NPR’s All Songs Considered gets their hands on “Duquesne Whistle”, the first track from Bob Dylan’s forthcoming Tempest, due out September 11th. True, there is something Basement Tapesy about it upon first listen.
Whistle while you Work.
Category: Music
The Ruin of Many a Poor Bit.
Speaking of SKYNET, witness here some very old-school technology deriving a binary understanding of the blues: “House of the Rising Sun,” covered by various oscilloscopes. Shades of Sam and Max‘s C.O.P.S. (Computer Obsolescence Prevention Society.)
The Axon Effect.
“Squids (like many other cephalopods) can quickly control pigmented cells called chromatophores to reflect light…We used a suction electrode to attach to the squid’s fin nerve, then connected the electrode to an iPod nano as our stimulator. The results were both interesting and beautiful. The video below is a view through an 8x microscope zoomed in on the dorsal side of the caudal fin of the squid.“
In his house at R’lyeh, dead Cthulhu waits dreaming…the ultraviolet dream, that is. Via Boing Boing, a squid’s chromatophores groove to Cypress Hill…Science! (Just don’t show it Oldboy.)
12:50, Press Return.
“I don’t want to start any blasphemous rumors, but I think that God’s got a sick sense of humor…” Or is there some other way to explain this, via @andrewducker:
Frightening, right? I’m highly agnostic, but still. In the fury of the moment, you can see the Master’s hand…
And this is crazy…
The Mic Passes.
“I’ve got more rhymes than I’ve got gray hairs, and that’s a lot because I’ve got my share.” —
Beastie Boy and founder of Oscilloscope Laboratories Adam Yauch, MCA, 1964-2012.
Endgame.
“To our Fans and Friends: As R.E.M., and as lifelong friends and co-conspirators, we have decided to call it a day as a band. We walk away with a great sense of gratitude, of finality, and of astonishment at all we have accomplished. To anyone who ever felt touched by our music, our deepest thanks for listening.” Also from last week, R.E.M. hangs it up after 31 years (notwithstanding a greatest hits album, to be released in November.)
The official site has been keeping up with the various encomiums and remembrances on the web. For my part, here’s the list of my 50 favorite R.E.M. songs that I posted in 2005, along with the R.E.M. archives and reviews of Around the Sun and Accelerate. To be honest, I feel like the band has been flirting with U2-covering-themselves territory on the last two albums, but, as a whole, I’ll stand up for their often-maligned later work — Up in particular.
Growing up in the South in the 80’s and 90’s, R.E.M. was ubiquitous. I remember Life’s Rich Pageant accompanying elementary school hayrides, everyone wearing their “Turn You Inside Out” concert tees to school in 8th grade, and crooning “Losing My Religion” with what passed for my high-school band at GSSM. To many of us down in “South Carolina-ravaged South Carolina,” they — and the nearby Athens, Georgia scene — represented a smart, cosmopolitan, and activist left that was still distinctively rooted in the South. Basically, they proved that being southern and being progressive were by no means mutually exclusive.
When I got to college, R.E.M. let their hair down, shook off the earnest stylings of Out of Time and Automatic for the People and decided to release a Monster. It, along with the Beastie’s Ill Communication, are basically the reasons I spent my early sophomore year shorn. (This was taken a few months later.)
And in November of 2004, a few days after Dubya was re-elected, I caught REM as the Garden, where, for the first and only time, they opened with “It’s the End of the World As We Know It (And I Feel Fine)” It summed up the moment, precisely.
So, RIP guys, and thanks for the memories and all the songs. Given the sad occasion, here, once again, is arguably their saddest and best.
Ten Years After.
You know what the world really doesn’t need right now? Another 9/11 retrospective. So, in terms of my thoughts on the recent tenth anniversary, I’ll just point you to the blog entries from that time, the 9/11 category here, and Paul Simon’s haunting, Dylanesque rendition of “The Sound of Silence” from the anniversary memorial.
It was a terrible day ten years ago, to be sure. But, I’m with Paul Krugman and The Onion. The horrors of that day can’t justifiy away torture, wars-of-choice, or any of the other ugly facets of the the low, dishonest decade that has followed.
Tricksters on the Borderlands, on the Throne.
“A few days ago I was watching Touch of Evil, Orson Welles’ fevered monument to America’s fear of and fascination with the Border, which opens with that famous three-minute tracking shot…It hit me (weirdly, I guess, but I spent way too much time thinking about sports) that this shot contained everything you needed to know about the U.S.-Mexico soccer rivalry.“
In Grantland, Brian Phillips looks to the border for insights into the US and Mexico soccer teams. To be honest, I’m not really sold on ESPN’s Grantland experiment just yet. Too much of the site exudes the terrible taste and fratgeek sexism of its editor-in-chief, “Sportsguy” Bill Simmons. Frequent contributor Chuck Klosterman is another red flag to me, for the same reasons. Both consider themselves pop culture arbiters and both are compulsively readable but – Simmons on the NBA notwithstanding — they’re also usually irritating and often wrong.
Still, Grantland does publish worthwhile culture pieces now and again — Hua Hsu on Watch the Throne today is another good one. And, speaking of good Watch the Throne commentary, Matt at Fluxblog has a particularly keen observation on it: “Kanye can’t help but project his intense insecurities – he’s emotionally transparent at all times, and it’s part of what makes him such a fascinating and magnetic pop star. Jay-Z, however, is the radical opposite – his every word and movement is focused on controlling your impression of him…In this way, Kanye is analogous to the Marvel Comics model of whiny, introspective, persecuted superheroes [Spider-Man, the X-Men, the Hulk] and Jay-Z is more like DC Comics’ Superman and Batman, who thrive when creators trade on their stoic, iconic qualities.“
When Their Hearts Grew Cold.
“Gilbert, Morris and Sumner look back on their career and see just as much humour – sometimes deliberate, sometimes unintentional – as Hook does (“Joy Division? Four tossers from Salford,” is how he remembers that most mythologised of bands), which only makes their current, Pink Floyd-style impasse all the more unfortunate. ‘When you get in a band you never consider the day it’ll all just stop,’ Morris says, looking suddenly a little lost.“
They’ve walked away, but not in silence: The Guardian‘s Rob Fitzpatrick checks in on the unfortunate demise of New Order. “There’s no future for New Order. It’s hard to draw a line under everything, but I think we have.”