this great mystery called "life" isn't it? And I mean that in both directions. Sometimes, like myself lately, you might feel down, rock-bottom down actually, and then fate, or whatever you want to call it suddenly jolts you back up and you find yourself being happy again. Which does not last forever obviously, the fall back down always comes eventually, but it's nice to be reminded that it's usually followed by a ride back up. And well, ultimately everything evens itself out anyway. I have already discussed this though so I won't repeat that today. I am as usually writing completely at random and hoping that something interesting appears here so that I can meet the (almost-)weekly deadline I have set for myself. Deadlines are actually something I thoroughly despise and always try to somehow postpone or get around, making me somewhat pissed at myself for having set one here. But if I don't do this regularly I notice that it gets harder and harder to write creatively and even spell correctly, which impairs my ability to go on working on my novel that now already consists of almost 9000 words, and I am really eager to write as much as I can for it seeing as I really enjoy creating the protagonists life on the edge. Maybe I'll post a little sneak-preview of it here at some point to get your opinion on it and, well, to share it of course. But not today. I want to have a little more material to choose from prior to deciding what part of it to excerpt and feature here. So I will once again just stick to writing something that's hopefully entertaining for you guys. Or at least something that makes you think about things, but you all know the drill by now. Which leaves me at an impasse because I am not really thinking a whole lot at the moment, I am simply basking in the happiness that has suddenly been catapulted back into my life. I mean there is a lot going on, there's trouble brewing all around the world, which I know because I am now following every source of news imaginable on Twitter and installed two News-apps on my smartphone. That idea came to me, as you can probably imagine, whilst reading a Hunter S. Thompson book. And also because I have lately been feeling like I should work towards a profession where I would actually make money with my writing, in whatever form that may be.
And according to "wordcounter.net" the above introductory paragraph was exactly 420 words long. Isn't that awesome? I mean that that just randomly happened so close to 4/20 is just fucking amazing. It actually made me smile just now. But anyway, there will be another post around that day concerning itself with mankind's favorite plant. Probably. Today however I will be ranting about something that has drawn my into a vicious circle of being pissed about it over and over again. That something is namely my inability to write lately. And by that I don't mean that I'm suffering from "Writers block" or something similar, no I mean that I do not have the fucking time. My social circle here has expanded beyond my wildest dreams meaning that if I'm not at university I am somewhere else hanging with friends or spending time with my girlfriend, both of which lead to me being home late and exhausted, ergo unable to produce as much as a god damned predicate. Which just saddens me because I would love to spend as much time on creating sentences and paragraphs as possible. But alas, reality and its many responsibilities are always lurking behind the next corner, ambushing me whenever they see fit, and thereby preventing any kind of creative process from happening. Even now I am very limited in my time, hastily typing these words on my smartphone whilst waiting at my institution for higher education for an exam to finish so that I can go home. Not alone though mind you, which means that this entry will not be continued until late afternoon today or worst-case scenario even tomorrow morning. That would be terrible, especially after announcing this post to be appearing "within the next few days" on Facebook. What a blunt error on my part. Making promises that will probably not be holdable after all. I am however trying my best to hold them, which is why I am using these few minutes of spare time to write this.
Being a highly social animal it is getting increasingly hard to find such moments of tranquility though. It's not only my misanthropic side speaking here; I genuinely believe that albeit longing for social recognition and interaction even us humans need a fucking break for one another from time to time. By which I do not want to demean the value of any time spent with people close to myself. Or complain about the amount of time that was spent. All I am saying is that it is essential for people to be by themselves occasionally, especially when creating art of any kind or when dealing with emotional extremes. In latter case having others around may be helpful to some, I agree, but personally I would much rather discharge myself emotionally on my own prior to talking to others and sharing my feelings. But maybe that's just me.
Hm. The above paragraph derailed kind of quickly from "inability to write" to "breaks from social interaction". Well I guess the topics are pretty heavily interlinked after all as outlined above. If there were more of those breaks my ability to write would 'rise' again. But then again social interaction is mostly not as bad as it used to be for me. Of course there are lots of things I still find insanely annoying about it that make me want to quit society and live on a small island on my own, but all in all it's gotten better I think. Although I have to admit that my perception of the world is once again tainted in rose by the recent uplift that fate (or whatever) has given my life, meaning that that might also be the reason for me thinking that interacting with humans is not as bad as usually lately. Which is not negative per se, but just something to keep in mind whilst reading this. I was in an entirely different mood when I wrote the last entry for example. Which is pretty obvious actually. But well, as the title suggests that's how life goes. And isn't it fucking annoying that I keep coming to that conclusion? I mean, I feel like a broken CD-player repeating the same old track over and over again. And also the reason I feel fucking trapped in an ever-repeating cycle. Don't get me wrong, I am more than happy with everything at the moment. But still. There is a relentless little nagging voice inside of my brain that's enticing me to somehow try and break free from the ups-and-downs of life. If that's even possible; and I highly doubt that to be honest. It's like Karma - something you can not escape. And whilst you know me enough by now to know that I am not spiritual or religious in any way, I do believe the underlying concept of Karma to be applicable to everyday life. If you behave decently and well towards others, eventually good will come to you in some form. And well, the opposite applies too: if you behave like an asshole you'll ultimately be punished for your wicked ways in some way. And albeit having to admit that there are enough cases where this does not seem to apply, I still believe the idea of Karma to hold some truth. All the times I have behaved like an utter jerk or have hurt people it has turned around to bite me in the ass in one way or another. And whilst not every time I behaved decently has been rewarded in some way, it still is true that it does not only make you feel better about yourself but also increases the likelihood of good things coming your way. At least that's how I have experienced it so far. Mostly. There are of course also examples of times where good deeds have been completely unrequited and even led to disastrous consequences for me. In retrospect even these times have been evened out by other positive experiences that can somehow also be traced back to aforementioned consequences, so the overall concept of Karma still applies. And somehow I find solace in that fact. Because you see so many people acting like the world revolves around them, and it's just so great to 'know' that these assholes will eventually have some sort of huge "down" within their lives because of that behavior. Know is in parentheses because you can not possibly be sure of a thing like that. But at least I like to think that it is that way, and that gives me some sort of comfort when dealing with those kind of assholes.
