Gina Harris's Blog, page 161

Band Review: Eion Willoughby

I often do something a little offbeat on Thanksgiving because I am concerned that with the holiday not many people will read it, and that seems unfair to the artist.
This year it was a relief, because I really hated this music, and I feel bad posting about it.
I do admit that listening to Soundcloud instead of watching the videos was a lot less annoying. That is not a reflection on Willoughby's appearance, because many of the videos don't even focus on him that much. The issue was more the apparent carelessness in the making and the utter lack of craft, giving the impression that everyone involved was so sure that they were wonderful that there was no need for effort.
Merely having it playing in the background did not have as bad an effect, though I did have the volume a bit lower than usual.
The songs done with Kendra are a little less annoying, so collaboration can have a positive effect, but I just don't care anymore. I will still post one of the videos as a song of the day next month, because this review did happen. He did follow me on Twitter. But then it's over.
Mainly it feels like a reminder that electronica has similar accessibility to hip hop, where a lot of people can do it, and so many people who aren't really that good at it still produce a lot of material.
https://soundcloud.com/eionofficial
http://www.eionofficial.com/
https://www.facebook.com/eionofficial?_rdr=p
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCkcOMoMUZbJyDAsTVQZKZ5Q?app=desktop
https://twitter.com/EionOfficial

So wrong

Not that long ago a politician was sounding absolutely ridiculous in his efforts to not admit to actually being wrong, as opposed to having merely misspoken or been fooled with a trick question, or anything other than legitimately having said something stupid and terrible.
(Doesn't really narrow it down much, does it?)
I remember thinking how important it is to be able to admit being wrong. It allows so much stupidity to be avoided, and that's not just by eliminating the absurd attempts at saving face. When you own mistakes you are able to learn from them better. You become less careless about future mistakes because you remember having to correct.
I was never a big liar before, but it was having to confess a lie that really set me against it. It just wasn't worth it.
(Though learning that you don't have to tell someone something that is none of their business can also make honesty easier.)
Anyway, I was thinking that maybe I should set an example and have a blog post admitting something I was wrong about, but I couldn't come up with anything good. Many things where I have been wrong or stupid about things have already been blogged about extensively.
Some things that I still have trouble with relate to a lack of patience with annoying people. It is possible to write really interesting and humorous things about how some people test my patience, but that seems more likely to get mean-spirited than make a good case. And I can just say sometimes I have really mean thoughts about people - in fact, I just did - but I don't think it helps anything.
However, I have been thinking about poverty issues a lot, along with my own financial issues. Some of the experiences that I have affect a lot of people, and maybe there are things to say. There are some taboos on talking about money openly, and also, I get really defensive about it. I certainly have made some financial mistakes. In that way it could accomplish similar purposes.
I had been thinking about writing about that this week, but it seemed like a bad lead-in to Thanksgiving. So, I believe I will be doing that next week.
If something else comes up, that may not work out, but still, be willing to admit when you are wrong. It takes a heavy weight off. Yes, try to understand things and make good choices so that you are not wrong all the time, but when it happens, embrace it.
Even if you're a politician? ESPECIALLY if you're a politician.

The stuff that is not writing

An amazing and horrible thing happened today.
Yesterday I wrote that I had submitted a new version of the Family Blood screenplay. While I had updated some information, one of my goals for today was to look at other submitted projects and see what I can do better with my own descriptions and information.
That may still be a good idea, but the urgency has been deflated a bit because the screenplay has already been rejected.
I'm not going to lie; my first reaction was to just sob for a few minutes. I really thought I had a shot, and that this particular shot would be my last chance of finishing the year in a fiscally sound place. In that way it was a big blow, and it coming within 24 hours felt really harsh.
However, once the sobs died down, I have to admit that's the first time I have gotten any response other than a notification that the 40-day review period has expired, indicating that this submission has at least been taken more seriously. I don't know if they automatically take a deeper look at second versions, or if it was because I added the image, or because I mentioned it being tied to a book series but then they saw that it is not a heavy-selling book series. It's just one more step, I guess.
Amazon has been helpful and frustrating lately. I added reviews to all five of my books on Goodreads. I followed the prompt to add a review to Cara on Amazon, and it allowed me to fill in some parts then rejected it because I might be biased.
However, when I was looking at adding excerpts on Goodreads, I see that previews are available via Amazon, which can be helpful. I still think adding a few paragraphs to the page itself that don't require any clicking or windows opening is a good idea, and will be getting those added tonight.
I guess there's always next year.

