Albums of the Day

Archive 1967-1975 (1998) and Archive 1976-1992 (2000), by Genesis: Today was Genesis day, as I worked through the 7 discs spread across these two boxed sets. They're completely different, but each has its charms. The first set is notable for three discs worth of (mostly) live stuff from the Gabriel-led quintet, which was previously limited to the 5-song album. It also includes a fourth disc of mostly demo versions of songs from the band's first album and a few other rarities. The second set is composed of B-sides (including most of the original fourth side from the US Three Sides Live release), live versions of songs that have missed the other live albums, and a few remixes and demos. Given the era covered, some of this stuff is fairly wretched, but there are enough gems (particularly the live stuff on disc 2 - "Ripples," "Entangled," "Duke's Travels / Duke's End") to make it worth having.

Album of Yesterday

Archive, 1967-1975, by Genesis (1998): The first of the two multi-disc archive box sets from Genesis is by far the more impressive. At four discs, it contains a tantalizing amount of archival material. Two discs are given over to a full live (mostly) version of The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway, complete with Gabriel's narration. A third disc contains more live stuff, from the Selling England by the Pound tour, including "Supper's Ready," again with Gabriel's narrative intro. The fourth disc is mostly demos of early songs, some of which appeared on From Genesis to Revelation, but without the tarted-up Jonathan King arrangements.

Album of the Days

Archive, 1967-1975, by Genesis (1998): For years, a live recording of was the holy grail of Genesis fans. Bootlegs circulated (the only bootleg I own, I think), but they were poor quality and hard to find. So when Archive was announced, fans rejoiced at half of its 4 discs being given over to the band's 1974 performance of The Lamb . . . in Los Angeles. Unfortunately, it's not quite "live," as some 1990s touch up was done, particularly by Peter Gabriel on his vocals. His voice really is quite different now than it was in 1975, so they're fairly easy to pick out. Still, you get the whole experience, complete with Pete's weird stories and some extra instrumental bits that were worked in to facilitate costume changes. Of the other discs, the most interesting is another live disc, taken primarily from the Selling England by the Pound Tour that includes a Gabriel-led version of the epic "Supper's Ready," complete with Pete's introduction. Disc 4, made up of early demos, is interesting only in an archeological sense.

A Blast from the Past

Back in the misty days of the last century, before blogs were all the rage (jeez, I sound like a geezer - get off my lawn, you damn kids!), I had a web page full of random thoughts that I threw up on the Net. It was called, very creatively, Random Thoughts. Due to popular request, I've rescued the RT archive from my old website and set it back up, with fresh internal links for all the entries. It's got 17 entries spanning 1997 to 2002 and discussing various topics, some of which I've blathered about here on the Ranch. In addition, there are links to two "special" entries, a final project I did for a law school class called Pratical Moral Philosophy for Lawyers (don't laugh) and my list of the top 100 musical works (the I owned at the time) of the 20th Century.

All that goodness can be found at the "Random Thoughts Archive" link to your right. Enjoy!

My Newest Obsession

When the girlfriend and I first met and were still feeling each other out (emotionally, you clods!), I made the mistake of disclosing that I have a computer program that manages a database of my CD collection. It's actually really cool - it tracks the total time of the discs, average times, accepts ratings - but it's a sure sign of a anal retentive geek. Thankfully, the girlfriend didn't run in terror at this disclosure, but said that she hoped someday to find something similar to catalog her enormous collection of books. It's one reason I love her.

Now, she has, and she's dragged me along with her. LibraryThing is an online catalog for your books. You add books by title, author, or ISBN. You can then see how many other people have the same book, share the same tastes, get recommendations, etc. If you're a book geek, it's incredibly addictive. And if you're a bloggin' geek, you can put a widget on your blog to show what's in your collection (down below the archive, to your right).

Sadly, for me, my collection - the entirety of which I've inputted in two days - pales in comparison to the girlfriend's. As I've said before, she reads books like I drink Diet Cokes. Good thing I'm not self conscious about such things!

So go on, try it out. You'll get hooked. I did. Thanks, honey!

A Kindred Spirit

One of my pet peeves, although one I don't go off on much here because I don't carry a camera around with me all the time, is the abuse so many people heap upon quotation marks. Hardly seems like a day goes by where some store sign or announcement completely mangles the poor things.

Thankfully, I've found somebody else who is keeping an archive of this abuse, The "Blog" of "Unnecessary" Quotation Marks. On first blush, my personal favorite is this one, a sign I've seen at a restaurant in the Pittsburgh area:



I'm not keen on the idea of sushi to start off with, but "sushi"? Sounds dicey.

Check the link above for more grammatical foolishness.

