Music Programming for Radio 101

I'm starting to think I should change the description of this blog to "I write things about music" cause here goes another post that is music-related, as a rant that I've been pushing off for too long and that I hope is a bit more understandable than other things I've complained about in the past.

Today I would like to complain about some people's idea of good music programming. I am a very happy customer of the Satellite service called "Sirius" (which now merged with their former competitor "XM"). Satellite radio comes with a fee but it has the advantage of providing uninterrupted music based on themes with no commercials at all, straight to your car. Now I understand that at home I can have the same service for free with Pandora, Last.fm and other services, but Sirius-XM works in my car and as I drive long distances I don't have to be tuning into new radios, just pick a channel and enjoy the music (plus the radio I have allows me to pause and rewind if I want to, as well as alerts when my favorite bands are being played in other channels). Anyway, the service rocks BUT there is a big problem I have been having for a while.

For a whole year I was an avid listener of Sirius 29, the Punk Channel. It was all I ever wanted to hear, non-stop punk 24/7! Unfortunately they decided it didn't have enough audience and moved it to Sirius 28 "Radio Faction" which was a collection of hard-rock/new metal and hear this... HIP-HOP! Since they were restructuring the radios, and moving punk music into it, I figured it would be a hard-rock/metal/punk station which makes perfect sense, but for some reason, some fucking retard in the programming department still thinks it's a good idea to put rap/hip-hop between hard songs!! To illustrate why my anger towards that channel is increasing I would like you to experience what it feels like with this true case that happened last week.

Imagine you have been listening to rock & punk for a while (and I'm assuming you enjoy it) and right after you finish the following song (Critical Acclaim by Avenged Sevenfold)...




(I personally like it, but that's beyond the point)
... they go and play this (50 cent featuring Eminem!!) WTF!!!



To then jump to something "normal" again, "They Say" by "Scars on Broadway".



Every now and then they'll do something ridiculous like that, including other "artists" like Nelly, Snoop Dogg, La Coka Nostra, ... Rap/Hip-Hop artist that as much as I would normally ignore (by simply not listening to a station where they are played) I am forced to endure (for the few seconds before I switch to Lithium (Sirius 24, early 90s grunge/rock channel)...

Now the thing that I don't get is: Who has the sick perverted mind to think that it's a good transition to go straight from hard rock to gangsta rap!??! It makes absolutely no sense to me. if they went from metal, to rock, then to something like Linkin Park (even if I don't like them, I tolerate them), then maybe some beastie boys and then the stinking rap... That would make a little more sense, a gradual progression towards that style, but they do it with such disregard for successive styles that it boggles my mind.

It really makes me wonder if there's anyone in the hip-hop station (there are about 10 of them on Sirius) that will do the opposite and put something like Slipknot right between Eminen and Jay-Z, personally I doubt it...

The Joys of Music...

Here comes another music post, this time dealing with how great music can make anyone feel.

As a teacher, I tend to get the typical 10am look on students faces, aka "why the fuck did I stay up till 4am when I had to get up at 9am?". They are tired and you need to give them a good jolt to wake them up enough to get the class started and having them sort of listen to what I have to say. It is not an easy task by any possible measure but an important one nonetheless.

Now you might be wondering, why does this have to do with music? Did you plug your mp3 player with some speakers in class? NO. Better. The classroom I teach in 3 times a week happens to have an actual piano in it. And I don't mean no synthesizer, I mean an actual long tail piano right at the back of the room.

So I got into class a bit earlier than usual today, walked to the back, asked the students if they wanted to do some singing to wake up, and somebody asked for "Bohemian Rhapsody" right as I was about to start playing it. It's a coincidence with odds raised based on the fact that it's one of the 3 songs I know on the piano, plus a really popular one to sing in groups, so the effect was doubled when I started the song the second they finished calling it out.

The students were a little shy, so I started the first verse, and they all started singing along, all the way till the end of the first solo. I stopped before the breakdown because I had to start teaching (and because I don't know how to play it) but the effect was done. The class was all smiles, with applause included, and at least for the first 15 minutes of class they were more awake than they usually are.

And that my friends, is the joys of music...

European blood not good enough for americans?

