Cogs can think.

I have been wanting to make this post for a while. Here is my list of best albums of various of my favourite groups. I’ll do it one band a post. This is the first one.

Garbage - “beatifulgarbage”

Garbage has always produced what is known as a ‘wall of sound’, mostly because three of the four band members are succesful producers (Butch Vig, the band’s drummer, has produced Nirvana’s “Nevermind” and The Smashing Pumpkins’ “Siamese Dream”), and hence know how to make well-produced studio material. What has always attracted me towards Garbage, besides the excellence of Shirley Manson, is the ‘whole-ness’ of the music; their music has so many layers, and so much depth, it is just astonoshing. There’s a new sound every second, and you’re never really bored. They are unique in this.

beautifulgarbage represented a drastic schism between the new and their previous two albums– a succesful schism, if you ask me. The album got raving criticisms, and it is widely acclaimed. Fans, on the other hand, were not happy with Garbage moving away from their rock roots– I liked it. A lot. However, the album is not easily consumable. It is difficult music, in a style nobody has ever used before.

The album, while critically acclaimed, produced little success on a single basis.

The key songs to download or listen to are:

Shut Your Mouth:

One of the most, if not the most powerful album opener ever put on record. Smashing dynamite rock, in the way only Garbage can do it. Key lyric:

We know your music but of course we’d never buy it / it’s too fake man / Right man! / we don’t give a fucking damn

Androgyny:

It’s all in the title, basically. A very electronic song, and the first single to be released off the album. In The Netherlands, it did fairly well, receiving some airplay. The song deals with what the title implies. A slightly odd video to match. Key lyric:

Boys in the girls’ room / girls in the men’s room / you free your mind in your androgyny

Cup Of Coffee / Drive You Home:

The best two love songs ever written. Cup Of Coffee is almost disturbing in how well Shirley Manson worded the loss of a love; in the song she describes how she stops answering friends’ calls, how she “give[s] herself to anyone who wants to take [her]home”. Disturbing.

Drive You Home, on the other hand, presents a Shirley who is trying to find out why her boyfriend still supports her after all the tings she’s done. also slightly disturbing (as are all Garbage’s ballads).

Key lyric from Cup Of Coffee:

It took a cup of coffee / to prove that you don’t love me

And from Drive You Home:

I never said I was perfect / but I can drive you home

Cherry Lips (Go Baby Go!):

A song dedicated to JT LeRoy. Just listen to it. You’ve never heard anything like this before.

Key lyric:

Whenever you came near the clouds would dissapear / because you looked just like a girl / your baby blues would flash / and suddenly a spell was cast

This reamins the One True Way to listen to music. I hooked my darling up today, I had not done that yet in my new house. I am now listening to one of the best albums ever made, American Pie, by the voice of the century, Don McLean.

Such musical greatness. Don McLean is truly exceptional. If today’s artists are only 1% of what he is, I’d be pleased.

I just saw “Contact” for the 3rd or 4th time. Besides the film being yet another example of the excellence of the always attractive and charming Jodie Foster, it also always makes me think.

You see, even though Contact is probably listed as a science fiction film, it actually is not. The film and the novel it is based on, is actually more of a religious story. During the whole story, science and religion are two opposing forces, one excluding the other. However, at the end, it becomes crystal clear that, contrary to what many extremist nutjobs on either side of the coin want you to believe, science and religion are actually not all that different.

In fact, they are one and the same.

And this is my true conviction as well. Religion, as is everything else in this world, is part of science; and science, like everything else, is part of religion. The moment someone states that god (lower-case ‘g’) exists, he or she makes a scientific statement; a thesis which, as do all theses, creates an antithesis (god does not exist). This very question is the same as, for instance, saying that wormholes exist.

Yet, were someone to write a scientific thesis on the existance of god, he or she’s be laughed at, not taken seriously, and sure as hell not be published. But, when you look at all this from a truly scientific point of view, why is that thesis less scientific than, say, a thesis argueing that wormholes exist? Why is the latter considered scientific, but the former is not?

