Minor, key update
I just added demo pages for my 2023 mixes to /music/playlists.html (as seen on the site homepage). Like the mixes themselves, the demos only display the information for the images embedded in the audio tracks—unless, that is, you know how to restyle in Firefox (or, if you have a deficient browser, you can always comb through the page source). But either way, seriously, I'd recommend that you listen to the mixes blind before looking at anything like that.
I'm also in the process of introducing (probably somewhere on the above-linked as well) the deli, where the plan is that I'll record all the new music I listen to every month (fresh tracks) as well as old favorites I take special interest in or find a new appreciation for (hot tracks). I should be able to commit to that through at least the end of April. ~∓~
Unrealistic insinuations
Lately I've come to realize I've inherited from my father (or, perhaps worse, maybe developed independently) a sort of glitch in my ability to communicate. I (would like to) think, generally speaking, I'm a fairly good communicator, but especially when it comes to expressing my feelings and desires towards another person, I have a habit of wanting my actions to paint a picture where blunt words feel gauche. I often do things around and particularly for other people (both friends and people I'd like to develop friendships with): coded actions that I hope they'll decipher with careful consideration.
Of course, most people don't give that kind of consideration to those actions, or have a different mental dictionary than I do—or even if they correctly interpret what I want to say, they might second-guess whether they should be reading that deeply into it, since I give no indication of that in the first place. The result of this is frustration on both ends—mine at seemingly not having gotten through to the other person, and theirs at my opacity, or at least my indirectness (on at least one occasion someone more direct than me but canny enough to notice what I'm doing has told me to cut it out).
This clandestine approach also produces hangups regarding the actions themselves. I try not to overstep, but that relies on feedback from the person themself, which they may feel awkward about giving unprompted. And if I begin doing something with the (unfulfilled, of course) hope that it'll set a precedent for them to reciprocate, I might begin to feel frustrated at the imbalance (though I try to suppress this since, obviously, I never consulted them on the matter).
A coffee shop I frequent occasionally plays host to some kind of "let's talk through our problems" session between one of the regulars and their friend (which, all else aside, is insane to hold in a public venue), and every time I drop eaves on them I hear some exchange along the lines of "I realized afterward that I upset you" / "Yeah, and I know you know that, but–". I always thought it seemed a bit stilted and overwrought (and of course hopelessly foreign to me)—but the other day my foil and I forced ourselves through a candid conversation about each other and our interpersonal relationship, and while we didn't particularly learn much from the discussion, I guess there was a kind of satisfaction to knowing that what we had already believed was built on a solid foundation.
Now, if only I could black out the memory of having to speak it all aloud. ~∓~
(P.S. A while back, I completed my 2023 playlist. It comes in 3 parts, each roughly 3 and a half hours long, which can be listened to in whatever order or combination you'd like. There's also a special gimmick with this year's list, which I won't detail here.)
Lights on
It's interesting how we've internalized invisible switches and circuits on a reflexive level. When you light a bonfire with a burning stick, you can't thrust that stick back into the pile to extinguish it, and when you shake somebody awake, you can't shake them back to sleep (well, perhaps if you shake really hard or really gently), but if you flip a lightswitch in the dark and the garbage disposal starts making noise, you immediately flip the switch back in the opposite direction. Even a child understands this. And when pressing a button turns on a light, we expect that pressing the button again, rather than accomplishing the same thing, will either turn the light off or change its output (e.g. intensity, color). I wonder when we learn this, because clearly it can't be known from birth (like I was saying before, it's generally not a type of relationship that exists in easily observable nature). Anyway, that's why I think a caveman would have trouble with video game puzzles. ~∓~
The other day, Courtney Barnett announced her decision to close up shop at Milk! Records with one final release. Normally, this is the part where it's revealed that the label was deep in the red, or that she was dissatisfied with recent releases, but in this case it was nothing of the sort. Of course, the financial strain was there, as it always is for indies, but at the End of the Day Barnett made the choice because she felt it was the right time.
Fans of the label (and artists seeking a place on its roster) might question why she wouldn't just hand off operations to someone else who would continue its legacy (which, in fact, she did 4 years ago). Maybe for those people it never seemed possible that there would be a "final" Milk! release in the near future. Maybe they even willfully ignored that it could close. I know myself how nice it is to have standby labels you can look to for music of a particular character that you'll (generally) like from artists whose names you may or may not recognize (it wasn't long after I discovered Blackest Ever Black several years ago that they also closed the book, and I don't know what I would do if the same happened to Confront Recordings). But I have more respect for a graceful (if abrupt) death than a decadent decline, or even a ravenous expansion.
While I've never been involved in something like Milk!, I've certainly worked on (and am currently undertaking, as with this blog) indefinite projects. When the question is whether I'm going to keep doing it, there's an easy answer: of course, I don't see any reason to stop right now. But it becomes more difficult when coming from the other direction. Will I still be on this page in 20 years? There's no chance. 15? 10? Probably not (assuming Neocities even exists at that point). Of course, things can change in that time (I doubt Barnett and Cloher imagined Milk! would even continue into the 2020's when they started out), but I know that includes my own ability and priorities—and when you go beyond personal projects, that also includes everyone else's.
I think this can also be applied to social circles. On an individual basis, you may be willing to commit to a lifelong friendship with someone (barring any crises). But can you expect that kind of mutual dedication from everyone in a friend group, for 50 years or even 10? It's a nice promise (which is part of the appeal of both coming-of-age movies—Stand By Me even makes it a thesis—and those pictures of old men playing dominoes or hanging out in Wendy's), but you've likely experienced how easily those clusters of glued-together sub-groups can fragment under duress. Will you be hanging out with the same people tomorrow, or a year from now? Obviously! You can't imagine anything coming between you (though there's no guarantee). But do you truly believe you'll be spending time with all of the same people half a decade from now? Personally, I have my doubts. ~∓~
Experiments
It's now been roughly a month and a half since I started micro (->). It's gone a bit differently than I imagined (not necessarily in a bad way). While I haven't exactly reduced the time I spend online, I'm now putting eyeballs on this website much more frequently, and as a result my efforts have often been directed towards adding and updating pages. Along the way, I've brushed up against the borders of my ability in HTML and learned new things (such as the fancy L-shaped div over there, which was an incredible headache). I also returned to the very early idea of making music a major presence onsite (as it is in my life), and even decided ultimately to migrate my music-related activities on Youtube to a new account. In the former context, the micro calendar unexpectedly became the blueprint for the Playlist Exchange page (and I had been a bit worried about bloating the main list with what could potentially be tens of entries in that category in the future, so having that on deck was a relief).
Also, with the groundwork laid such as it is, I want to explore the possibility of making my 2023 annual playlist (by the way, check out this year's) optionally browser-based. The reason I've historically (can you say that after 2 years?) not done so is that there's often no one music service that has everything I want to include (if any do). And in my experience, cross-platform playlist services (who remembers Playmoss from a few years back?) are unreliable. I have the image in my head of how it would be accomplished, but there are a few kinks I need to research before I can begin work in earnest. Here's hoping I can pull it off. ~∓~