Puppini Sisters - misc

Who knew... Three girls (no sisters) inspired by the Andrew Sisters, covering songs like "Wuthering Heights" and "Walk Like an Egyptian" in '40's close harmony style.

Also, I seem to have listened to them before...

It's fun, but many songs in a row slowly turn you cwwwwazy.

Jill Tracy - "Diabolical Streak" (album)

All songs very much the same dark cabaretesque style as "Evil Night Together".

She's also done some shorts (music, voice-over).

Definitely look into. Tres nice.

Pareidolia

when the brain arranges random stimuli into a significant image or sound; faces in the moon, animals in clouds.

The word comes from the Greek words para- ("παρά" = 'beside', 'alongside', 'instead') in this context meaning something faulty, wrong, instead of; and the noun eidōlon ("είδωλον" = 'image', 'form', 'shape') the diminutive of eidos. Pareidolia is a type of apophenia.

Kurrel the Raven - "Furry"

Seriously, don't ask how I got here (it was actually rather logical, but without context such a song makes you wonder), quite amusing Ozzie-song.


I've written a little song about furries.
It is a rap song.
I hope you like rap songs.
I know I do.
I will magically count to 4, and the beat shall appear.
1, 2, 3, 4.
Are you grooving yet? I hope so!
Grooving is what this song's about.
Grooving to furry information.
Hello!


Furries are diverse - let me say that first.
And it's this one fact which confuses the worst.
We don't all have costumes or collect stuffed toys,
so allow me to separate the signal from the noise.


First off, what's furry? That's an easy thing to tell:
It's an animal that happens to be human as well.
In technical terms we call it anthropomorphics,
But it's easy to explain without all the linguistics;
If it walks like a person but meows like a cat,
You've got yourself a furry - it's as simple as that!


If it talks like a person and flies like a bird,
Then it's still a furry even though it sounds absurd.
'Cause even though birds have feathers and not fur,
Mammals are the commonest type of furry in the world
So the word comes from them. Even starting with a fly,
You'll end up with a furry no matter how hard you try.


That's a furry. That's a furry, that's a furry.
I will sing it.
That's a fuuurry. That's a furry, that's a furry.
That's a furry you know.


So, that's a furry character but what about the rest?
A furry is a person to whom furries are an interest.
So both the character and the viewer are furry -
It'll all make sense soon, so don't worry.


Most furries never meet face to face.
We come from everywhere, all over the place.
There's furries in the Americas and in the EU.
There's furries in Asia and Australasia too.
On the Internet we gather from the soil of all nations:
All ages and races; both genders; a range of educations.
Here we are, all the furries are we,
Whether artists or congoers or strictly RP.


Now to help with the furry jargon here's some quick education:
RP is roleplaying in a made-up situation;
A fursona is a furry you pretend to be,
Usually one you make up yourself for other people to see.
In furry lingo, one word stands out:
And that word is yiff and this is what it's all about.
Or maybe I'll shut up and move right along,
Because you can't define yiff in a polite sort of song.
And that's without touching scritching or spooge,
When it comes to furry-speak, there's a veritable deluge.
But that's about the quota for the second verse done,
So join in the chant and have some fun!


Furry. This is furry. This is furry.
This is furry, furry!
Furry!
(We're not furbies, by the way.)


To make a furry's easy - anyone can do it:
You take your favourite animal and mix a human through it.
You modify the product - is it real or cartoony?
Is it two legs or four? Is it straight? Is it loony?
Does it have a pair of wings sprouting out of its back?
Does it have an extra set of legs that other furs lack?
Can it talk or does it speak with psychic communication?
Is it you? Is it not? Is it just speculation?


Once you have your fursona all sorted out,
You can take a walk and see what we are all about.
Some of us have gone and made a costume for effect -
But that's a different story - fursuiters on the left
and to the right we have the artists, who are numerous in style:
Anyway you like it, they can draw it with a smile!
But keep in mind that in the mix is every sort of thing
And not all of it for children, which can be a bit of a sting.


Experimentation is the order of the day;
Imagination keeps our minds at play.
Now the next verse is long so I'm going to abort
And start the chant early to keep the third one short.


We're Furry. We're Furry. We're Furry. Furry.
So Furry. So Furry. So Furry! aaaaah....


Up to the downside of all this furry fun:
Some people don't get it not all, just some.
Misinformation and lies are afoot!
It's crap up with which I shall not put!
Hey MTV! Hey Vanity Fair!
Take a bow, Eurotrash and Marie Claire!
And a special shout out to - you know what? I don't care.
If I bitch about detractors, it's a total waste of air.


I'm only a furry to have fun, say what you like.
Anti-furry propaganda can take a long hike!
And it's not just that we're all completely squeaky clean,
Only sometimes the normal world thinks it has a right to be mean.
And normal? Who'd wanna be? It's not for us!
You can heckle us all you like from the Boring Bus!
And if you need to put a weirdo down to feel bigger,
then you're a sad sort of person and you're sicker than Doug Winger.


Some furries are odd, some furries are mean,
Some furries draw pictures which are rather obscene.
Some furries believe things which are strange to me!
But remember what I said about furry diversity?


'Cause it's not a bad thing for the world to know us,
But just the kooky stuff is not a fair part to show of us.
We don't mind curiosity, 'cause that's what we're about,
But any future journalists had better watch out!


One extra singe doesn't do a lot of damage;
We furries have dealt with quite enough spammage.
With all that said, the tide is turning.
The wounds are healing and we're quickly learning that:


Best paw forward is the way to go!
Put your best paw forward and away you go!
Put your best paw forward and away you go!
That is if you've even got a paw. Um. I don't know.


I'd rather be furry and use my imagination
And die a happy death instead of bitter stagnation.
I'd rather express than repress and then get depressed
And then get stressed about my situation.


Well I've laid it on you birdy style, the good and the bad,
The fun and the games and the problems we've had.


So sayonara people, now you know what we're about.
This is Kurrel on the microphone, over and out!

Queen - Making of "A Night At The Opera"

How about that; the very first time I write something about Queen... not so suprising as I've been a fan for so long that I have been drifting the last decade, drifting to faraway lands.

But this documentary proved again; I am a Queen fan and always will be.

The documentary itself is okay; it was mostly the footage and the few gems of Freddy Mercury talking that completely gave it its glamour.

Choke

Interesting film. Not extremely good, but fun enough.

Fun to watch after reading some of Chuck Palahniuk's essays. You can see the hidden guns, the mind-method vs heart method.

It's a good example of one way of story telling.

Stereo MC's - "Breeze" (Deep Down & Dirty)

Never thought I was much fan of them. I know their name, but I cannot remember ever listening to them with pleasure. Nor with distaste. Just nothing special.

This is a rather intriguing song. Even though they use a vocoder.

Little People - "Basique" (Mickey Mouse Operation (Mumbe Jumbo/Illicut))

Pandora on a roll... seems I have listed them before, but it's catchy triphoppy with a soft bite. ahem.

Kid Loco - "Don't Forget The Fourth Track" (the Graffiti Artist (OST))

Slow hip hop in the lazy French style of Serge Gainsbourg (yes, I stole that description from Pandora).

Jack White - "Love Is Blindness"

Haven't heard this song in quite some time. Jack White's version is good, his screaming and high voice fits the craziness.

