tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-59746122024-03-13T15:51:41.326-04:00Brian Nicholson's blogTrying to not be a waste of people's timeBrianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15903796919335979951noreply@blogger.comBlogger687125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5974612.post-16556672103440313862023-03-05T17:48:00.001-05:002023-03-05T17:59:27.865-05:0012 Records for '22This might be a more manageable list of records than I've written in years past, though my listening was no less wide-ranging. It might be a bit more honest, with the concision of its culling arrived at lazily, scrolling the automated iTunes playlist of 2022 records and either noting the amount of times I played it or thinking "oh, that was a good one." While a large amount of very good music Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15903796919335979951noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5974612.post-59036680291890172562022-05-13T01:25:00.001-04:002022-05-13T01:25:49.956-04:00My Friend Alex I am very proud and happy for my friend Alex Tripp, who is coming out as trans and beginning a regimen of hormone replacement therapy. I have many times referred to Alex, conversationally, as my best friend, with occasional qualifiers of context like "who I met in college." We met when we were both eighteen, and we're both thirty-six now. That's half a lifetime. She's one of the people I Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15903796919335979951noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5974612.post-59768689653603995972021-12-27T15:34:00.003-05:002022-02-11T01:48:11.347-05:00Top Books Of Recent YearsIn the past I've done brief write-ups of all the books I read in the period of time since my last set of write-ups, and that slowly became too exhausting to contemplate, so I am not going to attempt that again. I did want to mention books that were new, at least, so here's the list of my favorite books released in the past two years. My attention span was sort of fried by the COVID era and I Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15903796919335979951noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5974612.post-21403407550701629162021-12-02T14:33:00.003-05:002021-12-07T00:41:10.319-05:00Favorite records of the second half of 2021Rather than doing a firm "best records of 2021" post, consider this the continuation of a list I began in the middle of the year. Again, I'm not necessarily trying to offer a firm or definitive ranking, as the fact that I'm not reshuffling those earlier entries among these for a definitive numbered order should indicate. There are small sub-sections based around genre for the sake of aiding a Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15903796919335979951noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5974612.post-70857477834660401682021-09-05T19:55:00.000-04:002021-09-05T19:55:37.557-04:00The Discourse Is A Drug Dealer With a Stolen Script One of the things that sort of sneaks up on you over the course of aging is how many things of consequence could reasonably be a part of your past. The longer a life gets, the fuller it could have been. While in my early twenties I could make jokes premised on the presumed absurdity that I would have an ex-wife, or had formerly been addicted to heroin, nowadays enough time has elapsed in Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15903796919335979951noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5974612.post-25023975391048799502021-08-06T06:14:00.003-04:002021-08-06T12:05:08.568-04:00DON'T LET ME DIE COMPLICIT IN THE CONSTRUCTION OF MY HELL I am a longtime holdout against smartphones, but during the course of COVID I received word that my old dumb phone would soon cease functioning. AT&T was shutting down its 3G network, in favor of 5G, and even though I'd read articles about how the wavelengths a 5G network uses were going to make weather prediction less accurate and therefore would endanger people as climate change got Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15903796919335979951noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5974612.post-41189733590471361432021-06-30T01:44:00.003-04:002021-08-27T00:28:15.353-04:00Favorite Records Of The First Half of 2021I have thought for the past few years that doing more regular music posts would be far more manageable, and potentially more useful, than doing a single year-end list. Of course, I don't really have the motivation to actually try to track down a position writing about music anywhere. I'm bad at it usually, and I'm not sure how much I value the current expectations of the form. (My ideal is the Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15903796919335979951noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5974612.post-5375385231825100082021-05-21T14:23:00.005-04:002021-05-21T18:50:41.100-04:00UFO Or Diamond As lockdown ends, and people potentially can return to a world of casual socializing, there remains a question of what there is to talk about. The ongoing catastrophe has impressed upon us a fatalistic worldview that no one wants to hear about at a party. The news offers its share of celebrity gossip and political flashpoints, but those present their own pitfalls. Thankfully, we have news Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15903796919335979951noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5974612.post-92011268062598880242020-12-02T13:18:00.005-05:002020-12-02T19:24:46.225-05:002020 Music: I Barely Paid Attention Damn, it was a weird year. While last year I was working in a