So last week they were doing a blood drive at my work place, and as I was talking with some of the organizers, I learned that I would not qualify to donate blood even if I tried to because I had lived in Europe for over 5 years. Here's a copy paste from the rules:
You are not eligible to donate if:
[...]
You spent (visited or lived) a cumulative time of 5 years or more from January 1, 1980, to present, in any combination of country(ies) in Europe, including
[...]
- France
[...]
- Spain
[...]


Seeing how that's where I spent most of my life, I guess my blood is not good enough! At least I have a better excuse not to donate than "I hate needles"... The sad thing is that I actually wanted to help this time (for once).

You don't know you've been missing something until you try it...

Today I would like to write something on a VERY positive note, so don't expect any usual grumbling from an old man. I would like to talk about those things that you don't know are great until you try them and then realize that you've been missing out for a long time. The same as the first time you get laid (or at least first time you enjoy it, for those of you that might have had a bad first experience), the day you learn how to surf/snowboard, or even the day you meet someone that you can simply connect with effortlessly.

In this occasion I am talking about something I did not realize still existed in the world we live today: total respect, kindness and camaraderie among total strangers. In the society we live in, we have slowly devolved into individuals that think of our needs and rarely do little things like saying hello to a stranger on the streets. Try that on the streets and you'll get a wide variety of reactions, from a smile to a look of "why the fuck are you talking to me you prick?!". Maybe people just grew old of saying hi to strangers, maybe we're tired, or maybe there is just too many people. Fortunately, there is a small group that will still do such a small token of kindness: Motorcycle riders.

So I rented a motorcycle over the week-end and went riding on nice mountain roads for about 6 hours a day, and as much as the sensation of freedom you get from riding the bike is great, what really touched me, and made me want to write this long bla bla bla is the feeling of camaraderie you get among riders. I was told during my license classes how riders stand up for each other, and are generally happy kind people, but I didn't realize how far that statement goes. Every rider I saw while riding waved hi to me, and I quickly joined the ranks of those doing it. It is something as simple as extending your arm, or making some room on a lane for a new rider (me) to switch lanes without getting run over, or just generally asking how was the ride when you stop at the same places. But every single rider I crossed paths with (and there were a lot) was all smiles, showing a happiness you don't generally see on car drivers which spend more time cursing at each other (I'm the first to do so). It's like being part of a "secret" society where everyone is friends with each other for the simple reason of being on two wheels. It is something I am glad I found, and I realize now how much I missed that feeling.

Love Songs - Or, did all the Muses in the planet go to sleep?!

As I was in a car (as a passenger) on a four hour ride, the driver decided to turn on Sirius satellite radio on the "Love" channel. After many below-average songs, Jermaine Jackson started playing suggesting "Why don't you do what you do when you did what you did to me" as well as "Why don't you say what you say when you say what you said anymore" and it pretty much gave me a good reason to sit here and start typing a new music-related rant.

In the past I talked about my point of view on Music creation, leaving lyrics aside, and how many "musicians" take shortcuts to try to appeal to the public. This is even clearer when it comes to lyrics. Look, I am not by any means the greatest lyricist in the planet, and I have created horrendous lyrics like "My Fart is a good Fart", but there's a limit! It seems that in the realm of love songs, which in general I have nothing against, there's the understanding that the more stereotypes you write, the more "romantic" your song is, which really pisses me off. There seems to be an understanding among sub-par writers that the more you write the word "Love" in your song, the more it reflects that same thing. The worse in all of it is that there are tons and tons of people that seem to agree, which has me flabbergasted.

If I wrote a repetitive song that said "I love the loving love that I love for you my love" would that be considered a good lyric? I certainly hope not, but you'd be surprised. In my opinion you can write two kinds of songs: funny non-serious songs or serious songs. Funny songs don't take itself seriously and you can therefore write any nonsense you want since you are clearly showing that you do not thing it is a good song. Kings of this would be for example The Bloodhound Gang which have defined their own lyrics as "Something a 5th grader would write", Flight of The Conchords with songs such as "It's Business Time" or one of my favorite, Tenacious D with for example "Fuck her gently". I have even indulged in lyrics of this kind as previously stated with a flatulence tale, which was actually the first thing I ever wrote (I know, it's sad).

