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SONG OF THE DAY

Okay, I’m trying something different today with these Eric Hutchinson songs. I love this singer-songwriter, but I hadn’t posted anything up by him before because, well, he’s still a relative unknown and giving away his music for free would make me feel guilty. Therefore no download links today.

(I know, I post up songs all the time, but I don’t put up whole albums and try to limit the number of songs per album. Plus, this guy’s indie and it’s all about supporting indie artists, right?)

I first saw Hutch play about four years ago and have since seen him perform about a dozen times. He’s not only fantastic live, he’s also genuinely funny and quick-witted (which comes through in his lyrics). He hasn’t shot to fame as quickly as I thought he would (or as he deserves), but his star is on the rise. In fact, the last time I tried to see him play — right after his big shout-out on Perez Hilton — I couldn’t even get into the club. Boooooo.

If you like these songs, I’d highly recommend you check out his songs on iTunes (link opens in iTunes). Money well spent!

 
Eric Hutchinson - “Ok, It’s Alright With Me”
From his (most recent) “Sounds Like This” album, which is available on iTunes.

 
Eric Hutchinson - “Outside Villanova”
Also from “Sounds Like This.” It’s the lyrics that make this song.

 
Eric Hutchinson - “Breakdown More”
I think this is actually my favorite song of his, although that distinction regularly fluctuates. This is from his earlier EP, “That Could’ve Gone Better,” which I have listened to so much I’m surprised the CD still plays. I don’t think the actual CD is on sale anymore, but you can get the mp3 album from emusic.com.

 
Eric Hutchinson - “Jettison”
Also from “That Could’ve Gone Better.” One of my friends puts this song on hours-long repeat when she’s feeling down. That sounds like it should be cause for concern, but the song is more like a companion to therapeutic bouts of melancholy. (We all need to nurse our bruised psyches sometime, right?)

 
Eric Hutchinson - “My Girl” (live)
And this one’s for fun. He regularly performs cover-song mashups like this one (he also does a Whitney Houston medley), which are always goofy fun.

 
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Fair warning: Rantiness ahead, but feel free to comment on non-ranty topics below!

Phew, for one who hadn’t intended to follow the Olympics to any close degree, I spent the early part of the week unintentionally watching almost everything (TV has been left on while I tune in and out, but inevitably I find myself watching most of the coverage). Then I got sick of wasting so much time listening to hyperbolic, jingoistic commentators blathering on about anything and everything to fill up air time and maxed out on my retarded-commentary quota.

For instance: saying that a gymnast’s last-minute injury was “like having a tear in your wedding dress before you walk down the aisle”? That is insulting to gymnasts and brides both. Oh yes, the elite gymnast who’d trained on an incredibly intense level for more than half her lifetime and was taken out of the Games at the last minute due to injury is really the same thing as a woman having a minor wardrobe mishap on her wedding day. How tragic. First off, you’re an idiot for making such a retarded comparison. Second, you’re an insulting idiot for perpetuating the stereotype that all women are frivolous, fashion-frenzied bridezillas who lose all sense of rational thought when it comes to her Day of Princessly Wedding Perfection. Some of us have never coveted a Vera Wang white dress, matchy-matchy flowers-to-cake-to-eyeshadow color coordination, or a $40,000 Big Waste of Money. Some of us are even capable of handling wedding days — or high-pressure moments — with self-control. I know! How novel! And here you thought all us women fret over a broken nail and simper over boys we like and cry when we’re frustrated.

Then we followed that bit of belittling commentary with the oh-so-clever quip following the women’s Cuba-U.S. beach volleyball match in which both teams came out sporting the same color beachwear. One team changed to alternate suits of a different color, but not without one correspondent remarking with relief over the suit change because showing up in the same outfit as another woman “is every woman’s worst nightmare.” Really? Because I have had a lot of nightmares in my life, and the color of my outfit matching the color of another woman’s outfit has never figured in any of them. Thanks for showing how thoughtful and elevated the discourse can be in women’s athletics.

Also getting on my nerves? The multiple anchors and commentators who describe the U.S. team athletes and coaches of Chinese descent as “returning home to their own country” for the Beijing Games (e.g., Shawn Johnson’s Chinese coach, the women’s volleyball coach). You know what? They’re fucking representing this country, they’ve devoted their livelihoods to furthering the sport for the U.S.’s teams, they’re contributing members of American society. So why are they all of a sudden chink-eyed foreigners “returning home”? I nearly threw my remote at my television set when one commentator essentially assured us, the American viewing public, that the U.S. volleyball coach Jenny Lang Ping (who’d formerly played for China and has since moved to the States) COULD BE TRUSTED not to compromise the U.S. team with divided loyalties to China. And what about Kevin Tan, U.S. men’s gymnast who happens to be Chinese-American. AMERICAN. Yet the commentators repeatedly had to blow smoke up their own asses about how amazing and progressive the U.S. is for having an Indian(-American), a Chinese(-American), and a Belarusian(-American) gymnast on the team.

Way to make it stunningly clear that you consider “true” Americans to be corn-fed, blue-eyed, blonde-haired white people, while the rest of us are merely The Foreign Other, no matter our citizenship or country of birth. We just happen to be benefiting from the U.S.’s benevolence and magnanimity in allowing us to live here, pay our taxes, and contribute to society, right?

Fuck you, NBC. Plz to be hiring some competent correspondents nxt time!

Suffice to say I’ve now got a heavy hand on the mute button and have switched to watching DVR-recorded broadcasts with most of the filler fast-forwarded. Because it’s stupid to give myself any aggravation over such a small thing (in my life) as the Olympics.

SONG OF THE DAY

Supergrass - “Run” [ Download ]

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(This is actually the model daughter of female former basketball star Park Chan-sook — silver medalist at 1984’s Olympic games — who’s just made a CF deal with SK Telecom. But I just like the shirt.)

Cuz the T-shirt message is awesome:

SONG OF THE DAY

Tristan Prettyman - “Simple As It Should Be” [ Download ]

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It’s AUGUST??

Where does the time go?

What happened to all the awesome wonderful exciting productive things I was supposed to do this year? Better get on it.

Her Space Holiday - “Famous to Me” (Hurtful Kid Mix). Her Space Holiday’s usual sound, as in the original version of this song, is more indie and mellow, but I think this is a gorgeous remix. It plays with electronic beats and sounds, but is not without emotion (which is not always true with a lot of electronica, which can strike me as being a little cold and distant).
[ Download ]

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Holla.

The Stills - “Gender Bombs.” I’m kind of ambivalent on The Stills — I like some shoegazer-y, Manchester-style dream-pop stuff but it’s not really my favorite genre. But they do have a few songs I really like; I was hooked on this one at the line, “Logic will break your heart forever.” ‘Cuz it’s true. [ Download ]

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