Essential Ending (for now)

It’s pretty clear to anybody who follows this blog that things have slowed to a complete crawl.  Even my typically more-active summer was without any new posts or other commentary.  So I think it’s time to play the final track on Essential Listening.

I am not, however, quitting the blogging world.  You see, Essential Listening slowly became more tedious over time because I had limited myself from the very beginning.  If I was tired of writing about music, it was hard to push elsewhere in a place that had a title about music.

So today I am going to suspend operations on this blog and point you at my new one – In Words and Phrases.  IWP will be focused on “ideas and events.”  Of course, that’s pretty broad – and intentionally so.  I will still write about music (it is a very rewarding adventure), but also my other favorite hobbies and passions – sports, cooking, photography, and other far-reaching topics.  I do hope you’ll join me over there.

And if you’ve been with this blog until the end, I thank you for even so much as pretending to pay attention.  I think it’s time to play the final track:

Back Soon

Brief update on the lack of F9F last week – it’s finals week here so I’m busy and buried under studying, projects and other work.  But fear not faithful blog readers! Things will be back in semi-normal order by the end of the week.

Thanks for sticking with Essential Listening!

BEST OF THE YEAR: 2010 EDITION

So I pretty much missed out on all the year-end mayhem.  However, that doesn’t mean I wasn’t formulating my lists.  Thus, it’s time for the best of 2010!

Here is the schedule we will follow for the next week or two:

BEST SONGS OF 2010

Part 1: Songs 40-21 March 3

Part 2: Songs 20-6 March 5

Part 3: Songs 5-1 March 7

BEST ALBUMS OF 2010

Part 1: Albums 30-16 March 10

Part 2: Albums 15-6 March 12

Part 3: Albums 5-1 March 14

Hopefully we’ll stick to that schedule.  Also, be sure to check out this page, which will hold the summaries when each post is done.

Thanks for sticking with me, and hopefully we’ll be back to a semi-non-regular posting schedule someday in the future!

Essential Listening: Version 3

Hey everybody.  Last night saw a massive overhaul to the appearance of Essential Listening.  I’ve been looking for a new theme for a while, and when WordPress released some of their newest defaults, I was pushed to do something.  So here we are.

Things may be in a bit of flux for the next few days as I get a better background and otherwise tool around with the (semi) final display.  Thanks for checking this out, and hopefully things will be more productive in the coming weeks!