Start Over Is No Way To Begin

My older brother gave me a call today. I had texted him earlier in the day expressing my new love for the Descendents and we just talked about punk music/what bands I should check out and all that stuff. He got on me for never getting into The Get Up Kids. Two of my biggest regrets in my near decade of listening to punk music is never heavily getting into The Get Up Kids and Hot Water Music. I've listened to plenty of songs to understand why they are as great and appreciated as they are, but I never went out and bought all of their discography. One of the songs I used to listen to was a song "Out Of Reach" off their Something To Write Home About record. Well, I was going through my ipod to see what Get Up Kids I have and it turns out I had that album. I probably grabbed his CD and put it on my ipod a few years back. Back in the good ol' days(2003), there was no such thing as ipods so I would download music off of Kazaa and make compilations. Well, I was letting the album run while doing things on the internet and Out Of Reach came up. Heart nearly skipped a beat. Nostalgia is such a powerful thing. So many different memories. It made me think of when I had my massive headphones and would walk around school with them. I was a freshman so I probably looked really goofy. It made me think about the people I was close with. The people I would run into during the passing periods. The cold, rainy days of Carroll High School. Days that can't leave my mind. I also remember being in this really terrible band with a few friends. We somehow thought my taste in punk music, the singers taste in ska music and the drummer and other guitarist taste in metal music would make an incredible sound. Obviously it didn't. But there was one practice on a rainy October day where I started the guitar and me and Andy(the singer) sang it together with such intensity. Especially at the 2:47 mark. I remember thinking I was a hard ass too because I was playing with no shirt and my cargo shorts with that infamous strap. Classic. Doesn't sound like a big deal right? But I think those are the best things to look back at. Just being young and having fun with friends. This song can nearly bring tears if I think about it hard enough. At the 1:47 mark, I got a flash back of how I used to look at someone. Isn't that ridiculous?! Nostalgia! Music! It can remind you of how you look at someone! What was it? The 3rd wing of Carroll? Upstairs. I can remember exactly how and where I would stand. The exact position my head was cocked. The exact $11 blue Wal-Mart hoodie with the self made thumb holes that I would wear. The exact position the trees were around me. You gotta love it man.

I love how a majority of the videos I post on this are of soft songs. I don't care though. It's great music. Please excuse some of the images on the video. It was the only one I could find of the song that wasn't live and with bad sound quality. So here it is.



The Get Up Kids - Out Of Reach - MyVideo

There's room to believe
out of sight
out of mind
out of reach
start over is no way to begin

Tell Them It’s Three Years That They'll Have To Wait As Their Whole World Implodes

Got in the car with my brother and two friends to make the never ending drive to College Station so we could catch the Propagandhi show the next day in Austin. We didn't exactly have a place to stay in Austin. We made a stop at Dairy Queen for some delicious ice cream. Can't go wrong with a vanilla ice cream cone. Anyway, it was at this point to where I took over the driving. While I do hate driving the road to CS, I don't mind it when there is good music and friends. So we put in Supporting Caste because it was only fitting to listen to the band we're going to see the next day. I'm driving, getting into the music, and see this sheriff just cruising on the shoulder of the road maybe 40-50mph. Pass him. No biggie. Well about 2 minutes later he comes up behind me. I go to the side to let him pass. He doesn't pass me. I'm going straight up 70mph. I had the cruise control set. No speeding whatsoever. I go to the side again. He still doesn't pass me. Well after about another 5 minutes of being on my ass, he turns on his lights and pulls me over. Big, hick, stereotypical Texas sheriff. I knew I didn't do anything wrong so while yeah, I was a bit nervous cause it's a sheriff, I wasn't freaking out. Pretty nice guy. Gave me a weird stare along with everyone else. He asked us why we were moving around so much. I said "because we were listening to Propagandhi." Asked us why we were headed where we were. I said "We're going to a punk show!" Apparently my heart was beating fast so he asked me to step outside of the car. I turned to my brother and smiled/opened my mouth in shock. He was quick to ask why I looked at him as I stepped out. "Is he your boss? Does he tell you what to and not to do?" I quickly counter with "Heyyyyyy! That's my twin brother! Can you believe it!?" He responds laughing and saying how much we don't look alike. I love when sarcasm goes over peoples heads. He got all our ID's. He took me behind the car to ask me some questions. Told me that we were all moving around in the car too much. This following part is not a joke made up for humor effect. He asks what schools we all go to(which I couldn't have been with a better crowd). I repeated what they had told him earlier including what school I go to: Cornell, Brown, Texas A&M and San Francisco Conservatory of Music. He asks me, "Aw yeah? Where's that at?" WHAT?! I calmly say "uhh San Francisco." He then asks if I'm in a band. Lighnting was going through my body when he asked me that but I again just said no. We shared a few sarcastic laughs. While he was scanning our ID's and I was just standing on the side of the road by myself, another cop showed up. But he had a nice doggie with him. Searched around and in my friends car for drugs. It was probably at the point where I saw the drug dog in my friends car to where I was like "DAMN. This is happening!" Shared a few more sarcastic laughs with him. Told him he could call me Raz cause earlier he had said how he couldn't pronounce my name and wanted to call me Raz. Got back in the car and took off. Why did we get pulled over? Why did we get accused of having drugs on us? Why?

