VAGUE SPACE

Explosions in the Arcade Mouse Jr.

Explosions in the Sky on Conan O'Brien.
Arcade Fire kicking the shit out of the stage on a show I vaguely remember watching some time a long time ago, called Saturday Night Live.
A new Modest Mouse video.
And a new Dinosaur Jr. album!!!  (didn't they break up several years ago - they're back?? Is it true that Lou Barlow is a member again? - what happened to "The Freed Pig"??)
I'm so confused, but what a fucking week of music.   Click below for the YouTubes of the action.
But here's the downloads...

Enjoy.

• Download Arcade Fire - Intervention (Live on SNL).mp3
• Download Arcade Fire - Keep the Car Running (Live on SNL).mp3
• Download Dinosaur Jr - Almost Ready.mp3
• Download Dinosaur Jr - Crumble.mp3
  
  • Holy shit is this a great "classic" Dinosaur song - it's like they never left (and like it's still 1993 and my liver was still functioning.  woo hoo!)
• Download Modest Mouse - March into the Sea.mp3
  
  • One of the better songs I've heard from the new album
• Download Explosions in the Sky - Welcome, Ghosts (Adem Mix).mp3

Syracuse 72, #9 Georgetown 58

Yes, you read that title correctly.  The Syracuse Orange - once a long shot to make the NCAA tournament - just reeled off their 5th straight win by routing - yes, routing! - the #9 team in the country, a Georgetown squad that had won 11 straight games by an average of 13 points, including a win vs. then #8 Pitt on Saturday.  Pretty damn impressive.  And on Senior Day, no less.  And the seniors came up strong - incredibly strong - Demetris Nichols, Mookie Watkins, and the much maligned Terrence Roberts - on one leg - all played like men and like superstars and defended the court against a very good (although poor shooting and sloppy tonight) Hoyas basketball program.  And let there be no doubt from all the naysayers on ESPN and the ill-informed RPI slaves.  Syracuse just made the NCAA tournament.  There is no longer any question, even if they lose to Villanova and in the first round of the Big East tourney.  It's over.  We're in.  Way to freakin' go, seniors.  That's 4 for 4 appearances for this much-maligned class.

This Week's Lost

Sucked ass.  The ratings are plummeting this season and this show is quickly falling into the trap that ruined The X-Files; there are so many secrets and puzzles wrapped within secrets and flashbacks wrapped within puzzles that are secretive, that by the time they start revealing shit, you forget why you gave a shit in the first place, and in the process of revealing the shit, it brings up like 6 more questions that will never be answered but it won't matter because you won't remember them two weeks from now anyway.  Excellent way to run a show, guys. At least The X-Files took a good five seasons before collapsing on itself, and they squeezed out a pretty shitty movie in the meantime.  And to think, last week's Desmond-centric episode was so gripping and wonderful, mostly because it didn't deal with any old boring Others-related mysteries, and the fact that Jack, Kate, and Sawyer weren't there to weigh things down.  You know, Jack's been with the Others since fucking September and he don't know shit about them or anything.  Can't someone give anyone a fucking straight answer?  Like "Yes, I was the stewardess on your plane and this is what happened to me after the crash..."   No, that would be too easy and realistic.  Instead, it's "It's complicated..." and then she walks away.  Motherfucker!  Aaaaahhhhhhhhh!!!!!!

Next week:  Maybe Charlie dies.  That would be kind of great.  They already killed off Eko and Ana Lucia, just about the only two new characters that were interesting.  So if they're going to keep thinning the herd, starting with Hobbit-boy is not a bad idea.  Oh, and here's a pretty funny send up of the Lost writers... much better than anything they produced in this week's horrendous display of "drama" (which also featured Bai Ling, as if the writing weren't embarrassing enough).

Murderer

   

    One more thing before I go,
    One more I'll ask you Lord.
    You may need a murderer,
    Someone to do your dirty work.

    Don't act so innocent.
    I've seen you pound your fist into the Earth.
    And I've read your books.
    It seems that you could use another fool.
    Well I'm cruel.
    And I look right through.

    You must have more important things to do.
    So if you need a murderer,
    Someone to do your dirty work.

• Low - "Murderer".mp3
• Low - "In the Drugs (Peel Session)".mp3
• Low - "Last Snowstorm of the Year (Peel Session)".mp3
• Pre-order Low - "Drums and Guns," released on March 20th

The Dunning-Kruger Effect

I ran across a mention of this phenomenon on the good ship USS Mariner, which was discussing the absurdity of Mike Hargrove calling himself a good manager (after six straight seasons of 4th place finishes for 2 different teams).  I have nothing to add, except to say that finally there is some sense to a world in which it seems only the most incompetent people are completely unaware of their own incompetence.  It's shocking, really, but it is a psychological truth.  Here's the entire wikipedia entry.  Ponder.  Comment.  And wonder why this happens.

The Dunning-Kruger effect is the phenomenon whereby people who have little knowledge systematically think that they know more than others who have much more knowledge.

Though many people have noticed this, it was rigorously demonstrated in a series of experiments performed by Justin Kruger and David Dunning, then both of Cornell University. Their results were published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology in December, 1999.

