Beautée / Tristesse

The birth of an opus

2009-03-21T03:14:00.001-07:00

January 3, 2007

i reallllllly think i am going out of my head sometimes.

im watching re-run marathons of sexual victims shows and shows about sex in the city, in a little barn house that my father built. He started in ‘79 and we just put in a toilet and a shower a couple of months ago. Im atleast 60 miles away from anyone I love, sometimes more like 1500. I am about 18 feet away from everything i love, however. Just up the poppel plank stairs, there is a pile of old guitars, a mound of microphones, wires, chords, electric boxes.

today, though I am taking a break from the previous 3 days of tirelessly working on an opus: seven songs that have succeeded to pull me through a hardened shell of myself, suprise me, entertain, impress and even heal me. They are me, and I am them, but, they sound nothing like I have ever really written before. No need to explain, I kind of understand.

So today, instead of sitting in the recording chair and working from basically when I wake up till 2 or 3 in the morning (just because nothing fills time better than that for me, except maybe for sitting with people) I woke up, ate a piece of toast with mom’s strawberry jelly, took a jog down the road and back, walked out to the woods to check on a deer carcass, ate a cheddarwurst cut up into pieces, watched a couple of these shows, teared up.

in the afternoon, i took some shit over to the town dump. I call it “town” but this is not a town. Its a township, and there are no garbage trucks or garbage men. I took two truck loads, and after driving back the second time I parked by the pull barn and hitched up the log splitter. I drove it down the road to an older couple that lives down the road.

Dick just quintuple bypass surgery but he helped me and Sharon split a large, huge pile of wood for about an hour. Sharon went lighting fast, carrying, stacking, picking up, putting down. It was cold, but I didn’t need gloves. At one point he left to sit down and the newly met strangers, Sharon and I, were a well oiled machine. It was loud, with the woodsplitter, so these new folks I offered to help with wood with, couldn’t really have a conversation to break the ice. Instead we just split and stack. Split and stack. There was this time when the hot exaust from briggs and statton was blowing on Sharons purple sweat pants and I could see the exact shape or her calf. It was just a metaphor for closley we were working together, with really having no idea about anything about eachother. touching hands as we hand off logs, unloading logs, logs that will heat thier home the rest of the winter. One of us farted. I don’t know who, she was moving to fast to notice.

i twitched a smile, but it didn’t even break our stride.

I was leaving in the truck, when I suddendly heard my self say “I feel good.” followed with the retort: “I feel great.” I punched on the cd player and, i know it seems unpoetic. Micheal Jackson’s solo version of “We are the World”.

It was strange being that close to the house of I was concieved in and not really thinking about it all that much. I don’t really know if it was Dick and Sharon that was living in the house at the time, about 25 yeras ago on a rainy summer night. And I don’t know if that gives more or less of an “in” asking Dick and Sharon if I could go in and see the room. ‘Cause, c’mon, who gets a chance to do that.

My friends are a thousand miles away. I miss them. But here I am with re-run marathons and an opus. Im okay. Im doing okay.

Flume

2008-12-10T12:49:00.000-08:00

I am my mother's only one

It's enough

I wear my garment so it shows

Now you know

Only love is all maroon

Gluey feathers on a flume

Sky is womb and she's the moon

I am my mother on the wall, with us all

I move in water, shore to shore;

Nothing's more

Only love is all maroon

Lapping lakes like leary loons

Leaving rope burns --

Reddish ruse

Only love is all maroon

Gluey feathers on a flume

Sky is womb and she's the moon

Bon Iver

Wandering in Street View

2008-10-19T02:08:00.000-07:00

Since the introduction of Streetview in Google Maps, I've been fascinated by the concept. The one thing that a (drawn) map, or even an aerial picture, can not generate, is something more commonly described as a human scale. A feeling of truly wandering in streets, driving around the place.
These drives, virtual or real, really show the essence of place. The way people live, the way they build their houses, their gardens. Where they eat, the sort of cars they drive.

Streetviews were firstly available in the U.S. A visit to Manhattan, or a more rural visit in Nebraska. Since this week, Google maps has brought us the streets of Lille, and more interestingly: Paris!

Hours and hours of Streetviewing are here to be discovered! I love it!!