Because we were jamming Propagandhi's Supporting Caste too fucking hard.


Propagandhi-Back To The Motor League

So it was time. Time to see one of the most legendary punk bands of all time. I was time to see Propagandhi. Canadian Rifle played first. Eh. Ok. Not terrible stuff. Drummer was good. Bridge and Tunnel played next. Never heard them before that night. I was really impressed. TONS of energy and really good music. Next was Trash Talk. Idk man, I'm still waiting to hear why they went on stage and refused to play music. They got half their name right...cause it certainly was TRASH. BURN. Anyway, it was terrible hardcore thrash music. I wanted to kick every slam dancer in the face. Who does that? At a Propagandhi show? Really? It was just god awful music. Propagandhi came on and didn't disappoint. Playing tons of Supporting Caste along with a lot of old classics. The pit was solid. It could have been bigger. Todd has the most intense fist pumps. Chris's voice just never goes flat or sharp. Great show. Great experience. Great times.

I Don't Want To Believe That All Of The Above Is True

1. Bomb The Music Industry-Scrambles
2. Dillinger Four-Civil War
3. Dead To Me-Cuban Ballerina
4. The Descendents-Milo Goes To College
5. The Descendents-I Don't Want To Grow Up
6. Alkaline Trio-Maybe I'll Catch Fire
7. Piebald-We Are The Only Friends We Have
8. Straighten Things Out-Dawn Of A New Hope
9. Straighten Things Out-I Think We Better Split Up
10. Transit-Stay Home
11. Transit-This Will Not Define Us
12. This Is A Standoff-Be Disappointed
So these are all the albums I have just received. Anyone who knows me knows damn well how strict I am about getting the full appreciation for albums. I don't believe in listening to 5+ records at a time because then you pick favorites and end up neglecting. I'm combining albums on different blank CD's. I usually only listen to a max of 3 records at a time. Propagandhi's Supporting Caste is on it's last leg and Hit The Switch comes out with a new record the 30th so that leaves 2 available spots. Who's it gunna be? Well I had already been listening to The Descendents albums here and there so I'm going to go ahead and make it that.

This is really the main point of this post. Lets rewind back to June and July of 2006. Ready? It was summer time. It was a good time. I had this situation to where I knew what was going to happen with a certain girl but it wouldn't happen until August for details that don't really matter. It was a foregone conclusion. Anyway, the beginning of relationships are always the best because both parties are so fake with each other. It's so happy. So outgoing. You think to yourself, "I'm with the best girl ever! How could we ever fight?!" But it's once the girl realizes your in the relationship to stay till she shows her true psychotic/insecure/jealous/mentally unstable side. Haha it happens every time and it's hilarious. Anyway, I started getting into the Euro punk label Bells On Records. One of the bands they had signed was Straighten Things Out. I listened to their myspace religiously. Fuck, one of their songs "My Daily Wreck" was my myspace profile song! That's huge! So when your going through good times and listening to good music, obviously that music will make its impact. Those 4 songs off that myspace are songs that make me way nostalgic about that stretch of time that was really great for me. Well I'm just now getting all of that album. I want to add the This Is A Stand Off album but there isn't enough space. Should I take off those songs that remind me of those times so I could make the space? I would skip them anyway so why even put them on? Because I have to! I can't just take away the flow an album. They made it like that for a reason. And I've never had those songs on a CD. I want to hear the correct next song that is going to come on just like the rest of their fans do you know? So then I think to myself, can't I just listen to them again and again and ERASE and create NEW memories? This is something I have always been 100% against and have never considered. Sure, I listen to music I used to listen to from high school/early college but those are just one time deals. So I've spent nearly all day thinking about this. Is it even possible? What if it just ends up me feeling shitty every time I listen to it? I felt like I needed a brain the size of the mars attacks aliens to figure this out. I asked two of my good friends Mario and Lydia and they said it would be impossible to make new memories. That it would just keep burning and burning. Still haven't made up my mind. I don't plan on listening to them until mid June/early July anyway so I still have time to think about it. I looked everywhere for a video/mp3/something of the song My Daily Wreck, but no luck. There was a live video but the quality wasn't good. But you can listen to another song(same situation as My Daily Wreck) by them that impacts me almost as much as that one here.