The Quiet Earth

Australian post-apocalyptic sci-fi flick in which an energy grid has "removed" all humans, yet those who were dying at the moment of happening, survived.

Okay, fun enough, but am not crazy about it. The very last scene... I don't know what they wanted to accomplish with that, but it did not make much sense.

The usualy "almost-going-crazy" apocalyptic-survivor stuff.

Ink (2009)

Impressive fantasy film in which a man has to battle his demons to get his daughter back.

Impressive visually, some gripping sound effects. The little girl plays really well.

The first 1/3rd of the film is confusing yet keeps you on the edge of your chair.

Mark & Clark Band - "Worn Down Piano"

Took me two days to refind this song; strange, because when listening to it, I remember so many lyrics (and other details) I should have been able to find it much faster...

16 Horsepower - "Golden Rope" (Low Estate)

Sad, haunting...

there you are / hanging by the golden rope

Boards of Canada - "Amo Bishop Roden" (In A Beautiful Place Out In The Country)

Instrumental. Echoing strings and a dry, intense beat.

Laura Marling - (various)

folk-y.

Not everything good. Sometimes she hit the minor chords like Alanis Morissette; good ("Don't Ask Me Why")

• Captain and the Hourglass : uptempo, nice
• Old Stone - melancholy
• Night Terror - haunting
• My Manic and I - simple, fast
• Night after Night - some Leonard Cohen ish influences, both in song and music

Stranger Than Paradise (1984)

Typically Jim Jarmusch; from the steady-cam-on-character-with-song start, to the disjointed fragments of how people live their lives, not shunning the difficult silences. The audio that keeps running just 1 sec after the fragment has turned black... the acting, which wasn't too good, yet at the same time felt pure because those are people who do not act, who are simply who they are...

Pretty amazing, though not a film you watch out of sheer fun.

Screamin' Jay Hawking - "I put a spell on you"

The blind activist

Fantastic post about why the media is still referring to Chen Guangchen as the "blind activist", even though some bristle that it is irrelevant. Fantastic because it is so simple and logical (in hindsight)

http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=3936

Alan Greenblatt of NPR wonders why news outlets insist on continuing to draw attention to the blindness of Chen Guangchen, the Chinese activist who recently escaped house arrest and who has been at the center of international attention this past week.

Greenblatt writes[1] (NPR online;5/4/2012):

Chen has been repeatedly referred to as "the blind activist" or "the blind activist lawyer" by news outlets such as The New York Times, The Associated Press and The Washington Post. The Economist's current cover story is headlined "Blind Justice."

On Wednesday, NPR decided not to label Chen a "blind activist"….

Descriptions of Chen as blind may have stuck in part because of the way he burst into broad Western consciousness last week—not through his longstanding campaign against China's one-child policy, but by escaping house arrest and trekking 300 miles to Beijing. The fact that he is blind made the story that much more dramatic.

"We're sticking with 'blind' because Chen's name might not be familiar to readers, but they may be aware that there's a 'blind activist' in trouble," says Blake Hounshell, the managing editor of Foreign Policy.

But it doesn't seem like a useful shorthand to Geoffrey Nunberg, a linguist at the University of California, Berkeley, and regular contributor to NPR's Fresh Air.

"It was relevant, obviously, in reference to his escape," Nunberg says, "but the continued use implies a relevance that just isn't there. I don't think it's a 'PC' thing - the point would be the same if he were, for example, 6′7″."

I disagree with Geoff Nunberg's claim that referring to Chen as "the blind activist" necessarily "implies a relevance that just isn't there". I think that Blake Hounshell is spot on in thinking of the phrase as a useful and efficient way of identifying Chen to readers. Hounshell is on to a phenomenon that is known to psychologists as a "conceptual pact" in which conversational partners tend to persist in using referring expressions that were originally introduced, even after they've long outlived their initial contextual relevance.

The process was first studied experimentally[2] by Susan Brennan and Herb Clark. They noted that in a given context, speakers do usually craft their referring expressions to contain as much information as is needed or relevant—for instance, in a context where the speaker is trying to get
the hearer to be able to pick out one particular fish from among several others, he might refer to "the striped fish", but in a context with a single fish, he would simply say "the fish".

What if a speaker has previously specified "the striped fish" as a way of disambiguating reference, but then later refers to that same fish, now in a context that only has the one fish? He tends to re-use the more explicit "the striped fish", even though this information is no longer relevant or necessary in the immediate context. The existence of a conceptual pact trumps contextual relevance.

Hearers, it seems, have expectations that are line with this. When a referring expression is recycled, the usual inferences of relevance become suspended. For example, normally hearers assume that an adjective is more than a mere grace note accompanying a noun, that it's earning its keep by
serving some useful purpose. I've measured this myself by looking at people's eye movements as they follow instructions to move various objects around. Suppose they see in front of them a tall pitcher, a tall glass, and a second shorter glass, and they hear the beginning of an instruction
that begins with "Hand me the tall…" At this point in time, they tend to look at the glass, not the pitcher. They assume that the speaker has gone to the trouble of specifying "tall" because it's needed to distinguish between the glasses—otherwise, the speaker could have just said "Hand me the pitcher." This shows that hearers normally do imbue words with maximal relvance. But, all bets are off if the speaker has previously referred to the pitcher as "the tall pitcher". Now, the mere fact of having used the same expression some time ago seems to be reason enough to include the word "tall".

I can appreciate that continuing to refer to Chen's disability might rankle, much as one might bristle at a continued description of someone as "the black candidate". For that reason alone, writers might be justified in jettisoning a previous "conceptual pact". But there is perfectly reasonable psychological motivation behind the lingering impulse to use the offending phrase, which is why writers face a quandary in the first place, and why NPR had to make a decision about this as a matter of policy.

Links:
[1]: http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2012/05/04/152037877/a-factor-in-a-much-larger-life-debating-chen
-guangchengs-blindness (link)
[2]: http://psych.stanford.edu/~herb/1990s/Brennan.Clark.96.pdf (link)

William Gibson - "Spook Country"

Looking forward to a new W. Gibson, but kind of disappointed.

It's set in today's time; I love his cyberpunk stories and the strangeness of them, the familiarity with which he throws around the weirdest stuff, everything so familiar to him yet as a reader you grapple to understand it all.

And that's what bothered me most here; he mentions a dozen times she "grabbed her Powerbook". Ok, we got it, a laptop, fine. And a big boss, someone who presumably can create a darknet at will, "hasn't set his WEP". First of all, that guy should know to set his WPA2, not WEP, second, and more importantly, it's a password. Doesn't matter what or how!

The repeating of (fake) brandnames or styles in cyberpunk works well, nay, is necessary because the reader is utterly unfamiliar with them. You need the repetition to slowly form a full image of something in your mind. With day-to-day objects like laptops and the such.. we don't need that.

Also, the characters, the story; it all gets only mildly interesting. The clou, I couldn't really care much about it.

The style, short chapters of 3 - 6 pages, cycling through the three storylines gives a nice impression of everything happening at once, without getting lost.

Yet, at most a 6.

Antichrist

Finally saw the (in)famous Lars von Trier. Not at the best moment, I must admit.

It's intense and brutal, but gripping nonetheless. I understand people looking away, but I couldn't, and both actors do an amazing job.

The three beggers felt a little bit like a sudden cheat, but only in hindsight; so it probably doesn't mean that much.

