything about my mental and emotional state at the time? Probably, but its still quite invisible from this side of the mirror.

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Gawd I Needed This…And I Didn't Even Know It

I consider myself neither a Streisand queen nor a Broadway queen, but goddamn, I put this on today—after not hearing it for 20 years or more—and it was like diving into a cool, clear, stream.

I won't say that I have specific memories attached to this album, but rather more of a feeling; a Joie de vivre from the 80s.

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Released 43 Years Ago Today

FLEETWOOD MAC: RUMOURS (1977)

Considered by many of a certain age to be the best rock album of all time.

Heard in the manner to which it was intended…

I saw them perform at the University of Arizona stadium in the fall of 1977.

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Finally!

It took longer than expected, but I've managed to acquire another piece of Holy Grail vinyl I saw online a couple years ago. After seeing a photo of the red vinyl version of Kraftwerk's The Man Machine on Tumblr or some such, I subsequently tracked it down on Discogs late in 2018, but never thought I could justify buying a copy. (It typically sold for over $100 USD). I have a pristine copy on black vinyl that is one of the few records to survive from my original collection, bought new in 1978, but when I saw this I had to have it—sooner or later. I guess the analog gods were smiling upon me a month ago, becuase a copy came up for sale at a third of the typical asking price and I jumped on it. It seemed to take forever to get here from Germany, but it finally arrived yesterday and believe me, it was worth the wait.

The seller graded it very conservatively, assigning a VG (very good) rating to the sleeve and VG+ (very good plus) to the vinyl itself. After receiving it, however, I have to say the sleeve is mint, and the vinyl itself it NM (near mint).

The Man Machine is probably my favorite of all the recordings in Kraftwerk's extensive catalog.

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Released 44 Years Ago Today

Sumeria: Golden Tears (1978)

This was one of the more…bizarre…releases from Alec Costandinos. It tells the story of an alien traveler who lives until he finds true love and then dies by crying gold tears.

Hey, it was disco. It was 1978.

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A Musical Discovery

How did I miss this guy all these years?

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This Playlist…

…was obviously curated by someone my age.

I have every one of these in my collection and remember each of them when they first came out; the vast majority on vinyl.

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Akhnaten

Last night Ben and I went to the Fathom Events screening of the New York Metropolitan's production of Philip Glass's Akhnaten. I have loved this piece since I first got my hands on the CD recording in the spring of 1988. I finally got it on vinyl last March, having only heard it digitally for the past 30 years. I've written at length (here, and here) about how it affects me, but long ago I gave up any hope of ever seeing the opera performed.

All that changed last night.

When a friend in San Francisco alerted me to the upcoming performance  on Fathom a few weeks ago, I jumped at it. Yes, the tickets were kind of pricey relative to a regular movie, but it was at a one of the nice dinner-and-a-movie theaters, and after experiencing it last night, I have to say it was worth every damn penny.

These are shots from the "new" Phelim McDermott production (the one we saw last night), not the one you find on YouTube.


All it took was the opening notes of the Prelude and the tears started streaming down my cheeks. The Window of Appearances and Akhnaten and Nefertiti gave me chills.

The sets, the staging, the costumes all combined to transport me to another world. And if nothing else, made me want to now see this production live. In short, it was magical.