Teun

Traditionally, we see romantic relationships as exclusive things. You're either in a relationship, or you're not. You either have a boyfriend or girlfriend, are engaged or married, or not. Relationships are quite literally a binary affair: the number of romantic relationships you have is either zero or one. Having more than one is usually called 'cheating', and it's bad, very bad. However naturally this attitude may feel, it has some strange side effects. First of all, it creates anxiety around...

It's a daunting task, covering an entire album, and even moreso when the album is a classic. Angelique Kidjo's take on Talking Heads' Remain in Light taps into the afrobeat and other African influences on the original, and makes them the musical focus. And I have to say that this is quite the genius move. The adaptation into this new style sounds effortless, which of course reveals the original album's influences, but is also a testament to Kidjo's incredible musical skill. If I hadn't known abo...

It's pretty bizarre to hear music that sounds so much like the Beatles, and that simultaneously sounds so modern and refreshing. The Beatles part is unsurprising, considering that Sean Lennon, son of John Lennon and Yoko Ono, is one half of the titular duo. But never have I heard a beatles-esque vocabulary used so well in a modern sound. It's a very colourful and fun experience that's not so easy to put into a box. Sure, it's psychedelic in that Beatles worship way, but it's also much more progr...

I am free. But not because of some smart re-conceptualisation of the term 'freedom' away from naturalistic determinism and towards some kind of phenomenological idea of freedom. No, I am free precisely because I am made of the same stuff that the rest of the universe is made from. I am a living part of an equally living universe. Our modern conception of 'laws of nature' as perfectly restrictive mechanical processes has itself emerged from the activity of human beings in this world. How could it...

Yesterday two important things happened in my life. I got my first COVID vaccine, and I had a talk with my to-be supervisor about my bachelor's thesis in philosophy. The shot was nothing to write home about, so I'll spare you the details. Suffice it to say that I was surprised by how not-unpleasant it was (I dislike needles quite strongly), and by how much my arm hurts a day later. The whole ordeal was organized super-efficiently. Or at least, I hope that it was, because the process had the cha...

A week or two ago, my smartphone broke. Unusable. My first reaction was anger and frustration. But as time went on, I got increasingly surprised by the upsides. So consider this my reflection on a brief period without my phone. First off, I find it pretty bizarre that living without a smartphone for little more than a week is even something worth writing about. That this can actually have an impact on one's life. It is a strange, ultra-recent development that we westeners seem unable to live wi...

I'll admit it, some open source programs feel like second-grade imitations of proprietary software. This is not a jab at any open source developers; I think this is mostly due to copyright laws and the sheer money that's behind the world's most popular software.However, there is open source software out there that's simply unbeatable. Here's a few of these programs.youtube-dlWebsite    https://yt-dl.orgIt is    a video downloaderPlatforms    Windows, macOS, LinuxReplaces    Freemake Video Downlo...

What a beautiful, hypnotic, crushing album. This is 4 tracks, 44 minutes of droning, pounding and at times grooving noise rock. Though 'noise rock' doesn't really cover the kaleidoscopic range that this album has. It constantly shifts before your eyes (ears?), it refuses to be pinned down, which is terrible to write about but lovely to listen to. (I refuse to list all the genres that this album pulls from. You listen and figure it out for yourself.) Percussionist and 'sound sculptor' João Pais F...

Jeez, what is there to say about this album other than that it slaps so freaking hard? Listening to this album means being crushed by riff after riff after riff, each of them heavier than the last. The production is perfectly dirty without getting muddy. The vocals are frantic and buried in the mix, as if the singer himself is struggling to overcome the gargantuan wall of guitars and bass and drums. And honestly, if anyone can find a song with better, more crushing, more groovy riffs than Funera...

Ah, the incomparable joy of finding out that an album you loved years ago is still great! The infectious joy and energy of Torche's Harmonicraft hasn't diminished at all over the years. So, I guess this is, like, poppy sludge punk? They sound like the perfect band to see live, which makes me a bit sad that I haven't. This album is also consistently good, it really doesn't let up. Every single song takes its ideas in interesting directions, and most of them are fantastic sing-along songs as well...