Tool - "The Pot" (10.000)

Who are you to wave your finger?
Ya' must have been out your head.
Eye hole deep in muddy waters.
You practically raised the dead.

Rob the grave, to snow the cradle.
Then burn the evidence down.
Soapbox, house of cards, and glass,
So don't go tossin' your stones around.

You must have been high.
You must have been high.
You must have been.

Foot in mouth, and head up asshole.
Whatcha talkin' 'bout?
Difficult to dance 'round this one
'til you pull it out, boy!

You must have been, so high.
You must have been, so high.

Steal, borrow, refer, save your shady inference.
kangaroo done hung the juror with the innocent.

Now you're weeping shades of cozened indigo
Got lemon juice up in your...EYE!

When you pissed all over my black kettle
You must have been HIGH, HIGH
You must have been HIGH, HIGH

Who are you to wave your finger?
So full of it.
Eyeballs deep in muddy waters
Fuckin' hypocrite.

Liar, lawyer, mirror, show me.
What's the difference?

kangaroo done hung the guilty with the innocent.

NOW!!
You'll weep or, change the cozened indigo.
Got lemon juice up in your high eye.
When you pissed all over my black kettle
You musta been!

So who are you to wave your finger?
Who are you to wave your fatty fingers at me?
You must, have been, out your, mind!

Weepin' shades of indigo
Shed without a reason
Weepin' shades of indigo

Liar, lawyer,
Mirror for ya,
What's the difference?
kangaroo be stoned
He's guilty as the government

NOW!!
Will you weep or, change the cozened indigo
Got lemon juice up in your, EYE!!
EYE!!

Now when you pissed all over my black kettle.
You musta been HIGH, HIGH, HIGH, HIGH.
Eyeballs deep in muddy waters
Your balls deep in muddy waters.
Ganja, please, you must have been out your MIND!!!!

["Kangaroo" refers to "kangaroo courts", which were mock courts established to prove people guilty without a fair trial or any real evidence - most of the court cases dealt with marijuana users]

Tool - "Wings for Marie (pt 1)" (10.000 days"

Amazing intro... haunting. Think Linkin' Park's crazy song "Session".

Bottleshock (2008)

Very feel good, with an overwhelming amount of beautiful Californian scenery. You'd think that for me, it must be awesome, and though I greatly enjoyed the film, at one point the overly careful slightly-overburned imagery was a bit too much.

The film picked up a bit more speed in the second half, and all in all a wonderful treat for a late Friday night.

Miami Vice (2006)

Hyperrealism; the colouring, the dry shots (very subdued) during the shootout.

Cars / driving: not so much, but that was a personal thing to watch this film.

It works well. The style looks good. Some so-so acting. One strange shot of early-morning back to night time.

Melancholia (2011)

Lars von Trier (written & directed by)

Kirsten Dunst, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Kiefer Sutherland.

What is this about? The failure of humanity in the face of inevitability?
The fact that deep down inside, etiquette, culture mean nothing?

"It tastes like ash."

The wedding that ended before it really had begun. Inevitable.
The mother and father fighting. Inevitable.

TED - Best of the web - Richard Feynman

"I have a lot of fun imagining things. We can understand so much by thinking about things, and it should be fun. There are no questions at the end, no teacher asking questions. Otherwise it becomes a horrible subject."

Andrew Lloyd Webber - "Jesus Christ Superstar"

Still don't know what it is with this album, but I love it. Certain songs and bits regularly come to mind, and every now and then I must hear it integrally.

Red Elvises - "Memoirs Of A Phuket Geisha" (Lunatics & Poets)

Melancholic, gypsy... it reminds me of this '80's British song that I cannot name...
Not all other songs from the same album are as exciting:

• Ticket to Japan : also ok

Devotchka - "Such A Lovely Thing"

Gypsy, Klezmer-ish, faster and faster until you rotate so fast you can't see your eyes anymore.

It's not their best song, but good.

Dutch Pink - "Idols and Infidels"

Raw, Tom Waits, vaudeville-ish, stamping on the wooden tables with a pint.

Roger Zelazny - "The Last Defender of Camelot"

•  "He Who Shapes"
  using dreams to fix neuroses. Intriguing.
• "Auto-Da-Fe"
  my old classic from the penguin short sci-fi books. Still good.
• "Damnation Alley"
  Pretty amazing post-apocalyptic work.
• "For a Breath I Tarry"
  An almost poetic worded story of Frost, controlling the northern hemisphere after the last humans have died.
• "The Stainless Steel Leech"
  Well executed. Can learn from this.
• The Engine at Heartspring's Center"
  Strange story about a cyborg living near a euthanasy centre.
• "The Last Defender of Camelot"
  Amazing story about a thousand year old Lancelot.

E.S. Posthumus - "Tikal" (Unearthed)

instrumental, orchestral, very film-score ish, fast paced beat, angelic chorus

Chris Isaak - "Black Flowers"

Among his best songs.

Marianne Faithfull - "Counting"

Immmensily beautiful, not at all like the raw sound she's famous for.

Counting time you have stood at the foot of my ivory tower
And waited and called out my name by the hour and counted
On the wings of my heart strings to carry the sound
I have counted on pleading, you see how I need you, come down

And now between twililght and midnight I come to you
Down in my gown of soft moonbeams and starlight
Bright is the evening, the breezes have fenced us

Roger Zelazny - "He Who Shapes" (in: The Last Defender of Camelot)

Intriguing story. If it teaches anything, it is building up to the climax.

Arvo Pärt - "Fratres (violin & piano)" (1980)

tears...

Paul Oakenfold - "Zoo York" (Bunkka)

"Requiem for a dream" mixed with a haunting voice, even U96 "Das Boot" hints..

Cool!

Tom Waits - "Ol' 55"

Well my time went so quickly,
I went lickety-split out to my old '55
As I drove away slowly, feeling so holy,
God knows, I was feeling alive.

Now the sun's coming up,
I'm riding with Lady Luck,
Freeway cars and trucks,
Stars beginning to fade,
And I lead the parade

Just a-wishing I'd stayed a little longer,
Oh, Lord, let me tell you
That the feeling's getting stronger.

And it's six in the morning,
Gave me no warning; I had to be on my way.
Well there's trucks all a-passing me,
And the lights are all flashing,
I'm on my way home from your place.

And now the sun's coming up,
I'm riding with Lady Luck,
Freeway cars and trucks,
Stars beginning to fade,
And I lead the parade

Just a-wishing I'd stayed a little longer,
Oh, Lord, let me tell you
That the feeling's getting stronger.

And my time went so quickly,
I went lickety-split out to my old '55
As I pulled away slowly, feeling so holy,
God knows, I was feeling alive.

Now the sun's coming up,
I'm riding with Lady Luck,
Freeway cars and trucks,
Freeway cars and trucks,
Freeway cars and trucks...

J.D. Salinger - "Raise high the roof beam, carpenters"

I kind of liked the story, but feel I should like it more than I did. Reading was erratic, bits and pieces here and there. Did it shatter in my mind?

Should reread it after a couple of months. In one go.

Placebo - "In The Cold Light Of Morning" (Meds)

Haven't been listening much to Placebo for years now, but recently Pandora has been playing some and it's been good.

Newly discovered this one. Late-night song.