I do not believe in a god (again, lower-case ‘g’). However, I also do not not believe in a god. There is no proof either way, hence, a true scientist cannot take a conclusive stance. Any scientist that does, is or a religious nutjob, or a bad scientist.

I just got the silliest Hyves invitation ever (Hyves is the Dutch equiv. of MySpace, or similar webtwodotohsocialnetworkingnonsense). In any case… As you all know, my name is Thom. Just, Thom. It’s not short for Thomas, or whatever. Thom, as a name, is pretty rare in The Netherlands, as 99.9% of the people who want to name their kid like me choose the common variant, which is Tom, without the ‘h’. Whenever I have to give out my name, I always have to stress it’s “Thom, with an ‘h’”.

And I just got an invitation to join a Hyves group for people named… Thom. The invite said:

Do you also feel alone because everyone else is named ‘Tom’? This group is for Thom’s only.

It reminded me of yet another priceless quote from Dead Like Me. It’s Georgia, wondering why people always try so hopelessly to become part of a group– any group. The quote is not literally, as I can’t locate the proper transcript.

Hey, do you have ten fingers? Yes! Cool, let’s make a club for people with ten fingers, and then, when we see someone with only nine fingers, we’re gonna beat the crap out of him!

Fcuking pathetic.

Now, all say, “thank you, Mr Bush!”

Let me state once and for all: yes, I believe know there is life outside of our planet; in whatever form that may be. Just do the math: our universe is believed to be infinite, this means that there is an infinite amount of galaxies, which together contain an infinite amount of stars, which in turn together are encircled by an infitie amount of planets, of which an infinite amount, therefore, can sustain life. It’s fairly simple mathematics (I mean, even I can understand it).

On the other hand, I know they do not come here to visit us. Besides a few redneck and/or sensationalist Americans people, there is no real proof they ever have.

Until I see about it in “Nature”, they have never set foot on this planet.

And lo and behold, Israel has broken the cease fire. I thought it’d be Hezbollah who would break it, as they got little to lose. I never thought Israel’d be as stupid as to break it, with the whole world watching. Then again, it is not as if that world will ever hold Israel accountable for its actions.

And now we’ll see Hezbollah retaliating, Israel will claim Hezbollah broke the cease fire, and all the mindless Americans will believe it, and after four weeks, nobody will remember who started what.

My internet died right after I got it last Tuesday; today, a mechanic of my ISP dropped by and after doing some measurements, the cause popped up: the wall plug where my the coax cable enters my house was severely broken. He replaced it, reset the able modem, and then everything worked again.

Anyway, I’m happy the cease fire in Lebanon is holding. All we can do now is hope that Hezbollah will finally be disarmed; but I’m not expecting it to be. At least it’s a good thing to see the Lebanese democratic government take over control of the south again, instead of Hezbollah– because, do not get me wrong, I despise them just as much as I despise the Israeli government; they both consist of murderers and killers. Hezbollah is completely different from the Palestinian organisations who are truly fighting an oppressor.

What intrigued me today was German Bundeskansler Andrea Merkel. She specifically said that it was unimaginable to have German troops be part of the stabilisation force, of course due to the 2nd World War. This makes total sense, and is completely understandable.

However, it got me thinking. What a powerful statement would it be to see the Israeli armed forces working together with German soldiers. Not only would it mean a lot for Israel, it would also mean a lot for present-day Germans, who still feel a misplaced guilt for the war, even though they have no relationship whatsoever with what happened.

Cooperation between the two countries on a military ground may herald in a new era, where the events of the 2nd World War no longer cloud the judgements made upon either Israel or Germany. But I ain’t holding my breath.

Ok, I already have internet! Seems like the calls I made did speed up the process… Nice! Now I’m all settled over here!

Here are some pictures of my new house!

Huisje

Jun 15, 2006 - 5 Photos