Daytime Running Lights

Grabb.it has revved up another notch.

Version 1.0 began in 2005 as a hobby project to learn Rails. Early 2007, we started from scratch on Grabb.it 2.0, released last May. Meet rev 3.

We’re shifting the focus to mp3 blogs – they’ve be around a while, but the new UI puts them out front. So if you love music and blogging, we’ll be doing a little of both around there, and you’re welcome to join us.

Here’s some old-time music I grabbed from the Berea Music Archive ages ago:

Getting Upstairs by Salyer, John Morgan

Announcement ya’ll I just dropped the Grabb.it API Documentation and examples on a brand new Google group. I’m inviting you to come mix up our data, and providing some Javascript kit as well.

Click here for the Grabb.it Playlist API Documentation.

There are code examples and more REST theory on the way.

Embeded below is a simple Flash Player playing New Music from Grandpa Chris, a Grabb.it XSPF playlist:

(consider me surprised if that comes through your reader)

Apologies for mentioning the iPhone thing. I’m getting sick of all the discussion too. Just one counter-point I need to make.

Certain negative comments I’ve seen on posts like the NY Times Bits blog disturb me deeply. The gist of the bad comments are “quit crying, baby, you took the risk and voided you’re warranty”. On them I call bullshit.

But the question is: where do people get the idea that one shouldn’t hack your own computer? My conjecture is that if you consider the iPhone as a fancy phone then it’s way cooler than anything LG is selling. But seeing it as a computer that happens to make calls and fit in your pocket, I’m offended and dismayed by Apple’s stance.

There is a reason Free Software advocates mean “free as in freedom” and to anyone who has been exposed to those ideas, any device which is essentially a computer, but which is actively hostile to its users, is deeply troubling. Computing (communications) and freedom go hand-in-hand, as we’ve seen time and again.

The enemies of freedom are scared by the widespread adoption of general purpose computing (it threatens their business model) and are trying as hard as they can to lock the doors. Should the new iPhone prove unhackable, it will show tyrants (and freedom fighters) that freedom and computing do not necessarily go hand in hand.

If Apple keeps this up much longer, they’ll go on my list of companies to put out of business. Freedom to compute as you wish is rapidly becoming as fundamental as freedom of speech, thought, and assembly. An enemy of freedom is an enemy of mine.

Astute readers may have noticed the increasing coverage of Grabb.it related topics in my various feeds. We’ve been putting the spit ‘n polish on for release. Hodel 3000, etc.

Basically all the things we have to do to iterate quickly and surely once we deploy. If you want to follow Grabb.it more closely, we’ve started a tumblr:

http://grabbit.tumblr.com/

Surprisingly, unless you’re a big Mamas and Papas fan, or you’ve heard this record before, you probably haven’t heard most of these songs. What’s neat about it is that even if you’d never heard any of the songs before, you’d know from the sound which were the hits.

Monday Monday and California Dreaming are smoother and richer than thier siblings. They sound less like a band and more like a vocal group. On the other songs there is guitar and drums and suchlike in a prominent position. Not bad, but I think I’ll have to listen to it again to get it.

I’m running my blog again, just like before, but with more power! So if you were accustomed to looking at the old Daytime Running Lights, now you’ll get accustomed to looking at the new.

If you’ve got the time and inclination, head over to the index page and check out the variety of feeds available. Some of you might rather subscribe to Livin’ or maybe even Music. There is a new party in town called Vinyl where I’m blogging my parents’ huge record collection, one Jerry Jeff Walker or freaky chilled-out flute player at a time.

I’m totally breaking the rules here, because I’ve only heard The Blow’s Paper Television on the iTunes store, which is the opposite of Vinyl.

It is hard to find anything but extreme praise for this record in the bloogyspore. It’s got all the good shit: minimalism, skittery fast impossible Jona beats, round bass that sounds easy, warm vocals, and keyboards that just don’t care.

However, as long time truest Blow fan, I can say that there are some gems on the previous EP that don’t get beat by Paper Television: like Hock It which introduces The Blow’s trademark vocal cut ups, only with heavy breathing, not singing. So check it now if you haven’t before. You’ve got a lot to listen to.

