* * * * * * * kdm

Ich war auch mal jung und folgte manchen Moden. Um 1970 herum hieß zum Beispiel eine: "Makrobiotik". Leckere Erdbeeren waren yin (bäh!), See-Algen waren yang (prima!) ...schmeckten aber scheußlich. Dann ging diese Idiotie auch vorbei.

The use of the computer for creating – as well as storing and re-using – musical recordings makes it difficult for a compiler to collect accounts of such recordings for an accurate discography.
. . . . . Before, with tapes, it also was not easy, but now with the new technique it's a nightmare. Today, the results are not visible anymore, the new digital signal processing methods are 100% virtual; there are no tape boxes anymore on shelves, no touchable and visible 2-, 4-, 8-, 16-, or 24-track master tapes, but just plenty of Zeros and Ones on harddisks (or little sticks, or whatever). And worse: It's so very easy now to reuse or recycle this musical material. With the right software it's so simple to change the key of a piece, the speed, the rhythm, play it upside down, etc. and use the same or the altered piece (or parts of it) again for a "new" recording (hence the sudden fashion of "re-mixes", because, I repeat: it's so very easily done today).
. . . . . However, for an observer and compiler it's hard to keep tracks = which musical snippet was done when? changed when? by whom? and used where? and how often? This brings the artistry of serious discographical work not to an end, but ...
. . . . . I fear that it also makes the music more arbitrary (= beliebig) and worthless. By coincidence this is happening at the end of a century and maybe it also marks the end of an era. Not many of the younger people collect music anymore, as it was seriously done in the past with the old formats on DISCs: schellack, vinyl. What is left to report about for a DISCographer, are just the obvious final results, the released discs (or any other tangible, touchable & visible medium in the future) as long as those will be still offered and used.

From "A Letter to the US", by John Cleese:
"Learn to resolve personal issues without guns, lawyers or therapists. That you need many lawyers and therapists shows you're not adult enough to be independent. If you're not adult enough to sort things out without suing someone or speaking to a therapist, you're not grown up enough to handle a gun."

Julia zeichnet gerne Bären. Seit etwa einem Jahr schenkt sie mir in jeder Woche mindestens einen, meist treibt er irgendwas.
Der Bär wird recht hurtig auf den obersten kleinen Zettel des Abreißblocks (in der Küche, für unsere Einkaufsliste) mit Bleistift skizziert. Dazu kommt dann schnell noch ein spontaner Zwei- bis Vierzeiler auf die Rückseite.
Hier, zum Start, gibt's einen klassischen, fast schon seriösen Bären, ohne jede 'action':
.

.
Draußen ist es nass und kühl.
Der Bär bleibt sitzen
auf dem Stühl.
.
Ouside's just wet and cold.
He stays at home, calmly and bold.

"Die Tatsache, dass wir am Boden eines Gravitationsschachts, auf der Oberfläche eines von einer Gashülle umgebenen Planeten leben, der sich um einen 90 Millionen Meilen entfernten atomaren Feuerball dreht, und das für normal halten, deutet zweifellos darauf hin, wie schräg unsere Perspektive manchmal ist."

"The fact that we live at the bottom of a deep gravity well, on the surface of a gas covered planet going around a nuclear fireball 90 million miles away and think this to be normal is obviously some indication of how skewed our perspective tends to be."