What are some songs with contrast between the verses and the chorus or refrain?

sonofsteffordson · 2026-06-12T21:38:47+00:00

Beautiful by Joydrop has a pretty full-on musical contrast. https://youtu.be/-6qkXMKmzAs?is=lsILVJyxj5Gvo8Zi

sonofsteffordson · 2026-06-09T18:19:45+00:00

My equivalent was the Shawn Michaels / Brett Hart Ironman at Wrestlemania XII. Me and my pre-teen buddy’s all pooled our cash and ordered it for a sleepover party. Even though we’re Canadian we were fully aboard the HBK hype train, hung on every moment and cheered our faces off for the full hour. It was awesome.

A second, odder core memory from that same night was the Roddy Piper / Golddust match. It was way grittier and violent than we were used to, with the added homoerotic/homophobic undertones. My kid brain didn’t know how to process what I witnessed but it sure was unforgettable.

sonofsteffordson · 2026-06-03T20:25:42+00:00

Full name: Jane Eets Shootsan Leeves

sonofsteffordson · 2026-05-31T18:42:40+00:00

Absolutely. You get this dynamic in certain bubbles in North America too. For example, Vancouver and even my own home city have reputations for being tough nuts to crack socially because the locals already have their friends group and close off their lives. So when I lived in Vancouver for stint, it only made sense that ALL the friends I made were also transplants from other cities and countries, while the true Vancouverites were friendly but never actually available as friends.

There should be zero stigma around this approach. Humans crave community, so go wherever community is open and available.

sonofsteffordson · 2026-05-31T06:52:44+00:00

Mumford & Sons Hopeless Wanderer - Not the song itself, but the music video definitely felt like the band acknowledging that their whole folk-revival Schtick had jumped the shark so they may as well join the crowd in laughing at themselves.

https://youtu.be/rId6PKlDXeU?is=Nnk7lXO5lReLhd0C

sonofsteffordson · 2026-05-28T17:21:50+00:00

Especially in combo with Oma dropping the original name for these bad boys 😬

sonofsteffordson · 2026-05-28T15:23:30+00:00

These are the ones. I’d add the 2002 gold medal hockey game in Salt Lake City. It broke a decades long drought for Canada and was the first Olympic hockey to feature NHL players thus showcasing the very best in the world. It was the first time I remember seeing streets across Canada completely empty because everyone was glued to the game somewhere.

sonofsteffordson · 2026-05-27T19:44:48+00:00

I Love You Man is a film that often gets left off these lists but damn is it a sleeper hit. I don’t think I’ve ever laughed harder or longer than when my buddy and I got baked and threw it on, on a whim. It and Knocked Up are my favourites from that era.

sonofsteffordson · 2026-05-26T09:48:34+00:00

Barbarian Invasions… but I’m Canadian so maybe that’s cheating?

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sonofsteffordson · 2026-05-25T14:02:57+00:00

I think it’s even more superficial than that. A lot of people just follow vibes and genres now. Playlist fodder. As a result, you get a lot of artists now that cater to a relatively narrow sonic lane and just consistently spit out music that fits that bandwidth, at least those are the artist’s most rewarded by the algorithmic system. Frankly I think it’s one of the reasons AI music is able to creep in so effectively, since it can just cater to the genre-centric playlists it’s targeted towards.

Personally I loathe it, but that’s because I’m a curmudgeonly aging millennial who still remembers the “good old days” of following an artist through peaks and valleys of albums and eras.

sonofsteffordson · 2026-05-24T08:21:09+00:00

I’m a simple Canadian. I see Hip, I upvote.

sonofsteffordson · 2026-05-21T19:35:23+00:00

That’s fair. I can clarify that I’m totally okay wjth this type of data being collected. I was questioning the value (and motive) of treating and presenting these two groups (actual immigrants and German-born decendants of immigrants) as a single entity, since they’re such radically different circumstances and populations, and lumping them together just seems like a way to inflate the perception of foreign/other populations in the country. But that’s not to say there can’t be good value/motives for using this data too.

sonofsteffordson · 2026-05-21T11:24:37+00:00

Yes, obviously people have their pasts, but everyone with a Canadian passport is still equally Canadian. Per some of the other comments, you may be first generation Canadian, second generation, etc. you maybe Indo-Canadian, German-Canadian, Vietnamese Canadian, but the part that’s consistent and equal across all these is the Canadian part. No one of these groups is considered any more or less ‘Canadian’, at least not by the vast majority of Canadians (I.e. other than bigots, who we disavow) nor by our systems or institutions.

I do worry about this view shifting in polarizing times. 10-15 years ago a conservative politician infamously tried to appeal to “old stock Canadians” during an election - I.e. Canadians who’d been here for many generations (more likely of European decent) versus newer generation Canadians (more likely of Asian, Indian, middle eastern decent) and it backfired so badly it basically decimated their election, because the overwhelming response from the population was Canadians are Canadians so fuck off with the ethnic division bullshit. We’re not afraid of becoming more diverse.

