I get the Blues on Sundays. It must be some sort of metaphysical ailment that I suffer from, because every Sunday without fault it happens. Inertia sets in and then all I can do is stare out into nothingness. It's the Spirit of Gravity deepening my soul.
I sometimes try to sublimate some of that energy towards writing a few blues tracks. The blues has always been my home base when it comes to the guitar, and it is a genre that I feel particularly at home with on Sundays. What this means is that I'll eventually record some of those tracks in an album that will be titled "Sunday Blues." Watch for it any given Sunday.
The title of this blog and the pseudonym that I write under are both derived from the album I'm working on. Yes, you guessed it: "Scattered Ashes" will be its title and Scipio my artistic name. The title is the product of some of my reflections on technology, the internet, P2P, MP3 and my personal eschatological perspective. The idea of spreading my music through the internet is a fascinating idea; indeed, the thought of having my songs stored on someone's hard drive who is thousands of miles away, not to mention who does not even know me, is such a captivating concept. We all wish to leave a legacy after we pass away, and for me, part of that legacy will certainly be my music. One day, only our ashes will remain, and that is something that we must accept both in a literal as well as symbolic a manner. In symbolic terms, part of those ashes will be my music.
I originally thought about naming the album "Scatter My Ashes," but I quickly realized how morbid that sounds. However, the concept behind it remains the same: the internet and the people who download my music will help scatter my ashes,
these ashes. Hence, the title "Scattered Ashes."
As to the name Scipio, it's genesis goes back to my college days when I was an avid History student. When I signed up for my internet account, the guy on the phone asked for a user name. After being informed that my real name was already taken, I looked down at my history book and said: "Scipio," as in Scipio Africanus, the Roman General who fought against Hannibal in the Punic Wars. And voila, my username quickly became a sort of nickname for chatrooms, IMS, email, etc.
Regarding my progress on that album, well, let's just say it's going to be a while before I have anything to share, but someday, someday.
For some reason, I was thinking today about this article I read in Wired Magazine some time ago. It is called "The Free and the Unfree" and it touches on the issues of piracy, IP rights and patents, amongst other things. In it, the author shows a direct correlation between piracy and underdeveloped economies; for example, it takes an average Chilean worker 94 hours of labor to earn the purchase price of a legal copy of Windows XP while for the average American worker it takes 13 hours. It is possible to derive all sorts of numbers from that figure; indeed, if the average price for a copy of Windows XP is about 200 dollars, and the average price for a music CD is about 15 dollars, then it takes that same Chilean worker about 7 hours to earn the money that it costs to buy a CD versus less than one hour for the American worker.
I think the article perfectly reflects the geopolitical tensions between the North and the South, the West and the Rest.
You may find it here:
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/12.06/free.html
