Tacubos Si, Tacubos No

En mi breve viaje al Defec, compré "SiNo", el último álbum de Café Tacuba (ya me había tardado, lo sé). Después de dos vueltas completas en mi iPod durante el avión de regreso y otra más mientras iba a clase hoy, puedo decir sin dudarlo que Café Tacuba me volvió a sorprender. Hoy es demasiado pronto para escribir sobre el álbum en si... generalmente necesito darle unas 10 vueltas a un disco para poder asimilarlo, para hacerlo mio y entonces ponerme a criticar o alabarlo. Necesito vivirlo en diferentes humores y esperar a que mi mente le asigne a las canciones memorias imporantes (los discos que realmente cobran vida son aquellos que me logran transportar a un lugar del pasado y me hacen revivir los olores y sabores de ese lugar). Como "Show" de The Cure me lleva al Ecole des Roches con Rodrigo. Como "The Life Pursuit" de Belle and Sebastian al asiento de pasajero del coche de Loren. Como "The Velvet Underground and Nico" a la carretera de Xilitla con Daniela. Como "Funeral" de Arcade Fire al periférico mientras cuelgo una llamada de Jessica desde Londres. Como "Andrew Bird and the Mysterious Production of Eggs" al RER B. Como "Comfort y música para volar" de Soda Stereo a Casa María con toda la banda. Como el unplugged de Nirvana a las islas griegas con Diego y Rodrigo. La lista parece interminable.

Lo que más me sorprende hoy sobre SiNo es la falta de reseñas en español. Fueron lo primero que busqué antes de escribir esto, para no sonar como un filisteo. Para no ser un simple repetidor. Pero las mejores reseñas que encontré fueron en inglés. La primera compara a los Tacubos con Radiohead y la segunda con los Beatles. Si alguien tiene alguna reseña en español que pueda curar mi malinchismo de hoy, por favor compártanla para que no me quede sólo con esta y piense que los comentaristas de Televisa Deportes ahora escriben reseñas de música ("la sensación épica que emite resulta CONTUNDENTE" ??? ayy no mames).

Para reseñas más casuales, Rodrigo pone a SiNo en su top ten del 2007 y Andrés le encontró algún parecido con los Sex Pistols (no encuentro su post...help!).

Beirut in Van

I've been itching to write about Beirut's concert at the Commodore Ballroom since I boarded an airplane last Thursday with Zach Condon's voice still present in my brain. The concert was flawless, and although Beirut lacks a "show", it was an impressive display of musical virtuosity. The band didn't present special lights nor some interesting eastern European visuals (somehow I was expecting something of the sort). Nevertheless, Condon's voice has a natural flavour that transports you to the imaginary Soviet places of your liking without the need of explicit visual effects. He looked calm and comfortable on stage, and instead of feeling like the singer was putting on an act for the audience (the extreme opposite would be a band like Kiss), it felt as if the public had been invited into Condon's living room while he sang for himself. The concert never lost its air of intimacy. For a very fresh look of Beirut, check their Concert à emporter at La Blogotheque.

My head usually gets tired after listening to a full Beirut album. Their melodies are so rich that I have a hard time concentrating on their music when it plays for an extended time. In other words, I can't play Beirut as background music... the complexity of their sound demands my full attention and I have too much ADD to go trough a full album without a break. However, after Thursday's concert I've been listening to their albums obsessively. I even slept on the flight to Mexico with The Flying Cup Club playing on my iPod. It's almost as if the experience of seeing all the instruments come to life somehow made me absorb their music better, such that I no longer struggle when listening to their recordings. If any of my readers has a more scientific explanation for this, please share it.

I forgot my camera, so I didn't take any photos or videos... fortunately, someone called jchutter recorded a big part of their performance. Also, I sat behind the console most of the concert and the sound engineer had the official set list attached on it. As an anecdote, Beirut had planned 2 encore songs on their set list...but during the concert, they played about 6 encore songs. It was fascinating to see a seemingly amateur Condon discuss repeatedly with his bandmates which song to play next. Beirut was having such a good time with the audience at the Commodore Ballroom that they simply needed to continue playing and improvising beyond their planned set.