Apologies to G T Denny

Some time ago I was mystified by a television commercial for a book that appeared to be self-published.
http://sporkful.blogspot.com/2012/04/cynical-look-at-shameless-self.html
In addition, I noticed that the author seemed to have posted four out of the five reviews that were there at the time, one of them being remarkably incoherent for an author.
I suppose I was a little judgmental, but now I have to back off, because tonight I am going to be posting reviews on Goodreads and Amazon for all five of my books. (Still no plans for a TV commercial.)
I will only post one review each, as myself, and I will specify that I am the author. I may even write that this feels weird because I am the author, though if I put that in each review it will get a little repetitive. It does feel weird. It just also feels necessary.
I would see the prompt to post a review on both sites frequently, but it didn't feel right. Writing a book is not the same as reading it, though you do get very familiar with the content.
I do like them. I feel they are good, but then if I give a good review is it arrogant?
Also, I hardly ever give five stars, I don't think I should give myself five stars, but then does that look like I don't have confidence in my work? Because four stars from me is pretty good. I think four stars is about right.
(It's just that they are fiction, and not trying to be anything other than a good story, so that's not "It was amazing"; that's "I really liked it".)
It's also weird to put a date on when I read them, though I am going with the publication date for the books published this year, and when I was looking over the proofs for the books I published last year. This will at least up my book count for the year, which is nice.
Or maybe I should just put the publication date for all of them so it doesn't look like I read the sequel before the original. I wrote them in the order they happened, to the extent that they did happen.
I'll try and get excerpts up for each book too, but that may not happen tonight.
What I can tell you happened today is that now that there is a Family Blood novel trilogy, I revised the Family Bloodscreenplay and reloaded it:
https://studios.amazon.com/projects/21022
I write better now than I did in 2013. (I should. I've been doing it a lot.)
So now it's like the movie is based on the book, but the book was based on the movie first. See. It's all weird!
And please, please, please, if you have read any of my books, please post reviews for them. It makes a difference. Thank you!

Band Review: Frank Waln

Frank Waln is a Hip Hop artist from the Rosebud Reservation in South Dakota.
Waln has a degree in Audio Arts and Acoustics, and I suspect that greater understanding of sound has been helpful to him in creating the powerful and memorable tracks. "AbOriginal", "Born on the Rez", and "2 Live & Die on the Plains" work especially well, making an impression while playing and then lingering in the memory.
I will say that on the Soundcloud page there is a lot more experimentation with distortion and screeches, and I don't like that as much. The officially released songs have been chosen and polished.
Often when I am reviewing Hip Hop I feel I need to give a caveat that Hip Hop isn't my favorite, because other people will probably like it more than I do. Then there are other groups that make me think maybe I do like Hip Hop.
Frank Waln is one of the latter, and the youngest I have come across in that group.
These are worth checking out. Music can be purchased on Bandcamp, iTunes, and Amazon.
http://frankwaln.com/
https://www.facebook.com/fwaln
https://www.youtube.com/user/NakeNulaWaun4
https://frankwaln47.bandcamp.com/
https://soundcloud.com/f_waln_35
https://twitter.com/FrankWaln

Band Review: The Tiger Club

I liked The Tiger Club quite a bit.
It was started by Baxter Robertson, a professional musician who nonetheless wasn't getting chances to play live. Getting together with other musicians who rotate in and out, Robertson was able to solve that issue. They play around Los Angeles and San Francisco, with several upcoming dates in San Jose.
Their 2014 release, Mephisto Island, has a light jazzy sound that makes moving your body irresistible. That seems like it could be a great show in an actual club.
Instead the web site indicates that the live show consists of a lot more covers, going among various genres.
That it interesting, because as interesting and dynamic they make it sound, there are no video of live performances on the Youtube channel. Instead that has five collage art videos that include one cover ("Purple Snowflakes") and one illustration video, none of which really do justice to the music.
So I do think the band could definitely do things to be more effective. If all of the members are professionals with busy careers, then there may not be time to develop and promote the fun side project, but it feels like some lost potential there.
Regardless, I do recommend listing to Mephisto Island, which is a lot of fun.
http://tigerclubband.com/
https://www.facebook.com/thetigerclubband
https://www.youtube.com/user/TheTigerClubBand
https://twitter.com/tigerclub