DJ Shadow - "Blood On The Driveway" (In Tune and On Time)

Interesting.

Part of the parlando ("I'm with you..") doesn't work that well for me. The singing much better.

Depeche Mode - "Freelove (Flood mix)"

Ages since I heard this. Always have difficulty finding the name. For some reason "Enjoy the Silence" pops up in my mind.

Marianne Faithfull - "So Sad"

I'll probably log this song every time I (or Pandora) play it.

It's worth it.

The Clover - "Lovely Potion #9"

Old and swing-y. Nice.

Nothing

Watched it again when I wanted something lighthearted. Must admit I didn't watch it to the end, but was disappointed. It seemed... amateuristic? Not really, but definitely not living up to my expectations.

It's Immaterial - "Driving Away From Home (Jim's Tune)"

80's-sounding driving song. Not much electronics. A Supertramp-whiney synth.

Bill Murray reads poetry to construction workers

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rj_LYsvGF0E

Leon Redbone - "My Walking Stick" (On The Track)

Strange, vaudeville, crooner.

Ane Brun - "To Let Myself Go" (A Temporary Drive)

Haunting, again. Seems similar, in my mind, to "This Voice", in style and singing.

Still, not bored by it.

Shiny Toy Guns - "Major Tom" (single)

Catchy 80's synthpop, from Californian band.

• "Frozen Oceans" - full frontal synth waves
  
• "Ghost Town" - more guitars, powerful. MIA-ish voices.
  
• "Richochet!" - rock, Marilyn Manson-ish sound to it
  
• "We Are Pilots" - slow, more vocal
  

All in all, "Major Tom" seems by far the best song.

The Blue Hawaiians - "Human Jungle (live)" (Live At The Lava Lounge)

Melancholy surf guitars, but with a sharper, rockier edge.

Duel

Still pretty intense. Haven't seen it for decades, but it still works.

Amazing.

Also, pretty good view of California!

the Torquays - "Overdrawn at Cortes Bank" (Somewhere in California)

Nice surf, not too fast, melodious.

Is a complete album interesting?

The Glitch Mob - "We Can Make The World Stop" (single)

Daft Punk-ish, nice beats, funky. Hints of '80's synths, but heavily overdubbed.
Came by on the Ratatat channel by the way, not Daft Punk...

Tom Waits - "Face To The Highway" (Bad As Me)

Wonderful. About leaving.

Matt King - "Waiting At The Bottom" (Rube)

Very slow, evening'esque.

With funny soft "shoop" chorus!

Tishamingo - "Devil's Love Song" (Point)

Not as raw or swampy as Jace Everett can be, or velvety blues like Chris Isaac, but still pretty good.

Surf / swamp music, misc

• The Catalina's - "Banzai Washout" (Lost Legend of Surf Guitar - Volume 2 - Point Panic)
• Lively Ones - "Forty Miles of Bad Surf" (Surf City/Surfin' South Of the Border)
• Los Lonely Boys - "Onda" (Los Lonely Boys, Dual Disc Edition)

The Cheepskates - "Last Minute Rush" (Run Better Run)

Surf, not as raw as Dick Dale, nor as crazily fast as "Man, Or Astroman?", but pretty nice.

Instrumental, but curiously enough with some samples near the end.

Tito & Tarantula - "Back to the House" (Tarantalism)

Amazing song; the ultimate mariachi-rock, slowly building up...

All songs they did in Desperado are amazing.

Rod Picott - "Gettin' to me" (Tiger Torn Dixon Blues)

Tito & Tarantula channel. Not extremely gritty, bit swampy.

Old 97's - misc

• "Just Like California" - still the best song
• "Four Leaf Clover" - powerful, fast, punky
  

Old 97's - "Just Like California" (Too Far To Care)

Swinging, alt country-folk ish, cool!


Just like California was not even there
Since it's gone I'm so withdrawn, I ain't got no one nowhere
Right beside the ocean, my darlin' Clementine
Well the water got high and she never got dry and she was a water sign

Time is on my bad side
Halfway there just wouldn't be fair
So I'm goin' all the way tonight
Halfway there just wouldn't be fair
So I'm goin' all the way tonight

Just like California to make a fool of me
Steal the sideshow, burn the disco, slide into the sea
I'm a thinking person and I think that it's wrong
To keep on saying true love's waiting, when true love is long gone

Time is on my bad side
Halfway there just wouldn't be fair
So I'm goin' all the way tonight
Halfway there just wouldn't be fair
So I'm goin' all the way tonight
Halfway there just wouldn't be fair
So I'm goin' all the way tonight

Idiots and Angels

animated film. Fun enough, but it suffers from the common problem: the animator seemed, particularly in the beginning, too eager to show off what he could do.

The film would have benefit by cutting a few pieces and shortening some scenes.

Made me think of Mr Pye a bit, though in this animated feature the protagonist does not 'earn' the wings because of his good behaviour. Au contraire, they are a burden to him because they force him to do good.

Interesting that the protagonist is killed off around 2/3rd of the film

Peter Welch - "And Then I Thought I Was a Fish"

http://stilldrinking.org/the-episode-part-1

An amazing story about not sleeping for more than 7 days, taking way too much drugs (for someone not sleeping for 7 nights) and going crazy. Literally crazy, going to the nut house crazy.

It's an amazing read, aside from some very funny parts, a wonderful narrative of what it is like to go mad.

Everything But The Girl - "Single"

I eat less and think more

Marianne Faithfull - "Sleep"

Beuatifully sad and melancholy.

Julee Cruise - "into the Night"

This kind of explains all: Julee Cruise was the talent scout for composer Angelo Badalamenti when he was working on David Lynch's film Blue Velvet in 1985. Badalamenti discovered that her airy voice fit a song for the film, so she wound up recording "Mysteries of Love" for the soundtrack. Three years later, she released her first album, Floating into the Night, which featured music by Badalamenti and lyrics by Lynch.

Also: very strang unsuspected sound effect.

This might be music that quickly becomes tiring, but nevertheless intriguing enough to look into.

Funny song: "The Art of Being A Girl" : a short parlando about ordering coffee.

Gerard Nolst Trenité - The Chaos (1922)

Dearest creature in creation
Studying English pronunciation,
I will teach you in my verse
Sounds like corpse, corps, horse and worse.

I will keep you, Susy, busy,
Make your head with heat grow dizzy;
Tear in eye, your dress you'll tear;
Queer, fair seer, hear my prayer.

Pray, console your loving poet,
Make my coat look new, dear, sew it!
Just compare heart, hear and heard,
Dies and diet, lord and word.

Sword and sward, retain and Britain
(Mind the latter how it's written).
Made has not the sound of bade,
Say-said, pay-paid, laid but plaid.

Now I surely will not plague you
With such words as vague and ague,
But be careful how you speak,
Say: gush, bush, steak, streak, break, bleak ,

Previous, precious, fuchsia, via
Recipe, pipe, studding-sail, choir;
Woven, oven, how and low,
Script, receipt, shoe, poem, toe.

Say, expecting fraud and trickery:
Daughter, laughter and Terpsichore,
Branch, ranch, measles, topsails, aisles,
Missiles, similes, reviles.

Wholly, holly, signal, signing,
Same, examining, but mining,
Scholar, vicar, and cigar,
Solar, mica, war and far.

