Ask An Alternative High School Teacher

Today we’ll speak with someone who has seen the future that is our children. The future sez “Start buying krugerrands now!”

So…the kids these days. What are they listening to? How bad is it?

I think teenagers’ taste in music are as all over the place as they always have been, only they’re typically listening to the derivatives of derivatives. Very few of the students would be able to tell me who M.I.A. is, but they all have about 13 different songs that sampled her second album liberally.  Then you have some students who genuinely confuse me because they like groups that are just so…odd. Bone Thugs-N-Harmony? Really? Or like if a student tells me they LOVE Nine Inch Nails; I really have a tough time understanding how anyone under the age of say, 21, might even know who Trent Reznor is.

Ask A Former Banking IT Guy Who Wants To Become An O-Chemist (Or Something Like That)

T. is part of my e-minarchisto posse (much love for the gry massive) but sometimes he’d say things about music that would make me cry blood. This is my attempt to eff the ineffable.

You and I are ebony and ivory (I probably tan better than you do) musically-speaking. If you’re into it I’m out of it, and vice versa. However, we both seem to like James Blackshaw. How is this possible?

Both of us liking James Blackshaw is possible because the universe is a vast and confusing place.  I mean, it’s like electrons right?  No two in the same atom can have the same quantum state, but they can have a few quantum numbers in common.  Our tastes, well, they’re both in an outer shell around n = 4, but you’re l = 3 and I’m l = 2.

Ask a Development Officer!

In this installment of “Ask a…” we’re talking to a development officer. When you go to a not-for-profit event, the attendees are solicited by a development officer. When you smudge a plaque by rubbing your greasy fingers on it, you’re defacing something that was paid for by prospects developed by a development officer. When you’re dying in a hospital bed, the decor was donated through a network of donors developed by a development officer. So they’re a bit like angels in that they are everywhere while being invisible, and because they do battle with Satan in the form of $300 annual donors who think they’re high rollers and the apogee of all human life on this Earth.

Ask a Game Producer!

In this installment of “Ask a…” we’re going to talk to a game producer and play my imitation jukebox obscura, where the most dangerous game of all is Ger-man.

I uploaded five tracks and changed the file names, but completely screwed up by not removing the tags. Mr. Producer was a good sport about it.

Ask a Physicist!

For more than a generation journalists have thought nothing of getting the political, sociological and economic opinions of musicians. Countless musicians have, in return, given great weight to their opinions and what it means for their work. It’s now never enough to be able to say “I specialize in a form of nonverbal emotional communication that transcends the boundaries of race, class and nation” – they must also offer their opinions and solutions on multifaceted geopolitical issues.

And so we end up with a collection of opinions which are no more likely to be more thorough or accurate than your average non-musician, but are given great weight and esteem.

Despite this trend, music journalists rarely seek out non-musicians and get their opinions on music – theory, practice, business, style, whatever – as ill-informed as they may be on these disparate and complicated subjects.

I think this is a travesty.

A travesty I would like to correct with SCIENCE!