How to deal with "western music" rasikas

vinsim · Post by **vinsim** » 31 May 2011, 23:11

I recently found myself unwittingly drawn into an argument with a friend, who posted a facebook comment on the dearth of quality music in today's music bands (read rock/pop) and how poorly they fare in comparison with the "gods of music" like Pink Floyd, Aerosmith, Metallica, etc.

I asked him 'why don't you grow up and look at the treasure chest of our own Indian music (read classical), instead of going ga-ga over some forgotten western rock bands?'; to which he replied, 'Music is music, east or west, it has no boundaries. You and your conservatism can go to hell!" - or words to that effect.

Does anybody else have had similar experiences, wherein the very slightest effort to promote Indian classical music to those rock & roll aficionados gets met with accusations of you being conservative, anti-progressive, blah-blah?

I do enjoy western music from time to time (probably a relic from my college days), but find myself highly irritated when I encounter such individuals who swear by their classic rock bands, while being totally ignorant of music within their own culture.

How do you guys deal with it?

vasanthakokilam · Post by **vasanthakokilam** » 31 May 2011, 23:38

Well, you have to admit you were a bit provocative, especially with the 'grow up'!

May be you can counter with a parody on the dearth of quality music in today's carnatic musicians and how poorly they fare compared to the 'gods of yesteryears'..

Seriously, ambassadorial and proselytizing music is not easy. Success rate is very low, you have to take a lot of rejections and not take it personally and more importantly one has to put away the idea that your 'target'' and 'target's taste in music' is somehow inferior. There is no objective measure for these things, people listen to music for a wide variety of reasons: Musical ( wow, this is just musically neat, look at the interesting arrangement, new Pidi etc. ), psychological ( sowkyam, peppy, gets one through the day, divine etc. ) and sociological reasons ( gives status/stature, rebellion, it is cool, peer-group effect etc. ).

Given all this, your mental model of why your target is listening to his music is most probably wrong.

Nick H · Post by **Nick H** » 01 Jun 2011, 02:05

I asked him 'why don't you grow up ...

I think I can see your mistake.

VK RAMAN · Post by **VK RAMAN** » 01 Jun 2011, 03:36

'grow up' - wow and sharp pen!

srikant1987 · Post by **srikant1987** » 01 Jun 2011, 09:25

What's there to "deal with" them?

But even I feel Metallica produces nice music. I like some selected songs of theirs. Other bands (yes, newer ones, especially) just pale in comparison ... they seem to have no substance (no bhAvam even

) It's dry like autumn leaves, which we can crush to get not juice but flakes and powder.

And Indian music isn't just CM and HM. Although the music in our movies hardly remains Indian any more, there are so many beautiful kinds of folk music in India. Not that I have experienced many of them.

Try to expose them to good Indian Classical music. But, what is "good" Indian Classical music?

And vinism seems to like the famous youngsters of today (there are some hints in the post) -- and not be a yesteryear-CM misser. I don't particularly sympathise.

cacm · Post by **cacm** » 01 Jun 2011, 09:39

ALMOST ALL the current day musicians can take lessons from METALLICA reg. purity, perfection, and perfect placement of notes. VKV

Nick H · Post by **Nick H** » 01 Jun 2011, 15:46

Whilst such harmony is, in itself, foreign to Indian music, they might listen to Crosby, Stills and Nash too, for such accuracy combined with beauty. Loads of bhavam too

vasanthakokilam · Post by **vasanthakokilam** » 01 Jun 2011, 18:15

How about the Grateful Dead? There seems to be 'something' in their music that can appeal to the Indian music rasika. I recently heard that they had a very indirect and faint Indian music connection.

arasi · Post by **arasi** » 01 Jun 2011, 19:04

Yes, add to the list: Nat King Cole, the Beatles, Sinatra and many others. And so many instrumentalists, jazz musicians among them. It was a pleasant experience to hear bits of music of one of our own members. bhAvam of a serene kind--Steve Topping...

mahavishnu · Post by **mahavishnu** » 01 Jun 2011, 19:12

What's there to "deal with" them?

Srikant, well said.