From "desire": desirable-admirable from "admire",
Lumber, plumber, bier, but brier,
Topsham, brougham, renown, but known,
Knowledge, done, lone, gone, none, tone,

One, anemone, Balmoral,
Kitchen, lichen, laundry, laurel.
Gertrude, German, wind and wind,
Beau, kind, kindred, queue, mankind,

Tortoise, turquoise, chamois-leather,
Reading, Reading, heathen, heather.
This phonetic labyrinth
Gives moss, gross, brook, brooch, ninth, plinth.

Have you ever yet endeavoured
To pronounce revered and severed,
Demon, lemon, ghoul, foul, soul,
Peter, petrol and patrol?

Billet does not end like ballet;
Bouquet, wallet, mallet, chalet.
Blood and flood are not like food,
Nor is mould like should and would.

Banquet is not nearly parquet,
Which exactly rhymes with khaki.
Discount, viscount, load and broad,
Toward, to forward, to reward,

Ricocheted and crocheting, croquet?
Right! Your pronunciation's OK.
Rounded, wounded, grieve and sieve,
Friend and fiend, alive and live.

Is your r correct in higher?
Keats asserts it rhymes Thalia.
Hugh, but hug, and hood, but hoot,
Buoyant, minute, but minute.

Say abscission with precision,
Now: position and transition;
Would it tally with my rhyme
If I mentioned paradigm?

Twopence, threepence, tease are easy,
But cease, crease, grease and greasy?
Cornice, nice, valise, revise,
Rabies, but lullabies.

Of such puzzling words as nauseous,
Rhyming well with cautious, tortious,
You'll envelop lists, I hope,
In a linen envelope.

Would you like some more? You'll have it!
Affidavit, David, davit.
To abjure, to perjure. Sheik
Does not sound like Czech but ache.

Liberty, library, heave and heaven,
Rachel, loch, moustache, eleven.
We say hallowed, but allowed,
People, leopard, towed but vowed.

Mark the difference, moreover,
Between mover, plover, Dover.
Leeches, breeches, wise, precise,
Chalice, but police and lice,

Camel, constable, unstable,
Principle, disciple, label.
Petal, penal, and canal,
Wait, surmise, plait, promise, pal,

Suit, suite, ruin. Circuit, conduit
Rhyme with "shirk it" and "beyond it",
But it is not hard to tell
Why it's pall, mall, but Pall Mall.

Muscle, muscular, gaol, iron,
Timber, climber, bullion, lion,
Worm and storm, chaise, chaos, chair,
Senator, spectator, mayor,

Ivy, privy, famous; clamour
Has the a of drachm and hammer.
Pussy, hussy and possess,
Desert, but desert, address.

Golf, wolf, countenance, lieutenants
Hoist in lieu of flags left pennants.
Courier, courtier, tomb, bomb, comb,
Cow, but Cowper, some and home.

"Solder, soldier! Blood is thicker",
Quoth he, "than liqueur or liquor",
Making, it is sad but true,
In bravado, much ado.

Stranger does not rhyme with anger,
Neither does devour with clangour.
Pilot, pivot, gaunt, but aunt,
Font, front, wont, want, grand and grant.

Arsenic, specific, scenic,
Relic, rhetoric, hygienic.
Gooseberry, goose, and close, but close,
Paradise, rise, rose, and dose.

Say inveigh, neigh, but inveigle,
Make the latter rhyme with eagle.
Mind! Meandering but mean,
Valentine and magazine.

And I bet you, dear, a penny,
You say mani-(fold) like many,
Which is wrong. Say rapier, pier,
Tier (one who ties), but tier.

Arch, archangel; pray, does erring
Rhyme with herring or with stirring?
Prison, bison, treasure trove,
Treason, hover, cover, cove,

Perseverance, severance. Ribald
Rhymes (but piebald doesn't) with nibbled.
Phaeton, paean, gnat, ghat, gnaw,
Lien, psychic, shone, bone, pshaw.

Don't be down, my own, but rough it,
And distinguish buffet, buffet;
Brood, stood, roof, rook, school, wool, boon,
Worcester, Boleyn, to impugn.

Say in sounds correct and sterling
Hearse, hear, hearken, year and yearling.
Evil, devil, mezzotint,
Mind the z! (A gentle hint.)

Now you need not pay attention
To such sounds as I don't mention,
Sounds like pores, pause, pours and paws,
Rhyming with the pronoun yours;

Nor are proper names included,
Though I often heard, as you did,
Funny rhymes to unicorn,
Yes, you know them, Vaughan and Strachan.

No, my maiden, coy and comely,
I don't want to speak of Cholmondeley.
No. Yet Froude compared with proud
Is no better than McLeod.

But mind trivial and vial,
Tripod, menial, denial,
Troll and trolley, realm and ream,
Schedule, mischief, schism, and scheme.

Argil, gill, Argyll, gill. Surely
May be made to rhyme with Raleigh,
But you're not supposed to say
Piquet rhymes with sobriquet.

Had this invalid invalid
Worthless documents? How pallid,
How uncouth he, couchant, looked,
When for Portsmouth I had booked!

Zeus, Thebes, Thales, Aphrodite,
Paramour, enamoured, flighty,
Episodes, antipodes,
Acquiesce, and obsequies.

Please don't monkey with the geyser,
Don't peel 'taters with my razor,
Rather say in accents pure:
Nature, stature and mature.

Pious, impious, limb, climb, glumly,
Worsted, worsted, crumbly, dumbly,
Conquer, conquest, vase, phase, fan,
Wan, sedan and artisan.

The th will surely trouble you
More than r, ch or w.
Say then these phonetic gems:
Thomas, thyme, Theresa, Thames.

Thompson, Chatham, Waltham, Streatham,
There are more but I forget 'em-
Wait! I've got it: Anthony,
Lighten your anxiety.

The archaic word albeit
Does not rhyme with eight-you see it;
With and forthwith, one has voice,
One has not, you make your choice.

Shoes, goes, does *. Now first say: finger;
Then say: singer, ginger, linger.
Real, zeal, mauve, gauze and gauge,
Marriage, foliage, mirage, age,

Hero, heron, query, very,
Parry, tarry fury, bury,
Dost, lost, post, and doth, cloth, loth,
Job, Job, blossom, bosom, oath.

Faugh, oppugnant, keen oppugners,
Bowing, bowing, banjo-tuners
Holm you know, but noes, canoes,
Puisne, truism, use, to use?

Though the difference seems little,
We say actual, but victual,
Seat, sweat, chaste, caste, Leigh, eight, height,
Put, nut, granite, and unite.

Reefer does not rhyme with deafer,
Feoffer does, and zephyr, heifer.
Dull, bull, Geoffrey, George, ate, late,
Hint, pint, senate, but sedate.

Gaelic, Arabic, pacific,
Science, conscience, scientific;
Tour, but our, dour, succour, four,
Gas, alas, and Arkansas.

Say manoeuvre, yacht and vomit,
Next omit, which differs from it
Bona fide, alibi
Gyrate, dowry and awry.

Sea, idea, guinea, area,
Psalm, Maria, but malaria.
Youth, south, southern, cleanse and clean,
Doctrine, turpentine, marine.

Compare alien with Italian,
Dandelion with battalion,
Rally with ally; yea, ye,
Eye, I, ay, aye, whey, key, quay!

