Here we have the latest and greatest jazz release.  This is a single from the upcoming album “Four MFs Playin’ Tunes”by the Branford Marsalis Quartet.

There’s a lot to like here, and it makes me excited to listen to the album in it’s entirety.  Branford’s tone sounds more dry, dark, and hollow here (hollow isn’t a bad thing).  Listen to the way he starts his solos right near the beginning — I was immediately brought back to Sonny Rollins on Way Out West or Plus 4.  But what he is playing here is not only hailing back to the ample annals of jazz tradition, but there is also a newness and a freshness to what the band is doing.  For example at 1:16 he has this accented quarter note line that ascends and descends and the band is right with him, going up the hill and back down it.  This is a small section of a nearly 8 minute performance for sure, but my point is that it sounds very fresh and gives me hope to hear the album as a whole.  If you are interested in the album, check out the featurette-length overview onYouTube.

Have you listened to the single or the album yet?  I would love to hear your thoughts.  Sound off in the comments!

The DISK Fine by Able Brewing

In the coffee world, manual brewing methods are king right now. This is something that I will not complain about because quite often these manual methods give the user greater control over the relevant variables at a much lower price point than any suitable automatic brewer.

I’ve always found the aeropress to be among the most finicky of our current generation of manual brew methods. I think it may be that because of it’s low brewing volume (220 grams of water is about your max), minute changes in each variable are much more noticeable than if you are brewing at higher volumes. This is good because it gives the user a chance to learn about brew variables, but bad because it can be tough to nail a spot-on brew.

The aeropress comes with thin paper filters, which have always been my preference. I don’t like sediment in the cup. Filters that allow sediment do usually deliver a greater spectrum of flavors to the cup but in my experience these additional flavors are not desired. While eco-friendly practices are a worthy pursuit, coffee filters have never seemed like a big enough source of waste to prod me towards a more “green” method. If the right solution came along however, I would be game.

Enter the DISK Fine, made by a company named Able Brewing. It is a thin mesh-like metal filter that aims to deliver eco-friendliness (reusability), low amounts of sediment in the cup, and flavor benefits of metal filtering. Additionally, a reusable filter has the potential to save money in the long run, and this particular one is made entirely in the U.S. In my opinion this is an impressive value chain that Able Brewing has tied into this ~$15 product. I give them props first and foremost in this space.

My thoughts on the Disk Fine:

There is a trade-off compared to the original DISK; durability. When I first opened the DISK Fine, I was a little scared to handle it. I was expecting a thin metal plate, but the the DISK Fine is closer to a piece of circular-cut metal mesh. I don’t think it will break, but I fear it getting accidentally bent or crushed. Though, this one sacrifice proved worth it in the long run.

This is possibly the least amount of sediment I've seen from any metal/mesh filtering method.

Brewing with the DISK Fine is not really any different in practice than with the original disk, or the aeropress paper filters. (See my brew recipe below). The difference is quite noticeable when it comes to what is in the cup (isn’t that what coffee geeks like us are supposed to be excited about anyways?). As you can see in the picture above, the amount of sediment in the cup is negligible until you get to the last sip. I choose not to take the last sip, and am usually quite pleased by the cup overall. I think it’s important to note that because of the pressure exerted on the filter, there has always been a little bit of sediment in my aeropress brews, even when using the paper filters.

Besides sediment volume, there are some differences in the cup. First off, remember that the DISK and DISK Fine deliver an immersion/metal-filter style cup. So, body is increased, and acidity decreased. Similar to Kone v2 style brews, you end up getting a very “soft” cup. It’s gentle and respectful, but it doesn’t lack flavor. The one thing I’m always trying to balance is over-extraction vs. under-extraction; the aeropress has a small sweet-spot, and a metal filter with low sediment gives an even stronger sense of extraction to the user. Finding that extraction sweet-spot will be key for a user of the DISK Fine.

I digress. The DISK Fine is a great product. It’s better than the original DISK (less sediment, just as much flavor/body) it’s reusable, it’s perhaps more eco-friendly than paper filters, and it’s completely made in the U.S. So, as long as I’m careful handling it, I’m one step closer to my lifelong dream of tasting immersion brewed coffee without the grit. By avoiding the last sip in the mug, I’m pretty much there

My Aeropress Recipe:

Inverted. I don’t claim to have come up with this originally.  I’ve tried a lot of others’ brew methods, tweaked them, and tweaked some more.  This one is probably derived from another recipe that I saw online.

