Friday, January 09, 2004
Trouble.
My old tennis coach, Shane Daniels, was arrested on Wednesday on the charge of sexual battery. We were close friends when I was in high school, we don't keep in touch so well, but whenever I'm in town, I always give him a call. He and my brother are very close, my brother actually took a lesson from him on the same day he was arrested.
This is something of a deep shock. How ought I react? I spoke to my mother just now, and she believes that we should take his side, and help him in any way we can. I think that this is a good thing to do, but if he was proved guilty, then it would be (another) stain on my conscience, in that I attempted to prevent a criminal from coming to justice. This seems to be the limiting case of friendship: how far can you possibly compromise personal integrity for the sake of another? What he is accused of doing seems reprehensible to me, but as a friend, I am inclined/disposed to take his side. Must I weigh the evidence, and pass judgement on him before I decide whether to support him or not? Or, ought I put my faith and trust in him, and give him the benefit of the doubt (this is the first time I've really understood what that phrase meant)? I really don't know.
This is something of a deep shock. How ought I react? I spoke to my mother just now, and she believes that we should take his side, and help him in any way we can. I think that this is a good thing to do, but if he was proved guilty, then it would be (another) stain on my conscience, in that I attempted to prevent a criminal from coming to justice. This seems to be the limiting case of friendship: how far can you possibly compromise personal integrity for the sake of another? What he is accused of doing seems reprehensible to me, but as a friend, I am inclined/disposed to take his side. Must I weigh the evidence, and pass judgement on him before I decide whether to support him or not? Or, ought I put my faith and trust in him, and give him the benefit of the doubt (this is the first time I've really understood what that phrase meant)? I really don't know.
Wednesday, January 07, 2004
Top CDs of 2003 (revised)
(in no order, except Duos for Doris is first)
Keith Rowe/John Tilbury- Duos for Doris (Erstwhile)
Amplify box (Erstwhile)
Gunter Muller/Otomo Yoshihide- Time Travel (Erstwhile)
Kraig Grady- Stolen Stars (Archive of Anaphoria)
Prurient- Troubled Sleep (Truculent)
Repeat (Jason Kahn/Toshimaru Nakamura)- Pool (Cut)
Kevin Drumm- Land of Lurches (Hanson)
Mattin- Gora (TwoThousandAnd)
Julien Ottavi- Nervure Magnetique (Sigma Editions)
Dion Workman- Ching (Antiopic)
Steve Roden- Invisible Cities (trente oiseaux)
Steve Roden- Speak No More About the Leaves (sirr)
Le Quan Ninh- Le Ventre Negatif (Meniscus)
Dave Phillips - IIII (Manufracture) [this may have come out in 2001, doesn't matter it deserves its place]
Whitehouse- Birdseed (Susan Lawly)
RHY Yau- Coagulation: Selected Works 1996-2000 (Auscultare/Groundfault)
Loren Chasse- Hedge of Nerves (Anomalous)
Sachiko M/Sean Meehan (sean meehan productions)
Daniel Menche- Invoker (Antifrost)
Cremaster- Infra (Antifrost)
Joe Colley- Desperate Attempts at Beauty.... (Auscultare/Groundfault)
Reissues:
The New Blockaders- Gesamnichtswerk
Elaine Radigue- Geelriandre/Arthesis (Fringes)
-----
Pretty predictable, the one that's on here that no one's mentioned it the Kraig Grady disc, it's a super gorgeous, vaguely gamelan derived, Organum hovering work for really super-complex weirdly tuned instruments, it's probably the most strictly sensuously gorgeous thing on the list. He's some kind of great.
The Mattin, Julien Ottavi and Dion Workman make up a kind of trilogy of awe-inspiring solo laptop music, they're the Holy Trinity of new laptop improv. They're all hella good looking too.
Keith Rowe/John Tilbury- Duos for Doris (Erstwhile)
Amplify box (Erstwhile)
Gunter Muller/Otomo Yoshihide- Time Travel (Erstwhile)
Kraig Grady- Stolen Stars (Archive of Anaphoria)
Prurient- Troubled Sleep (Truculent)
Repeat (Jason Kahn/Toshimaru Nakamura)- Pool (Cut)
Kevin Drumm- Land of Lurches (Hanson)
Mattin- Gora (TwoThousandAnd)
Julien Ottavi- Nervure Magnetique (Sigma Editions)
Dion Workman- Ching (Antiopic)
Steve Roden- Invisible Cities (trente oiseaux)
Steve Roden- Speak No More About the Leaves (sirr)
Le Quan Ninh- Le Ventre Negatif (Meniscus)
Dave Phillips - IIII (Manufracture) [this may have come out in 2001, doesn't matter it deserves its place]
Whitehouse- Birdseed (Susan Lawly)
RHY Yau- Coagulation: Selected Works 1996-2000 (Auscultare/Groundfault)
Loren Chasse- Hedge of Nerves (Anomalous)
Sachiko M/Sean Meehan (sean meehan productions)
Daniel Menche- Invoker (Antifrost)
Cremaster- Infra (Antifrost)
Joe Colley- Desperate Attempts at Beauty.... (Auscultare/Groundfault)
Reissues:
The New Blockaders- Gesamnichtswerk
Elaine Radigue- Geelriandre/Arthesis (Fringes)
-----
Pretty predictable, the one that's on here that no one's mentioned it the Kraig Grady disc, it's a super gorgeous, vaguely gamelan derived, Organum hovering work for really super-complex weirdly tuned instruments, it's probably the most strictly sensuously gorgeous thing on the list. He's some kind of great.
The Mattin, Julien Ottavi and Dion Workman make up a kind of trilogy of awe-inspiring solo laptop music, they're the Holy Trinity of new laptop improv. They're all hella good looking too.
Tuesday, January 06, 2004
Friends with investments
You've heard the phrase, "friends with benefits" right? It refers, basically and crudely to a friend of yours that you're not dating but are fucking/making out with.
I take issue with the use of the word "benefit", instead, I'd think of it as "friends with liabilities." When you're talking in financial terms, borrowing money from the bank is a liability, the opposite of an investment, which would result in "benefits." You've become indebted to the bank. So, consider making out with a friend of yours, in that you're "taking your pleasure", you're borrowing against some sort of vague emotional capital that you've built up [a flaw of mine, I can't help but to talk about friendship in terms of economics, disguisting, but inescapable], you're putting that at stake.
This is why that sort of relationship becomes so strange. In doing the above, you're splitting the relationship, emotional vs. physical pleasure. But that distinction lies on false grounds, because each person becomes a debtor and a creditor to the other person. One turns a blind eye to this, and a forgiving of debts would become a termination of the relationship. So there are credits and debts that rack up, that can never cancel each other, the friendship becomes predicated upon hiding this pile of red and black.
I take issue with the use of the word "benefit", instead, I'd think of it as "friends with liabilities." When you're talking in financial terms, borrowing money from the bank is a liability, the opposite of an investment, which would result in "benefits." You've become indebted to the bank. So, consider making out with a friend of yours, in that you're "taking your pleasure", you're borrowing against some sort of vague emotional capital that you've built up [a flaw of mine, I can't help but to talk about friendship in terms of economics, disguisting, but inescapable], you're putting that at stake.
This is why that sort of relationship becomes so strange. In doing the above, you're splitting the relationship, emotional vs. physical pleasure. But that distinction lies on false grounds, because each person becomes a debtor and a creditor to the other person. One turns a blind eye to this, and a forgiving of debts would become a termination of the relationship. So there are credits and debts that rack up, that can never cancel each other, the friendship becomes predicated upon hiding this pile of red and black.
