Kasparov at Polgar Festival in Budapest

Blogger did something that messed up the header I liked, and I didn't have the patience to work on getting this one right. It's so severe looking now. Perhaps when I am good and sick of it I'll have the patience to work on it again.

Today was the Polgar Chess Festival in Budapest at the Palace of Arts. I took my youngest son Alex. All three of the famous Polgar sisters were there, including Judit who is the highest rated woman ever in chess and the only one to enter the top ten in the world.

We saw Sofia Polgar play a simul exhibition against thirty players.

Kasparov with Judit Polgar

Later there was a press conference with the three Polgars and former world champion Garry Kasparov. It was too crowded to get any good photos, unfortunately.

Double Standard

I started reading another Cormac McCarthy novel today. I've read a couple of his and I find them okay, though I don't love him the way so many apparently do. I think what bothers me about his work is what I perceive as a double standard. Here is an example from the very first page of this novel called The Crossing:

"He pulled his breeches off the footboard of the bed and got his shirt and his blanketlined duckingcoat and got his boots from under the bed and went out to the kitchen and dressed in the dark by the faint warmth of the stove and held the boots to the windowlight to pair them left and right and pulled them on and rose and went to the kitchen door and stepped out and closed the door behind him."

You see, he gets to be called brilliant by writing such run-on sentences with 12 'and's in them, which he does all the time, but if any of us dared to do such a thing, any agent or editor would reject us outright and consider us complete amateurs. It just pisses me off a tad that the very same set of eyes that would read that sentence coming from me and hit the Delete key will foam at the mouth with ecstasy because it is written by a famous author.

Sorry, just had to do a mini-rant about that before I go on reading.

Lost Music

Since work has been crazy busy the past couple of months, I've had very little quality personal time. What time I have had I've mostly been just reading and listening to music. Very often I get into the mood for specific favorite bands and listen to their stuff over and over again until I tire of it and move on to a different favorite. A couple weeks ago something reminded me of one of the oddest but brilliant flashes of music from the late eighties--Frankie Goes to Hollywood.

For me this band came out of nowhere. The music of the 80's has grown on me over time, but while living through them I felt it was mostly mediocre, especially compared to the brilliance of the late 60's and early 70's (Zeppelin, Floyd, Beatles, The Who, Stones, Cream, Hendrix, etc.). I spent several years of the 80's listening to almost nothing but U2, and I considered them to be by far the greatest band of that time (still do).
But Frankie Goes to Hollywood crashed onto the music scene like nothing I had ever seen before. They were brazenly, openly gay (at least the two frontmen) yet produced in-your-face galloping pop-rock tunes like Two Tribes and Welcome to the Pleasuredome, not to mention their rather blatantly sexual hit Relax. Their singer had a sneer of a voice that worked great even when producing rehashes of tunes like Springsteen's Born to Run (nothing can touch the original, yet there is an addictive quality to FGTH's version). And even their unknown songs were often quite good--Black Night, White Light has an awesome bass line and backing vocal. They do a creditable take of the old hit War as well. And Krisco Kisses...well, it's a bit too over-the-top for  my taste, but it certainly deserves a few listens!

I find it very sad to listen to the friends of my sons and learn that many young people these days have no appreciation or knowledge whatsoever of older music, even though that music is generally far superior to anything on the charts these days. (We still have fabulous modern bands, like Tool, A Perfect Circle, Soundgarden, White Stripes, Stone Temple Pilots, Pearl Jam, etc., but they are rarely anywhere near the charts).

FGTH's music turned off a lot of people who were uncomfortable with their brazenness, but they deserve a second chance, especially their terrific first album.

An Interview With Me!

The wonderful Afe Smith was kind enough to do an interview with me over on her blog. Sorry I haven't been blogging, but it's been a hectic summer. It started off well on the writing front after I got the nice review from Harper Collins, and I wrote six new chapters, but then I got slammed by work and have really stalled.

An Evening Walk in Budapest

With my family away in Croatia on a vacation and me stuck in Budapest for work, I decided after dinner to take an evening stroll with my camera.

Castle with crescent moon

 It was a lovely evening with a nice moon and lots of people walking near the Danube.

