This Guy Falls Down

Typepad and Facebook, pt. 2: How to have Typepad posts show up as Facebook notes

My previous post about Typepad and Facebook was supposed to be an example of how to have Typepad inform your Facebook network every time you post.  Well, it didn't work.  As I searched Typepad's help database to look for the answer, I came across something stunning:  you can import blog poats as a feed on Facebook.  So all of your network - anybody who gets notified when you update your profile - can read your blog without leaving Facebook.  Not sure how this affects Tehcnorati ranking, etc. but who cares?  People who wouldn't normally go out of their way to check out your blog can now read it if they so choose.

It's so easy, it's almost ridiculous.  Here's how to set it up:

1. Go to your weblog and right click on "Subscribe to this blog's feed".  Copy the URL into your clipboard.
2. Sign into Facebook.  Under applications, go to "notes settings" and click on the "import a blog" link. 
3. Paste the URL for you weblog feed into the provided box.  A preview will appear.  Save the feed (I think there's a button at the top right) and you're all set.

For further assistance, check out the entry in the Typepad Knowledge Base.

Best of 2007: Five Albums I can't get enough of

Just like my "films that don't suck" list, this one needs a little explanation.  Who am I to say what the "best" 5 albums of the past year are when I only heard a few dozen out of the thousands that were released.  I haven't heard the Radiohead yet and I'm sure it would be on the list.  I love the new Springsteen, but haven't given it enough time.  You get the drift...

So these five records are the ones that dominated my iTunes playlists and car CD changer for most of 2007.  At any given point in the past year, if I was listening to music, it was the High School Musical 2 Soundtrack :) But when I had control of the music, this is what I was listening to:

1. Neil Young, Live At Massey Hall 1971:  It's probably a bit telling that probably the best album of the year was made over thirty years ago.  For people that don't "get" Neil, I recommend this one.  This is the closest thing to a "perfect" live album as I've ever heard.
2. Avenged Sevenfold, Avenged Sevenfold:  The most interesting heavy rock music currently being produced is coming out of the Southern Callifornia "metalcore" scene.  These guys are pretty much ruling that world right now.  Bonus points for incorporating ridiculously fast Dragonforce-style guitar solos without sounding like a parody.  And "Dear God" might be my favorite song of the year.
3. Wilco, Sky Blue Sky:  My boys came back, and better than ever.  Wilco left behind much of the experimentation of the last two records and made a '70's-style rock masterpiece.  They've never been a song band, but "Please Be Patient With Me" and "There's a Light" are the closest thing to standards Jeff Tweedy has ever penned.  And it's great to hear Nels Cline finally adding his quirky guitars to the mix.  Brilliant.
4. Mac Powell and friends, Glory Revealed:  This would be on the list even if Mac wasn't my "be fri".  The concept is compelling:  record an album of songs pulled straight from Scripture to help people incorporate it into their lives.  And the bluegrass motif proved itself perfect for a multi-artist project.   But the songs are the real stars here.  "By His Wounds" got all the attention at radio, but "He Will Rejoice" is perhaps my favorite song Mac has ever written (that says a lot) and Candi Pearson-Shelton KILLS IT on the title track.
5. Demon Hunter, Storm the Gates of Hell:  This album got me from the title - what a great concept.  And the title track is just brutal in the most pleasing metallic sense.  If the intensity of "Storm the Gates of Hell" is too much for you, fast foward it a track or two.  This album is a great mix of screamo and classic thrash.  And new guitar recruit Ethan Luck (you might remember him from The Supertones) adds some great textures to keep it interesting.  I love this band.  I love this album.  I want a Demon Hunter T-shirt.  I want a Demon Hunter lunch box.  I want to join the Demon Hunter fan club.

Facebook and Typepad

My newly discovered and utterly confusing Facebook world just collided head on with this blog.  With this recently-introduced Typepad feature, you can notify Facebook (and everybody who keeps up with you on Facebook) that you've updated your blog.  It's a great way to harness the networking of Facebook with the blogging prowess of Typepad.  And I would think it might get your non-blogging friends to read your blog...

