For Saturday, July 31, 2004
Lately here in Colorado we've been having some scetchy weather. We've been in a drought for 11 years, and we are supposed to get over 300 sunny days a year, but the last three weeks we've had cloudy and rainy weather. This is a good thing, since like I said we've been in a drought. But it can put a dampener on some weekend activities.
Well, this morning when I opened my garage I was greeting by a beautifully sunny blue sky and a fair temperature (around 70 degrees F). It felt like a rebirth. It felt young and energetic and so did I. I also felt like a change.
I was about to drive over to Garden of the Gods, as I do most Saturday mornings, which is a good 20 to 30 minute drive. So, with a nice drive ahead of me and a desire for change and a feeling of youth, I decided to switch-out the CDs in my car.
So, here's the new line up.
Disk 1: Sprung Monkey Get A Taste
This album just screams free-willed youth. I don't think there is a track on this CD that I don't like. I remember the first time I heard them; I was in a Best Buy with some friends in Alabama and their song "That's What You Say" was playing over the speakers. The chorus started and a friend said, "That sounds like Ozzy!" It did sound like Ozzy's voice, but the lyrics were not anything I could imagine him singing. So we asked some girl working there was CD was being played and picked it up. Good decision.
Disk 2: Eve 6 Horrorscope
Man I love Eve 6. Their lyrics are so dense and interesting, and Horrorscope is my favorite album of theirs. A friend told me they got their name from an X-Files episode about some clones or some such thing (I'm not a big X-Files fan), where there were these different versions of Eve. I get a real kick out of the song "Sunset Strip Bitch". It just seems that this song was written about some guys that I know, and so I laugh everytime I hear it.
Disk 3: Custom Fast
Another album celebrating youth. Custom has a more mellow tone that Eve 6 or Sprung Monkey, and their songs have more of an edge. I can't listen to their music without thinking about an incident at lunch a few years back. Some friends and I were heading to lunch from work, and my Custom CD was playing. A friend picked up the CD liner that had the song lyrics and started reciting "Hey Mister". This fellow was an extremely straight-laced guy. The type you would never imagine cursed or even entertained a single impure thought. But here he was, in his white-bread monotone, reciting these lyrics that have made many-a-father cringe. It was one of the strangest and funniest things I've ever experienced.
Oh, and "Morning Spank" should be an anthem for any group of guy friends.
Disk 4: Poe Haunted
Enough with the So-Cal youthful energy. Time for some mellow and, appropriately titled, haunting melodies. I love this CD. I don't know what more to say about it. I love the music, the lyrics, and the thematic element throughout the entire album. Let me share some of my favorite parts.
From "Haunted"
Come here
Pretty please
Can you tell me where I am
You won?t you say something
I need to get my bearings
I?m lost
And the shadows keep on changing
And I?m haunted
By the lives that I have loved
And actions I have hated
I?m haunted
By the lives that wove the web
Inside my haunted head
From "Amazed"
Wait, I thought I had this down
I built all my cages and my hide out
I covered all my bases
But you
You creep in like a whisper
I try not to listen but I hear you
I don?t know just what it is you do
But do it again
I?m amazed
When push comes to shove what I?d give to you
Everything
I?m amazed
The walls that I wouldn?t mind crashing through
And I?d do it for days and days
I?m amazed, I?m amazed
From "Hey Pretty"
Well I've got a mind full of wicked designs
I've got a non-stop-hole in my head-imagination
I'm in a building that has two-thousand floors
and when they all fall down
I think you know it's you they're fallin' for
I can't forget I am a sole architect
I built the shadows here
I built the growl in the voice I fear
You add it up but to do better than that
You've got to follow me
Boy I'm tryin' to show you where I'm at
Disk 5: Linkin Park Meteora
About a year and a half ago a friend and I were in a pretty crappy situation at work. We were the only two people from our company in a sub-contractor's building. Our project had pretty much taken over the work that a lot of these people had been doing, most of these guys were burnt-out ex-miltary looking down on us young upstarts, and our managers were 1200 miles away (which may have been a good thing since it turned out they were screwing us as much as everyone else). There were numerous lies told about us, and many attempts to get our security clearances revoked and even one or two lame attempts to get us arrested for security violations (federal prison type of crap).
We had moved 1200 miles for this job; from Alabama to Colorado. We knew very few people in town, and the people we did know ended up betraying us to try to get either promotions or jobs with our company. We truly felt under siege. The only people we could trust were each other, which meant the two of us formed a rather iron-clad friendship.
We tried telling the powers-that-be about everything, and how the project was going down the shitter and would be in serious trouble if someone did not straighten things out. But with everyone against us, we didn't get very far with that approach. We left the project and it was essentially cancelled. Eventually the truth came out, and now the managers in charge are no longer in charge of jack, and they were very lucky to keep their jobs. Ha Ha! We were right! Asshats.
In the middle of all this Meteora was released, and track 11 seemed like it was a special treat just for us. It became our anthem during that time, and still holds a special place in our hearts over a year after we escaped from that crap situation.
Here's some of that joy from "Nobody's Listening"
Yo, peep the style and the kids checking for it
The number one question is "how could you ignore it?"
And drop right back in the cut
over basement tracks and rap stack got you backing us up
Like..Rewind that!
We're just rollin' with the rhythm,
rise from the ashes of stylist division
With these non-stop lyrics and life living,
not to be forgotten, but still unforgiven
But in the meantime, there are those
who wanna talk this and that, so I suppose
that it gets to a point where feelings got to get hurt,
and get dirty with the people spreading the dirt. It goes...
Tried to give you warning, but everyone ignores me
Told you everything loud and clear
But nobody's listening
Called to you so clearly, but you don't want to hear me
Told you everything loud and clear
But nobody's listening
I got a heart full of pain, head full of stress
Hand full of anger, Held in my chest
And everything left's a waste of time,
I hate my rhymes, but hate everyone else's more
I'm riding on the back of this pressure,
guessing that it's better, I can't keep myself together
Because all of this stress gave me something to write on,
the pain gave me something I could set my sights on
Never forget the blood, sweat and tears,
the uphill struggle over years, the fear and
Trash talking and the people it was to,
and the people that started it, just like you
Disk 6: Maroon 5 Songs About Jane
This is a holdover from my last group, so there's not much to say about it other than, "Good stuff!"