RiskyVessel's recent activity
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Comment on What have you been listening to this week? in ~music
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Comment on The teens who listen to ‘mallwave’ are nostalgic for an experience they’ve never had in ~music
RiskyVessel LinkRomanticizing is definitely a better term than "nostalgia" if you haven't lived it. I think it's just as much about wanting to experience something real, as anything else. As the guy says in the...Romanticizing is definitely a better term than "nostalgia" if you haven't lived it. I think it's just as much about wanting to experience something real, as anything else. As the guy says in the article "mallwave does let me escape from the shittiness of everyday life". Not that life wasn't shitty in the 90s, but it did seem less plastic.
Look at Transformers movies. CGI and advanced effects have become so cheap (relatively) that you can make an entire movie out of action scenes and explosions. You don't even need story anymore, just pretty faces! Theaters are filled with franchises pumping out movies for copyright reasons, and to make a quick buck. There was a time, as recent as the 90s, where this wasn't the case, and story or filmography mattered much more.
I have a friend who likes trap music (and I kind of want to slap them every time they bring it up). In the 70s and 80s it made sense that beats sounded similar, because there were limited hardware options available. You had to rely on lyrics and flow and good samples to make good hip hop. We now live in an age where there are literally infinite sound options available (for free!) and yet all these "producers" are just masters of copy/paste for that same crappy high hat beat. Because they know it sells. It's a safe bet to maximize profit.
In the 90s you had photographers who developed film and understood the complex relationships between light, aperture, film, paper, developer. People who were interested in art. Now everyone has a phone camera and a whole array of Instagram filters to make all their mundane photos look "professional" or "retro". You just need to pump out a few generic posts a week to become an "influencer" and call yourself a professional.
Sure, things sucked back in the 90s, but we've been increasingly ramping up vacant consumerism since the 70s and each decade it gets hollower and more meaningless. I think all of this is a longing for a time when things had more value. I was thinking about this the other day while watching the Twin Peaks trailer. There was a look and style to 90s filmography. It was darker, gritter, weirder. Story and emotion and creativity seemed to matter more. It didn't have today's gloss and production values.
It's like a guy recording a guitar track on a tape deck in his shitty one bedroom apartment because he wants to get it out, versus a team of writers running 15 different guitar tracks through a high priced studio and producing it to sound minimal and lo-fi, because they feel like that's what will sell the most records.
There was a lot of shitty consumerism in the 90s, and obviously a lot of crap was shoveled out to make a buck, but it seems like the authentic stuff is harder to find now.
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Comment on What are the best vegan or vegetarian burger options out there? in ~food
RiskyVessel LinkMaybe not what you're looking for, but make the black bean burgers from How It All Vegan. Wrap them in a tortilla and pan fry them (no oil) on both sides so it seals and gets nice and crunchy....Maybe not what you're looking for, but make the black bean burgers from How It All Vegan. Wrap them in a tortilla and pan fry them (no oil) on both sides so it seals and gets nice and crunchy. Best vegan burger I've ever had. It's a great way to serve a vegan burger without mess. Plus the author is pretty cool and has a bunch of great cookbooks out.
I'm not really a big fan of processed food though, so I haven't tried a ton of fake meat options. We have Gardein, Boca and Morning Star around here, and I think they all taste weird.
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Comment on What is a book that has changed you? in ~books
RiskyVessel LinkThe Chronicles of Narnia - C.S. Lewis, followed about a year later by The Hobbit - J.R.R. Tolkien. A neighbour gave these to me when I was about 8. I loved them. They set me on a life of chasing...The Chronicles of Narnia - C.S. Lewis, followed about a year later by The Hobbit - J.R.R. Tolkien. A neighbour gave these to me when I was about 8. I loved them. They set me on a life of chasing the imaginary (maybe not a good thing).
Catch 22 - Joseph Heller. It sort of made me feel ok about my feelings on the absurdity of life.
No Great Mischief - Alistair MacLeod. This is without doubt the best book I've ever read. What Catch 22 did for absurdity, this book did for feelings of melancholy. It's hauntingly beautiful, and probably the most emotional book I've ever read.
8 Minute Meditation - Victor Davich. This helped me a lot through a less than stellar period in my life.
I just picked up the new LP by Single Mothers. Canadian hipster punk. I've also been spinning a bit of d-beat from Wolfbrigade and The Varukers, though really more as background noise. Another recent pickup is the remaster of Amy Winehouse's Back to Black so that's been getting a lot of play.