If you're using your computer, you're most likely listening to music. This is the motivation behind the "Currently Listening to" feature of the livejournals most of my friends have. I take it one step further, by babbling on for a paragraph or so about whatever song I happen to be listening to. Do any of you care what I have to say about music? Probably not. But it does help me keep track of the odd tidbit of musical knowledge I actually possess. Please note that this feature is defunct now, since I'm using LiveJournal to make my posts, rather than typing the html by hand. Each post will still include what I'm currently listening to, but there will be no blurbs.

November 24th, 2002: Cranberries - Dying in the Sun
This is a fairly depressing song, as you can tell by the title, but I've actually never listened to the lyrics very closely. For all I know, it could be an upbeat song about the joys of living, with an ironic title. It's probably my least favorite song from Bury the Hatchet, which doesn't say much, since I love that album. Of course, "Fee Fi Fo," also known as "The Pedophile Song" comes pretty close on the bottom of my list. Naturally, The Cranberries are against pedophilia, but it still seems strange to write a song about it. Although, it's not any worse than Ace of Base's anti-prostitution song "Love for Sale."

November 21st, 2002: Men at Work - Land Down Under
I actually got Men at Work's greatest hits album about five years back, while trying to fill the quota for some CD club I was part of. I had only heard of a few of the songs, since Men at Work weren't popular in America for long, but they were all pretty good. I was just about to remind everybody that "Land Down Under" is Moon Child's favorite song, but it's not. MC's favorite song is "Safety Dance" by Men Without Hats. "Land Down Under" is Wave Child's favorite song. You can tell I'm really slipping, when I can't even remember the personalities of my old stuffed animals...

November 18th, 2002: REM - Green Grow the Rushes
Another track from Fables of the Reconstruction, which I'm pretty sure is Avi's least favorite REM album. It's certainly not my favorite one, but I like it just fine. "Green Grow the Rushes" is a pretty good song, perhaps a little more enjoyable than "Feeling Gravity's Pull," but again, not a favorite. It's just REM filler music, which is fine by me.

November 16th, 2002: Limahl - The Neverending Story Theme
This really isn't a very good song, but I loved those movies when I was a kid, so it has some nostalgia value. Meliss, Joel, and I had a Neverending Story marathon two summers ago, and the movies aren't nearly as good as good when you're older. The first one was decent, I suppose, but the other two were just horrible. The same effect can be viewed with The Land Before Time and The Brave Little Toaster. One good movie that spawned a whole bunch of crappy sequels.

November 12th, 2002: Third Eye Blind - Jumper
This song is from the old days of my MP3 collection, when I would just download any song I liked from the radio or VH1. Since music videos and Top 40 radio stations were my only exposure to music, I ended up with a lot of random singles from currently popular bands. Lately I've been concentrating on specific artists, to such an extent that I might actually start buying their CDs. I actually haven't downloaded a single MP3 since discovering Hikaru No Go, and I feel I'm better for it.

November 7th, 2002: Dido - Don't Think of Me
I first heard Dido when Scott picked it up from some CD club that he's a part of. I ended up really liking about half of the tracks, though I'd probably like more of them now if I ever get around to downloading them. Interestingly enough, a few people have told me that Dido sounds like Dolores O'Riordan, lead singer of The Cranberries. Actually, it may have only been my mom that said that, but that's still one point in Dido's favor.

October 31st, 2002: Cranberries - Just My Imagination
This is one of my favorite songs from The Craberries' fourth album, Bury the Hatchet. Charley had this album back during junior year, and he used to play it all the time in the car on the way to school. I was the only other person who really apprecaited them though, and ended up buying the CD after hearing it a few times though. Charley seemed to be a big fan of the song "Copycat", which I actually kind of like, but apparently annoyed the heck out of everbody else. They still bring that up whenever I mention the band. Oh well... there's no accounting for taste.

October 27th, 2002: REM - Feeling Gravity's Pull
This is a track from REM's fourth album, Fables of the Reconstruction. It's a decent song, I suppose, with lots of Michael Stipe goodness. While it doesn't particulary stand out for me, "Feeling Gravity's Pull" perfectly displays why I like REM so much. Not only do I like a whole bunch of their songs, I don't actually dislike any of them. When I load up my REM collection, I need a few songs like this to fill the space between my favorites. Otherwise, they'd get played too much, and I'd become disenchaned with them. And nobody wants that.

October 25th, 2002: Ace of Base - Beautiful Morning
Wow, I mention Ace of Base on my music page, and the next day, I find out they have a new album. I wonder if the same thing will happen for Enya, REM, or The Cranberries? Anyway, "Beautiful Morning" is the first single from Da Capo, and it's absolutely nothing like the song "Beautiful Life" from their second album. "Beautiful Life" is also nothing like "Wonderful Life", the seventh track on this album. I love Ace of Base, but they really need some help naming their songs.

