Endless Flavors of Prog
Simon Reynolds has unleased PROGMETHEUS UNBOUND. He defines his purpose as a "provisional cartography of progward tendencies through the last 40 years of music; a prototype taxonomy of prog substyles, prog-adjacent musics, and post-1976 prog sprog genres." Naturally, as is wont to happen when you start making lists and categories, things get out of hand. Even for someone as categorically prolific as Mr. Reynolds.
The updated list which includes commentary from the gallery can be found here.
Camp Six Pictures
Adjacent to Camp Six at Port Defiance Park at the northwest end of Tacoma is a clearing filled with the rusted hulks of old logging machinery. Over the weekend, during the afternoon break in the clouds, I took my camera down to the clearing and took pictures of the equipment. I'm going to be running them here over the next couple of days. They aren't historical documents by any stretch, but rather impressions of the machinery of the loader and the yarder.
There is a 110-foot spar tree in the center of the clearing. This pole was used to as a ground for the ropes and the tongs which moved the logs from the loading area onto the railcars and the trucks. It doesn't seem that tall when you are standing at its base, but then what ever does?
There is a plaque attached to one of the machines. It describes the machinery and how it was used. There is a quote which the loading teams lived by: "Run in to save your job; run out to save your life."
The entire Camp Six series will end up at this URL when I'm done. The photo log will show them as they get posted if you want to keep up.
Map Blog
Jonathan Crowe has a weblog devoted to maps. An avowed map-aholic, he's out to gather links and pointers to all things map-related that the internet has to offer. You can find the Map Room here.
I took a brief tour of it today and got side-tracked by the link to the site which charts all the locations of Megaliths in England.
Stalin Kittens
Joel Veitch of rathergood.com -- he of the viking kitties -- has got a new flash animation. Stalin Kittens dancing to Laibach's "Tanz Miz Laibach."
The shockwave movie can be seen here. Make with the clickie.
Music in Speech
"Human musical preferences are fundamentally shaped not by elegant algorithms or ratios but by the messy sounds of real life, and of speech in particular -- which in turn is shaped by our evolutionary heritage." An article in The Boston Globe from earlier this month summarizes research done by David Schwartz, Catherine Howe, and Dale Purves of Duke University (full article of their research can be found in the August 6th issue of The Journal of Neuroscience).
From the article by Christine Kenneally (who is writing a book about the evolution of language): "Schwartz, Howe, and Purves analyzed a vast selection of speech sounds from a variety of languages to reveal the underlying patterns common to all utterances. In order to focus only on the raw sound, they discarded all theories about speech and meaning and sliced sentences into random bites. Using a database of over 100,000 brief segments of speech, they noted which frequency had the greatest emphasis in each sound. The resulting set of frequencies, they discovered, corresponded closely to the chromatic scale. In short, the building blocks of music are to be found in speech."
Hellboy Trailer
Yahoo! Movies has an exclusive Hellboy trailer.
KPOSI
I'm listening to KPOSI, the Positron Records music stream, tonight. They're highlighting the new Sister Machine Gun record, Influence, which will be released on November 28th. Also in the rotation is komposi002, the second compilation of material from the artists who are part of the Positron stable.
komposi002 has a new Die Warzau song on it. Pardon me while I squeal with fan-boy delight. Engine -- the last of the Warzone built records -- came out a long time ago and is still one of my favorite discs. That isn't to say that Chris Randall (Mr. SMG himself) hasn't been putting out really solid post-industrial guitar funk records himself since he scooted off to make his own path on the rock and roll landscape. But Die Warzau, man...
[np: Sister Machine Gun's "Everybody"]
Long Term Thinking
Brian Eno was recently in San Francisco to give a lecture sponsored by the Long Now Foundation, an organization which is trying to instill long term thinking in our monkey brains. Eno's lecture was on the topic of his new book, 250 Projects for a Better Future. The premise is to formulate 250 attainable projects which would have a lasting benefit on the future of mankind. www.worldchanging.com posted a note about the lecture as well as an open invitation for contributors to post suggestions for Eno.
There are some interesting comments posted to the thread there. The one which caught my eye was the pointer towards Arcosanti, a arcology being built in the Arizona desert. Designed by Paolo Soleri, it is a physical application of his principles of "arcology" (architecure + ecology).
