Aug 302013
Most surprising use of a 12-string guitar? You might say. I love Bowie’s rhythmic deployment of that instrument on his breakthrough albums; I didn’t know he kept using it that late into his career.
Almost anything goes in an All-Star Jam. Pull out your instrument of choice and join in.
Meanwhile, you might dig this Olde Thyme mix of music from founding RTHer General Slocum.
20s and 30s vol.1 by General Slocum on Mixcloud
YOU MEAN ALL THOSE OVERPRICED BEATLES BOOTS I’VE PURCHASED OVER THE YEARS ARE WORTHLESS NOW? DEPT.
http://mashable.com/2013/08/28/new-beatles-album-uncovered/
Did anyone see that Linda Ronstadt has Parkinson’s and can’t sing anymore? I just think that’s really awful. It’s not like I actually know Linda or anything, but that really bummed me out.
I did see that, and I felt a little sad for a loss of the time in my life that her peak years represented.
FILE UNDER REALLY STUPID STUFF ONLY I AND POSSIBLY 2 OTHER PEOPLE WILL APPRECIATE:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IWANZopDTeY
I never noticed the resemblance between Holly Robinson Peete and Terrence Trent D’Arby before!
Until a couple days ago, I thought she’d died, because all I’d heard was people saying “Did you hear the news about Linda Ronstadt? So terrible.” or things to that effect, and because I’m lazy I never bothered to actually look it up.
Any opinions on the new albums by Superchunk and Franz Ferdinand?
By the way, Bowie’s holstering midway through this song is fantastic! I dare you to find a more stylish, confident act of holstering.
The Superchunk album is solid, but it’s nothing new or different from what they’ve always done. This is not a problem for me, and I always enjoy hearing Jon Wurster play the hell out of the drums.
I’ve only heard the title track (I believe) from the new Franz Ferdinand. My impression after 2 listens is that it’s a bit of a waste of an excellent guitar hook. I want the song to be better, but the song never arrives, if that makes sense.
I haven’t heard the Superchunk album yet.
Dunkin’ Donuts is being taken to task for an ad campaign running in Thailand that some feel is racist for its “blackface” connotations. As much as I would like to agree with charges of corporate insensitivity, I’m thinking it’s more a matter of stupidity. The woman is eating a chocolate donut, and the taste infuses her with a brown coloring, which just happens to look a little bit like blackface. It’s not like she also starts grinning madly and wears oversized, bright red lipstick. If someone was pushing a blueberry- or cherry-flavored product the woman would turn blue or red. Would Native American groups protest? (I’m not even sure that any African American groups have launched these charges against Dunkin’ Donuts, by the way.) I can see what people are getting at.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7EOEk-RBLas
I don’t think it’s actual racism, but I do think the natural thing for people to think when they see something like that is “that’s blackface”. The corporation should probably have thought it through a little more, but yeah, I don’t believe it’s genuinely racist. The ad should probably be pulled though, just to avoid any more firestorm.
Agreed, I can’t believe they didn’t catch that likely tie-in before launching the campaign.
Americans might think that, but would people in Thailand have any understanding of blackface minstrelsy? I seriously doubt it.
Agreed, I can’t imagine people in Thailand making that association, but I imagine that someone working for Dunkin’ Donuts would have been a Westerner. Either way, this seemed like a non-story. I wanted to post my thoughts on a non-musical venue like Facebook, but I was in the middle of work, and I didn’t feel like giving any work friends I’m also FB friends with the idea that I do anything but work while I’m on the job.
Bwaaaah haaa haaa! A great spot.
I did not know that. So sad. She is a GREAT woman in my book. I am just old enough that guys were still putting her “Hasten Down The Wind” album posters up in their dorm rooms. I listen to that best of they put out in 2006 semi-regularly.
Two random thoughts:
1. I see Van Dyke Parks has a new album out, called “Songs Cycled.” Obviously a reference to his most famous album, I wonder if it’s intended as a “sequel.” Now, “Bat out of hell” is not my thing, so I’m not interested in that sequel and although I enjoyed Joe Jackson’s “Night and Day,” the idea of him making “Night and Day II” seemed a bit desperate – at least, the idea of him calling the album that. Seems that the sequel album is mostly common in rap and prog-rock, but I wonder has there ever been a sequel that was truly worthy of it’s predecessor or one that wasn’t an obvious plea for fair-weather fans to return?
2. This: https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=I_ifKtOwFd0#t=19
cher, that Utopian All-Star Jam was for the ages! Thank you for bringing tears of laughter to my eyes first thing in the morning.
Good question about the sequel album! You’d think there would be one decent example. I will be thinking about this question and let you know if I happen on a good one.
AND HERE I THOUGHT THAT JEFF “SKUNK” BAXTER WAS THE WINNER OF THE SURPRISE CAREER RETOOLING AWARD DEPT:
This, from a fascinating NYT Mag article on neural network game play in heads-up hold’em poker:
Soon after, in October 2006, Hamman called Gregg Giuffria, a neighbor of Gates’s at the Del Mar Country Club in Southern California, where both had homes. Giuffria was once better known as a member of the hard-rock band Angel, but now he ran a company that made gambling machines. After a bit of small talk, Hamman told him about Dahl’s software. “It’s real smart,” he said. “I thought it was only interesting. But then you play against it and realize that it’s bluffing you. All of a sudden, you’re talking to steel and glass like it’s human.”
By the time Giuffria heard from Hamman, he had already wandered far from arena stages. He took the first step in 1990, 15 years after Angel’s first album came out, when he had a life-changing dinner with Lee Iacocca, the former Chrysler chairman. (Giuffria’s wife, April, knew Iacocca as a family friend.) “I thought I was not the dumbest guy at the table,” Giuffria says, “but the dumbest guy on the planet.” He suddenly saw himself as a 39-year-old “white boy chasing rock ‘n’ roll, with hip-hop coming in — it was time for me to reinvent myself.”
Days later, he cut his hair and, on the advice of Iaccoca, began analyzing patents that the Defense Department was allowing to be released to the public sector. The hope was that Giuffria would discover an unexploited business opportunity and maybe Iaccoca would partner with him to develop it. Giuffria came across a company called Summit Systems that held a patent for a mathematical process that had an application for slot machines. Iaccoca passed, so Giuffria used royalties from his music career to acquire rights to the patent from the moribund company and eventually helped sell them to International Gaming Technology, now the world’s largest manufacturer of slot machines. “In one afternoon,” Giuffria says, “I made more money from that patent than I had in 18 years of touring, writing songs and getting gold records with Angel.”
That success hooked Giuffria on the gambling industry. He and Iacocca collaborated on casino developments around the country. Later, Giuffria built a Hard Rock casino near New Orleans and got into creating gambling machines. “It’s all entertainment,” Giuffria says, when describing the transition from rocker to gaming entrepreneur.
Funny, I didn’t bother reading that article because the headline focused on gambling/cards, which I have NO interest in. Had the headline worked in the Angel angle I would have clicked on the story.