Crappy Mic Test... This is One of My Missions

Tosca in PHL

Tracks I am said to say or have said I love or have loved at one time or another:

La piqûre - Karkwa
You Can't Always Get What You Want - The Rolling Stones
I Wish I Had an Evil Twin - The Magnetic Fields
La Folie - The Stranglers
Scattered Pearls - Casiotone for the Painfully Alone
All the Umbrellas in London - The Magnetic Fields
Swan Lake: Act II. No. 14 Scène - Пётр Ильич Чайковский
It's A Wonderful Life - Sparklehorse
Lovely Day - Pixies
The flood in your old town - Candy Bars
Manta Ray - Pixies
You Are a Runner and I Am My Father's Son - Wolf Parade
Singapore - Tom Waits
Bitties in the BK Lounge - De La Soul
Instant Karma - John Hiatt
Kisses Over Babylon - Edward Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeros
Ghost - Neutral Milk Hotel
A Shot In The Dark - Henry Mancini
1-2. Rachmaninov All-Night Vigil, 'Vespers' - Bless The Lord, O My Soull  E. Wimeri - E. Wimeri, Finnish National Opera Chorus
Swallow - My Bloody Valentine
Cowbell - Tapes 'n Tapes
Dance Yrself Clean - LCD Soundsystem
Drunk Girls - LCD Soundsystem
Jus De Canneberges - Malajube
What Dogs See - Cymbals Eat Guitars
Hand-Me-Downs - Soul Position
I Was Born (A Unicorn) - The Unicorns
Comfort Eagle - CAKE
Hysteric - Yeah Yeah Yeahs
Swans (Life After Death) - Islands
Gone Daddy Gone - Violent Femmes
Red Moon - The Walkmen
Black Cadillacs - Modest Mouse
Cleanse Song - Bright Eyes
Take It Easy - Surfer Blood
What We Had - Handsome Furs
Three Peaches - Neutral Milk Hotel
Commander Riker's Party - Think About Life
Treats - Sleigh Bells
In the Summertime - The Rural Alberta Advantage
Try - Colourmusic
Add It Up - Violent Femmes
Education - Modest Mouse
Joset of Nazareth's Blues - Titus Andronicus
The Skin of My Yellow Country Teeth - Clap Your Hands Say Yeah
Marching Theme - Neutral Milk Hotel
Lover I Don't Have to Love - Bright Eyes
Dear Sons and Daughters of Hungry Ghosts - Wolf Parade
Me And My Hand - Broken Social Scene
Spanish Gold, 2044 - Swan Lake
Handsome Furs Hate This City - Handsome Furs
Satan Said Dance - Clap Your Hands Say Yeah
Nature Springs - The Good, the Bad & the Queen
Cans - Tunng
Don't Haunt This Place - The Rural Alberta Advantage
The Deadroads - The Rural Alberta Advantage
White Light/White Heat - The Velvet Underground
Teeth in the Grass - Iron & Wine
Suco De Tangerina - Beastie Boys
Ode To Sunshine - Delta Spirit
English House - Fleet Foxes
Albert Camus - Titus Andronicus
The Gleam Pt. 2 - The Microphones
Let's Dance To Joy Division - The Wombats
A Bugged In Selection By Erol Alkan - Erol Alkan
Tessellate - Tokyo Police Club
Rabbit Habits - Man Man
clap your hands - Pale Young Gentlemen
Remember Severed Head - Clues
Left Foot Stepdown - The Bees
Anne Elephant - Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin
(I'm A) Donkey For Your Love - BOAT
Railroad Man - Eels
March Into The Sea - Modest Mouse
Kiss Me Like You Mean It - The Magnetic Fields
Elope - Clues
Cannibal Resource - Dirty Projectors
Cave Mouth - Clues
Haarp - Clues
Two Characters in Search of a Country Song - The Magnetic Fields
Le Ruse - Tapes 'n Tapes
Healer - Chromatics
Volcanoes - Islands
Park Song - The Dodos
Shine a Light - Wolf Parade
Heavy Metal - Clap Your Hands Say Yeah
Stay Positive - The Hold Steady
Whalebones - Man Man
The District Sleeps Alone Tonight - The Postal Service
Mr. Soul - Neil Young
I'm Not Asleep - Vivian Girls
dropz - Peter Nalitch
Requiem - Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Stop Breakin' Down Blues - Robert Johnson
Fields Are Breathing - Black Moth Super Rainbow
Gloria In Excelsis Deo - Antonio Vivaldi
Wanted Man (Live) - Johnny Cash
