en http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/uk/ Thu, 1 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000 Thu, 1 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000 60 http://www.audioscrobbler.net/data/webservices http://www.last.fm/user/quethiril/journal The Last.fm journal for quethiril. Last.fm journals are a place to talk about all things music. http://www.last.fm/user/quethiril/journal/2007/02/12/2rm3_1000! Mon, 12 Feb 2007 01:46:38 +0000 http://www.last.fm/user/quethiril/journal/2007/02/12/2rm3_1000! KAJIURA Yuki is the first artist on my Overall Top list to make it to 1000 plays. This is not particularly surprising, since I used to listen obsessively to her Erementar Gerad and Tsubasa Chronicle soundtracks while working on problem sets and taking exams, both of which are many hours a sitting. Usually OST tracks don't make it to my Overall Top Tracks unless I single them out, like Fuuin, but at some point I think all of the Erementar Gerad tracks were on the list at around 8 plays each. (But that just means I don't really listen to any song that much, I guess.)

Anyway, the 1000 mark seemed like a good time to look over the rest of my list, too.

Unsurprisingly, my Overall Top Artists list is dominated by background music composers -- since I usually listen to nonvocal tracks indiscriminately, and a lot of the tracks are short, each CD gets these artists some 30 plays a pop. So you see Shimomura Yoko, Motoi Sakuraba (who recently shot up several places after I discovered the Golden Sun OST), Nakagawa Kou, Yamane Michiru (who should really be much higher, if it weren't for Last.fm's issues with Yamane Michiru vs. Michiru Yamane vs. 山根ミチル), and Nobuo Uematsu (who would be higher if I dug out my Final Fantasy soundtracks).

In contrast, my Overall Top Tracks list is completely different, being made up of vocal tracks that I get addicted to and listen to again and again. Usually the first 20 plays or so are accumulated in just a week or two when I can't stop listening to it. Deciding to translate the song also helps, because it takes me several listens to double-check romaji, and then it's just nice to listen to the song to set the "mood" of the translation (or something). That's why Addicted, Kagen no tsuki, Tsuioku no Ame, and Shijun no Zankoku will probably be appearing up there shortly.

Of course, there's some overlap between the two lists. As mentioned, there are a few OST tracks that I will single out, like Fuuin. And although I don't have that many Nobuo Uematsu albums on hand to listen to, several tracks from the Final Fantasy VII Advent Children OST, like Tenrai ~Divinity I~, are worth much repeated listening.

...um, yeah. This whole entry has come out much dumber than I planned. I sound like a scientist rattling off experimental results or something. -_-]]> http://www.last.fm/user/quethiril/journal/2006/05/22/2rm2_wait,_i_already_knew_i_listened_to_obscure_music... Mon, 22 May 2006 06:33:05 +0000 http://www.last.fm/user/quethiril/journal/2006/05/22/2rm2_wait,_i_already_knew_i_listened_to_obscure_music... Stolen from m0telroom:
Take the number of last.fm listeners for each of your top ten artists and add them up. Dividing this total by 10 will give you your rating. Your rating can be divided by the max possible rating (248919) then mulitplied by 100 to give a percentage.

梶浦由記 - 9,979
Only? I'd think Kajiura Yuki would have tons more listeners than that. o.O

下村陽子 - 9,395
Wow, they have about the same number of listeners.

山根ミチル - 2,037 + 890 + 17
Last.fm is dumb and doesn't convert Yamane Michiru's name anymore, so I have to combine the listeners from 3 separate pages, but then who knows how many of those are double and triple counting, considering I have all 3 of her names in my list? *mutter*

桜庭統 - 6,150

Nakagawa Kou - 118 + 46 ??
Gah... apparently people aren't sure how to read this guy's name or something, so some people think it's Nakagawa Kou, and some people think it's Nakagawa Takashi... -_-

安藤まさひろ - 364 + 147
'nother artist they stopped converting.

片倉三起也 - 220
Man, I guess background music composers just don't get much love. Considering even Kajiura Yuki didn't break 10K.

Angel Note - 28
I think I may have these tracks labeled wrong, if no one else listens to them. But as far as I've been able to look up, they were the ones who did the BGM for Final Approach...