Anyway. I am really lacking creative capabilities today. I feel somewhat drained lately. I am probably just too happy to write. Or maybe I am just lazy as fuck and am using that as an excuse for myself. Which is actually not uncommon at all; if there is a possibility to blame unproductive behavior on anything but ourselves, us humans are extremely quick to do so. And understandably so. I mean, it's easy to face being too lazy to do things you're not interested in, but when it comes to things you would actually want to do but for some reason feel unable to complete them it's a whole other story. Because, well, you want to finish these activities and reach the goals you set for yourself. And the feeling of inability that hinders the progress towards it may just stem from laziness. A laziness that is not necessarily bad though, because your inner batteries need recharging once in a while and those periods of non-productivity may lead to just that. It only becomes problematic when the non-productive periods outweigh the productive ones. And I don't necessarily mean outweigh in temporal terms. The productive periods can be a lot shorter than the non-productive ones. Some people just work better when they cram their creative span into a few frenzied days between weeks of not doing anything. Which is a perfectly valid way of working, as long as the fruits said productivity yields are big enough. Which is very subjective of course, and entirely depends on your own perception of things. For some that may be a few hundred words, for others a few hundred pages; if you're writing that is obviously. But it applies to any kind of creative process. I myself usually try to just write a little at least every other day because otherwise I lose my flow so to say and have a harder time getting stuff done the way I would want to. Which is also yet another reason this post took such a long time to be completed actually. 11 days for an entry to appear. That's a little longer than almost-weekly, but still roughly fits the scheme. Plus I doubt that anyone is really going to complain about it.
But I am getting tired. And well, as outlined above I really think that I have exhausted my creative potential for the next couple of days, and seeing as I really need and want to continue working on my novel, I will need to be creatively active again quite soon, so I am putting a stop to this moderately interesting but hopefully still to some degree enjoyable entry, and as always leaving you with some good music to unwind:
Astronaut - Quantum (Spag Heddy Remix)
-> This is one of the songs that could probably literally make me cum. It is such an epic fucking remix of an already awesomely melodic song, and the build up to the raw drop that still manages to remain melodic throughout and thereby not destroying the charm of the original but adding a raw bite to it so to say, that makes this entire song such a perfect musical creating, so... Enjoy!
Spag Heddy - Pink Koeks
-> Well after just featuring the remix above I felt enticed to research some more songs of this guy, and stumbled upon this gem, which besides being completely fucking sick and awesome also makes me happy somehow, maybe it's the melody, I don't know, but hearing this track makes me smile, and well it's just an amazing tune, I am really liking this artist and will surely have more of his works here in later posts, so... Enjoy!
Annihilator - Alison Hell
-> This song is, as you can see at the start of the video based on a true story of a little girl who slowly fell into the depths of insanity, starting with a simple fear of boogey man. Well, besides from these sick guitar riffs that far surpass many modern-day guitarists wildest dreams, this song is extremely deep and reflects the development of Alison's mental deterioration frighteningly well. All in all a great classic, so... Enjoy!
Iron Maiden - Brave New World
-> Although I have a certain aversion to the great Huxley novel of the same name because I was forced to deal with it in English class, it holds a great truth about what humanity's heading to, and well this song somewhat touches on that theme as well, there's lots of social criticism in there, and it's just an overall beautifully sad song that most definitely needed featuring here, so... Enjoy!
Andre Nickatina & San Quinn - Ayo for Yayo
-> While I know neither of these artists' other songs or even background or anything at all actually, I do know how much I enjoy this song, and how fucking awesome it simply is. And of course a warning about the dangers of cocaine addiction. But that shouldn't be a nuisance, it's still a fucking great song, the beat is really chill and the guys flow fits so amazingly with it, making it an all in all awesome tune, so... Enjoy!
DMX - Where The Hood At
-> Whilst being pretty homophobic, which is not unusual in Rap, this is still a fine-ass piece of rap music right here. D to the M to the X. I mean, you all know this song, and there is not much more I can really say. Great classic tune, so... Enjoy!
Well, this did not turn out as one of my best posts to be honest, and I do apologize for the slight lack of quality which occurred because of reasons outlined above. I will do my best to compensate for this with my next post though, and will also try and post within the next seven days instead of eleven this time. But anyway, I hope this entry was still enjoyable to you, and wish you a good night, or day, depending on which part of the world you're reading this from.
Peace!