VK: I used to be into the Grateful Dead in a big way about 20 years ago when I first arrived in the US. They jam a lot, their music is quite improvisational and they have tight control over kalapramanam (even though it is mostly common time 4/4 beats). Their live concerts are unrehearsed and their musical experience is essentially live, one of the few rock bands whose live concerts generate more interest than their studio recordings. In this respect, one could argue that a CM rasika could enjoy their music. But their lead singer Jerry Garcia has no shruti suddham, probably the result of a lifetime of psychedelic drugs. Mickey Hart, their drummer, ran the planet drum ensemble that has featured Zakir Hussain, Vikku and other carnatic mridangists from time to time. I am told that he plays both the mridangam and tabla.

As Sri VKV mentions, you can't find fault with metallica even if you don't like their brand of music. I don't, but I still find their energy appealing.

I agree with Nick H about CSN. Southern Cross, Helplessly hoping etc are absolute classics and lessons in multi-part harmony singing. But listening to David Crosby today ... oh well, Iet's just say it is best to keep the good memories and play the tape.

I find the whole idea of how people lamenting about how today's music is diluted/not the same thing/has poorer standards to be universal. There was a prolific web writer (before there were blogs) called Ramesh Mahadevan, who has captured this in a rather nice short story (http://www.mahadevanramesh.com/Articles/rosebud.html)

mahavishnu · Post by **mahavishnu** » 01 Jun 2011, 19:23

Arasi: Just saw your post. I fully agree.

When I was a grad student living in New Haven, I was almost exclusively listening to the Beatles and some jazz. My roommate who was an Israeli guitarist from Berklee college re-introduced me to Carnatic music, with an old record of Ramnad Krishnan recorded in 1967. We then transitioned to listening to Shakti, L Shankar and the like. Then, I started identifying swarams for him from complex Indian melodies after that (which he couldn't do even with perfect absolute pitch). After this I got so hooked on Carnatic music, that I rediscovered all the tunes of my childhood with a keener ear.

Now, I listen to little else but CM. Although when the odd thread like the one on Steve Topping comes up, I feel sad that I have not kept up with genres of music that I used to follow closely.

vinsim · Post by **vinsim** » 01 Jun 2011, 23:16

vasanthakokilam, thanks..your reply was most helpful.

srikant1987, for the record I like the past masters as well as today's youngsters.

Agreed that Metallica produces some scintillating music. That is not my point. The question was how to deal with someone so prejudiced that they can't even acknowledge there is quality music beyond Metallica/Doors/Pink Floyd and other classic rock bands. I admitted in my first post that I "unwittingly" entered into an argument with such a person - I guess there is no easy way to proselytize CM or HM to others.

Nick H · Post by **Nick H** » 02 Jun 2011, 00:25

mahavishnu wrote:I agree with Nick H about CSN. Southern Cross, Helplessly hoping etc are absolute classics and lessons in multi-part harmony singing. But listening to David Crosby today ... oh well, Iet's just say it is best to keep the good memories and play the tape.

Helplessly Hoping is the best example I know of how to break every rule and still produce magic. Its number puns (..one person... two together... three... for each other) are almost embarrassing, and its alteration (the title is just a taster) way way over the top. If you just read the words on paper, you'd probably think it was corny beyond belief! yet... I still love it.

Actually, many of their lyrics have meaning to me now just as they did then. This is not meant as a dig at vinsim, but I can sincerely say that CSN helped me to grow up --- and they are still doing so!

A couple of weeks ago, courtesy of YouTube, I went a bit further back in time, looking for music that I grew up with while my growing was still being measured in single digits, listening to music that owed more to the preceding decade. I escaped the 'fifties: I doubt that Elvis Presley meant anything to me until much later. How I managed it, I have no idea! Catch a Falling Star was one of my early favourite songs, but, more to topic, when I listen to these two songs by Dinah Shore (Yes, My Darling Daughter and Buttons and Bows) and this (the lyrics are irritating (especially to vegetarians

) but what a voice) by Eve Boswell, I can intuit why I like particular carnatic singers of today!

Another example of a truly great voice from that era is Doris Day. Dream a Little Dream of Me is actually better know to me as sung by the Mamas and the Pappas. I seem to recall an early internet IM primer mentioning that those who liked more ornamented styles of singing, such as the Ms and the Ps, would be more likely to like Indian music.

Vinsim, I don't know. My musical journey very much included The Doors and Pink Floyd too, although not, so far, Metallica. I know that, in general, I have always preferred those who sang into the mic rather than screamed into it, and those who played the guitar rather than those who hit the stage with it (although I came to admire Hendrix eventually). If your friend (is he still your friend?