“When a man get’s hairy, you know he need a shave. When a woman get’s musty, you know she needs to bathe.” – Buddy Brown’s Blues

Lightning Hopkins is obviously one of those people who can play guitar and sing, all while smoking a cigarette. His comfort with his songs is evident throughout all his work. Just a few lines later in Buddy Brown’s Blues he sings “I got something to tell you, make the hair stand up on your head”, and after that, the rest of the song is humming. These days, they call that balls.

I first got into Lightning when I was about 15, and someone got me a compilation of his music on CD. I listened to that CD over and over again until I lost it (that’s what CDs are for). Now I’ve got it Lighting on vinyl, and I’ll be playing this record again and again as I put together the Pix website. Ah, work from home.

Chris’ mom Shelley said this is what Alleycat, our old band, sounded like. But that was then, and this is now, and we’re in a new era. As in, this album is from 1980, and sounds like it. There are two sisters, and one other woman, in this band, and it looks like the engineer/producer played bass. The first song, “NURD”, is almost new-wave, definitely on the whole post-punk girl band wave (perhaps the crest). Then, a Cole Porter cover, sweet and with rough but sentimental (as in hearkens to old times, not cloying, not over rehearsed, but with the freedom of some ladies who love to sing together and often do, like how Claire and Katie Davis and Shauna and I would sing Christmas Carols in the Hot Tub with great acoustics in Mount Shasta). Songs about being in love, being a jerk, loving a jerk, a traditional Irish song, unavailable, wrong loves, growing up. A lot of material for ten songs. I liked it, and will return to it again.

I don’t know much about Chinese music, but it seems you can learn alot from this album. Not only is it full of traditional melodies, but the fold-out cover has little Wikipedia-like entries on traditional instruments. One of the tracks, Days of Emancipation, even celebrates “the joy and excitement of Chinese farmers during the great land reform and birth of the new China (October 1949).”

I’m gonna listen to this one again!

I’m most familiar with “Viva Terlingua”, but this album is nearly as good. Not quite as catchy, but Jerry Jeff’s voice and sound come through just as familiar and inviting as on the album’s I know. I think part of the reason this albums sounds like “Viva” is that the band lineup is pretty much the same. I know Gary P. Nunn is on both records, and maybe more.

So anyway, if you get motivated to listen to some Jerry Jeff Walker, I might start with some of the more classic albums. They are so good you’ll think they have to be one-of-a-kind, but it turns out that a lot of Jerry Jeff Walker’s stuff is that good, so there’s no shortage of new fun to be had.

I picked this record from the shelf because I’m currently drinking a beverage called “Pirate’s Choice Kombucha: Local Brew for Local Pirates”. Once you’ve got a pirate theme, you have to run with it.

I’d never heard Rickie Lee Jones before. She sings with a soft, high voice of jangly piano and professional-sounding band. Her melodies and sound (particularly on “living it up”) remind me a little of Frente, but with more musical complexity and dynamics. A quick glance at the lyrics on the back cover of the album reveals that the songs are about something – ie. they tell stories (often in the third person), which is nice compared to the mere expression of angst which passes for songwriting these days. All in all, I’m glad I put this record on.

This is one of those records I’ve heard a kazillion times, so when I play it, I remember the times I’ve played it before. Like that party Sophomore year where like 15 Dylan records were on the CD changer and I wore that scarf that girls said made me look “Byronic”. Or that New Years party in Texas where someone was passing around a red powder they called opium, but probably wasn’t. I drove my dad’s Corvette to the party, out in the countryside, and even now every time I hear “Visions of Johanna”, it sounds like it did on the drive home from the party, with the crisp, dry Texas air and the top down. You’ve probably heard this album a few times, too, but if you haven’t, now’s the time to start.

Has anyone else noticed that Mr. Dylan’s music is correlated with adventure?

This record is has my uncle’s initials on it (“SPA”) as well as “Tom Anderson” which is what my dad called himself before he went to the army. In the pictures the band looks about as young as I imagine Dad and Uncle Steve being when they bought it.

Highlights include “Tom Dooley” and “Sloop John B”, one of my all time favorite songs. It’s fun to hear such a stripped-down version of a song I’m so familiar with from the Beach Boys’ Pet Sounds. I can almost feel the song trying to burst out from its restrained package.

The Kingston Trio has a slicker sound than I’d expected, not filled with the “authentic” sounding folk mistakes I’m used to on acoustic albums from 10 years later (I’m thinking about Syd Barret and pals here), but even still they sound like three guys singing and playing guitars in a single take.