About Me
- Finley
- I am an aspiring freelance journalist, blogger, and writer. I mostly write opinion pieces about society, politics, music, and philosophy. If you're looking for any freelance work in that area, make sure to contact me via e-mail.
Showing posts with label assholes. Show all posts
Showing posts with label assholes. Show all posts
Thursday, April 17, 2014
It's like a rollercoaster-ride
Labels:
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Wednesday, March 26, 2014
I feel stupid
for not having realized earlier that I can also change the font of my blog posts' text, so now that I have I will compose all posts from here on using my favorite font "Courier New".
There are multiple reasons for my fondness of this font: first and foremost it is because it looks like a typewriter, which is something I really enjoy, it has a classic time-less appeal that speaks to me on an artistic and aesthetic level; secondly my mum had an old typewriter on which I'd write the occasional nonsense as a child, but unfortunately it was destroyed in a fire that burned most of my parents' and my old stuff that had been put into a storage container when we moved to China in '07, enhancing my emotional connection to this font; and finally the Hunter S. Thompson book collection I am currently reading is written entirely in this style, and as you know I idolize the guy, making this font the only appropriate choice for me to use for my blog.
I have to say that lately I am even more compelled to write than usually, seeing as I am receiving loads of positive feedback in real life recently, which is definitely a nice motivator for me to continue working on my posts. Not that I wouldn't have done that would I have gotten no or even negative feedback. But it's still nice to feel a certain sense of recognition, that people are actually impressed with what I have to say. It warms the cockles as it were. Actually, I am still seriously contemplating writing a book, or maybe try to get an unpaid columnist position somewhere, and aforementioned feedback makes these ambitions thrive like well-planted seeds being tended to by an attentive and loving farmer. Knowing myself I might be too lazy to actually get started though. I mean a book. That's a lot more pages to fill than my blog requires me to. It would still be nice to produce something in print however. Or maybe these are just day dreams that I will give up again at some point soon. I will let you know albeit most of you probably not caring.
But if I were to actually write a book, it would most definitely not be fiction per se. I can't imagine myself imagining a whole new world and stuff, that would not be something I would terribly enjoy either I think. I'd more write like my own personal manifesto on everything that I consider to be wrong with this world, or perhaps an opinionated analysis of society through the eyes of a third-person narrator. Or just a series of cynical essays that will resemble my blog posts. Or not even go the extra mile to create new material and just compile my posts into a book. But I don't know about any of that for now.
For now, I'll just stick to writing this blog and entertaining you guys. Or offending or boring or whatever your sentiments towards my little slices of the great ham that is the art of writing are.
Meh, the ham analogy doesn't really work for writing,does it? More for like, a butcher. But you get what I mean, my few little ramblings here are hardly more to the writing community and its history than ants are to us or we are to the universe. Just a tiny almost non-existent piece of the whole, whatever that happens to be.
But I am getting off track here, I am in no mood and way too sober to start discussing the meaninglessness of life compared to the entirety of the universe, or discuss the individuals worth in a high-speed world that is rushing to anonymity and conformity. No way, not today, not without getting seriously fucked up first, these are no topics for sobriety, period.
I am not even sure why I am already writing any of this, my next post is not due for another week or so. But I am too lazy to change the DVD, I have seen the menu animation of "Final Destination 2" for what feels like the millionth time already, and am too bored with the movie to watch it again, meaning that I am stuck sitting here, with essentially writing as the only thing to do apart from the usual pastimes of the Internet of which I'm growing more and more weary seeing as they are a relentless repetition of semi-comedic material about as meaningful as a dog turd on the sidewalk. Yet I still fully indulge in them as soon as a flicker of boredom comes up. And it's not even like I don't have anything else to do, I am sure that if I looked into it I would find lots of things in need of completion for my studies. I could also start writing lyrics again. Instead I am sitting here, looking at this sterile screen in front of me wishing I was writing on an actual typewriter instead of just in a font that looks like one, and slowly drowning in a sea of pointless words and formulations, fading away into the illusion of contributing to the prevalence of common sense simply by writing about it. Or maybe it's not an illusion after all, maybe there are actually people being reinforced in their own use of common sense and decency in a world where these virtues are so quickly lost and replaced by shallowness and egoistically biased judgement.
It is so easy, almost encouraged to behave like an asshole nowadays; it's unnerving! I can not understand these people. Well that is not entirely true. I can comprehend why someone would behave that way. Personal gain is a powerful motivator that often overlooks humanity and compassion. I have been there as well, the opportunities to throw someone under the bus in order to get something out of it are almost omnipresent. But I have rarely acted on it, and if I did I either felt like shit because of it or had very good reasons to do so. Either way, I have seen it far too often that people do not only act insidiously out of impulse and circumstance, but rather actively seek opportunities to deceive, manipulate, and use others, and when these opportunities are found exploit them like there's no tomorrow. And honestly, this saddens me. I mean it's not like I haven't learned to recognize these bastards from a mile away and avoid them like hell, it's not like this a completely new phenomena to me or in general, but still I feel like a little part of me dies every time I hear about or see that kind of behavior.
The reason for this is mainly that in my mind, and those of many others, it is so easy to behave decently. Respect those that respect you, and those who show disrespect or insult you you ignore or avoid. I am not saying you should "turn the other cheek" either though, don't get me wrong, some people simply need an ass-whooping from time to time. But this senseless negativity, this back-stabbing, this pointless hatred that some exhibit are simply not understandable to me. Live and let live for Christs' sake, it's not that fucking hard, is it?
