Implausible Dreams - Main Page

I'm not giving in to security under pressure
I'm not missing out on the promise of adventure
I'm not giving up on implausible dreams

Implausible Dreams is my personal webpage, originally posted in 2002 (Implausible Dreams). The name comes from the Rush song you see above (more).

I've got a number of interests that I'll share here - not the least of which is soccer, but also motorcycling, hockey, music and Texas A&M University athletics.

HOT TIMES IN DFW SPORTS!

Right now, the two biggest things are FC Dallas and the Texas Rangers as they go after post-season glory. Here are a few notes about FC Dallas and then I've updated my Texas Rangers page with specific thoughts about the series v. the Yankees. Click HERE to read more.

FC DALLAS

As for FC Dallas, what can you say? 19 games unbeaten in league play. Set the MLS record for games unbeaten on the road. Hot on the trail of RSL and LA for the overall best record in the league. That doesn't count the game against the 2010 Champions League winners, Inter Milan. What an amazing run!

Jeff Cunningham has tied Jaime Moreno for the all-time goals-scored record in MLS, and with the way Moreno hasn't been playing, and the run Jeff is on, Jeff is in position to set a new record. Personally, I love the idea of FC Dallas being the only MLS club to have two players who held or hold the all-time goals-scored record.

Hands down, FCD is one of the top teams in MLS and has a chance to prove how good they really are over the next month. Although the loss to RSL was a step back, there were positives to take from it and Dallas can still do a lot of damage going forward. We find out this weekend where all the teams will finish and what the playoff landscape looks like. With FCD at Los Angeles on Sunday, we will know what result of the game will mean before kickoff.

Either way, get ready for the playoffs!

US Soccer Links

One of the key parts of this website is the US Soccer Links Page. It is designed to ultimately be a one-stop launching pad for much of the soccer world for people who follow soccer in the US. FC Dallas? MLS? US national teams? It either has it or will have it. The idea is to have all the links in one spot. So far, I've got the major ones down, especially for Dallas, MLS and the USSF. I have the basics of the USL and some general overall news sites so you can get to EPL, etc., if that is your cup of tea. It is still a bit under construction in a few spots, but recently revised and still very useful. Let me know what you'd like to see added!

What you'll find below are descriptions and links for the new additions/updates to certain pages, some information about older but still useful pages, and then some other stuff about me. Note that most of the main pages also have links on the right side of the page. Enjoy!

CHAOTICA

The most recently completed page is Chaotica, my music page. See it just below this post with information about some unique musicians that I personally enjoy. Most recently, I've done blog posts on Kaki King and Del Castillo.

Other Updates

Recent tweaks have been made to Cygnus X-1, my Dallas Stars page.

I had previously updated Highway Child - my motorcycle resource page, as well as written some actual blog entries including two motorcycle/karma blogs, Why Motorcycle Riders Wave and Karma = Good (Motorcycle Version).

Here are some other pages, most with recent updates:

Janice and The Music Therapy Show - about Janice Harris' wonderful radio program
Neil Peart Condolences Page
Highway Child - Motorcycle Page

Go HERE for a little more background information about these pages and me.

The Women's Professional Soccer - Power Rankings

And now.... what?

Well, the excitement about a new women's professional soccer league has not only worn off, it has cooled significantly after the league suspended operations for 2012.

There is still hope, though, and the W-League of the United Soccer Leagues and the Women's Premier Soccer League will continue to grow high-level women's soccer.  The WPSL has added its "Elite" league for 2012 as well.  We shall see how things go, but hopefully things can keep moving in the right direction.

April 21, 2010

The second weekend started to show some separation. Not surprisingly, Washington got their first win over the expansion Atlanta Beat. St. Louis found a way to get a result at Chicago. FC Gold Pride took advantage of the traveling team and got a solid result over Sky Blue. The mild surprise of the weekend was the expansion side Philly finding a way to get a tie at Boston.

