• The bit that you skip #81: TV on the Radio – New Health Rock

    As I continue writing these posts, one per day, with varying quality, I can see recurring themes. And if you’ve been reading them daily, you probably picked up on them too. Also, thanks for reading them! Videogames have been an integral part of my life. From the simple bleep blop beeps of Intellivision, to the…

  • The bit that you skip #80: Megadeth – Peace Sells

    I wasn’t a fan of metal music when I was young, and I don’t think I’ll ever be. That doesn’t mean I can’t appreciate a good riff here and there, and if a song is really good, it’ll go into my collection. My first experience with Megadeth was Youthanasia, and Train of consequences had a…

  • The bit that you skip #79: Billy Joel – We didn’t start the fire

    It’s odd how the memory of a song can be irrelevant to the song. Billy Joel’s we didn’t start the fire reminds me of two things, the first one being watching The Wonder Years both in English (on cable tv) and dubbed to Spanish (on aerial tv). You’d get sometimes both episodes the same day,…

  • The bit that you skip #78: Fleetwood Mac – Little Lies

    Just like Bryan Adams’ So Far So Good, Fleetwood Mac’s 1988 collection of hits was my “ah, it’s them!” situation. The observant ones would sneer at having a greatest hits as the first connection with a band as celebrated -and derided by some- as Fleetwood Mac. Little lies is a very 80s song. Crisp production,…

  • The bit that you skip #77: Youssou N’Dour & Neneh Cherry – 7 seconds

    Nothing sounded like 7 seconds in the summer of ’94. It had a grip with its ominous atmosphere, a mixture of longing and sadness. It was a real clash walking in Tampico while it blasted from my walkman. “Should I learn Senegalese?” I asked myself, not knowing he was singing in Wolof. The french part…

  • The bit that you skip #76: Bryan Adams – Please forgive me

    Compilation albums are a strange beast. Often a cynical mish mash of crowd pleasers and a few odds and sods, they can precede an artist’s downfall. Surely as big of a warning as a covers album. Bryan Adams So Far So Good felt different. I was acquainted with Bryan Adams that well until his Robin…

  • The bit that you skip #75: Mastodon – Colony of Birchmen

    After MTV Latino steered into a cliff of reality shows, I had to switch to other avenues to find new, fresh music. Magazines did the trick for a while, bulleting boards and discussion forums carried the torch too. I won’t lie about the use of Bearshare, Emule, and Audiogalaxy, which replaced FTP sites where you…

  • The bit that you skip #74: Dust on the breakers – Frontiers

    A fond memory of my mother was riding shotgun on an old orange (later crimson) Datsun 160J. She only drove when we lived in a small oil worker colony near the refinery in Tula, Hidalgo. Being the smallest one, she would take me here, there, and everywhere to help carry shopping, keep a watchful eye…

  • The bit that you skip #73: Geggy Tah – Whoever you are

    I lived in Tula until ’85. It was a workers’ colony in front of the Miguel Hidalgo Refinery. Not the safest of places, I know, but what can ya do? I have fond memories of the place and I clearly remember a straight lane from one of the refinery’s corners to the access gate to…

  • The bit that you skip #72: The Chemical Brothers – Hey Boy Hey Girl

    We all have a “lucky song”. I found mine just at the right time and it was Hey boy hey girl by The chemical brothers. But what do I mean by “lucky song”? It’s the one you listen when you are nearly over the brink. The one you use to pep yourself to ask someone…