8Sided Blog

a zine about sound, culture, and the punk rock dream

Not As Many Yesterdays

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• Over the past several months, I’ve been reading not-so-heavy fiction before bed to help clear my head of news-trauma before sleep. I’m using the opportunity to check out books I probably should have read in my teens and college years but didn’t. At the time, I was mainly reading music fanzines1It’s fair to say that music fanzines made up 85% of what I read between the ages of 17 and 25 and Stephen King novels (with the occasional Vonnegut and beat writer interlude), so there’s a lot of catching up to do.

I just finished Isaac Asimov’s The Foundation Trilogy. A lot of people enthusiastically recommended the series, but it didn’t blow me away as I expected.2I guess I really should have read this when I was younger, as that’s when all the people who recommended it did. I’m glad I read the trilogy, though. There are many thought-provoking concepts, and that’s the least one can want from a book. Also, the storyline of The Mule captivated me. The Mule is a mutant conqueror who can mentally bend people’s emotions to become subservient, effectively enamored by him. What’s most interesting is that these people are aware of their manipulation, but they press on in their devotion. Here’s a passage from Second Foundation:

What kept him from action? What deadened him? There was a time when he was a rebellious and unpromoted captain of the First Foundation’s commercial empire, when it would have been himself rather than Channis who would have taken prompt and daring action such as that. Was the Mule right? Was his controlled mind so concerned with obedience as to lose initiative? He felt a thickening despondency drive him down into a strange lassitude. […]

Pritcher nodded mutely, and cogitated in the sudden loneliness on the evils of approaching fifty. The visiplate was sparsely starred. The main body of the Galaxy misted one end. What if he were free of the Mule’s influence—

But he recoiled in horror at the thought.

I can’t help but equate this to our struggles with social media and the internet in general. Not to mention, how we ‘lose initiative’ through our internet interactions (see: slacktivism). We know we should turn away, but we can’t — it feels too good to persist. File this alongside Wednesday’s ‘Siren’s song’ metaphor.

• Often this blog gets ‘meta,’ and I talk about the joys and processes of blogging. There are many things that I wish I had started earlier (like reading something meatier than music fanzines). I like to think blogging is one of those things. But, I was blogging as soon as the late ’90s. Astralwerks set up a site for me, and I had a ‘dispatches’ page where I could post a tour diary or studio updates. My Q-BAM site had a blog, too. And I’m embarrassed to admit I semi-regularly blogged on MySpace — most of those posts disappeared into the ether.

The problem was that I didn’t blog consistently. If I did post, the content was usually related to promoting an upcoming gig or release, or a tracklist and link to the latest Invisible Airwaves radio show. Occasionally the writer within appeared — here’s a piece I wrote on Tony Wilson from 2007 that I still enjoy seeing — but those pieces were rare. 

I’m thinking about this because I ran across a blog post by ex-Google programmer Steve Yegge from 2005. It’s called You Should Write Blogs, and I wish I had read it at the time. Steve is encouraging everyone to blog, and he lays out compelling reasons. Early on in the piece, he writes:

This is certainly the most important thing I’ll ever say in my blogs: YOU should write blogs.

Even if nobody reads them, you should write them. It’s become pretty clear to me that blogging is a source of both innovation and clarity. I have many of my best ideas and insights while blogging. Struggling to express things that you’re thinking or feeling helps you understand them better.

I don’t know if this article would have inspired a blogging (or writing) practice in those years. I certainly didn’t understand how writing in public sharpens the mind, hones opinions, and feels fantastic. No one told me. Or, more likely, I wasn’t listening — I was too busy slurping vodka and playing records in dark rooms. 

What’s the cliché? The best time to start something is yesterday, and the second-best time is right now. I’m thankful I started this blog a few yesterdays ago, even if it’s not as many yesterdays as I’d like. For the rest of you, the time is now. Get blogging. Here’s some encouragement of my own.

• This video of David Bowie turning the interview tables on MTV’s Mark Goodman is making the rounds. And with good reason. How cool.

• I’m just putting this here: State Moves Into Unannounced Goth Phase of Reopening

• The news has come over the wire that Jon Hassell is releasing the second installment of his ‘pentimento’ series on July 24. The first one, from 2018, was excellent, so I’m excited to hear its follow-up, Seeing Through Sound. The lead track — “Fearless” — is live, and it’s no surprise that it’s a stunner. Pre-ordered!

