it's early on a sunday morning, and i have a new song for you. but, let's just talk a little bit first and put the new song in a separate post afterwards.
that was a bit of a busy week for me. things are starting to turn over at school; i'll have some tests coming up this week, before we swing over to the second part of the semester after hallowe'en. we're going to be doing animal farm in english class for the first few weeks of november, and then i need to focus on my independent study, which is not so independent - the english teacher has insisted i read the grapes of wrath, so it seems like i'm stuck with it. i think he could have picked something worse for me. the exploratory section has switched out of pointillism and into computer science, so i'm not going to be skipping the class any more. french class is still boring. and, my gifted math class is carrying on with no instruction whatsoever that i can discern of...
something else that happened this week is a new korn record. so, what's my story with korn, so far?
korn is something that i was exposed to via a guitar world magazine that claimed they were poised to become the next nirvana. this piqued my interest; while the claim has already become sort of cliched, there was something about the presentation in the article that led me to take it a little bit more seriously. so, i picked up their first record some time last year (mid 1995) on a total whim...
...and did not initially like it at all. i could hear the claim that they were picking up a grunge aesthetic and running with it, but i didn't like the funk or hip-hop aesthetics and i found the vocals to be really hit or miss - they're either effectively harsh or just openly absurd. after multiple spins, i developed a kind of appreciation for the disc. but, i don't feel that i ever clicked with it the way i was hoping i would.
i read an early review of their new record that was overall very negative but claimed they were moving more in the grunge direction that i was looking for, so, i just picked up this record, life is peachy, on a whim, as well. i'm honestly still processing it, but i think i've decided that i like most of it, at least. i certainly think it's a lot more interesting than the previous record, anyways.
see, what i'm finding interesting about the record is how bizarre it is. the syncopation is pretty twisted. there's all kinds of weird effects. it's full of dissonance and broken harmonies. so, it actually offers a fairly open landscape to explore. people are starting to label them a metal band, but i don't really understand that - and i'm certainly not interested in approaching them from that perspective, or in listening to metal. i hear grunge on the record. i hear punk. i hear industrial. and, i hear some hip-hop, too. the hip-hop is exotic for me, but this is otherwise a good intersection of my musical tastes. but, metal? where? and, why? and yuck...no thanks....
i don't know if their proper fan base is going to enjoy this or not, but i think it's a huge step forwards in a more interesting and abstract direction.
