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Friday Random Ten with Contacts
Apr. 20th, 2007 10:09 amI had an eye exam this morning, early, to start the process of getting contact lenses. I didn't imagine I'd be walking away from the doctor, actually wearing lenses.
I'm almost 39, I've been wearing glasses as long as I can almost remember, and I've never seen clearly without them. I've never driven, shopped, or typed without them. Now I have and am. It's an oddity and a wonder. Everything looks so different.
I'm going to be walking around looking like I'm on some serious hallucinogens for a while -- I think the doctor and assistant were quite amused at my wonder; they said I looked like a little boy on Christmas day.
I feel like one.
On the bad, well, not-so-bad-but-not-great, side, the "slight" red/green colorblindness that was detected in me the last time I was checked for it (by my pediatrician, Dr. Hecklau, when I was pretty small) is indeed -- as Berit will be filled with smuggery over, I'm sure -- something more than slight now. Not that much (got that, Berit?), but, as the doctor said, "just a bit more than slight."
So from now on, when Berit and I are arguing if a gelled light is showing red or orange, she gets the final call.
I also have one grey and one blue contact (without prescription) to check and double check on which one I want to go with for the "Hamlet" colored lenses. Currently, I'm leaning to the grey.
So, a quick random ten; I have a dental appointment in 40 minutes:
1. "Ebony Affair" - Betty Wright & Timmy Thomas - Why Can't We Live Together - The Best of Timmy Thomas
Sweet soul music. Thomas writes oddly for the genre in some strange way I can't quite define - just a bit "off" of standard. So, a little more interesting than a lot of other soul.
2. "Sook Boo Ga Loo" - Bobby Rush - Soulin' vol. 4
And more soul. It's a groove morning.
Good song, but it's got that thing going where you name as many places in a song as possible, in an attempt to insure sales of and/or crowd reaction to the song in those places. There's got to be a pithy name for that little lyrical trick. I was trying to come up with one in the car yesterday after hearing one of these, and couldn't do it.
Oh, right, that wasn't the exact same kind, that was the bit where you name as many great bands or musicians in your own song to try and get a reaction by leeching off of them (eg; Arthur Conley's "Sweet Soul Music," which drives me nuts). Yesterday's song was Wayne County & The Backstreet Boys doing "Max's Kansas City," which names about every good punk band from '73-78 in it. I forgive it a bit from Wayne - it's just his (now, her) style . . .
3. "Leader of the Sect" - The Downliners Sect - The Definitive Downliners Sect: Singles As and Bs
Oh, ew. This is a 60s Brit blues/R&B band that never really got too big. Most of their stuff is quite good, but this is a "novelty" kind of number, not really based on "Leader of the Pack," but lyrically close and with a similar spoken intro (done, by these English kids, for some reason in overdone "Snagglepuss" voices, for crissakes!).
Short, though. They still play really well.
4. "Burning Burning" - The Bunnys - Sixties Japanese Garage Psych Sampler
Another great hard crazy Japanese garage-rock single. Hard fast and nasty, with oddly sweet vocals, then some vicious screaming.
5. "La Via Della Droga" - Goblin - Roma Violenta: La Cinevox Si Incazza
More groove, but from a bunch of Italians scoring a horror film or thriller, probably some time in the 70s. Classic track I'm not all that familiar with - similar to their scores for Argento and Romero, but a little funkier and able to work outside of being just for a film score. Great bass and guitar work.
6. "Stingaree" - Charlie Musselwhite - Alligator Records 25th Anniversary Collection
Good little blues. Just voice and guitar.
Which is nice. As good as it is that Alligator Records produced and released so many records for Bluesmen who had been forgotten (and screwed by the record industry in the past) through the 60s on, I find a lot of their recordings a little too produced and slick. This is clean, but not slick. There's a difference.
7. "Flower" - Liz Phair - Exile in Guyville
And speaking of unslick. At least soundwise.
Liz unpacks the dirty mouth in a great track from that first album that we all fell in love with, then forgot about, for the most part, a few years later.
The album is still great, and this track, which could sound incredibly forced in its sexual forthrightness, and doesn't, is still one of the highlights.
8. "Steppin' Out" - Paul Revere & The Raiders - Nuggets: Original Artyfacts from the First Psychedelic Era
"Hey Joey, it's a nugget if you dug it!" -- Lenny Kaye to Joey Ramone at one of Joey's birthday parties at Coney Island High right before Kaye and the house band played a medley of "Pushin' Too Hard" and "Jessie's Girl."
And here's a nugget and I do duggit.
Last night, though, I heard one of my favorite once-obscure songs, "Knock, Knock" by The Humane Society, used in a light beer commercial. That's . . . oh, god. I know it's because people like me are working in ad agencies now, but jesus, still . . . a light beer commercial!?
9. "Dance We Me, Henry" - Georgia Gibs - Back to the 50s 03
Silly 50s kitsch novelty music that I like having as a changeup in the iPod, and a reminder of what was going on in the actual hit parade as rock 'n' roll was rising out of the stew.
10. "Take It Off" - The Genteels - Las Vegas Grind!
And here's a chunky part of that stew. A nasty little instrumental from a band that doesn't live up to its name.
