Musical Meanderings

An exchange with Mike Llorca via email this morning:

Me: I keep waiting for Audioslave to impress me, and they don't. For a band that's a three-piece fronted by a singer, they don't fill sonic space very well. I think [Tom] Morello's vastly overrated. Everyone else says he's so creative, but you know, take away his $89 Boss envelope filter and he's just plunking away, doing nothing that's harmonically interesting or complicated.

…

Mike: You know, I was thinking that verbatim...oh, and I added "They suck"

***

Man, you ever take a look around and realize, ever-so-briefly, that things might just be okay? Job’s not bad, school starts tomorrow, kids have been good. Heck, my commute is so short that I’ve gained enough free time to work out. It’s been so long since I was on a workout regimen that the last time around I was listening to my tunes on a cassette Walkman.

Now I use an iPod, which I love. Still trying to get that perfect workout mix going. Upbeat helps, naturally. God, last night during one of the intense intervals I was running out of steam, and “Ace of Spades” by Motorhead started. It’s not my imagination: It helped.

Other good workout tunes: “Crisis King” by Helmet, “The Big Takeover” by Bad Brains,” and “Stone Cold Crazy” by Metallica. Oh, and “Quite F*cked” by Hermano, heh heh.

***

Classic rock died long ago, and it turns out that we hear so much of it as radio’s way of paying their respects.