This weekend, Atlanta continues its road trip - fun way to start off for an expansion side, huh? This time, it is against the California team with Marta... On Sunday, Philadelphia hosts the Freedom, Chicago hosts the women from Jersey and Athletica takes on the Breakers. Put my money on FC Gold Pride and the St. Louis crew. I'm sensing a draw in the Independence match. Can Sky Blue take advantage of a Red Star side that is still looking for some consistency?

Here are the numbers for the week.

			Totals
No	Pvs	Team	Pts	G	PPG	Pace
1	1	Boston Breakers	4	2	2.00	2
2	2	St. Louis Athletica	4	2	2.00	0
3	3	Sky Blue FC	3	2	1.50	-1
4	7	FC Gold Pride	3	2	1.50	-1
5	5	Philadelphia Independence	2	2	1.00	-1
6	8	Washington Freedom	3	2	1.50	-3
7	4	Atlanta Beat	1	2	0.50	-1
8	6	Chicago Red Stars	1	2	0.50	-2

April 13, 2010

The first weekend of play didn't reveal much we probably couldn't surmise coming into the season. Philly and Atlanta tied at zeros for their first game. St. Louis picked up right where they left off, beating FC Gold Pride at home in convincing fashion and Sky Blue beat Chicago as well. The surprise of the weekend was Boston winning at Washington. Considering how tight last year finished, and the fact that there are now eight teams, is it too soon to worry about dropped points? Probably, but you can't like starting off that way.

So here are the numbers for the week. See below for the theory behind the numbers.

No.	Team	Pts	G	PPG	Pace
1	Boston Breakers	3	1	3	2
2	St. Louis Athletica	3	1	3	0
3	Sky Blue FC	3	1	3	0
4	Atlanta Beat	1	1	1	0
5	Philadelphia Independence	1	1	1	-1
6	Chicago Red Stars	0	1	0	-1
7	FC Gold Pride	0	1	0	-1
8	Washington Freedom	0	1	0	-3

Looking forward to next week, we have St. Louis at Chicago and Sky Blue at FC Gold Pride on Saturday and Atlanta at Washington and Philadelphia at Boston.

Can Athletica continue their home success on the road? Chicago obviously wants to defend their home turf, so that should be a good battle. Can Sky Blue FC do the same? FC Gold Pride didn't start the season well, but now they are home. Traditionally, coast to coast travelers don't do well.... The Sunday games ought to give us a good barometer of where the expansion teams are relative to the league. These are pretty much the first true-blue expansion teams in women's professional soccer history, so there isn't much of a track record to look at for perspective. I'm looking forward to seeing how they do.

April 3, 2010

Well, it has been quite an interesting off-season. No more LA Sol, but we've seen the addition of the Philadelphia Independence and the return of an original WUSA team, the Atlanta Beat. They join the Washington Freedom and the Boston Breakers as returning teams as we kick off Season Two of the WPS.It will be interesting to see how the new players settle into their new teams and how the league adjusts without the Sol.

August 23, 2009

Congratulations to Sky Blue - what an amazing run to the championship! Especially considering the format - obviously, I wasn't a believer, but they didn't give up and found a way to win all the games.

I can't say enough about the determination it took to win all those games under those circumstances.

August 10, 2009

Congratulations to Washington and Sky Blue for being the third and fourth seeds into the inaugural WPS playoffs! Especially for Sky Blue, who had the toughest road to the playoffs of the remaining three teams.

What I find interesting is that the playoffs all happen in a week - this weekend's first round, next Wednesday's Super Semifinal and then the Final the following weekend. That is a lot less of a down period for the LA Sol. Add in their victory over the Breakers on Sunday, and I think they have regained their mojo enough that I think they are no longer in significant danger of losing the final to a more in-form team. So call that me picking the obvious.

Here are the final rankings for the 2009 WPS season. It has been fun getting back into things and I look forward to next season where we have more teams to work with and a better feel for what teams bring to the table.