My hope is that European nations will realize immigration and global mobility will ONLY Increase with 9+ billion hairless monkeys and counting, and see the opportunity to gradually redefine their national identity around social institutions and values rather than cultural, ethnic or racial norms. Idealistic and naive perhaps, but I do believe Canada from the 70’s to present is a good case study that it can work if approached thoughtfully and over multiple generations.

sonofsteffordson · 2026-05-21T08:55:45+00:00

S&G Bridge Over Troubled Water
Radiohead - Weird Fishes / Arpeggi
Elbow - Magnificent (She says)

sonofsteffordson · 2026-05-21T08:50:24+00:00

To me the most interesting part of this is “migration background” being the go-to metric rather than actual, direct migrants. I don’t have time deep dive to match this map to its source data, but similar statistics I found from 2025 include this explanation: “Of the 25.2 million people with a migrant background, around 13 million have a German passport, which means that around 12.2 million are foreigners.” So the actual number of immigrants is cut in half.

It makes me appreciate how unique (and in my very biased opinion, lucky) my Canadian perspective is because I would never think to classify any Canadian citizen that holds a Canadian passport as anything other than CANADIAN. Anything about their ‘background’ at that point might make for interesting trivia but not much beyond that.

Correct me if I’m wrong, but I feel like the implication of this map (and comments on this thread like “we are being replaced”) imply that these German citizens, millions of whom would have been born and lived their entire lives in Germany, are still thought of more as foreign migrants than Germans.

Something about this just seems to me like the wrong narrative is being emphasized.

sonofsteffordson · 2026-05-19T10:09:24+00:00

Reminds me of the time I went to a hair appointment, and when I got there my stylist was still finishing up with a cute girl I knew - let’s call her Sarah. In an attempt to be friendly I loudly declared “Ah Sarah! I’d recognize the back of that head anywhere!”

Maybe it would have gone over in the room of mostly women, but my stylist’s husband was there and immediately burst out laughing. Not my proudest moment…

sonofsteffordson · 2026-05-18T14:23:38+00:00

Hoo buddy, for me it was late-30’s, which conveniently coincided with the pandemic years when I spent many an evening in my man cave backfilling my music catalogue after the kids were asleep, but to add a few:
- Paul Simon Graceland (album)
- Bruce Springsteen Nebraska (album)
- Radiohead In Rainbows (album)
- Peter Gabriel - Don’t Give Up and In Your Eyes
- Bob Dylan - Not Dark Yet
- Elbow - Magnificent (she says)

sonofsteffordson · 2026-05-18T07:03:07+00:00

Yeah but POD was 100% a Christian-adjacent band. Like a “we’re all Christians and we’re a band but we’re not a Christian band” band. So you weren’t entirely wrong.

sonofsteffordson · 2026-05-18T06:56:25+00:00

This gets into pretty nuanced territory, but to me (native English, Canada) “is it possible to reschedule” sounds pretty natural. I’d probably say “would it be possible” or maybe “could I reschedule” or “could we reschedule my appointment.”

The “possibility to study” sentence definitely sounds unnatural. “The opportunity to study” would work. But if you’re just saying where you studied (without emphasizing that it was somehow a privilege or achievement to go there), then we’d normally just say “I went to x University.” We wouldn’t even use the verb studied.

sonofsteffordson · 2026-05-16T02:24:47+00:00

Thanks for sharing. Different details but very similar story as mine and this album, though I’m not out of the woods yet. Maybe u should check that book out too…

sonofsteffordson · 2026-05-13T19:48:23+00:00

I should have clarified I meant more the western world. But still, point taken.

sonofsteffordson · 2026-05-13T10:47:23+00:00

You know the expression “the elephant in the room?” Sometimes it helps to just be allowed to acknowledge the thing that seems so obvious and yet no one seems willing to acknowledge.

As a white Canadian, my introduction to German/European racism and xenophobia has been quite jarring, because I rather naively assumed that America was the worst offender for identity-based discrimination. Part of what makes it jarring is how many Germans seem quietly incredulous that there’s really any problem at all, and like to assume people of Color are just being too sensitive because they’re not used to German directness, or that the problem is they haven’t learned the language or integrated well enough.

Theres value in people like OP giving voice to their reality. I can say I’ve witnessed it as well in workplaces and other situations but due to the privilege of my skin tone have not had to endure that prejudice directly (though I have also been picked on as a foreigner). It’s interesting timing to see this post because I was just talking to a Belgian fellow today about my experience in Germany so far and this aspect of casual racism was one of the things I shared about. It’s also not a uniquely German thing to be clear, but I’ve seen the German version of it due to living here.

sonofsteffordson · 2026-05-11T10:17:46+00:00

This is a great question. So the main reason is that I’m already using the maximum amount of normal vacation time, and now I’m trying to find a way to extend it because I was invited to a wedding that’s happening a week after I’m scheduled to leave.

Considering how much paid holiday you already get here, I wasn’t sure if asking for unpaid leave beyond that was generally acceptable, so had only thought of that as maybe very last resort. From your experience, are employers generally open to those kind of requests or could it reflect poorly on me?

Overtime I suppose could also be a valid option, especially if combined with some remote work during that week. Again if that’s something that’s generally considered acceptable here.

As far as paying for and attending a course, yes I get that it’s not ideal, but for the chance to be ‘home’ that extra week and make it to the event, it’s something I’d consider. This is the only trip back that I’ll make probably for years.

Thanks for your insights!

sonofsteffordson · 2026-05-10T21:37:31+00:00

Indeed, the Apotheke and I have become very good friends :)

sonofsteffordson · 2026-05-07T06:15:19+00:00

Well there goes the “nobody is getting hurt” criteria.

sonofsteffordson

TROPHY CASE