Music: More summer favorites

From Bear in Heaven, first heard at a local festival, to some rediscovered dubstep favorites, here is more of what I'm listening to this summer.

Bear in Heaven --You Do You

Remix of Prodigy's "Breathe"
Breathe was awesome for the 90's. This remix is awesome for now.

Dubstep: This summer's toned-down chillstep favorites

Many of this summer's dubstep favorites are calmer than what I usually post...

Music: Four songs I've kept on repeat this month

New music from March that I have stuck on repeat + two more recently discovered favorites:

Dodge and Fuski -- Never Let Me Go -- Sucker Punch EP -- March 25

Pace and complexity of films increase with our abilty to understand them

You can walk out of an 80's movie for a bathroom break and still be able to follow the plot when you come back. Look away from the screen during some newer movies, and you may as well try again next showing.

Movies have gotten shorter since the days of Ben-Hur and the Ten Commandments, but I don't think our attention spans are to blame. We get bored watching Ben-Hur not due to our own ineptitude, but because it was made for people accustomed to slower thought. There isn't a lot going on in older movies. The same can be seen on a smaller scale in films from the 80's and 90's. Whenever I watch a movie that rocked my socks off as a kid, I'm surprised at how slow and tame it really is.

Movies like Cloud Atlas require the ability to jump rapidly from plot to plot, multitasking and processing previous story lines in the background. If Cloud Atlas was shown to an audience just a few decades ago, I'd wager almost every viewer would be completely lost -- as a minority of viewers are now on movies like Inception, Memento, and Cloud Atlas.

It's a trend in music, movies, video recaps like the one below (see if you can keep up!). The more capable and comfortable we become at processing digital input, the quicker we can learn and experience. But, How fast is too fast and can the trend continue?

Music: Politics and dubstep / Children in dubstep videos as symbol of rebirth

In dubstep videos, children frequently represent emerging perspectives that challenge existing power structures (Think: Occupy, Anonymous, and Wikileaks vs. big business and heavy-handed government).

 Skrillex - Bangarang

Unlike past counter-cultures tied to music, dubstep seems to point out that modern movements, aka "the kids", now actually have teeth. Hippies and their music tried to change the world from the inside through philosophy and love. Punks tried to change the world by tearing it down. Now, alongside dubstep, a computer based musical genre characterized by complexity and diversity, comes social movements using similar computer-based tools, schemes, and

Music: Dubstep is not a temporary fad

The more I listen to dubstep, the more I appreciate its progress and value as a genre. I see it as the best musical representation of present and future times. It is the music of now. While other styles of music maintain their value by conjuring up nostalgic memory or being fun to play; by being nuanced, historical, exclusive; or by being a showcase for the musician's skill, dubtep is all this and more. Dubstep is the music of progress, of technology and machine, of bricolaged disciplines, historical tempos and signatures. It began as electronic music that contained a wobble and a drop but since then it's developed into more.

As a computer-based genre, it develops at the speed of technology (hardware and software) and alongside the internet (rapid propagation of information and song). Its development is a phenomena unlike that of any other genre simply because of its place in time and method of creation. Jazz, with its birthplace in the melting pot that is America was born in the optimistic energy of the city.  It combined influences from around the country and elsewhere. Dubstep is influenced by music from all over the world via the technological filter we have adopted for our life and progress. Dubstep can be emo, violent, spiritual, passive, danceable, and/or more and the genre still has plenty of growing room. Check out Dubstep.net for a variety of styles.

Here are four of my current favorites:

 

Music: 3 new singles I have on repeat

Cat Power -- Cherokee

Parkway Drive -- Dark Days (From full album Atlas, out Oct 30th)

Fatso -- Far From Home (Farleon Remix)

Music: Never Say Die (dubstep compilation)

I downloaded Never Say Die Records' 2012 compilation for a recent long drive. Some of my favorites from the cd: 

 

Python -- Dodge and Fuski

Still Getting It (Zomboy Remix) -- Foreign Beggars

Headrush -- 501

Music: Dubstep, I'm smitten

In the past, I've kept my taste in music off the blog, but no longer! True, the heavy/fast/dissonant variety I favor sends most people (including my wife) running from the room, but I'm passionate about my music.

I despise old, stale, rehash music and respect intelligent artistry. I prefer creativity over talent but always appreciate a good hook or melody. I try to stay current with my favorite musicians and up-to-date on progress and evolution within my favorite scenes. So, why not share?

Send me anything you think I'll like (Facebook/comment here/email) and click on the "music" tag to the right to see all my posts on music.

I'm working through a dubstep addiction right now. I love the stuff. It's the new “in your face” genre I've been predicting and waiting for since hardcore and industrial trickled off. Check these out if you're unfamiliar:

 Kramer discovers dubstep

 

Skrillex - Bangarang

Celldweller -- Asking Alexandria Remix

 Minnesota -- California Dreaming Remix

Action/Horror Dubstep cut-up (not for the squeamish)