And the most surprising thing to me is that everywhere I go the people surrounding me mostly fully agree with me on this, but still I see mankind behaving like goddamn retarded assholes not even remotely trying to just leave others be and worry about their own issues. Why do these lunatics think that they're solving anything or making life better for themselves when they so clearly are not? This has to be some sort of mental health issue, there is no other reasonable explanation that comes to mind. Or maybe my non-egoistic way of thinking is a symptom of mental deterioration after all, and all those I consider to be assholes are the healthy ones. But then again, this could all just be the dream of some over-sized mongrel that ends the second the beast wakes up from the sound of its own farts, so I don't see any point in speculating beyond my observational sphere on this, meaning that I will stick to my original utterance: Most people are egoistic assholes with a mental condition, and those that recognize this trend in their surroundings as well are a dying breed of decent humans, just like I like to think I am.
But essentially, it's egregious to assume anything based on one's perception of oneself, because it can not be anything but heavily biased, usually towards, but sometimes even against oneself.
This bias in inherent to our nature and is not something to be ashamed, but just something to be aware of. It is possible to assess your own works' worth, but you need to realize that you're looking through tainted glasses when doing so, and adjust your self-assessment accordingly, which is a skill that develops over time. As the years go by you and what you create will be submitted to tons of judgements by various kinds of people, and you will see how and to what degree that varies from your own perception, which will in turn allow you to adapt your own appraisal of what you did to that of your audience, which is usually more accurate simply because it's a stew of many opinions from people who may not even know you instead of just your own. I can not emphasize enough that this does not mean to let yourself be influenced by others' opinions in your doing though, remember that most people are assholes that don't know what they're talking about at all, but don't forget that there are honest souls out there as well either; meaning that singular negative feedback from idiots should not get you down, but neither should singular praises from idiots lift you up, both would be fallacious feelings and lead to you not working the way you would want to, ultimately resulting in depression and failure, because you'll either produce good work thinking you're producing crap or vice-versa, ergo not being as productive as you would probably want to be. But vis-à-vis the aggressively mediocre taste of humanity nowadays actually being productive is of no value to the entertainment industry; pandering to the lowest common denominator amongst today's brainwashed TV-addicts however, is. Not that I haven't talked about this what feels like a million times already, but still it is true, be it in music, film, or writing that the corporate giants are turning true creative output into a cheesy, slimy mass properly cut into easily digestible pieces ready to be served to the brain-dead masses, thinly disguised as valuable nutrition for the mind.
And of course, the driving force behind it is money. But despite us all realizing this we're not only condoning this behavior, we're even endorsing it by showing these corporations that it's easily possible to make billions of dollars off of untalented, crappy musicians simply because we, or some assholes among us, are buying into their shit! But this has already been discussed at length in one of my earlier "Food For Thought" segments, and I will not subject you to this torturous discussion once again, and am myself in no mood to get all aggro about this now. So, let's just keep in mind that money makes good music go bad, and that it's the corporations', "the man's" fault combined with our inability to resist their bullshit lies and propaganda. And I am using the word 'propaganda' explicitly because of its tremendous historic meaning, because I think that planting an ideology in people's brains is no more or less worse than using similar schemes to push bad, commercialized music, films, or books onto unsuspecting audiences, and thereby thoroughly ruining the essence of these arts, essentially ruining the artistic side of these arts. Of course the repercussions of selling crappy art are not as easily visible or as shocking as those of indoctrinating an entire nation with an ideology, but are not to be underestimated nevertheless.
I mean think about the entertainment that will be here 20, 30, or even 50 years from now considering its development from the late 70's until the first decade of this century. Do you begin to see what I mean? We've gone from "The Great Shark Hunt" to "50 Shades of Grey"; from "Master of Puppets" to "Wrecking Ball"; and from "Pulp Fiction" to "Titanic" and "He's just not that into you". Mind you that I'm not trying to undermine the fact that there are indeed great artistic creations of this decade that managed to restore enough of my faith in humanity as to not jump off a bridge, but they're not as prevalent anymore, they're being reduced to the tiniest of niche. The big stars of the past were those that had actual worth, be it musically, artistically, or linguistically. Even those that sucked were better than today's "Top 50" or equivalent rankings, and that is just a sad sign of deterioration within the humans' understanding of the arts. And if we allow this rotting to continue, we will ultimately end up with horrific corporate industries managing an artists' every thought to make sure it is sell-able, and otherwise force-ably dismissing it. Oh wait, that's not a prediction at all, that's what's happening right now, but this seems to be the most extreme perversion of artistic integrity that I can come up with on my own. But well, in a few years I will surely be proven by one of the large entertainment industries that I just lack imagination, they'll find a way to making sell-outs even worse, I guarantee. And isn't it just sad that I can already predict that now with a fairly high amount of certainty? But that's the nice thing about it being only a prediction - it may or may not come true, and I certainly hope it doesn't, although I have to say that given the developments of the past decade I'm pessimistic about it.
Anyhow. This topic has been rehashed so many times in so many different ways already that my little take on it here should suffice considering I have myself already dealt with it before on this very blog, but not on the meta-level that I have elevated the theme to here encompassing essentially all forms of art.