Say aver, but ever, fever,
Neither, leisure, skein, receiver.
Never guess-it is not safe,
We say calves, valves, half, but Ralf.

Starry, granary, canary,
Crevice, but device, and eyrie,
Face, but preface, then grimace,
Phlegm, phlegmatic, ass, glass, bass.

Bass, large, target, gin, give, verging,
Ought, oust, joust, and scour, but scourging;
Ear, but earn; and ere and tear
Do not rhyme with here but heir.

Mind the o of off and often
Which may be pronounced as orphan,
With the sound of saw and sauce;
Also soft, lost, cloth and cross.

Pudding, puddle, putting. Putting?
Yes: at golf it rhymes with shutting.
Respite, spite, consent, resent.
Liable, but Parliament.

Seven is right, but so is even,
Hyphen, roughen, nephew, Stephen,
Monkey, donkey, clerk and jerk,
Asp, grasp, wasp, demesne, cork, work.

A of valour, vapid vapour,
S of news (compare newspaper),
G of gibbet, gibbon, gist,
I of antichrist and grist,

Differ like diverse and divers,
Rivers, strivers, shivers, fivers.
Once, but nonce, toll, doll, but roll,
Polish, Polish, poll and poll.

Pronunciation-think of Psyche!-
Is a paling, stout and spiky.
Won't it make you lose your wits
Writing groats and saying "grits"?

It's a dark abyss or tunnel
Strewn with stones like rowlock, gunwale,
Islington, and Isle of Wight,
Housewife, verdict and indict.

Don't you think so, reader, rather,
Saying lather, bather, father?
Finally, which rhymes with enough,
Though, through, bough, cough, hough, sough, tough??

Hiccough has the sound of sup...
My advice is: GIVE IT UP!

To LIve and Die in L.A.

Plot- and story wise it has a fair amount of holes and strange unrealistic twists.

But it's clear to see its appeal. Its powerful mood is most visible in the scenes with least to none dialogue.

Tin Hat Trio - "Empire Of Light" (Book Of Silk)

like an old French chanson.

Ane Brun - "This Voice" (A Temporary Drive)

Girl with lightly rough voice, simple music, 70's in its simplicity.

A bit haunting. Nice.

Her sound reminds me of Moby's "Wait For Me", but without the beats.

Felix Mendelssohn - "Songs Without Words II" (Peter Nagy, Mendelssohn: Songs Without Words II"

Soft piano. Melancholy.

Radio Citizen - "El Cielo" (Berlin Serengeti)

slow, Latin-American, rhythmical.

Nice!

Pi (Darren Aronofsky, 1998)

Jagged style, representing the overwhelming sensory input of the protagonist.

Protagonist not a nice guy. Empathy / sympathy created through his migraine attacks and the fact that everybody else is more vicious.

Story: mysticism, codecs, pattern, logic, higher truth.

Why does the rabbi let him go?

Devices: Go. Neighbour (in love, he does not respond). Stock market. Black & white, migraines. God in Bugs.

Repetition. (patterns?). Tell a story through the differences in repetition.

BBC4 - The Life Scientific - Schizophrenia

Jim al-Khalili talks to psychiatrist, Robin Murray about his life's work trying to understand why some people have schizophrenia and others don't. As a young man, Murray lived in an Asylum in Glasgow for two years, mainly because it offered free accommodation to medical students. Struck by how people's minds could play tricks on them and the lack of proper research into the condition, he resolved to put the study of schizophrenia on a more scientific footing. Fifteen years ago he believed schizophrenia was a brain disease. Now, he's not so sure. Despite decades of research, the biological basis of this often distressing condition remains elusive. Just living in a city significantly increases your risk (the bigger the city the greater the risk); and, as Murray discovered, migrants are six times more likely to develop the condition than long term residents. He's also outspoken about the mental health risks of smoking cannabis, based both on his scientific research and direct experience working at the Maudsley Hospital in South London.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01bwmvt

John McCrae - "In Flanders Fields the poppies grow"

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly.
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved, and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

Hugh Laurie - "Let Them Talk"

New Orleans blues, if I'm not mistaken.

* "St James Infirmary" - instrumental, wonderful
* "Swanee River" - accordeon, jazzy, key-pounding piano
* "After You've Gone" - very classy bluesy
* "Lowdown, Worried and Blue" - very very blue

Popmatters' review of Tale of Tales' "The Path"

Intriguing game this must be. Careful, here be spoilers.

Labyrinths of Childhood: Exploring ‘The Path’
popmatters.com

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In Semiotics and the Philosophy of Language, Umberto Eco describes three types of labyrinths, the linear, the maze, and the net, and how each one relates to the encyclopedia. Eco claims that the linear labyrinth is the simplest to navigate because it’s a “continuous line” that has been wrapped around itself (Semiotics and the Philosophy of Language, Indiana University Press, 1984, p.80). The second type, the maze, is more complicated because it includes multiple paths—some of which are dead ends—and that the traveler needs to choose which path to follow in such labyrinths. Eco’s writes of his third type of labyrinth, the net: “the main feature of a net is that every point can be connected with every other point, and, where the connections are not yet designed, they are however, conceivable and designable” (p. 81). If the linear labyrinth is a line and the maze is a tree, then the net is “a system of embedded polygons” (p. 81).


Eco’s net structure is most commonly compared to the “rhizome” described by Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari as “the best image of a net” (A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia, University of Minnesota Press, 1987, p. 81). Deleuze and Guattari also describe their rhizome by comparing it to a map. They claimed that both were “open and connectable in all of [their] dimensions… susceptible to constant modification” (p. 12). However, Deleuze and Guattari make it clear that “one of the most important characteristics of the rhizome is that it always has multiple entryways” (12). However, Eco doesn’t make it clear if the net has multiple entrances like the rhizome or only one entrance like the other labyrinth structures.


Espen Aarseth, though, argues that since every point in the structure can be connected, Eco’s net is not a true labyrinth. Aarseth goes so far as to call the net “exactly the opposite of the fundamental inaccessibility of the other models” (Cybertext: Perspectives on Ergodic Literature, The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1997, p. 6). Aarseth has made the incorrect assumption that because a net is open (lacking the corridors and dead ends found in the other two structures), it’s an easier structure to navigate. Nothing could be further from the truth. Since every point can be connected to every other point, the traveler is presented with an infinitely greater number of possible paths than a maze could ever offer. No game better illustrates that Eco’s net is a valid, and challenging labyrinth structure than Tale of Tale’s The Path.


Eco describes the net as “unlimited territory”, and no other description could be more perfect for The Path. The Path, designed by Tales of Tales’s Auriea Harvey and Michael Samyn, is an open-world game based on the fairy tale, Little Red Riding Hood. The game begins in a red room with six girls. Each girl in the room is styled to make it clear that each has a distinct personality, but they are all wearing some kind of red outfit. The player chooses one of the girls and sets off for Grandmother’s house. Other than this opening scene and the final scene in Grandmother’s house, the majority of the game’s action takes place outdoors in an open forest.


