Ubuntucat

I just read Linux Music Workflow: Switching from Mac OS X to Ubuntu with Kim Cascone, and I have to say I’m shocked, especially after reading Kim Cascone’s Wikipedia entry. Kim is a serious musician, not just some schmoe dinking around in his basement.

I’ve been a full-time Ubuntu user for a little over four years now, having switched from Windows XP. My wife switched around the same time but from Windows to Mac, as she uses Mac for serious graphic design work.

Even though I get annoyed when anti-Linux trolls make it sound as if no one could use Linux just because Linux isn’t great for certain niche commercial applications (AutoCAD, Adobe CS, certain graphics-intensive video games), I have to concede that Linux is not for everyone. And if someone had come up to me yesterday and said, “Hey I’m a professional musician who uses a computer full-time for audio stuff. Should I use Linux?” I would probably laugh in her face and tell her to go with Mac OS X.

Even though I don’t use Linux for serious audio work, I’ve seen enough of the Linux audio mess of Pulse Audio, OSS, and ALSA to know it can be an obstacle for someone seeking to use Linux primarily for audio work. After reading that blog post, though, I have to say I’m pleasantly surprised.

And I also think that, even though there is a myth of meritocracy in the software world, arguing about how freedom is important isn’t going to win over the general public. If open source is really a better development model, it will create better software. There shouldn’t be a choice between functionality and ideology. If the ideology of freedom being better is true, then it should produce the best functionality eventually. And maybe it is slowly getting there.

I don’t subscribe to the notion that if Ubuntu (or some other Linux distro) fixes all its usability issues that all of a sudden hundreds of millions of Windows users (and Mac users?) will just download .iso files, burn them to CD, boot from CD, and install and configure a new operating system themselves. But why have extra obstacles?

Keep on bringing the improvements, Linux communities. This is definitely a cool development.

Anyone who reads this blog on a regular basis knows I’m a fan of Ubuntu Linux, a free operating system. While many of its users celebrate the freedom in licensing Ubuntu (as is typical of Linux distributions) comes with, a lot of folks just like the fact that it’s cost-free. Quite an online community has been built around this free product.

Yesterday, I saw a different kind of “community” building (and then disappearing) around something else free—music. My wife and I were on the way to dinner, and we saw a huge cardboard box on the side of the road next to an apartment building. We looked inside and saw hundreds of audio CDs. We looked all around it to see if there was some kind of sign. As far as we could tell, this was someone’s garbage, free for the taking. Just as we’d decided this, three men in their early 20s came around, and all five us dug around through the collection and picked what CDs we wanted, often politely ceding our initial choices to each other if we saw someone else who wanted that CD more. An older Russian woman came by and started remarking on how there were probably hundreds of dollars’ worth of CDs in there that someone amassed over years, and now it was just garbage, and how we do the same thing (accumulate and discard) with clothes sometimes. She eventually had a look inside, too.

It is kind of an interesting idea. The CD you used to wait months for and save up for, the CD you were so happy to get and listen to over and over for weeks—years later, that CD is just a toss-away for strangers to rummage through.

What impressed me most about the whole situation is how polite and friendly people were with each other, as they picked up CD after CD. Folks were making small talk and reminiscing back to their own first CD purchases as kids. Even though everyone at one point or another audibly toyed with the notion of taking the whole stash and selling it to Amoeba (a local used music store), no one actually did. We all just picked the CDs we wanted and then went on our way. It wasn’t a madhouse. It was civil.

At that moment, scrounging around for musical scraps, I felt a part of a community, even though I didn’t know these people, I didn’t know their names, I probably wouldn’t see them ever again, and if I did I probably wouldn’t recognize them (“Hey, it’s you! Remember that time we were looking through the same cardboard box of CDs back in 2009?”). It’s amazing how a “community” can form around free stuff. It can even form for only a matter of minutes and then quickly dissipate. Almost like a flash mob. But less organized.

It’s also kind of funny how people would make remarks about the CD collection’s owner. Is it a guy? Is it a girl? Why does the owner have such eclectic tastes? You try to imagine, based on a collection of CDs, what this person is like. Would you be friends with her or him? Who owns a Rick Astley album, let alone two? Berlin had more than one greatest hit?

If I ever do get rid of the rest of my CD collection, maybe instead of selling it, I’ll put it in a large cardboard box and install a hidden camera, so I can see what people say about me while they’re taking my music. It’d be an interesting experiment.

Okay, everyone I know is crazy about Susan Boyle. I see Facebook postings about how great she is and how people are amazed by how good she is. I see news stories about how mean people are for laughing at her. I see feminist critiques citing her as a champion for how women especially should not be judged by their looks.

Am I the only one who isn’t caught up in all this? I saw the YouTube video. The instant she appeared, I knew exactly what would happen. She would be awkward and ugly, people would laugh at her (and the camera would linger for that extra moment on each sneer), and then she would blow everyone away with an incredible voice, and the judges and audience would recant their disdain and embrace her.

Do people really think she just walked right on stage like that? Everyone was surprised? No. The producers planned it. She had to audition, and at that moment the producers knew they had it made (“It’s Paul Potts… but better… this will be ratings gold!”). They would let the camera crew know to highlight certain things (if audience members are laughing in disgust, linger longer on those folks), they would let the hosts know to make extra fun of her beforehand. Maybe the judges wouldn’t be let in on it, so their surprise will seem more genuine.