Parameters:
15 grams of coffee ground slightly coarser than standard filter drip
220 grams of water @ 201 degrees Fahrenheit
1:55 total targeted brew time

1. Set up your aeropress so that is it inverted.  Fill with boiling water to preheat.  Preheat mug and Disk Fine as well.
2. Place coffee grounds in aeropress, then place aeropress on scale and tare.
3. In about twenty seconds, pour 100 grams of water into aeropress and stir 3 times (clock is now at 0:20)
4. Using another twenty seconds, pour in the remaining 120 grams of water (clock is now at 0:40)
5. Place DISK Fine (along with black filter harness)
6. Steep coffee in aeropress until clock reaches 1:10
7. At 1:10, flip aeropress and slowly press coffee.  Aim to finish the press at 1:55
8. As soon as you hear air being pushed through the grounds into your mug, STOP!
9. Enjoy

Clever Dripper: manual brewing bliss?

Enter the Clever Dripper.  Whether you want to call it a solution to the yearnings of humanity or just a novel brewing method, I like it — alot.  Essentially the Clever Dripper gives you full immersion brewing capabilities with alongside of paper filtering.  It looks like a large manual drip cone with a handle.  Simple place the filter in the cone, add coffee, water, and steep.  When the cone it places on top of the decanting vessel (read: mug) the valve at the bottom of the cone is opened and out comes that glorious brown nectar.

I was first able to taste coffee from the Clever Dripper last year.  While visiting Might Good Coffee, we ordered 2 cups of their fresh roasted Costa Rican coffee — one brewed with a manual melitta cone, and the other in the clever dripper.  The results were stunning.  I’ve always enjoyed manual brewing drip methods, and the coffee as brewed in the Melitta cone tasted great.  Then I tasted the Clever Dripper cup.  There was, quite simply (and astoundingly) more everything.  More body, more acidity, more nuance, more complexity, and more flavor.  With the Clever Dripper I seemed to be getting a clearer picture of what this coffee was like.

I was sold.  I bought my own Clever Dripper in the beginning of the year and have been using it diligently since then.  I would reccommend it to anyone interested in getting into manual brewing.  In fact, a formidable brewing setup can be found in the Clever Dripper / Electric Kettle / Burr Grinder combination.  After four months of fiddling, sipping, and calculating, here is the recipe that I’ve settled on:

26.5 grams of coffee ground slightly coarser than standard filter drip
350 grams of water @ 201 degrees Fahrenheit
–

1. Place paper filter in clever dripper, filling it with boiling water to pre-heat the device and rinse the filter.
2. While your boiling water cools to 201 degrees F, grind your coffee.
3. Empty the water from the Clever Dripper into your mug (this will pre-heat your mug)
4. Place the Clever on your scale, pour ground coffee into it, and tare scale to zero.
5. Start your timer.  Pour about 80 grams of water over the coffee for pre-infusion.
6. After 45 seconds have passed on the timer, pour the remaining water into the Clever, for a total of 350 grams of water.
7. Around 2:10, use a heated spoon to submerge any coffee grounds that may be floating on the surface, then give three gentle stirs, agitating only the slurry above the coffee grounds which reside at the bottom of the cone.
8. Pour hot water out of your mug
9. At 4:00, place clever dripper on top of mug.
10. After all coffee has draining into the mug, rinse the the clever dripper and enjoy!

This recipe will yield around 290 to 300 grams of brewed coffee.

For me, this is the recipe to beat for the Clever Dripper.  Who can top it?  Sound off in the comments.

In each CoreDogs Experience article, my goal is twofold: (1) to look in-depth at a single feature of the site or its content (this will likely be analysis or commentary of a CoreDogs feature that is present in multiple places as opposed to a single section) and (2) to take a look at what went on in a given section of the course.

CoreDogs Feature: Organization

So far we’ve taken a look at several of CoreDogs’ differentiating features.  Now, let’s take a look at the way the site is organized.  There are three “books” of instruction; Foundations, ClientCore, and ServerCore.  Within each of these books are 5-10 lessons.  Each lesson contains a number of “sub-lessons” or explanations.  There is a definite and obvious hierarchal structure to the entire site.

