book soundtrack
have you ever been listening to music while reading a book and for some completely irrational and inexplicable reason suddenly felt that the music somehow matched with the plot, or the charaters, or both? that happened to me a couple days ago, and now i can't stop listening to the album. the combination is "a deepness in the sky" by verner vinge, and duran duran's "astronaut." it's strange, since i think i would have ordinarily written off duran duran as run of the mill cheesepop, but now i kindof like this album (is that a bad thing?). i guess it strikes a certain synergy with the book, though, which is interesting, and raises some difficult philosophical issues (why it was recommended to me), but is essentially still a cheap scifi paperback.
i don't know why, but for some reason i always feel guilty about enjoying (even a little bit) the "lower arts" or things that are more popular with the general public. probably stems from my abysmally low opinion of the general public; in particular, their abysmal level of cognitive competence. i guess the summary is really just that i hate the fanatics and dorks that embarass themselves just as much as the next guy, but being a scientist, i also think that technology and creativity are interesting and sometimes even exciting things---i just haven't found a clean way to reconcile these two warring brain factions yet.
if anyone has any more insight into this, i'd love to hear it.
1 Comments:
Well, Chris, I`ve made it. Coming at you all the way from a small jr. high school in Japan, brother. It`s always been one of my idiosyncrasies that I love words and reading, but I rarely ever do it. I usually read assigned materials or things I feel I really need to read. But when I am reading, I am usually quite happy. But for some reason, I always feel like I should be doing something else, or like the world is going on without me and I should be living, not lying in bed imagining. But it`s completely illogical because I don`t feel that way about watching TV or movies. In fact, I knowingly indulge in the escapism of video all the time. So I just don`t see why books make me feel that way. I guess they really inspire me to be creative myself and then I feel like I should be writing something or talking to someone or changing something. But movies are just passive escapism. Maybe that`s it. So anyway, I rarely experience the synergy of book and music, because I haven`t been reading much.
About the lower arts, I`ve generally tried to resolve the warring factions by embracing the kitsch or vulnerability or humanity or silliness of pop culture. So as long as I`m not taking myself too seriously, I`m ok with the clash. But what really bothers me is when I get the feeling that the things I do and say and create are just pop drivel, regurgitating shit I heard in a Good Charlotte song or something. So it`s really hypocritical to say that I am all down with pop and then hate myself for being a product/producer of it.
That`s what I have to say.
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