I should also mention that there’s a GoFundMe page for Jon Hassell. He’s not in the best of health right now, and the present COVID-19 dangers have made his situation direr. The page was set up by friends and family to help Hassell get financial assistance so he can receive the care he requires. [LINK]

• Lake Holden was looking particularly serene this morning = [LINK]

The Promise of Unending Knowledge

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• Here are two audio snapshots of recent protests. First, Radiolab offers a short meditation on Nina Simone’s sad, unbroken thread line to today’s injustices, profiling a remarkable concert she gave three days after the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. And via his S/FJ newsletter, Sasha Frere-Jones shares a recording titled ‘Five Minutes June 3 2020.’ The audio — taken from the streets of New York City — is both exhilarating and terrifying. It’s also sound-as-art, a collage of moods and voices that rings in every feeling part of you. [LINK] + [LINK]

• HBO Max shows why escaping to the indie web is looking better with each passing day. It’s about time for a federal version of the CCPA. [LINK]

• I stumbled across this excellent NY Times piece by Peggy Orenstein from 2009. She writes eloquently about her struggles with the addictive qualities of the internet. I’m charmed by this mythological metaphor for our shared dilemma:

Not long ago, I started an experiment in self-binding: intentionally creating an obstacle to behavior I was helpless to control, much the way Ulysses lashed himself to his ship’s mast to avoid succumbing to the Sirens’ song. In my case, though, the irresistible temptation was the Internet. […] Those mythical bird-women (look it up) didn’t seduce with beauty or carnality — not with petty diversions — but with the promise of unending knowledge. “Over all the generous earth we know everything that happens,” they crooned to passing ships, vowing that any sailor who heeded their voices would emerge a “wiser man.” That is precisely the draw of the Internet. [LINK]

• There’s a nice profile of my friend Craig Snyder in the latest edition of Byta’s #HowWeListen series. Yes, he talks about how he listens (and what he’s listening to) and gives a lovely shout-out to yours truly and my weekly newsletter. But my favorite part is Craig talking about how records and the spaces they’re in (‘the room’) should fit each other:

I used to have a big vinyl collection but I’ve now slimmed my collection down to a case that holds 200 records. I remember going into one of my favorite bars called Tubby’s in Kingston, NY and noticing their vinyl collection. I remember asking how they curated their collection and the owner said, we picked out our 200 favorite records that fit this room. No matter which record we pick, it feels right. I also had an experience in an Airbnb in Montreal where there was a small vinyl collection. As I looked around the apartment I realized that these 50 records were the perfect collection for this particular place.

These two experiences made me rethink accumulating records. If I buy a new LP, then one needs to leave. That’s my goal with my 200 LPs. They’re the soundtrack of my living room in the Catskills. If I lived in a different house I’d probably need a different set of 200 albums. [LINK]

• Here’s a moody instrumental tune from Yorkshire’s worriedaboutsatan. It creeps up on you without being creepy.

• Lake Holden’s looking good this morning → [LINK]

Immune to Misinformation

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I’m happy that John Green is doing this Crash Course series on Navigating Digital Information. This is important and I look forward to all the episodes.

John recently gave up all social media for a year. Here’s his first-day video and here’s his one-month follow-up. In the latter he states: “Now I have sometimes believed that I’m like immune to misinformation but I’ve come to understand that such a belief actually makes you more susceptible to it.”

The Dark Side Of ‘Mobilizing Your World’

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The Verge:

AT&T’s zero rating model is pretty much the nightmare scenario that internet advocates and pro-competition observers have been warning us about. That’s because AT&T owns DirecTV, and is now giving DirecTV Now privileged access to AT&T’s wireless internet customers. The corruption is so obvious here that it doesn’t need a fancy net neutrality metaphor — AT&T is clearly favoring a company it now owns over competitors.



The company stands to reap massive tolls on the other end of that “most favored nation” deal with DirecTV, because it also offers something called “sponsored data” to other companies that want the same kind of privileged access to AT&T customers. So, for example, if Netflix wants to compete fairly with DirecTV, it would need to pay AT&T to exempt its video traffic from data caps.



This is what ISPs really want the internet to look like: a bundle of premium services that run up the cost of access to their networks. It’s the same game internet companies have been playing from the beginning, when they got the government to classify them as “information services” instead of “telecommunications services” — the ISPs really don’t want to be “dumb pipes,” because there’s less money to be made when you just give people high-quality internet with no restrictions.



They’re using the same playbook: turn the internet into basic cable, and charge everyone for features and content on top of that. Then, charge competitors to compete with their own vertically integrated video services. It’s a two-way toll that ISPs have been trying to erect forever.



Republicans have been trying to gut the FCC for nearly a decade, and between Trump and a Republican-controlled Congress there’s probably enough support to dismantle net neutrality policy, if not the agency itself. If that happens, zero rating and sponsored data schemes could become completely monstrous.



I wish I could offer some optimism here, but I have the sinking feeling there are tough times ahead for us self-employed citizens who rely on an unvarnished internet for our bread and butter.