Los Endos

I've come to a conclusion.

After more than six years and 3100 posts, I've decided that the Ranch has run its course. In short, this will be the last post I make here. I'll leave the blog itself up as an archive (and a collection of useful links), but the lights will go dark after this post, so to speak.

What's brought me to this decision? I blame jedi jawa.

OK, that's not really fair or accurate, but I couldn't resist the parting shot. Last month he blogged about the "ultimate blog question" - why do you do it? Among the answers he sussed out was the "I blog for myself" theory. That's the one to which I've always subscribed. I've never had a counter at the Ranch to measure readership. Outside of a comment, here or in the real world, I've got no way of knowing how many folks are reading, if any.

When I started the Ranch back in 2004, I did it for myself as a creative outlet. It was someplace where I could come and write about anything that struck my fancy. I'm lucky because I get to write for a living (gotta' crank out a couple of briefs this week!), but the scope of that work is kind of limited. Besides, making stuff up out of whole cloth is discouraged, to say the least, not to mention sarcastic broadsides. So the Ranch was a nice parallel to my professional writing.

At that time, the blog was the only outlet like that I had. In the past six years, things have changed considerably.

For one thing, I've started writing fiction with some regularity, if not necessarily any great skill. There's a finished novel manuscript on my kitchen table in need of editing along with another half-finished one on my laptop. That's not to mention the handful of short pieces in various stages of polish and the dozens of ideas I've got bounding around my brain. I want the time and energy to see those projects through.

For another thing, I'm much more musical than I was back in 2004. For "real" music I get to join jedi jawa and toot my clarinet in the Kanawha Valley Community Band. On the home front, I can deploy a growing amount of hardware to make all sorts of noises to annoy and entertain. It's a different kind of energy, yes, but just as creative as the writing stuff. I want more time and energy for those things, too.

So, going back to the "why I blog?" question, my answer has always been selfish - because it's a fun creative outlet. Now that I've got other creative outlets making demands on my time, the blogging just doesn't seem as much fun anymore. It's not that blogging takes so much time, but it blows a hole in every day and drains some of the enthusiasm I have for doing anything other than watching TV when I get home from work. Call them psychic opportunity costs. Shifting those from blogging to other things meshes better with the particular whims of my current life.

Simply put, all things run their course and the Ranch has run its. Thanks to everybody who has read, commented, and linked back here over the years. I appreciate all of it.

And now, the appropriate musical sendoff . . .

Album of the Day

Playing the Fool, by Gentle Giant (1976): Seems like I'm on a bit of a roll when it comes to live albums. This one, recorded on the band's tour following Free Hand, is a dazzling display of musicianship. Given the complexity of their tunes in the studio, I figured they'd have to dumb things down to make them work live. Thankfully, no, although some of the tunes got rearranged a bit. The reworked "On Reflection" benefits from an extended recorder intro (yup, you read that right), while "So Sincere" devolves into a full group percussion frenzy. And, of course, everybody plays multiple instruments (sometimes on the same tune), so they retain the sonic variety that marks the studio albums. This album, along with the recently released archive videos from around the same time, really drives how what an impressive live act these guys were.

The Iceberg Was Framed!

Today, on the 86th anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic, this article from the New York Times sheds some new light on what caused the liner to sink on her maiden voyage and become the subject of a horribly overrated film. What's to blame? The rivets:

For a decade, the scientists have argued that the storied liner went down fast after hitting an iceberg because the ship’s builder used substandard rivets that popped their heads and let tons of icy seawater rush in. More than 1,500 people died.

When the safety of the rivets was first questioned 10 years ago, the builder ignored the accusation and said it did not have an archivist who could address the issue.

Now, historians say new evidence uncovered in the archive of the builder, Harland and Wolff, in Belfast, Northern Ireland, settles the argument and finally solves the riddle of one of the most famous sinkings of all time. The company says the findings are deeply flawed.

That conclusion is bolstered by examination of rivets recovered from the wreck since it was discovered in 1985.

OK, so the iceberg still played a critical role. But more and more, it appears that industrial sloppiness played a large part in history's most infamous maritime disaster.

Album of the Day

Archive 1967-1975, by Genesis (1998): Yeah, yeah, I know - more Genesis. Sorry, folks, that's the way it works in the A-Z. Expect the same when I hit the Marillion, Rush, Yes, and Zappa parts of my collection, too. Having said that, there's not much to say about this one that I haven't said before.

Know Your World Cup Teams

As the World Cup Finals in Germany draw ever nearer, it's never too early to start becoming familiar with the 32 teams involved. CNNSi's Grant Wahl is previewing two teams per week leading up to the tournament. You can find his archive here.