Another element of organization that I really like is the Wikipedia-style table of contents at the beginning of each sub-lesson.  Here is the table of contents for the Creating a database lesson:

[image here]

Each item on the table of contents is clickable and takes the user to a hash tagged location on the page.  I love seeing this simplistic table of contents at the beginning of each sub-lesson because it lets me know (along with the “Where are we?” and “Lesson Goals” sections) what exactly I’m in for and how much content there is.  Additionally it gives me an instant picture in my mind of the shape of the lesson.  By “shape of the lesson” I mean something like the story arc of a book or movie.  It’s a sort of Cliff Notes to what I’m going to be learning.

Course Content So Far

The Basic database applications section focuses on creating an application (in the form of a website) that displays information (from a database) for users.  Furthermore, the application allows administrators to add, edit, or delete records in the database.  As noted in a previous article I found the sections regarding forms to be tough and a little hazy in instruction, but this database section was a home run.

The way that this section teaches the concepts should be imitated as much as possible in today’s textbooks.  The first three sub-lessons (of 17 total) focus on providing the goals of and necessary background information for creating a basic database application.  Then, two separate Sample applications are introduced; a website called DogToys (that stores products in its database) and a website called DogRock (which stores articles about dog rock music).  As new concepts are introduced throughout the section, it is explained how the concept would be implemented on each site.

Furthermore, the student is instructed to build a third sample throughout the section; a website that stores jokes in its database.  So for each concept that is taught, the student not only sees it implemented in two different samples, but then is charged with implementing it themselves in their own, slightly different sample.  When done this way, CoreDogs does not teach the student how to replicate an action; it actually causes them to be able to apply what is learned in a real world situation.  If one is able to create a basic database application revolving around jokes, why wouldn’t they be able to create one revolving around books?

On top of these praises, I have to add that creating the database was fun.  I actually enjoyed myself as I worked through each sub-lesson, crafting my application to make it better, bit by bit.  The way that the entire Basic database applications section is broken up is masterful; at no point did I feel bogged down or confused.  This is what the Form lessons should ideally be like as well.

There are a few ways that this section of the ServerCore book could be even better.  First of all, when MySQL injection attacks are discussed, it may be helpful to provide a little further explanation as to what the “escape_string” method actually does to the data.  I also found myself wondering if phpMyAdmin is only for use in PHP applications, or can be used otherwise as well.

Finally, the exercises page could use some help.  It seems that there are three large projects offered here, but each one is broken into three smaller exercises.  I understand that this helps break down the work, but it can also be disorienting to fish through nine different exercise wondering “Which one should I do?”.  Simply dividing up each group of exercises would probably do the trick.

All in all, this was an excellent section of CoreDogs.  The “learning” itself was at the seemingly perfect steepness so that this student was never frustrated and actually enjoyed creating the application.  Seriously, all textbook should try teaching their concepts in this fashion; it could change the way that we learn.

In each CoreDogs Experience article, my goal is twofold: (1) to look in-depth at a single feature of the site or its content (this will likely be analysis or commentary of a CoreDogs feature that is present in multiple places as opposed to a single section) and (2) to take a look at what went on in a given section of the course.

CoreDogs Feature: Humor

In addition to the minimalist writing style and Socratic dialogue methods, a fair share of humor is interspersed throughout the content.  Humor is a very personal thing, (preferences can greatly vary between individuals) and my first concern would be that the creator’s humor style would be an annoying hindrance throughout the course.  Let’s look at an example of CoreDogs’ humor:

 [image here]

Most of the humor revolves around the idea that the “speaker” of the content may or may not be a dog.  It’s funny, yet neutral.  It never pokes fun at any potentially controversial topics/debates/issues.  Another common example of this is that whenever the student sees the results of a “productivity win”, they are treated to a resounding W00f!

I’ll let readers decide for themselves, but I don’t mind the humor at all.  It always seems to be brief, entertaining, and not detracting from the educational value of the content.  Though, it’s not hard for me to imagine that those who are less inclined to humor may have trouble picking up on the whole dog shtick and in a grievous error reduce all hints of humor to an inadequate word like “stupid”.  You win some and you lose some I guess, but in my opinion the humor works.

