One, Two, Three

To: Ash

From: Crecente

Re: Let’s Trade Top Ten Listened Lists, M’kay?

https://lastchance.cc/lets-trade-top-ten-listened-lists-mkay-5512392%3C/a%3E%3C/p%3E

I don’t really listen to music that often while working. Too many interviews, phone calls, and questions from the fam. But here’s a list of what has most often played on my PC. While I’m a fan of Michael Jackson, the top listing is likely because it’s alphabetically the first song I have in iTunes and often autoplays for a few seconds before I switch. Excuse making done.

12-Year-Old Runs Up $1,300 FarmVille Debt

StarCraft II Special Edition Launching For $100

iPhone Gets Online Gaming Network, Multitasking This Summer

Why Gamers Should Care About Net Neutrality

Rumor: Gears Of War 3 Adds Underwater Combat, Mech Suits & More

Final Fight’s Exploding Barrel of Goodies

Should Ghosts or Programming Haunt The iPad Ouija Board?

https://lastchance.cc/12-year-old-runs-up-1-300-farmville-debt-5512410%3C/a%3E%3C/p%3E

And now the music:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MYx3BR2aJA4

1. ABC – The Jackson 5

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mzNEgcqWDG4

2. Summertime – Janis Joplin

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oHlKjeHKIYI

3. A Felicidade – Antonio Carlos Jobim

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n0rtZSKCpaE

4. Who No Know Go Know – Femi Kuti

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SmxB2BwVufA

5. (Ghost) Riders in the Sky – Johnny Cash

6. White Rabbit – Jefferson Airplane

7. Back From Kathmandu – OK Go

8. Under Pressure – Queen & David Bowie

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tXaZmY52gHM

9. Back in Black – AC/DC

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TTPqPZzH-LA

10. This Must Be the Place- Talking Heads

Wow, yeah. I guess I have odd taste in music. Go figure. I also tend to play on shuffle, so none of these songs really hit high up on the played often chart. I have about 5,300 songs on my computer (nearly 15 days of non stop music), so this really is just a taste.

While there’s certainly a lot of jazz and jazz-influenced music up on that list, it doesn’t come close to touching on my interest. The thing I love about jazz is how it has so deeply influenced writing.

Jack Kerouac’s style of writing was completely born of late nights sitting in on the likes of Charlie Parker, Miles Davis and Thelonious Monk jamming. The idea of writing in breaths deeply influenced me when I was younger. Not my writing here, probably not even my keep-it-to-myself fiction writing, but I can dream. The idea was that bebop jazz musicians played spontaneously and ignored meter, instead going for a sort of breathless stream of consciousness that just kind of flowed out of them. Kerouac later adopted that style for his writing. Typing up in such long, punctuation-free prose that he crafted a sort of scroll just so he could write On the Road without having to stop to change pages. (Something his editors later refused to take until he transfered it over to a more typical form). He once wrote a book in two days. Granted he was on speed, or acid, or something that helped to shorten his life and turn his brain to jelly, but still, wow.

Anyway, if you have the time go back and read Keroac while listening to Monk.