Writing in the Air
There’s this saying, “The Internet is forever.” It’s usually said ruefully, in reference to an unfortunate high school photo or a bad tweet from 2009. When you share your life online, there’s a searchable record of your regrets.
In the age of link rot, auto-updates, and ever-shortening obsolescence cycles, it’s also true that the Internet is ephemeral. It’s been twenty-odd years since many in my generation shifted our professional and creative focus to the digital realm. That’s long enough to raise some big questions about the lasting nature of our work, and our willingness to devote so much of ourselves to it.
A couple weeks ago, I looked up an old video game review I wrote back when I was an editor at Kotaku. I loaded the page and noticed something was off. The images were missing. I checked a couple of my other articles, and found the same thing: no images. In the case of this review, I had made custom images that included text headers for each section. Without them, the review was a wall of text with no framing or structure.
As it turns out, the removal of images at former Gawker Media sites is a whole thing. For whatever reason, the sites’ current owners appear to have mass-deleted every image from every article written before they bought the company. I left Kotaku a few months before that sale, so their decision includes every one of the almost four thousand articles I wrote during my eight years at the site.
I’m not really sure what to think about that. I always knew I didn’t own that work, and I never felt particularly attached to most of it. Some of it’s pretty good, I think, but plenty of it is silly or half-baked. I always figured that, over time, it would be compromised or degraded one way or another. I’ve got backups of all my articles saved on my hard drive, and moreover, I left the job carrying all the lessons I learned, the writing skills I developed, and even those willing members of the audience I had built.
But still, man… that’s a lot of work to see ruined all at once.
I’ve sometimes heard people describe jazz as “writing in the air.” It’s a beautiful way to think of the music, and the ephemerality of collective improvisation. You can record a jazz performance, but the recording is only ever just that: a record of what happened, for posterity. The essence of the art occurred in the present tense.
A trumpeter’s melody snakes along on the contours of the drummer’s ride; the pianist throws a harmonic structure around them, then dismantles it. She and the bassist lock eyes, then drop together to a pedal tone. A smack of the snare; a screech of the horn. The dance continues.
There are many vectors along which jazz can be spun out to some grand metaphor for life. This is one of my favorites, because it helps me find beauty in the melancholy fact that my work, just like the rest of me, won’t last forever. I can let go of legacy, and embrace the spirit of the moment. I’m in this space right here, right now. Writing in the air.
Strong Songs Year Three, Complete
Year three of Strong Songs has drawn to a close, and I was proud of the final run of episodes. Over the last couple of months, I…
Made a particularly detailed episode about Earth, Wind & Fire’s “September”
Relived the drum sounds of my youth with Janet Jackson, Jam & Lewis’s “Love Will Never Do (Without You)”
Went down a rabbit hole about the sax solo on Wham’s “Careless Whisper”
Interviewed the great Eric Vetro, voice coach to the stars
Managed to fit an analysis of Talking Heads and Jonathan Demme’s concert film Stop Making Sense into an hour-long episode
Capped off the year with a year-in-review episode, if you’d like to take a quick tour of things you may have missed
As always, this show has been such a rewarding undertaking, and I’ve been thankful for everyone who’s been listening along, spreading the word, and supporting the show on Patreon. I’m looking forward to year four; it feels like it’s time to shake up the formula and try some new things.
Music Recommendations
Some recent listening highlights for your holiday cheer:
Cory Wong - Motivational Music for the Syncopated Soul - I’ve really been enjoying Cory’s music lately. I wouldn’t have guessed that he’d wind up having the hottest horn section around, but here we are.
Gotye - Like Drawing Blood - This one came via a listener email, and I’m digging it. Recommended for anyone who thinks of Gotye only as “that guy who did that one song.”
Yebba - Dawn - One of the best albums I’ve listened to in a long time. I know everyone’s talking about Adele’s new album (which sounds great from what I’ve heard) but if you dig that, listen to this.
CHVRCHES - Screen Violence - Always dig new material from this band, and this one’s solid as always. A bit more world-weary, but that makes sense.
Japanese Breakfast - Jubilee - A buzzy artist who sits right in the Venn diagram overlap between games and music. She’s great.
The Strokes - The New Abnormal - Didn’t expect to be listening to a Strokes record in 2021, but hey, this is good!
Lil Nas X - MONTERO - My Triple Click co-host Maddy Myers got me to finally give this album a proper listen; I’d heard the singles, but it’s a different thing listening to the album. God, the swagger on this guy.
Love, Dean - Self Titled - A fabulous debut soul record from my buddies Luke and Rachel Price—Strong Songs listeners will know Luke as the fiddle player who played an outro solo in year two. This album is great - beautiful harmonies, great tunes. Give them some love, they deserve it!
Béla Fleck - My Bluegrass Heart - There’s something so reassuring about a group of old pros sitting down and doing their thing. The studio banter on this album is so humorously low key, given the virtuosity of the music.
John Wizards - Self Titled - This is a remarkable album out of South Africa, courtesy of a Strong Songs listening club pick. One of those bands that released one album almost ten years ago and seemingly vanished, but I’m glad I know about them.
Deafheaven - Infinite Granite and Sunbather - My buddies Mike and Billy got me to check out these guys, who mix shoegaze energy with black metal sounds to get a style of music that I suppose is called “blackgaze.” It’s an oddly relaxing sound, and I really dig what they’re doing.
Avishai Cohen - Seven Seas - Avishai has long been one of my favorite musicians, and he’s really found a nice pocket these days, playing this odd meter, organic small group stuff. Nice singing on this album, too.
Parliament - Funkentelechy vs. The Placebo Syndrome - Talking about Bernie Worrell on the Stop Making Sense episode got me back listening to Parliament, and good lord, this album is cool. There’s this feeling of endless playful possibility, like they were making music with no conceptual boundaries.
Aimee Mann - Queens of the Summer Hotel - A beautiful new collection of songs from Aimee. She makes it seem easy.
Osibisa - Happy Children - Another cool band with musical roots in Ghana, courtesy of a Strong Songs listening club pick.
Horsey - Debonair - Here’s a fun one; a modern band that reminds me of no one so much as Mr. Bungle. Fantastic musicianship, never does what you expect.
Onward
And that’ll do it for now! As always, you can find me on Instagram and Twitter, though I haven’t been using either one all that much lately. I’ll be back at some point, I’m sure.
I’ll leave you with this photo of Appa, sleeping like a completely normal dog.
I may or may not have another newsletter before the end of the year, but if not, I hope you all have a safe and relaxing holiday.
Take care and keep listening -
~KH
11/19/2021