Either way, if you decide to veer away from the "Funny" lyrics, you go into the serious lyrics with a serious message. That message could be love, hate, revolutionary ideas, peace on earth, you name it! The only rule is that you express your TRUE feelings in whatever matter you are talking about. Now let us concentrate on Love songs since that is what we were talking about (and we gotta get back on track). Some people have written songs that can really reflect how someone might feel when they're in love, songs like Willie Nelson's "Always on my mind" is for a example a great song that shows how you can feel when you and your loved one part ways. Another good love song (in my humble opinion) would be "More than words" by Extreme, with a perfect reflection of the message I'm trying to convey: "What would you say if I took those words away. Then you couldn't make things new, just by saying 'I love you'".

These are just two examples of how you can make a powerful love message without falling in the stupidity of repeating the word "love" as many times as you can. I only wish more songwriters would step away from that shortcut and write meaningful lyrics, that really reflect how a person in love really feels. And for anyone that has been there, you know you don't walk around all day saying "I love being in love and I love the love in the loving world". There is much more to love than that, and that 4 letter word is definitely not enough to define it.

I leave you with one of the songs I mentioned above:

Fuck Her Gently - Tenacious D

Did you ever wonder how to explain reproduction to a kid?

Here's a classic of French comedy, inspired in a commercial where a dad asks his kid "what's with that bottle of milk" repeated times with no answers, eventually he asks the kid if he did his homework and the kid explains about the milk.

Translation is below the vid:

Kid: "Dad, how do you make babies?" x3

Kid: "Dad, what's that bottle of milk?"

Dad: "Well, (grabbing the bowl) this is your mom, (grabbing the milk) this is my dick...

And that's how you make babies. It's not complicated."

Voice-over: "And tomorrow you'll learn how diarrhea is made with Chocolate milk"

Holy Monkey!! By Le Chuck's BEARD!!!

This just made me one of the happiest geeks in the world!!!

Monkey Island is BAAAAAAAACK!!!

I have no idea how good it's going to be but I'm definitely gonna get it as soon as I get back home to a PC (stupid Macs)...

http://www.telltalegames.com/monkeyisland

The joys of flying or "Where the fuck is my luggage!!"

You ever wonder how can a suitcase be misplaced when you take a flight?

It is something that has always puzzled me and as I lay awake and my friend's place (5am CET), unable to sleep due to Jet Lag, and expecting a call from the Charles De Gaulle airport around 7am (in 2 hours) I figured I'd write about it.

So I took a flight yesterday, a DIRECT flight mind you, where I decided to check in one single tiny light suitcase, just so I wouldn't have to carry it around, given the fact that I broke my foot 2 weeks ago and I'm still recovering. After a 7 hour flight I land in Paris, wait for my suitcase and slowly see how people start leaving while I'm still there waiting like an idiot (along with 2 more groups of people). Why you ask? Because our suitcases never made it to that moving belt. We go to the baggage claim and they start trying to locate to suitcase, when it becomes clear that the suitcase is still at Newark airport. How the fuck is that possible?

Now correct me if I'm wrong but here is how I picture how baggage is handled when traveling from point A to point B:

- You check in your suitcase with the airline

- They put a tag on it that clearly says the destination (CDG in my case) and the flight number.

- The suitcase is then carried by people under the watchful eye of a bunch of employees that make sure the suitcase is routed to the proper luggage container

- Once the luggage container is filled up (new improvement that makes losing luggage much harder than in the old days when they would just manually load each suitcase in and out of the plane), they take them to the appropriate flight and load it in.

- On arrival they take the boxes out and take them to the belt where every suitcase is unloaded.

Now SOMEHOW, in this fairly straight forward process, a suitcase has the ability to decide it doesn't wanna go and stays somewhere in the airport. Is it from people twitering or blogging instead of loading it in? People being too lazy to take it? Boxes being filled up? I always wonder, especially how can they finish loading a plane, and not notice there's a bunch of suitcases left just sitting there until after the plane has landed in its destination and they realize they have to send it through a new flight.

Now I understand that when you transit through a bunch of airports you increase the risk of getting your luggage misplaced, as you add the problem of having people manually inspecting each bag of each flight checking to see if it has to stay or go somewhere else (with the added problem of routing it to the proper flight) but I still don't get how you misplace a suitcase going from A to B directly. It almost makes me wanna have to carry my luggage to the plane myself and have them load it in front of me, kinda like when you take a bus.