Hungarian Dance No. 5 - Johannes Brahms
The Maestro - Beastie Boys
Over and Over Again (Lost and Found) - Clap Your Hands Say Yeah
The World at Large - Modest Mouse
Haunted Graffiti - Ariel Pink's Haunted Graffiti
The Blue Danube - Johann Strauss II
No One Knows - Queens of the Stone Age
Someday Speaks Loudly - Colourmusic
Bang Bang (My Baby Shot Me Down) - Nancy Sinatra
Kiss Kiss Is Getting Old - Les Savy Fav
Willow Tree - Chad VanGaalen
80's Life - The Good, the Bad & the Queen
Running Up That Hill - Chromatics
Young Shields - Casiotone for the Painfully Alone
TNT - Tortoise
Melody - Serge Gainsbourg
With the Lights Turned Down - Throw Me the Statue
Gigantic Transatlantic Trunk Call (Bonus Track) - A.C. Newman
Gin & Milk - Dirty Pretty Things
MKK3 - These New Puritans
Andante Festivo - Jean Sibelius
Epitaph For My Heart - The Magnetic Fields
Windsurfing Nation - Broken Social Scene
White Queen to Black Knight - Six Finger Satellite
Time to Get Away - LCD Soundsystem
Thunder & Lightning - The Unicorns
Hallelujah - Leonard Cohen
Dinner Bells - Wolf Parade
The Ballad Of Butter Beans - Man Man
As A War - Pale Young Gentlemen
Put in A Little Gas - Colourmusic
Violets - Candy Bars
Tsuxiit - Islands
The Passenger - Iggy Pop
Modern World - Wolf Parade
Bullets - Tunng
Mykonos - Fleet Foxes
Crows - Clues
Perfect Fit - Clues
You Have My Eyes Now - Clues
In the Dream - Clues
Approach the Throne - Clues
Jogging Gorgeous Summer - Islands
Body - Mother Mother
If I Were A Carp - Final Fantasy
Digital - Joy Division
Le voyage de Penelope - Air
Cassius - Foals
The Gospel Song - Colourmusic
Dignified and Old - The Modern Lovers
Time To Pretend - MGMT
Forgiveness - Yeasayer
Circles - Colourmusic
Dead City/Waste Wilderness - Abe Vigoda
Eyepennies - Sparklehorse
Chrome's On It - Telepathe
Scene 7: Air de Mephistopheles: `Voici des roses' - Hector Berlioz
High On A Hill - The Little Ones
Challenge - Japanther
My Night With the Prostitute from Marseille - Beirut
The Basque Country - Candy Bars
Seventy-Nine - Japanther
Oh! How The Dogs Stack Up - Mogwai
Allegro - Franz Joseph Haydn
Partie Traumatic - Black Kids
Future Reflections - MGMT
God? - The Dodos
Sinking Feeling - Mixel Pixel
Blackout! - The Cloud Room
Из ресторана - Peter Nalitch
Your Pretty Sphinx Voice - The Sour Notes
Bad Kids - Black Lips
All Night - Figurines
Red And Purple - The Dodos
Sunshine and Clouds (and Everything Proud) - Clap Your Hands Say Yeah
Humans - Islands
Looking Over My Shoulder - A Big Yes And A Small No
Cupid Always Misses (The Ba Ba Song) - The Muttering Retreats
What A Fucking Mess This Turned Out To Be - A Big Yes And A Small No
Claire, Are We Safe To Be On Our Own? - The Deirdres
2080 - Yeasayer
Allegory Gets Me Hot - Times New Viking
Faded Away - A Big Yes And A Small No
Upon Viewing Brueghel's "Landscape With The Fall of Icarus" - Titus Andronicus
Midnight And I - White Rabbits
Контрабанды - Мумий Тролль
Nightless Night - Husky Rescue
Herring Bone - Department of Eagles
Act III: Sull'aria - Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Mozart: Le Nozze di Figaro: Voi che sapete, che cosa e amor - Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Mozart: Le Nozze di Figaro: Overture - Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Night Drive - Chromatics
Feedback in the Field - Plants and Animals
Is This Love? - Clap Your Hands Say Yeah
Fear and Loathing in Mahwah, NJ - Titus Andronicus
Mind Traveler's Song - Univox
Pi - Univox
Ghost Under Rocks - Ra Ra Riot
Hospital - The Modern Lovers
Spring Song - Colourmusic
Mercy - Plants and Animals
Three Changes - The Good, the Bad & the Queen
Chicken Pox - I'm from Barcelona
Love Will Tear Us Apart - Joy Division
