random thinks

I'm Diggin the Geeksta Rap!

OK, I admit it. I am a geek. Yep, I'll own that one. Anyone who has stuck around reading the miscellaneous mind droppings I've left here over the last year or so know that. Not a new story. Anyhow.

I ordered the "Geek Rhythms" CD from RLPK Records via CD Baby. See previous post on this: Geeksta' Rap.

4 songs on the CD, and 4 more that are scores for the first ones. Kinda smooth rap. Lot's of geeky rhymes and references: enthalpy, entropy, distillation, scalars, organic chemistry... and lots of Geeky Scientist references: Reynolds, Carnot, Prandtl, Newton, Bernoulli. I really like the beats as well.

Very fun stuff. I'll have to play it for my students.

CDBaby.com: More Great Customer Service

I ordered the "geeksta rap" cd last week Wednesday, and it showed up in the mail today. After the great customer service letter I rec'd later that night, I went back to the site and found another CD I wanted. It showed up in the mail today as well, along with a "surprise FREE CD". Very cool. They tell me I'll get another free CD with my next order. I really like these guys.

The disclaimer from the bottom of the invoice is good too:

Thanks for ordering from CD Baby! We want everything to go PERFECTLY. If your order was late, or wrong, or damaged in any way - or you're just having a bad day and want to unload on someone - feel free to contact us.

Nice of them to offer to let me unload on them. I may take them up on it.

Now That's Customer Service...

See post below. I ordered the CD from the geeksta rap guy via CDBaby.com. I received the order confirmation almost immediately, automated thing that it was, with a note saying that I'd hear from a real live human when the CD shipped. Imagine my surprise when I returned home from aerobics and dinner with friends to read the following in another email:

.

Your CD has been gently taken from our CD Baby shelves with
sterilized contamination-free gloves and placed onto a satin pillow.

A team of 50 employees inspected your CD and polished it to make sure
it was in the best possible condition before mailing.

Our packing specialist from Japan lit a candle and a hush fell over
the crowd as he put your CD into the finest gold-lined box that money
can buy.

We all had a wonderful celebration afterwards and the whole party
marched down the street to the post office where the entire town of
Portland waved 'Bon Voyage!' to your package, on its way to you, in
our private CD Baby jet on this day, Wednesday, February 9th.

I hope you had a wonderful time shopping at CD Baby. We sure did.
Your picture is on our wall as 'Customer of the Year'. We're all
exhausted but can't wait for you to come back to CDBABY.COM!!

Thank you once again,

Derek Sivers, president, CD Baby
the little CD store with the best new independent music

Now THAT my friends, is customer service. I'll have to be ordering from CDBaby again in the near future.

Geeksta' Rap

Randomly found this morning:

Rhyming engineer writing geeksta rap.

It seems that a chemical engineer decided to become a rap artist to express his love of the life of the mind. From the article:

It's all because of Rajeev Bajaj, a 39-year-old chemical engineer from Fremont, Calif., who is either going to become the def jammer of the science and technology domain or the poster boy for excruciatingly embarrassing nerdiness.

Trust me on this one. I know the heartbreak of "excruciatingly embarrassing nerdiness". Or so my friends like to tease me.

Check out the lyrics at: RLPK Records

From "Geek Dreams":

My education was tough;

Math chemistry physics

lot of it I got to do;

My brain has more muscles

than most dudes in gym do;

Oh yeah, I'll be ordering this CD, even if only to play for my "Digital Culture" class and to annoy my friends.

On the cover of the Rollin...U.S.A. Today?

(click)

OK, so I am horribly quoting a good old song. Sue me. I guess I should apologize for jumping on a bandwagon, but when I saw this on the cover of today's USA Today, I found it amusing and dumped $0.75 into the box for a copy.

The article is nice and fluffy, but interesting nonetheless: "In iPod America, legions in tune".

For the record, I have owned three different iPods (a 10GB 3rd gen, that now belongs to my nephew; a 40GB 4th gen that is at home charging, and the new 1GB iPod shuffle that is hanging around my neck as I write this), and love them. Of course, I am the target demographic: a tech geek, an Apple/Mac fan/user, and an "early adopter".

I have been playing around with other music formats (Ogg Vorbis recently) and looking at other players to see how they compare (most notably iRiver). I like the way that Vorbis sounds as good with smaller file sizes, but has little support with most mainstream players. The iRiver experiment was a failure: too expensive, too many features I did not need (does anyone who enjoys listening to music actually use an FM radio anymore?), and the interface between player and computer so inelegant as to be annoying.

So, for now, I hang the cute white stick around my neck, jack in a good pair of earphones, and smile as the music plays.

