The 50 Most Popular Web Design Blog Posts, Resources & Cheat Sheets of 2007

1960 to 1965 marked the darkest time of Miles Davis’s life. The white police busted his head open. His parents passed away two years apart. His drinking and snoring cocaine increased. His wife left him. Yet on top of all, in his own word, “[T]he music wasn’t happening and that was fucking me up.” But Miles Smiles again when he finds the sound from the young players: pianist Herbie Hancock, tenor Wayne Shorter, bassist Ron Carter, and drummer Tony Williams. When playing with these youngsters, Davis recognizes that, “this was going to be a motherfucker of the group.” This album helped pushed Davis’s career out of the slump period. The group plays together in an endeavor to bring its music to a higher level. For detail readings of each track on Miles Smiles, the last two chapters of Jeremy Yudkin’s Miles Smiles, and the Invention of Post Bop are highly recommended. Yudkin’s meticulous explanations show what goes on in the studio during the recording sessions.

An inspiring blog from a 25-year-old Michelle who is diagnosed with Acute Myeloid Leukemia (AML). Through her web site she writes about her experience as well as helps people who are seeking for bone marrow donors. Here’s a piece of her mind on Leukemia:

Sometimes it feels like Leukemia is some kind of bug that is going around. I swear during my first week in the hospital it felt like everytime I turned on the tv I would see a new story about a young girl relapsing, a recent college grad in a clinical trial, or a father of 2 looking for a donor. I know my ears are hyper sensitive to the L-word, but I just wonder how come so many young people are being diagnosed with this disease – a disease that is mainly suppose to infect the elderly. It’s strange that before getting sick I didn’t know a single person that had a blood disorder and today I know of 5 people who are connected to me in some way or another (friend of a friend, relative of a friend, colleague of a friend, etc.) that is sick. Is this all a coincidence???? Or is there something in the water?

Her web site provides more information on how you can save Michelle and other patients like her by becoming a marrow/stem cell donor or how you could attend a marrow drive.

A great battle between two fantastic illustrators, Cindy Li and Veerle Pieters, at Layer Tennis.

Remember the victory speech Obama gave that lit a fire? Meet his editor Jon Favreau:

The pitch worked. Favreau and Obama rapidly found a relatively direct way to work with each other. “What I do is to sit with him for half an hour,” Favreau explains. “He talks and I type everything he says. I reshape it, I write. He writes, he reshapes it. That’s how we get a finished product.

My new job at GW and new life in D.C. area are so far so good. Now that I am getting into the groove of commuting, I kind of am enjoying it. Actually I have to thank my future sister-in-law for making my commuting painless by loaded up $250 onto my SmarTrip. I left it at home yesterday and it was a pain trying to get around without it. I ended up spent five dollars for a $1.35 bus fare because I didn’t have small bills on me. I am loving my future sister-in-law already (nothing wrong with a little kiss-up).

For the first four days, I kept forget to bring my camera out to lunch so I can take some shots of GW campus. Today I remember the camera, but forgot it is raining. So, I’ll try to take some next week. The budget guy came into my office yesterday to check out my MacBook Pro after seeing the bill came in. He said a PC usually costs about $1,200, but my laptop costs almost three grants. Luckily a student/co-worker next door heard it and tried to explain why Mac is way better than PC and how students are now used to Mac that they don’t even want to use the PCs in their classroom. I didn’t have to say a word.

At home, I have a crazy roommate too. In our first conversation I asked him how many brothers he has. He told me two and the oldest one has a big “con cu.” I was like, “you checked him out?” He replied, “Yeah, he’s my brother.” I was like, “That is strangest shit I ever heard.” He went on, “But don’t tell anyone I said that.” I laughed. I won’t tell anyone, just the whole wide world. So if you’re reading this, don’t tell anyone alright.

“Ching-a-Ling” (Remix)

Ngo Thanh Van’s studio-generated voice still sounds like a machine on her latest record. Studio ’68 is an album that you listen to once with your finger on the skip button and never want to come back again. In every song her vocals get lost in the club production. It sounds as if she accompanies the beat instead of the other way around. Despite not having to sing much, Ngo Thanh Van gives up singing altogether on the ninth track “Tinh Ca.” The album-closer “Vi Anh” is the only slow track on the album and she delivers with such a soulless effort that makes you wonder why she even bothered.

NPR profiles Paul Desmond:

Known as “the swinging introvert,” Paul Desmond once described his sound as “like a dry martini.” With his darkly lilting approach, Desmond rose to fame while soloing in the crook of Dave Brubeck’s piano, teaming with the bandleader to help form one of the most heralded groups in jazz history. Desmond also penned one of the most successful jazz classics of all time, “Take Five.”

Check out the program here.

Ben Ratliff, jazz critic of the New York Times, obviously spent a lot of time listening to jazz in order for him to pick out 100 Most Important Recordings. Let it be known that these selected albums are based only Ratliff’s taste and he does have quite a range: from the well-known figures (Miles Davis, Charlie Parker and Louis Armstrong) to lesser-know cats that I haven’t heard of. What makes the book worth-reading is Ratliff’s clear, approachable, and astute criticism. Here is a beautiful except on John Coltrane:

His playing is intense, lusty, and sometimes smeared with harsh, abrasive noise, but it is not scattershot. He finds areas of exploration and methodically roots around them. Four minutes into “Venus,” he finds a pivot point in the middle register, oscillating back and forth from it toward dark low notes that work their way up the horn. Two minutes and twelve seconds into “Jupiter,” Coltrane starts gushing descending scales, almost making them sound as if they’re overlapping; he starts altering these with shrieks a minute later. Then around the five-minute mark he finally returns to the three-not theme, repeated and bounced around between octaves; when he’s finished, as always, he shakes the bells again—as much a signal to Ali that he’s finished as to the listener.

This is a pleasurable read for both novices and aficionados.