music
aardvarchaeology | December 9, 2012I'm bothered by odd redundancy in an 80s song lyric. Millas mirakel advises us that "It is better to light the fire of life than to never be allowed to be yourself". Yes, and? That turn of phrase should compare two undesirable things, like "It is better to lose one toe than to lose both eyes." Here Milla, who I might add is overall a strangely schoolmasterly and archaic pop lyricist, is basically saying "It is better to win the lottery than to lose both eyes."
This is why we shouldn't have freedom of speech.
aardvarchaeology | November 8, 2012My part-time employers the Academy of Letters are charmingly unworldly in a muscular way. They're not a government body and are beholden to nobody except King Gustav III who laid down their bylaws in the 18th century. He hasn't cramped their style in quite a while. And they are quite comfortably funded indeed through various bequests and donations they have received through the centuries. The Academy is essentially an invitation-only club for professors in the humanities and social sciences, and their priorities are not of this world. Edit and publish the correspondence of a 17th century…
aardvarchaeology | October 29, 2012
Qoph is an excellent heavy psych rock outfit from Lidingö not far from where I live, and I'm really excited to learn that their third album is on its way! Here's the first single. I like it!
oracknows | August 21, 2012...that's right. It'll soon be time to get your flu shot. Listen to ZDoggMD:
I think I'll ask for the thimerosol-containing version of the vaccine again this year.
aardvarchaeology | August 7, 2012
My musical taste spans half a century, but like many people I have a particular soft spot for musicians of my own age and the albums they made during our 20s. I really love 90s neo-psych. It was disconcerting when these musicians started putting out divorce albums (of Montreal's brilliant 2007 Hissing Fauna, Are You the Destroyer?) and organising reunion tours (The Olivia Tremor Control in 2005). And now they've started dying.
Bill Doss of The Olivia Tremor Control and The Apples In Stereo died on 30 July, aged 43. He brought the 60s sunshine pop element to OTC's mind-bending musical stew,…
oracknows | July 30, 2012C. difficile is an enormous clinical problem to which, unfortunately, we physicians can contribute, as ZDoggMD tells us in Dawn of the C. Diff:
You go to the doctor to talk ‘em in
To givin’ antibiotics for your coughin’ thing
They explain that the pain in your throat’s a virus
“Antibiotics are not desirous!”
But you ain’t hearing this, you get all in they face
“Why, this is malpractice, a total disgrace!
I’m not leaving this place without a script, my man!”
Frustrated and berated, doc throws up his hands
The result? Well, let this video tell the tale:
aardvarchaeology | July 22, 2012This month marks the 50th anniversary of the Rolling Stones's first gig, at the Marquee Club in London. Journalist Hanspeter Kuenzler and Bavarian e-book publishers The eBook People GmbH celebrate the occasion with a massive illustrated two-volume biographical anthology in English on the band. Counting the pages in an e-book is of course difficult. But suffice to say that the first volume, that Aard has received for review, extends to 694 pages on my smartphone, where I read it.
Kuenzler provides the year-by-year narrative backbone of the story and, in a nice touch, for each year lists…
aardvarchaeology | July 12, 2012Black Keys – Brothers (2010). Soulful vocals and psychedelic guitars.
Brimstone Solar Radiation Band – Solstice (2005). Melodic Norwegian psych.
David Bowie – Low (1977). Soul rock interleaved with ambient instrumentals.
Howlin' Rain – Magnificent Fiend (2008). Soulful vocals and psychedelic guitars.
Lightships – Electric Cables (2012). Teenage Fanclub bassist goes solo.
Norm Sherman – The Esoteric Order of Sherman (2012). Eclectic musical comedy.
OK Go – Of the Blue Colour of the Sky (2010). Intricate studio pop, Prince falsetto.
Voodoo Trombone Quartet – Eponymous (2005). Ska, rocksteady,…
aardvarchaeology | July 5, 2012
This musical style was invented by the Pixies in the mid 80s. Their early work was a main source of inspiration for Curt Cobain of Nirvana. Now Cage the Elephant have recreated the early Pixies style from its blueprints and written a song about Cobain's birthplace in Washington state. I like it!
In other rock 'n' roll news, Fornvännen was just offered a review copy of a book about the Rolling Stones. The journal deals mainly with prehistoric archaeology. I guess Keith Richards has looked like Ötzi for quite some time now, come to think of it.
oracknows | June 14, 2012One of my favorite YouTube channels is Epic Rap Battes of History. Some of my favorite battles include Darth Vader vs. Adolf Hitler (and, of course, the rematch), Mr. T vs. Mr. Rogers (hilarious!), Napoleon vs. Napoleon, Gandalf vs. Dumbledore, and, of course, my favorite of all time, Albert Einstein vs. Stephen Hawking. However, just this morning I got a notification that the boys had finally posted a rap battle we've all been waiting for, one that I'm surprised they didn't do a long time ago. That's right: Steve Jobs vs. Bill Gates.