WARNING: If you love acoustic stuff, you will love this

Joey Cape-I'm Not Gonna Save You

I found out the other day that I, Raziel I have the biggest man crush on Joey Cape Gonzalez has been given the opportunity to finally see his hero. I've expressed my love and why I love his music on here so much before so there is no need to further elaborate. June 30th, I'll be there in San Antonio, balling my eyes out trying to touch his shoes. I can't wait.

It's You And Her Against This Cruel World

Happy Lagwagon Day! If your a close friend, you knew this post was coming. What can I say? The man to the right is my fucking hero. The man who is responsible for writing my absolute favorite song of all time. Joey Cape. I can't even begin to put into words what it means to me. "It's just another saturday." Every May 16th for the last 6 or so years, I have jammed Lagwagon's May 16th the entire day. When I say that, I mean it. I have it playing right now via myspace. When I go to my room I will put it on my Ihome. When I go to play Call of Duty in a little bit, I will gladly get killed more due to not being able to hear because I got May 16th playing. Anywhere I go today I will have it being played in my car. I go all out for this. Someone should make me a shirt. It reminds me most of that near perfect summer of 2004. Partying with friends. Playing shitty punk covers with my brother and Joe. Being off the hook with the girl I had been involved with for a good while. Regularly hanging out with different ladies(I was 14 so this was big). Saying goodbye to an at the time friend. Playing basketball. Just fucking enjoying that sun that the summer brings every year. I know that sounds dumb, but you should know what I mean. I want to get married on May 16th. I want the song me and my wife first slow dance to at my wedding to be May 16th. I want it to be played at my funeral. Why? Because this song pretty much sums it up. It has been my favorite song since the day I heard it and it will always remain like that. Sure, possibly better songs with way better melody and intensity(A Wilhelm Scream) and all that stuff may come around but there's nothing that could possibly overtake my never ending love for this song. Thats heart. Thats love. This song is everything I am.

Wasn't it just the other post I was talking about how crucial music was at parties? Well I had a pretty damn unexpected experience with this. Two nights ago, I went back to Islander Village or the Fountains or whatever it's called to party at another apartment there. 3 girls owned the place. It was a fun time. Only 10 or so people. Kings cup. Beer pong. Country song. Rap song. Dance song. Blah blah blah I'm more than used to it so I don't have a problem. Besides, it's not like its my place so I'm not going to bitch about the music. Anyway. Someone drew an ace during Kings cup so you all know what means, avalanche. I was maybe the 3rd or 4th person to the right so I got a legit amount of time to drink. While I was pouring the lovely bottle of bud light down to my stomach who would eventually hate me for it, a song came on that made me nearly spit my drink out. A song SO out of left field. I was in disbelief that I was hearing it. But that beginning guitar riff was exactly what I thought it was. Brand New's The Queit Things That No One Ever Knows. I was so happy that I started moving to the music during the avalanche. Loved it. One of the girls at the party had been going to warped since 03 so she dug the whole pop punk deal. There was more Brand New (Your Favorite Weapon) played along with songs off Taking Back Sundays Tell All Your Friends album. What a bad ass girl, right? Because of the randomness of that being played and the large amount of alcohol I consumed that night, I will easily put that on one of the top 10 best parties I've ever been to.

