Category Archives: drugs

4/20 is another day.

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I may be one of the few non-potsmokers out there. The ridiculousness of a “holiday” just annoys me, though. I couldn’t care less about people that smoke. It doesn’t bother me. This notion of a “holiday”? Bothers me. I understand why some do it. Legalizing marijuana. Bla bla bla. Fine. Hell, I sort of agree with you. Tax that shit. Help get us out of the financial rut our country is in. Guaranteed that if it was legalized and taxed? Potheads would bitch about that, too. It’s our pastime.

So just to be a complete jackass, at first I was going to post the following song.

Why? Well, Adolf Hitler was born on 4/20. Somewhere, some little stupid prude would get all huffy and up in arms over how “offensive” it was, though. That and I didn’t have the song. So instead, I wanted to post something happy I was listening to to get my mind off of a whole bunch of bullshit. It really has nothing to do with 4/20. Or pot. Or much of anything. I just like the song. So go listen to it. And afterwards? Bitch me out for being “insensitive”.

Click to Play Cassius – La Mouche (DJ Falcon Mix)

Charlie Sheen Is An Asshole, But Let’s Learn From It

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“The best revenge is to be unlike him who performed the injury.” – Marcus Aurelius

Watching the one-man circus sideshow known only as Charlie Sheen gave me some fits of anger. Why? Well, his comments on AA are what really made my blood boil. The insinuation that the ideas behind AA were “written for normal people” and that there was a specific path to go by is just disingenuous. Yes, there are the 12 steps. It doesn’t mean that one has to have rigidity in how they practice and follow through on those 12 steps. Anyhow, that wasn’t really what made me upset. It’s the fact that I’ve personally witnessed a life change positively – due to the help they provided – makes me a bit angry. My own mother hit rock bottom from alcoholism almost 20 years ago, and hit the point where she tried to take her own life.

Now, it’s my understanding that the teachings of AA are inspired by Christian teachings. Personally, I’m an atheist. My own mother grew up in a strict Irish-Catholic home, but doesn’t practice, now. She still stays with her mission to stay sober, so it does do some good. The fact that we now have a celebrity slamming a program that helps millions that have nowhere else to go is honestly showing how out of touch he is. His comments about how “special” he was only stoke those flames and show the true amount of disconnect.

His unfortunate path is his own, but he’s now acting out in a manner that affects people in society. The everyday people that he called “losers” that are addicts and know nothing else, for example. It’s sad, really. The anger I originally felt has actually turned into pity. The ranting while talking about how underpaid he was also struck a nerve, as I was an education major in college, and watch as the governors of Wisconsin and New Jersey are openly battling teachers’ unions. Teachers are underpaid. Not Charlie Sheen. This sad arrogance is 100% anger, which he denies.

So what should I do? Do I lash out? I seriously thought about it. The media does play a large role in this, as they keep giving Sheen a podium to stand on. That role is what will likely end up being Sheen’s downfall, as people will quickly tire of the pity he’s asking for. When one out of ten people in our country are without a job, you’d find nary a few that would feel for a man that spent his money irresponsibly by snorting it up his nose. The media will have to take a large part of the blame for joyously allowing one man’s self-destructive behavior to simply worsen and hit a low.

Instead of lashing out, I hit a point where I simply now want to refuse to add gasoline to the fire. The decisions he’s made serve well to teach us all. He really is right in that his kids will learn from him. However, they won’t learn the lessons he thinks. His father, Martin Sheen, has already had enough, and is simply saying that he would be there for his son. There really isn’t shame in it. I can’t say I would be a bigger or better person for wagging my finger at him, though. It’s a natural reaction, of course. My willingness to understand the wrong in being angry is part of how he instead teaches me more about myself and how I could be a better person on my own, as I hope many with drug and alcohol addictions learn to do, too.

To find an AA chapter near you – visit here.
For help with drug addiction – visit here.

Click to Play Daft Punk – Teachers

she matters when everything is meaningless

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It was FATE; it had to be. I was stressing about a topic to write about for inALLcaps.com, and struggling with writer’s block. It was then that I turned on the TV and caught the last half of the movie Natural Born Killers.

I have watched this movie hundreds of times. I even wrote a thesis on Natural Born Killers in college. The epiphany came at the end of the movie: The reminder that Trent Reznor had produced the soundtrack to this excellent movie. FATE! I knew then that I had my idea!

For almost a decade I’ve been telling anyone who would listen that “The Fragile” was the best album ever put out by Nine Inch Nails. This was an epic album but it got shit on by just about everyone. “The Fragile” never got the respect it deserved.

It was the kind of album that, when the volume was cranked you could lie in bed with your eyes closed and imagine it as the brilliant soundtrack to an even better movie. This movie might have everything you would want in cinema: drugs, sex, violence, and maybe something redeeming for the twisted main character. At least that’s what happens in my version.

Let’s stop here; this post won’t be about that old ass album. (But really…if you don’t own it…buy it ASAP)

This post is about HALO 26, otherwise known as Ghosts I – IV. 4 CDs – 36 tracks.

Reminiscent of “The Fragile”, yet “Ghosts” is a completely instrumental album. The packaging and artwork on this album is amazing, just like most NIN albums of recent release. But this whole piece of work is very different then anything Nails has put out thus yet.

So let me get you started with a tune from Ghosts:

[Download Track 29]
This track is more upbeat than much of the rest of the album, chosen in order to pique your interest.

Trent Reznor explains, “I’ve been considering and wanting to make this kind of record for years, but by its very nature it wouldn’t have made sense until this point. This collection of music is the result of working from a very visual perspective – dressing imagined locations and scenarios with sound and texture; a soundtrack for daydreams. I’m very pleased with the result and the ability to present it directly to you without interference.”

It’s this soundtrack concept that I love. I like the fact that I can just get lost in the music. Maybe even better than “The Fragile” is the lack of lyrics to get in the way. I wanna just let my mind wander.

I want to remind you that this not the industrial rock that you would expect from Trent. This is, as Reznor has explained on his website for the album, an unexpected surprise from experimentation. 10 weeks with no agenda and driven by impulse.

Trent elaborates:

We began improvising and let the music decide the direction. Eyes were closed, hands played instruments and it began. Within a matter of days it became clear we were on to something, and a lot of material began appearing. What we thought could be a five song EP became much more. I invited some friends over to join in and we all enjoyed the process of collaborating on this.

The album was initially released digitally on the Nine Inch Nails official website without any prior advertisement or promotion. They even created their own torrent to distribute 9 tracks from the album. Actually, check out this from a text file inside the official torrent:

Now that we’re no longer constrained by a record label, we’ve decided to personally upload Ghosts I, the first of the four volumes, to various torrent sites, because we believe BitTorrent is a revolutionary digital distribution method, and we believe in finding ways to utilize new technologies instead of fighting them.

[Download Track 7]
I want to stress again…this is not about one great track. Much like a concept album I feel like it needs to be listened to from beginning to end. You don’t have to…but just do as I say, you’ll be happier in the end. /smirk

Trent is my hero. If you had a NIN sticker on your car I instantly think you are probably someone I would like to hang out with. Check out this album, however you get your hands on it. Then comment here. I want to know what you think about this album. Truly. Let’s become friends.

This is where I would normally put the Amazon referral links here so you can buy the album and we can hope to make 10% commish. Put the best deal for this album is direct from Trent: ghosts.nin.com $5 gets you the album in digital form. Tough to pass on that right? You spend more than that on a coffee in the morning…