Category: Musical Snobbery

Hitting the Heights

It seems odd to me that AD&D’s Ravenloft setting never included a version of Wuthering Heights.

Think about it. You’ve got the perfect Dark Lord in the form of Heathcliff, torturing his household and tormented by his memories of Catherine. Catherine would actually be a ghost, tapping on the windows at night and increasing Heathcliff’s torment. The Domain would consist of the bleak, high moors, with a few scattered houses and a single village, and the borders would be sealed when necessary by raging sleet and hail storms.

It’s such a natural fit that its lack boggles the mind. Were there no English Majors at TSR?

While on the subject of Wuthering Heights, I don’t believe that it’s possible for any human being to sing as high as Kate Bush does in the first few bars of her song based on the book. Her pitch is either a post-recording effect, or she is some kind of alien masquerading as a human being.

(I know where I’m putting my money… :D)

Oh, can I also mention Kate Beaton’s brilliant take on the book?

Wuthering Heights: Part 1
Wuthering Heights: Part 2
Wuthering Heights: Part 3

Interesting Musical Facts: Number One

Did you know that Nick Cave and Enya collaborated on a cover of Don’t Fear the Reaper?

No?

Well that’s good, because they didn’t, although enough people seem to think that Finnish goth band HIM sound enough like Nick Cave and Enya to misattribute their cover to them on file sharing networks. Here it is anyway…

Nick Cave? I can sort of hear it. Enya? Doesn’t sound anything like her!

Can’t say I’m a huge fan of HIM’s interpretation (not enough cowbell for a start), but each to their own.

(No doubt many HIM fans are now raging with fury that I dare to describe HIM as a “goth band”. No doubt many HIM fans think I actually care :D)

Do as History Teaches

It’s that time again, the time when the Australian swim team goes off to the Olympics and – to the general consternation of the nation – totally fails to dominate. Our swimmers pick up some silvers, some bronzes and maybe a few golds, and the press fills up with questions about where it’s all gone so wrong.

The thing that everyone fails to remember is that this is the Olympic Games, not the Commonwealth Games. In the Commonwealth Games we slaughter everyone, because, frankly,  we’re the only people in the Commonwealth who can actually swim. At the Olympics we face the Americans, the Russians, the Chinese and a horde of upstart, wildcard nations that luck out by stumbling over a single brilliant swimmer. Faced with all that competition we actually punch well above our weight, but there’s still hand wringing and gnashing of teeth every time we win a silver (or, the horror! a bronze) rather than a gold.

To those who are upset at our team’s performance in the pool – or elsewhere – I say shut up and listen to some TISM.

Adelaide Hospital Abusing Petzold

On hold with the tech support desk at a hospital in Adelaide, trying to sort out a client’s email problems.

They’re playing eight bars of Petzold’s Minuet in G Major for Broken Doorbell at me on a loop.

In the name of all that’s holy Lord, kill me now!