Wednesday, August 26, 2009
Tuesday, August 18, 2009
Can't get enough of Mister Mraz.
This past weekend, I went to see the Gratitude Cafe tour headlining Jason Mraz at the Molson Amphitheatre. It was my second time seeing Jason Mraz, and unfortunately, I'd have to say it was many times more enjoyable the first time around. In any case, this tour was hosted by Bushwalla and included K'Naan and G.Love and Special Sauce as openers. The opening bands were mediocre, but nothing worth mentioning. If only Bushwalla was an actual opening act; I'm sure he would have been much more entertaining. We had seats in the 200 level (but on the left wing) so it was much harder to take pictures than I expected. I eventually gave up a quarter way through the concert because it was so impossible. I hate big venues like the Molson Amp; it takes away the intimacy and "personal touch" of a show. All in all, I'm not going to complain about it because Jason obviously still pulled off an amazing show and I still had a great time.
Thursday, August 6, 2009
The ballad of the sad cafe.
"First of all, love is a joint experience between two persons — but the fact that it is a joint experience does not mean that it is a similar experience to the two people involved. There is the lover and the beloved, but these two come from different countries. Often, the beloved is only a stimulus for all the stored-up love which had lain quiet within the lover for a long time hitherto. And somehow every lover knows this. He feels in his soul that his love is a solitary thing. He comes to know a new, strange loneliness and it is this knowledge which makes him suffer. So there is only one thing for the lover to do. He must house his love within himself as best he can; he must create for himself a whole new inward world — a world intense and strange, complete in himself. Let it be added here that this lover about whom we speak need not necessarily be a young man saving for a wedding ring — this lover can be man, woman, child, or indeed any human creature on this earth.
Now, the beloved can also be of any description. The most outlandish people can be the stimulus for love. A man may be a doddering great-grandfather and still love only a strange girl he saw in the streets one afternoon two decades past. The preacher may love a fallen woman. The beloved may be treacherous, greasy-headed, and given to evil habits. Yes, and the lover may see this as clearly as anyone else — but that does not affect the evolution of his love one whit. A most mediocre person can be the object of a love which is wild, extravagant, and beautiful as the poison lilies of the swamp. A good man may be the stimulus for a love both violent and debased, or a jabbering madman may bring about in the soul of someone a tender and simple idyll. Therefore, the value and quality of any love is determined solely by the lover himself.
It is for this reason that most of us would rather love than be loved. Almost everyone wants to be the lover. And the curt truth is that, in a deep secret way, the state of being beloved is intolerable to many. The beloved fears and hates the lover, and with the best of reasons. For the lover is forever trying to strip bare his beloved. The lover craves any possible relation with the beloved, even if this experience can cause him only pain."
-Carson McCullers, The Ballad of the Sad Cafe