There's no shortage of bands that claim a combination of metal and jazz, but so very few pull it off as well as this Portugese band does. Often, metal bands playing jazzy musical segments – or even calmer passages in general – lack the nuance to make them sound good. But Névoa absolutely has the skill to pull off the dynamic changes on this record. And it's not just that they actually play both the metal and jazz parts exceptionally well. It's also how they manage to have their very own sound ...

Not often does a band that's rooted in stoner, doom and post-whatever capture my attention like this. This album is incredibly diverse, and it does everything it attempts very well. Its 'basic' sound is indeed stoner-influenced (I hear Intronaut and Baroness and Mastodon in there) but this album is a ride that goes much further than that. It has blistering passages of rage that are not only heavy, but also quite unlike anything the abovementioned bands have ever put out; it has calm, soothing se...

There's nothing quite so satisfying as musical surprises. And this album is full of them. The backbone of this album is super-nostalgic 80's powerprog, at times so cheesy it borders on homage. But this band brings in a truckload of modern influences, popping up where you least expect them. The heavy passages especially caught me off-guard, not only because they contrast so strongly with the rest of the music, but also because they turn out to fit perfectly, and are executed with great finesse. A...

If you ever feel like you're living in a ridiculous dystopian hellscape, then this album will be immensely satisfying for you. Their sarcastic takes on the state of the world are as funny as they are painful. I could describe their sound as a mix of System of a Down and avant-garde stuff like Dog Fashion Disco and Stolen Babies, but they really have their very own thing going on. They even have moments of truly heavy, un-ironicised death metal. The whole thing is pretty crazy, I guess is my poi...

I'm gonna be honest, I didn't even finish this album yet. I just really want to write about it so I don't forget how I feel. I like to think of music, especially heavy music, in terms of scratching an itch. Some music scratches a particular shallow itch really well, even violently. Some ultra-heavy music can scratch such an itch until it hurts. (I wonder how this all sounds to someone who isn't into heavy music... inviting, no?) NEPTUNIAN MAXIMALISM also is in the business of itch-scratching, ...

This is a vibe album, as most King Gizzard albums are. In the same way that some movies are vibe movies: your enjoyment will largely depend on the extent to which you can vibe with it. And I can vibe with K.G. They dragged out their microtonal instruments again, and they definitely experiment to get some interesting tunes out of them. This might be a sequel to their 2017 album Flying Microtonal Banana, it's definitely not a redo. The band has clearly evolved in the 3½ years (and 6 studio albums...

Damn. The pure joy of two artists that you love coming together and making something beautiful. And it's even more lovely when these two artists don't seem to fit together at all. Underworld is a legendary (but also kind of underground) electronic music group, mostly known for their song Born Slippy. The Necks is an obscure jazz band with a truly unique sound (think ambient, minimalism, improvisation). These two groups came together for a single 47-minute track that weaves these two textures t...

I want to start keeping track of music that I listen to and like, so that I don't forget. I call it "it's good" because it's good music. Yeah. I might come up with a better name later. Zeal & Ardor is notably less black metal on this short EP, but it's still impactful. At the Seams, for example, is an uncharacteristically pop-rocky tune, which makes its final black metal-tinged moments all the more impressive. The whole thing feels like a bit of a hodgepodge, but a very impassioned and rele...

This might be as good a time as any to resume this bizarre unread blog. For I've read some books that, as Kant put it, awoke me from my dogmatic slumber, and I ache for a place to put my thoughts lest I forget them.The two books are, somewhat unfortunately for this blog, both in Dutch. They are Theorie van de Kraal ("Kraal" is an enclosure for livestock) and Hints voor een diagnose. I should've probably read them in reverse order, because the former book deals with the current political climate ...

I'll be honest, I'm way too lazy to write today. But since I just opened my editor and I already started writing, there's no going back now. Technically I already achieved my goal, since I can just click "submit", but let's not be an asshole about this. What I really want, is to have my 100 writings and do some fun statistical stuff with it. Like, I wonder what word I used the most in my writings. I could make one of these word webs. I hope it won't contain any swearwords. And the most common wo...

