Music:
Boiled in Lead, "Blackened Page": An interestingly mysterious song, written by one of my favorite fiction writers, the brilliant Steven Brust. J.S. Bach, "Cantata #77": Bach's Cantata's are some of the finest pieces of music ever written. Amazing. Mandelbrot...
Posted on February 22, 2008 3:13 PM • 1 Comments •
Metaphor, "Call Me Old and Uninspired or Maybe Even Lazy and Tired but Thirteen Bodies in my Backyard Say You're Wrong": Very cool (if silly) track from one of the best neo-progressive bands I found via Bitmunk. I love...
Posted on February 1, 2008 5:04 PM • 3 Comments •
Godspeed You! Black Emperor, "Antennas to Heaven": What can you really say about the greatest post-rock ensemble ever? The Windmill, "Please Keep War Stories to a Minimum": a recent post-rock discovery of mine, via bitmunk. Excellent group. Rachel's, "An...
Posted on January 25, 2008 3:24 PM • 7 Comments •
Haven't done this in a while: 10 random tracks from my iPhone: Porcupine Tree, "The Sky Moves Sideways" Mogwai, "I Chose Horses". Mellowness from one of the greatest Post-Rock groups around. Thinking Plague, "Lux Lucet". Thinking Plague is one...
Posted on January 18, 2008 2:48 PM • 4 Comments •
Ladies and gentlemen.. For your pleasure and edification, allow me to present... The singing Tesla coils! Yes, if you're clever, and you're willing to do a whole lot of work, you can operate a Tesla coil so that the...
Posted on November 5, 2007 4:31 PM • 29 Comments •
This past week, I discovered a new digital music download site, called Bitmunk. It's less expensive than iTunes or Amazon, and has a fantastic selection of obscure bands. Through Bitmunk, I found a couple of terrific new neo-progressive bands,...
Posted on October 26, 2007 10:25 AM • 3 Comments •
Sorry for the slow posting this week, but work has been a bit intense, and I've also had some family matters to take care of, which have left me with very little blogging time. Hopefully things will be a...
Posted on October 12, 2007 2:35 PM • 4 Comments •
Via YouTube, I came across this little gem. Who would have thought that you could create a beautiful fugue from a Britney Spears song? Fugues are one of my favorite musical forms. There's something magical (and something mathematical) about...
Posted on September 27, 2007 8:36 AM • 10 Comments •
Naftule's Dream, "Something is There": What do you get when you mix up a traditional Klezmer band with Ornette Coleman, plus just a bit of thrash? Naftule's Dream. Genesis, "Counting out Time": a catchy little tune from Peter Gabriel's...
Posted on September 7, 2007 3:36 PM • 4 Comments •
Sonic Youth, "Or": Very smooth for SY. But great. They're an amazing band. The Flower Kings, "Blue Planet": A typical track from one of my favorite neo-progressive rock bands. For the Flower Kings, this is a short one at...
Posted on August 17, 2007 11:04 AM • 8 Comments •
Marillion, "If My Heart Were a Ball It Would Roll Downhill": Very neat track from one of my favorite neo-progressive bands. Catchy, but with lots of layers. Mandelbrot Set, "Constellation of Rings": math-geek postrock. What's not to love? The...
Posted on July 13, 2007 3:42 PM • 8 Comments •
Thinking Plague: "The Aesthete": Thinking Plague is just plain odd. They're a hard-to-classify group. It's got vocals, but instead of the vocals being the lead, they treat voice as just another instrument. They're often atonal, and when they're tonal,...
Posted on June 29, 2007 12:09 PM • 5 Comments •
Baka Beyond, "Baka Play Baka": This is what happens when you take a bunch of great trad Irish musicians, and lock them into a room with a bunch of great African musicians from the Baka tribe in Cameroon. I...
Posted on May 11, 2007 3:38 PM • 3 Comments •
Rachel's, "Even/Odd": Rachel's is a very classically-oriented post-rock ensemble - violin, bass, woodwinds. They're absolutely brilliant. "Even/Odd" is a short, extremely rhythmic track with an interesting pulse with an almost siren-like string lead played over it. Very, very cool....
Posted on May 4, 2007 2:06 PM • 8 Comments •
The shuffle generated interesting results this week. Apothecary Hymns, "The Marigold". Apothecary Hymns sounding extremely Tull-like. Good stuff. Mogwai, "Katrien". Mogwai is simply brilliant: one of the greatest post-rock groups out there. I keep getting more of their stuff,...
Posted on April 20, 2007 12:15 PM • 1 Comments •
I've been swamped lately, learning to manage my new commute, and being overwhelmed by my new job. So I've been a bit lax about the blog; I've missed three weeks in a row for the friday pathological programming; and...