Once again, Boston and New Jersey swapped places. Those teams were neck and neck down the stretch, but a home win by Sky Blue over FCGP combined with Boston's loss to LA on Sunday gives the Jersey Girls (sorry, I'll admit, I'm a Kevin Smith fan) the edge at the end. After all was said and done, it was Sky Blue FC's better home record that put them over the top.

No.	Prv	Team	Pts	G	PPG	Pace
1	1	LA Sol	41	20	2.05	1
2	2	St. Louis Athletica	34	20	1.70	-6
3	3	Washington Freedom	29	20	1.45	-11
4	5	Sky Blue FC	26	20	1.30	-14
5	4	Boston Breakers	25	20	1.25	-15
6	6	Chicago Red Stars	20	20	1.00	-20
7	7	FC Gold Pride	18	20	0.90	-22

So now we're on to the playoffs. As a reminder the format is 4@3, then winner @2, then winner @1. So Washington hosts New Jersey, then St. Louis hosts that winner, and then LA hosts the final.

Sky Blue at Washington. It looks like the Freedom have the upper hand both in terms of recent results and also playing at home. Through the course of the season, the Freedom compiled a 5-2-3 (w-l-t) record, including a recent 3-1 win over Sky Blue on August 8. SBFC only won two road games this past season - over Chicago and Boston. On paper, it looks to be Washington's. The question is whether Sky Blue can continue to show their mettle and beat the Freedom. Unlike last Saturday's game, where Sky Blue FC came into the game on short rest having played on Wednesday, this time New Jersey will be fresh and rested. I'm predicting a Freedom win, but these teams are close enough in competition that anything is possible.

Super Semifinal at St. Louis. Whoever wins the first round game will most likely fall victim to the second best team in the league. Athletica is the only team other than the Sol to have a winning record on the road as well as at home. Even without their star forward, St. Louis is deep enough to overtake either Sky Blue or Washington.

Super Semifinal winner at Los Angeles. If St. Louis is upset in the semis, you can chalk this up to LA before the first whistle. Yes, yes, I know - you still have to play the games. But three games in seven days for the visiting team? We've seen what this does in MLS to teams, and the WPS teams have a lot less experience dealing with short turnarounds (although every team did have to do it more than once this past season).

On the other hand, if St. Louis wins as expected, then I think you'll see one of the best games of the season, although I see LA edging out St. Louis at the final whistle as you will still have St. Louis playing on short rest and the break isn't as long as I originally thought - cutting down the chance that LA would lose a bit of its edge in the time off.

So yes, probably going According To Hoyle for this year's playoffs.

Thanks for joining us this season. Enjoy the playoffs and we'll see you - along with the Atlanta Beat and the Philadelphia Independence - in 2010!

August 4, 2009

And now we know more. Not everything, but we know a lot more. Going into tonight's game, we know that Boston has fallen further behind Washington, but because of where Sky Blue FC is and what that team is facing, the Breakers are most likely to make the playoffs - probably as the four seed.

We do know that as Athletica go into the game tonight against Chicago, they are locked into second place and will host the Super Semifinal on August 19.

We also know that Sol is not invulnerable - even with Marta.

What we do know is that there is a good separation of teams, with the New York/New Jersey team the lone possible outlier. LA and St. Louis are clearly Nos. 1 and 2. Boston, Washington and Sky Blue are the middle three and FC Gold Pride and Chicago are the bottom two. Both recent results over the past few weeks and the overall numbers bear this out.What we don't know are: (A) whether Sky Blue can overcome their coaching carousel to pull off the improbable - or maybe even just be competitive; (B) whether Washington can hold off Boston for the third spot; and (C) whether Boston can overcome recent stumbles to reassert themselves enough to at least be the Four Seed or even overtake the Freedom.

The fun of it is this - any of the three teams fighting for the playoffs can be third, fourth or out.

