Senior Project

I began working on The Rising when I was traveling in Eastern Europe. Originally the idea was to write a series of songs about war, but almost everything I was coming up with felt contrived and irrelevant. It was so frustrating that I almost gave the whole thing up, but then I got to Poland.

I had several very intense and important things happen to me while I was in Poland and they defined my focus from then on. I began reading about the Nazi genocide, Jewish resistance, and Jewish culture. In a bookshop in Kazimierz, the Jewish neighborhood in Krakow, I picked up “Survival in Auschwitz” by Primo Levi, “Words to Outlive Us” about the Warsaw Ghetto and the uprising that took place there, “A Hole in the Heart of the World: The Jewish Experience in Eastern Europe After WWII,” “Smoke Over Birkenau,” and a book of stories of Jewish Mystics throughout the centuries.

I began to write. I had some words and guitar parts at first, then gradually the songs came together. I wanted them to be for a band so I wrote for electric guitar, bass, and drums.

When I was 17 or 18 I saw a video recording of Metallica playing with the San Francisco Symphony. Since then I’ve wanted to orchestrate songs. I figured my Senior project was a good time to do just that. Continue reading Senior Project

DBOD

picture-7.pngThe following is a list of albums that were released this year that I did not have the space to review, but recommend no less. Hopefully you’ll see something that catches your interest and inspires you to look it up. Ummm…… yeah, smoke babies. Oh, and P.S., go to www.slsknet.org for the best file sharing program ever. Pipes!

Continue reading DBOD

Piano Broken, Replaced

By Foster Neill

20061027-piano.jpg

Last week, the piano in the Dancespace was destroyed. The socalled piano, a rotting instrument falling apart, though entirely out of tune and already broken in many ways, was often played, sometimes drunkenly, at parties and through out the day. Many loved the piano, many hated it. Loved for its freedom, hated because it sounded awful and few people actually know how to play a piano.

The destruction of said piano was raised during Community Meeting, and though it was admitted the piano was in poor shape, it was also decidedly a loss for the community. Many faculty members were especially concerned, as the behavior was largely seen as unnecessary and irresponsible.

The destroyer of the piano, who ever that may have been, was urged to take responsibility and compensate the community with a replacement. Later in the week an electronic piano of sorts was found in the area where the old piano had been, to both groans and glee. The replacement piano was last seen in the AIMAC recording studio where it was being played.