Music vs. Poker

Author's note: this post was originally made on WEALTHY STREET POKER and has been moved here since the creation of this site.

Maybe I should start a separate blog for this kind of stuff. It would seem silly to keep posting stuff about the music I'm into these days on a site titled "WEALTHY STREET POKER." Either way, I'm posting it here for now because I simply don't have anything to talk about regarding poker. Anyone who has been keeping up with the posts may have noticed that my discussion of hands/strategy, etc. has ceased as of late. The reason for this is that I have not been playing any hands to discuss. I have fallen off of the face of the poker scene, both online and local - maybe it's been almost two months since I played a hand of poker? Probably less than that, but certainly nothing regular.

"So what's been occupying all of those hours?" one might ask. School started last week, and that has kept me very busy with all sorts of correspondence and paperwork I have to complete which pertains to my graduation in the Spring. So far nothing is locked in, and that's not a good thing. But I'm working on it, and anyway, school doesn't really count as a replacement for poker. At least in the past I haven't cut cards out of the equation once classes start. If I had to identify one thing that's occupied my "interest zone" is the music. I've been paying a lot more attention to music recently - appreciating it more. Not only am I trying to appreciate newly discovered qualities of music that I know, I'm also discovering new bands/songs altogether. There hasn't exactly been a clean break with heavier rock from the 70's/80's, but I've been more partial recently to gentler, more intricate fare like Alan Parsons, Allman Brothers, America, The Band, CSN&Y, Marshall Tucker Band, Steely Dan, Tom Petty, Yes, etc.

One band that I've been aware of my entire life but never invested much effort into investigating is Little Feat. Fortunately I got my dad the 4-disc box set a few years ago for Christmas, so now I have more Feat than I know what to do with. I think it represents a very interesting dynamic when many of the band's best songs are live versions of album tracks. Perhaps stating opinions as absolutes is not the most tactful thing, but anyone who thinks that the album version of "Dixie Chicken" is better than the live one from Waiting for Columbus is a fool. "Willin" is pretty good live, too.

Oh, I forgot to mention Genesis, Pink Floyd, and Phil Collins (yes, I know that he was in Genesis). The list could go on, but you get the picture. Here's an idea: get the full eight minute version of Phil Collin's "Take Me Home" and listen to through good quality headphones with plenty of volume. I'll just say that there's some wild stuff going on in that song that you definitely cannot hear when it's playing over the grocery store Muzac speakers. The same goes for Toto's "Africa" (another all-time elevator music classic).

"I seek to cure what's deep inside,
Frightened of this thing that I've become."

Pretty deep, Toto.