) prefers the "heavier" stuff then he may not be ready for CM yet a while. I mentioned that I "missed" the fifties, even though I lived through them: when I came to catch up a little, I didn't find it such a jump from my then-preferred Western classical music to The Pink Floyd and the "progressive," rather than pop, rock of the age. I don't think it is such a leap from the improvised guitar tickling of some of that age to improvisation of the Indian sort. Probably instrumental is more easily approached, and possibly Hindustani is more accessible, at first.

Anyway, I enjoyed my reflection, so thank you for that. There is indeed no way to proselytize: all you can do is to make available. One person's prejudices are another's taste. I'm often amazed at how much broader are the musical horizons of some of senior rasikas than are mine!

arasi · Post by **arasi** » 02 Jun 2011, 01:34

Nick,
Catch a falling star was MY favorite one too! Como, Dinah Shore and Doris Day, all with a deflection in their voices, all different, of course. Nat King Cole singing Love is a many splendered thing. Otherwise, the scene was boring. The musicals like South PAcific and later The West Side Story were super. Tamizh and Hindi songs were captivating for us around that time.Then the Beatles arrived in the western pop scene, chasing away the doldrums of the rest of the fifties, early sixties with their unbelievable music!

Vinsim, You win some, you lose some

We sureley are not winning (with you) with our 'can even nostalgia be this old!' choices

Mind you, compared to me, Nick is a youngster!

Nick H · Post by **Nick H** » 02 Jun 2011, 02:49

Yes, I was fond of those musicals too, although even fonder of the Fred Astaire stuff, for both the singing and dance. It drove my parents mad when a Fred Astair film was on: I wouldn't watch anything else, they said, "we were fed up with this long before you were born." Actually, we had similar arguments over furniture and decor...

The music to West Side Story is really wonderful, but I just can't take the R & J story: just too tragic.

arasi · Post by **arasi** » 02 Jun 2011, 04:55

Nick,
To this day, Bernstein's score for the movie sounds terrific to my ears. What an inspired piece of work! I agree about the R &J bit, though

smala · Post by **smala** » 02 Jun 2011, 05:24

"....There was a prolific web writer (before there were blogs) called Ramesh Mahadevan, who has captured this in a rather nice short story (http://www.mahadevanramesh.com/Articles/rosebud.html)..."

RM created the famous character Ajay Palvayanteeswaran in his days of active soc.culture.indian newsgroup days...there is a lot of sardonic humor in his articles. He even wrote a Primer for CM. The link below leads to his humorous articles, his musings on CM, life in Chennai after he moved back some years ago...
http://www.mahadevanramesh.com/

arasi · Post by **arasi** » 02 Jun 2011, 07:07

smala,
Thank you!
A rare find. I simply can't get over it. What a sense of humor! Some of his writing are not available now. A pity...
Wonder where he is now. Does he have a blog under some other name?

VK and others,
Do you have any idea?

Sreeni Rajarao · Post by **Sreeni Rajarao** » 02 Jun 2011, 07:21

Sorry, I don't have any information about Ramesh Mahadevan.

However, I wanted to write that during my Grad school days (1990-91), Ramesh Mahadevan and C P Ravi Kumar were two writers who had a huge following in the Indian student community in the US. It was common for PIGS (poor indian graduate students) to spend significant hours of their "computer lab time" browisng the newsgroups that were popular in those days!

mahavishnu · Post by **mahavishnu** » 02 Jun 2011, 09:02

Sreeni: I was a grad student in the same era as well. I spent many hours reading through usenet newsgroups and some of Ramesh Mahadevan's stories were just classic. The internet was so limited back then and we were really looking forward to his humorous posts. And each time a new one came out, we would all be so thrilled.