Talismans

I am writing this with a bat around my neck.
We are pretty fond of the Fossil Cartel, and like looking there.
https://thefossilcartel.com/
My favorite things to look at are the carved pendants. I once expressed interest in an amethyst manatee, and Maria gave me hers, but the bat came later.
It came because I saw that turquoise is supposed to fight writer's block, and they had bats. Bats are associated with good fortune and happiness in China. It seemed like a good necklace for a writer who needed some luck.
I'm pretty sure Maria bought me that too, but it took a while to use it for writing.
When I finish a project, I need some downtime. After finishing Morgan, I wanted to get started on Family Reunion right away, but I needed a break, and fell once more into my Spider Solitaire addiction.
I do understand addiction a lot better than I did, but I was still having a hard time fighting it. There are a lot of reasons not to write - it is super easy to avoid, no matter how much you love it or have to say. That's when I started thinking about the necklace.
I have written plenty without the necklace as well, but I started thinking of it as a way to shift my mind. I am on the computer for lots of things, but when I am there for writing, I want to be there for that, and not get distracted. I thought the necklace could function symbolically. Symbols are important to writers. Putting it on would say "I am sitting down to write now."
And then I couldn't find the bat at first; the beginning chapters were written with the manatee.
If I am using it specifically for being in writer's mode, taking it off might make sense when I leave, but I actually keep it on a lot, especially if I am not done for the day.
I also enjoy that when I lean over our kitten to pet her and it dangles in front of her, she will try to eat it. (She can fit the entire manatee into her mouth easily, but the bat is a little harder.) And I am a little sad that she seems to be growing out of it, even though that again does not have a writing purpose.
It is not a perfect system, but I have avoided the game playing and I have gotten a lot of writing and editing done.
Family Reunion is ready and I am starting the upload tonight.

Vision Boards

I have not yet created my vision board. I do now have an idea of what it will look like.
I was getting ready for a journal session Sunday, and I realized that the next thing to do was create my vision board. Doing so has always felt baffling for me, but if that was the thing to do, it was the thing to do.
I read over the list of things that I wanted a few times before church.
http://sporkful.blogspot.com/2015/10/this-next-section-wants.html
At church I am the ward librarian. Right before and after Sunday School is my busiest time. It gets busy enough that I do not go to Sunday School, but there are often lulls in between. I had gone over the list because I wanted to take advantage of such a lull to try and visualize. When I had a free moment I started sketching.
Suddenly pictures came to me. They weren't pictures that I was capable of replicating with my pencil, but whereas previously the visual had been evading me, it stopped.
There were a few things I learned in the process. I had been thinking I needed a way to represent every single thing, and that does not seem to be the case. It may be that some things are already present enough in my life, or they will naturally follow with other things. Also, some pictures will do double duty.
For example, one image that came to mind, and you can find lots of different illustrations of it, is a woman seated in the lotus position with all of the chakras represented. As I've written before, the chakras have come to represent balance to me, and with that they also represent health.
Health blurred with my desire to be financially secure and be able to give in the image of a cornucopia. Shown spilling over with seasonal fruits and vegetables, it does reference health, but it also signifies abundance, and that will be mean that I am both safe and able to give.
I may very well draw little stacks of money, and that's fine if I do. I had thought about drawing a gift-wrapped box to show the giving, but I know what I want to do with it already. Maybe I don't need that reminder. At that point it became more about creating a feeling than a list, and the feeling could be accomplished with greater simplicity.
There are other things that I could use for embellishments but don't need. For example, I have thought about things that signify creativity - like pens and paintbrushes - or music - like notes - but I have those things in my life. They are important, but they are also already here. However, I do want to depict two bookshelves, one representing what I want to write, and one representing the things I want to learn.
The other image that came strongly to mind is of a woman being embraced by a man behind her. It might even have a heart around it.
My first thought was that I'm not even sure that should be a priority. I have accepted that it is unlikely, and that I can live with that. Those are really the same issues that I had with putting down feeling cherished on the original list, but I did still put it down.
However, thinking about the positions, the woman has someone she can lean on, and arms encircling her, so there is support and warmth, but also she is not blocked or hindered at all, and there are non-romantic elements to that, even if the first thought is romantic. And also, the heart wants what it wants.
This may not be how everyone does it, but this is how it's going for me.