record store for half of it, and keeping note of everything I heard the
whole way through, this year I was not doing that. I would listen to
things on Bandcamp or Youtube maybe once if I was vaguely interested,
and then immediately move on to forgetting all about it if it didn’t
make an impression. Most music existed only Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15903796919335979951noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5974612.post-68712699439028748822020-08-18T11:56:00.004-04:002020-08-19T01:11:37.957-04:00Losing So LongI keep on thinking that one of the reasons Bernie Sanders’ presidential
campaign failed is because the leftist argument he made, that even when
he won, people would need to continue fighting and protesting in order
to get the things we demand is just hugely unappealing to normal people
not invested in politics. What’s funny is that, by default, this
argument now needs to be made to all of Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15903796919335979951noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5974612.post-24742521528045892192020-08-02T16:09:00.003-04:002021-09-13T00:41:47.008-04:00On Music And Being AliveIt surely happens every day, but it only comes up every three or four months. Someone projects their insecurities onto the world at large, aimed in particular at whoever makes them feel insecure. The postulation is made that people who like “weird music” are only pretending to like it, that there is something performative to the act of listening. This is done, it is said, for the sake of Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15903796919335979951noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5974612.post-90236779359105892552020-06-01T04:31:00.002-04:002020-06-01T04:39:05.556-04:00America Riots While Baltimore Doesn'tSo, over the past weekend, in response to the Minneapolis Police Department murdering George Floyd (a black man, known as Big Floyd to fans of DJ Screw and the Screwed Up Click), and his death being caught on camera for all to see, and the delay in any action to arrest the officer responsible for murder, there have been a series of protests nationwide. In Minneapolis, these protests gave way to Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15903796919335979951noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5974612.post-47677986576662947522020-05-05T13:12:00.000-04:002020-05-05T13:12:06.597-04:00What Happened by Joe BidenI wrote a long piece from the perspective of a dementia-ridden Joe Biden regretting what went wrong in his campaign after he loses to Trump in November. Ideally it will circulate like a real thing, although it is far too lazily-researched and filled with jokes to constitute a hoax. Content warnings are necessary for all the stuff Joe Biden has done that are triggering to think about, you already Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15903796919335979951noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5974612.post-24291677343353541532020-04-20T00:13:00.002-04:002020-04-20T13:03:14.225-04:002019 MusicLast year, I kept a list of every 2019 record I heard. Originally, the idea for this was so I would have a better idea of what new music I liked, so that I could recommend things to people who came into the record store I worked at. I kept the list going after I quit the job. Now, having kept a fairly exhaustive record of my reactions to things -- I gave records a little numeric notation, a scaleBrianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15903796919335979951noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5974612.post-8596203416745711252020-04-03T03:36:00.003-04:002021-02-07T00:34:04.537-05:00American Failure In The Light Of Covid-19So I still have no intention of voting for Joe Biden, in case you were wondering. In 2016 I begrudgingly voted for Hillary Clinton, thinking “I should vote, on behalf of the people who can’t,” imagining a population of people in prison or who otherwise would get their vote suppressed, people of color who were worried about the prospect of a Trump presidency. In 2020, it feels impossible to make Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15903796919335979951noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5974612.post-27697690391774797002020-03-18T13:33:00.001-04:002020-03-18T13:33:41.343-04:00How Many Eyes Do You Need To See?A few months ago, I was officially diagnosed with glaucoma. This was a good thing, inasmuch as I waiting for a diagnosis. A few months before I had seen the neuro-opthalmologist who gave this diagnosis, and prescribed eyedrops to begin a course of treatment, I had seen an opthalmologist who noted the high amounts of pressure in my eye, but gave me a referral to see another doctor instead, becauseBrianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15903796919335979951noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5974612.post-66481545185369763882020-02-13T21:16:00.000-05:002020-02-13T21:16:18.920-05:00BERNIE 2020This time last year, everyone who announced they were running for the Democratic nomination was running using chunks of Bernie Sanders' 2016 platform. Everyone supported a $15 