In Medias Res # 25- You’re boring, baby, when you’re straight (Special Super Sized Video Packed Commemorative 25th Post)

Anybody else like The Kills? Not the Killers of “Somebody Told Me” fame. I have no real opinion on them one way or the other. The Kills are a two piece band that makes thudding bluesy rock music. They’re pretty awesome.
Anyways they released a new album this week which is spectacular. Their first album came out when I was a senior in college. I listened to it quite a bit on my ipod as graduation approached and so now whenever I dig it out of its case I’m immediately transported. The new album and the process of making a mix tape (I know, I’m dating myself. Who actually makes mix tapes anymore?) for the trip to ACPA has me nostalgic for music and its affect. I’m an album listener. I don’t single out specific tracks. I like to listen the whole way through. As such the nostalgia an album as a cohesive whole generates is pretty much correlated to specific times and places for me.
I was going to write this week about prepping for ACPA as an employer. Then I realized there’s another Thursday (which means another post) before ACPA starts. Instead I started thinking about coping mechanisms, and for me the most efficient and effective way to relax is to put on my headphones. I listened to a lot of music when I was job searching, and even now in my office I keep a constant drone on in the background. Part of this is because I’m in temporary space under a dance studio while my new office is built (and those hoofers make a lot of noise, I tell ya what). Still, I find it difficult to think without some ambient noise in the background.
I listened to all of these albums in whole or in part during the job search, and even now I still throw them on at work to get transported.


The New Pornographer’s Twin Cinema
This is not the best New Pornographer’s album. It might actually be their worst. Of course the worst New Pornographer’s album is like the least chocolate covered cherry. Fer chrissakes it’s still a chocolate covered cherry, and that’s pretty awesome. So why this album in particular especially given the majestic awesomeness of Mass Romantic and the Electric Version? Well, this album came out during my worst stretch of grad school, and as I drove around rushing from work, to class, to a tiny semblance of a social life I really just wanted someone to sing me Spanish techno.



Morrissey-You are the Quarry
Again, a least chocolate covered cherry album by an artist with much better work under his belt. And again, I spent a lot of time alone running around with this album in rotation on my i-pod. This album in particular, though, is about frustration. Frustration with friends, lovers, with your country and with other people. I was in college-although it was the summer- and I was interning at a crappy literary agency. I was reading horrible manuscripts, working for a jerk, and I was the only one of my friends who didn’t work nights. So I was up early every morning to get to work, and spending most of my weeknights crashing around 8pm. Morrissey and I were riding the same wavelength that summer. I still find myself listening to “First of the Gang to Die” when I need to get pumped up which is odd since its not a particularly ‘pumped up’ song.



The Magnetic Fields-69 Love Songs
Not everything I have a romantic attachment to is a result of a stressful period. This album is actually three discs long and its one of the many many things I share with my brother. Right after I got my first car (and installed a CD player) I somehow ended up with this album. I think-if memory serves correctly- this was given to me as a birthday gift. I can’t remember by who, though, and I wish I could because they obviously have fantastic taste. Whatever the case I ended up driving my younger brother around a lot. And we listened to this album a lot. And we both happen to like it. A lot. I got stuck in an airport in Denver because of snow last year and I listened to this album the whole way through. It made the time fly. When my brother came out to visit me at my new job we drove around town and this was our soundtrack.



Belle and Sebastian-Life Pursuit; Fountains of Wayne-Traffice and Weather; Welcome Interstate Managers
This was my job search album. I haven’t been able to listen to it since. Its a pretty good B&S album. Way more up tempo than the vast majority of their catalogue. This and the Fountains of Wayne albums Traffic and Weather and Welcome Interstate Managers are bleary sad albums about being a work professional. They’re really more suited to long journeys than multiple spins in the office. They are albums that make you appreciate the work we do. Just about every morning- even if I’m tired and cranky- I look forward to going to work. But these albums also hit home a little too much. Take the lyrics from FOW’s Someone to Love off of Traffic and Weather:

It's Thursday night she should be out on the scene

But she's sitting at home watching "The King of Queens"

There's something wrong that she can't describe

She takes the contacts out of her eyes

Sets the alarm for 6:45

So she can get a little exercise.

I’m not dying for somebody to love. But I did set my alarm yesterday so I could get up and jog while the weather is still nice. And I do like to catch an episode of ‘The King of Queens’



Sleater Kinney-Everything every by Sleater Kinney (The Hot Rock, Dig Me Out, All Hands on the Bad One, One Beat, The Woods)
Wow. Ok, Sleater Kinney makes me feel kind of old. Dig Me Out came out 11 years ago. Some of my students were in first grade. I’ve liked a lot of bands that have broken up. That’s nothing special. But Sleater Kinney got me through my adolescence. I play music in my office a lot. Some of the stuff (Elvis Costello, Pavement, even Ghostface Killah) I just expect is too old for my students. The fact that SK is no longer a band, and that for my students this stuff is no longer current (or even relevant) that makes me feel old. And for some weird reason that makes me feel happy. I love every one of these albums, but it is nice not to be a restless grouchy teenager now. There is something to be said for being a grown up, with a job, and responsibilities. I went to two concerts this week, and so I don’t feel like an old fogy yet. I can still stay up late with the Kids. But I did leave both shows by midnight cause I had work the next morning.



Joan as Police Woman-Real Life
According to my media player at work I have listened to Real Life by Joan as Police Woman more than any other album since I've been here. There's nothing especially distinct about the album. It definitely fits into that Fiona Apple, Feist, Yael Naim genre of white girl with a piano music that I tend to secretly enjoy. I can attribute some of this to having downloaded that album the week I started work. Still, there's something about the music that keeps drawing me back to it. I think with some space and distance I can figure out why exactly. Maybe with some time and space I'll figure it out.

I don’t really know what the point of this post was. Sometimes my mind just usually drifts (especially on Wednesday afternoons when I sit down to write these things) and I spew whatever I’m thinking about. As I’m getting ready to head to ACPA on the other side of the table (and actually attend a few sessions, may chance?) I can’t help but think that some other people are probably nervously fiddling with their i-pods. Do other people have job search music? Music that reminds them of a specific time and place? Like your first semester as a hall director? Or that alternative spring break you took students on? Is there a genre of music that predominates student affairs?