Tonight is the last Heroes — for a billion years. The writer’s strike is going to take all my shows off the air, forcing me to pay more attention to work, activism, and my family. Geez! I’m going to have to TALK to my family. I blame the Jews and the Republicans.Oh well, at least there’s still Howard Stern.
No shit! I’m jones’n for John and Steph en.
What’s with the filter? Can’t write out s t e p h e n? I can only imagine how THAT came about.
Dave
Kicking TV is like kicking religion – the other opium of the masses. You’ll feel better. One day at a time.
What,
Great point. While living overseas, my wife and I lived on the economy, so we didn’t get Armed Forces Network. Needless to say, once we turned off the TV, we found out we actually had lives
Yeah, without TV you’ll have all kinds of time to spare. Now you’ll be able to read twice as many blogs and make twice as many posts.
Haven’t owned a TV for 25 years. All our kids were raised without one in the house. One was so desperate, she saved up all her allowance and Christmas money and was all set to buy one of her own.
The main thing you miss is the cultural context. People who have all heard the same ad 500 times will make up a pun or something, expecting everyone to get it. That, or some catch phrase from a popular show will just go over my head.
There was a time that, whenever anyone heard that I didn’t have one, they would offer me the old B&W console that they no longer watched, what with there being several other colour ones in their house. Hasn’t happened for a while.
Used to put me in mind of drug addicts trying to make sure all their friends were users too. Or now that you mention it, religious proselytisers.
What DD said. It’ll be nice to have a break from the materialist oppression of weekly serial TV shows.
Except there’s always episode DVDs of shows I haven’t seen on NetFlix. Dammit.
Don’t get me wrong. I enjoy all the shows I watch. That, of course, is the problem. I enjoy other things too, but TV is the one that can’t be left sitting, lest you get a week behind.
Thanks, TiVo. Once upon a time, if you missed one of your favorite shows (and there were less channels and therefore less shows available to qualify as one), you missed it, sucked it up, got the details from friends, and tried to catch it next week. Then the VCR came, but you would frequently forget to put a tape in before you left the house for the evening. Now the only thing you have to worry about is deleting enough green shows to have an hour to scrounge on the disk.
i will take a drive in the country or a good book anytime over a tv show.
what do you prefer group activity or solitary pleasure?
Take heart Dave. There’s still the Victoria’s Secret Show tomorrow night.
What writer’s strike? We don’t have cable and I watch an old black and white TV with rabbit ears. We watch several selected shows a week and not any of the “reality” shows.
I’d as soon listen to a xtian preacher as H.Stern.
Festivus is upon us!
TV? What DD Dropout said about drug addicts is right on. I do at times feel a little outside of the massive cultural edifice of television. Its amazing to hear how much my friends and family talk about TV. What amazes me more is the fact that, though I haven’t regularly watched TV in over 10 years, they still seem shocked when I remind them of that fact. Its inconceivable to so many that I wouldn’t be plugged into the boob tube (not that the internet is much better).
The only reason the strike depresses me is because my brother is a strike captain. He and his wife are well established TV writers in Hollywood, but they are feeling the pinch, especially with a young daughter (my beautiful niece!) and the holidays upon us. Funny thing is, they aren’t shocked at all that I don’t watch TV.
I love TV. Seriously. There are a lot of good shows (and enjoyably crappy ones) out there. I can’t just sit and watch it though – gotta be doing something else at the same time, like practicing the guitar or writing.
Rusty
What kind of axe do you have? What style of music do you spend most of your practice time on? Curious fellow musician.
I can’t wait to cancel my Comcast and their rates are going up this month. Perfect timing.
Hey, Why don’t we all cancel our Comcast and cable subscriptions and maybe they’ll lower the prices!
TV is the key to being intellectually lazy.
I miss the old days of Adam Corolla on Loveline or on the Man Show! There’s just no reason to watch TV or listen to the radio anymore. …oh wait a second, still got weekly college football games though.
What
You probably know guitar buying is a disease, and while I’m not particularly afflicted, I have a few. Currently focusing on my recent Highway 1 Strat. Love it! As for styles, I play blues, jazz, rock – the usual American forms, I guess. :^)
What do you play?
Uh oh, fellow musicians.
I’ve been playing the guitar for about 10 years now, bass guitar for 5, and drums for a few months. I’ve been writing songs for as long as I’ve played the bass. I stick to rock and roll for the most part, though I wouldn’t know exactly how to categorize it (given that there are about a million different words we use to label music, silly humans).
I have a myspace page with 4 songs up now, have a listen:
http://tinyurl.com/2mbnm5
And if you want to criticize my music, I would be very grateful. It’s impossible to get decent opinions out of people when you’re asking about your own music. People are too afraid of hurting my feelings to tell me they don’t like my music, you folks should feel no obligation to act the same way.
alatham, that’s cool! I’ll check it out when I get on my other computer.
Rusty
I usually play my Heritage archtop but I sometimes bring out the Larivee acoustic or the Tele. Jazz and blues are what I stick to these days. Pop punk is something that I love to listen to but don’t play anymore since I am trying to protect my hearing.
Alatham
I like your tune “Semi Momentary Lapse”. It has real potential. My criticism would depend upon what your goal is. If you want to people to listen intently to this song I think it could use some arranging. The song, if I remember correctly, was of the form I A B A with I being an intro, A being a verse and B being a chorus. I would drop the music only intro and then do 4 bars of your la-la-la intro followed by a 2 bar music-only teaser that incorporates the musical elements of B. Then repeat A B A B and go out on some twangy full chord using your vibrato bar to lower the pitch drastically. Also more contrast between the melody in A and B would keep one’s interest. I would suggest a happier sounding melody to contrast with the darker sound of the music in B.
But that’s just me. Despite the suggestions I enjoyed listening to that tune. Thanks for sharing it.
For you theist trolls that continually come (unimpeded by comment deletion) here to fight vs. seeking to find out what we are all about, the above conversation is a perfect example as to what can happen when you don’t derail the thread.
See, when you mind your manners, so do we!
Thanks What,
You’re right about the A-B-A form of the song, though I wouldn’t call any of the sections a chorus. It’s more like a truncated sonata (without the extra C-A at the end).
You may well be right about the arrangement, but the song has been finished for so long that I have no intention of going back and editing it. But I will keep those suggestions in mind.
I’m glad you enjoyed it, it’s one of my favorites from my new record.