The Path, then, is a game about exploration and ultimately about growing up, but the player doesn’t know this when she first starts playing. In The Poetics of Gardens, C. W. Moore, W. J. Mitchell, and W. Turnball Jr. write that “in a garden designed for exploration, it is essential, of course, not to reveal everything at once” (qtd. by Laurie N. Taylor, “Labyrinths, Mazes, Gardens, and Sandboxes: Game Space Metaphors”, Digital Humanities Librarian, University of Florida, 2006). Harvey and Samyn take this idea one step further, as the creators don’t reveal anything at all about the nature of the game—at least not at the game’s beginning. Instead, the player begins the game at the end of a gravel road looking out on an empty forest. The player is instructed to go to Grandmother’s house but is not given any directions for how to get there. The only clue the player has to follow is the well-worn path laid out before her. With no other hints to go on, the player decides to follow the path. The player soon discovers that this path does in fact lead to Grandmother’s house. However, after reaching the house and reuniting with Grandma, she is labeled a failure. She did not collect any items, unlock any secret rooms, or meet the wolf.


Since none of the objects that the player was meant to encounter were near the dirt path that she followed in a first playthrough, the player realizes that she must set out into the wood if she is to find any of these things. Even though the player now knows she is meant to find things, she still has no idea what these items are or where she will find them. There is no map or tutorial to show her the way. She must, as Eco puts it, “grope [her] way” around in order to reach her goal (p. 82).


This proves to be no easy task.


L.B. Jeffries describes the forest layout in The Path well when he calls it “disorienting and visually difficult to navigate” (ZA Critique: The Path>, PopMatters, 30 June 2009). If the player stays in the forest too long, “night” falls and the forest grows darker, making it nearly impossible for the player to see where she is going. Running is another factor that affects the player’s ability to explore. At first, running seems like a good idea. However, soon after the girl starts running, the camera pulls back and out. Now instead of seeing the forest from the girl’s eye level, the player is looks down from above. The longer that the player runs, the farther removed she is from the girl. This distancing effect severely limits the player’s peripheral vision.


After several attempts to navigate the forest, the player is left hopelessly lost. Even without the physical barriers that Aarseth claims are necessary to make a labyrinth inaccessible, the player still has a difficult time reaching her destination. While she could compare her situation to being lost in a maze, to do so would fail to accurately measure the game’s potential for exploration. One characteristic of a maze is that “it displays choices between alternative paths, and some of the paths are dead ends” (Eco, p. 81). The Path features many choices between alternative paths but no dead ends. There are paths that lead a player where she doesn’t want to go, but there are no physical barriers that force the player to stop and go back.


Even if a player does choose a route that leads her away from her goal, she will still encounter some of the objects and some of the flowers that she has been told to collect. Granted, there are objects that are only accessible to certain girls and there are some specific locations that are more meaningful to each girl, but every girl can reach every place in the game. Ruby may be the only girl to meet a wolf in the playground, but Robin is still allowed to come and play on the swings.


Also, Eco states that in a maze “certain choices are privileged in respect to others” (81). The only choice that is “privileged” in The Path is the decision to meet the wolf because meeting the wolf is the only way to be successful. However, unlike in a maze, the choice is not located at the end of a set path. The player can approach the wolf’s location from any direction and after any length of time. The player even has the option to find the wolf’s location and leave again before encountering the wolf.

One Wolf Per Girl

While the recognizable structure of a maze is completely missing (its walls, its boundaries), the game’s design does give the initial impression of being a linear labyrinth. For a game about maturation, this initial impression makes perfect sense. Choices are simple when life begins because children—especially girls—are expected to do as they are told. Giving the player a single path with no deviations mimics the way that young children see the world: there is what they are told to do and nothing else.


The irony is that following instructions usually results in positive affirmation for a child, but this is not the case in The Path. Instead, once again, the player is called a failure—the ultimate negative feedback—leaving her feeling both frustrated and disappointed for having “followed the rules”.


Jeffries believes that Harvey and Samyn designed this ending so that “irked, the player will go exploring on the second round, collecting items and trying to navigate the confusing forest.” He claims that the designers are “preying on […] the curious power that telling a gamer ‘You didn’t win’ seems to have over them.” However, the message behind this ending screen is much deeper than a simple challenge to do better next time. By giving the instructions to “stay on the path”, the designers turn exploration into an act of rebellion. Following directions didn’t get the player what she wanted, so she begins to question the authority of the ones who gave her those instructions. In order to get what she wants, the player has to start thinking for herself—an important step in growing up.


The Path had to be designed as a net because no other labyrinth structure could better support the game’s theme of growing up. Each of the girls represents a different stage of female development; their different ages and characteristics make this point obvious to the player. Just as in real life, each stage of development includes some decision that the player must face in order to move on. This decision is represented in The Path by the six different wolves hidden throughout the forest—one wolf per girl and each one represents a decision unique to a specific girl’s stage of development.


Again, the net structure of the game challenges the player to think for herself. Unlike the maze’s Minotaur, the wolf is not located at the end of a dead-end hallway where the player would be forced to encounter it. Instead, the wolf occupies a specific space that the player chooses to enter. The player can circle the wolf’s space while she considers what to do next; she can turn around and come back later. The player can even enter the wolf’s space without drawing the wolf’s attention. In fact, Harvey and Samyn designed the game so that the wolf will not initiate interaction with the girl. The player must consciously decide to approach the wolf and interact with it.


It is important to note that each of the wolf interactions have an ominous feel about them. In other words, the player is given fair warning that something is not right about these situations, but each wolf also comes with some kind of enticement specific to its girl. For Ruby, the enticement is cigarettes and a bad boy image. For Scarlet, the enticement is music and a sense of refinement. All six wolves have an allure that draws the player in and makes her go against her better judgment and engage the wolf.


These interactions with the different wolves represent another important step in growing up—dealing with the consequences of one’s actions. The player willingly puts the girl into a risky situation, and now she must accept responsibility for what has happened to her. As soon as the cut screen ends and the player sees the girl lying on the path in the rain, the player realizes what she has made happen. She feels shocked, remorseful, and even a little disgusted.


Then, the player sees the kill screen that calls her a success. The player now knows that the only way to achieve the success that she wants is to give each girl over to the wolf. This reality forces the player to confront yet another part of growing up, namely realizing how far she will go for personal gain. The success-driven player continues and becomes, as Jefferies says, “a kind of seducer, studying the girl and taking her to the places [she] knows will resonate with her […] And with this knowledge [she] guides them to their inevitable wolf, their violation and loss of innocence.”


The net structure supports the forest’s message of making choices and thinking for oneself, but once the player decides to go through with the violation, there are no more choices to be made. To illustrate the theme of dealing with consequences, Harvey and Samyn designed Grandmother’s house as a linear labyrinth. After entering the gates, all freedom is taken away from the player. The player is not even allowed to choose her own direction through the house. Instead, the game dictates which way the girl moves no matter which directional key the player uses. Harvey and Samyn want the player to acknowledge that her decisions in the forest have created this route and now she has no choice but to follow it. Rebellion and curiosity have led to consequences that the player must face.


During these sequences. the player is taken on a disturbing ride full of grotesque images and unnerving sound effects. The length of this sequence depends on the objects that the player has discovered in the woods, but no matter how long it lasts, each segment ends the same way—with the violent death of the girl. Hermann Kern writes that “the center [of a linear labyrinth] is where death and rebirth occur” (Through the Labyrinth: Designs and Meanings over 5,000 Years, Prestel, 2000, p. 30). The “death” is when the traveller reaches the end of the labyrinth and the “rebirth” is when the traveller turns around (“a 180-degree change of direction”) and goes back out the way that she came in (p. 30). In The Path, the traveller’s death is more literal than figurative. The player’s last image of each girl is her broken body.