Enjoy!

Here are the raw numbers:

1	1	LA Sol	38	19	2.00	-1
2	2	St. Louis Athletica	30	18	1.67	-6
3	4	Washington Freedom	26	19	1.37	-11
4	3	Boston Breakers	25	19	1.32	-12
5	5	Sky Blue FC	23	18	1.28	-13
6	6	Chicago Red Stars	20	19	1.05	-19
7	7	FC Gold Pride	17	18	0.94	-19

July 27, 2009

With the season winding down, some of this will cover some playoff scenarios in addition to the current rankings. Despite a few stumbles, the LA Sol and St. Louis Athletica were able to hold onto their respective spots at Nos. 1 and 2. We now know that two teams won't make the inaugural playoffs (San Jose and Chicago), but we also know it will be a real fight to the end for the remaining three teams (Washington, Boston and New York) for the final two spots.

Yes, technically, St. Louis hasn't locked up a playoff spot yet, but with only three games remaining - two of which are at home - the chance that they will be caught by all three chasers is a lot closer to none than slim. Four points is a lot of points to make up. Athletica could very well lock up a playoff spot and all but take the second spot with a win over their new-found rivals, Boston, this Saturday.

On the other end of it, Sky Blue FC has the toughest road - only two games left and currently tied with Washington for that last playoff spot. New York catches a break in that they play a team mathematically out (FC Gold Pride) at home, but then play what could be a winner-take-all match in the nation's capitol for their final game.

Boston and Washington currently look to be the strongest to be the 3 and 4 seeds, and they play on Wednesday in Maryland. Not much at stake in that game, huh? The Freedom hold more of their destiny in their hand than any team, especially with two of their three remaining games at home.

What is nice about the way the season is playing out is that each team trying to get into the playoffs has a game (or two) against their rivals for those playoff spots - so they get a chance to take their spoils right there on the field.

As for the rankings, we have a change - with the recent results, Washington has passed Sky Blue FC for the fourth spot. Even though they are tied on points, the Freedom have both a game in hand and a better road record. St. Louis came back to the pack a little with their loss and tie, but not enough to really flirt with being caught by Boston - yet, that is. A win for Boston this weekend could push the Breakers past Athletica in both points per game and Pace. LA isn't going to be caught this season - not until the championship game, anyway.

I still think three weeks off is a LOOONG time between games, and think there is a greater than zero chance that the No. 2 team - Athletica or not - has a good chance of being rested for one week, then taking on a beat-up 3 or 4 team, and then in a good groove to play the No. 1 team. We'll see how it plays out - should be fun!

Okay, so here are the raw rankings. As always, comments are surely welcome!

No.	Prv	Team	Pts	G	PPG	Pace
1	1	LA Sol	38	18	2.11	0
2	2	St. Louis Athletica	27	17	1.59	-6
3	3	Boston Breakers	25	17	1.47	-10
4	5	Washington Freedom	23	17	1.35	-10
5	4	Sky Blue FC	23	18	1.28	-13
6	6	Chicago Red Stars	17	18	0.94	-19
7	7	FC Gold Pride	14	17	0.82	-19

July 20, 2009

Due to some work issues, I wasn't able to do the rankings for this week, but it was notable that you started to have some real pressure on some teams in terms of playoff spots, and you got to see some real desperation.

July 13, 2009

So are we seeing a crack in the Sol armor? Could St. Louis not only be the second best team in the league, but one that has the guns to take LA down for the championship? Athletica's amazing road record points to that possibility. Joan of Arc's ladies have played four fewer home games than the Sol, but their Pace is but a mere -3 behind La's even.

Below what appear more and more to be the top two teams in the league, teams are bunched together tightly. Two points separate the next four teams, with the San Jose club falling behind a little more with each passing week.

We have one of our first best examples of how these rankings wash out statistical anomalies. Technically, the Red Stars are ahead of the Freedom in terms of points, but they have played one more game and have a worse home record than Washington and so you can clearly see how this keeps the Freedom in the Five Spot.