October 22nd, 2002: Abba - Dancing Queen
Ah, it's been a long time since I've heard any music from my second favorite Sweedish pop group. I seem to remember watching a movie with Rach, Jess, and company while visiting New York that featured this song heavily. It was Australian and weird, and I don't really remember anything else about it. I do remember that all of the guys watching it disliked it though. Incidently, even though I like this song, I hate the version the A Teens made. If they were an Ace of Base cover band, I'd respect them a lot more.

October 19th, 2002: Aphex Twin - On
Jon gave me a bunch of Ahpex Twin's stuff amost two years ago, back when I was still living with Bob. AT is into some really weird stuff, but I actually like his more coherent songs. He'd be pretty cool to see in concert, as long as he stayed on the normal side of things. Interestingly enough, this is one of three songs on my playlist that I can think of with the sounds of thunder in the beginning. The others being Enya's "Storms in Africa II" and Robert Miles' "Children". I wonder if I like all thunder-based music? I'll have to look into it.

October 16th, 2002: .hack//sign Soundtrack - Silent Life
To celebrate the fact that I downloaded all 26 episodes of this anime over the weekend, I decided to download the soundtrack as well. With maybe one or two exceptions, I like all of the songs on it. Silent Life is especially good, and for the most part, its an instrumental. It's got some weird chanting or whatever at the very beginning, which I could franky do without. In fact, if they took that out, this song would be that much better. With the exception of one song, this soundtrack was made by Yuki Kajiura, but since I can barely pronounce the name, I'm going to avoid talking about him (her?). Anyway, if you like anime music, you should definitely check this stuff out.

October 15th, 2002: Styx - Domo Arigato Mr. Roboto
So I was watching anime a few days ago, and Bear does a favor for Mimiru, to which she responds, "arigato," which basically means "Thank You" in Japanese. This naturally got the lyrics of this Styx song into my head, and to stop the insanity, I had to download it. I had actually meant to get the song a while ago, but never got around to it. So don't let anybody tell you that anime and 80's music have nothing in common.

October 11th, 2002: Mystic Spiral - Freakin' Friends
If any of you out there are real music buffs, you'll realise that Mystic Spiral is not a real band. It's from Daria, one of my all time favorite TV shows. Mystic Spiral is the band that Jane's brother Trent is in, and they performed a number in the Daria special "Is it Fall Yet?" two years ago. It's not that great of a song, but I find it amusing, and isn't that all that matters?

October 10th, 2002: Eagle Eye Cherry - Save Tonight
This was my favorite song during my junior year of high school. Whenever I heard it on the radio, I'd just go crazy. I'd sing along, dance, and generally have a good time. This was back before I had discovered Napster, so naturally, I bought the CD. What a mistake that was. My musical tastes weren't as broad then as they are now, but I hated that album. Besides "Save Tonight", I only liked one other song on the CD, and I didn't even like that one much. I really wish I hadn't sold it for like fifty cents a while back. I'd probably like more of the tracks now. I need to figure out what I was smoking back then... going into Cash Converters and expecting to come out with money. Hah!

October 8th, 2002: Nine Days - Absolutely (Story of a Girl)
I'm not really sure I understand the whole concept behind parentheses titles. In this case, both "absolutely" and "story of a girl" appear frequently in the song, so I guess it's to make searching for it on Napster-esque programs easier. In the case of Green Day's "Good Riddance (Time of Your Life)", that subtitle is the best way to find the song. Unless you own the CD, or heard it from a DJ or friend, you'd never have a clue that "Good Riddance" is the real title. Just last week, Jon was ranting about the infidels that think "Bullet With Butterfly Wings" is called "Rat in a Cage." But when the real title is that obscure, I can't really blame people. Silly Smashing Pumpkins.

October 7th, 2002: Enrique Inglesias - Be With You
Sure, I despise the Latin Explosion as much as the rest of you, but I've got a soft spot for Enrique. Ricky Martin and Marc Anthony can sleep with the fishes for all I care, but Enrique is up there with Desi Arnez in my book.

October 6th, 2002: Enya - Portrait
I downloaded Enya's entire music library a few weeks ago, and I've been listening to it pretty steadily ever since. This song is from her third album, called The Celts. That's a little misleading though, because The Celts is basically a rehashing of an earlier CD she released before Watermark, called simply Enya. Watermark was her first big album, so Enya doesn't really count, as far as I'm concerned.

October 5th, 2002: Aqua - My Oh My
I actually used to own this CD, though I sold it few years ago for something like fifty cents. I must have been really scrapped for cash, because a CD is worth more than that as a frisbee. I frequently have a craving for upbeat dance music, and Aqua fits the bill. Just for the record, I also despise that Barbie song.

October 3rd, 2002: Hack Sign Soundtrack - Yasashii Yoake
This is the closing song for a new anime I've been watching called .hack//sign. It's about an on-line game called "The World", and a boy who gets trapped in the game when he finds that he can't log off. The show is incredibly popular with the gaming world, and we're looking at a Febuary release for the DVDs and computer game.