A propos of nothing...song running in my head

I've had this song running through my mind for the last day or so. I do not know why. I cannot decide if the song is sad, or hopeful, or resigned, or simply matter of fact.

"Tell Me on a Sunday"
-Andrew Lloyd Webber

Don't write a letter when you want to leave
Don't call me at 3 a.m. from a friend's apartment
I'd like to choose how I hear the news
Take me to a park that's covered with trees
Tell me on a Sunday please

Let me down easy
No big song and dance
No long faces, no long looks
No deep conversation
I know the way we should spend that day
Take me to a zoo that's got chimpanzees
Tell me on a Sunday please

Don't want to know who's to blame
It won't help knowing
Don't want to fight day and night
Bad enough you're going

Don't leave in silence with no word at all
Don't get drunk and slam the door
That's no way to end this
I know how I want you to say goodbye
Find a circus ring with a flying trapeze
Tell me on a Sunday please

Don't want to fight day and night
Bad enough you're going
Don't leave in silence with no word at all
Don't get drunk and slam the door
That's no way to end this
I know how I want you to say goodbye

Don't run off in the pouring rain
Don't call me as they call your plane
Take the hurt out of all the pain
Take me to a park that's covered with trees
Tell me on a Sunday please

Headbanging Inspired Playlist

(Click to enlarge) Inspired by Wednesday night's "Son of Glam" concert, I compiled a list of some of my favorite tunes from the "Hair Bands" of the 80's. While I am not so sure that Rush or Van Halen truly count for that designation, I put them in anyway. Black Sabbath is a bit of a precursor as well, but since the tribute band covered Ozzy, I put it in.

As I said, I was never really a headbanging type of guy, but I can still appreciate some of the anthems and power ballads these groups threw out there.

Oh yeah, and if you have not realized it already, the iTunes Music Store is like crack. This little lark cost me $12 for the dozen songs I did not have. Oh for the days of the Pepsi bottle cap promo...

Son of Glam Rocks the House

(Click to enlarge)
Son of Glam an 80's "hair band" tribute group was on campus last night for the entertainment of the college community. Billed as "the ultimate 80's hair band tribute", they played for over 90 minutes of headbanging fun.

While never a huge fan of this type of music, I heard it all the time on the radio during my high school and college days. Not to mention watching MTV back when they really played videos. I was more than a little surprised when I found myself singing along to all but three of the tunes they played. These guys were funny, and amazingly talented. The lead guitarist had some serious chops. You might say that copying others is no big deal, but this guy played the stuff straight as an arrow.

I made the comment last night that mimicing the lyrics was not too hard for the lead singer since most of the guys he was covering sounded like cats being strangled anyhow. I know, bad joke, and this guy was fun.

There were 6 of us older non-student-type folks sitting in the back, having at least as much fun as the students. I had more than a few memory flashbacks to high school and college prompted by the tunes of: AC/DC, Bon Jovi, Ratt, Metallica, Van Halen, Def Leppard, Guns 'N Roses, Poison, Quiet Riot, and Twisted Sister.

The group's song list is here. Check it out and see if the songs don't bring back at least a couple of lines of forgotten big hair music.

I have to admit, I am going to head into iTunes to see if I can put together a playlist of some of the stuff from last night. Or at least stuff inspired by what I heard last night.

Albums All The Way Through

After a bit of an exchange with Keith over at Word Shadows, I have realized that there are few albums of music that are great to listen to all the way through, without skipping a track. It seems these days, you get a few hits, and a lot of mediocre filler.

I have found a few over the years, but very few. Off the top of my head, here is my list. I'd like to find out what yours are. Greatest Hits compilations don't count.

"Graceland" by Paul Simon
"Goodbye Yellow Brick Road" by Elton John
"Marc Cohn" by Marc Cohn
"All That You Can't Leave Behind" by U2
"Unarmed Against the Dark" by The Feathermerchants

I am sure there are more, but I cannot think of them right now.

Music on the Brain

I was checking out the blogs on the blogroll this morning and saw that Keith over at Word Shadows did a piece on the music passing by his ears, which included a couple of songs I am very familiar with.

I have been putting my iPod to use more the last few days than I have in the months I have owned it. Music seems necessary right now, for some reason.

Here are the songs that seem to be getting all the airplay for me these days:

"Who's Gonna Ride Your Wild Horses" - U2
"Dyslexic Heart" - Paul Westerberg
"Let's Go Crazy" - Prince
"Hooked on a Feeling" - B.J. Thomas
"Clocks" - Coldplay
"Senior Service" - Elvis Costello and the Attractions
"Dance Without Sleeping" - Melissa Etheridge

What's on your iPod?