Crazy story.
Don't think I will be trying any "brown brown" anytime soon.
Just the fact that this guy survived to tell what he went through makes it worth reading.
Once again...It is unbelievable to me what can go on continuously in Africa and how little we hear about it before the news cuts to yard sales and Brittany Spears.
What if there was a wedding with bridesmen and groomsmaids...
Sultan of Sleaze dead after apparent suicide
Shouldn't of messed with Cruise now that he can move things with his mind...
"Moscow girls make me sing and shout..."
So...I am now obsessed with Soviet Kitsch.
Regina Spektor (relatively) recently has hit the mainstream because of her new album Begin to Hope including the single playing everywhere "Fidelity". I admit that is how I found out about her. The song is good, a little too expected over produced but good. The main quality which hung me on it is her voice. I am obsessed with female vocalists (Kori Gardner, Joanna Newsom, Imogen Heap, Tracyanne Cambell, Neko Case, Sabina Sciubba, Jenny Lewis, Nora Jones, Allison Krauss, etc...). Spektor is unique and very talented like the aforementioned. I obtained both Begin to Hope and Soviet Kitsch (an older self-released album) a few months back and had started to listen to them a little bit. Due to the alphabetizing iPod I ended up playing everything by her and since "B" comes before "S" listening to Begin to Hope a lot more than Soviet Kitsch because something would come up before I had a chance to listen to both albums.
Last night I got the chance to lie in bed undistracted and listen to Soviet Kitsch strait through and... It was amazing! I love the album. It is much more unrefined and personal than the more recent album. Listening to it strait through gives you the opportunity to maybe understand a little bit of who Regina Spektor is and what she is trying to do. The album is heavily musical with "free verse" vocals beautifully laced over top worked together with Spektor's one of a kind voice. There is heavy piano work mixed with powerful string accompaniment, even segments with Spektor beating out the rhythm with a drum stick on a chair. It is a highly emotional album and even without words that speaks though the dynamics of the music. You can tell she felt her way through every one of the songs and the entire composition. The album is creative and often switches between motif's suddenly mid song then coming back to bring it all together in the end. The vocals are uncensored and personal. Everything is real and everything is Regina Spektor because it is her self-released work before a label got the chance to "make suggestions" which would get her to "the public".
I'm not saying the new album is bad, its not, I enjoy it throughly as well. I'm just saying if you are a skeptic about Regina Spektor, give Soviet Kitsch a shot. She will surely prove to you, even if it's not your thing, that she is an artist, and a very talented one. Personally...I love it, and I am going to do what I can to get some of the older self-released albums such as "Songs" and "11:11" (the first of which is available through CDBaby.com and the second only electronically).
"...They Georgia's always on my my my my my my my my my mind"
i think i might stay around richmond for life
i thought a lot this weekend and realized i feel home here
the woods here are my woods
and i feel at home wandering them
i decided that moving around doesn't really make you feel better
i was originally thinking if things were feeling weird still later that i would just move
and try and find something
but i decided i would be happier to embrace something which i know
This is my stomping grounds.
VitaNuovaJon: Stomp all over
Jungle Gyms are fake trees. (the name says it all)
Lights are fake suns, moons, and stars.
Sports are fake competition.
Amusement parks are fake adventures.
TV is fake relationships.
How much more are we going to create?
80% isn't going to cut it much longer.
Our culture isn't working.
We are not meant to be safe.
We are meant to live.
I have always struggled with the issue that human beings are in some way special. The idea that the world was made for us and to be ruled by us seemed like a bunch of crap. If that is the case then before there was us then we must decide who the world was made for before us? The chimpanzee's? That sounds just about as ridiculous as that it was made for human beings.
The world was made for all of the creatures, plants, and substances in it.
If Jesus came to us because we are special. He came to us not because we were special in a good way. But because we are special in a horrible way. We were the first of all that roamed, grew, and died on this earth to not understand how the world worked, and who the world was made for. Our pride told us that it was made for us and that everything in it was ours to protect or destroy. Jesus Christ must have come to us because we were the first species who needed it. Not even the first species but the first culture. Native people did not need a savior. They knew how to live in harmony with the world and with the creatures in it and the creator and spirit who moves through all things. We didn't understand how to fit in peaceably, without harming other species, the planet, or ourselves. We even needed Him to come as a man because we are too prideful to have listened to anyone else. So yes, we did and do need a savior, but I think we completely misconstrued his message even so. Our bible is inspired by God but written by men who suffered from the same pride issues as the rest of our culture does. The world is so much bigger than "us". Jesus Christ was a man, a great philosopher, and leader of a revolution. God is not a man. Nor a woman. Nor anything of the kind. We cannot even imagine. I am fairly convinced Jesus was sent to us, and I know that we needed him, but I am still pondering his relationship to God. I don't really believe in the trinity, but I believe in Jesus, God and Spirit.
I am still figuring things out, but I am trying, honest, and not leaving anything to be ignored.