Posted on April 13, 2007 7:58 PM • 3 Comments •
Frameshift, "Walking through Genetic Space": a track from an album inspired by the writings of Steven Jay Gould about genetics and evolution. The leader of the project is the lead singer of Dream Theater; the end result has a...
Posted on February 16, 2007 2:05 PM • 6 Comments •
Marillion, "Ocean Cloud": Long, wonderful piece of neo-prog rock from my favorite prog band. Mogwai, "Acid Food": Mogwai is a brilliant post-rock group, leaning more towards the rock than the classical. This is a slow track with vocals, with...
Posted on February 2, 2007 10:37 AM • 1 Comments •
As an experiment, I decided to try making a iMix of the items in my FRT that are available via iTunes. Please let me know if you like this; it's a bit of extra work for me which I...
Posted on January 5, 2007 4:52 PM • 12 Comments •
Friday Not-So-Random Five I decided in honor of the new year, I'd do something a bit different this week. Instead of doing a random shuffle on my IPod, I separated out my favorites of the modern classical pieces that I...
Posted on December 29, 2006 4:01 PM • 2 Comments •
Kate Bush, "Pi". I've been waiting for this to show up in my shuffle for the FRT! Kate Bush, singing the digits of π! Suzanne Vega, "Knight Moves". This is an old favorite of mine. The lyrics have some...
Posted on November 24, 2006 12:31 PM • 4 Comments •
Trout Fishing in America, "I Get Ideas". Trout is a great band; they do both children's music and adult music. This is one of their children's songs, but I love it anyway. What's not to like about a song...
Posted on November 17, 2006 10:02 AM • 3 Comments •
By way of PZ, I just found the website of Jonathan Coulton, a musician who seems to specialize in humorous and geeky songs. The music is good; the lyrics are absolutely fantastic. Here's an example that he gives away, called...
Posted on November 13, 2006 11:18 AM • 5 Comments •
Porcupine Tree, "Prepare Yourself". Porcupine Tree is a strange bad, which started out as an elaborate joke. This is off of their most progressive album, "The Sky Moves Sideways". It's a brilliant piece of work. Dream Thater, "Blind Faith"...
Posted on November 10, 2006 11:48 AM • 0 Comments •
It's friday, so it's time for more of my highly warped taste in music. Tempest, "Turn of the Wheel". Tempest is a really cool band. They're a cross between an electrified folk band and a neo-progressive rock band. Strong Irish...
Posted on October 27, 2006 2:19 PM • 8 Comments •
It's friday again, which means I get to bore you with my bizarre taste in music. Spock's Beard, "A Guy Named Sid". SB is a fantastic neo-prog band, one of my favorites. This is a track off the first album...
Posted on October 6, 2006 4:18 PM • 5 Comments •
Steven Reich, "Explanations Come To An End Somewhere": one movement from one of Steven Reich's recent works, the "You Are" variations. I think it's some of the best stuff he's ever written. Fiddlers Four, "Pickin' the Devil's Eye". Another...
Posted on September 29, 2006 2:09 PM • 2 Comments •
It's friday again, so in addition to a bizzare programming language, you get a random ten. Transatlantic, "Mystery Train".: very cool neo-prog rock track. Darol Anger and the Republic of Strings, "Dzinomwa Muna Save". Darol Anger is one the most...
Posted on September 22, 2006 3:35 PM • 7 Comments •
Haven't done one of these in a while. In light of the "Geek-off" this week, I made a playlist out of what I think of as my "geekier" music, and let ITunes assemble a random list from that playlist. Elizabeth...
Posted on September 8, 2006 9:07 AM • 7 Comments •
It's friday again, so it's time for a random ten. So out comes my iPod, and the results are: Bela Fleck and the Flecktones, "Latitude": mediocre tune off of the latest Flecktones album. This album was a 3-CD set. Unfortunately,...
Posted on July 7, 2006 10:08 AM • 0 Comments •
The Stills, "In the Beginning". I accidentally downloaded this from Salon this morning. I know absolutely nothing about the band. Planet X, "Digital Vertigo". PlanetX is quite a strange group. All instrumental, something like a cross between bebop and...
Posted on June 16, 2006 6:21 PM • 2 Comments •
What kind of music does a math geek listen to? Capercaille: Who will raise their voice?. Traditional celtic folk music. Very beautiful song. Seamus Egan: Weep Not for the Memories. Mostly traditional Irish music, by a bizzarely talented multi-instrumentalist. Seamus...
Posted on June 9, 2006 9:43 AM • 7 Comments •