I played at Starbucks last night again and it may have been the last time I do that. One person showed up that I was actually surprised she did. Usually when you tell someone/exchange numbers at a party for plans a week ahead, they don't go through. I've enjoyed my friday nights the past month. It's been play at starbucks, hang out, then party. I love that but I'm kind of tired of playing there. The only way I'll play there now is if people request it. People meaning my friends.


Lagwagon-May 16th

Happy Lagwagon day everyone.

How Do I Go On When Your Part Of Meeee. I'm Dying Inside Each Time I See You. Don't Lose Sight Of Me Cause You're All I See

It's 1am and damnit I want to party. BUT, most people I party with were studying tonight and my close friends are still up in Austin/College Station. Thus, I have been forced to do another one of these. Hows the guitar playing been? Not really there. I haven't been playing anymore than an hour or two a day. Why? Because I really went nuts this past school year and everyone deserves a break. I know my discipline and motivation will sky rocket the second I step foot on San Francisco soil. I was so unfocused on classical guitar today that when Rufio's "Above Me" came up on my ihome, I went to my game room, blew the dust off my old electric guitar, grabbed the amp, and took it to my room to play along. I got off shuffle and went to their album Perhaps I Suppose. The shuffle feature was still on but I didn't bother turning it off. Why is that relative? Because about 6 or 7 songs in, Raining In September came on when Road To Recovery had still yet to be played. Therefore leaving a what? 57% chance of it coming on after that? Well right as I hit the last chord for Raining In September I heard the sweet bass line for Road To Recovery and got super stoked. If you haven't listened to this album which I'm sure you haven't, those two songs are back to back so thats why it was so pleasing. Muscle memory is really in an amazing thing. It's been literally years since I've played through those songs. Playing them brought back so many awesome memories of late 8th grade and most of freshman year of high school. Walking around Carroll with my huge discman, theatre rehearsals, skipping 7th period, the parties, the cheesy girl crushes I had, the rainy Carroll days, just really everything about Carroll for those times. It was fantastic. I wanted to put Rufio shirt I'm wearing above to just go all out but was too lazy to find it. I found myself laughing at songs like "One Slow Dance," "Just A Memory" and "Road To Recovery." The lyrics are so incredibly terrible and cheesy. They are to all of them really.

Love is a bitch.
All relationships end.

You and me dancing the night away
You can feel my heart beating so hard.
We look eye to eye
And I'm swept away.

I remember you and me when we used to
Laugh all night until we fell asleep, oh
And i know we're through
But i've still got thoughts of you left inside my head

I was 14 years old...give me a break.

So as you should have read a few weeks back, I'm teaching. Teaching is pretty fun. A little frustrating at times since I'm dealing with two little girls but it's mainly fun. Catalina, one of my students, is this cute little blonde girl who is super goofy. I'm usually laughing the entire lessons because of the things she says. She told me she wants to be a singer when she grows up and go to either Harvard or Texas A&M CC. Fair enough. Well whenever she doesn't remember something, I write it on her paper and I usually say "I'm going to write that down." Well the first lesson I had with her I asked her how old she was, what school she went to, all that stuff. Well I had forgotten I asked her both those and so I ask how old she was. She says "7. Haven't I already told you that?" Then I ask her what school she went to and she responds "I already told you that too! Windsor Park! Write THAT down!" OWNED.


That fucking esurance song.

I seriously die a little every time this comes up on TV. I only watch two channels(ESPN and Comedy Central) and EVERY TIME with out fail this song seems to make me forget about the episode of Scrubs that made me want to change my life or the news on ESPN. It bothers the never ending shit out of me. Especially that "singing the blues" part that he sings real fast. Annoying! Terrible! Bothered me so much that I learned the chords to it so I could never play them in the same progession. He's doing an G7, A7 and C9 in the beginning which is a I II IV I. Then it goes into a C9, A7, then back to C9 C#9 (OH MY GOD THE GENIUS GOES CHROMATIC)then to D9. Then does the G7, A7, C9, D9, G7 which is a I II IV V I. So I warn everyone reading this that plays any instrument and composes, NEVER compose a piece/song that uses that chord progression in the key of G. Thank you and goodnight.