So here are the raw numbers - feel free to share your comments!

No.	Prv	Team	Pts	G	PPG	Pace
1	1	LA Sol	37	17	2.18	0
2	2	St. Louis Athletica	23	14	1.64	-3
3	3	Boston Breakers	18	14	1.29	-10
4	4	Sky Blue FC	18	14	1.29	-10
5	5	Washington Freedom	16	14	1.14	-12
6	6	Chicago Red Stars	17	15	1.13	-14
7	7	FC Gold Pride	12	14	0.86	-14

July 6, 2009 - Power Rankings Returns!

I am very proud to bring back my format for power rankings and apply them to Women's Professional Soccer!

After a four year hiatus, I'll be back on the web with what I consider to be the best objective evaluation of where teams are as the season progresses, this time for the new women's soccer league, WPS.

The idea is to find a way to wash out the statistical anomalies that come along during a season as some teams play more home games than away games or vice versa, and the same for games played. This gives you a more realistic look at where the teams stand at any given moment. This is different than most of the power rankings out there that are either mostly or entirely subjective - and we all know the flaws inherent in that system...

I originally came up with this formula in the early years of MLS, and did this for MLS while writing for 3rdDegree from 1998 through 2005. I also did them for WUSA for a time as a part of my Shannon MacMillan page.

Now, I'll be applying them to WPS, and I'm really looking forward to it.

So here they are - the first week of WPS Power Rankings!

July 6, 2009

No.	Prv	Team	Pts	G	PPG	Pace
1		LA Sol	37	16	2.31	3
2		St. Louis Athletica	20	13	1.54	-5
3		Boston Breakers	18	13	1.38	-7
4		Sky Blue FC	15	13	1.15	-12
5		Washington Freedom	16	14	1.14	-12
6		Chicago Red Stars	14	14	1.00	-14
7		FC Gold Pride	12	13	0.92	-13

As this is the first week, there aren't previous (Prv) numbers.

The System

The Points Per Game is pretty straightforward.

The Pace is the key, in my opinion. It is an objective standard that takes into account what in most sports - to some degree - is a factor: home field. The Pace refers to winning at home, and tying on the road. So if you win on the road, you get +2. If you tie at home, you get -2. Winning at home or tying on the road is 0.

Analysis - July 6, 2009

What is interesting is that for this current group, things line up pretty straightforward - PPG and The Pace are almost exactly the same in terms of how the teams are ranked. Obviously, the Sol are the cream of the crop. With the unique WPS playoff format, they will certainly be the most rested team once they have to play in the final - assuming they keep their place, with sure seems like a safe assumption at this point. I wonder if they might be TOO rested...

St. Louis and Boston are pretty clearly the next tier of teams, with the rest of the league following them. This will be fun to track these last bit of the season and then see how things play out in the playoffs.

So what do you think? Is this something that you're interested in?

Implausible Dreams - Background Pages

I'm not giving in to security under pressure
I'm not missing out on the promise of adventure
I'm not giving up on implausible dreams

Implausible Dreams is my personal webpage, originally posted in 2002 (Implausible Dreams). The name comes from the Rush song you see above (more). This post contains the background/less current information about this whole project.

Background Pages

Here are some of the older pages that were from the original version of this website, Implausible Dreams (flashnet version).

I don't plan on updating The Red Book (originally about the Dallas Burn, now FC Dallas) as I work for the team and I'm going to leave that stuff up to the official team sources, the media and the fans. You can see a lot of the links worth checking out on my US Soccer Links Page in the FC Dallas section.

I also will probably not update the original idea that sparked Implausible Dreams, my World Cup Resource page, as I probably won't have time to. If that changes, I'll consider it. But for now, use the original page above and the US Soccer Links page to get access to that stuff.

