Moving on up

This blog is being left as is for archive purposes; new entries will not appear here. Please visit Stubborn Facts, the group blog to which I will be contributing from now on.

New Dream Theater

...Same old disappointment. More throwaway crap from the Train of Thought vein.

Personally, I think the four studio albums DT released with Kevin Moore and Derek Sherinian are pure genius, beautifully written and (with minor nitpicks about I&W) beautifully produced. I could have lived with more bass in the mix on Awake, but as anyone who's listened to anything I've produced will know, you can tell I like the bass loud and clear. Those albums are internally diverse and richly three-dimensional, full of emotional twists and turns, smartly blending many styles without ever losing touch with the human connection that, IMO, needs to underlie music for it to be meaningful. They also seem part of a contiguous whole. And, to put it diplomatically, the albums they've done with JR have also had "Dream Theater" on the cover. Which isn't a criticism of Jordan, because I love his solo albums, both those he's done before joining DT and since. But the material DT have put out since he joined is chronically and almost pervasively uninteresting to me.

Federalist Society Student Symposium

My take's available here for anyone who hadn't seen it already. :)

The Guy Pratt website

Courtesy of the Sonic Frog, it's the very shiny Guy Pratt website! Outstanding bass player, great website.

Rudy 2008?

I've not said much on this subject here, but those fretting about Giulliani being too liberal on key issues to support should click here. My argument is that in an election for President of the United States, it's more important that a candidate accepts and understands that a lot of the controversial social issues are reserved by the Constitution to the States, and as long as Giulliani understands that -- the indications are that he does -- and will appoint judges and justices who will so rule, his substantive views on what individual states should do with that freedom are less important.

Christmas kitty pics