Here are some buildings in Paris:

The grocery-store of Amelie:

Grotere kaart weergeven

Herzog and DeMeuron's Paris appartment building:

Grotere kaart weergeven

Le Corbusier in Paris:

Grotere kaart weergeven

National Library:

Grotere kaart weergeven

music

2008-10-16T12:19:00.000-07:00

Some nice tunes I've been listening to lately...

Bon Iver - Skinny Love

Red House Painters - Have you forgotton?

Bonnie "Prince" Billy - Horses

The Mojave desert phone-booth

2007-04-30T06:13:00.000-07:00

I stumbled upon this article on wikipedia about an isolated desert phone booth.

It was placed in the middle of the Californian desert somewhere around 1960, for local miners to make 'private' phonecalls.

15 miles from the nearest highway and miles from a building, it must have been one of the most remote phonebooths. It was fully functional too: people could make phonecalls to and from the desert. And so they did... Check out this site which has truly amazing stories about the booth!

The official Mojave Phone booth site

There's even a movie about the place!

When media found out about it, the phone booth turned into a hype.

The park rangers finally got rid of the phone because of the attention it was getting, and the lack of attention the park's nature was getting...
A map of the parc is here, which shows locations of more lonely phonebooths...

I really hope they still function, so people can go there to have a private, quiet phonecall...

Blogotheque

2007-04-29T11:45:00.000-07:00

For a few months now, I have a new addiction called 'les concerts a emporter'.

A music blog called La Blogotheque - which is superb in itself - has a special little corner with beautiful take-away musicvideos.

The Paris based blog invites the freshest, hottest, newest, best indie artists to come and play.

The Arcade Fire, Cold War Kids, I'm from Barcelona, Jens Lekman, Alamo Race Track and many more have already played, and there'll be more to follow for sure...

Locations are always exciting: a busy street, hotelroom or elevator.
The songs are performed live, pure and in one take.
The atmosphere is magical!

This has to be one of the best blogs around...

10

2006-10-19T10:35:00.000-07:00

10 reminders for better architecture:

1 invent nothing
2 mix everything
3 consult artists
4 refine simply
5 take it further
6 remain enigmatic
7 embrace the old
8 separate shell from contents
9 be bold
10 learning by numbers

Ortner & Ortner.

I was surprised to find humor on the website, their architecture being very serious in my humble opinion. Not that seriousness is a problem!

Maybe it has to do with the kind of projects and their clients,
maybe with them being Austrian. Kidding!!!

silent library

2006-06-14T07:14:00.000-07:00

This is Japanese humour:
A 'gameshow' in a library, and while doing terrible tasks, remain silent.
This is an episode that stars K1 kickbox champion Ernesto Hoost.

Funny stuff...

Silent library

NYC films

2006-06-05T07:02:00.000-07:00

Little movies that show little pieces of a big city.
NYC films is a great website with independent filmmakers.
Movies on all subjects.
Nothing fake here, this is New York.

From Coney Island and Brighton Beach to Soho personal-shopping and Japanese NY...

I love it.
Take a look...

Google mask

2006-04-12T02:08:00.000-07:00

Last few years have been strange.
We're modernizing quicker than before, we've become dependant on mobile phones, the internet, cheap flights and ipods. All to be free and do what we want to do, to know what we want to know and go where we want to go.

9/11 has had its impact on global "freedom": people have re-discovered fear.
Free people suddenly see their safe surroundings transformed into bunkers, media being censored and pro-aggressive propaganda soaring sky high.

Is that progress? I can tell you, fear has reached me too.
And not because of 9/11, because of post 9/11.

This is where freedom and fear collide: google maps vs. government maps, more, more

urville

2006-04-05T09:00:00.000-07:00

Urbanism has always had its share of utopia. Ideal cities, extreme ideas and megastructures have been known since the tower of Babel.

However, urban planners and architects have had some ideas that were realized. Hausmann's grid in Paris has had it's followers and Le Corbusiers ville radieuse that has been a source for many cities.

More utopian is the work of Gilles Trehin. A 28 year old frenchman who designed Urville.
Gilles' project has become a part of his life, since starting in 1984 he has designed and thought of every aspect on urbanism and megacities.

Please visit his website, it's fascinating!

hidden camera videos

2006-03-26T12:31:00.000-08:00

This is real good stuff...