California, A Place They Say Glistens Gold.

May 11, 2009

Dear Raziel,

I hope that you had a nice weekend! I wanted to let you know that Orientation at SFCM will begin on August 18th (I mentioned in my previous email that Orientation began on August 21st, but this date has now changed). Sorry for any confusion. Please let us know if you have questions.

Sincerely,

Melissa Cocco-Mitten, Assistant Director of Admission

Reading things like that just never get old. Everytime I open up my e-mail and see one from the conservatory, I get super excited. I recently read an e-mail from them saying that all the single rooms had been reserved and that I would have to share a room. I was bummed but who knows? It could be for the better. My only deal is that I like my privacy and I like being on my own. I lived with my brothers for 17 years of my life so it's not like I can't live with other people, but it's been nice not having to worry about who wants to watch TV or take a shower etc etc. What if when I meet my dream girl(a beautiful violin/piano player) and she wants to go back to my place? What if he is a stiff that will get upset when I come home drunk and play Call of Duty in the late hours of the night? But then again, maybe this guy could be really kick ass. I'm not going to be pessimistic about the whole situation. I'm actually pretty excited to meet the guy. And I'm sure it's going to make some things easier for me. So while yeah, it sucks that I can't live on my own, I'm sure a room mate will work out well in a lot of different ways.



Joaquin Turina-Generalife

Chaos. My trio performed this at the competition we handily won. I was sitting in my room earlier today thinking to myself, what's a challenging piece I could play that not many people play? How can I identify myself? When I was playing with my trio, we tried searching for a trio arrangement of the piece but couldn't find it so we had to base our idea of how the piece goes off the video above. It just kind of clicked to me that playing Generalife would be a great piece to identify myself with. It's simply just bananas. Yes. Bananas. And I have such a good idea of how to phrase it already. I looked for the music and couldn't find it so I e-mailed the performer above asking if he had his transcriptions for sale. He responded in spanish with a link that didn't work. Sucks. I really do want to learn this but chances are I won't be able to find the transcription. Unless I transcribe it from a piano score which I am not willling to do.

I was at a party the other night somewhere in the fountain apartments. I had no idea who the girl was that owned the place but I was singing that classic country song "I sware" with her and a few other people. Why mention this? Because it's music! Music at parties is so crucial. Partying is something I love doing quite a bit. Bad thing is that I only have a handful of friends that love punk music as much as I do and I only party with one of them because he's mah best fwend. This brings me to my next subject. Kind of.
Remember Taking Back Sunday? Of course you do, you loved them in 2004 and 2005. You had to. MTV was feeding it right down your throat and you were taking it like a champ. You had your black shirt with the yellow logo. You had the shit ton of black bracelets on your wrist. You had your black hoodie. You had your dyed hair. They are one of the bands responsible for how high school kids dress today. Well here it is, I actually liked Taking Back Sunday in 8th grade. But at the time I was also way into Brand New, New Found Glory, Saves The Day and Rufio. So my liking for them was prett legit. I hate how that comes off. It comes off like a typical punx kid trying to say he did it first but whatever. But all that aside, I used to really dig them. Years would go by and yeah my punk rock attitude got the best of me and I would kind of keep it in the closet that I still would dig some of their songs. I would have never gone out and said that I dig the new TBS song but if someone asked, I would say yeah its catchy. Alright get to the point. Because MTV fed this stuff to the youth of america, it was played at parties in my high school days. I remember soberly or drunkenly singing along to this song with my friends in my arms. Memories I can never forget. Would sing those catchy mainstream pop punk bands like Coheed and Cambria, New Found Glory, Story Of The Year, My Chemical Romance, Matchbook Romance, Yellowcard etc. etc. So it was pretty sweet that people were enjoying some(never really liked soty or coheed) of the bands I did. Fuck, I'll still say One For The Kids is a solid pop punk record. Well once upon a time a shitty ass genre took over. Hardcore, screamo, emocore, metalcore, post hardcore, all the fucking shitty names that rarely actually described the music they played. That trend thankfully died out but there are still bands trying to jump on it. One of those bands is called This Or The Apocalypse. Why bring them up? Well they recently decided it was a good idea to cover Taking Back Sunday's "Make Damn Sure." Can you imagine that? Your really fucked if you didn't even like Taking Back Sunday to begin with because then it's collaborating two terrible things. But jesus, even with having this somewhat guilty pleasure for TBS, I hated it. I took this as an insult. How dare they try to shit on all my memories? How dare they insult the art of covering music? It just doesn't make sense to me sometimes. I wish I could have been there when they were like "DUDES! Let's cover Make Damn Sure!" Where could it have been a good idea?