Well, looking back on the text so far, I have to say that I am currently quite fond of dealing with multiple topics in one post, individually brief or long. Which was not a conscious decision, but rather just happened in the course of my writing. Maybe you have noticed it too, maybe I'm just imagining it, I don't know. But should you have noticed it, let me know if you like it or if you prefer mono-topical posts. Because I myself am usually drifting through thoughts and ideas whilst writing these posts, and am not really following a clear structure or trying to make a main point, but rather series of small points that add up to a nice, almost-weekly dose of 'wisdom'. I use quotation marks here because I am ambivalent when it comes to defining my ramblings as actual wisdom. To some extent I obviously consider them to be, hence the title of my Blog, but still I can not shake the feeling of sounding like an asshole with overblown ego wanting to impose his own opinions onto other people by declaring them to be wisdom. But as indicated before, I do think that there are things to take away from these posts. I just do not want them to be taken as being what they are, I want you to question every syllable I utter so as to form your own notion of the topics dealt with here. Hence my ambivalence towards the use of the word 'wisdom' as a description of my literary productions. But I still firmly stand behind this Blogs title, especially considering that it just has a nice ring to it, and that it does describe what I want you to attain by reading and thinking about the themes dealt with in these posts. Yes, you heard that right, I want to you to gain a feeling of "music and personal wisdom" within your daily life, I want you to subject yourself to philosophical lines of thought each and every day, preferably whilst listening to good music. But I know that you won't do this anyway, I mean neither do I to be honest. It is a nice thought though isn't it? To actually sit down with some nice writings on philosophy, drinking a cup of hot chocolate, and listening to some good old classic Rock. But it rarely happens that people actually do that nowadays, unfortunately. Even reading in general seems to be declining. Well at least when it comes to actual books that is. At least when it comes to my generation. Or, well, parts of it, I'm not someone to bash an entire decade of people, but it does feel like with every passing aeon less and less brain-mass is being passed on to offspring, slowly turning them into brainless zombie-like creatures more resembling primal beasts than fully developed homo sapiens sapiens. As part of the generation "Y" as sociologists put it, a lot of people may think that I am too young to be making these kind of calls, but to be honest I kind of doubt that using your brain to recognize patterns of mental degradation around you has an age-restriction. But it all seems to come down to this anyway. Every single one of my blog posts, and every line of thought I think. Maybe it's just me being a cynical asshole as always, maybe it's just me being condescending to way too many a soul. But I doubt it. Unfortunately.
Well, once again, a post that resulted in me criticizing society or rather developments within society caused by itself. But you all knew that that was going to happen, and so did I. Still, I do think that this beast of a post holds a lot of vital points I have not made at any point before, and should all in all be a long but entertaining read. Or at least that's the underlying intention, and I hope that I succeeded. Well, this concludes this 3000-word result of three days of typing, and here is some good music:
Led Zeppelin - Immigrant Song
-> Great Band, great track, and I love to play this introductory riff on my guitar, it was such a great day when my guitar tutor taught me how, and yeah Led Zeppelin needs featuring here and will be quite a few more times in the future... Enjoy!
Dub FX - Society Gates
-> I have definitely had a Dub FX song on here before, but I am almost entirely sure that it was "Fly with me". Well, whereas "Fly with me" is rather psychedelic and elicits a feeling of drug-use in me, "society gates" is a nice piece about society and the norms it forces its inhabitants to conform to, which fits nicely into the final paragraphs of this post, so... Enjoy!
Twisted Sister - The Price
-> Well I had Twisted Sister on here before as well, but definitely not this song and needed featuring here! It's an epically beautiful tune that holds many truths on many levels, and is musically great as well, so... Enjoy!
Black Eyed Peas - Joints & Jam
-> "A chick-a-doom, a chick-a-doom chick-a-doom doom" - The Black Eyed Peas were so great back in the days, what the hell happened to them? I mean yeah, money and corporations, but can they really delude a band's essence this much? Apparently they can. But anyway, great track, funny video, so... Enjoy!
Twofold - All Around
-> UKF does not disappoint, this is an epic song by Twofold, an artist I've seen a couple of times on the UKF Dubstep Channel lately which is usually a good sign, and this guy definitely deserves the spot on this 'exclusive' playlist that is UKF; amazing song, so... Enjoy!
50 Cent - I'll Whip Ya Head Boy
-> Upon re-watching "Get Rich Or Die Tryin'" a couple of times these past months I decided to include this great song that a friend of mine used as introductory music for his boxing match. I've never been the biggest 50 fan to be honest, but I've always liked his tracks and this one is definitely awesome, and you will see a few others of his works on here at some point, so... Enjoy!
At Vance - Vivaldi Four Seasons (Summer)
-> This is a great metal interpretation of the Summer-part of the Vivaldi's Four Seasons by the German band "At Vance", whose music I've been enjoying for about 4 or 5 years now. I had to include this amazingly crafted piece of music here at some point so might as well do it now, bring a little bit of sunshine into the darkness as it were. Anyway, this is an awesome interpretation of a classic piece, so... Enjoy!
Well, this post turned out to be a real beast of over 3000 words of ramblings, that I hope are enjoyable to you. I have addressed multiple topics in various lengths, but I think I managed to keep it all revolving around somewhat of a red line throughout the erratically uttered thoughts.
