insomnia;

don't ask me why i am not sleeping right now.

the national have a new song out, "so far around the bend." it's for the red zone's new benefit compilation, dark was the night, which comes out february 16th, incidentally the same day that girl talk plays at wellesley. they are streaming a new song every day on the cd's myspace:

here is the song, too (courtesy of 4ad's cute little widget)



bryce dessner is collaborating with visual artist matthew ritchie for a two-day arts and music and performance piece wonderful nonsense extravaganza at mit this wednesday and thursday. special guests include aaron dessner and an mit/wellesley chamber string group (. . .) it's called darkness visible and i'm really excited to go. also, it is free!

wintersession has come and gone with nary a whisper. we start school again in a little bit over a week, but not before serena and i journey to new york for restaurant week at convivio, bklyn vs. bmore curated by todd p and possibly even drinks at pdt. one of janna's friends bartends there, so it's not a sure thing but far more likely than if we weren't friends-of-friends. also also, totally didn't know that janna had an argentina blog, even though one) it is not defunct as janna is home and two) she knew about my blog.

e.b. came and went and left a trail of broken hearts in her wake (kidding) though her visits to wellesley have all been epic. the last one also brought a most welcome guest, the famed (infamous?) phillipp s. penka, real person. eebs, know that every theme party and inevitable shitshow that happens this spring will be thrown in your honor, and that you will always be an honored guest in spirit. but in a less creepy, pseudo-eulogizing way. it is 3:15 in the morning after all, you can't expect me to be that coherent.

i'm going to rename this blog.

good night.

podcast nation

Hi y'all. Please please please do yourself a favor and go download the September 2nd episode of the NPR podcast All Songs Considered. It's free, and I mean, if you need any encouragement, know that that it's title is "The 80's: Were They Really That Bad?" And know that Bob Boilen, Stephen Thompson, Robin Hilton, and Carrie Brownstein (!!!!!) get into ridiculous arguments about the relative merits and demerits of the music of the 80's. And they play Starship. I listened to it in its entirety today, giggling the entire time and basically making a fool of myself. I've subscribed to the All Songs Considered Podcast, which has done wonders in making me feel connected with the world, especially the musical world (obviously). I love being here in Italy, but FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out, thanks, Rachel) is a feeling that sometimes takes over. I guess All Songs Considered, along with the election podcast (I mean, duh), This American Life, and dilligent downloading of Gossip Girl and Pushing Daisies keeps me feeling sufficiently 'in the loop with America.'

. . . quick interlude . . .

From these incredibly long posts:

I am currently obsessed with Dent May:

Dent May & His Magnificent Ukulele

Thursday

After school and aperitivi, I went to the Nextech festival with my friend Pete. I invited a lot more people, but since many of them were either tired from the week or preparing to go to Assisi the next morning, it ended up just being the two of us. Firstly, the journey to the festival itself, which I suppose was a mini-saga in itself. A quick geography lesson: my host mom's apartment is on the via Dei Bruni, due north of the Centro and about a 35-40 minute walk to the piazza del Duomo. The Nextech festival was at the ex-Stazione Leopolda, southwest of the city center, a good hour's walk from my house. Therefore, I took a bus to a stop vicino to the venue, but one wrong turn at the Porta al Prato meant that I walked fifteen minutes' in the wrong direction, with a bottle of Chianti in one hand and a map in the other. But after that little detour, and a correct left turn back at the Porta al Prato, I found the coolest venue, ever. I stupidly didn't bring my camera, but you'll just have to trust me that it was the best thing, ever. One thing that I actually really appreciated about the entire operation was that the promoters or designers or whatever really knew how to light the entire space in a way that was atmospheric without being garish or too over-the-top.

Stazione Leopolda used to be a train station, probably before they built Santa Maria Novella, but now it's a reclaimed space, maybe a bit like the courtyard of P.S. 1, but really not like anywhere I've ever been before. The station is set back a bit from the street, and behind these big, Deco-ish wrought-iron gates is a big open courtyard with weird modern sculptures and lots of benches set around the perimeter. Inside, the floor plan is actually kind of similar to a Roman basilica, now that I think about it. There are two enormous central rooms where they had projection screens (one) and DJs spinning (the other). The video projections included a very, very cool series on eyes and a kind of incongruous addition of the Gnarls Barkley video for 'Crazy.' The 'side aisles' of the space were probably the waiting areas of the old station, where they had smaller screens and benches for the revelers who were tired of dancing.

I hadn't heard of any of the DJs or the band that played that night, but all of them impressed me greatly. They were all from various locales in Europe; the live band, Poni Hoax, was French and I think the DJs were from Germany. Chicks on Speed were supposed to play on Friday night, but at the ticket counter on Thursday, I saw that they had already scratched. Oops. Anyways, for thirteen euro, I had a GREAT night of... a trashy, wonderful indie hipster dance party. It felt like I was home, which was a singularly wonderful feeling. And while we were sitting on the kerb before entering, finishing the bottle of wine, I have to say that the people-watching was incomparable. And by incomparable, I mean that it felt like I was in Brooklyn again?

My night was good enough for me not to get home until five, ante-meridien. This was perhaps a poor choice considering the fact that both of us had to be on the bus for Assisi at seven thirty. The walk home took a while, obviously, but it was surprising how many people were still out on the streets at that hour. Don't worry, Mom, Pete and I walked back together, and the streets of Florence are absurdly well-lit at night. We ran into two independent sets of other Syracuse kids out on the way back, too. I stumbled into bed a bit past five, knowing that I had just experienced something unique to my stay in Florence, though I hope that some other ridiculous event happens at Stazione Leopolda so I can go back. And that was Thursday.

internships and the nextech festival

I got it! I am now an intern for The Florentine, Florence's bi-weekly expat newspaper. The internship is through Syracuse, and my first story is going to be about the locations that Spike Lee used when shooting Miracle at St. Anna, which is set in a little Tuscan village. I'm hopefully doing internet research on Sunday and travelling around the actual places next weekend. Tomorrow and Saturday I am going to two school trips, to Assisi on Friday and Ravenna (!) on Saturday. And, fingers extra extra crossed, I am emailing Scott Schuman to see if I can interview him, because Florence is so frequently featured on the Sartorialist.

Starting tonight, the Nextech Festival starts in Florence. It's festival of "musica elettronica e ambiente visivo" so basically DJ sets, live electronica and lots and lots of projection screens. And even though we are leaving for Assisi at 7:30 in the morning tomorrow, I am still going to this show tonight. I will sleep on the bus. Plus live music of any sort is so very few and far between in Florence, that I should take advantage of it whenever the opportunity presents itself, right?And Chicks on Speed are playing tomorrow, so I might go to all three nights? I'll have a full report after the weekend.

i won't fuck us over i'm mr. november

I own this t-shirt, thought up by the National as a little fundraising gimmick for Barack Obama himself. I love the National. I'm pretty down with Barack. But did anyone in the National or on the Obama marketing team realize that the song "Mr. November" contains the lyrics "I'm the new blue blood / I'm the great white hope" ? I mean, not to read too much into it or anything, and not that election politics are anything but reading too much into it or anything like that, but isn't it a little bit ironic...

Now is when I wish blogs could accurately convey that 'really, you really did just do that' kind of quizzical look.

Also, only middle-aged white men seem to comment on it.

Also, what the fuck, Russia.