Wasted the weekend away. Oh well.

Did manage to pick up some books and cd’s.

mini reviews attached…

System Performance Tuning – Musumeci & Loukides
– solaris oriented, but the linux info that is included is
the most up to date, accurate, and useful info I’ve seen
in a book. Even though there is maybe only 40 pages or
so of linux specific info, I think it’s much more useful info than
any of the linux specific books I’ve seen. This is the second
edition btw, iirc the first version was solaris only and not very useful.

Atlas of Cyber Space
Despite the title, not one of those “1001 Websites About Macrame” but an
overview of various attempts to visualize the internet, 3d games, etc. I’m
a sucker for any book with lots of pretty pictures attempting to visualize
huge sets of data.

Did something kind of odd with regard to the cd’s. I bought
5 cd’s that I will probabaly only ever listen to once or
twice. And I kind of suspected that before I bought them.

Aphex Twin – …I care because you do
Better than 99.9% of the electronic I’ve heard, but just doesnt
really sink in. Is this a good/bad/otherwise aphex twin album?
A bit too low energy and soundtracky at times.

King Tubby Meets Lee Perry – Megawatt dub
The quality of most dub albums tends to be kind of dubious.
Very hit and miss. And this one shows signs The Thing That
Should Not Be On Dub Records. ie, vocals…

TransChamps – DoubleExporsoure
I like Trans Am. I like the Fucking Champs. But you know
how “supergroup” albums tend to be. It’s actually pretty good,
just definately not what you would expect a TransAm/Champs combo
to sound like. But it’s kind of inconsistent.

David Bowie – Heros
I like David Bowie, especially berlin era stuff. But, not really the kind
of thing where I would say “I want to listen to Hero’s!” or leave in the
car cd player for a week, etc. Even with Bowie,Eno, and Fripp, it is
still essentially a pop vocal album.

Bela Fleck & the Flecktones – Live at the quick
Excellent, but live albums rarely fall into that “listen to over and over”
category. Also, the new stuff tends a bit much towards “jam band” territory
and doesnt seem to have the same energy level as the earlier fushiony stuff.
Also, the early stuff had much more minimalistic production, which I kind of liked.