I recently read Shea's blog in which he discussed his feelings about rap, and it got me thinking about my own feelings toward hip hop. I remember owning several rap cassette tapes in middle school that I listened to regularly. Tupac, Wu-tang clan, and A tribe called Quest, were a few of the groups I enjoyed. Since then, my taste for rap has diminished severely. Nowadays, I only hear rap when my roomates, or someone else, plays it--which happens occasionally. And I don't enjoy much of what I hear. ("Mike Jones! Mike Jones! Mike Jones!" somehow doesn't do it for me.) Why don't I enjoy rap? It all sounds the same: heavy bass, fake drums, dull lyrics, etc. Thinking about though, all musical catagories have their cliches. I like rock n roll, but there is certainly a sense--especialy to a niave listener--that all rock sounds the same. If there is bad rap, there must be good rap somewhere. I realize "good" is a subjective term, some people enjoy Mike Jones!, but there's gotta be some rap out there that I can listen to, maybe even a rapper who plays an instrument? If you know where it is, please let me know. Maybe I'll revisit my old tapes and see if I can regain any of my old interest.

Arts Night

I thought our performance Tuesday morning went well. The john Fox trio had some electrical problems, but still pulled off an good show. I enjoyed the lawnchair (armchair?) pirates too, I'd never seen 'em before. I thought Ben's conducting was crucial to the success of the group playing, it made it much easier to keep track of who was supposed to be playing when, and how.
I remember someone at the rehersal mentioning that just because we were playing slowly didnt mean we had to play quietly too. It was a good point, when you think "slow" you naturaly think "quiet", but why shouldnt you play slow and loud? Our "speed" ending was a good loud climactic finish. I think we all saw "speed" and our instincts told us to play it loud. (good insticts) It would be interseting, though, if we'd played really fast and really quietly.