YouTube and Classical. No relation.

I've found that as I've stepped away from spending so much time on YouTube that what I'm actually interested in on YouTube is changing. I went through a phase where I quite liked background watching livestreams from Diversity & Dragons and Black Lodge Games; I now find that I have little interest in doing so. They spend at least an hour before they really "start" just chatting with the regulars in the comments, and then they say stuff that I'm either not that interested in, or already know and agree with. I don't want to spend hours just validating my tastes; they need to do something more for me. Since they don't, I don't think I'm their target anymore. And I'm not as validated in my tastes as I used to be anyway. I think the BLG guys are more interested in system for its own sake than I have been in years (if ever) and although they come across as very similar in what they want a game to do—very paleo-trad, if I can use my own term. But then again, maybe not really. They rave on that channel about ACKSII, which is exactly the kind of game that I abandoned in the mid-80s precisely because it wasn't very trad-focused, and was all about domain management and other rulsey minigames that I have little to no interest in. They're also insistent that Mythras doing high fantasy is completely different than anything d20-based, and you can't convert from one to another. I fundamentally disagree that you can't play any given game in one system vs another. Sure, sure, there are a lot of implicit things in the mechanics, but those are the details, which are swappable and easy to modify; the actual core mechanics; who cares? If Pathfinder can be run successfully in Savage Worlds, if Traveller can be run successfully in GURPS or even d20, if Star Wars can have three completely different systems that all work well, if Rokugan... well, you get my drift. You can work any setting, tone, and theme into any system. It's not that hard. Their insistence that you can't is completely contrary to my experience and desire.

Anyway, this is an increasingly long-winded way of saying that I'm not watching a lot of this stuff anymore, and I might even unsubscribe. No offense to them, but I'm just not getting much of what I personally want out of their content anymore. Even as they do seem to be growing their channel and finding more of their audience, it's becoming more clear that it's not me as much as I thought it might be. Oh, well. I'm actually feeling that way about a lot of D&D content on YouTube; either they're repetitive and I don't care what they're saying anymore, or they're too OSR for my taste, or they're too 5e for my taste, or their too... just reading fluff straight outta the books (AJ Pickett, I'm looking at you) or their just too long-winded in general, and they're making 45 minute to hour-long videos on topics that don't need more than 10-15 minutes.

All in all, I'm enjoying spending much less time on YouTube and much more time with my books. Like I used to. That's the real Old School Revolution, right there. 

I didn't get to read as much as I hoped last night, because I had to do my taxes (I don't think I've waited this long since I was a teenager. If I'd known I was actually due a big refund, I would have done it weeks ago. I was worried I'd have to pay! Luckily, my new company kicked in a fair bit to counter the value of the relocation package, which counted as income, so I was due much more money back than I expected. I ordered two new sets of metal dice from Amazon to celebrate.) But I'm making progress in Darkness & Dread, which I have read before, but not in many years. It's always good to revisit how to play the way that you want to. I have some upcoming work travel, which is usually good for reading too. And this coming weekend, my wife will be traveling without me. Also good for reading. I hope to finish two books by the end of the week; Darkness & Dread and the novel which I'm technically reading but haven't actually started yet. Maybe the pdf Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting (3e) that I'm reading too; I'm more than a third through that.

I'm also hoping to pop into Seminole Canyon for a couple of hours for my work trip, since I'll be nearby. Now that we're in daylight savings time, I can probably do it. It's late enough already in the season that it'll be hot, but hopefully not crazily so. I can already get a forecast for the day of the 28th, although I don't trust it that far ahead, but it has a high of 87°. Not terrible. If I have sunglasses and a water bottle or two, I'll be good.

Next up to read, in all four categories: 1) Elder Evils (game book), 2) Magician: Apprentice  Raymond Feist (novel), 3) Epic Tales: Greek Myths & Tales (actually what I'm currently reading, but I just started it. It won't be done anytime soon) (non-fiction), 4) 5e Iron Kingdoms Requiem (pdf). By the time I travel, I hope to have both the gamebook and the novel listed next both finished and I can read... I dunno, Fiendish Codex I: Hordes of the Abyss and Magician: Master. 

Finally, music. The last several months, I've hardly listened to more than a few pop songs at all, mostly older ones from the 80s that popped up on my YouTube recommendations list. I haven't listened to any on my phone at all. Maybe I've finally grown up or something, but I have been significantly less interested in pop music lately. I've listened to some synthwave; the closest to pop music, but mostly I've been listening to "orchestral" (sometimes synthesized) stuff, and of course lots of movie soundtracks and classical music.

I've always liked classical music, even as a teenager. Because I had just enough of a musical background that I could appreciate the musicality and artistry about it, I presume, but also because a lot of it is, in my opinion, objectively beautiful. My favorites have always been "Romantic" rather than strictly "Classical" but by and large, orchestral art music is always called classical regardless of the time period or style. My favorites for many years have included a lot of Russian Imperial composers; Tchaikovsky, Rimsky-Korsakov, Borodin, even Mussorsky. I've also liked a lot of German/Austrian composers: Liszt, lots of Wagner (especially Der Ring without words arrangements, so which I have many) and Tannhäuser pieces, and yeah; I know Liszt claims to have been a Magyar rather than an Austrian, but... y'know. I love Les Préludes and Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2, and have several recordings in particular of the latter, both as a piano piece and orchestral. And of course, I like Beethoven, although I'm a bit less interested in his more famous 5th and 9th symphonies; my favorite by far is the 6th. And plenty of other Italians, French other composers; Vivaldi, Von Suppe, Ponchielli, Grieg, Dvorak, Bizet, Berlioz, etc.

I do sometimes find classical music catches my attention more than I'd like, and it makes it poor background music for reading or writing. It really—usually—deserves to be listened to more attentively. That's why the movie soundtracks, and other amateur soundtracks get more attention from me than they deserve on pure musicality alone; I don't feel like I'm missing too much if my mind is otherwise occupied. Not that they aren't worth listening to as well; I don't like purely boring ambient stuff, I do like music that has enough musicality that I can listen to it. But the classical masters are true masters and few of their modern follow-ups are doing anything as interesting as they were.

As an aside, I've had the Tannhäuser Overture "stuck" in my head all day long. I think the version that I'm listening to is the Szell recording. There's a couple of other really nice classic ones too; Stokowski, I think, did one, and Karajan.