Okay, off to the dentist. Back later with cat pictures - I have more new ones.
I'm almost 39, I've been wearing glasses as long as I can almost remember, and I've never seen clearly without them. I've never driven, shopped, or typed without them. Now I have and am. It's an oddity and a wonder. Everything looks so different.
I'm going to be walking around looking like I'm on some serious hallucinogens for a while -- I think the doctor and assistant were quite amused at my wonder; they said I looked like a little boy on Christmas day.
I feel like one.
On the bad, well, not-so-bad-but-not-great, side, the "slight" red/green colorblindness that was detected in me the last time I was checked for it (by my pediatrician, Dr. Hecklau, when I was pretty small) is indeed -- as Berit will be filled with smuggery over, I'm sure -- something more than slight now. Not that much (got that, Berit?), but, as the doctor said, "just a bit more than slight."
So from now on, when Berit and I are arguing if a gelled light is showing red or orange, she gets the final call.
I also have one grey and one blue contact (without prescription) to check and double check on which one I want to go with for the "Hamlet" colored lenses. Currently, I'm leaning to the grey.
So, a quick random ten; I have a dental appointment in 40 minutes:
1. "Ebony Affair" - Betty Wright & Timmy Thomas - Why Can't We Live Together - The Best of Timmy Thomas
Sweet soul music. Thomas writes oddly for the genre in some strange way I can't quite define - just a bit "off" of standard. So, a little more interesting than a lot of other soul.
2. "Sook Boo Ga Loo" - Bobby Rush - Soulin' vol. 4
And more soul. It's a groove morning.
Good song, but it's got that thing going where you name as many places in a song as possible, in an attempt to insure sales of and/or crowd reaction to the song in those places. There's got to be a pithy name for that little lyrical trick. I was trying to come up with one in the car yesterday after hearing one of these, and couldn't do it.
Oh, right, that wasn't the exact same kind, that was the bit where you name as many great bands or musicians in your own song to try and get a reaction by leeching off of them (eg; Arthur Conley's "Sweet Soul Music," which drives me nuts). Yesterday's song was Wayne County & The Backstreet Boys doing "Max's Kansas City," which names about every good punk band from '73-78 in it. I forgive it a bit from Wayne - it's just his (now, her) style . . .
3. "Leader of the Sect" - The Downliners Sect - The Definitive Downliners Sect: Singles As and Bs
Oh, ew. This is a 60s Brit blues/R&B band that never really got too big. Most of their stuff is quite good, but this is a "novelty" kind of number, not really based on "Leader of the Pack," but lyrically close and with a similar spoken intro (done, by these English kids, for some reason in overdone "Snagglepuss" voices, for crissakes!).
Short, though. They still play really well.
4. "Burning Burning" - The Bunnys - Sixties Japanese Garage Psych Sampler
Another great hard crazy Japanese garage-rock single. Hard fast and nasty, with oddly sweet vocals, then some vicious screaming.
5. "La Via Della Droga" - Goblin - Roma Violenta: La Cinevox Si Incazza
More groove, but from a bunch of Italians scoring a horror film or thriller, probably some time in the 70s. Classic track I'm not all that familiar with - similar to their scores for Argento and Romero, but a little funkier and able to work outside of being just for a film score. Great bass and guitar work.
6. "Stingaree" - Charlie Musselwhite - Alligator Records 25th Anniversary Collection
Good little blues. Just voice and guitar.
Which is nice. As good as it is that Alligator Records produced and released so many records for Bluesmen who had been forgotten (and screwed by the record industry in the past) through the 60s on, I find a lot of their recordings a little too produced and slick. This is clean, but not slick. There's a difference.
7. "Flower" - Liz Phair - Exile in Guyville
And speaking of unslick. At least soundwise.
Liz unpacks the dirty mouth in a great track from that first album that we all fell in love with, then forgot about, for the most part, a few years later.
The album is still great, and this track, which could sound incredibly forced in its sexual forthrightness, and doesn't, is still one of the highlights.
8. "Steppin' Out" - Paul Revere & The Raiders - Nuggets: Original Artyfacts from the First Psychedelic Era
"Hey Joey, it's a nugget if you dug it!" -- Lenny Kaye to Joey Ramone at one of Joey's birthday parties at Coney Island High right before Kaye and the house band played a medley of "Pushin' Too Hard" and "Jessie's Girl."
And here's a nugget and I do duggit.
Last night, though, I heard one of my favorite once-obscure songs, "Knock, Knock" by The Humane Society, used in a light beer commercial. That's . . . oh, god. I know it's because people like me are working in ad agencies now, but jesus, still . . . a light beer commercial!?
9. "Dance We Me, Henry" - Georgia Gibs - Back to the 50s 03
Silly 50s kitsch novelty music that I like having as a changeup in the iPod, and a reminder of what was going on in the actual hit parade as rock 'n' roll was rising out of the stew.
10. "Take It Off" - The Genteels - Las Vegas Grind!
And here's a chunky part of that stew. A nasty little instrumental from a band that doesn't live up to its name.
Okay, off to the dentist. Back later with cat pictures - I have more new ones.
