OT: The Thread About Nothing CCXI: The Thread About Everything Besides Hockey and COVID-19

[My3Sons]

Ya know - I love and revere Giant Steps as much as the next guy - but your 'none of the classic rock titans' phrase just isn't true. I think John Lennon writing 'I am the walrus' to stump a university professor at music theory or Pink Floyd's musical choices on Dark Side, or Tom Scholz's understanding of scooping frequency bins when overlaying guitar parts on More Than A Feeling moved the needle as much as Coltrane modulating thru the circle of fifths, Mozart pulling 12-tone musik out of his arse 120 years ahead of Schonberg or anything John Cage ever did. Don't sell those guys short.

The 'What makes this song great' series on YouTube is fantastic if you guys are interested in the internal theory/arrangements of songs - Every time I start I'm up until 2am watching them all.

In the book that collects all the publicly available JOHN Lennon letters (great book for anyone interested) there is letter published in which Lennon responds to a letter he got from a Quarry Bank student in which he student asked Lennon what he meant in the words of his songs because they studied them at the school. John says something to the effect that whatever they meant to John at the time the listener was always free to interpret the song however he wished.

I think that letter from that student inspired Walrus. John said in an interview at some point it was written nonsensical to be impossible to interpret. I don’t think music theory played into it but that is just my interpretation of the facts as I understand them.

I am such a nerd. Sorry.

 

[TheUnseenHand]

I was bored at home, then discovered CloneHero. But my old plastic guitar had a messed up strum bar. So I did what anyone else would do and took it apart and swapped out the switches. Works like new again!

 

[Nubmer6]

Wait! In that picture...

Do I see @TheUnseenHand's... hand????

 

[EliasFTW]

Wait! In that picture...

Do I see @TheUnseenHand's... hand????

 

[BenedictGomez]

John said in an interview at some point it was written nonsensical to be impossible to interpret.

I think, "psychedelic drugs" is a more likely solution to that puzzle.

 

[My3Sons]

I think, "psychedelic drugs" is a more likely solution to that puzzle.

If Lennon was anything it was a snarky contrarian who would have loved people puzzling over nothing. That said he took lots of LSD.

 

[TheUnseenHand]

Wait! In that picture...

Do I see @TheUnseenHand's... hand????

 

[billingtons ghost]

In the book that collects all the publicly available JOHN Lennon letters (great book for anyone interested) there is letter published in which Lennon responds to a letter he got from a Quarry Bank student in which he student asked Lennon what he meant in the words of his songs because they studied them at the school. John says something to the effect that whatever they meant to John at the time the listener was always free to interpret the song however he wished.

I think that letter from that student inspired Walrus. John said in an interview at some point it was written nonsensical to be impossible to interpret. I don’t think music theory played into it but that is just my interpretation of the facts as I understand them.

I am such a nerd. Sorry.

Lyrically, maybe, yes - but I read in another book (might have been Hard Days Write, Here There and Everywhere, or another two volume set that I keep loaning out to people but never get back that details all of their songs and the theory/instrumentation behind them...) that Lennon had heard that students were disecting his songs in a music class. He was said to have said 'let them try to figure out this one...' and then wrote the "harmonic Mobius strip" that is the outro and some of the interesting side-stepping chromatics of Walrus. I played this song out in a dive bar and it was a blast as a cover. Here's a bit of a dissection below where I got the 'Mobius strip' line from... Good stuff. (YOU are a nerd?)

Alan W. Pollack's Notes on "I Am The Walrus"

 

[My3Sons]

Lyrically, maybe, yes - but I read in another book (might have been Hard Days Write, Here There and Everywhere, or another two volume set that I keep loaning out to people but never get back that details all of their songs and the theory/instrumentation behind them...) that Lennon had heard that students were disecting his songs in a music class. He was said to have said 'let them try to figure out this one...' and then wrote the "harmonic Mobius strip" that is the outro and some of the interesting side-stepping chromatics of Walrus. I played this song out in a dive bar and it was a blast as a cover. Here's a bit of a dissection below where I got the 'Mobius strip' line from... Good stuff. (YOU are a nerd?)

