One picture says it all ...

[uwe]

"Members of the Taliban look on after setting fire to a pile of musical instruments and equipment"

There's many worse pics from Afghanistan and it's just "stuff" they're burning, but it's emblematic for a regime hell-bent to return to an age prior to enlightenment.

And of course they all have cell phones so they can convene for their bonfires.

[westen44]

"We are responsible for our own ignorance or, with time and openhearted enlightenment, our own wisdom.:

--Isabel Wilkerson

Personally, I probably lean toward what a Spanish teacher once told me when he said "the smart money is on ignorance."

[lowend1]

"Members of the Taliban look on after setting fire to a pile of musical instruments and equipment"

There's many worse pics from Afghanistan and it's just "stuff" they're burning, but it's emblematic for a regime hell-bent to return to an age prior to enlightenment.

And of course they all have cell phones so they can convene for their bonfires.

I'm sure there's a Firebird X at the bottom of the pile.

[uwe]

Downed with a Stinger ground-to-air rocket launcher now that you mention it! US development aid for Third World Countries.

[westen44]

I normally have a pro band attitude.  But if someone did that to the gear of the band that "practices" across the alley, I can't say it would upset me.  I don't even know what genre they play and I don't think they do, either.  They've been playing for years now.  It just never ends.  I think it must be a case of a band not good enough to get any gigs.  So they just jam mindlessly.  Fortunately, they're a little bit too far away for it to bother me very much.  But I pity the neighbors who are closer to them.  There are no hard feelings on my part, but this attempt to play music really isn't a bright spot in my life.  C'est la vie. 

[morrow]

“It's very hard to live in a studio apartment in San Jose with a man who's learning to play the violin.” That's what she told the police when she handed them the empty revolver.

Richard Brautigan

[uwe]

[uwe]

I always was and continue to be utterly noise-resilient. I can do legal work with Judas Priest playing and regularly do (and not just quietly in the background), no issue. When we're in our rehearsal room and the band in the adjacent room is kinda loud, it never bothers me. But it doesn't work both ways. At one of our recent rehearsals, a member from that other band - young enough to be my son - knocked at our door and inquired very politely whether we could turn the bass down, it was distracting them, "especially the mids". (I was playing my LP Junior Tribute over a Markbass/Orange Little Terror bi-amping set-up.) I was flabbergasted how pansy these young people have become. Unfathomable for me to do something like that. I should have yelled at him: "I WAS AT SLADE GIGS WHEN YOU WEREN'T EVEN YET FLOATING SEMEN AND SAW PEOPLE GET NOSE BLEEDING FROM THE VOLUME OF JIM LEA'S BASS BINS, YOU LITTLE NIRVANA-REARED, "MOMMY, I CAN'T CONCENTRATE"-RITALIN-GULPING PUNK! GET A GRIP ON YOURSELF!"

Old people are terrible, I know.

[westen44]

I'm not sure how much of a choice that is to be bothered by noise or not.  I can be bothered by it greatly sometimes.  But I would find it hard to ask a band to turn down.  If I haven't asked the band across the alley, I'm not sure if I would to anyone.  But through the years I've had to respond to a number of complaints about my bands.  I think the most persistent one was from a retired band director.  Surprisingly, he was no fan of rock music.  However, talking to the police was never a problem.  They were always cooperative and even polite.  I think in most cases they actually liked the music themselves.