Liner Notes

Soundscape #97: “Without Music, Life Would Be A Mistake” — Friedrich Nietzsche

liner notes — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 01:35:07 +0000

Hughes Leglise. Pont St Louis, 2005.

I’ve heard it said that sometimes a whiff of cookies baking in the oven can bring a flood of childhood memories. A friend once felt really nostalgic in a strange house just because there was a certain smell coming off a certain piece of furniture. For me, it’s music.

I was listening to a song the other day and suddenly I got the feeling that I was somewhere else. Particularly I had this vivid image of this street in Paris near where my hotel was. The strange thing is that the image came out from nowhere and it didn’t feel like a picture; it felt like I was physically there.

There’s no question that music transports us to a different place and/or time. I often associate certain songs with places I’ve been, even though there’s no discernible connection and the association is entirely random and forged simply because I was listening to it at that time and place.

I’d like to think that the little connections we make between our senses and the world around us are little ways in which we try to make a part of the world our own but it could only be just pure randomness.

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Playlist:
1. (0:00) Yo La Tengo - Tom Courtenay (Electr-O-Pura)
2. (3:28) Gigolo Aunts - The Big Lie (Minor Chords And Major Themes)
3. (6:57) Green Day - She (Dookie)
4. (9:12) Weezer - The Good Life (Pinkerton)
5. (13:28) Headlights - On April 2 (Some Racing, Some Stopping)
6. (16:05) The Killers - Change Your Mind (Hot Fuss)
7. (19:18) Pavement - Gold Sounds (Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain)
8. (22:05) Smashing Pumpkins - 1979 (Mellon Collie And The Infinite Sadness)
9. (26:22) Death Cab For Cutie - Photobooth (Forbidden Love EP)
10. (30:10) Suede - The Wild Ones (Dog Man Star)
11. (34:54) Teenage Fanclub - Neil Jung (Grand Prix)
12. (39:45) Beirut - Postcards From Italy (Gulag Orkestar)
13. (44:01) Bright Eyes - We Are Nowhere And It’s Now (I’m Wide Awake It’s Morning)

Soundscape #96: “It Is A Truth Universally Acknowledged”

liner notes — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 03:21:45 +0000

I don’t know if it’s a good thing that love isn’t what it used to be. We’ve all watched the same movies where boy meets girl, boy loves girl, boy loses girl, boy gets girl back and they all lived happily ever after. They are all variations of course but they basically bitch about how love would conquer all. If only it were that simple!

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Soundscape #95: Worry Often Gives A Small Thing A Big Shadow

liner notes — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 02:12:15 +0000

The concept of time is a peculiar one to us humans. Not only are we able to project into the future our hopes and dreams, we are also cursed with memories of our past failures. We are in fact living 3 time periods simultaneously. Stop anyone on the street at any time and he/she is probably either mulling over a prior meeting and daydreaming about a far flung holiday at the same time.

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Soundscape #94: L’esprit de l’escalier

liner notes — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 01:10:39 +0000

Sometimes it’s hard to keep a healthy balance between who you are and the people around you. As we all seem to like thinking of ourselves as individuals, it seems inevitable that these individuals would clash and come to blows at some point. Be it the smallest pettiness against a neighbour or a full-out war against another country, arguments/conflicts are usually our ways to assert our point and trying to get that across the other party. I have nothing against arguments nor conflicts; in fact, I think them essential to our social and mental wellbeing. Without opposing views, we wouldn’t know what’s wrong from right. We would not know humility either if we feel we’re right all the time.

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Soundscape #93: Everyone’s Got One

liner notes — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 01:18:37 +0000

Ego, according to the mighty wiki, is a Latin word meaning “I”, cognate with the Greek “Εγώ (Ego)” meaning “I.” And no other species on this planet has a better idea of “I” than us humans. The idea of the ego goes further than Freud’s famous “ego, id and the super-ego.” Psychology aside, it’s just another idea of the self.

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Soundscape #92: “In Solitude, Where We Are Least Alone” — George Gordon, Lord Byron

liner notes — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 04:37:40 +0000

Some people unwind by going for a couple of drinks after work while others opt for a spot of retail therapy. I like doing both of course and they have both saved my life on numerous occasions. But what I like most of all - after the long numbing day at work and after the equally numbing commute home - is to come home, put away my keys, my bag, my stuff, have a shower, make myself some food and a cup of hot tea with lemon and honey, turn on my computer… you get the idea.

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Soundscape #91: “Poor And Content Is Rich, And Rich Enough” — William Shakespeare

liner notes — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 09:25:17 +0000

It’s hard not to be swept up into a culture of consumerism in this increasingly global world. We get firsthand information about what’s happening in other parts of the world via internet; we see what other people are doing, eating, wearing and as with the greener grass syndrome, we want it too.

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Soundscape #90: “A Balanced Diet Is A Cookie In Each Hand”

liner notes — Fri, 04 Jul 2008 00:40:30 +0000

The relationship between us and our bodies worsens as we age. It seems as though we need more time to recover from a hangover. Our skins look really bad when we sleep 1 hour less at night. Our reflexes are probably slower as well.

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Soundscape #89: A Commuter’s Guide to Life in The Fast Lane

liner notes — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 03:03:19 +0000

In view of escalating costs, most city dwellers would utilise public transport at some point, if not every day. Trains are usually the backbone of the transport system in any city. They are (usually) fast, clean, efficient and relatively cheap, in Singapore at least. The MRT is usually the transport of (no) choice for most people. As most city dwellers know, there is much to learn about a country’s people just by observing them in the train. It’s amazing how everyone’s in their own little world while getting squashed like sardines.

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Soundscape #88: “If The Body Be Feeble, The Mind Will Not Be Strong” — Thomas Jefferson

liner notes — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 06:39:25 +0000

Nothing proves the duality of mind and body than a spot of flu. When the body flounders and struggles, the mind cannot be far off. I was down for about a week with the works: flu, fever and a bad throat. The fever is especially debilitating. At about 39C, I felt as if I were disconnected with everything and didn’t care at all about anything at all. I was in my own private hell.

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