Arasi: He has since moved to India and now blogs at http://mahadevan-ramesh.blogspot.com/

I suppose one could comment on the decline in internet haute culture the same way we lament about the way music (classic rock or classic carnatic) has decline over the years

In the end, we are all just holding on to our memories.

srikant1987 · Post by **srikant1987** » 02 Jun 2011, 09:22

I didn't know "browsing" was already there in the US in 1990-91!

mahavishnu · Post by **mahavishnu** » 02 Jun 2011, 09:32

Except, no one called it browsing or surfing till '94 or so...
The Universities were the first to get the bitnet, a precursor to the modern Internet. And grad students were the first to jump on it, since they have sooooo much free time

vasanthakokilam · Post by **vasanthakokilam** » 02 Jun 2011, 09:40

Browsing starting in 1993-94 onwards. Before that, it was USENT. It was mainly text which you read with a news reading program like 'rn' in Unix.

The memory is a bit vague but I think I was around when the indian classical music group was born out of the general soc.culture.indian newsgroup. I was plugged into USENET in 1983. Mahavishnu, you are right about the culture then.. Also a certain measure of exclusivity made it special.. it was mainly available to universities and some corporations.

MV · Post by MV » 02 Jun 2011, 10:04

What a pleasant thread!! My top one for bhavam is 'Cry me a River' by Diana Krull. I enjoy Michael Buble while the father fights the lone battle against the sons that he can't hold a candle to Sinatra. I enjoy it even more-for once its not my battle. About 'Western Rasikas' growing up, I don't even go there..

smala · Post by **smala** » 02 Jun 2011, 10:36

...Wonder where he is now...

I did say he is in Chennai... in post 17.

the link at the end of my post 17 ?- all his articles are there - buttons on the left. Home page that comes up gives his home and cell number plus email - he is very reachable. **Repeating** the link - http://www.mahadevanramesh.com/

RM and I have long discussion connections during my grad school days.

gardabha_gana · Post by **gardabha_gana** » 02 Jun 2011, 10:41

Mahadevan Ramesh... brings back memories... I used to look forward to his postings on soc.culture.indian in the early 90s. His writings are so humorous and for IITians it is a walk back down the memory lane into hostel life. His carnatic primer was very educative for me. Especially Ajay's homecoming - was typical of desi trips back pre-liberalization days when returning from the us creating so much excitement and expectations from the extended family

smala · Post by **smala** » 02 Jun 2011, 10:48

...The memory is a bit vague but I think I was around when the indian classical music group was born out of the general soc.culture.indian newsgroup....

No. There were rec. groups, soc. groups and alt. groups in Usenet.
Rec.music.indian.classical was an umbrella group. Rajan Parrikar was very active there - Rajan is also a good friend of Ramesh Mahadevan as you will see from the link I have repeated. Check the "about" section where Rajan gives a succinct intro on RM.

srikant1987 · Post by **srikant1987** » 02 Jun 2011, 10:55

Wow! We should probably have a "Western music" section along the lines of the Hindustani Sangeet section.

vasanthakokilam · Post by **vasanthakokilam** » 02 Jun 2011, 10:55

Right. What I meant is: In those days to start a newsgroup you need to first propose it, debate it, put it out for a vote etc. I thought that process for rec.music.indian happened in soc.culture.indian. I will have to check out the history. I know RP from those times, some of those memories are better forgotten

But definitely not the humorous postings from RM..

smala · Post by **smala** » 02 Jun 2011, 10:58

Hey there were several biggies in s.c.i. as it was known - it was a catch all group with subsets for practically every state... Some names are Satya Prabhakar who is the brain and founder of Sulekha.com a very popular portal in India. There was Subbharao Khambampati post-doc from stanford, then was a very very well read Arun Gupta, Dorai Sitaram who wrote a serial spoof, Susan Chacko, Uma Subramaniam...I contributed some noise plus a cookbook Cook and Sigh a take on the famous Samaithu Paar...

vasanthakokilam · Post by **vasanthakokilam** » 02 Jun 2011, 11:03

Subbharao does ring a bell..

gardabha_gana · Post by **gardabha_gana** » 02 Jun 2011, 11:29

yeah.... the newsgroup is rec.music.indian.classical there was proposal, voting etc. I used to post on it occasionally. Re: s.c.i. I saw some excellent proposals for the ayodhya dispute alternatives using ascii art that would have made any indian proud. We used to get all news from s.c.i until misc.news.southasia (a moderated group) started. Of course, there were constant wars india vs pakistan, iit vs non-iit etc always going on - and I unwittingly started a flame war during my early days. Man that sounds like stone age now... (pre mosaic/netscape days). Also followed elections and cricket scores on irc

sruthi · Post by **sruthi** » 02 Jun 2011, 12:46

Man that sounds like stone age now... (pre mosaic/netscape days).

