Hello Cornellians — the few of you who are still lingering in the corners of campus, clutching Daily Suns and awaiting the burning of the Dragon while all your friends fly for warmer climes. I hope you are doing well. And that you are being artsy. I had quite an artsy week this week. First, I got all my music back! External hard drive: working. 70 gigs: accessible once more. Then on Sunday, I spent two hours wandering the Johnson Museum, from where I headed directly to Barnes Hall for the iO String Quartet concert (the seven or eight of you who regularly read the Arts section may have seen my review on Monday — the concert was amazing!). I also saw one of the best worst movies I’ve ever seen. And I got into some awesome new music.

Loquacious in personality and modest despite his numerous achievements, Ian Goldin ’12 has experimented with nearly every musical instrument designed, plays in the Percussion Ensemble, sings in the Cornell University Glee Club and is a member of The Hangovers. And if that wasn’t enough, he’s also recently been elected Musical Director of The Hangovers, a rare honor for a freshman. As he begins by quipping “Ian Goldin needs a haircut; make sure you put that in!” this “Superhero” talks about his interests in music and what it means to be a member of The Hangovers.

Sun: Ian Goldin the Superhero. Tell me how you got that title?

It’s safe to say that most members of the audience at the Johnson Museum’s screening of Heima Friday night have been dreaming of rolling tundra, dramatic skies and fair isle sweaters ever since. The documentary follows the band Sigur Ros during their two-week series of free, unannounced concerts across their native Iceland in the summer of 2006. The Iceland concerts marked the end of the band’s world tour for Takk ..., their fourth album.

The Shanghai Quartet visited Bailey Hall on Saturday for a riveting performance that had some of the rough-and-tumble feel of a rock concert. To open the performance, the quartet took on Mozart’s String Quartet in D minor, K. 421, setting an elegant yet chipper tone for the concert. They dallied with the first movement’s lightsome runs with a tempered gusto. In the Andante that followed, however, the quartet attacked a dark counterpoint, allowing it to well up with an unexpectedly inward melancholy. When the counterpoint motif came back, they erupted in a startling, hall-reverberating crescendo that brilliantly shattered the remaining façade of delicate composure the piece had initially created.

Friday night, Cornell’s Southeast Asia and Music departments came together, sponsored by the Breaking Bread initiative, to put on Songs from 24,615 Islands, a night of Indonesian and Filipino music. The Breaking Bread initiative at Cornell focuses on bringing diverse peoples together to share culture and establish common ground. The Philippines and Indonesia are two incredibly ethnically diverse countries, and in the spirit of coming together, two musical groups – one Filipino/Western and one Indonesian Muslim – applied to Breaking Bread.

I don’t intend to rant about our hooking up culture, the idea of “friends with benefits” (has anyone besides parents actually ever used that term?), or how nobody dates anymore. All I want to do is point out that the music we listen to endorses this culture — a culture in which when two people are attracted to each other, they are expected to hook up, not go on a date. Please don’t be like, “What! I don’t do that.” I’m not saying that everyone does it. I’m also not saying that people didn’t randomly hook up in the ’80s, or the ’60s, or the 1800s for that matter. I’m just saying that today, the music we listen to adds to this culture.

I’m sitting in Libe Café, my column is due in two hours and, to be totally honest, I have absolutely no idea what to write about. There’s a new Andrew Bird album out that’s most definitely worth a listen or three, and a soon-to-be released Neko Case recording that my sources tell me is quite stupendous. (Does talking about “my sources” make me seem mysterious and “in-the-know?”) But in general, I try to leave new albums to those who write the handy-dandy Arts “Test Spins.” Someone pick those up, eh?

A few weeks ago I went to a party. Actually, this is highly newsworthy all in itself and I half-expect it to be panelized and editorialized. No, I jest, I jest. Seriously though, I was at a party. Proved all the naysayers wrong, didn’t I?

This was a pretty typical college party: slippery dance floor, frat boys who don’t know how to drink, and girls who don’t recognize me from this primo column space and therefore react negatively when I ask them what they think of my column. Oh, and of course there was a DJ, to spin the hottest tunes.

The first time I came home the 3,000 miles from boarding school for Thanksgiving in 2001, I couldn’t hold in my glee. My mom parents drove me straight to In-N-Out Burger, then one of my best friends surprised me in my living room with several movies and an impromptu sleepover. I missed her so much and I couldn’t wait to duke it out with pillows at the jammie jam while we gossiped about old flames and Justin Timberlake. It was such a relief to be home and out of the grind. Everything was looking up.

And then our family’s dishwasher exploded.

It’s been almost two weeks since the Grammy’s. In fact, it’s been exactly 12 days since I sat in front of my television in awe of three presenters. Mark Hoppus, Tom DeLonge and Travis Barker –– the members of the pop-punk sensation, Blink 182 –– stood on stage together to announce their reunion.