Poor Jackie - Man Man
Long-Forgotten Fairytale - The Magnetic Fields
At the Bottom of Everything - Bright Eyes
Rehab - Amy Winehouse
Crowd of Drifters - The Magnetic Fields
Hallelujah - Jeff Buckley
King Tubby Meets Rockers Uptown - Augustus Pablo
The Movement of a Hand - Bright Eyes
Unforgettable Season - Cut Copy
A Simple Way to Go Faster Than Light That Does Not Work - Tortoise
Creep - Radiohead
Honeybear - Yeah Yeah Yeahs
Lua - Bright Eyes
Cloche - French Kicks
I'll Believe in Anything - Wolf Parade
Kingdom of Doom - The Good, the Bad & the Queen
String - Tunng
Ariel Ramirez - Richard Buckner
Major Label Debut - Broken Social Scene
Mask - Chromatics
Promise - Violent Femmes
I Heard It Through The Grapevine - The Slits
A Song for the Deaf - Queens of the Stone Age
The Hunger - The Cloud Room
Titus Andronicus - Titus Andronicus
I Believe in Symmetry - Bright Eyes
Ibi Dreams of Pavement (A Better Day) - Broken Social Scene
O Lazy Days - M. Ward
Jail Guitar Doors - The Clash
Down Boy - Yeah Yeah Yeahs
Infinitely Late at Night - The Magnetic Fields
Arms - Tunng
Bodysnatchers - Radiohead
Blood On Our Hands (Justice Remix) - Death from Above 1979
Stairway to Heaven - Rodrigo y Gabriela
Us Ones in Between - Sunset Rubdown
Crosstown Traffic - Jimi Hendrix
Nimrod's Son - Pixies
The Spider And The Fly - Elf Power
Oh Comely - Neutral Milk Hotel
The Boxer - Simon & Garfunkel
Landlocked Blues - Bright Eyes
In Heaven/Where is My Mind? - Pixies
Passing Me By - The Pharcyde
Love Song No. 7 - Clap Your Hands Say Yeah
Dancing with Jean-Maurice (Album Version) - Les Pires
Guilty Rocks - múm
The Russian - The Bees
Veni Vidi Vici - Black Lips
B For My Name - Beastie Boys
El Condor Pasa (If I Could) - Simon & Garfunkel
Nude - Radiohead
Brazil - Arcade Fire
Neighborhood #2 (Laïka) - Arcade Fire
Everything Is - Neutral Milk Hotel
Wet And Rusting - Menomena
Bang Your Drum - Wolf Parade
Winter Windows - Sea Wolf
Why? - Andrew Bird
Tango Till They're Sore - Tom Waits
Lil' Red Riding Hood - Sam the Sham & The Pharaohs
Tight Fit - New Young Pony Club
Ice Cream - New Young Pony Club
In the Rushes - Islands
Abominable Snow - Islands
Missing Pieces - Voxtrot
Emasculate the Masculine - The Unicorns
Panis Et Circenses - Os Mutantes
No Cars Go - Arcade Fire
Right in the Head - M. Ward
The Captain - The Knife
Happy - The Wrens
Peel Back The Moon, Beware! - Elf Power
Everyday I Love You Less and Less - Kaiser Chiefs
Song for the Dead - Sea Wolf
Jumping Someone Else's Train - The Cure
Mama, Won't You Keep Those Castles In The Air And Burning? - Clap Your Hands Say Yeah
Shoplifters of the World Unite - The Smiths
If - Islands
Carry Around - Annuals
The Well and the Lighthouse - Arcade Fire
The Truth (feat. Roisin and J-Live) - Handsome Boy Modeling School
Bratislava - Beirut
Smoke and Mirrors - The Magnetic Fields
Walking In My Shoes - Depeche Mode
Neighborhood #1 (Tunnels) - Arcade Fire
Israelites - Desmond Dekker
did i step on your trumpet? - Danielson
The State I Am In - Belle and Sebastian
Simple X - Andrew Bird
Publisher - Blonde Redhead
Quiver and Quake - Elf Power
Skin Is, My - Andrew Bird
It's a Curse - Wolf Parade
Road to Joy - Bright Eyes
Baby - Os Mutantes
Fraulein - Pale Young Gentlemen
The Prayer - Bloc Party
I Want Your Love - Chromatics
I'm Going To Stop Pretending That I Didn't Break Your Heart - Eels
Stand - The Bees
The Fool - Neutral Milk Hotel
$20 - M.I.A.
Spiral Stairs - Elf Power
Shut Up I Am Dreaming of Places Where Lovers Have Wings - Sunset Rubdown
My Light, Maria - Pale Young Gentlemen
The Dance of the Hours - The Clientele
Checkout Blues - Eels
Postcards From Italy - Beirut
Spoons - Tunng
Jodi - The Dodos

