Bill Cosby, Playboy Jazz Festival, Alfredo Rodriguez
Playboy have a jazz festival? And it was hosted by Bill Cosby this year? And what the hell is Bill playing with in his pocket? Some things are best left unanswered! Enjoy Alfredo!
Professor David Nutt: Superhero
Today, Professor David Nutt was relieved of his role as official Drug Advisor to the British government after he rightfully explained that alcohol is far more dangerous than most banned drugs. I watched him being interviewed on Sky News this evening. I was completely impressed by his performance. The man was dead right about everything he said!
As an aside: People love to dream of fantastic conspiracy theories, where George Bush is a reptillian and 9/11 was done by field mice, but they ignore real genuine shit thats going on around them. Conspiracies don't involve space aliens, they involve money and business. Look at Ireland, the "Celtic Tiger" was grown on one big housing-bubble conspiracy: "At all costs, keep the voters happy, so they keep buying houses!"
I can freely and legally walk into my local TESCO at half three in the morning and purchase all sorts of substances, such as weed killer, bleech, superglue... that will likely kill me with a single dose, and yet I become a criminal if a magic mushroom grows naturally out in my back garden. Why does the state feel a need to protect me from some harmless substances with criminal laws and yet turns a blind eye to other harmful substance abuse? I don't do drugs, except for, caffeine, sugar and alcohol [three wickidly damaging chemicals] but I am stanchly opposed to the corrupt nature of our misguided nanny-states. My respect for criminals increases everyday....
Spamming, kicked up a notch
I noticed that spam comments here have gotten a whole lot better. Before they were either blatant or of the "I love your site" stock comment. Now they are ad-lib and specific to the content of post, written like the person actually cares whats going on in the post. It's very subtle and there are no hyperlinks in the text, only the authors homepage links back.
I commend you spam people, you are really making an effort these days. I have fallen for it a few times too! And hey, maybe you guys really do own all those online casino's and porn sites that you include as your website.
I commend you spam people, you are really making an effort these days. I have fallen for it a few times too! And hey, maybe you guys really do own all those online casino's and porn sites that you include as your website.
America Will Be Nuked Today
Well what do you think of that video, ladies and gentlemen? The bomb will go off today, according to the prophets... well one said Obama would be assassinated and Mckenna's Time Wave Zero just predicted something would happen (tis' a bit vague really).
I've known of the Time Wave Zero thing for years. It predicts the end of "novelty" in 2012, independent of the Mayan calender, which does not necessarily mean the end of the world, just the end of history as we know it. The exact date for this October dip is the 26th, so close enough I guess. Looking at the correlation of events and trends within the wave however, like in the below video, one those feel that you could nearly shape it to fit any event.
I read a theory once about how time is shaped like a Helix, which outlined how time is recursive, like a fractal. This is the same as what McKenna found with Time Wave Zero. Again both ideas were formed independently. Just said I'd throw that in for the crack.
See, here's my theory. Even if you could predict the future, that shit changes things! It's like all that quantum funk that won't allow you to measure sub atomic events because it changes things when you do.
That said, we can all predict the future, we do it nearly every day. Get a friend to throw a ball at you. You and your body "predicts" where the ball will be in a few moments and adjusts to catch it. And the strange thing is, it's a historical fact that Nostradamus was shit at sports... makes you think doesn't it.
[videos via Ristorante Mystica]
Brad Mehldau Trio
I went to see the Brad Mehldau Trio in the Cork Opera House last night. First time I've seen them live. I have to admit I wasn't the biggest fan in the world, but that was out of ignorance rather than dislike. I do own a few albums but nothing crazy like.
First thing to be said about the show: hardly anyone there! Not surprising really, considering what a poor following jazz has in Ireland, especially Cork (see future post of mine). Second thing to mention: no photography! a dude had to come out on stage and make a point that the band requested this rule to be especially enforced, so no mobile phone snaps for you I'm afraid.
The band came out and did their thing. Brad Mehldau sat at the piano, on a throne of ego, pretence, arrogance and self-assuredness... what a presence! He was the personification of jazz. Every note played was conjured from the fingers of a perfectionist. The man could have sat and played an hour of silence and I would have been bowled over. You were certain there would be no goofy remarks about Star Trek and Scientology between songs with this guy. Wonderful, absolutely wonderful! The rest of the band did their thing but it was all Mehldau for me on the night.