The last Throwback Thursday

One of my to-do items is almost done.
In January I started posting pictures on Twitter and Facebook for Throwback Thursday. The goal was to do 43, one for each year of my life. This Thursday will be the 43rd.
It has been important for multiple reasons. There has been reviewing my past and seeing whom I have been and how I have gotten here. There was getting used to seeing myself physically and looking at myself physically when I had avoided it for so long. There was seeing that other people don't hate my pictures nearly as much as I do.
That has been about perspective, but it has come in other ways too. The picture I really hate is from when I was unemployed, and that was an unhappy time in many ways, but then there were a lot of pictures from that year where I was doing thing with friends. Having more time, I was able to connect more, and that wasn't miserable. I had already remembered that it was a very creative period, but it was a connected period too.
I am mostly sure that the Thursday picture will be selfie that I took with a goat about a year ago. That is partly as a bridge to the next project, but also, a lot of the more recent pictures have been posted already. 



That's something that has changed. I have been making an effort to get more pictures taken, and I have been posting them more. This has not killed me, but don't be too impressed with the transformation. My current Facebook profile picture is painful for me. 


Most of the photos have been my upper body, which is fat, but I have been getting used to that. This current picture shows my legs, and I have not gotten used to those. They're bad, but I saw that they were bad and still left the picture up.
The reason it went up in the first place is that I needed to replace the Halloween shot. It's a picture of me with Cookie Monster, and since the songs of the day are Muppet-themed this month it made sense. I took a picture in a Santa hat for December, though really only the white trim shows, so it may not be obvious it's a Santa hat.

I have been updating my profile picture more as part of this. I don't know that I will keep changing it monthly, but it's something I can do to keep the knowledge and the acceptance and the conquering of my body issues going until I can start the next thing: taking a selfie each day for a year.
My camera broke in September. It wasn't going to be ideal for selfies anyway, which seem to be more of a cell phone thing, but it at least would have been a possibility. I have been borrowing my sister's camera for these other shots, but I'm not going to borrow it once a day for a year.
So I don't know when that will get started. I know now that for it to be fully effective, I should probably make sure to get the lower body in on a regular basis.
I also know that once I start posting selfies daily some people will think I'm a narcissist. Well, maybe, but not because of that.
Thinking in terms of the 365 feminist selfie project, I'll be starting it about two years late. That feels pretty typical for me, but it's okay. I will get where I'm going, and I hope I'll bring others along with me.
http://sporkful.blogspot.com/2015/01/43-photographs.htmlhttp://sporkful.blogspot.com/2015/05/no-more-good-pictures.htmlhttp://sporkful.blogspot.com/2015/09/the-most-hated-photo.html

Band Review: Robert Mirabal

Robert Mirabal is an award-winning musician and performer from Taos, New Mexico. That encompasses a great deal.
It includes recordings of Native American flute playing, as well as making the flutes. It includes dancing. It includes playing in a multicultural band in New York and supporting world music, but also fusing traditional music with rock and funk, collaborating with Mark Andes of Heart (among other bands). In includes composing for modern dancers, two Grammys, and a Christmas album.
Unsurprisingly, you will hear a lot of different things as you work through the catalog. The Story of Land sounds very traditional, as do some tracks on more recent recordings, like "Drum Battle" on Music From A Painted Cave. Some tracks are more like spoken word, like "Theo's Dream", while some are more similar to rock, like "Skinwalker's Moon". The most interesting track may be "The Dance" for all of the different qualities it incorporates.
Mirabal does have some videos online, though the video often extends past the audio. Separate from his channel, there are many other users who have posted parts of performances. Being able to see the costumes and the movements may be the best way of enjoying the music. The comments I saw showed a lot of enthusiasm, with many people having been greatly moved.
Only links for his own pages are included below.
http://mirabal.com/
https://www.facebook.com/robertmirabalmusic/
https://www.youtube.com/user/RobertMirabal/featured
https://twitter.com/MIRABALMAN