Day: December 10, 2006

Silents is Golden

There are a few things about which my opinion cannot be changed. If you watch Chaplin’s “City Lights” and you don’t cry at the end, you aren’t human. This is, for me, the all-time greatest ending to a movie.
[flv:http://www.dograt.com/Movies/Wordpress/DEC06/CityLights.flv 400 300]

Backtrack

I Feel Fine

Friday, December 8, has no entry. It’s blank. The day that John Lennon was killed in 1980. I’d like to say I did that intentionally, to symbolize the space that could never be filled; but, the fact is, I screwed up.

The first Beatles song that I was aware as being “a John song,” was “I Feel Fine.” I’ve always considered “I Feel Fine” to be very innovative, and not just for the guitar feedback intro. To me it represents the point when The Beatles started to really break away musically from Beatlemania.

The audio player has the original single, 42 years old, that belonged to my big sister. Perhaps it still does, but she’ll never get it back! 😉 When that finishes, a second track will kick in with take 6 of the instrumental for “I Feel Fine.” This one you won’t find on “Anthology.”

[audio:http://www.dograt.com/Sounds/Wordpress/DEC06/IFeelFine45.mp3,http://www.dograt.com/Sounds/Wordpress/DEC06/IFeelFine.mp3]

Technical note: Listen to the cymbals in the left channel of the studio session recording. Hear the smearing and slurping effect? The original is perfectly clear and clean. This is a good example of where 128 Kbps MP3 comes up short.

I Saw Dead People

Body Worlds

Recently, I went with Eric and some friends to see the Body Worlds 2 exhibit at the Museum of Science in Boston. At first it’s interesting and perhaps fascinating, but a little goes a long way, and very quickly it becomes creepy. And I say that as a one-time student of human anatomy for artists.

What makes it disturbing are the macabre positions and situations in which the preserved corpses are placed. After a while one gets the disquieting sense the exhibit isn’t so much instructive as it is perhaps the expression of one man’s ghoulish fetish. Mel Gibson would find it a turn-on.