The official set list on the console at the Commodore was:

Nantes
Brandenburg
The Penalty
Mt. Wroclai
My Wife
Forks and Knives (La Fête)
Scenic World
Benito Juárez
A Sunday Smile
Elephant Gun
Cherbourg
After the Curtain
Gulag Orkestar
-------------(encore)
O Leaozinho
Postcards from Italy

And here is a playlist I compiled following the setlist:

Daily Double!

Hours before my flight to Mexico took off, I was standing in the Commodore Ballroom listening to Beirut. Today, I woke up to a gorgeous Vancouver morning and decided to do my best impression of Zach Condon (it's unplugged Wednesday again!).

I hereby give you Nantes:




And Elephant Gun:



p.s. my webcam is a piece-o-crap Microsoft VX-1000...don't buy it!

En el DF

Estoy en el DF. Ya comí enfrijoladas y vi unas cuantas flores de jacaranda en el piso. Hoy hay boda, y mañana una visita al centro. Me regreso el lunes.

Farewell cherry blossoms

I thought the cherry blossoms would keep their pink flowers all through spring and into summer... but no, I woke up this morning and most of them are gone. Last week, when I realized their flowers were beginning to fall, I drove down Acadia Road with my camera rolling and created this brief ode to my first cherry blossom season. Enjoy!

p.s. too bad the camera didn't capture the blue skies.

Al Gore undecided?

When Al Gore says he is undecided on endorsing a candidate, I wonder if he's hoping that we suddenly forget that he spent eight, I repeat, eight years as Bill Clinton's Vice-President. Just imagine the number of hours they spent together as Whitehousemates. The subtext to his statement is that he supports Obama, but doesn't want to give such an explicit slap in the face of his former bff Bill. Take that Hillary!

As for me, I think this election is a third and possibly last chance for Americans to root out the Evil Empire that has been created behind their backs (a more serious approach on this can be found in Chomsky's Failed States and Vidal's Dreaming War). After listening and reading some of Obama's speeches, I can only hope that it's not simply a rhetorical façade. If he becomes the president and succeeds in turning his back on lobbyists, fixing the HMO disaster (watch Sicko by Michael Moore), and ending the USA's neo-imperialist foreign policy, then maybe, just maybe, the US will save itself from an impending hegemonic meltdown.

To answer the question of why Hillary can't bring the desperately needed change, I give you John Edwards:

I hate my PC

I haven't posted in these past days because my PC suffered a series of convulsions that seem to be announcing the end of its short life. The symptoms point to a slow but painfully frustrating death of what I once thought was a good computer. Your host owns a Lenovo T60 Thinkpad that is only 12 months old yet is already gasping its last breaths. I could say the problem started a month ago when I began getting random error messages, repeated program crashes, software playing disappearing acts, and finally, the infamous blue screen of death. But the problem really started a year ago when I chose, yet again, to but a Windows powered PC. As I opened the package to my new Thinkpad I noticed the slogan "You obviously value great engineering" on the manual and smiled thinking that I had made the best choice. Unfortunately for me, I had been fooled again.

It's not that Lenovo lies when it says you bought a piece of great engineering. Their PC's have unparalleled keyboards, incredible physical durability, and a very solid proprietary software package (ThinkVantage) that greatly facilitates working with the computer. However, my Lenovo PC came with one major disadvantage: its Microsoft Windows operating system.

As a disclaimer, I've taken care of my laptop like a baby, never dropping it, never spilling liquids on it, cleaning the dust from the keyboard every other month, almost never shutting it down without the proper procedures, updating the drivers often, and defragmenting the main disk very often. I even purchased the most expensive McAfee security suite available and have done my best to keep it clean from programs like Limewire that could flood it with spyware and trojans. However, there is only so much a Windows powered PC can endure and my shiny Lenovo has reached its expiry date.

The next question could be, "is Bill Gates the richest man in the world for creating high quality products?" Any Windows PC owner can tell why the answer is an unambiguous "No". He's the richest man in the world because, after turning the brilliant idea of personal computing into a reality, he became a fantastic player of the monopoly game. But this rant is not about him (for more about him, open any Fortune magazine from the past two decades). This rant is about my newfound hate for my PC and my deep desire to give an Apple a chance.