Here's Typepad's explanation, but basically you just go to Weblogs>Configure>Publicity and jump through the provided hoops...

Best of 2007: Five films that didn't suck

Since I'm the father of a young child, and since my prime moviegoing time falls in mid-summer, I haven't seen all of the highbrow flicks raved about by critics and showered with awards.  But I do end up seeing more movies than most in a given year.  And, honestly, most of them suck.  Listing the "best films of 2007" would require too much justification.  "Movies that didn't suck" seems to be the area I know best.  So here you go:

1. Beowulf:  For about a minute, I was rolling my eyes.  I didn't know it would be done in CGI.  But it's unbelievable.  You've got to see this in 3D.  I think it's still playing, but not for long.  This is probably the most visually stunning film I've ever seen.  There is some gore, and a lot of violence, and even an odd naked fight scene (don't worry, there's no full on CGI nudity).  But there's a reason this story has endured for a millenium and a half.  And they did a bang-up job adapting it to the screen.
2. 1408:  John Cusack stars in one of the creepiest films I've ever seen.  What sets 1408 apart from other suspense films is it's villain:  a hotel room.  While it's hard to carry this one gag over the whole film, they darn near pulled it off.  It gets a little old towards the end, but the last scene brings it back around. 
3. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix:  This isn't the best Harry Potter film by a long shot (I think I'd give that one to Prisoner of Azkaban).  But it kicked The Golden Compass squarely in the butt as far as kids' fantasy films go.
4. Ratatouille:  Probably the best film in the Pixar catalog.  Because the plot centers around a rat, this film will probably not be remembered the way Finding Nemo or Cars is, and that's a shame, because I think they really nailed it on this one.
5. Blades of Glory:  OK, so on some levels this film does suck.  But we're not judging it by the same standards as most films are we?  I laughed hard for an hour and a half.  Mission accomplished.

1/2 Marathon Training Run

Distance: 11.46 miles
Time: 2:05
Pace: 10:57/mile

Today was probably my best ever run at this length.  40-45 degrees feels like about the perfect temperature to train.  I started listening to metal music on my longer runs and it definitely helps me pick up the pace!

2 1/2 weeks until the race.  I feel pretty ready...

The most beautiful night of the year...

Here's a lyric I wrote for Christmas Offerings about Christmas Eve:

The most beautiful night of the year
All the stars light up the sky
And the city is sparkling with silver and gold
From a million points of light

A reflection of something that’s deeper within
Just a flicker of something more

Jesus, light of the world
Shine through the darkness, bright like the day
Jesus, light of the world    
Shine in our hearts, and show us the way, tonight

Who is this child in the manger?
Kings bow down and angels sing
The Lord of the Universe, has come here to save us
A precious offering

All the heavens above and the earth below
Are filled with the light of your love

(copyright mine)

You might have heard this before...

... but just in case you haven't, here it is.  Be sure to listen all the way to the end.  You're welcome.

(Thanks to Brody for the link!)

The Death of High Fidelity

This article from Rolling Stone pretty much nails the state (sonically, at least) of the recording industry.  iPods, ProTools, compression and AutoTuners have all conspired to make music sound really different than it did just a few years ago.

It's a really good article, and from my perspective it's pretty much spot on.  Whoever did the article did their homework - the first couple of paragraphs I was thinking "yeah, but all these records sound loud because they're overcompressed."  Then comes a whole paragraph about compression.  Then I'm thinking about  Oasis' What's the Story Morning Glory  as being the first record I recognized as sounding "different" and how everybody in that era started going for that "Britpop sound" and lo and behold they mention that too. 

Honestly I don't really mind it to a point.  For most rock music, "loud is good".  What also bothers me  is how so many car and home stereos have these God-awful EQ settings or faux surround modes that you can't turn off.  You basically never hear an album the way it was recorded. 