Caltech Glee Clubs - 4
*throws a few more shovelsful of dirt over mainstream rating*

菅野よう子 - 40,732
Here comes Yoko Kanno to save the day, I mean, my mainstream rating. :D

TOTAL: 70130
Rating: 7013
Percentage: 2.82%

Wow, I still broke 1%. Color me impressed by the eclectic tastes of Last.fm users. Now if only more people listened to Hookslide.]]> http://www.last.fm/user/quethiril/journal/2006/05/04/2rm1_hookslide! Thu, 4 May 2006 05:07:59 +0000 http://www.last.fm/user/quethiril/journal/2006/05/04/2rm1_hookslide! So Hookslide is this a capella group based in San Francisco, but one of our school's own a capella groups, Out Of Context, has gotten them to come down and give concerts two years in a row now. This second time, I managed to get both of their CDs, so I can listen to their songs on endless repeat. :D

The awesomest thing about Hookslide is John Pilat, who does both bass and beatbox at the same time. Watching him is kind of like watching a countertenor: your mind can't quite wrap itself around the fact that the sounds you are hearing are coming from the person in front of you. In the case of John Pilat, it's pretty obvious that he's doing the beatbox, so the bass just seems to come out of nowhere. Also, he has a really pretty singing voice, too, as can be seen in Apache Wedding Prayer, for example. (He's the one who opens the song with "Now you will feel no rain...")

Listening to Hookslide on CD is very different from hearing them in person. It's much more . . . um, loud when you hear them. One of my friends noted that the balance is better on the CDs, meaning you can actually make out the lyrics. But it feels less alive and energetic, too. I definitely think having heard the live performance adds something to the CD tracks.

But at least I have the songs. I fell in love with the aforementioned Apache Wedding Prayer as well as Two Ways Out last year, so I was quite happy that they performed them again and they both on the second CD, Bump It Up. The first CD isn't as good, but it has their cover of Dream On, which I like a lot, too.]]> http://www.last.fm/user/quethiril/journal/2006/04/05/2rm0_omg,_polovtsian_dances_everywhere! Wed, 5 Apr 2006 06:54:06 +0000 http://www.last.fm/user/quethiril/journal/2006/04/05/2rm0_omg,_polovtsian_dances_everywhere! I discovered Polovtsian Dances through Polovtsian Dances And Chorus, the song in DDR Extreme 2 -- I mean, the melody was familiar, but I didn't what it was called or where it came from. Then my choir director announced that we were going to be singing it, and I learned that it comes from Prince Igor and all that. And then just now, listening to The Garden Of Everything, which also features Steve Conte (and is from the RahXephon movie, supposedly), I suddenly realized that the same melody is being sung by sakamoto maaya during the chorus. @_@

More people need to use the middle part. The part that's like, da-DA da-DA da-DA da-DA DAAAAA! :P And all of the parts with the awesome orchestra-ness.

But I wish the soprano part was lower, or the alto part higher. *sad second soprano* Also, Russian is hard to pronounce fast.]]> http://www.last.fm/user/quethiril/journal/2006/01/12/2rlz_urban_trad. Thu, 12 Jan 2006 03:21:51 +0000 http://www.last.fm/user/quethiril/journal/2006/01/12/2rlz_urban_trad. We spent New Year's Eve in Brussels, so after a very brief countdown, my sister and I started channel flipping through the hotel's TV, settling on one of those "live music all night" channels. The first group they featured was Urban Trad, which sang a haunting, addictive, Celtic-ish song called Sanomi. It impressed me enough that I noted the group's name for further research when I got home. Sadly, it turns out that most of Urban Trad's other songs are more generic Celtic/world and not really all that notable. There are a few cool songs here and there, like Vigo, Avreel, and Mecanix Remix, but for the most part I prefer Secret Garden.

Sanomi is a creature all its own, though. No wonder it's kind of their feature song. It's going to be my next ringtone. ^_^]]> http://www.last.fm/user/quethiril/journal/2005/10/03/2rly_revisiting_david_arkenstone. Mon, 3 Oct 2005 07:48:36 +0000 http://www.last.fm/user/quethiril/journal/2005/10/03/2rly_revisiting_david_arkenstone. Listening to Atlantis reminded me that I have a huge collection of David Arkenstone MP3s from a few years ago, when I became curious after listening to Music Inspired by Middle Earth and thinking it could easily rival the movie soundtracks. I made a playlist of all the tracks that were non-vocal, which ended up being several hours long, and used it as exam music. Now that classes are starting again, I'm remembering what great homework music it makes. Gentle enough not to be distracting, but with enough energy not to put me to sleep. I love the Celtic-feeling tracks especially, like those in Avalon: A Celtic Legend. I guess it's kind of confusing, because apparently he's gone by a whole bunch of names in the past, and has a million albums, and does a lot of different styles (though most don't stray that far from new age instrumental). I gave up on keeping track of name by album and just relabled them all as being by David Arkenstone. The only other name that I remember offhand is Enaid. But yeah, pretty much all of his music is beautiful and dreamy and relaxing, and I love all of the songs of his that I've heard.]]>