Easter Benefits for the Cute Jewess

 
 
 
 
 

Home?

When he was young, he wasn't afraid of finding himself with nothing but what he wore in a city that was new. Something changed. Now, when he thought of the doorways he had slept in, the rooftops, the subways and the ferries, he felt the hollowness. Without even being there, he felt that lonely pain. He was too old for that now. It probably happened in the past 5 years, this change, and really, most people wouldn't ever consider it a way to go. Homelessness was rough, and without an ambition, a dream to propel you through it you might get stuck. There wasn't a dream. The irony was, for all the ground he had covered, all he had traveled, he felt like he was where he began.

Without being actually homeless, sleeping in shelters or in squats, he was without anywhere he felt was home. A recording on a tape he used to listen to had a professor explaining that home wasn't a place, it was an idea, an abstract idea. It takes courage to believe in a home. Maybe for most people it wasn't anything of significance, but Jacob rarely felt that safety and surety that he associated with a home. So he checked the listings for jobs and kept his ear open for gigs that would let him satisfy the demands school made of him. It all felt like it was moving too slow. The most recent campaign had been a week or so, and was gathering momentum. Until he found a job and a room, he would be in the limbo he had known too much of.

He took his girlfriend's dog out sometimes. It struck him that he wouldn't even think of getting a dog, since he can't even take care of himself without fear. Something wasn't in him, he wasn't something that most everyone else was. Sure, he could get a job, a salary, and a lease, and maybe it would feel better, more like a home, but there would still be something fundamentally different about it all. He was always a visitor.

Elaine & Benjamin's First Date

(Not the worst) Thucydides' Mitylenian Debate

Cleon, in prosecution, presents the aggravating circumstance of Mitylene having revolted without having been oppressed by Athenian empire and, what may have been worse, allying themselves with the Spartan nemesis. Thucydides describes an interpretation of evidence, the Pelopennesian fleet having crossed the Aegean revealing the uncouth revolt to be premeditated. While the plebeians of Mitylene, under a Lacedaemonian Salaethus, having been armed faute de mieux, the expected Peloponnesian reinforcements tangled in distractions, did to their own credit immediately rise in insurrection against their officers and force the Mitylene leadership to end the revolt which represented a threat to Athens, this was not considered any substantial mitigation in what Thucydides sketches as a wrathful determination by the Athens council to execute all Mitylenian males and enslave all women and children. All of this presents a version of the scenario at the surface level, but as Diodotus articulates, it is not so cut and dry.

The penalty decreed, after the Athenians slept on it, seemed not in proportion to the crime. In considering the injustice in punishing all when among the set innocents should suffer, an appeal was scheduled. Cleon, from whom the original sentence and decree is said to have originated, makes a case to uphold said decree with Diodotus countering to reverse the decree. In spite of Cleon's sway, rather vicious reputation, and the loaded propositions of fault and impropriety among counsellors who could contrive to disagree with him, specifically that they work in deluded methods of sophism, or have sold their objectivity or allegiance, Diodotus proceeds to explain the complications involved in the determination of the Mitylenians' fate and to lay out how the advantage of Athens is compromised in Cleon's motion.

The real issue, as Diodotus insightfully states, "... is not justice, but how to make the Mitylenians useful to Athens." Diodotus makes the case that capital punishment for all, regardless of their rank or order in a revolting state, leads the logic that each man will fight to the death rather than consider a capitulation when it becomes available and clearly to advantage. This creates only more challenge and expense for Athens. What's more, if a scorched-earth policy is taken, no revenue will continue to flow, and that revenue is the very thing that lends Athens the influence she wields. Diodotus' final claim regards the working class, who by executing in this case are alienated. To do so would be to alienate the allies Athens can regard as friend in contrast to the oligarchy. Diodotus' line, in the language of his own conclusion, is rendered thus, "In short, I consider it far more useful for the preservation of our empire voluntarily to put up with injustice, than to put to death, however justly, those whom it is our interest to keep alive." He then intimates, in this ancient account, that the wheels of justice are better turned slowly, and carefully, in a remark that challenges Cleon's notion that "justice and expediency" are well matched.