Course Content So Far

The Fundamental forms section focused on the basics of creating forms for web pages.  It began with the HTML basics, and then moved onto some pieces of form creation that involve PHP.  In usual CoreDogs style, all the usual factors that make the learning beneficial (the humor, writing style, and dogs) are all still being used.

At the beginning of this section though, the instruction seemed a bit hazy.  Many new ideas were introduced successively, some that seemingly contradicted things I have learned previously.  Specifically, it was hard to grasp the idea of “sending form data to a page”.  Is this like sending data to a PHP script or program that resides on the server?  Consistent use and explanation of these terms would take some burden off the student.

Furthermore, the concept of HTTP GET requests and included headers are also introduced in this section but I found myself wondering “Why?”.  After completing the majority of the sections regarding forms I was able to understand that pages/programs need to receive this data in so that they can process or check it in some way.

Another area that could use clarification is the distinction between a method and a function in PHP programming.  In the Doing Computations lesson when I would see the term “shipping method” mentioned, I kept wondering where the corresponded method was located in the code.  I later realized that this one was my own brain’s fault – the course content was simply referring to the method with which a purchased product was to be shipped, not an actual method used in programming.  Furthermore, this distinction is briefly mentioned in the Checking form data section.

There were also some very helpful parts in this section, particularly on the Magic quotes and strings page.  I had always wondered why on some web pages, data output would seem corrupted, with all of these weird backslashes in the middle of the words.  Right after I read the content that explained this occurrence I wondered “WHY?!?!” and sure enough, the dogs were right there, asking and answering the same question.

The Saving form data section includes lessons on sending form data by email, or saving the data to a file.  These were both quite helpful.  After learning PHP, I can imagine one of the first things a student might want to do is to create a contact form on their website that allows visitors to ask a question or send a comment.  This lesson shows how to do that.

Also, in the sending form data by email lesson, the concept of “arguments” within a PHP function is mentioned, but not really introduced.  For someone who is new to PHP and programming as whole (which is likely the target audience for the content) it would be helpful to explain what an argument is and what it does within a function.  A graphic of a function with arrows pointing the arguments might be nice[1].

The saving form data to a file lesson was equally as helpful.  I particularly like figure 9, a table that shows the step by step interaction between the browser, apache web server, and PHP interpreter.  Seeing this really helped to solidify what was actually going.  A few more of these in other areas may be helpful (There is also one in the Complete validation lesson).  Also, the variety of exercises in this section is a good thing.  I especially like the fact that the “Transaction log” exercise was directly applicable to use in a small business.  This is something that has the potential to be immediately useful to students.

The Checking form data section ended up being very complex.  It revolved mainly around validating user input, but eventually this included using JavaScript on the browser side, PHP on the server side, and then getting them to work with each other and appear seamless to the user.  Despite this complexity it was possible to understand the lesson; one just needs a firm foundation of understanding before putting all the pieces together.  The section culminates in a mega-example in the Complete validation lesson.  HTML, CSS, JavaScript, and PHP are all in play here.

One question that I kept asking myself was “Why do we need server side validation if the data is being checked by JavaScript in the client side?”.  There were three reasons listed in Basic server-side validation lesson that aimed to answer this!  Once again the content seems to anticipate the questions that the student may ask.

PHP Function Libraries are mentioned in both the PHP Functions and PHP Validation Function lessons.  I found myself wondering why these files use the “.inc” extension.  This may be a good question for the dogs to explain.

On the whole, this section required some very hefty thinking.  In fact, the complexity of the final example was almost a little too much.  This may be because the example used a lot of JavaScript which is taught in the ClientCore book.  It’s been a while since I had personally been through that book, so I’m sure that contributed to the difficulty.  I found that I was removing myself from the flow of the lesson more often than usual in order look something up or look back to another lesson for clarification.  Moving in and out of the lesson became disorienting after a while, especially because of the longer lesson length.  This could be combated in a few ways: (1) break down the information into smaller bits.  It makes sense for all the content in the Complete Validation page to remain together but maybe the use of H3 tags could be employed even more. (H3 tags are put to good use in the Code Changes section)  Breaking the content up graphically like this may help to keep students brains from launching into the stratosphere. (2) since a lot of the complexity comes from the fact that we are dealing with both JavaScript and PHP it would be helpful if each time focus is shifted to a bit of code, it would be announced if it was PHP or JavaScript.  This is done sometimes, but for example below figure 8 in the Complete validation lesson, instead of saying:

If the submit() function returns true, the browser goes ahead and…

You could say:

If the JavaScript submit() function returns true, the browser goes ahead and…

Clarifying the language being used as much as possible should help to keep students’ heads on straight.

