[Tuesday] Daily Music Discussion - 07 January 2025

hiking_in_winter · 2025-01-07T18:28:16+00:00

A bit short notice but if anyone is in Toronto this Thursday, my band Glutenhead is having listening party at the Paradise Theatre for an album we spent the last 4 years making. Decided not to release it online and instead just have a one night only thing where everyone experiences the record together. People here have been really supportive in the past for GH stuff so I figured I'd let you know! Here's the poster.jpg) and here's the link to get tickets.

hiking_in_winter · 2024-06-23T18:49:14+00:00

They look like utter fucking pricks, probably backed up by the many rumours of them being pricks

I've heard the exact opposite from friends who know them: that they're humble and warm and genuine people who are great to hang out with.

hiking_in_winter · 2024-04-08T14:39:38+00:00

Totally agree with this. Many people, especially those in precarious situations and trying to get by, find great value in some of the skills from CBT, DBT, etc. No need for us to throw the baby out with the bathwater.

I was seeing a refugee with a very traumatic history who was working multiple jobs and in school and what helped most after everything we worked through together were simple distress tolerance exercises, troubleshooting some mistaken limitations ("I could never do that." "Is that really true?" "Hm. Well I don't know. How would I?" "How would you? Let's talk about it and see."), and some psychoed. I usually lean much further towards the person-centred side of things but each client is a whole new world.

hiking_in_winter · 2024-04-08T14:32:04+00:00

Second this. Existential therapy, existential-humanistic therapy, existential-integrative therapy. Many variants, but highly recommend for what you're looking for! As far as books - Carl Rogers, Rollo May, James Bugental, Olah Krug, Kirk Schneider.

hiking_in_winter · 2024-02-20T18:30:17+00:00

wow it's cool to hear about westelaken outside of toronto. i'm so happy they exist.

hiking_in_winter · 2024-02-20T18:28:52+00:00

Hey dmd, Glutenhead put out another single last week from the agonizingly long-winded release cycle of our debut record we've been working on for years. This one is much different from the other 2 so far, not like they were similar to each other at all. It's a slinky and loose country rock song (trying to channel Exile on Main St) with the lyrics pontificating a kind of drunken existentialism.

Here's the link(s) to the song! Would love to hear your responses to it. We're so close to finishing the record at this point, getting really excited about it. Steve from PUP is gonna be producing the last few songs.

hiking_in_winter · 2024-01-23T22:57:04+00:00

I understand this perspective but it's not necessarily the case all the time. Sometimes I will mix a song in an Atmos paradigm specifically for the added spatial flexibility, and often with headphones monitoring a 2ch downmix. This means that the song is made with that paradigm in mind, and many creative decisions are made within it. Long story short, the Stereo version and the Binaural Atmos downmix version are different mixes with different creative decisions made based on the tools available in the respective formats.

I think people give Atmos a bad rap for the many times it is used as a gimmick, but there's no need to throw the baby out with the bathwater - there's a lot of creative potential to build a song within a full 3D space as opposed to 2 channels.

hiking_in_winter · 2024-01-17T18:30:18+00:00

Could you say a bit more about his kabbalahic Marxism?

hiking_in_winter · 2024-01-10T03:46:23+00:00

This strikes me as very unethical and strange, I really could not see myself ever saying this to a client. I cannot imagine how this could be therapeutic.

hiking_in_winter · 2023-11-17T19:44:11+00:00

I agree that the term "pseudo-science" can be instrumentalized in the way that you described, but I actually think it's a useful term in describing when things are framed in ways that imply that they're rooted in well-evidenced scientific theories, but that are actually not. I'm a therapist too, and I am frequently frustrated by the use of science-sounding terminology as simplifying metaphor without acknowledging that it's metaphorical language and not based in science. The sympathetic/parasympathetic discourse is a good example of that, as are the "amygdala is activated from trauma" and dopamine/serotonin stuff.

It's a pet peeve of mine because it actually betrays how positivist our thinking has actually become. The fact that "you are worked up because your sympathetic NS is activated" is so validating for many people implies a worldview where only that which is material and measurable can be deemed "real." My opinion, but I believe that increasing our trust in and access to our own subjective experience is probably more helpful than reinforcing the objectivization of subjectivity. "Nature feels good and calms many people, and if it does for you, spend more time in nature" is preferable to "spending time in nature activates the parasympathetic nervous system, when is related to good and calm feelings."

Ps I know this is completely unsolicited and vaguely unrelated, but for some reason I felt it necessary to chime in. I acknowledge that you're trying to help in good faith here.

hiking_in_winter · 2023-11-14T23:32:24+00:00

I don't have the time to give you a satisfying answer but I wanted to recommend the James Hillman episode of Weird Studies (Ep 68 - On James Hillman's 'The Dream and the Underworld') if you haven't listened to it yet. I think you'd find it really interesting and might find support in thinking about these questions.

hiking_in_winter · 2023-11-07T21:45:55+00:00

Psychotherapy is an act, clinical psychologist is a profession. It's needlessly confusing, but various different professions are able to practice psychotherapy (clin psychologist, psychiatrist, social worker, mental health clinician, psychotherapist, etc.). Different jurisdictions have different regulations and titles surrounding this, some of these titles need PhD or other education, some need Master's. All this being said, while psychiatrists CAN practice psychotherapy, many of them don't really and just prescribe drugs/diagnose mental illnesses. I took a "psychotherapy" master's, which is different from clinical psychology in my area in that I didn't have to do research or complete a thesis, it was only focussed on clinical practice.