But anyway, creating this entry took a few days, and now it's again midnight soon, so I'll go to sleep and let you enjoy this literary creation of mine.
Peace!
There are multiple reasons for my fondness of this font: first and foremost it is because it looks like a typewriter, which is something I really enjoy, it has a classic time-less appeal that speaks to me on an artistic and aesthetic level; secondly my mum had an old typewriter on which I'd write the occasional nonsense as a child, but unfortunately it was destroyed in a fire that burned most of my parents' and my old stuff that had been put into a storage container when we moved to China in '07, enhancing my emotional connection to this font; and finally the Hunter S. Thompson book collection I am currently reading is written entirely in this style, and as you know I idolize the guy, making this font the only appropriate choice for me to use for my blog.
I have to say that lately I am even more compelled to write than usually, seeing as I am receiving loads of positive feedback in real life recently, which is definitely a nice motivator for me to continue working on my posts. Not that I wouldn't have done that would I have gotten no or even negative feedback. But it's still nice to feel a certain sense of recognition, that people are actually impressed with what I have to say. It warms the cockles as it were. Actually, I am still seriously contemplating writing a book, or maybe try to get an unpaid columnist position somewhere, and aforementioned feedback makes these ambitions thrive like well-planted seeds being tended to by an attentive and loving farmer. Knowing myself I might be too lazy to actually get started though. I mean a book. That's a lot more pages to fill than my blog requires me to. It would still be nice to produce something in print however. Or maybe these are just day dreams that I will give up again at some point soon. I will let you know albeit most of you probably not caring.
But if I were to actually write a book, it would most definitely not be fiction per se. I can't imagine myself imagining a whole new world and stuff, that would not be something I would terribly enjoy either I think. I'd more write like my own personal manifesto on everything that I consider to be wrong with this world, or perhaps an opinionated analysis of society through the eyes of a third-person narrator. Or just a series of cynical essays that will resemble my blog posts. Or not even go the extra mile to create new material and just compile my posts into a book. But I don't know about any of that for now.
For now, I'll just stick to writing this blog and entertaining you guys. Or offending or boring or whatever your sentiments towards my little slices of the great ham that is the art of writing are.
Meh, the ham analogy doesn't really work for writing,does it? More for like, a butcher. But you get what I mean, my few little ramblings here are hardly more to the writing community and its history than ants are to us or we are to the universe. Just a tiny almost non-existent piece of the whole, whatever that happens to be.
But I am getting off track here, I am in no mood and way too sober to start discussing the meaninglessness of life compared to the entirety of the universe, or discuss the individuals worth in a high-speed world that is rushing to anonymity and conformity. No way, not today, not without getting seriously fucked up first, these are no topics for sobriety, period.
I am not even sure why I am already writing any of this, my next post is not due for another week or so. But I am too lazy to change the DVD, I have seen the menu animation of "Final Destination 2" for what feels like the millionth time already, and am too bored with the movie to watch it again, meaning that I am stuck sitting here, with essentially writing as the only thing to do apart from the usual pastimes of the Internet of which I'm growing more and more weary seeing as they are a relentless repetition of semi-comedic material about as meaningful as a dog turd on the sidewalk. Yet I still fully indulge in them as soon as a flicker of boredom comes up. And it's not even like I don't have anything else to do, I am sure that if I looked into it I would find lots of things in need of completion for my studies. I could also start writing lyrics again. Instead I am sitting here, looking at this sterile screen in front of me wishing I was writing on an actual typewriter instead of just in a font that looks like one, and slowly drowning in a sea of pointless words and formulations, fading away into the illusion of contributing to the prevalence of common sense simply by writing about it. Or maybe it's not an illusion after all, maybe there are actually people being reinforced in their own use of common sense and decency in a world where these virtues are so quickly lost and replaced by shallowness and egoistically biased judgement.
It is so easy, almost encouraged to behave like an asshole nowadays; it's unnerving! I can not understand these people. Well that is not entirely true. I can comprehend why someone would behave that way. Personal gain is a powerful motivator that often overlooks humanity and compassion. I have been there as well, the opportunities to throw someone under the bus in order to get something out of it are almost omnipresent. But I have rarely acted on it, and if I did I either felt like shit because of it or had very good reasons to do so. Either way, I have seen it far too often that people do not only act insidiously out of impulse and circumstance, but rather actively seek opportunities to deceive, manipulate, and use others, and when these opportunities are found exploit them like there's no tomorrow. And honestly, this saddens me. I mean it's not like I haven't learned to recognize these bastards from a mile away and avoid them like hell, it's not like this a completely new phenomena to me or in general, but still I feel like a little part of me dies every time I hear about or see that kind of behavior.
The reason for this is mainly that in my mind, and those of many others, it is so easy to behave decently. Respect those that respect you, and those who show disrespect or insult you you ignore or avoid. I am not saying you should "turn the other cheek" either though, don't get me wrong, some people simply need an ass-whooping from time to time. But this senseless negativity, this back-stabbing, this pointless hatred that some exhibit are simply not understandable to me. Live and let live for Christs' sake, it's not that fucking hard, is it?