This was carefully plotted, folks. Make no mistake about it. And even though people were surprised, I think they had a right to be surprised (they didn’t have a right to make fun of her, though). It’s not that she’s ugly (even though she is). It’s not that her dress is frumpy and unfashionable (even though it was). It’s her demeanor. It’s her seeming obliviousness. It’s her seeming lack of stage presence.

There are good singers, and there are good performers. If you’re lucky you’ll get a good performer who is also a good singer. If you see someone who seems physically awkward and doesn’t command the room when she walks on the stage, you think you’re not going to see a good performer. It actually makes sense. For the producers and Britain’s Got Talent ratings, it’s just trimming on the tree that she’s also physically unattractive and unfashionable.

But people’s expectations that she would not be a good performer are perfectly in line with how she walked on stage, how she made that awkward little dance while talking (as if she were a three-year-old girl). So stop judging yourselves for misjudging her stage presence and performing abilities.

The worst part is that all of these people who say “Shame on us for judging her by her looks and laughing at her” will still judge people by their looks and still laugh at them. I may be the most cynical of them all when it comes to the Susan Boyle phenomenon, but all I see are Britain’s Got Talent exploiting an ugly duckling, and people congratulating themselves on guilt that won’t lead to real character change. You haven’t learned your lesson, general public.

I don’t really listen to much contemporary Christian music these days. I’m still in love with some Christian bands from the 90s (Dakoda Motor Co., PFR, Caedmon’s Call). As a matter of fact, even with non-Christian stuff, I’m still in love with the mid-90s (Poe, Portishead, Toad the Wet Sprocket, the Fugees).

I still remember the first time I heard Acoustic Shack. It was after some youth group meeting on a Friday night, and one of our youth group counselors was going to give me a ride home. Before we drove off from church, though, he asked me to listen to something. I liked what I’d heard, and when he told me it was a Christian band, I was like, “What?!” (At this time, Michael W. Smith, DC Talk, and Amy Grant were pretty big; and Petra and all the Christian “heavy metal” bands were just cheesy).

So I got the CD (Fret Buzz) from the nearest Christian bookstore (which was 45 minutes from my house), and I loved the whole CD. When a friend of mine lent me a tape (yeah, what we had before CDs and right after records) of Acoustic Shack’s first album (which was self-titled), I loved them even more. Yes, the drums were all pre-programmed on the first album, but I liked the guitar solos and melodies a lot better than on the second one.

For years I listened to those two albums over and over again. I wasn’t too impressed with the third album A Distant Bell, and I never got to hear the fourth album.

Recently, I got nostalgic for Acoustic Shack and tried to track down more information about them. I found out that Michael Misiuk formed some band called The Kreepdowns, and I wasn’t able to find much about it at all online, so I gave it a shot.

I found a used copy of it for sale on Amazon (clearly no one else cares about The Kreepdowns, because the CD was less than the price of shipping, and the shipping was only a couple of dollars).

Well, I finally got the CD today, and it’s okay. It’s no early Acoustic Shack. It’s actually quite a bit heavier (a lot more electric guitar and screaming). I just gave it a quick listen, and so far “Cello” (the second track) is the only one that’s half-way decent.

If, like me, you’re nolstagic for a bit of good mid-90s Christian rock, there are a couple of YouTube “videos” (watch the album cover while you listen to the music) of Acoustic Shack:

“Radio Play”
I love the little multiple-guitar dance that happens between 2:10 and 2:50.

“It’s Good to Know”
2:15 to 2:50 on this song has a nice little acoustic guitar solo.

“Torment Party”
No real guitar solo here, but the song just has a nice sound to it overall.

Too bad Lisa and Michael Misiuk aren’t making any more music. I wonder what they’re doing these days.

I’m more or less a non-violent individual. I’m generally a turn-the-other-cheek kind of Christian. I punched a friend of mine once in high school by accident when I thought I was chucking him on the shoulder. I also threatened a bully in middle school, and he scared me a bit, because I thought he was actually going to call my bluff, but it never came down to actual fisticuffs.

Still, I am the master of misheard lyrics, and at least on two occasions I heard something about beating someone. Is it just me?

Misheard lyrics: Well, you done done me in, you bet I felt it. I tried to beat you, but you’re so hot that I melted.

Actual lyrics: Well, you done done me in, you bet I felt it. I tried to be chill, but you’re so hot that I melted.

[from Jason Mraz's "I'm Yours"]

Misheard lyrics: ‘Cause then I would let you know that I love you so, and if I was your man then I would beat you. The only lying I would do is in the bed with you

Actual lyrics: ‘Cause then I would let you know that I love you so, and if I was your man then I would be true. The only lying I would do is in the bed with you

[from Pharcyde's "Passing Me By"]

Of course when you actually look at the context, the real lyrics make a lot more sense in both cases. Chill is the opposite of melting. Beating doesn’t really figure into it at all. And why would you say you would beat someone if you were trying to win that person over in a love letter?

My aching ears. Excuse me while I kiss this guy, Jimi.