Alan W. Pollack's Notes on "I Am The Walrus"

That is great. Thanks so much for sharing. My guess is that we both have a point here and Lennon would be both happy that we reduced his classic number to a sort of game and angry that we were able to maybe knock him down a peg. I'll leave it to others to decide who is the bigger nerd.

 

[BenedictGomez]

Lennon was a talented d*******g.

 

[My3Sons]

Lennon was a talented d*******g.

Absolutely. He could be a bully and a total jerk. He responded best to someone giving it right back to him. Most of that occurred when he was famous in his 20s when most of us toil away in obscurity. He also was largely out of the public eye for his last five years and was killed at 40. The last truly awful thing he did that I am aware of took place in 1973. I like to think he was grown up and reasonably kind in his personal relationships by 1980.

 

[devilsblood]

Not to derail the thread too much farther than I already have, but basically, boiled down, I mean one cannot validate ones own existence.

But did he not validate himself to himself?


Edit: Also what was the "therefore you are" part?

 

[TheUnseenHand]

But did he not validate himself to himself?

That is akin to saying "this is this because I say so". It's not because you say so, but because others agree.

If you punch me, it would probably hurt. I might even yell. It's the yell that validates the punch, not the punch. If you punched me and absolutely nothing happened, and I didn't react in any way or acknowledge that anything happened, and no one else saw it, did you punch me? If you have absolutely no impact on the world around you, do you exist? Can you prove it?

 

[devilsblood]

That is akin to saying "this is this because I say so". It's not because you say so, but because others agree.

If you punch me, it would probably hurt. I might even yell. It's the yell that validates the punch, not the punch. If you punched me and absolutely nothing happened, and I didn't react in any way or acknowledge that anything happened, and no one else saw it, did you punch me? If you have absolutely no impact on the world around you, do you exist? Can you prove it?

Your skepticism is exactly the type of scenario in which he was trying to prove his existence. It doesn't matter if no one else acknowledges his existence, the fact that he thinks, proves that he exists. Could he think if he did not exist? He didn't need anyone else to agree, in fact at this point in his meditation(as the term was then used) he had no consideration for the world outside of himself. If I remember right he then goes on in an attempt to prove himself outside himself, though as I recall it wasn't very interesting.

 

[Nubmer6]

I think my eyes just glazed over.

 

[devilsblood]

I think my eyes just glazed over.

To further(or maybe to clarify) my point, the "you" in the potential "I think therefore you are", could have merely been a dream, or the creation of an evil demon. So by thinking he was laying the ground work for proving the "you" but it certainly was not enough to prove the "you" in itself, as the possibility of "you" being a dream was still there.

The thinking was proof for the existence of himself, and imo, and as it seems the worlds opinion, a very effective one.

 

[Edmonton East]

Coronavirus got Taylor Hall switching sports. smh. Bulked up quick though.

 

[billingtons ghost]

Your skepticism is exactly the type of scenario in which he was trying to prove his existence. It doesn't matter if no one else acknowledges his existence, the fact that he thinks, proves that he exists. Could he think if he did not exist? He didn't need anyone else to agree, in fact at this point in his meditation(as the term was then used) he had no consideration for the world outside of himself. If I remember right he then goes on in an attempt to prove himself outside himself, though as I recall it wasn't very interesting.

Isn't this putting the horse before Descartes?

 

[None Shall Pass]

Isn't this putting the horse before Descartes?

Boooooooooooooo

 

[billingtons ghost]

Boooooooooooooo

Aw come on, I've waited my whole life for a pun like that.

 

[devilsblood]

Isn't this putting the horse before Descartes?

Boooooooooooooo

Sadly I didn't get the joke until I read None's post.

 

[Nubmer6]

Isn't this putting the horse before Descartes?

I happened to have had a mouth full of coffee when I read that.

On a related note, I think I need a new keyboard

 

[Satans Hockey]

Damn that was some absolutely crazy wind today around 1:30 to 2:30 today.

 

[TheUnseenHand]

It felt really good to be out in the creek again. It had been too long.

 

[JimEIV]

It felt really good to be out in the creek again. It had been too long.

Nice.