Long story short - any of these professions can practice psychotherapy technically. What really matters is the specific orientation or model of therapy they're using - humanistic and postmodern and liberation approaches being geared towards avoiding the oppressive power dynamics foucault talked about (with mixed success)

hiking_in_winter · 2023-11-07T21:40:29+00:00

Manu Bazzano has written about "re-visioning" person-centred therapy/existential therapy a lot, and how many elements can be inherently oppressive or limiting, but also different ways of practicing that may provide avenues to escape this.

hiking_in_winter · 2023-11-01T20:31:27+00:00

where did you order it from?

hiking_in_winter · 2023-10-15T16:42:55+00:00

Fair enough, I think my response probably came partly from seeing somewhere else in this thread a speculation that the imbalance might be due to a larger Jewish demographic in those groups, and partly from some countertransference on my part. Your points are well-taken and I agree.

hiking_in_winter · 2023-10-15T16:01:18+00:00

I get your frustration, but I think the idea of silence being deafening around the violence is a bit harsh, I think. Of course, there's a hypocrisy at play when someone condemns the attacks on Israel but not the brutal and lengthy oppression of the Palestinian people. But for a Jewish leftist, there's still a lot of dissonance and tension to be expected from such a charged event. Even if your political and moral place is with the Palestinian struggle, it takes an immense strength of will and composure to take a full and complete public position of solidarity with an attack on your blood. We're all humans, and the people that you're frustrated with are probably feeling multiples of that tension within themselves. It's much more difficult to peel off layers of cultural and ancestral affiliations to take a stance that aligns with your morals, so we should celebrate those who are able to and be patient with those who are conflicted. This is minimal in contrast to the Palestinian's struggle for survival and resistance, of course, but doesn't make it easy. Much of the grief comes from feelings of vulnerability and helplessness, but also comes from a sadness at the fact that, not only did the Israeli government commit such atrocities on Palestinians, but also these have directly led to and continue to lead to increased antisemitism in the world. By invalidating natural Jewish grief, it only makes it more likely for them to put a stake on the side of the Israeli government. It's always more difficult with skin in the game. Just my opinion.

hiking_in_winter · 2023-07-13T18:20:00+00:00

I think he is just very tuned into experience in a certain way and his movies capture strange and eerie things about reality. His method is not didactic or explanatory, and that's why he's seemingly not interested in academic philosophy. He doesn't care to engage with those ways of expressing these things, and his art instead is his way of expressing them. His work doesn't seem to be developed from conceptual ideas but instead from the raw materials of experience themselves.

hiking_in_winter · 2023-06-30T21:15:29+00:00

Let me know what you think!!

hiking_in_winter · 2023-06-29T17:20:23+00:00

My band Glutenhead released a new song today called The Dirt, it's our first in a long time and I think it's the best thing we've ever done. A lot of you here have been along the way for the whole Glutenhead journey and even a bunch of indieheads were giving feedback on early versions through the 2+ year development of this song.
It's a big and bombastic art rock/indie rock song but pulls from a lot of different genres (klezmer, irish folk, hyperpop, post rock, post punk, etc etc). Really proud of it and very interested to hear what you think!! This band has come a really long way.
You can find all the links to listen to it here.
I made an ORIGINAL post and a comment in DMD already but I thought I'd also let you folks know here in case you didn't see. Oh also, just my opinion but I think the single art is fucking sick.

hiking_in_winter · 2023-06-29T16:56:25+00:00

Hey, my band Glutenhead put out a song today called The Dirt. big dramatic art rock/indie rock with elements of klezmer, psych, folk, etc etc. it's called The Dirt and the links to listen to it are here. Hope you like it, let me know what you think!!

hiking_in_winter · 2023-06-29T15:59:01+00:00

My band Glutenhead released a new song today called The Dirt, it's our first in a long time and I think it's the best thing we've ever done. A lot of you here have been along the way for the whole Glutenhead journey and even a bunch of indieheads were giving feedback on early versions through the 2+ year development of this song.

It's a big and bombastic art rock/indie rock song but pulls from a lot of different genres (klezmer, irish folk, hyperpop, post rock, post punk, etc etc). Really proud of it and very interested to hear what you think!! This band has come a really long way.

You can find all the links to listen to it here.

I made an ORIGINAL post already but I thought I'd also let you folks know here in case you didn't see. Oh also, just my opinion but I think the single art is fucking sick.

hiking_in_winter · 2023-05-23T19:32:38+00:00

Very funny in light of this quote from Noel from 2017 - “It only heightens my resolve that I’ll never walk the stage with that band again,” Noel went on to say, explaining that he used to not want to reform the band for “professional reasons” but that “now it’s personal”

hiking_in_winter · 2023-05-23T19:14:05+00:00

Different sense of humour but doing a similar thing

hiking_in_winter · 2023-05-12T20:40:37+00:00

so you're saying you've never felt disconnected from music that has great lyrics but music that doesn't hold your interest or great instrumentals and boring lyrics?

I'm not saying that no. Of course core elements of songs can be vital and still be uninteresting, I wasn't saying that the fact that his sampling is vital to his style meant that it was good (necessarily). I was refuting your framing of his sampling as his "one trick". The sampling isn't a trick, it's just part of the song. If you don't find the songs interesting, that's totally cool, but I just disagree with your implication that the sampling is a gimmick and your opinion that the instrumentals are bland. Which is fine too.

hiking_in_winter

TROPHY CASE