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"Too Much Freedom" by Lou Barlow. Play Count: 7

4/2/2025

Both John Davis and Lou Barlow opened the show with 3 solo guitar songs. John went first and his first one contained the phrase "don't google me". He then told us he's a 4th grade teacher and this is his Spring Break. This is one of the things he tells his class. Lou played "The Ballad of Daykitty" and "Skull" and another I did not recognize. Once they were together Lou mostly played bass and John played guitar. They had an iPad that would serve as a rhythm track. On a few songs Lou would play the live drums. They played quite a few songs I didn't recognize. One I recognized was "Pole Position". During "Natural One", Lou's vocals were messed up until the end of the song. It seemed like we were hearing them only through the stage monitors. He told us he once sang that song Karaoke with Sleater Kinney. I bought a CD and told him I listened to his podcast and that the "Bidet Song" was so funny it brought me to tears.

3/30/2025

Our neighbors invited us to this kid friendly show on a Sunday afternoon. It was at a screen printing shop that is celebrating its 10 year anniversary. They had a few bands, and we stayed just for one with our neighbors. Dreckig are a couple that sing in both Spanish and German. The music is electronic beats, and they have live drums and percussion on top. They also played a song or two that had a flute played through reverb. While they are playing and dancing they are wearing sparkly hooded capes and big sunglasses. It was really fun. I think it might have been Oscar's second show. We went to see Red Yarn years ago at Alberta Street Pub, but I never wrote it up. Oscar seemed to like watching the drumming (it was pretty cool). We also checked out the mixing board. I hope to make it to more shows with Oscar.

Swift Concurrency (3/23/2025)

I've still been coding for fun. I've really dug deep into Swift Concurrency over the last year. It's picked up again in the last month or so. The program I use to backup my iTunes data is able to process the data in a massively concurrent manner. This means on my MacBook M4 it will use 1200% CPU while running! I keep learning more ways to get more processing done in parallel. What I discovered most recently was that my code would do work concurrently to make a single collection, usually an Array. Then it would process over that Array again with massive concurrency, to once again make a single Array, and then even do one more concurrent process after that. I learned how to not serialize to an array each time, using AsyncStreams. They are so cool.  #

3/14/2025

After seeing them about two months before, I went with Jesse to see Sunbathe again. It was at this old bar in North Portland. It was another bar with a one foot stage in the corner. It was fun, and seemed packed. I really liked the first band, Strange Pilgrim. The entire show had both a smoke machine and lasers, so it was pretty cool. I just liked their guitar sound, and the vocals were reverbed. The singer was able to turn a dial on a box to change the reverb while he sang. The second band, The Fur Coats, had two saxophone players (who both also sang). They also had a slide guitar and a keyboardist. So their sound was nice and big and fun. Sunbathe put on a great set; just as good if not better than last time. I still must buy their album. This was a rare bar show for me, and it went late. I got home at 12:30 AM and I was so so tired.

Becoming Led Zeppelin (2/24/2025)

Mike and I went to see this movie last night. It was full of amazing performances. It was a good story, ending just after Led Zeppelin II went #1. I was amazed how quickly they and their sound were formed. The set shown from Sweden when they were contractly on tour as The Yardbirds was intense. It was just a month or two after they got together. I'd also had no idea they owned all their recordings. Go see this if you like Led Zeppelin, even just a little bit. Mike joked that they ended it in 1970, so they wouldn't have to talk about the weird stuff Jimmy Page did.  #

Sharing Update (2/22/2025)

I've updated my site to be able to shared more easily. A preview of the entry, show, or more will show up. It works in Messages, Facebook, BlueSky, and probably more places.  #

Capitalism (2/21/2025)

I listened to all of a terrific podcast about the history and state of Capitalism. You should check it out; I learned so much.  #

Pitfall! (2/5/2025)

I loved the game Pitfall! when we had our Atari 2600. Theoretically if you got a high score, you could send Activision a photo of your T.V. showing the high score. I have an instant photo of a T.V. showing my high score somewhere. A smart person "ported" Pitfall! to the web. Amazing.  #

Bonnie 'Prince' Billy (2/4/2025)

Terrific interview with Bonnie 'Prince' Billy.  #

Half (1/30/2025)

This morning I realized I've lived more than half my life away from Illinois.  #

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