Young Pervy Wanker
Les Paul Gone
Guitar legend Les Paul dies at age 94
By LUKE SHERIDAN
Associated Press Writer
Les Paul, the guitarist and inventor who changed the course of music with the electric guitar and multitrack recording and had a string of hits, many with wife Mary Ford, died on Thursday. He was 94.
According to Gibson Guitar, Paul died of complications from pneumonia at White Plains Hospital. His family and friends were by his side.
He had been hospitalized in February 2006 when he learned he won two Grammys for an album he released after his 90th birthday, “Les Paul & Friends: American Made, World Played.”
“I feel like a condemned building with a new flagpole on it,” he joked.
As an inventor, Paul helped bring about the rise of rock ‘n’ roll and multitrack recording, which enables artists to record different instruments at different times, sing harmony with themselves, and then carefully balance the “tracks” in the finished recording.
With Ford, his wife from 1949 to 1962, he earned 36 gold records and 11 No. 1 pop hits, including “Vaya Con Dios,” “How High the Moon,” “Nola” and “Lover.” Many of their songs used overdubbing techniques that Paul the inventor had helped develop.
Eagle vs. Wolf
via the Seemer
Tailfins of 1959
The poet Robert Lowell was heir to a New England literary tradition that included Herman Melville, a connoisseur of the metaphor and the metaphysics of finned creatures. In “For the Union Dead” in 1960, Lowell saw something sinister, even sinful, in the tailfin:
“….Everywhere,
giant finned cars nose forward like fish;
a savage servility
slides by on grease.”
Blonde On Blonde
A blonde woman was speeding down the road in her little red sports car and was pulled over by a woman police officer who was also a blonde. The blonde cop asked to see the blonde driver’s driving license.
She dug through her purse and was getting progressively more agitated. ‘What does it look like?’ she finally asked. The policewoman replied, ‘It’s square and it has your picture on it.’
The driver finally found a square mirror in her purse, looked at it and handed it to the policewoman. ‘Here it is,’ she said.
The blonde officer looked at the mirror, then handed it back saying, ‘OK, you can go. I didn’t realize you were a cop.’
Scientists Discover Terriers Are Stupid As Well As Annoying
Dogs as intelligent as two-year-old children
By Richard Gray, Science Correspondent
Intelligent border collies include Sampson, winner of Britain’s Most Talented Pet (Photo: John Robertson)
Researchers have found that dogs are capable of understanding up to 250 words and gestures, can count up to five and can perform simple mathematical calculations.
Using tests originally designed to demonstrate the development of language, pre-language and basic arithmetic in human children, the researchers were able to show that the average dog is far more intelligent than they are given credit for.
They have also compiled a list of the most intelligent and least intelligent breeds using information from obedience classes. Border collies and retrievers were rated among the most intelligent while hounds and terriers were the least bright.
The average dog is about as bright linguistically as a human two-year-old,” said Professor Stanley Coren, a leading expert on canine intelligence at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver who has carried out the work.
Revenge Of The Pervy Wanker
Cow Tongues Nailed To Trees in Brooklyn
15 Cow Tongues Found Nailed to Trees in Prospect Park
Brooklyn, NY – Fifteen calf tongues were found nailed to trees in Brooklyn’s Prospect Park recently.
The bizarre sighting was made in Peninsula Meadow, just north of Prospect Lake.
The tongues, which appeared to come from a butcher shop, were hanging about six feet off the ground from 15 different trunks, park officials said.
Parks Department officials said it’s a mystery why the animal parts were hung, but animal tongues are sometimes used in cult or fringe religious rituals.
Saving Whales With Art
A Whale of a Controversy
Japan’s dolphin-hunting industry gets skewered in The Cove, a just-released documentary by director Louie Psihoyos. But after this year’s setbacks at the International Whaling Commission’s annual meeting, dolphins aren’t the only marine mammals that are in trouble.
BY BRIAN FUNG | JULY 31, 2009
Blood on their hands: A demonstrator, covered in fake blood, lies on a Japanese flag as part of a 2008 antiwhaling protest outside Japan’s consulate in Melbourne. The first such movement began in 1977 with Save the Whales, which seeks to provide education about “marine mammals, their environment and their preservation.”