My personal favourites:
- the job interview
- the honey shop
- the bus stop

Music for One Apartment and Six Drummers

2006-03-22T06:00:00.000-08:00

Next time you go and walk the dog, carefully lock windows and doors. Maybe buy an extra set of locks. Who knows what might happen while you're away...

italian police

2006-03-13T12:00:00.000-08:00

Italian police are always helpful. Ask them for the nearest gas station and they show directions, gumball style...

DUI

2006-03-12T12:28:00.000-08:00

Two abnormal but very funny drunk driving videos!
Both sides of the ocean have special methods of testing....

America

Scotland

flashmobs

2006-03-07T14:27:00.000-08:00

They exist in various shapes and sizes, but I love every single one... Flash-mobs.
It's probably to do with the fact that it's an "in-crowd" thing: I was there, I was part of it...

wikipedia
http://www.flashmob.com/
http://www.flashmobs.info/

Here's some nice examples:
pillow fight, here's the same fight, but from another angle
red light, green light, yellow card, dusting architecture,

jonathan ross' asian invasion

2006-03-02T13:25:00.000-08:00

Fantastic 3 part series on asian movies.
3 one hour long documentaries with lots of clips, interviews and beautiful shots of asia.
wow...

part 1 japan

part 2 hong kong

part 3 korea

official bbc website on the series here.

gmail

2006-03-02T10:59:00.000-08:00

Free accounts, just leave your email-adress in the comments section.

one red paperclip

2006-02-28T04:19:00.000-08:00

Recent internet-money-making is done with crazy methods:
selling pixels, home-made crap or just plain begging.

latest method: trading.

One red paperclip is a blog by Kyle MacDonald who tries to up-trade his red paperclip; trying to end up with a house. That's trading 1 (one) red paperclip for a real house.

Don't believe he'll succeed? Well, he just traded his one cube van for a record deal!!!

brokeback parody

2006-02-27T05:08:00.000-08:00

some great parodies on the brokeback mountain movie:

spongeback mountain

bareback mountain (NSFW)

broke mac mountain

top gun 2 brokeback squadron

brokeback to the future

brokeback fiction

star wars - the empire brokeback

videos

2006-02-27T03:10:00.000-08:00

Some more amazing videos

Roundabout scratching

Ukelele player

German coastguard

German de-pimpin' part 1, 2 and 3

the wonder of accommodations....

2006-02-27T01:07:00.000-08:00

There's a bunch of tourism & accommodations videos on google video. They're 2 minute long advertisements for little towns and cities made by (or published on google video by) elocallink.tv. They're meant to be promotional, but the lack of quality and the blandness of the subjects gives them a bittersweet look perfectly suited for beautee-tristesse...

While watching a few I noticed some strange phenomena:

1: the editing of the video is the same for most of the clips.
2: the voice-over is the same for most of the clips.
3: the length of the video is mostly the same.
4: the subjects they promote in each video are the same.
and now for the big one:
5: the imagery they show in videos is the same for most clips!!!

There's probably one firm that makes all these videos. It uses stock footage of children fishing, elderly having a good time in a pub, hotel rooms, bed and breakfasts etc....

Check out these two videos: one for augusta, virginia and harrisonburg, virginia. Notice their bed and breakfasts. That's an incredible coincidence! The same name, the same sign, the same room, the same visitors!!!! Incredible!!!!!!
But there's more: clarksville, tennessee has the same b&b, and so does lynchburg, virginia.

I wonder what local governments have paid pay for these videos.

Cheney's got a gun

2006-02-25T09:10:00.000-08:00

So Dick shot the poor guy in the face.

Cue all comedy and parody:

the Aerosmith song, and another one.

Great comedy here from the today show via onegoodmove.
That site is great btw...

improv everywhere

2006-02-22T08:59:00.000-08:00

They did it again!

After numerous pranks involving no pants, suicide jumpers, mcdonalds bathroom attendants and very good subway scenes;

* breath pause *

The cellphone prank!!! with video.

Improv everywhere, check them out!

change your surroundings

2006-02-19T12:12:00.000-08:00

You all know the television commercial with thousands of colorful balls bouncing through san francisco streets.

Different setting, same music here:

Graffiti research lab did this experiment with "magnetic leds".
Great effect!