You can listen to this disaster here.

But The Truth Will Always Find A Way, To Shine Through And Force Only Dismay

Done. Over. Finished. Concluded. Completed. No more. No return. Yahtzee! You see that picture to the left? No more will I take that road at 7:45am to school. No more will I weave all around those roads on my way to school. Obviously I'll take the road again some day because Corpus is Corpus, but I won't be a student of Del Mar. I finished up with finals at Del Mar this past Wednesday and I'm pretty excited to say the least. How did finals go? So so I guess. I wasn't too worried about any of them because I have to take entrance exams for theory, aural skills and piano when I get up to San Francisco. Theory final went ok. I studied with Shawn and Christy at a Starbucks and got a good amount done. The test was ok. I did struggle a little bit with the Sonata form though. Sonata form is ridiculous. If your interpretation of where the transition is ends up being wrong, then the pretty much the rest of your answers will be wrong. Second theme group, re-transition blah blah blah. I missed a lot of class this semester due to out of town auditions and competitions. I think I missed up 7 or 8 days of theory total. People who take theory will know that that is a crime. Aural skills went ok. I have made an A on every dictation and skills exam this semester which naturally made me a little bit cocky seeing as to how this was the "hardest" of all aural skills classes. Well, the final dictation and skills exam were not all that easy. I didn't get a measure of rhythm for the first time in 2 semesters and I know I missed a chord on the harmonic dictation. Oh well. Piano final went ok but I could have and should have practiced more.

I look back on this past year of Del Mar. What a time it was man. From the months of August-December, I went nuts with practicing. I was practicing 5 or 6 hours a day and then with at the time unfortunate (it later became to be the best thing that ever happened to me) events in October-December, I pushed up the practicing to 7 sometimes 8 hours a day. In those months, I also won the Del Mar Honors Commencement for the 2nd year in a row by playing BWV 996-Prelude and Presto, Gigue. I also got the once in a life time opportunity to have a master class with one of the best guitarist to ever live, Pepe Romero. The second semester was really something. Guitar department turned into the Choir department. The day before my first audition, I went up to Mr. Hii and told him everything and the guitar department wasn't the same after that. My trips to College Station, Austin, Denton, Providence and New York City were some of the best times of my life. Getting into 3 of 4 schools. Then there was the trio. With a month and a few days before competition day, a member of the quartet left us so we were left with no choice but to do a trio. We learned 3 new pieces and practiced 4 hours a day 6 days a week and fucking killed the competition. My instructor told me he was done with me, talked shit about me to other students, put my goals and ambitions down. 7 students including myself went to the chairman of the department to complain. The ensemble was a mess. There were snitches every where. People were called out during lab or yelled at in the halls. It really was a soap opera for a while. I'll never forget in April 2008, I told my good friend Jimmy Buck, "This time next year, Mr. Hii will not want anything to do with me." I was right. I also put on a guitar recital with Josh.

Will I miss Del Mar? Well you know, I never liked going to Del Mar. I hated the school. The campus was boring. Always construction. But I did enjoy the music program. I felt the teachers there were top notch. The people? Will I miss the people? Well it's always nice to be looked at as the guitar player. There were many times this past semester to where I'd meet people and they would say something like "Oh, your Raziel? I was referred to as the celebrity of Del Mar Music by a girl haha. So I guess it's nice to be looked at with that kind of respect. So maybe I'll miss that. But I will for sure miss my guitar friends. I've developed some solid friendships with most of them. My piano 4 class which consisted of 6 or 7 guitar players would sit at our specific spot every day for 2 hours talking about stuff and scoping the ladies. It's just kind of a weird feeling, because after the triple B(Beers, Bitches and Booze) party on May 16th, I may never see some of those guys again.