Kruger and Dunning noted a number of previous studies which tend to suggest that in skills as diverse as reading comprehension, playing chess or tennis, or operating a motor vehicle, "ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge" (as Charles Darwin put it). Specifically, they hypothesized that with regard to a typical skill which humans may possess in greater or lesser degree,

1. incompetent individuals tend to overestimate their own level of skill,
2. incompetent individuals fail to recognize genuine skill in others,
3. incompetent individuals fail to recognize the extremity of their inadequacy,
4. if they can be trained to substantially improve their own skill level, these individuals can recognize and acknowledge their own previous lack of skill.

All of a Sudden I Miss Everyone

Explosions in the Sky
All of a Sudden I Miss Everyone
Rating: 7.8 (out of 10)
All of a Sudden I Miss Everyone - Bonus Disc
Rating: 7.4 (out of 10)

It has begun.  The start of a new year of incredible music releases, and after somewhat disappointing and downright ugly new albums from indie rock bands CYHSY and Bloc Party, respectively, Temporary Residence has kicked February off with a bang with this double-disc release from Explosions in the Sky, along with the new Eluvium CD Copia, which is also quite good.  But EITS is where their bread is buttered, and they have made a great, if not incredibly original, album and paired it with a six-song re-mix disc by artists Jesu, Adem, The Paper Chains, Mountains, Four Tet, and the aforementioned Eluvium.  All in all, it's 90 minutes of majestic, glorious post-rock brilliance that elevates the genre and delivers on its high expectations.  Just a great collection of music.

• Download Explosions in the Sky - "The Birth and Death of a Day (Jesu mix)".mp3
• Buy All of a Sudden I Miss Everyone from Temporary Residence

Bat Attack

• Dwight: "I don't have a lot of experience with vampires, but I have hunted werewolves.  I shot one once but by the time I got to it, it had turned back into my neighbor's dog."

This week's special episode of The Office was directed by none other than Joss Whedon, the creator of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel (and Firefly) and basically the greatest writer/director in the history of television.  I wish I'd had this blog during Buffy's early days.  Then you'd all think I was cool.  Anyway, a bat is somehow loose inside of Dunder-Mifflin, and while they are waiting for Animal Services to come capture it, Jim convinces Dwight that he was bitten by the bat and is experiencing "strange" symptoms.  Dwight prepares for the inevitable.

• Dwight: "Do you have the tools to turn a wooden mop handle into a stake?"
• Creed (instantly opening his drawer): "What size?"

Sound of Silver

And we have an early frontrunner for 2007 record of the year...

"Friend of the Night" arrived last March and won best song of 2006, and "Neighborhood #1 (Tunnels)" first came to my ears in December of 2004 and went on to win song of the year for 2005.  So it is very conceivable that the early leader ends up running away and hiding for the best record of the year.  And this release from LCD Soundsystem's forthcoming Sound of Silver may be the next in line.  It's that good. 

Where are your friends tonight?

• LCD Soundsystem - "All My Friends".mp3

Syracuse 73, UConn 63

A huge win for the Syracuse Orange, at home over the Connecticut Huskies, that brings them to 19-8 overall with an 8-5 mark in the Big East Conference.  The Orange are now riding a three game win streak that probably would move them off the bubble and into the Big Dance if the season ended today.  Of course, with three tough games left before the Big East Tournament, there's still a lot up in the air.  But at the very least, I feel much, much better about the team than last week at this time, as the three wins - one ugly and poorly played except for Nichols (over St. Johns), one a dominating 2nd half performance over a weaker team (South Florida), and this - a mixed bag of good and bad play, saved by some really sloppy ball-handling and poor shooting by a very young UConn team that helped us win.  Of course, we lost to them two weeks ago on the road, so this was a huge, huge win.

But before I get to the game recap, I want to mention the horrendous telecast on ABC/ESPN, which no less than five times missed signifcant game action by having the cameras turned on either the crowd or the coaches (including one where the camera lingered on Boeheim for about five seconds while play was going on and he was reacting, and the viewer had to simply imagine what was happening on the court due to Boeheim's facial expression).  And they didn't show any replays of the missed action afterwards, including a crucial (at the time) turnover by the Orange on an inbounds play.  Worse than even that, though, was the horrible announcing job by Steve Lavin and his partner (I'm sorry, I don't know who it was), who basically completely ignored the action on the court to just talk about anything college basketball related they could think of for two hours.  It was so bad I was tempted to press mute, except I wanted to hear the Syracuse crowd.  Just an awful performance by ABC/ESPN.  And Dickie V wasn't even doing the game.  Unbelievable.

Snow Daze

The last time I was in Vermont in the winter was when I had my old car, a non 4-wheel-drive Volkswagen Passat, which I drove up to Mt. Snow with some friends for a ski trip.  Now, skiing and me don't really mix - I'm not much of a fan of the cold, and my athletic abilities, however fleeting, have been much more suspect without truly functioning knees - but I was promised a weekend of drinking and, um, drinking in a big house in Vermont, with a little skiing and snowboarding thrown in for good measure.  So I went.  After a Saturday filled with snowboarding - which was more successful than expected, although only because my expectations were so low - we headed back the three miles on the mountainous country roads to the house we were renting.  It had snowed the entire time we were on the slopes, which made the roads particularly treacherous, but I took it slow and made it back to the side street on which our house was located.  That's when all hell broke loose.