William West/AFP/Getty Images
Ruscha’s Frey Showing At Albright-Knox
‘Wall Rockets’ at Albright-Knox celebrates artist Ed Ruscha
NEWS ARTS WRITER
It was the dead of winter in 2006, and James Frey was in a bad way.
His best-selling memoir, “A Million Little Pieces,” had recently come under fire in the national media for factual inaccuracies. He had just appeared on “The Oprah Winfrey Show” to defend his work, and Oprah, once a fervent Frey supporter, had torn the author into a billion little shreds.
It seemed that everywhere Frey looked –on blogs and talk shows, in newspapers and magazines –someone was gleefully waiting to vilify him.
Others of lesser conviction might have fled to the hills of New Hampshire or Vermont to become J. D. Salinger-esque recluses, never to set foot in the public spotlight again. But Frey was never much for convention. In his time of need, instead of seeking refuge in alcohol or drugs or even therapy, the embattled author turned to the art of Ed Ruscha.
“I’ve had odd professional experiences,” Frey said on a recent visit to the Albright-Knox Art Gallery. And after the odd professional experience that was Frey’s messy evisceration on “Oprah,” Frey’s French publisher called to console him after what she called his “public stoning.” The phrase stuck in Frey’s mind.
“When all that stuff was happening, I don’t know why, I was like, ‘I’ve got to get Ed Ruscha to paint me a picture that says ‘Public Stoning,’” Frey said.
The painting Frey commissioned from Ruscha now hangs in the Albright-Knox as part of “Wall Rockets,” a sprawling tribute exhibition inspired by the work of the legendary California artist. It runs through Oct. 25.
Electric Sheep Real
Real-life Ram-bo: The sheep who abseiled down electricity cable after snagging his horn
Help? The sheep dangles some 15feet above the ground, its horn caught in the live electrical wire
Which One Is Your Favorite?
from M. Husain
Herbie Gets His Due
HERBIE HANCOCK JOINS L.A. PHILHARMONIC:
Jazz great named creative chair; begins two-year tenure in 2010.
The Los Angeles Philharmonic has tapped Herbie Hancock as its new creative chair for jazz, a post that oversees jazz programming at the Walt Disney Concert Hall and the Hollywood Bowl.
According to Variety, the Grammy winner is scheduled to begin a two-year tenure starting with the 2010 season. He will succeed Christian McBride, who has held the post since 2006.
Baatin Gone
Slum Village rapper Baatin dead at 35
Detroit native, known for spiritual lyrics, had recently returned to group
BY BRIAN MCCOLLUM • FREE PRESS POP MUSIC WRITER • AUGUST 1, 2009
Titus (Baatin) Glover, the Detroit rapper who co-founded the much-acclaimed Slum Village, has died.
Baatin, who turned 35 in March, left Slum Village in 2002, later telling the Free Press he had been diagnosed with schizophrenia. He continued to record and play occasional solo dates before returning to the Slum fold for the group’s upcoming album, “Villa Manifesto,” due Sept. 22.
Word of Baatin’s passing circulated quickly this afternoon in music circles both locally and nationally, where Slum Village has long been an exalted name in underground hip-hop.
The Art of Harvey Kurtzman
The Art of Rebellion
From “The Art of Harvey Kurtzman”
If not for Mad magazine, there might never have been (in no particular order) 1960s youth culture, underground comics, Wacky Packs, “Laugh-In,” “Saturday Night Live,” R. Crumb, Art Spiegelman or an age of irony, period. Mad, which began in 1952 as a comic book that parodied “serious” comics as well as American popular culture, with an emphasis on television, movies and advertising, was conceived and originally edited by Harvey Kurtzman (1924-93), a Brooklyn-born comic-strip artist, writer and editor. Kurtzman was the spiritual father of postwar American satire and the godfather of late-20th-century alternative humor. If this seems like hyperbole, all you have to do is read The Art of Harvey Kurtzman: The Mad Genius of Comics (Abrams Comic Arts, $40), Denis Kitchen and Paul Buhle’s insightful, entertaining and profusely illustrated (with rare images of original work) biographical monograph, which chronicles almost everything Kurtzman accomplished — and that was quite a lot.
