Wednesday, December 27, 2006

Post-yuletide Bliss

Okay...it has been a while. Work has become a localized area of extreme low pressure (a vacuum) and boy does it ever SUCK! It is bad when the team (well, those who are doing most of the work) disagree with the direction the middle management wants to go. To use an analogy (as I am apt to do), it is like being told to drive a train (going about 100 MPH) to a certain location, but you are being made to go on a track that happens to be on is going the wrong direction, and over a cliff. You know that failure lies ahead, you and others have voiced this fact multiple times, but no one (that has the power to change tracks) is willing to listen. Did I say that I LOVE going to work in the mornings?

Now that I got that out of my system, let's talk about the holiday: Christmas/Xmas/Kwanza/Hanukkah/Festivus/whatever you choose to celebrate or not.

I am not going to waste my time or yours venting about the idiocy regarding whose holiday can be celebrated/what decorations (or not) can be placed where. I wanna talk about the real meaning of the season (in today's day and age)...presents! Well, one of them anyway.

2 years ago, I bought the "Smile" album/CD that Brian Wilson released after 35 years. I was blown away and moved as no music had moved me before. I listened to it over and over, in the car, at home with the headphones. I had listened to it enough to identify that a 5-note section in one track is the basis for another track toward the end of the CD. It is truly a modern symphony, 3-related movements, each telling an individual story, but together the three comprise a grander vision. Yes, I think the album is great. I thought it would take a an equivalent genius to come up with any work that is on the same level and I thought it would be years before that genius came along.

Well, that work has been released and the genius behind it, like the esteemable Mr. Wilson, has been around a while. This genius of course is Sir George Martin and the work is the new compilation of Beatles' work "Love". Like "Smile" before it, "Love" begs to be listened to in it's entirety, in one sitting. The trip is one and half hours long, but covers much ground...primarily the middle-late era ("Rubber Soul" and later) during which Sir George was the producer. The juxtaposition of bass line of one song and the lead riffs from different song, overlayed with the vocal tracks from yet again another song are in almost all instances wonderful. In my opinion, track 14 "Within You Without You/Tomorrow Never Knows" and it's seamless flow into "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" and then further into "Octopus's Garden" is the best segment of a totally enjoyable disc. The best track, when taken by itself is definitely "Strawberry Fields Forever" which starts with an acoustic version (similar to that on Beatles' Anthology 2) and slowly transitions to the full orchestra version before your very ears. If you couldn't tell, I am a huge Beatles' fan. But this wondrous album is a perfect illustration of how the lads' music transcends time and generations.

1 comment:

Beav said...

Oh!! I've been wanting to hear more of that than they show on the commercials they've been running lately. Now I'll have to get it.

Thanks for the heads up!