Here is the original post, "Implausible Dreams Returns!" It contains a more detailed description of why we're back.

For those so interested, here is the link to my old Main Page. And then there is the link to my REALLY old Main Page.

More about me:

Soccer - Dallas Burn/FC Dallas, USSF

There have also been a LOT of changes on the soccer front. The Dallas Burn is now FC Dallas. Jason Kreis and Eddie Johnson are gone, Pizza Hut Park has been completed, and I'm no longer just a fan, but now actually work for the team. To those who get it - Yes, it is as cool as it sounds. To those who may not - imagine working for the NFL in the late 1950s or early 1960s and being there when things were about to explode. (Implausible Dreams, indeed!)

Needless to say, I'm not going to be providing any inside information about FC Dallas. You won't see anything here that isn't already public information - and I would guess that the Blogger people wouldn't like sales information on this page, so that won't be here either, although if you have any questions about anything, don't hesitate to contact me.

The main page I've updated there, though, is my USA Association Football Links page. At the time, it had a number of great links to all the cutting edge information. And it still does in some cases. As you probably can imagine, though, over the past four years enough has changed that a few are no longer around and I don't have a few of the newer sites on there. I want to get the format right, so it might take me a little time to get that one finalized.

One new thing that is a part of my life is Texas Hold 'Em. LOVE that game. I'll probably have to put a page together for that as well.

Kaki King - And all of a sudden, with no warning, I was overtaken (again)

I've been impressed by musicians and music often. As I described in my Del Castillo piece, give me depth, intensity, passion, texture. It happened with Pearl Jam and "Ten." It happened with Live. It happened with Oysterhead. (For more detail, see Chaotica.)

This time, it wasn't the abrupt, immediate, in-your-face overwhelming that happened with Del Castillo. Instead, it happened weeks after the introduction, sneaking up on me from the quiet reaches, slipping into my consciousness.

One moment, she was just another suggested musician who didn't really strike a chord with me, an appreciated thought that just wasn't a good fit.

And then, before I knew it, I was wanting to listen to her music almost all the time. Now I'll suggest Kaki King to anyone who I think appreciates good music and creativity, but especially music with a texture, a quirkiness and an inventive side.

A bit of background on the artist - Born Katherine Elizabeth King in Georgia, Kaki King eventually moved to New York to study at New York University. She developed her own style of playing guitar and has written a number of albums. Take a look at the wikipedia entry about her for more details.

The story for me relates to my friend Mike - a music critic - who recommended I listen to her album, "Dreaming of Revenge" after I shared some of my opinions about female musicians. (I've always appreciated the creativity and expression that many female musicians share through their music.) As I was thinking more along the lines of No Doubt, Hole, L7, Skunk Anansie - in other words, more hard rock/aggressive artists - at the time, my first listen made me think Mike was just misunderstood what I was talking about.

Turns out I was the one who was off. What I misunderstood was he was talking about the musicianship - and on that point, he was spot on. Because I was also talking about Ani DiFranco, Liz Phair, MeShell Ndengeochello, Tori Amos. But I didn't know that at the time.

My first listen, I heard the album all the way through, and with each song I was expecting something more aggressive. As it never came, I just set it aside, mentally.

But over the course of the next few weeks I found myself every once in a while wanting something more sedate, and every once of those whiles, I'd remember that I thought Dreaming of Revenge was in that genre, so I'd throw it on the playlist.

And then one day, I found myself wanting to listen to Kaki King's Bone Chaos in the Castle and I didn't have it readily available, and I REALLY wanted to listen to it. It perfectly met my mood at the time, and that caught my attention. Maybe I should give her a closer listen.

And when I did, I was shocked at what I had been overlooking.

In terms of style, pull up a You Tube of "Playing with Pink Noise" (video high quality), and you'll get a feel of what I'm talking about. I have yet to find an online version of Bone Chaos in the Castle that does justice to the album version - which you can hear on iTunes if you want to get a taste - but that also gives you a good sense of some of her more creative writing. It is at times a percussive style - almost as if you mixed Stuart Hamm and Stanley Jordan, with a very Ani DiFranco indifference to spice up the attitude.