Apple vs. PC vs. Linux. Discuss. Yeah, I know. It's a…
oracknows | May 27, 2012I was thinking of taking Memorial Day off. There are several reasons. First, it's a holiday. Second, the blog still isn't functioning quite up to snuff after the transition to WordPress. In particular, we still have a major spam infestation that is unlikely to improve before Tuesday. It also doesn't help that I have a whole bunch of grant writing to do.
Then I saw this. I became aware of the post through a TrackBack, and that TrackBack came from the website of a rock group—yes a rock group, and a bad one, at that—made up of antivaccine loons. Those antivaccine loons call themselves The…
aardvarchaeology | May 16, 2012
Bizarre musical development. The drum and base genre of music was created when people turned up the tempo on drum machines to insane speeds. But this guy plays drum and base beats live! Ree-spect!
aardvarchaeology | April 30, 2012
This past weekend the Swedish Skeptics celebrated our 30th anniversary with a two-day conference in Gothenburg. It included the annual business meeting of the society at which I was reelected as chairman for a second year. And at dinner, I sang a song about how I view my role in the society, and the Swedish Skeptics' role in Sweden at large. It's Tomas di Leva's 1991 Själens Krigare, "Soul Warrior". Here's a quick translation.Can you feel it?
It is everywhere
Space opening
In our hearts
I am the soul's warrior
With love as my weapon
I am the soul's warrior
And the light in the tunnel
I am…
oracknows | April 4, 2012Remember The Refusers?
They're the antivaccine band with the recycled classic rock sound lacking a shred of originality or chops that flooded the blogosphere with their crazy in the form of Clash wanna be songs like Vaccine Gestapo, which inspired Surly Amy to make me a Vaccine Gestapo pendant to wear at TAM a couple of years ago. (I still wear it to various skeptical events from time to time.) Particularly amusing and pathetic was the antivaccine sing-along The Refusers ran a couple of years ago at the demonstration at Age of Autism in Chicago, complete with Andrew Wakefield gamely playing…
aardvarchaeology | April 2, 2012
I've written before about the prolific and many-talented Norm Sherman: a podcaster, multi-instrumentalist, song writer, singer and comedian with a truly unique voice. Several unique voices actually, thanks to his ear for accents. He occupies a position in geek-orientated on-line music and podcasting similar to that of George Hrab, another one of my favourites. But while Hrab has six albums to his name, the younger Sherman has two so far: his eponymous 2007 début and now the new The Esoteric Order of Sherman.
Both of Sherman's albums are musical comedy, but where the first one is mostly…
aardvarchaeology | March 22, 2012
I've been following Californian rock singer and guitarist Ethan Miller off and on since Comets on Fire's 2002 album Field Recordings from the Sun. I love his singing and psychedelic song writing. And so recently the song "Nomads" from the 2008 album Magnificent Fiend (with Miller's current band Howlin' Rain) has been playing in my head. I couldn't quite make sense of the lyrics, so I checked on-line, and found them (perhaps predictably) to be stonerishly meandering. But also bluntly self-referential in a way that is either really stupid or neatly self-ironic. You be the judge, Dear Reader.…
gregladen | February 29, 2012Davy Jones suffered a heart attack and died, in Florida, at 66 years of age.
Davy Jones, the lead singer of the 1960s group The Monkees, died of a massive heart attack Wednesday in Florida, his spokeswoman said. He was 66.
His publicist, Helen Kensick, confirmed that he died in Indiantown, where he lived.
Jones rose to fame in 1965 when he joined The Monkees, a British popular rock group formed for a U.S. television show. Jones sang lead vocals on songs like "I Wanna Be Free" and "Daydream Believer."
Jones was born Dec. 30, 1945, in Manchester, England. His long hair and British accent helped…
aardvarchaeology | February 17, 2012
Somehow I suddenly remembered the Sesame Street album I loved when I was a kid, 1977's Signs!. And sure enough, all the songs are on YouTube now!
aardvarchaeology | February 3, 2012I've been following Roy Zimmerman's output of musical satire since his 2004 album Faulty Intelligence, and I was certainly not disappointed by the recent You're Getting Sleepy. The CD's title is shared with the opening song and refers to the hypnosis that must be going on when half of the US electorate votes for the increasingly insane Republican Party. (Remember, Mitt Romney is their low-key, sensible and uncontroversial alternative!) As resident of a country whose entire spectrum of mainstream politics lies to the Left of Barack Obama, I of course have no problem with Zimmerman's stance.…