new blog!!!!

So I finally came up with a theme for my blog. nails. I loveeee nail polish so much so I thought it would be nice to share my guilty pleasure with the rest of the world.

polishedandproud.wordpress.com

Click it. Read it. Love it.

ideasss pleassse

I am the procrastination queen. Instead of reading the hundreds of pages I need to finish before my midterm on Tuesday, I am writing this. But it’s important. I need to figure out some sort of theme for my blog but I can’t think of anything! In other words, I NEED your help.

In other news, I had an embarrassing night at the bar last night. Has anyone else had their boyfriend or girlfriend walk out on them in a rage in front of everyone? If that’s happened to you, did you deserve being walked out on? Because I certainly didn’t deserve it last night. Now I have no idea what to do because I feel so disrespected. I feel like if I play it off like it’s not a big deal it will give my boyfriend the idea that he can pull that kind of shit again. Advice anyone?

they always come crawling back.

I’m back. What a surprise. Seriously though, not even I could have anticipated this. But the little wordpress bookmark I made when writing my blog was mandatory for my class kept on giving me those puppy dog eyes, (not literally though.. I wish) and I had to come crawling back. So good evening. Welcome to the big bad wolff’s big bad garden. My name sounds so mean so I thought I would balance everything out with some girly flowers. That is actually a picture of a rose from my best friend’s garden. Isn’t it beautiful?

it feels gooooooood to be back.

Random, I know, but I thought I’d take some time to show off my blue eyeliner. I likkke.

On another completely seperate note, thank you wordpress, for contributing to the pile of pointless things I am apparently determined to complete before I finish my new media essay. Which, may I add, is due tomorrow. This explains the quick post tonight. I must write two more pages about how media technologies change to accomodate our wants and needs.

Peace out A town.

you call that “LIVE”?

Back in my parents days, records were live recordings of musicians. There was nothing special about these, no special effects added to the instrumental, no voiceovers, it was purely raw footage of the singer or band.

Today, the recordings we listen to are developed in studios holding millions of dollars worth of sound equipment. Voices are mutated and played with, and any person with a half decent voice (sometimes not even) can be altered with and made to sound incredible.

As we talked about in class, and as it is discussed in chapter 2 of Goodwin’s book, performances now imitate recordings, as opposed to recordings imitating live performances. Goodwin’s book, published almost 20 years ago, was right about this and about the new technology that makes music much more complex. The technology has gone a long way since Goodwin has made this point. With technology changing so rapidly, Goodwin’s point has only been strengthened.

We base our opinion on a live performance on how it matches up to the recordings. In my own experience, I recall watching performances and thinking they sucked, because they just didn’t sound the same as they did on the radio. When Nelly Furtado came to Bluesfest, I was disappointed. Her newest album at the time, featuring songs like “Promiscuous Girl” was loaded with effects that made her voice sound almost alien-like at times. The live performance clearly couldn’t compare to the album.

Prozzak, a Canadian band is made up of two fictional characters: Simon and Milo. There are artists behind the scenes, but are rarely seen. They do not appear in their music videos. Rather, the videos consist of cartoon characters Simon and Milo playing the music. Around 1999, when their debut album came out, they appeared on some sort of music awards show and actually played. I remember this because it wasnt like any of the other performances that night. Prozzak played, in the dark, while Simon and Milo appeared on a screen “playing” the song with their cartoon instruments.  This is an example of how far the technology has gone. The performance was more or less a music video.

Because of the disappointment of the audience if the performance doesn’t match the recording, its becoming harder and MUCH more expensive for artists to perform. All they needed before was a stage and a mic, and now, they need lights and lasers, synthesizers, pyrotechnics, the list goes on. With advances in technology, we – the consumers – ask more and more. We are never fully pleased, and this doesn’t just have to do with music, it is our way of life. Nothing is ever enough for us, which is partly why I can’t see how I am going to wrap this post up, I’m not satisfied even though I’ve written 500 words. I’m going to leave it at that, because I know if I keep on going I’ll never be able to stop.