And the most surprising thing to me is that everywhere I go the people surrounding me mostly fully agree with me on this, but still I see mankind behaving like goddamn retarded assholes not even remotely trying to just leave others be and worry about their own issues. Why do these lunatics think that they're solving anything or making life better for themselves when they so clearly are not? This has to be some sort of mental health issue, there is no other reasonable explanation that comes to mind. Or maybe my non-egoistic way of thinking is a symptom of mental deterioration after all, and all those I consider to be assholes are the healthy ones. But then again, this could all just be the dream of some over-sized mongrel that ends the second the beast wakes up from the sound of its own farts, so I don't see any point in speculating beyond my observational sphere on this, meaning that I will stick to my original utterance: Most people are egoistic assholes with a mental condition, and those that recognize this trend in their surroundings as well are a dying breed of decent humans, just like I like to think I am.
But essentially, it's egregious to assume anything based on one's perception of oneself, because it can not be anything but heavily biased, usually towards, but sometimes even against oneself.
This bias in inherent to our nature and is not something to be ashamed, but just something to be aware of. It is possible to assess your own works' worth, but you need to realize that you're looking through tainted glasses when doing so, and adjust your self-assessment accordingly, which is a skill that develops over time. As the years go by you and what you create will be submitted to tons of judgements by various kinds of people, and you will see how and to what degree that varies from your own perception, which will in turn allow you to adapt your own appraisal of what you did to that of your audience, which is usually more accurate simply because it's a stew of many opinions from people who may not even know you instead of just your own. I can not emphasize enough that this does not mean to let yourself be influenced by others' opinions in your doing though, remember that most people are assholes that don't know what they're talking about at all, but don't forget that there are honest souls out there as well either; meaning that singular negative feedback from idiots should not get you down, but neither should singular praises from idiots lift you up, both would be fallacious feelings and lead to you not working the way you would want to, ultimately resulting in depression and failure, because you'll either produce good work thinking you're producing crap or vice-versa, ergo not being as productive as you would probably want to be. But vis-à-vis the aggressively mediocre taste of humanity nowadays actually being productive is of no value to the entertainment industry; pandering to the lowest common denominator amongst today's brainwashed TV-addicts however, is. Not that I haven't talked about this what feels like a million times already, but still it is true, be it in music, film, or writing that the corporate giants are turning true creative output into a cheesy, slimy mass properly cut into easily digestible pieces ready to be served to the brain-dead masses, thinly disguised as valuable nutrition for the mind.
And of course, the driving force behind it is money. But despite us all realizing this we're not only condoning this behavior, we're even endorsing it by showing these corporations that it's easily possible to make billions of dollars off of untalented, crappy musicians simply because we, or some assholes among us, are buying into their shit! But this has already been discussed at length in one of my earlier "Food For Thought" segments, and I will not subject you to this torturous discussion once again, and am myself in no mood to get all aggro about this now. So, let's just keep in mind that money makes good music go bad, and that it's the corporations', "the man's" fault combined with our inability to resist their bullshit lies and propaganda. And I am using the word 'propaganda' explicitly because of its tremendous historic meaning, because I think that planting an ideology in people's brains is no more or less worse than using similar schemes to push bad, commercialized music, films, or books onto unsuspecting audiences, and thereby thoroughly ruining the essence of these arts, essentially ruining the artistic side of these arts. Of course the repercussions of selling crappy art are not as easily visible or as shocking as those of indoctrinating an entire nation with an ideology, but are not to be underestimated nevertheless.
I mean think about the entertainment that will be here 20, 30, or even 50 years from now considering its development from the late 70's until the first decade of this century. Do you begin to see what I mean? We've gone from "The Great Shark Hunt" to "50 Shades of Grey"; from "Master of Puppets" to "Wrecking Ball"; and from "Pulp Fiction" to "Titanic" and "He's just not that into you". Mind you that I'm not trying to undermine the fact that there are indeed great artistic creations of this decade that managed to restore enough of my faith in humanity as to not jump off a bridge, but they're not as prevalent anymore, they're being reduced to the tiniest of niche. The big stars of the past were those that had actual worth, be it musically, artistically, or linguistically. Even those that sucked were better than today's "Top 50" or equivalent rankings, and that is just a sad sign of deterioration within the humans' understanding of the arts. And if we allow this rotting to continue, we will ultimately end up with horrific corporate industries managing an artists' every thought to make sure it is sell-able, and otherwise force-ably dismissing it. Oh wait, that's not a prediction at all, that's what's happening right now, but this seems to be the most extreme perversion of artistic integrity that I can come up with on my own. But well, in a few years I will surely be proven by one of the large entertainment industries that I just lack imagination, they'll find a way to making sell-outs even worse, I guarantee. And isn't it just sad that I can already predict that now with a fairly high amount of certainty? But that's the nice thing about it being only a prediction - it may or may not come true, and I certainly hope it doesn't, although I have to say that given the developments of the past decade I'm pessimistic about it.
Anyhow. This topic has been rehashed so many times in so many different ways already that my little take on it here should suffice considering I have myself already dealt with it before on this very blog, but not on the meta-level that I have elevated the theme to here encompassing essentially all forms of art.