[from arcosanti.org] "In 1970, the Cosanti Foundation began building Arcosanti, an experimental town in the high desert of Arizona, 70 miles north of metropolitan Phoenix. When complete, Arcosanti will house 5000 people, demonstrating ways to improve urban conditions and lessen our destructive impact on the earth. Its large, compact structures and large-scale solar greenhouses will occupy only 25 acres of a 4060 acre land preserve, keeping the natural countryside in close proximity to urban dwellers."
Chasing Bush
Chasing Bush is intended to keep track of George W. Bush during his upcoming visit to the UK. President Bush has a very interesting take on the hows and wheres of protestors during any given public appearance. Charles Levendosky of the Casper Star-Tribune sums the dichotomy up well: "As president, Bush has widened his restrictions on demonstrations against his policies. Anti-Bush protesters are now relegated to what are euphemistically called Free Speech Zones. These areas are cordoned off as far as a mile away from the president and the main thoroughfares, so that Bush cannot see the demonstrators, or their signs of protest, nor hear their chants. The free speech enclosures are only for those who disagree with the administration's current policies. Those citizens who carry pro-Bush signs are allowed to line the street where the president's motorcade passes." [Link to full op-ed piece.]
Chasing Bush has a mission. "In short, through one central portal, anyone in the city or across the planet will know where Bush is at any given moment - and be able to see what a misguided venture the entire visit is." For those of us not able to get to the streets of London -- nor would it matter really if Bush is able to convince the English Powers that every street should be shut down while the US President is in town -- Chasing Bush will be the closest we can get.
If you happen to see George W. Bush during his visit, be sure to send the location and the time to: bush@interwebnet.org.
Sustainable Urban Renewal
The Robert Redford Building in Santa Monica, dedicated by its namesake yesterday, is a forward looking environmentally friendly structure. The building collects rain water and uses it to flush the low-flush toilets as well as provide water for the plants. Solar cells contribute about 20% of the energy used by the building and skylights illuminate a good portion of the interior. The floors are made from bamboo and the exterior is a composite of fiber and cement which has the appearance of wood. Sea breezes and specially designed towers help maintain the building's temperatures and the carpets are made from hemp (not that sort of hemp).
Being classified as a structure of "sustainable urban renewal," the 15,000 square foot building was originally erected in 1917 and was recently stripped down to its wooden frame before being constructed in its new iteration. Redford, in a statement released in concert with the dedication, said that the building is a symbolic step forward for the conservation movement which has recently been traumatized by the Bush administration. "We are now suffering through an administration that has, in a very calculating way, set out to undermine and destroy 30 years of hard work," he says. "There's never been a time in my life when I've felt so challenged as a country, so challenged on the environment, as we are now."
[via Reuters]
What One Can Discover About One's Lunch
A good way to make lunch seem oh so less tantalizing. Today's wake-up call is from Mark Morford, over at SFGate.com
"We gotta give a damn where our food comes from. Far too few in this nation seem to give a damn about what they pump into their mouths. Make the connection that what you put into your body translates directly to how you feel, sleep, breath, function, orgasm, smile, think, move, smell and taste to others who may desire a lick of your divine chemical-free self."
Link to the entire piece.
[via kellysue.com]
How I killed myself today while reading this article: Turkey, bacon, and cheddar sandwich on a hoagie roll from the deli. No idea where the meat and cheese came from. I put Jones' spicy BBQ sauce on it. The sauce has 21 ingredients, most of which appear to be in that category of "our special selection of herbs and spices." Bag of Tim's Cascade Style Sour Cream & Onion potato chips (15 ingredients and "spice extractives"). Can of Diet Coke.
What the hell is a spice extractive?
Samorost
The FWA winner for August 2003 in the Recreational & Games category was Samorost, a truly inspired flash game which is equally winsome, hallucinatory, and otherworldly. It is one of those little things that the Internet will suddenly provide (okay, someone sent me a link) and offer no instructions or directions. Just two planets on a collison course and only you and your cursor can help the little space alien/rabbit guy avert the catastrophe.
Lost City Rediscovered
LONDON (Reuters): "An Anglo-American team of explorers have found an Incan city lost for centuries in the Peruvian jungles despite being within sight of the key religious center at Machu Picchu.
"Using infrared aerial photography to penetrate the forest canopy, the team led by Briton Hugh Thomson and American Gary Zeigler located the ruins at Llactapata 50 miles northwest of the ancient Incan capital, Cusco." [from Yahoo news, 11.06.03]
Lunar Cycles
There was a full lunar eclipse last night. I was riding in a car down Burnside Avenue in Portland, OR, when the clouds parted enough for us to see the partially obscured moon. I called Melissa and, as we were talking, I realized the last time I had seen a lunar eclipse I had been about three blocks away. November 28th, 1993. Melissa had dropped me off over in Chinatown on her way back to school after Thanksgiving. I was in Portland to see Curve. This time it was to see Killing Joke.