Finally, I love the “name dropping” of useful webber resources whenever applicable.  Specifically, mentioning the FAMFAMFAM Silk Icon set.  Sometimes searching for the best (free) resources can consume just as much time as the actual coding.  Sharing these resources is highly beneficial.

All in all, these sections were another great chunk of instruction.  For the first time things started feeling really tough (In the Complete validation lesson) but given the complexity of what is being taught, this is probably excusable.

In each CoreDogs Experience article, my goal is twofold: (1) to look in-depth at a single feature of the site or its content (this will likely be analysis or commentary a CoreDogs feature that is present in multiple places as opposed to a single section) and (2) to take a look at what went on in a given section of the course.

CoreDogs Feature: The Dogs

Another recurring theme within CoreDogs is the presence of some dog characters.  Some of the commonly appearing ones are named “CC”, “Renata”, and “Kieran”.  They are employed as characters who contribute a sort of Socratic debate method that aim to answer common questions.  For example, after a given amount of explanatory/instructional content either CC or Renata will make a comment like “Hey wait a minute, this seems awfully complex.  Is it worth the effort?”, and then the Kieran character will affirm their question by saying something like “Good point.  Let’s talk about that a bit”.  After this hypothetical dialogue, the course then gives a detailed answer to the dog’s questions.  The screen shot to right is placed near the end of Web site templates section.  The conversation that follows is very helpful in making an argument for the added productivity that the seemingly complex PHP dynamic web template creates.  It serves as a great summation of the usefulness that should be grasped from this section.

This method aims to answer questions that students would commonly ask at a given point in the lesson.  I love this.  (I was immediately reminded of the way the Apostle Paul lists hypothetical questions and then answers them for readers of his letter to the Romans)  As a student, thinking that I could read detailed explanations to my questions would greatly decrease any worry that I might have about taking an online course.  In my opinion, it would be great to see this used in all of the text books that I’m required to use at school.

Course Content So Far

The Web site Templates section focuses on the PHP require command as well as variables to create a dynamic template for a website.  The advantages of this sort of template come from being able to edit the header or footer of a website in one spot, and have the changes be immediate on every page of the site.  You could almost call this sort of template a content management system.

This section felt quite a bit longer and more exercise laden than the previous sections, but this is understandable because it is introducing the actual use of PHP for the first time in the ServerCore book.  To get the student familiar with PHP, a combination of near-transfer and far-transfer exercises are used.  While I was going through these exercises, one question kept popping up in my mind:

Earlier in the ServerCore book, I was instructed to set up a development server on my PC using XAMMP.  This was very easy to set up and has worked seamlessly so far.  BUT, after completing each exercise, the user is instructed to submit the URL of the completed exercise.  This is so the instructor can check my work and make comments on it if necessary.  The problem is that if I submit the “localhost” URL from XAMMP, the instructor won’t be able to access my work.  This shouldn’t surprise anyone, but I think it should be clarified that to submit an exercise, it needs to be first uploaded to an actual web server.[1]  In fact, differentiating between the student’s Development and Production server could be useful in that it will familiarize students with this real-world concept that may be used in the workplace.  A comment at the end of an exercise like “Upload the completed exercise to your production server and submit the URL” should be enough once this concept is explained.

Another minor snafu related to the use of XAMMP was that in the Show IP Addresses exercise, IP addresses were displayed as “::1”.  This was mentioned by another student in the discussion section of the exercise (which proved helpful in this case).  If the use of XAMMP is encouraged throughout ServerCore, it may help to mention this in the main body of the content as well.

One more XAMMP related remark was that in the Web server time exercise, the time was displayed was not the same time as my PC’s clock.  This doesn’t bother me much, but I can imagine some students getting frustrated by this (thinking they did something wrong).