She also does some amazing lyrical bits with songs like "Life Being What It Is" (the You Tube video by "A Shoot The Player Film" bit is a great look into her colorful, honest personality), "2 O'Clock," and "Saving Days in a Frozen Head." As a fan of Exile in Guyville, I appreciate her turns of phrase. Such as....

"Life being what it is - we all dream of revenge
Open your eyes for a second - just to roll them at me."
- Life Being What It Is

"Sunlight wakes me - just to say 'Let's go to sleep now'."
- Saving Days In A Frozen Head

"2 O'Clock - you're still sleeping.
When you wake up you'll be in such pain.
And I wait with the plate, piled high with my love, that you won't eat from.

"File off the sharpness of feelings so
I'll be protected from all of your evil.
When you come 'round my love, I'll be gone - finally done
Never to come to your rescue."
- 2 O'Clock

Kaki King also does some good work with layering pieces - looping line after line, musically, and sometimes putting vocals over it. Either way, it often has the texture and flavor that appeals to those looking for the little nuances.

Threads of some of her music reminds me of k.d. lang's Ingenue, others Ani DiFranco's Not a Pretty Girl. But all of it is unique, and wonderfully textured and detailed. The dynamics and intricacy that I look for in my music is all here.

A lot of this is available via You Tube and iTunes. So go forth, enjoy and share your feedback.

But bear this in mind - I shared this with a co-worker and he fell head of heels madly in love with her in less than an hour.

You have been warned.

For more on Kevin's takes on music, check out Chaotica.

Chaotica - my music page - Rush, Del Castillo and more!

Here are some links to my favorite musicians and bands. As I recently wrote in my bit on Del Castillo, I've always been very into music. As a musician, and in how I live and experience my life, music is very important to me.

My musical interests run the whole spectrum - from classical to punk, jazz to metal. The overriding theme? Make it intense, make it have meaning. What I've done here (and will update from time to time) is highlight a few musicians that I think highlight this.

My most recent piece is on guitarist/singer-songwriter Kaki King.

Rush

Overall, my favorite in large part because of the combination of their musicianship, music and message. As a bassist, obviously, Geddy Lee was someone I looked to for inspiration. Their message of "Anything can happen/I'm not giving in to security under pressure-I'm not giving up on Implausible Dreams" - a thread that runs throughout their music from Fly By Night to current music - is something that has always resonated with me.

Here are a few sites of note: Official - Power Windows - Wiki - Forum

Also, I put together a Neil Peart Condolences Page (Original - Updated) a while back. Although it isn't as relevant now as it was at the time (and yet I still need to update it with submissions), I still find people who don't know the back-story and what was a very dark chasm that Neil walked through.

Del Castillo

First and foremost, read my blog from my first encouter with the band here. That says a lot of it, albeit in a really long and involved post. Short version - they are an incredible Latin Rock band, with musicianship and style that I found very impressive. If you've seen the movie Once Upon A time In Mexico or Kill Bill Vol. II, you've heard their music.

Here is their official page. They also have a number of You Tube clips that do them pretty good justice.

Live

From my original version of this page, "a band that has never let me down for their understanding of the need for dynamics in music. So many musicians put a line together, or a rhythm, and they go with it. I feel like my friend Gready when he screams, 'Do SOMETHING!' Live has always done something with their music."

Official

Oysterhead

One of the most creative projects of the past decade, Oysterhead is the combination of Primus' Les Claypool, Phish's Trey Anastasio and Stewart Copeland of The Police.

Official - Wiki


Other bands (links to be added) - Mechelle Ndengeochello - Ani DiFranco - Skunk Anansie - Days of the New - Disturbed - Eric Johnson

BTW - this was my original version of this page.