gorgeous day: reredefined

(Inspired by Cami whether she likes it or not, because I don't have the energy to do a daily music meme, but I do want to share my favorite music.)

Fastball has been my favorite band for years. I haven't talked about them for years, in the wake of flourishing interests of the Japanese variety, but they're still near and dear to my heart. The thing about me is that I don't listen to a lot of music (absurd and not-so-absurd music Ashley spammed me with notwithstanding); I have five playlists on my iTunes -- five artists whose full discographies I put on shuffle/repeat and play as the background music of my life: Arashi, Kanjani8, Shiina Ringo, Backstreet Boys, and Fastball. Beyond those five artists, I don't typically listen to anyone else regularly.

Fastball is best known for their hit "The Way", from 1998. You might remember it.


They released an album before then, entitled Make Your Mama Proud (1996), which was a bit harder and grittier -- also a bit more nonsensical and stupid in terms of what the music is about. They've since evolved into what I'd consider a "mellow southern power pop/rock" group; they depend on the classic setup of catchy melody/strong harmony on top of unadorned instrumentals, but occasionally their Texas twang comes out.

Four years ago I convinced my family to drive five hours to Cincinnati to see them perform, and it was one of the best experiences of my life. In concert, they're musically spot-on and quite energetic, but they're also incredibly friendly and laidback and down-to-earth; they make me want to be their friend; they make it easy to be their friend.

I jokingly refer to them as a one-and-a-half hit wonder sometimes (because "The Way" was their clear hit, but "Out of My Head" was also a really popular song at the time that a lot of people forget about), but I think all of their music is fabulous. They have a strong sense of what kind of music they produce, and in the 14+ years they've been active, they haven't compromised that at all.

So I'll close with a live cut of my favorite song from their latest album (released in 2008), "Soul Radio", plus another song, "Always Never":

Tony writes the nicest/prettiest/catchiest/most melodic music. It's amazing. (You can listen to some of it on his myspace.) Too bad his lyrics are kind of weird sometimes... :X

( Tony Scalzo - How Did I Get Here )

Well, see, that one isn't so bad. Try this stanza on for size, though.

( stanza from Tony Scalzo - Reality )

...?

I wish his EPs weren't LE. His first two EPs are sold out at his website's store, but his third EP is out. I'm itching to click on the Paypal link...


Wisdom teeth are coming out tomorrow. I'm going to try that thing where you start counting as you're being anesthesiaized and you return to consciousness sometime later in the recovery room, still counting.


Oh, and random thought for the day, courtesy of Tokyo Toshokan: "The Duchess of Busty Mounds".

Hahahahahahahaha, what a stupid title. Spanish-subtitled anime pr0n, no less. I love it.

The physics final was excellent. Mr. Kloser must have done a rush job with getting everything ready, since he recently found out that he'd be out of town this morning... We didn't need him there to answer questions, though, because he left the answer key stapled to everyone's tests. XDDD The first thing I do when I get a test is flip through it to make sure I have enough time to answer all the questions, and, lo and behold, there it was: the answer key to the final (labelled "Answer Key", no less), thirteen questions to match, right in front of the equations sheet. "Ummmmmm..." Alan and I were wondering if it was some type of psychological trick, but the answers were all correct, so, after she'd collected them, Miss Daughtery handed the answer keys back near the end of the period and just told us to check our work and to explain our reasoning for each problem.

The calc final was long, as expected. I clocked in at about 2:30, which is better than last semester's 3:00, but I need to get a good grade on this test, so I'm hoping I did well. I feel all right about it (I marked 15 or so questions (out of 25) as "almost definitely pretty close to correct", and I marked another 5 or so "maybe kind of correct"... stupid fscking no-partial-credit multiple choice tests :O), but that's how I felt last time, and I got a lot more wrong than I thought I would.

But we'll see. =___=;;


Afterwards, I went to Hobby Lobby and picked up some stuff to make keychains. Well, keychain. Singular. For someone.

I hope it doesn't turn out really scary-looking or anything. XD


Oh, I have to re-remind my parents about the Fastball thing on Sunday... I re-mentioned it last week, and my mom was like, "Yeah, let's go!" because she loves visiting random cities, so, as long as my parents remember, it looks like everything's green unless something weird pops up. Hopefully Lady Luck smiles upon me this weekend for Fastball.

And for the calc final, OMFG. =_=;;

I envy those of you who can change your icons without making a new post about them, but I'm unfortunately not as controlled as you are. ~_~

New Kamakari icon (replacing my previous Kamakari icon) = new default icon! And since the icon clashed with my Tezuka-colored layout, I just randomly picked a new S2 layout with a calm theme. Icon lyrics (I don't think you can read them) are from "Falling Upstairs" by Fastball. Of course. I love Fastball with all of my being. ><

In other news, I'm getting back into the fansubbing groove, finally. Major Blood+ marathoning this week before I edit some episodes during my happy four-day weekend. =^_^=

pre-school: listened to the Tenimyu Dream Live 1st soundtrack before school (yeah, burned copy...)

period 1: felt the love from Mr. Kloser and Sarah and Rob (wah!!) during Physics... so nice~

period 2: chatted with Mrs. Chismar and Claire a tiny bit before Calc; chatted with my Calc class (so much fun) after Wojo was finished teaching

period 3: mentioned Fastball once in study hall (in convincing Mr. Gerencher to play their music next Monday)

period 4: internally rolled eyes at Anne for not knowing what she was talking about (regarding anime) during lunch

periods 5-6: drew a nice "random girl" during Media... I'll have to scan it in; I haven't drawn for such a long time

periods 7-8: used public variables in Computer Science and got Mr. Dillon to refer to Diki's graduation speech XD

period 9: mentioned Fastball during English (in trying to find the crazy boys a theme song... Charlie the Methadone Man, anyone?)

period 10: uh, adoration...?

post-school: chased Alan around (in trying to convince him that yes, he is the most huggable guy)

at home: realized that it's TEZUKA-BUCHOU'S BIRTHDAY and danced around a bit

Unfortunately, not everyone has had as wonderful a day as I have. If it's any consolation, I was crying during Physics yesterday... ~_~

But I get to finish off a nice day by shutting myself off from the world and studying chemistry for six hours in living, breathing anticipation of the SAT IIs tomorrow! YAY!