My friend Diego would argue that Mac is not necessarily easier to use or better in terms of performance. He has a good point... the idea that Macs are easier could be a fallacy that has been very effectively constructed by Apple's propaganda. He suggested that instead of investing on a new computer and struggling with learning how to use a new operating system, I should completely restore my hard drive to it's first day and give it another chance. I guess it makes financial sense. As for my friend Andrés, I suppose he would suggest sticking it to Microsoft by learning how to use Linux instead. Knowing that they're my most computer-savvy friends, I'll try both suggestions (even the imaginary one) and hopefully write my next post from the same keyboard. Nevertheless, I am prepared for the most probable outcome: the death of my PC and its inevitable replacement with a Mac computer. (I need to start saving)

Comparative photocopying

Ahora que empieza el verano en UBC, me acuerdo de la pesadilla que era hacer las fotocopias de los folders para las materias del ITAM. En honor a aquellas simpáticas playeras de tianguis europeo:

In Heaven:

• Cada profesor de UBC manda sus reading lists al UBC Bookstore.
  
• El Bookstore se encarga de conseguir los libros y hablar con las editoriales.
• UBC Bookstore le paga los copyrights a las editoriales de acuerdo a la cantidad de alumnos inscritos en el curso y hace los paquetes de lectura.
  
• Los alumnos llegan al UBC Bookstore y encuentran los paquetes de lectura para su clase en estantes que tienen el nombre y número de su clase.
  
• En menos de 5 minutos, el alumno tiene sus paquetes de lectura para cada clase, con fotocopias perfectamente bien hechas, y sin lastimar los libros ni violar derechos de autor. Win-win situation.
• Si el paquete tiene algún defecto o decides dar de baja la clase, tienes un mes para regresar el paquete y te regresan el 100% del precio.
  
• El costo de un paquete de lecturas con alrededor de 800 hojas es de 70 dólares.

In Hell:

• Los profesores del ITAM llevan sus libros o los libros de la biblioteca a la papelería Coffee & Copies en Rio Hondo para hacerles fotocopias.
  
• El profesor tiene que esperar varias horas o hasta varios dias para que estén listas las copias. Por supuesto, nadie habla con las editoriales.
• Una vez hecho el paquete de lecturas, el profesor le informa a sus alumnos el número de folder en Coffee & Copies.
  
• Cada alumno va a la papeleria y pide ver el folder indicado. Los folders tienden a tener errores: páginas desaparecidas, páginas ilegibles, errores en la lista de lecturas, etc. El alumno escoge las lecturas que quiere fotocopiar.
• Típicamente, en la primera semana de clases el alumno se puede tardar media hora en tan sólo escoger sus copias y tal vez un par de horas de espera para recibir su paquete de copias. (Coffee & Copies es un changarro con 3 fotocopiadoras y no más de 5 empleados, y tiene que atender a TODO el ITAM. En un semestre típico, hay alrededor de 300 folders de copias...imaginen la clientela si cada uno de esos folders corresponde a una clase con 20 alumnos. La única competencia es Copy Todo, la papelería vecina con 2 fotocopiadoras, 3 empleados, y alrededor de 150 folders por semestre).
• No hay ningún tipo de control sobre el número de copias que se le hace a cada libro o lectura. Nadie paga derechos de autor.
  
• Cuando el alumno encuentra un error en sus copias (pasa siempre), regresa a la papelería y se da cuenta que el error está en la copia del folder, por lo que el salón entero tiene el mismo error. Esos errores nunca se corrigen porque el profesor se entera el día en que el alumno tenía que haber leído dicha lectura.
• El costo de un paquete de lecturas de 800 hojas es de 320 pesos.

Lo que me parece curioso es que los profesores participen activamente (y promuevan) esta violación de los derechos de autor. Al ITAM parece no importarle que en la misma calle sus alumnos aprendan el arte de copiar libros sin pagar derechos. ¿Será que los derechos de autor son sólamente un detalle burocrático? ¿Realmente vale la pena protegerlos? Como diría Germán Dehesa, es pregunta.

Aliens are free from original sin

Ahhh... the beauty of surfing the internet on an otherwise uneventful rainy evening in Vancouver. I found this delicious piece of news that has given me hope: I can now sleep without fear, knowing that I will not encounter hordes of aliens in heaven when I die. (I'm thinking that the title to the previous post could be better applied to this one...)

Involuntary comedy

Leave if you can.

Chatting with my friend Raúl, he told me that he hasn't seen the volcanoes in DF once in this whole year...because of air pollution. He says today's rain might dissolve pollution and cause the volcanoes to reappear. My reply was... just leave if you can. I share a terrifying report which I suppose will mean nothing to anyone that has lived in Makesicko City and, like myself, felt invincible breathing that air.