After my last final, I walked outside to my car. I stood up by my car and stared at the school for a couple seconds. Looked around the parking lot that I would circle non stop for a parking spot even if I was late because I was too stubborn to park anywhere else. All the memories really of just the parking lot. People I've talked to, people I've hung out with etc. I got in my car, had Potemkin City Limits ready to play and sped off in excitement. I'm done with Del Mar College.

I mentioned in a post last month how there are albums I just refuse to listen to due to the memories they carry. A few songs came up on my ipod shuffle and well damn, I forgot a few.

1. Lagwagon-I Think My Older Brother Used To Listen To Lagwagon
2. Good Riddance-My Republic
3. Near Miss-Testing The Ends Of What They'll Put Up With

Lagwagon-Fallen

My favorite song off their latest EP. I really do miss Lagwagon even though they released the EP above this past August. It was solid. I think 3 or 4 of the songs could have passed as Bad Astronaut songs. I miss Bad Astronaut even more since I know they are never coming back. While I'm always obsessed with Joey Cape, it got to be pretty heavy around January through March of this past year which isn't very healthy. He was heavily influenced by Elliot Smith and we all know how that ended. When I would lazily(is that a word) not practice my piano assignments, I would play tons of Bad Astronaut/Lagwagon/Joey Cape/No Use For A Name/Tony Sly songs. Not the full out song. Just the chords on the left hand and the vocal melody with the right.

I'm getting kind of tired of playing Starbucks open mic. There has been new people to see me there each time, but it's getting kind of old. I need to find another place to play.

Much The Same reunion please?

I'm Thinking Bout A Brand New Hope. The One I've Never Known

Green Day has caused quite a bit of buzz lately. They have a new record coming out on the 15th. You can listen to a stream of the new album here. Green Day is Green Day. Billie Joe's voice will always be undeniably catchy. I don't even know where to begin when it comes to talking about them. I've never been a die hard fan, but I've always been a fan. I wrote a paper on their song Macy's Day Parade in 8th grade which was pretty awesome. Green Day is what got me and millions of other kids into punk rock music. I remember hearing Hitchin' A Ride in what was it? 4th grade? I instantly fell in love with it. Especially the last part. Even with their success, I would still always defend them because really, in my eyes, they have never made a bad album. A lot of people talked shit about Warning but I personally liked it. While I did enjoy American Idiot, I didn't like how they were presenting themselves. Out of no where, Armstrong and Tre began wearing thick eye liner and the all black suit with the red or white tie and Mike looks like satan apparently. Anyway, songs have been leaking and I've been very un-impressed. That "Know Your Enemy" song that is being played left and right is really repetitive and kind of gets on my nerves. I only enjoyed 2 maybe 3 of the songs on the stream posted above. Could it be that Green Day will finally make a record that I'm just not too into? Maybe, but I can't hate them. They look like morons and could potentially be done with making great music, but I can't hate them. They have done too much for me and punk music.

Apparently pieces that are straight 16th notes are my forte. I've played Bach BWV 1001-Presto, Fuge, Bach BWV 996-Gigue, Presto, Villa Lobos Etude #2 and now I can add Barrios Prelude op. 5 no. 1. Which brings me to why I'm kind of sad with how easy it was to learn this piece. Why was it so easy? Sure, it was in G minor, a simple key signature, but really, this was surprisingly easy for me. I know I've gotten better since the last time I learned a piece, but still, it shouldn't have been this much of a breeze. But I've concluded that it's just the fact that I'm so used to these straight 16th notes songs. I thought it would take me the whole month to learn it well but it took me 5 days. Josh brought up a great point and said that I hardly have any "pretty" pieces which is very true. Gerald Garcia has a piece called Spring Breeze which I will always consider to be the most beautiful song ever written. Xuefei Yang is a world class guitarist who is known for playing this piece. We exchanged myspace messages and then I asked her where I could get a copy of the piece and I haven't received a response in weeks. That's the classical guitar world for you. To separate yourself from everyone else, you need to play pieces no one else plays. You need to play a piece that will define you. At first I was like really? I'm just a 19 year old headed to a conservatory. In a way I almost take it as a compliment. Not that I think she's actually threatened by me, but you know. I guess I would do the same. I'm considering a Chopin waltz among others. But I do know I need to get on top of that kind of piece. All my songs are so aggressive.

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This one is for all the ladies.