Day: March 30, 2006

My Life with My Life in the Bush of Ghosts

my life in the bush of ghosts

Sez here that, following on the heels of the Talking Heads reissues (which have been spectacular, btw, at least the first four albums), another early ’80s David Byrne masterpiece is getting loving reissue treatment, with a twist. Byrne’s collaboration with Brian Eno, My Life in the Bush of Ghosts was a significant milestone, if not an out and out first, for all sorts of practices that are in wide use today, including sampling, found vocals, and crosses between world music and guitar pop. But the album and the extra tracks (though no “Qu’ran”) are only part of the coolness: As part of the reissue, downloadable multitrack masters will be made available for two of the songs and licensed under Creative Commons for remixing purposes.

The remix site isn’t live yet, so it’s anyone’s guess for what will go up there. I’m hoping for “Help Me Somebody” and “Moonlight in Glory,” though I’d be very very happy to get a chance to remix “The Jezebel Spirit.” Hopefully they’ll have the remix site up before the 11th, when the album officially drops.

Via BoingBoing, who link to a bootleg of the missing track “Qu’ran” (which I downloaded in the good bad old days of Napster and which I would gladly pay money to get in a higher bitrate version).

(Oh: my life with this album? Got it a few months after graduating and got hooked. It made its way onto one of the best mix tapes I ever made, and I was so hooked on it that I was prone to quoting some of the found words while I was out with friends, who then of course looked at me like I was nuts. Which I was. I was in the Bush of Ghosts. I still haven’t found anything quite like it. Moby’s Play, while not without its good points, is a pale shadow by comparison.)

Bad Internet, good Internet

I’m on the road again, and ran into two Internet service concepts for travelers that I haven’t seen before. The first: JetBlue’s free WiFi at JFK. Now this is an airline that knows how to inspire loyalty. I only had 20 minutes before my connection boarded, and normally I would hate to buy WiFi just to start downloading my email and then get on the plane. Being able to do that for free? Brilliant.

Second, the wired high-speed service in my hotel room (a Hyatt). The service is paid (boo!) but they allow you to have a fixed IP address without NAT (yay!), which is pretty cool. The service is by GuestTek, whom I hadn’t heard of before but who certainly have the right message for their institutional customers: “Attract more guests and increase customer loyalty with high-speed Internet access.” Now, if they could just get across the part where it shouldn’t have to cost the customer $9.95 a night…

You’ve got a Funny Face

I wrote a few days ago about why I love our nearby big city—but our own little burb isn’t without its charms. For instance: how many towns can claim an Australian expat as a local celebrity—one who has been living on the streets for a month? The Arlington Advocate published a story today about Funny Face, an Australian “labradoodle” (lab-poodle cross) who escaped her new owners within two hours of arriving in the country and led the entire population of several neighborhoods, including mine, in a chase that took the better part of the month before her eventual capture.

The best part of it, other than the occasional white streak with a red sweater going down the street, was the commentary on the local email list. Quotations posted from the List in the article included a designation of Funny Face as “the canine equivalent of Moby Dick,” as well as daily updates of where the dog was in the neighborhood.

So add this to the values of online community: sometimes your neighbors can help you find lost friends—or at least help you laugh about them.