The quality of the instructional content is still top-notch, as mentioned in my previous article.  Though, something to be careful about is the use of the HTML <code> tag when referring to file names that are in examples or diagrams.  In the image below (taken from the Complete template system page) I thought there was a CSS file named “library.dogsite.css” being referred to.  This is a tiny quibble but may be worth keeping an eye on.

All in all, this section was rewarding especially because I’m already able to use PHP to create a sort of dynamic web site template.  Many of the images and diagrams work very well and are great at visualizing what is being explained.  I particularly liked this color-coded one.  See the table below for a summary of my thoughts on this section.

In each CoreDogs Experience article, my goal is twofold: (1) to look in-depth at a single feature of the site or its content (this will likely be analysis or commentary a CoreDogs feature that is present in multiple places as opposed to a single section) and (2) to take a look at what went on in a given section of the course.

CoreDogs Feature: Writing Style

The first thing that jumped out at me was the style and methods of writing that are employed on CoreDogs.  The writing style is clean, factual, and minimal.  Never wordy, every sentence is very clear in the point that it wants to make.  Take for example the two opening paragraphs of the ServerCore book:

Paragraphs often begin with a simple statement like:

ServerCore helps you write programs that run on Web servers.

There is a constant sense of purpose present in the content.  It is always aware of what is coming next and is always getting the student ready for it.  The writing is always very quick to explain what will be discussed in the upcoming book/section/lesson.  This is very helpful because the student is never lost in the material.  He/she is constantly reminded of what has been taught, what is being taught, and what will be taught.  Without having to worry about how a particular section fits in with the big picture, the student can focus on the material at hand.

I can’t quite put my finger on it, but the way that CoreDogs’ content is written reminds me of the way that Google’s documentation is sometimes written.  They are both always easy to understand and extremely concise in the way that they communicate.  I’m a big fan of this.

Course Content So Far

The first section in the ServerCore book is called “Why learn PHP with CoreDogs?”  It begins by explaining how PHP is a core web technology and gives extended examples of why learning PHP can be beneficial to someone.  After the case is made, it is further explained how CoreDogs aims to teach PHP in the ServerCore book and how CoreDogs’ core beliefs differentiate it from other textbooks or online courses.

After establishing the case for learning PHP, the next section “The PHP Ecosystem” gives a quick overview of how PHP pages operate on the web.  I was impressed with how brief and comparatively non-technical this overview was.  In no way does this content make the reader a master at understanding PHP architecture (and that is by no means the point here) but it lays a great foundation for understanding what the heck the purpose of PHP code in the big picture.  I can imagine that in a normal PHP textbook the first chapter might explain how to write something like an “if statement”, but as CoreDogs employs its learning science best practices, we get to see the big picture first.

During the “Tools for writing PHP programs lesson” I was able to install an Apache development server on my Windows 7 PC in minutes.  It felt great to get something like that installed and working right away.  I did notice that there were no Mac-specific instructions for the install or links to a Mac version of the development server package.  From my limited experience, it seems like the majority of student tend to purchase MacBooks before going off to school, so it may be advantageous to at least provide a link to XAMPP for Mac.  I did appreciate the recommendations for both paid and free options for code editors on Mac and Windows.

These first two sections although succinct, served as a great introduction to PHP as a core web technology and actually got me excited to continue through the course.  In conclusion, a summary of what I liked and what I thought could use some re-tooling.

A gorgeous album cover that you can stare at existentially while you listen to the music.

Preface/Disclaimer: I am not intensely informed on the genre that this album falls into (Indie Folk is my best estimation).  Jazz, Funk, Rock, and Blues are the primary genres in which I carry the most listening preference and performing experience (I’m not trying to boast here because my actual performing experience is nothing everything to sneeze at.)  But with that being said, I do enjoy meaningful music made by talented people in any genre.  It seems to me that Fleet Foxes’ Helplessness Blues fall perfectly in that category.  So this is less a review about the impact and change that Helplessness Blues brings to the Indie Folk movement and more a review that focuses on what this album means to me — what I like about it and what I don’t like about it.