Who knows, in 10 years' time, this forum could also be part of our collective memories. People may refer to this as the middle ages...!

Btw, you can read some of the old posts from the early 90s - google comes as a great help here!
E.g. http://groups.google.com/group/soc.cult ... 02890f836f

Nick H · Post by **Nick H** » 02 Jun 2011, 15:07

rec.music.indian.classical... I was there! Probably not as early as some of you people, especially those who were students/academics, and maybe not as much, as my "browsing" (what was it called, pre-www?) was part of work. As I was the only one who knew what I actually did, this was not hard, and I was easily able to justify the modem phone bills by the sheer quantity of technical help I obtained as I was self-learning my new career.

By the way, that career began like this:

boss, "As you know, we are computerising our invoicing: would you like to take on and manage this project?"

me, "Why me? I don't know anything about computers?"

boss, "Neither do any of us, so why not you?"

So, a new machine was delivered. The box of manuals was as big as the machine. I arranged them on the shelf, opened the first one, and began to read: "What is the Unix Operating System?" The rest, as they say, is history, but I never guessed, at the time, what part computers would play in my musical and social life, as well as becoming my profession.

Nick H · Post by **Nick H** » 02 Jun 2011, 15:15

smala wrote:....There was a prolific web writer (before there were blogs) called Ramesh Mahadevan, who has captured this in a rather nice short story (http://www.mahadevanramesh.com/Articles/rosebud.html)

Oh! A Gentle Introduction to Karnatic Music --- yes, I remember that too. Unfortunately the links on his site to this series of articles are broken.

srikant1987 · Post by **srikant1987** » 02 Jun 2011, 15:17

The box of manuals was as big as the machine.

Hmm, and the machine itself used to be bigger those days too ...

arasi · Post by **arasi** » 02 Jun 2011, 17:54

Thanks again, smala. I did see the contact numbers but was not sure if they were current, not knowing that you were in touch with him. Thanks for re-repeating the link--Mahavishnu chimed in too.
Funny thing is, I wasn't 'born' when all this was happening--I mean, into the cyberworld. My kindergarten days had to wait until I was ready to go to school in the new millennium!

bilahari · Post by **bilahari** » 02 Jun 2011, 19:33

Arasi, "with our 'can even nostalgia be this old!' choices" - HA HA HA!

smala · Post by **smala** » 02 Jun 2011, 22:13

Nick:

smala wrote:....There was a prolific web writer (before there were blogs) called Ramesh Mahadevan, who has captured this in a rather nice short story (http://www.mahadevanramesh.com/Articles/rosebud.html)

Oh! A Gentle Introduction to Karnatic Music --- yes, I remember that too. Unfortunately the links on his site to this series of articles are broken.

Some confusion...first, I did not say this. second, in post 17 I gave another link and repeated it in post 25 where RM articles may be found...ALL his articles are readable there, no broken links!

Nick H · Post by **Nick H** » 03 Jun 2011, 11:26

The individual articles on this page all result in 404s

smala · Post by **smala** » 03 Jun 2011, 13:34

All four parts to the Ramesh Mahadevan's Primer - Gentle Intro to Carnatic Music :

http://www.shivkumar.org/music/varnams/index.html

Nick H · Post by **Nick H** » 03 Jun 2011, 18:33

Thank you very much for that. It will be most interesting to see them again

veeyens3 · Post by **veeyens3** » 04 Jun 2011, 01:15

At the outset I may as well inform our friends that my credentials do not justify my forays into this thread. My knowledge of western music is a big zero, with, even after more than 20+ residence in U.S.A. I do not know about the various genre of music discussed in the thread,But seeing a reference made to the Usenet in universities and the thread about carnatic music therein, and one Ramesh Mahadevan, I thought that I would venture in. By virtue of my son in law being in the faculty of an University, I had access to their internet and I came across couple of very inntelligent and knowledgeable contributors one Srini Pitchumani and other ,whose name at present I am unable to recollect, with whom on few occasions , I had arguments based on our differing perceptions, but in a very dignified and polished , Luvknowian “pahle Ap”ways, never even for a moment drifting into personalities. But I am very sad to know that frequently we lose our patience and go off the track. May Sri Rama bless you all

vasanthakokilam · Post by **vasanthakokilam** » 04 Jun 2011, 01:18

Srini Pitchumani is a member and very occasionally posts here.. but not of late.

smala · Post by **smala** » 04 Jun 2011, 02:19

VK, Sri Veeyens take a look at of Ramesh M's primer links three posts above - he lists many CM musicians active in the days of Usenet...(I have no clue re. any !) in his acknowledgement...Prof R. Pichumani and a Srinivasan Pichumani are among them.

here's a C&P of the Ack.in part 1 of RM's - Gentle Intro. to CM...

