music and book update

got a few cds over the last couple of weeks…

• on – soluble words (epic)
• the clash – rockers galore (epic/legacy)

robb zipp gave me these a while back after the radio show.

• adult. – gimmie trouble (thrill jockey)

adult. continues to rock. not as good as anxiety always imo, but it still has some nice stuff on it.

• sbk, nikolai, dj dala – blueprint sessions, spring 2006 (indie)

i got this at a party i went to friday night. it was hosted and attended by people i work with, who work at the same place as me, or are related to those that do. plus a couple hundred other people. it was quite the shindy — beer, liquor, and probably a number of other mood- and mind-altering substances. i ate supper with brad and kelly at an italian restaurant, then brad and i dropped kelly off at her house and headed over to the party around midnight (on our motorcycles, of course). we left there sometime after 3am. i’m still well aware i’m not at all a partier.

• iron and wine – our endless numbered days
• bonnie “prince” billy – master and everyone

these two were given to me by groovehouse to check out.

• saxon shore – luck will not save us from a jackpot of nothing (burnt toast vinyl)

scott hatch included this with the black xxl burnt toast vinyl shirt he sent me. i’ve now finally got the entire order from him. but he did throw in this saxon shore cd and a the trouble with sweeney cd. scott’s a good guy.
i’m probably going to be making a purchase from ersatz audio here pretty soon. (the duo from adult. run ersatz audio.) also, i was looking around locally for albums by ms. john soda, veronica lipgloss, and some others, but had no luck. i guess i may have to mail-order them.
in book news, i finished reading upton sinclair’s the profits of religion last week. boy, he really had some harsh things to say. it was written in a conversational style, a lot of it dealing with events and goings on at the time he wrote the book – the late 1910’s. i thought it made some really good points about some of the hypocrisy and greed that has infected the church throughout much of history. of course, america — being a consumer oriented culture — has created a very different version than the historical roman catholic church. he obviously believed strongly in the value of science, but it was at times humorous because he was very confidently and harshly using the “facts” of science against religion…when the science has since been modified or almost completely changed. it was also kind of entertaining how enamored he was by socialism and how he was convinced it was going to take over america, considering how things played out historically. some of the references and such contemporary at the time were lost on me, and parts of it now feel like wasted energy since some of groups are gone or irrelevent these days, but overall it’s worth reading. yes, it’s obvious he has some animosity and perhaps a bit of a grudge, but honestly there are plenty of things the church has done and does that deserves an angry response. (especially when they try to couch it in spiritualism, or deny it.) there were some really nice quotes, but i didn’t mark up the book at all. perhaps i’ll have to skim it again sometime to pull some of the quotes out.