Antes de que nos olviden

Así como en las pizzerías se dieron cuenta que el martes es su dia de menos clientela, yo me doy cuenta que al igual que en los cines, el miércoles es mi dia de menos visitantes de habla hispana. Entonces, no me queda más remedio que aplicar el viejísimo truco del 2x1 y esperar que con ello no me olviden los que son blogflojos este día. Para inaugurar esta nueva promoción y antes de que se termine este miércoles, les dejo un tentempié en nuestro idioma.

On interpretation

Reality or interpretation? Can memory be evidence? Can photography? Does it even matter? (and where am I coming from?)

I saw the film The Passenger yesterday. The director, Andrzej Munk, died in a car accident while driving home from the set before the movie was finished. The film was shot in Auschwitz and tells the story of a female SS officer that remembers one of the prisoners in the camp, Martha. However, because the movie wasn't finished, the only thing the viewers get is a piecing together of the parts that were shot, with still images and a narration of the parts that are missing. The narrator warns that the movie could be a mere interpretation of the director's intention. In other words, the movie is put together following the memory of what Munk wanted to show.

Almost metaphorically, the movie is about memory and interpretation. The SS officer, Lisa, shares her memory of life in the camp with Martha. All the images we see and the story we experience comes from Lisa's recollection. The scenes become a battle between reality and interpretation, between evidence and memory. Through Lisa's eyes we see life in Auschwitz as Lisa wants to remember it. We only see the version of the death camp that Lisa's mind allows her to remember...all else is blocked. Atrocities are erased and abuse is blurred in the background, while in the foreground lies a story of two women immersed in a power struggle. Martha appears energetic, defiant, even well fed. She doesn't drag herself through the camp like a prisoner that is broken down by life in the camp. Her eyes don't show the emptiness of a person that is merely waiting for death. However, this is only how Lisa wanted to remember her. She envied Martha. She was fascinated by her. So Lisa's mind chooses to remember Martha in a way that blocks out all the suffering...and ultimately, eliminates all the guilt of being an SS officer.

I go through a similar thought process whenever I see the work of a photojournalist. They bring us a reality that is first interpreted by their lens, but then passes through a series of filters: the choice of developer, toner, paper (or digital channels and filters)...and then the editing (inclusion/elimination) of the photographs in the series. Their work is a visual memory of their life experiences. But is it evidence? A photojournalist interprets a time and place where we were never present...and our absence gives this rendering a feeling of reality. To me, there is always something mysterious about a photograph that depicts an event: the exclusion from the frame of everything that was not directly in front of the lens. The reality that was not included gives the depicted event an air of mere interpretation...of memory that cannot be taken as evidence. (I'll stop now before somebody cries plagiarism of Susan Sontag).

And all this blathering was just to share the work of Brent Stirton.

I feel just like a child

Friday again... but this time I have no tremendous story to tell because there haven't been any tremendous events in my Vancouver existence this week. I've been sitting at my desk for the past 2 hours trying to decipher a Canadian government website because I need to download some forms. When I moved here, I assumed bureaucracy would end and government websites would be easy to navigate.

Right. Bureaucracy is kept at a bare minimum here in B.C....standing ovation. For instance, when I acquired a used vehicle two months ago, I braced myself for at least a month of paperwork and permits and photocopies and all kinds of unnecessary steps to transfer the car's ownership, register it, buy insurance and get my license plates (The horror, the horror). Little did I know about British Columbian efficiency: I went to an ICBC office (conveniently located everywhere... even in shopping malls) with the vehicle's previous owner and in less than 7 minutes I was the rightful owner of a car with new license plates and insurance. The lady just opened a drawer full of license plates and asked me which numbers I liked best! I remember back in Mexico City when you had to wait for over a year to get your license plates... and every single new car had to drive around with a paper photocopy of their license plate taped to their back window for a year. Incredible.

Wrong. Federal government websites here are as confusing as in my country. It seems as though people that create government websites live in a world detached from reality, and even speak a different language. They assume that you already know the names of all the forms and procedures and requirements...and they don't have the courtesy to provide a "search" bar. Anyway, I'm lost in a website and with all this legal mumbo jumbo that I'm trying to decipher, I feel just like a child.