Well, looking back on the text so far, I have to say that I am currently quite fond of dealing with multiple topics in one post, individually brief or long. Which was not a conscious decision, but rather just happened in the course of my writing. Maybe you have noticed it too, maybe I'm just imagining it, I don't know. But should you have noticed it, let me know if you like it or if you prefer mono-topical posts. Because I myself am usually drifting through thoughts and ideas whilst writing these posts, and am not really following a clear structure or trying to make a main point, but rather series of small points that add up to a nice, almost-weekly dose of 'wisdom'. I use quotation marks here because I am ambivalent when it comes to defining my ramblings as actual wisdom. To some extent I obviously consider them to be, hence the title of my Blog, but still I can not shake the feeling of sounding like an asshole with overblown ego wanting to impose his own opinions onto other people by declaring them to be wisdom. But as indicated before, I do think that there are things to take away from these posts. I just do not want them to be taken as being what they are, I want you to question every syllable I utter so as to form your own notion of the topics dealt with here. Hence my ambivalence towards the use of the word 'wisdom' as a description of my literary productions. But I still firmly stand behind this Blogs title, especially considering that it just has a nice ring to it, and that it does describe what I want you to attain by reading and thinking about the themes dealt with in these posts. Yes, you heard that right, I want to you to gain a feeling of "music and personal wisdom" within your daily life, I want you to subject yourself to philosophical lines of thought each and every day, preferably whilst listening to good music. But I know that you won't do this anyway, I mean neither do I to be honest. It is a nice thought though isn't it? To actually sit down with some nice writings on philosophy, drinking a cup of hot chocolate, and listening to some good old classic Rock. But it rarely happens that people actually do that nowadays, unfortunately. Even reading in general seems to be declining. Well at least when it comes to actual books that is. At least when it comes to my generation. Or, well, parts of it, I'm not someone to bash an entire decade of people, but it does feel like with every passing aeon less and less brain-mass is being passed on to offspring, slowly turning them into brainless zombie-like creatures more resembling primal beasts than fully developed homo sapiens sapiens. As part of the generation "Y" as sociologists put it, a lot of people may think that I am too young to be making these kind of calls, but to be honest I kind of doubt that using your brain to recognize patterns of mental degradation around you has an age-restriction. But it all seems to come down to this anyway. Every single one of my blog posts, and every line of thought I think. Maybe it's just me being a cynical asshole as always, maybe it's just me being condescending to way too many a soul. But I doubt it. Unfortunately.
Well, once again, a post that resulted in me criticizing society or rather developments within society caused by itself. But you all knew that that was going to happen, and so did I. Still, I do think that this beast of a post holds a lot of vital points I have not made at any point before, and should all in all be a long but entertaining read. Or at least that's the underlying intention, and I hope that I succeeded. Well, this concludes this 3000-word result of three days of typing, and here is some good music:
Led Zeppelin - Immigrant Song
-> Great Band, great track, and I love to play this introductory riff on my guitar, it was such a great day when my guitar tutor taught me how, and yeah Led Zeppelin needs featuring here and will be quite a few more times in the future... Enjoy!
Dub FX - Society Gates
-> I have definitely had a Dub FX song on here before, but I am almost entirely sure that it was "Fly with me". Well, whereas "Fly with me" is rather psychedelic and elicits a feeling of drug-use in me, "society gates" is a nice piece about society and the norms it forces its inhabitants to conform to, which fits nicely into the final paragraphs of this post, so... Enjoy!
Twisted Sister - The Price
-> Well I had Twisted Sister on here before as well, but definitely not this song and needed featuring here! It's an epically beautiful tune that holds many truths on many levels, and is musically great as well, so... Enjoy!
Black Eyed Peas - Joints & Jam
-> "A chick-a-doom, a chick-a-doom chick-a-doom doom" - The Black Eyed Peas were so great back in the days, what the hell happened to them? I mean yeah, money and corporations, but can they really delude a band's essence this much? Apparently they can. But anyway, great track, funny video, so... Enjoy!
Twofold - All Around
-> UKF does not disappoint, this is an epic song by Twofold, an artist I've seen a couple of times on the UKF Dubstep Channel lately which is usually a good sign, and this guy definitely deserves the spot on this 'exclusive' playlist that is UKF; amazing song, so... Enjoy!
50 Cent - I'll Whip Ya Head Boy
-> Upon re-watching "Get Rich Or Die Tryin'" a couple of times these past months I decided to include this great song that a friend of mine used as introductory music for his boxing match. I've never been the biggest 50 fan to be honest, but I've always liked his tracks and this one is definitely awesome, and you will see a few others of his works on here at some point, so... Enjoy!
At Vance - Vivaldi Four Seasons (Summer)
-> This is a great metal interpretation of the Summer-part of the Vivaldi's Four Seasons by the German band "At Vance", whose music I've been enjoying for about 4 or 5 years now. I had to include this amazingly crafted piece of music here at some point so might as well do it now, bring a little bit of sunshine into the darkness as it were. Anyway, this is an awesome interpretation of a classic piece, so... Enjoy!
Well, this post turned out to be a real beast of over 3000 words of ramblings, that I hope are enjoyable to you. I have addressed multiple topics in various lengths, but I think I managed to keep it all revolving around somewhat of a red line throughout the erratically uttered thoughts.
But anyway, creating this entry took a few days, and now it's again midnight soon, so I'll go to sleep and let you enjoy this literary creation of mine.
Peace!
Labels:
50 cent,
assholes,
book,
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corporations,
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font,
generations,
Hunter S. Thompson,
Internet,
money,
multiple topics,
novel,
positive,
society,
stupidity,
twisted sister,
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