From: owner-alloy-digest@smoe.org (alloy-digest) To: alloy-digest@smoe.org Subject: alloy-digest V6 #167 Reply-To: alloy@smoe.org Sender: owner-alloy-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-alloy-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk X-To-Unsubscribe: Send mail to "alloy-digest-request@smoe.org" X-To-Unsubscribe: with "unsubscribe" as the body. alloy-digest Saturday, June 30 2001 Volume 06 : Number 167 Today's Subjects: ----------------- Alloy: yes, it was a virus ["Julie Sweeney" ] Re: Alloy: yes, it was a virus [Robin Thurlow ] Re: Alloy: yes, it was a virus [Brian Clayton ] Alloy: RE: alloy-digest V6 #166 [Kathleen Presser ] Re: Alloy: ta, and bad taste ["Chris & Beena Cracknell" ] Re: Alloy: ta, and bad taste ["Robin Thurlow" ] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Fri, 29 Jun 2001 10:55:57 -0500 From: "Julie Sweeney" Subject: Alloy: yes, it was a virus Robin, thanks for putting up my message.... this magistrate virus is a weird one, apparently it spreads like others through your email list, but also takes random bits of text from your hard drive to put into the emails, and corrupts some Windows system files to boot. I'm glad to hear the smoe server (or whatever) bounced these things. My real post yesterday was in response to Melissa's top 10 beach music list. Sorry to be a pain in the ass and look like a dork to boot!!!! Julie ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 29 Jun 2001 12:26:23 -0400 From: Robin Thurlow Subject: Re: Alloy: yes, it was a virus You're not a pain at all, the virus wasn't your fault. This sort of thing is what the attachment filters (and others) are there for... xxx ~R ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 29 Jun 2001 09:25:11 -0700 (PDT) From: Brian Clayton Subject: Re: Alloy: yes, it was a virus On Fri, 29 Jun 2001, Julie Sweeney wrote: > Robin, thanks for putting up my message.... this magistrate virus is a weird > one, apparently it spreads like others through your email list, but also > takes random bits of text from your hard drive to put into the emails,[...] Actually, the real virus here is Microsoft Outlook. :) Running, ducking, BC - -- "No one can predict with certainty what the ultimate meaning will be of mastery of space." -- John F. Kennedy, May 25th, 1961 ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 29 Jun 2001 12:35:10 -0700 From: Kathleen Presser Subject: Alloy: RE: alloy-digest V6 #166 There are four to five Dolby songs that come to mind when thinking of summer. 1. My brain is like a Sieve 2. The Ability to Swing 3. Screen Kiss 4. Air Head 5. Keys to Your Ferrari Of course when I think of summer I naturally think of Southern California since that's where I've spent just about all of my life. The Aliens Ate My Buick album is not that bad. At first it was a bit of a shock to listen too. I really felt Dolby went off the deep end. But, actually you've got to respect any musician who tries different styles of music. I've come to enjoy most of the songs on that album, even the 'very' experimental ones like 'Mulu' (about the only time I've heard Dolby sing acapello). Gee, what do you know, I'm very on subject. Coolness!! Kate;-)The washed up riverdawg from the 80s Get personalized email addresses from Yahoo! Mail http://personal.mail.yahoo.com/ ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 29 Jun 2001 16:40:50 -0400 From: "Chris & Beena Cracknell" Subject: Re: Alloy: ta, and bad taste - ----- Original Message ----- > You've got to pity this bloke's bad taste : > "Thomas Dolby - Aliens Ate My Buick (CD) (EMI): If I could put into words how Actually I read his review on Thomas's "The Golden Age Of Wireless" and I wouldn't say it's a matter of this guy hating Thomas's music as it is that he just really hated "Aliens Ate My Buick". With the exception of "She Blinded Me With Science" he seemed to be quite impressed with the emotional depth of the rest of TGAOW. I'm pretty sure that even though SBMWS is without a doubt Thomas's most well known and well loved hit it's probably not the song that Thomas himself is the most proud of. Infact, I wouldn't be too suprised to learn that Thomas rues ever recording that song because let's face it that's not only the song that "made" Thomas Dolby, it's also the song that "broke" him too. It was so well loved and so recognized that the masses enlarge and probably the record companies too wanted Thomas to just keep doing more songs like SBMWS, and when Thomas grew and stretched out