But I think the worse is when you read the paper they give you after you claim that you haven't received your suitcase. If you read it carefully, you'll notice you're allowed to ask for a refund of the items you had in there if the luggage has been "lost" for more than 5 days in a row. But here's the funny thing: you need original receipts for any item worth more than $100. Now who in hell travels around the world with receipts for their suits, their shoes, their GPS, or other possible things that you might put in a suitcase when traveling?! Sometimes it's things you have owned for years and years. I'm lucky that apparently they know where my suitcase is, and they seemed confident it would arrive the next morning, so I won't have to deal with it. But if my suitcase didn't make it to the plane the first time, will it make it the second?

I guess in a couple hours I'll be able to tell...

UPDATE:

So I call the phone number I was given yesterday, an automated response system asks me for my reference number, I type it in, and a pre-recorded voice tells me: "We are sorry but we have still not received your luggage. We will call you when we have more positive news."

Fucking great...

New UPDATE:

They finally found the suitcase (2 mornings later) and will be delivering it tonight...

Why Bother writing good songs!?

So as the one person that actually reads this stupid blog knows, I play music and I write my own songs, and I actually try to take the effort in writing different songs. But every now and then you end up realizing that what sounds good has been written over and over again. You can't have blues without the typical E-A-B progression nor rock without E-B-C-A (or any of its alterations). It's what I cordially call "the magic T" since you can play it with power-chords by simply moving your wrist and changing chords by following a pattern that looks like the letter T.

Either way, below my ranting is a really funny video that shows how many bands exploit this "shortcut" to make songs that are essentially the exact same thing with changes only in tempo, rhythm and lyrics. At least they used instruments...

My point is, if in the end the masses seem to only want to hear the same 4 chords over and over again in every song, why do people like myself bother trying to write more complex songs? Why explore new sounds? Why try to come up with meaningful lyrics when most pop songs just repeat the same 2 lines a gazillion times? Well that's because people like me are not into music for fame, fortune, chicks, drugs, booze, mtv, awards and any of that bullshit. We're in it for the love of music, we're in it to express ourselves, and just like human beings, you can't represent all your vast array of feelings with just 4 shades, there are nuances, there are different intensities, and it can all be portrayed with more evolved music. Unfortunately, most people listen and "like" what they are fed to like, but that's the problem that will always come up when corporations start trying to milk music as much as possible for profit.

So my advise to you, if you ever write music, write what your body tells you is right, not what a guy in a suit tells you will make money.

Enjoy the clip:

Is there anything more boring than chicken? (I guess Tofu)

There I said it. As I just finished eating a chicken breast I just came to face the fact that chicken is probably the most boring-tasting food in the planet, other than tofu.

Now don't get me wrong, I'm not talking about things like chicken curry with all of its spices, a nice roasted chicken with all of its juices from El Pollastre Alacantí. I'm not referring to a chicken Pad Thai, or even something like KFC. I mean chicken on its own. When I am going to go out of my way to eat some other formerly living creature, the minimum I would like to get is something that on its own can have flavor! When you eat a nice sirloin steak, duck, lamb or any of the many many other meats in the planet, it's an explosion of flavor in your mouth, even when you don't bother preparing a sauce for it, so why is chicken this boring? You ever wonder why we always say "it tastes like chicken!"!??!?! In my opinion it's just because chicken doesn't taste like anything, so you can always say anything else that can't be defined tastes like chicken. It's like saying something tastes like water, it's another way of saying "it has no taste".

So is there any more boring and tasteless source of proteins? You bet! It's called Tofu. Look I understand the point of Tofu if you're vegetarian, so you don't eat poor animals and still get your proteins intake. But for non-vegetarians, why eat a meat substitute when you can actually eat meat!! It literally has no taste, other than whatever sauce/soup you cook it in, it's like eating a silky sponge and I don't see the point!

Anyway, enough ranting... Beef ftw!

People in Long-Island want it to become a state...

WHAT A BUNCH OF MORONS!!!

The best is when they say "Canada is in Europe right".

http://www.hulu.com/watch/78029/the-daily-show-with-jon-stewart-long-island-wants-to-secede

Really make me wonder WTF they teach in Geography classes!

Why in the hell did I create a blog?

So that when I go visit my friends blog at unadireccionfacilderecordar.blogspot.com I don't get asked by blogspot to create an account...

- I do NOT plan to keep this updated

- I might come here and rant about something every now and then

- I still think blogs are stupid...