Palace and Chain Bridge

Chain Bridge

After crossing the Danube, I noticed an absolutely stunning young Italian woman walking along the river with two of her friends. I stopped to take the picture above, and she stopped to take the same shot. As she walked by me, she looked me right in the eyes and gave me an amazing smile. I've been happily married for 18 years, so it's a rare thing for any woman other than my beautiful wife to smile at me, let alone one who kinda, sorta looked like this...

Needless to say it made my week!

Parliament

So I had a very nice evening. How have you all been doing?

Top 20 Soundgarden Songs

Since Soundgarden got back together last year and released an awesome new album, I've been listening to a lot of their great songs. I've done a few 'best of' lists in the past but somehow neglected Soundgarden, which is after all one of my favorite bands. For the purposes of this list I will also include some Chris Cornell solo work and also Temple of the Dog, which heavily featured Chris. If by doing this list I can introduce some previously unknown songs to you then I will be very happy.

1. Searching With My Good Eye Closed -- This was the first Soundgarden song I heard, as they opened with it at the live concert I attended that was my introduction to their music. The song is so heavy that it isn't just in old fashioned drop D tuning like many heavy songs--the guitar is tuned down two whole steps to B. The riff is so heavy and the vocals fit perfectly over it. I'm not enamored of the long intro, so I edit the song to fade in just before the vocals kick off.

2. Boot Camp -- Soundgarden's last album before they broke up was the vastly underrated Down On the Upside, which is my favorite of their albums. This song is pretty much overlooked by people for some reason, but I listen to it all the time.

 3. Bones of Birds -- I bet you never heard this one either. It's from the new album, and naturally it hasn't been released as a single, since Soundgarden never puts their best songs out as singles. This one took a little time to grow on me, but it's lovely.

 4. Beyond the Wheel -- This is one of the oldest Soundgarden songs, and while the studio version is very good, the live version from the Letterman concert is incredible.


5. Fourth of July -- Another overlooked song. It's dirgelike tone really appeals to me.

6. Pretty Noose -- A cool rocker from their best album. Love the wah wah pedal here.

7. Blood on the Valley Floor -- Excellent song from the new album, so of course it isn't a single.

8. Call Me a Dog -- My favorite song from the Temple of the Dog album.

9. Zero Chance -- Just gorgeous, and again from their best album, Down on the Upside.

10. Worse Dreams -- Here's another reason why the new album is so splendid.

11. By Crooked Steps -- See 10

12. Taree -- See 10 and 11. This song has the best buildup of any on the album but falls a tad short on the chorus, at least for me. It could easily have been the best song on the already great record.

13. An Unkind -- Short, rocking tune from the awesome Down on the Upside album.

14. Nothing to Say -- One of the best of the old Soundgarden songs.

15. Nowhere But You -- A Chris Cornell solo tune that is quirky and sounds like it belongs in a Tarantino movie.

16. Blow Up the Outside World -- What more can be said about the Down on the Upside album...it's the best!

17. Burden in My Hand -- See 16

18. Room a Thousand Years Wide -- Simple but great, from the Badmotorfinger album.

19. Jesus Christ Pose -- Iconic tune from Badmotorfinger, and while I love it, I somehow rarely feel like playing it, which is why it drops to here on the list.

20. Switch Opens -- A somewhat surreal but beautiful song from Down on the Upside.

Okay, so there are so many great Soundgarden songs that didn't make my top 20, but that's because Soundgarden tends to release their second-rate songs as singles while leaving their best stuff to languish in obscurity. Here are their other songs that have four stars on my iTunes list:

Like Suicide, The Keeper, Seasons, Outshined, Hands All Over, Flower, Overfloater, Mind Riot, Earache My Eye, Karaoke, Spoonman, Black Hole Sun, Hunger Strike, Your Savior, All Night Thing, The Day I Tried to Live, Loud Love, Live to Rise, Flutter Girl, Preaching the End of the World, Follow My Way, When I'm Down, Steel Rain, A Thousand Days Before, Non-State Actor, Been Away Too Long, Attrition, Black Saturday.

Wow, so many great songs! Not many bands outside of The Beatles, Zeppelin, Floyd, U2, Pearl Jam, etc., have managed so many.

Budapest Flood

Last week Budapest saw the Danube River flood to its highest level in a century. (click the photos to enlarge)

Parliament Building

Me on the river walk drive that is usually well above water