Unfortunately, the designers end the metaphor there, leaving the player without the possibility of rebirth. The girl that was killed does not reappear unharmed in the opening room. Instead, the player only sees the girls that she has not played. Not until the player has used each girl does the player receive some feeling of rebirth. However, the feeling is still incomplete because the final girl (a seventh girl), the girl in white, still dies violently. At the very end of the game, she stands in a blood-stained dress in the opening room. The girl in white is not reborn; she’s the same girl, only tainted.


Kern calls the linear labyrinth “the embodiment […] of initiation rites” and claims that “a certain level of maturity is required to understand the shape of, as well as to make the decision to venture into, a labyrinth” (p. 30). The maturity represented in The Path may not be the type that Kern had in mind, but there is no denying that the girl who enters Grandmother’s house is more experienced in the ways of the world than she was when she started the game. However, the girl is only able to reach the level of maturity necessary to enter the linear labyrinth because the net labyrinth challenged her to think for herself and gave her “an unlimited territory” to explore.


The designers have turned exploration into an act of rebellion. Following directions didn’t get the player what she wanted, so she begins to question the authority of the ones who gave her those instructions. In order to get what she wants, the player has to start thinking for herself—an important step in growing up.

Where The Wild Buffalo Roam

An amazing Hunter S. Thompson. As amazing as Johnny Depp.

Tanya Donelly - (misc)

other half of the Throwing Muses (with step-sister Kirstin Hersh)

Dreamy, eerie, interesting.

• "Moonbeam Monkey" - eerie


• "Spaghetti" - upbeat and strange lyrics, nice

A Blaze Colour - "A Blaze Colour"

Heard once on X-Rated.

• "Through With Life" - Slow, but intriguing. Uneasy lyrics. *)
• "Dark Times Ahead" - 80's. More uptempo.
• "The New Ones" - repetitive, same 80's voice

*) Might be good for writing

Stone (2010)

Robert DeNero, Edward Norton, Mila Jojovich.

Arsenist's wife seduces prison shrink in order to get her husband free? But things shift.

I don't feel it. The story, it's .... too random?

One joint of marihuana

18 months.

eight-teen months!!!!!!!! fil

Buy the ticket, take the ride

"a supreme, Southern gentleman"

"interesting times have been the oldest of curses, and mazes have monsters in them too." (narrator)

Shotgun golf: whiskey, golf & shotgun; sshooting the ball out of the sky; fair game.

Kentucky Derby: wanted to find the face behind the decadence. Went shitfaed for a week then looked at himself and Ralph (his lawyer) and knew; this is the depraved ecadence. It is us.

He would always last forever, because he was always real, real gone.

He gives us a reason to continue, or at least, a damn good alibi.

it has come to this

it has come to this; where I forget as many dates of deaths of those who shaped my life, as I forget the dates of birth of friends still here.

William S. Burroughs : A Man Within (2010)

Demolished labels.

Sad. Emotion shutdown according to Genesis P-Orridge.

The literary agent that is being interviewed is an asshole full of his own shit.

He cried when thinking of nuclear war, imaging his 6 cats dying.

3 cut-up novels, inspired by the cut-up machine

P-Orridge; he was obsessed with control.

"upbringing was very middle class but he had a housekeepr who introduced him to opium"

[walking with a gun] "I want to shoot SOMETHING! I want to shoot SOMETHING!!"

Immense silencer in his basement. Would shoot 6 rounds of 38's and you wouldn't hear a thing in the living room.

[shooting] "This is better than heroin; you shot something else and *it* went bang!"

Killed his wife in William Tell way. Happened in Mexico. Left without trial.

"I am forced to the appalling conclusion that I would've never have become a writer but for Joan's death."

Ginsberg was politically correct within the hippy movement. Burroughs was absolutely not. (I wonder if that is why Ginsberg always, to me deep down inside, feels like a poser.)

- the priest, they called him

- dead city radio

Maxence Cyrin - "Where Is My Mind" (It's Kind Of A Funny Story) (OST)

kinda nice.

Bonzo Dog Band - "Ali Baba's Camel" (The Bonzo Dog Band Vol 2 - The Outro"

Weird voices, crazy singing, love it

Aine Minogue - "Exile" (Between The Worlds)

Very Loreena McKennith ish, yet it struck a note with me. Was reminded of Alanis Morissette's "Supposed Former Infatuation Junkie" sound, its haunting, eerie minor-chords of "Unintended"

Virgin Suicides

Still an amazing film. Incredible. Music, the scene, the setting....

David Lynch - "Crazy Clown Time"

Disturbing songs. Lots of vocoders, but they add to the eerie mood.

Crazy lyrics.

This man is a genius, even if you don't like his stuff

District 9 - OST

intense. Didn't know this. Didn't remember from the film. Have to relisten.

Valhalla Rising

By Nicolas Winding Refn.

Very slow-paced mood piece, of a warrior, One Eye, and a kid. Escaping pagans, travelling with Christian Vikings, to end up, not in Jerusalem, but the New Land.

Madness (Belief) takes its toll. Uncertainty.

Seldom seen such intense use of over-exposure (particularly of the sky) in such an amazing way.

I Am Kloot - "Avenue of Hope"

no-one's born, no-one dies,
no-one loves, so no-one cries,
and we wait to see just what we will become

don't let me borrow, don't let me bring,
don't let me wallow, don't make me sing,
let me see just who I will become

Nicolas Winding Fern - "Drive"

slow, but intriguing. Music-wise 80's. Bladerunner elements.

Some parts, particularly in the beginning, a bit too slow. Much use of slow motion.

Good to have a film who doesn't jump from quick action to fast-paced dialogue. Takes his time.

Tron-ish music.

Why the pink titles? Curious choice.

Danny Boy

What's the best version?
I skip Johnny Cash and Tom Jones. I shiver just to think of Nana Mouskouri and the Kelly Family.
The Dubliners? Pretty good. Irish Tenors? Classic, but they have their touch. The Pogues? Pretty good, rooting in today's world with yesterday's sound.

update

Dave Matthews Band: no!
Eric Clapton: some horrible plonky-guitar version
Sarah Vaughan: too theatrical, as if she is in a musical

Ken Burns - "Baseball"

Impressive documentary about the origins and history of baseball, particularly if you know next to nothing about it.

• "It's not philosophical, it's not metaphysical, it's just so much fun!"
• [Civil War] "The left- and rightfielder could both make it back to our ranks. But we had not just lost our centerfielder, but also the only baseball in Alexandria, Texas." [soldier's diary]
• "I've heard we won the baseball game because our pitcher has a fine curveball. The purpose of the curveball is to deliberately deceive the batter. Harvard is not in the business of teaching perception."
• I am dumb, Harry
• sometimes there would be a keg of beer at 3rd base, to provide some extra support to the player.
  

Pusher (1996)

Nicolas Fern.

Rather rough film about a guy dealing drugs, sliding down the slippery slope of owing more and more...

Not bad, not crazily good. Don't watch if you're in a difficult mood.

Gotye - "Seven Hours with a Backseat Driver"

Strange instrumental song. Nice. Bit of Middle East influences.