When I was young(er), memes were, well, pretty obscure. I went to websites like Memebase and Failblog (which, by the way, still exist!), and later Encyclopedia Dramatica and, yes (I'm sorry), 4chan. All these were part of what I'll call "internet culture". Which, back then, didn't mean culture in general. There was actually a culture outside of the internet! And this internet culture, with its countless inside jokes, was, I'll be honest, for dorks. There was a very specific type of person who'd ...

I didn't write yesterday, but only because I was writing something else, something serious. And I just didn't feel like writing anything more. Oh well, why am I even making excuses for myself?Today I found out that it is illegal to cycle together on one bike in Belgium. As in: a second person sitting on the back of the bike, legs to one side. Maybe I'm ignorant, but I find this very weird. In the Netherlands, carring someone on your bike is the peak of romance. The most famous scene from the mos...

It's strange how difficult it is for me to just enjoy a day with nothing in particular to do. I really think that feeling happy is the most important thing in life, and things like work and study are just ways to achieve it. So I don't think that I have to work every single day to have a good life. But still, when I have nothing to do, I can't really enjoy myself. Even though there's always something to do, and I would really enjoy these things in other contexts. For example, I like reading (to ...

So I'm becoming a tutor. Some days ago, I saw an advertisement on my uni's website, saying that they're looking for people who can tutor middle schoolers who have trouble with certain subjects. I applied, got a call, and I have my first lesson this Tuesday. So first of all: that went really goddamn fast. But also, I had an extensive introduction today, and that really helped. I now feel like I'm actually somewhat prepared and I somewhat know what to expect. Somewhat. I already know that in teach...

It's weird, when you try to be a good person and care about stuff, the number things you can do becomes smaller and smaller. The past few years of my life have been characterized by a growing awareness of the concequences of my actions. I stopped eating meat and eventually all animal products because of their environmental and ethical implications. I don't want to be a part of an ultra-polluting, animal-torturing industry, so I decided to stop supporting it. I also try to buy food locally and in...

This is going to be a quick one. Because I want to do other stuff, and also because I once again have no clue what to write about. Surprise!You know, sometimes I just feel like I have nothing of worth to contribute. That sounds much sadder than it is. Today, for example, I just feel like working, studying, but not writing. Because there's nothing in my head that feels worthy of being written down. And I don't want to pressure myself to have valuable thoughts every day. Some days are for reflecti...

I don't know if anyone else has noticed, but politics in the west is kind of a mess. And I'm not just talking about the US and the UK here, although these are two prime examples. No, but this is happening all across Europe too. It has become a worn-out cliche to say it, but I'm going to anyways: it seems that we're more polarized than ever. Or maybe the people aren't, but politics is. And it seems to me that people have stopped seeing the people with whom they disagree as simply people with diff...

Today will be another no-backspacing day. Mostly because I have no idea what to write about and I'm tired, so I can al least challenge myself to keep writing without correcting anything. Also, since I'm tired, I expect this to be incredibly messy. Let's see. So far so good.I don't really feel like once again talking about ethics or philosophy, although I'm still busy with that. I really feel like talking about some minor something. But what? It's fun to write about recognizable things, things of...

I find it difficult sometimes to balance my beliefs and being a nice person. For example, I try pretty hard to limit my usage of plastic, especially one-time-use plastics. They're the least useful and the easiest to avoid. Not using plastic bags, for instance, is incredibly easy, and it makes a real difference, because these bags are made of low-grade plastic that's (almost) impossible to recycle. So my difficulty, then, comes when other people do insist on using plastic bags. I generally try to...

It's such a shame that my best thoughts come to me when I'm meditating. You know, the one moment when you're supposed to be free from your thoughts. I was thinking about the subject for my research paper, having all kinds of good ideas for it and imagining writing them down and constructing a first paragraph for them. Then I was thinking about how it's such a shame that all my best thoughts come to me when I'm meditating. I thought that this would be a good thing to write in my daily writing. I ...