*******
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I owe a tremendous amount of gratitude to my music teachers, Prof. T. R. Subramaniam and Prof. Prabhakara Varma and to friends like Surya Prabha, Srikanth Chary and Prof. R. Pichumani (University of Connecticut) for teaching me the fundamentals. A big thanks to Ilayaraja (no, I dont know him personally) for many wonderful Karnatic music-based film songs, which presented an entirely different angle to Karnatic music. Finally, I owe it all to my friend K. S. Balaji for introducing me to Karnatic music.

I am also fortunate to be friends with several folks who are very knowledgeable about music. I learnt a lot from them and many of them have been active on the music bboards one time or another. (Some are still active). A short list of these people includes Prof. S. Mahadevan and Monica (Vanderbilt University), Prof. Venkatasubramaniam and Vyju (Purdue), Mukund Srinivasan, Chandramouli (A. T and T), Prof. V. Krishnan (University of Texas), Srinivasan Gopalaswamy (Carnegie Mellon), Srinivasan Pichumani and Kannikeswaran. And it is always a pleasure to acknowledge how much I benefited from Rajan Parrikar and his immense knowledge of almost every aspect of Indian music.

......more at http://www.shivkumar.org/music/basics/r ... evan-I.htm

vasanthakokilam · Post by **vasanthakokilam** » 04 Jun 2011, 02:50

Ah.. many of these names are coming back to me now. Definitely one

and possibly a few others.

Thanks smala.

gardabha_gana · Post by **gardabha_gana** » 04 Jun 2011, 22:43

Srikanth Chary currently teaches veena in the bay area and is an accomplished vainika from the Lalgudi School

smala · Post by **smala** » 05 Jun 2011, 01:26

Thought I'd put gold ole Google to use on these names above and here's what's comes up..

Chandramouli :
Sreevidya Chandramouli, Faculty, Dept. of Music, Univ of Oregon
Chandramouli Narayanan- Musician, spouse

http://www.carnaticstudent.org/course/e ... idhya.html

*******
(Prof) Prabhakara Varma :
Mavelikkara Prabhakara Varma 1928 -2008
Principal, RLV College of Music
Trained Sankaran Namboodiri, Dr. K Omanakutty, Netiankara Vasudevan

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mavelikkar ... kara_Varma

*****
Suryaprabha :
Devarakonda Suryaprabha

http://www.thehindu.com/arts/music/article353278.ece

*****
Prof T R Subramaniam :
Faculty, Dept. Of Music, Univ of Delhi.
Disciple of Musiri

http://www.carnaticcorner.com/articles/trs.html
http://www.hindu.com/fr/2010/03/19/stor ... 060300.htm
http://chowdaiahandparvati.blogspot.com ... anyam.html

*****
Prof R. Pichumani :
R. Pichumani (b.1920) from the Tanjore school of Tiruchi College, " a distinguished vainika in his own right.
The Tradition of Carnatic Music on Veena - 1
Shri R. Pichumani - Tanjore Vani
w/ S. Karthick
Makar Records 024

vasanthakokilam · Post by **vasanthakokilam** » 05 Jun 2011, 02:50

Most probably, the Pichumani is a different person.

mahavishnu · Post by **mahavishnu** » 05 Jun 2011, 03:22

VK: Yes, you are correct.

The reference is to Ranga Pichumani who was a young faculty member at the University of Connecticut, when I was a grad student there. He has since moved to Virginia Tech to take an endowed professorship. http://www.me.vt.edu/people/faculty/pitchumani.html
I imagine that he and RM overlapped at CMU.

As Smala notes, the other Pichumani is a noted vainika; I have attended several of his concerts in India. This is him here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dwC0PC1-J7g

In any case, this thread has turned very lounge-ish.