First off, this album is not recommended for anyone looking for positive and uplifting messages. If you are currently suffering from depression, I dont recommend listening to it. It might just push you over the edge. Then again, maybe you'll listen to the words and realize, "hey wait a minute, I'm not the only one feeling this way!"
It's absolutely ideal if you have experienced a relationship gone bad. You'd think they wrote the words just for you. Hmmm, I better check to see if my room is bugged.
http://www.theoryofadeadman.com/
Although I like all the songs on this album, my personal fave tracks on this are: Santa Monica, Better Off, Hello Lonely, Me & My Girl and Since You've Been Gone.
I'd like to thank "Sal" for recommending this album to me. I am totally obsessing it now.
Wednesday, November 29, 2006
Album "1X" by artist - Three Days Grace
This album is very dark. It allows you to feel comfortable with singing along to some pretty angry songs, which is very typical of this Canadian band.
My personal fave tracks are: Pain, Animal I Have Become, Never Too Late, Riot and Get Out Alive.
http://www.threedaysgrace.com/
My personal fave tracks are: Pain, Animal I Have Become, Never Too Late, Riot and Get Out Alive.
http://www.threedaysgrace.com/
Album "Wintersong" by artist - Sarah Mclachlan
Please take this review with a grain of salt. You have to remember that Sarah Mclachlan is my all-time favourite musical artist. As far as I am concerned, Sarah can do noooooooo wrong. I'm a teency-weency biased.
Having said that, I had to say that I was hesitant on buying this album. When an artist puts out a XMas album, I tend to think that they are on the down-side of their career with a next stop to a smoky loung in Vegas.
I'd like to thank "S" very, very much for buying this CD for me. You are far braver than I, my friend!!! I am ever so thankful that you did, cuz this album is GREAT!
I have listened it over and over and over and over and... you get the point. It just gets better every time I listen to it.
Sarah picks the darker, more introspective XMas songs for this particular album, and I am just fine with that. It goes back to her darker roots, not referring to her hair, of course.
If you are a Sarah fan like me, you will likely enjoy this album, too.
http://www.sarahmclachlan.com/
Having said that, I had to say that I was hesitant on buying this album. When an artist puts out a XMas album, I tend to think that they are on the down-side of their career with a next stop to a smoky loung in Vegas.
I'd like to thank "S" very, very much for buying this CD for me. You are far braver than I, my friend!!! I am ever so thankful that you did, cuz this album is GREAT!
I have listened it over and over and over and over and... you get the point. It just gets better every time I listen to it.
Sarah picks the darker, more introspective XMas songs for this particular album, and I am just fine with that. It goes back to her darker roots, not referring to her hair, of course.
If you are a Sarah fan like me, you will likely enjoy this album, too.
http://www.sarahmclachlan.com/
Excerpt from the novel - The Fountainhead, by Ayn Rand
I have been reading the classic novel by Ayn Rand, called The Fountainhead. The basic premise is that there are 2 young men who are architects - Peter Keating and Howard Roark. They both have very different outlooks on life and how it should be lived. They, along with the many other characters who orbit around them, add colour and insightful commentary on human nature and how this affects the condition of their own lives and, ultimately, that of mankind.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Fountainhead
I find it to be a bit of a soap opera, BUT (and this is a big but), one that inspires or angers. It is a wonderful read and I have certainly come to identify with some of the characters for some of the wrong reasons. I also now aspire to emulate some of the qualities of the characters who maddened me.
I'd like to thank "L" for recommending this book to me. She told me that it changed her life, so as you could imagine, I had very little choice but to read it.
Here is the first of the excerpts I'd like to share with you...
"... If I found a job, a project, an idea or a person I wanted - I'd have to depend on the whole world. Everything has strings leading to everything else. We're all so tied together. We're all in a net, the net is waiting and we're all pushed into it by one single desire. You want a thing and it's precious to you. Do you know who is standing ready to tear it from your hands? You cant know, it maybe so involved and so far away, but someone is ready, and you're afraid of them all. And you cringe and you crawl and you beg and you accept them - just so they'll let you keep it. And look at whom you come to accept."
"I take the only desire one can really permit oneself. Freedom."
"To ask nothing. To expect nothing. To depend on nothing."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Fountainhead
I find it to be a bit of a soap opera, BUT (and this is a big but), one that inspires or angers. It is a wonderful read and I have certainly come to identify with some of the characters for some of the wrong reasons. I also now aspire to emulate some of the qualities of the characters who maddened me.
I'd like to thank "L" for recommending this book to me. She told me that it changed her life, so as you could imagine, I had very little choice but to read it.
Here is the first of the excerpts I'd like to share with you...