in different directions and dared to explore different paths and avenues of expression the record companies and the masses just went, "but... but... but that's not 'She Blinded Me With Science'." Now I'll admit, I love "She Blinded Me With Science". It was the song that introduced me to Thomas Dolby and when I listened to it I thought "My god! I'm not alone! Someone else out there understands that brainy geek-grrrls are HOT. Someone else out there knows it's okay not to lust after cheerleaders!" But if Thomas had simply continued to put out songs like "She Deafened Me With Algebra", or "She Crammed Physics Up My Nostrils Until I Lost The Sense Of Smell" I would have very quickly gone, "This guy sucks!". Thomas could have gone the route of Duran Duran and just wrote one song with different lyrics and he would have been able to ride the charts longer than he did but he didn't. He dared to be hounest and it cost him mainstreme success but gained him artistic success and I for one couldn't be happier for it because it's given me a hell of a lot of great music to listen to. I've said it before and I'll say it again. Thomas is a "musician's musician". While the masses might be doing down on Nsync and Britany Spears people who really make, know, and appreciate real music know and respect Thomas's talent. I noticed the guy doing the reviews did not have a copy of "Astronauts and Heretics" I think if he had this album it would have gotten a good review because many of the things this guy loved about TGAOW are things I love about "Astronauts and Heretics". Now as for his criticism of AAMB, well that's his opinion. It's not one I personally share but I could see how somebody might make a point for it being over produced and too dancey-pop. And if he didn't like AAMB then it's likely that he wouldn't like The Gate To The Mind's Eye soundtrack because it and AAMB are probably the two most dancey-pop albums Thomas has done. I can see how people might not like that if they have a low tolerance for dancey-pop music. I liked both albums, and there are some real gems on both ("The Keys To Her Ferarri" and "Nuvogue" being two of my favorite Dolby songs) but in the grand scheme of all that is Dolby both albums rank as my least favorite works. Astronauts and Golden Age are in a pretty close tie for first (still not sure which is my favorite) and Flat Earth runs behind them. Then would come Aliens and in last place Mind's Eye. Of course Mind's Eye is really a soundtrack and I haven't seen the video so I'm really only judging half the project. Having done soundtrack work myself I can tell you that you can't always do what you might want to do musically with a song because ultimately you're working for the video/film/game. Your job is to enhance what's going on up on the screen so the music has to work with the visuals and not compete against them. Perhaps what was up on the screen might inspire you to create a certain work and if left on your own you might choose different artistic paths to take to complete that song but when you're working on a soundtrack you don't have that luxury to follow your own path. You have to go where the visuals lead you. So if Mind's Eye had actually been it's own album instead of a soundtrack it probably would have been a very different piece of work because Thomas would have been free to go where his own imagination would take him instead of having to teather his work to the visuals. But then again, I haven't seen Mind's Eye so I don't really know if he did go off on his own or not. Maybe he said "visuals be damned I'm writing a freakin' song here and it'll go where I want it to go", I don't know. Anyways, you might want to point this person towards "Astronauts and Heretics" because I think it'll be a Thomas Dolby album more to his liking. Crackers (And may the cube be with you from hell!!!) CrAB - http://www.hwcn.org/~ad329/crab.html The Official Bira Bira Webpage - http://birabira.chaosmagic.com Ghastly's Ghastly Comic - http://ghastly.keenspace.com ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 29 Jun 2001 19:49:41 -0700 From: Robyn Moore Subject: Re: Alloy: ta, and bad taste And lo! At 13:40 2001.06.29, the email zephyrs conveyed thy words unto me thusly: >your own path. You have to go where the visuals lead you. So if Mind's Eye >had actually been it's own album instead of a soundtrack it probably would >have been a very different piece of work because Thomas would have been free >to go where his own imagination would take him instead of having to teather >his work to the visuals. But then again, I haven't seen Mind's Eye so I >don't really know if he did go off on his own or not. Maybe he said "visuals >be damned I'm writing a freakin' song here and it'll go where I want it to >go", I don't know. There are a few differences between Mind's Eye as it plays out on the video and the soundtrack CD. Most notably, the 'rap' by Thomas towards the end of N.E.O. only shows up on the CD, and not on the video itself. So there's at least a little bit of artistic license involved. Robyn M @ Robyn Moore @ http://www.wiccans.net/robyn.html @ You knew the job was dangerous when you took it. - S.C. ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 29 Jun 2001 23:24:28 -0400 From: "Chris & Beena Cracknell" Subject: Re: Alloy: ta, and bad taste - ----- Original Message ----- > Most notably, the 'rap' by Thomas towards the > end of N.E.O. only shows up on the CD, and not on the video itself. Eep! That rap was actually one of my least favorite moments of the entire CD. ^_^; I'm sure it's just me, but I've found that something just sounds a little odd when white guys, particularily british white guys, rap. Crackers (DJ MC LMNOP from hell!!!!) CrAB - http://www.hwcn.org/~ad329/crab.html The Official Bira Bira Webpage - http://birabira.chaosmagic.com Ghastly's Ghastly Comic - http://ghastly.keenspace.com ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 29 Jun 2001 20:36:35 -0700 From: Robyn Moore Subject: Alloy: Ravivar Fiore Today I received the CD single of My Brain is Like a Sieve that I won off eBay. The cover picture is similar to the one on Retrospectacle with Thomas and the snake, only it's been processed with all the colour layers separated, to give it a 3D-ish effect (picture available at http://www.johnbirch.co.uk/page11.html). It's the CD5 version, which contains My Brain is Like a Sieve (Bill Bottrell single remix), My Brain is Like a Sieve (instrumental), and Ravivar Fiore (Thanks to Lazlo for the version indicators). I was wondering if anyone knew about the Ravivar Fiore track. It's an eerie little (1:16) piece, with a woman singing the lyric in a soprano voice. All I've been able to suss out so far is that it's in French, and the melody line is supposedly lifted from "Blueberry Pies" off the Steve McQueen album, which I've never heard. Does anyone know any of the following - Who sang it? What are the lyrics? Between the bells/xylophone in the music and her soprano voice, I can only just tell they're in French. What do they mean? My French is shaky at best, so I'm not up to translation even if I could make them out. Was it meant for anything else, or is it just a sweet that ended up on the single? Enquiring Minds Want To Know! Robyn M @ Robyn Moore @ http://www.wiccans.net/robyn.html @ You knew the job was dangerous when you took it. - S.C. ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 30 Jun 2001 01:08:12 -0400 From: "Robin Thurlow" Subject: Re: Alloy: ta, and bad taste - ----- Original Message ----- From: "Chris & Beena Cracknell" > Eep! > > That rap was actually one of my least favorite moments of the entire CD. > ^_^; Hmmm.. I actually really like that part in particular! > I'm sure it's just me, but I've found that something just sounds a little > odd when white guys, particularily british white guys, rap. To me, a rap only sound odd when the person is rapping about something that would obviously be foreign to them... experiences they wouldn't have had, like if Thomas had been rapping about growing up on the streets of Harlem. But hearing him go on about astronomical things sounds like poetry to me :) ! There's so much to do with poetry in this soundtrack. A pretty unusual touch for something revolving around synth and computer animation. It shows a real understanding of the theme of the movie, the central human spirit at the core of technology & evolution, and so on (at least as I understood it!) Even the forms the music takes reflect the evolution of music itself through the ages which I thought was a cool touch. I've always thought the film and the music worked very well together, but I must admit, though I've played the cd so many times the case has had to be replaced twice, I've only watched the film once, because I really don't like the computer animation of this era. It's much better these days though. Robin T just after watching "Ravenous"... ew. ------------------------------ End of alloy-digest V6 #167 ***************************