Jaz Coleman from the stage a few hours later: "This is what we believe. This is the death and resurrection show."
No Skipping
So I've been thinking for awhile about the whole iPod/MP3 brouhaha and trying to determine if it was something that would faciliate listening to music. Not that I have any trouble with that, but rather trying to ascertain a means by which I could carry around more music with less weight. The iPod is certainly an attractive toy, but it suffers from the same problem that my mini-disc player does: the music format -- CD -- isn't native to the device, which means that I have to transfer everything from CD to MP3 (in this case) if I want to use the device. Granted the ripping speed from modern CDROM drives is much better than the 1x transfer rate to mini-disc, but still, there is some planning and maintenance between you and actually listening to the music. And, when the whole point is listening to music, then the idea of time out for prep seems counter-productive.
Caught a wake-up call today via a reference to this cartoon over at Penny Arcade.
Just How Geek?
In case anyone was wondering: 35.30572% - Major Geek
The Latin question and the fact that I listen to "music that nobody else listens to, ever" helped.
The test: www.innergeek.us/geek.html
And, in support of that number, I find myself laughing that from a list that asks you to select check boxes, somehow they get seven significant figures when determining your GQ.
[Thanks Pete]
Next Time, They'll Just Take Your Wallet
A report from the Apollo Alliance says that a division of Haliburton (who received a no-contest bid from our government to stick their fingers deep into the reconstruction of Iraq pie) is charging the US more than DOUBLE the going rate to transport oil into Iraq. From the report: "Since March, Halliburton has been charging the US government excessive prices. As of October 19, 2003, Halliburton had imported 61,304,091 gallons of gasoline from Kuwait into Iraq, a distance of approximately 400 miles. The US government has paid Halliburton an average price of $2.65 per gallon. According to energy experts, the cost of buying and transporting fuel from Kuwait to Iraq is less than $1.00 per gallon..."
Meanwhile, House Republicans have recently stripped the Iraq supplemental bill of an anti-profiteering clause where companies would be held criminally liable for price gouging. Okay, I can't decide which makes me more disgusted by our national leadership right now: the fact that someone thought there was enough justification to warrant having to actually put in a clause making price gouging illegal or the fact that the toadies of corporate interest have been able to strip such a clause out. They don't even care that the rest of the world is watching them suck at the corporate tit. They've probably got such a suctioned grip on the nipple they won't pop off until the well runs dry.
Which, I suppose, is the point. Fill your bellies while you can, boys and girls, because at some point a larger bully with a bigger stick is going to come along and make you share with the other kids. Now wouldn't that be tragic?
UPDATE: From boingboing today, a link to the IRS form for a tax refund in excess of $1 MILLION. Must be because the other form doesn't have enough room for all those FUCKING ZEROES.
What You See When You Are Floating in Space
ESA astronaut Pedro Duque from Spain kept a journal during his recent trip to the International Space Station. He discovered that ballpoint pens do indeed work in space (and the Russians have known it for years) and that one can sail through the Northern (or, in the case of his flight path, the Southern) Lights.
Man, this must have been something. From his journal entry of 24 October:
"Too weird to be clouds. As you get closer it turns into more and more brilliant gauze veils, which form curtains coming up from the ground. Another turn of the spacecraft and you see them again, you are almost above them. The curtains get more and more defined - they are striped and reach very high, even higher than the spacecraft. You go straight towards them, and you can’t avoid feeling somewhat uneasy - will this be dangerous?
"When you enter them, all the curtains next to you start to light up and change shape, as if you were walking among sunny window blinds. The phenomenon lasts for one minute, then two, even three, and nothing unusual can be felt, the spacecraft goes on with its very soft trip along the rail of its orbit. When you leave behind this phantasmagoric image and face the blackness again you feel relief, but also a sense of loss."
Creepy Face
I dropped the SmartMedia card from my camera into my computer when I got home this evening to show Melissa the pictures from today and found this one at the end of the virtual roll. Creepy, considering that I didn't take it.
Fortunately, I recognize that Marvin the Martian clock so I, at least, know where and when it was taken. Now to find the culprit.