Brad Mehldau does a lot of interpretations of other peoples songs, but unlike certain other jazz composers who do the same (Christopher O'Riley et al), I find the end results of his reworkings to be exquisite. They work on their own, you don't need to have heard the original to appreciate the effort. Take for example his version of Radiohead's Paranoid Android. Christopher O'Riley also reinterpreted the song but I find his version to be an overworked copy of the original with a façade of fugal decorations. Mehldau's version on the other hand, works as a jazz piece in it's own right, while capturing the spirit of the original. It was another of his Radiohead interpretations which sealed the deal for me with the man and his music. For [it must be] years I always assumed "Knives Out" to be his own piece until I found out it was a Radiohead track. It has remained as my most favourite song of his, so when I heard its opening notes being played on the bass at the start of the encore you can't begin to imagine how electrifying it felt for me. It was like the whole world made sense right at that moment.
When a live performance manages to blur your awareness to your immediate surroundings, the same as when you're listing to a CD in the security of your own home, you know it's been a good night.
First thing to be said about the show: hardly anyone there! Not surprising really, considering what a poor following jazz has in Ireland, especially Cork (see future post of mine). Second thing to mention: no photography! a dude had to come out on stage and make a point that the band requested this rule to be especially enforced, so no mobile phone snaps for you I'm afraid.
The band came out and did their thing. Brad Mehldau sat at the piano, on a throne of ego, pretence, arrogance and self-assuredness... what a presence! He was the personification of jazz. Every note played was conjured from the fingers of a perfectionist. The man could have sat and played an hour of silence and I would have been bowled over. You were certain there would be no goofy remarks about Star Trek and Scientology between songs with this guy. Wonderful, absolutely wonderful! The rest of the band did their thing but it was all Mehldau for me on the night.
Brad Mehldau does a lot of interpretations of other peoples songs, but unlike certain other jazz composers who do the same (Christopher O'Riley et al), I find the end results of his reworkings to be exquisite. They work on their own, you don't need to have heard the original to appreciate the effort. Take for example his version of Radiohead's Paranoid Android. Christopher O'Riley also reinterpreted the song but I find his version to be an overworked copy of the original with a façade of fugal decorations. Mehldau's version on the other hand, works as a jazz piece in it's own right, while capturing the spirit of the original. It was another of his Radiohead interpretations which sealed the deal for me with the man and his music. For [it must be] years I always assumed "Knives Out" to be his own piece until I found out it was a Radiohead track. It has remained as my most favourite song of his, so when I heard its opening notes being played on the bass at the start of the encore you can't begin to imagine how electrifying it felt for me. It was like the whole world made sense right at that moment.
When a live performance manages to blur your awareness to your immediate surroundings, the same as when you're listing to a CD in the security of your own home, you know it's been a good night.
I Finally Got My FÁS Certification
And it only cost me one blowjob! For more info on how you too can become a "professanal" check out here.
Flies & Shit
Anyway, I was just free-styling that shit right there, sorry, what I actually wanted to say was... Apparently those crazy Atheists, sorry "scientists", have managed to flash the brains of flies with false memories, the same as if you were flashing old EPROM microchips or something... and they did it using a "laser". So lasers can create memories and beer can remove them... Fuck depression, this world is awesome!
[New Scientist Article : via WOW]
Bloody Notes
Playing a bit too hard today :) Creating some wonderful ostinatos with my left hand though.
Dreamscapes
I painted these last night in bed. I was bored and figured I might as well do something constructive. The top one is loosely based on a dream I still remember from a few years back, the second is a continuation of the theme. I've included hi-res versions for people who like to click things.
Ooh Maahnt
zeuhlmusic.blogspot.com has really been churning out some Magma and Zeuhl treasures over the last year.
And for the curious... here's the song that the above bass score is for. It's in 6/4, who would have guessed :) J'adore la musique Zeuhl!
Like A Big Mental Disease
Major Lazer "Pon De Floor" from Eric Wareheim on Vimeo.
There's a hell of a lot of psychadelic big black ass banging going on in this video. There's a hell of a lot of... well, everything really.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