I do wonder if everything being made right now is going to sound REALLY dated in a few years... 

(Via the observant Jabob Ward)

The Metal Kick, explained

So I've made a couple of references in passing to being on a "metal kick".  That deserves an explanation. 

It's funny how you get somewhere and you're not really sure how.  Just a few nugdes is all it takes.  A conversation here, a song on the radio there.  And before you know it, your musical tastes have changed.  All I know is that at this point in time, if the Foo Fighters come on, I change it because it's too tame.  And for a time they were my limit as far as heaviness goes.

So it started back in the summer.  We were in the middle of writing songs for the new record, so I didn't want to be listening to the radio and accidentally ripping off some Fantasia song or something.  So I started listening to good old, instrumental '80's guitar rock.  I got into it.  And I thought, hey, this could be productive - it's good to listen to guitar music since I'm a guitar player and I'm about to record some guitars.  I even bought a guitar magazine because Joe Satriani was on the cover.  Also featured in this magazine was a band called Avenged Sevenfold.  I read the article.  I'm intrigued.  I check them out on iTunes.  They rule.  So then I start a quest to find other music like this.  That's your Cliff notes version right there.

Of course, there are other factors involved here, a few of them being:

• The documentary "Metal:  A Headbanger's Journey".  I saw it about a year ago.  Pretty interesting - this probably planted a seed of some sort.
• Silmaril - I bought this album back in the summer.  Metal it is not.  But it is good music that doesn't rely at all on the blues idiom, and there are references to Tolkien and the end times.  Very metal indeed.
• One Yngwie J. Malmsteen.  I started listening to him as part of the "guitar music" thing.  Reading about him on wikipedia and looking for others like him led me to SymphonyX and other, newer, more metallic artists.  I even bought an Yngwie DVD.  Great stuff.
• Fargo Rock City - I read this book 3 or 4 years ago, but I picked it up again a couple months back.  Hilarious book, BTW, if you've never read it.
• XM Satellite Radio - They've got a metal station, a hair band station, and a heavy music station.  You have to be careful, especially on the metal station, because it's uncensored.  Lots of language, and some pretty brutal lyrics.  Proceed with caution!
• The studio.  A couple of the guys there were also way into the Yngwie.  And also way into the metal.  When we weren't listening to what we were working on, chances are we were listening to the metal. 

Now that I've got you thinking I'm completely mental, I'm going to leave you for the time being.  But I'm sure you've got some questions.  What am I actually listening to?  What about Wilco?  Aren't the lyrics terrible?  How do I get this goodness in me?  Those questions and more will be answered in a future installment....

So I stole some books from a pastor's office...

Wait, before you freak out, let me explain.  We did a show at Fellowship of the Woodlands outside of Houston.  It was a very cool and very huge church, and they let us use the pastor's study for our dressing room.  Besides the killer nacho fountain, there was a massive bookshelf stocked with all kinds of cool books.  I took this picture of a few books that caught my eye:

Right before we took the stage, we had the chance to meet Pastor Kerry Shook, a really down to earth guy.  It totally felt like we hit it off.  We mentioned the killer book collection, and he said "Man, if you guys see anything you want in there, go ahead and take it."  So I'm like, wow that's generous, but I'm not going to snag books from another dude's cool library.

After the show, our road pastor Nigel speaks with Pastor Shook again, and the offer is placed on the table one more time, something along the lines of "I told the guys that they could have some of those books if they want them.  I mean it - I probably don't read half of what's in there."  OK, so now it was getting serious.  After consulting with Nigel, I decided to swipe the books with a couple of conditions:

1. Leave a nice note (Nigel's idea).
2. Return the books when I'm done (my idea).
3. Do a book report via this blog and encourage other people to read the books (also my idea, I think).

Step 1, mission accomplished.

Steps 2 and 3, coming up...

(BTW - I have no idea how to rotate pictures in a blog, nor do I have the time to fool with it.  You'll just have to tilt your head to the side or turn your computer)