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| Well I just posted a bunch of massive facebook statuses on the same topic, so this could really make more sense in a blog entry. So here we go, some thoughts on the Sing-off, Season 3, Episodes 1 and 2.
First half of the first episode down. Yellowjackets - just ok. You're still high on Kenya, we'll forgive you. Fannin family - potentially cool... Loved Afro-Blue's Put Your Records On! And Delilah is quite impressive.
Second half done. Rap typically goes over my head, but I liked their performance... I think seeing it helps a lot. Cat's Pajamas... this guy's thoughts summarizes it pretty well: "They cut to a live performance (for an audience of old ladies..., and suddenly I realize that they're trying really, really hard to be Rockapella circa 1998, perhaps too much." Basically, my thinking is, they've already got it going well, why are they here? Although it is kinda interesting to think about a Rockapella-like group getting eliminated first... As for Vocal Point... well I think I'm just tired of Jump Jive and Wail, between singing it with Hawkapella and playing it in the showband...
Ep. 2 first half: Ah Dartmouth... I love guys college a cappella. Pentatonix does sweet stuff, and girl is cute. Messiah's Men, I think it's cool that they're on the show. Totally agree with Shawn, and I also think that they did a good job of not rushing the song... I think most groups would have. Sonos, well I already have one of their albums, 'cause they're kinda already known in the a cappella world for their arrangements, which are great (like this). I liked the performance a lot!
Other tidbits about Sonos: that album I have has them doing Gravity WITH Sara Bareilles lol. They also used to have another guy in the group, which might have helped...
Ep. 2 second half: Collective: Rachel Lampa? I totally have a few of her songs, 'cause she's been on wow albums. Anyway, I totally wanted to fix the empty spots in the arrangement during the chorus. Soul'd Out: you are Not glee... but anyway... Um, not sure what was supposed to happen in that song transition, but it didn't. North Shore: the charm of Jerry Lawson, with better tuning, but perhaps less soul. I liked it, though it's probably not for a modern day CD. Impression before hearing them: Deltones = Pitch Slapped. Afterwards: Deltones = Backbeats. And friendless girl is gorgeous.
Overall impression for the first round of the Sing-Off:
Pretty much agreeing with the judges. The most surprising cut was Cat's Pajamas, but on the other hand, I don't think they have a reason to be on the show. They can do what they're already doing great, and it isn't what the modern world wants on a CD.
Favorite song from the first round is Put Your Records On, gonna have to download that one.
Definitely noticing the trend for collegiate-ish male, female, and co-ed groups showing on the various seasons. Male - Bubs, On the Rocks, Vocal Point, Aires, (Whiffenpoofs is a slight exception) - have a certain fun, energetic, grounded feel to them. Co-ed - Pitch Slapped, Backbeats, Deltones - have another feel, wider... and something else I can't describe. And female - Noteworthy, Delilah - doing what female groups kinda have to do to do well: hit you in the face.
Man I like this show... hope I get to watch more episodes soon!
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| Time for an update! What about? I dunno... but it's about time for one...
You know it's coming up on 8 years that I've been on xanga... that's pretty long... many of the more popular xanga sites haven't been here nearly that.
It seems to me that the reason to be on xanga has changed... at least for me. I was in high school when I started, and in those first few years, I had a number of friends who also kept up with their own xangas, so my posts tended to be some thoughts for the day or a little bit about what's been going on. But nowadays I don't have much of anybody that I've met in real life that uses xanga anymore... not that I know of anyway. My other xanga has a specific purpose: to keep people updated on my ship stuff. But this xanga doesn't have a specific purpose, and so nowadays I feel like I need to feel like talking about something and take the time to write a decent-length entry to be worth updating, because let's face it, not many people read this thing, and I don't have the kind of time to build myself up among the xanga community.
On the other hand, I do keep on reading the ones I'm subscribed to... which usually means I stumbled upon multiple of their posts in the past that I found particularly interesting, or they friended/commented me and I thought their posts were worth reading... even if they probably don't look at my xanga, like, ever hehe. But nobody's done that recently, so I haven't had any new subs recently...
Anybody feel like gaining a subscriber? You might not see much activity, but I'll be reading :)
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| ok, 2 months... time for an update I suppose.
So from the time of my last entry to Feb 13, we had many practices and 3 performances for a musical that my parents and I wrote to do at our church. It went really well, and I enjoyed writing half the music for it 
Very close to the end of that, I get an e-mail asking me to come to a ship to play piano for the showband again. Which I accepted.
So I then spent just a few days visiting people all over the place... Delaware, New York, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania. It was a little nuts, but cool anyway.
Feb. 18, and now here I am on the Fantasy
Cool people, cool home port, read theshipblog for more on that...
Anyway... I'll hopefully write a more substantial entry soon, but here's a start
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| You know I've been thinking about writing something about what I've been doing lately... for example, my week in Philly/NY with people I had never met before....
This is not that entry 
Anyway, I just wanted some place to put this little audio preview, and as myspace never did figure out why I can't log into my music myspace, I'm gonna put it here!
This is an audio preview of a multi-track a cappella video that I'm going to make. It is just a song from the video game Donkey Kong Country 2 (from the brambles levels)... possibly the general favorite from what I gather. I actually might re-record a lot of the parts, but this is the general idea. Enjoy! Suggestions welcome as well.
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| You know, whenever people talk about things people do/make as "unnatural", I just think to myself, but we ARE nature. A bird builds a nest out of things it found in nature, and we call the nest part of nature. We are, like the bird, an animal, and we build things, like the nest (a house), out of things found in nature. We may take more steps than the bird does to get to that house, but it's not like we created anything out of nothing. Originally, it did come from nature. Everything the bird does, we say is part of nature, so how are we different?
Why isn't everything we do considered part of nature?
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