"... If I found a job, a project, an idea or a person I wanted - I'd have to depend on the whole world. Everything has strings leading to everything else. We're all so tied together. We're all in a net, the net is waiting and we're all pushed into it by one single desire. You want a thing and it's precious to you. Do you know who is standing ready to tear it from your hands? You cant know, it maybe so involved and so far away, but someone is ready, and you're afraid of them all. And you cringe and you crawl and you beg and you accept them - just so they'll let you keep it. And look at whom you come to accept."
"I take the only desire one can really permit oneself. Freedom."
"To ask nothing. To expect nothing. To depend on nothing."
Stranger Than Fiction - movie review
Last night, I saw the movie - Stranger Than Fiction, starring Will Ferrell. It has a very good supporting cast, including Emma Thompson, Dustin Hoffman and Queen Latifah.
http://www.sonypictures.com/movies/strangerthanfiction/index.html
I wanted to write this review last night, but I have to tell you that this movie is challenging both intellectually and emotionally. I tried very much to pay attention to the nuances and subtle, albeit, deep messages, that it posed. It took me overnight to properly digest and reveal my feelings about it.
Just this process is enough for me to recommend this movie.
If you are thinking this will be a "slapstick comedy", because it stars Will Ferrell, it is most certainly not. It is quite the opposite, but it has incredibly subtle humour that makes you lightly laugh at the absurdity of it.
The premise is that the main character - IRS agent Harold Crick, hears his life being narrated inside his head. It concerns him, so he is referred to a literature professor at the local university - played by Dustin Hoffman. btw - the narrator inside his head is a fiction-writer, played by Emma Thompson. Along the way, he falls head-over-heals in love with a woman he is auditing.
It's a wonderfully puzzling entanglement that takes some time to fully appreciate.
What I took away from this was that we all have a "narrator" inside of us that is telling us what to do. Of course, we dont actually hear the narrator, but he / she is there guiding our daily, often mundane existence. I can certainly relate to this, and it inspires me to be more conscious of missing "living my life" because of blind, unconscious, familiar and safe routine.
For example, Harold is auditing a woman who owns a bakery. Though he is very attracted to her at first sight, his inner routine and embedded code of ethics keep him from telling her how really feels about her. Sensing this, she offers him some cookies she baked just for him, but he refuses, out of sense of duty to his job. But really, it is a blind following of his inner narrator. The point of this is that we so often get caught up in daily routines that are so deeply embedded within that we tragically miss the opportunities for happiness that are standing right in front of us.
There are so many other messages this movie gave me, but going into them all would be a bit impractical, and then not much left to surprise if you were planning on seeing it.
At the end of the movie, I felt at tear roll down one cheek. It touched me that much.
PS - I'd like to thank "V" for recommending this movie to me. You were right, it is a 9 out of 10.
http://www.sonypictures.com/movies/strangerthanfiction/index.html
I wanted to write this review last night, but I have to tell you that this movie is challenging both intellectually and emotionally. I tried very much to pay attention to the nuances and subtle, albeit, deep messages, that it posed. It took me overnight to properly digest and reveal my feelings about it.
Just this process is enough for me to recommend this movie.
If you are thinking this will be a "slapstick comedy", because it stars Will Ferrell, it is most certainly not. It is quite the opposite, but it has incredibly subtle humour that makes you lightly laugh at the absurdity of it.
The premise is that the main character - IRS agent Harold Crick, hears his life being narrated inside his head. It concerns him, so he is referred to a literature professor at the local university - played by Dustin Hoffman. btw - the narrator inside his head is a fiction-writer, played by Emma Thompson. Along the way, he falls head-over-heals in love with a woman he is auditing.
It's a wonderfully puzzling entanglement that takes some time to fully appreciate.
What I took away from this was that we all have a "narrator" inside of us that is telling us what to do. Of course, we dont actually hear the narrator, but he / she is there guiding our daily, often mundane existence. I can certainly relate to this, and it inspires me to be more conscious of missing "living my life" because of blind, unconscious, familiar and safe routine.
For example, Harold is auditing a woman who owns a bakery. Though he is very attracted to her at first sight, his inner routine and embedded code of ethics keep him from telling her how really feels about her. Sensing this, she offers him some cookies she baked just for him, but he refuses, out of sense of duty to his job. But really, it is a blind following of his inner narrator. The point of this is that we so often get caught up in daily routines that are so deeply embedded within that we tragically miss the opportunities for happiness that are standing right in front of us.
There are so many other messages this movie gave me, but going into them all would be a bit impractical, and then not much left to surprise if you were planning on seeing it.
At the end of the movie, I felt at tear roll down one cheek. It touched me that much.
PS - I'd like to thank "V" for recommending this movie to me. You were right, it is a 9 out of 10.
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