Triskaideka-bloggia - 13 Years of BB

Don't Fear Number Thirteen

Triskaidekaphobia refers to the quite real fear of the number 13, whereas triskaidekabloggia refers to the celebration of the 13th anniversary of a favorite web blog (I decided).

Well, here we are again. Another April, and another anniversary for this blog. It's now been 13 years since I started this folly. Think about that, 13 years, through the good years and bad years, I'm still here. So, it's really been one messed-up year since the last anniversary, but things are looking up. My family and I have made it through the pandemic relatively unscathed. I have now been vaccinated, as are increasing numbers of people every day. Soon. live music venues and concerts should be coming back.  

So, anyway, Yes, this little outpost of a music blog has now been going for 13 full years, and although I readily acknowledge that it is not the most prolific or comprehensive blog around, a whole lot of great music has been talked about and presented here over the years, of many different styles, all from artists that I personally enjoy very much, and hope that others will also enjoy. I try to present a variety of music that may be hard to find or not readily available elsewhere. I also try to provide some background and context to the music and artists, as well as my own commentary, rather than just unadorned music files, to give those new to these artists some perspective and history, to explore the music further. And I also have tried to keep these posts available as much as possible over time, thus pretty much everything that has been posted previously should still be available (with the exception of things that ran into copyright issues). I hope that what I have provided here has been useful and worthwhile, as well as musically satisfying, and I hope it has been something that you come back to often and have been introduced to some new music here that you really enjoy, to expand your musical horizons and enjoyment, and be a positive addition to your musical experience as well as your music collection. And so I thank all of you out there who take the time to peruse this blog, download (and perhaps even read the comentary), and possibly provide comments or feedback, for making this endeavor worthwhile for me to continue.  

And once again, as I have each year at this time, I also want to take this time to thank and celebrate all the others out there who have made so much of this great music, which is not available for purchase anywhere, freely available to all who wish to download and enjoy it. I am only able to offer these downloads because others before me have made them available. So, to all the other bloggers, tapers, forum posters, and music fans that have collected these recordings and made them available over the internet, and most importantly, to all the great artists and musicians out there that have created and performed this wonderful music and allow these recordings to be freely exchanged, I offer a huge and heartfelt Thank You. And again, I implore everyone to purchase all the official releases of your favorite artists, as well as, wherever possible, go see them live in concert (as soon concerts are allowed again). The music here serves to supplement, not replace, all of their officially released music. They are supported by fans like us.

Moving Forward, I expect things to continue here along the same lines as previously (but maybe some improvements). I've been trying to post things a bit more consistently in recent months, and hopefully that will continue (or even improve) as the year goes on. I've introduced a new feature column of artist album rankings (so far only one done, but more coming). The next one up will be thoughts and ranking of another of my favorite artists, Genesis (will post that as soon as I get it written up). Other than that, I will always try to feature music and artists I think are worth hearing, with occasional tributes to recently fallen musical heroes. As always, I encourage feedback and discussion of anything mentioned or presented here. I know that there are alot of issues with Zippyshare for file storage (unavailable in many countries, and obnoxious, aggressive pop-ups throughout), but I have not been able to find a suitable substitute to transfer the bulk of what is currently on zippyshare. For most of the new stuff I am now using Solidfiles, but that has had problems too (regarding unavailability, unreliability at times, and a low storage maximum), such that I cannot use it to transfer large numbers of files. And my Mega accounts are also maxxed out, so to add anything added to them, something else has to be deleted. Anyway, again, if you know of other file storage options that are reliable, free, allow multiple simultaneous uploads/downloads, and have large storage capacity maximums, let me know. Anyway, Thanks to all, and let's try to stay safe, secure, and happy out there, and no matter what, be sure to appreciate and fully enjoy your music, whatever it may be.