minimum wage and Medicare-For-All. It was then announced that the health insurance industry was going to go all out in terms of the money they were going to spend against a single-payer system, and as the months went on, Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15903796919335979951noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5974612.post-54820189297206798622019-10-07T17:18:00.003-04:002019-10-07T17:18:51.246-04:00Status UpdateIt’s been a bad year, and it isn’t over yet. Without getting into all of it up front, I’ll just say that I decided to take the step of leaving the city of Baltimore, where I’d lived for eleven years, in an attempt to regain control of my life and subsequently improve it. The second part of the plan has yet to come to fruition, and things are still wildly out of control.It is very difficult to Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15903796919335979951noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5974612.post-86382190833419247012019-10-03T11:56:00.001-04:002019-10-03T11:56:01.478-04:00NO ONE UNDER FORTY IS GOING TO VOTE FOR JOE BIDENMuch to my dismay, Joe Biden is the leading Democratic candidate in the polls. I do not think he could win an election, although I am aware that in polls showing match-ups with Trump, it is Biden that wins by the largest margin. I do not think this is true, although I do generally think that anyone could win against Trump, as he is historically unpopular. I know people imagine that Bernie SandersBrianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15903796919335979951noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5974612.post-29302959253114352892018-12-13T01:53:00.001-05:002018-12-13T01:53:15.960-05:00Books I read in 2018I am attempting something slightly different with this post writing up various books I've read so far this year. I am not quite writing them all immediately after reading, but am trying to keep up a little while at the same time delaying the posting until I read a bunch of books I am anticipating reading that I think I will like enough to recommend to others. But let's begin with the explorationsBrianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15903796919335979951noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5974612.post-53420346549714067532018-12-08T00:12:00.003-05:002020-12-02T15:29:15.095-05:002018 MusicDuring the past twelve months of working at a music store that actively stocks new releases, I kept track of what I heard that was released this year that was remotely of interest. I also kept track of all the things I heard and investigated via the internet. I am actually in a pretty good position to do a year-end "the year in music" post. The main thing working against me is just the feeling Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15903796919335979951noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5974612.post-74996429285827004742017-12-11T09:37:00.002-05:002017-12-11T09:37:47.871-05:00Catching Up On Writing About My ReadingI am not reading nearly as much as I did a few years ago, when lists of all the books I read in a year would appear on this blog, with a handful of entries including links to longform reviews I wrote elsewhere. Partly this is because the main venue where those reviews would appear is now defunct, and the other sources by which I would find out about books, both new and old, seems largely to have Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15903796919335979951noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5974612.post-43098542008126885032017-12-05T00:18:00.000-05:002017-12-29T23:13:15.054-05:00Music of 2017
As I began to write this post, I realized that the "jazz phase" that defined most of my music listening for the last few years, so much so that I thought it would just be a fact that would define my thirties, seems to have past. I am back to the land of song as a form of direct emotional communication from the singer to the listener. Weird jams to bring the listener into tripped out zones took aBrianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15903796919335979951noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5974612.post-33849118994544296372016-12-06T13:41:00.000-05:002017-01-15T03:47:20.834-05:00Music In 2016Ideally, I would've written about music throughout the year. Year-end lists attempt to make a canon or time capsule, but I realized that every time I buy a piece of music as physical media I am doing so based on the assumption that it is something I will want to return to in the future, and so I desire the physical form as a reminder of its existence. There should be more to music listening, to Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15903796919335979951noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5974612.post-23082418192917612202016-01-13T02:06:00.001-05:002016-01-13T10:32:55.288-05:00Books I Read In 2015
The idea of writing about all the books I read this year is an exhausting proposition. This is not necessarily because I just read SO MUCH, but because of much of what I read I found exhausting. Some things took a long time to read, others were started and left unfinished, but whether I will pick them up again or leave them to collect dust is still unclear. Still, I read enough things I either Brianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15903796919335979951noreply@blogger.com0