Helplessness Blues is Fleet Foxes’ second full length album. (The first was self-titled Fleet Foxes) Legend has it that the band had a hard time arriving at the final cut of this album.  Initial recordings of most of these tracks were scrapped as Robin Pecknold (lead singer/songwriter) and the band listened to the demos, sighed mournfully, then exclaimed “DO OVER!”.  In my opinion the band can finally enjoy a sigh of relief because in my opinion, Helplessness Blues turned out to be a meaningful and high-quality record.  This album is filled with all-around beautiful music — tight and pleasing harmonies,  a smorgasbord of instruments, healthy reverb (more on this below) and powerful lyrics that shed an interesting light on my generation of Americans.

Instrumentally: Helplessness Blues is a beautiful depiction of the twentysomething, vintage-is-beyond-cool, dare I say slightly hipster aesthetic.  Taking influences from Americana Folk on their self titled debut, and now (some reviewers say) leaning toward a more British folk vibe, the album is filled with the sounds of the 60s and 70s.  I myself can hear the Beach Boys and Crosby, Stills, and Nash, but I’m sure more studied Folk fans would be able to pick up much more.  One friend of mine called the overall vibe of the album “minimalist” and I don’t believe that would be stretching it.  While harmonies seem well practiced and splendidly executed, I wouldn’t say these guys are virtuosos.  The way they play their instruments is beautiful and it gets the job done.  They are very good at molding a mood within a song by controlling when the harmonies sound and when the lead singer is alone.  In fact, the times when Robin Pecknold is the only member singing lyrics serve as a sort of spotlight, meant to pull your attention to what he is saying while minding how he is saying it.

Songs are built episodically as opposed to the chorus-verse format.  The album sounds skillfully recorded, with that healthy reverb sound applied without drowning the music itself (this is something that many of albums like these suffer from these days) and the arrangements are dynamic, inviting, and swirling without being intrusive to what the singer is saying.

Lyrically: The words and the proclamations behind them are what makes Helplessness Blues great music as opposed to good music.  Robin Pecknold writes from a very introspective point of few, such that he tends to make a statement about himself and then ask questions like “What does that say about me?”.  The album opens with the following lines (Montezuma, Track 01):

So now I am older,
Than my mother and father,
When they had their daughter,
Now what does that say about me?

Then he ponders on a failed relationship (Sim Sala Bim, Track 03):

What makes me love you despite the reservations?
What do I see in your eyes
Besides my reflection hanging high?

In perhaps the most powerful track on the album he makes proclamations about what he wishes his life would be like (Helplessness Blues, Track 05):

I was raised up believing I was somehow unique,
Like a snowflake distinct among snowflakes, unique in each way you can see.
And now after some thinking, I’d say I’d rather be
A functioning cog in some great machinery serving something beyond me.

….[Later in the song]….

If I had an orchard I’d work till I’m raw
If I had an orchard I’d work till I’m sore,
And you would wait tables and soon run the store.

Wow.  This is something I can get behind, this is something that resonates with me.  And what shocks me is how fundamentally different this pining is compared to the usual postmodern, meander-through-life philosophy.  Postmodern thought likes to think about what it means to exist, what the purpose of life is.  This is all great stuff to do but the problem is that the postmodern narrative ends ambiguously, eventually leaving an entire generation of Americans still searching for the meaning of life in their twenties instead of producing, creating, and living out that life.  Living at home with Mom and Dad, partying all the time, living paycheck to paycheck, and never coming close to producing or being useful.  That is how I’ve seen postmodernism influence young people’s lives (including mine).  We grow up in an environment that gives us quite nearly everything we could want, yet twenty years later we have nothing to show for it.

Yes, I’m reading into this a LOT.  But I think this is significant.  Here is a guy who’s band hit it big, selling critically acclaimed music all over the country — and what he yearns for is to work so hard that his body can’t physically take it anymore?  Maybe this marks a turning point, or foreshadows post-postmodernism.  If so, I welcome it.  This is the power of music, and Fleet Foxes’ lyrics in particular.

The Big Picture: If you couldn’t tell already, I really like Helplessness Blues.  The music beautifully carries that “vintage’ aesthetic that has become so popular, but thankfully goes deeper.  Robin Pecknold’s lyrics are incredibly introspective, yet are so well crafted that they ultimately cause the listener to shed light on his/her own life experiences.  Should you buy Helplessness Blues?  At very least check out the 1 min 30 sec samples on iTunes.  But, if any topic in this review has piqued your interest, GO BUY THIS ALBUM.