“In Mad and all his subsequent ventures,” the authors write, “Kurtzman drew a bead on the phony aspects and idiosyncrasies of modern commercial culture…. He took on Senator Joseph McCarthy as surely and seriously in the pages of Mad as Edward R. Murrow did on television.” He also fought against a wave of comic-art censorship that overtook the country in the ’50s and fostered the restrictive Comics Code (echoing the role of the Hays Office for motion pictures).
A Heart Valve Tree
from Oregon Health & Science University
Heart valves grow on trees
At the time of the receipt of the Howard J. Stroud Papers (Accession 2007-015), we posted a short notice in this space. Beyond creating a basic inventory of the collection, not much processing has gone on in the ensuing months.
This morning, I was poking through the photographs looking for interesting images of heart research here in Oregon–since Stroud was director of the Oregon Heart Association for decades. The collection does not disappoint. Along with numerous photos of dignitaries, events, researchers, and heart surgery, we have this shot of the Starr-Edwards heart valve tree. Written in ink on the back of the photo is this information: “Forming a pattern set-up, “tree”, from expendable wax patterns. This setup will be coated with mold material. Patterns removed by heat to form mold. Metal poured into ceramic mold to form castings.”
Create Your Own Library Card
Library Card Generator January 17, 2007
This great fun! On this site you can make your own library card. You can put anything on it. If you press the button to make it a couple of times you get all sorts of varieties on your card. Sometimes the card is a different color, or the handwriting changes. This is mine:
Thanks to Darmok for finding this fun site!
The 80s Dance
The Louvre Online (Searchable Database of Museum Works)
John Hughes Gone
The Top Ten Book Sites On The Net
The 10 best book websites
On the internet, you can download page after page of free material, post your work online and even catch a publisher’s eye
by Mike Peake
Literature is thriving on the web. It’s not just for sale on mega-sites such as Amazon either, but being swapped, analysed and recommended by fellow bookworms. You can download page after page of free material, post your work online and — dare we say it — even catch the eye of a publisher.
Fancy a daily dose of literature? Just sign up, select a book (the emphasis is on out-of-copyright classics, and most are free), then set aside a few minutes a day to read the pages the site e-mails to you at whatever time you choose. The text is readable on a computer and most mobile devices.
Described as a “social network for people who love books”, this site consists of a lot of people cataloguing the books they have on their shelves then indulging in some lively literary banter. For a similar proposition, check out LibraryThing.com.
You’ll probably never get your hands on a first-edition Shakespeare, but this is the next-best thing: 400 priceless literary treasures scanned in ultra high-resolution, now yours to peruse online.
VRAOUM!
from Radio France Internationale
Slap! Pow! Bam! … VRAOUM!
by Laura Angela Bagnetto
Article published on the 2009-08-02 Latest update 2009-08-03 17:01 TU
Slap! Pow! Bam! Anyone who’s read those words knows they come from the world of the comic strip, beloved by children and adults alike for over 100 years. At La Maison Rouge in Paris, the Vraoum!exhibition celebrates the world of comics in its original form alongside contemporary art that has been influenced by the funny papers.
[ click to read at RFI.fr ]
“You føcking stupid… title thieving… føcking little slut.”
The Rumpus Interview with Jill Sobule
As a musician I have always refrained from criticizing another artist. I was, “well, good for her.” It did bug me a little bit, however, when she said she came up with the idea for the title in a dream. In truth, she wrote it with a team of professional writers and was signed by the very same guy that signed me in 1995. I have not mentioned that in interviews as I don’t want to sound bitter or petty… cause, that’s not me.
Okay, maybe, if I really think about it, there were a few jealous and pissed off moments. So here goes, for the first time in an interview: Fuck you Katy Perry, you fucking stupid, maybe “not good for the gays,” title thieving, haven’t heard much else, so not quite sure if you’re talented, fucking little slut.
Emmy & ATAS: “I was just thinking what an interesting concept it is to eliminate the writer from the artistic process.”
Emmy Format Shift Angers Writers
The Emmy awards announced Thursday plans for a change in the format of the ceremony. Eight of the 28 Emmy categories will be pre-taped, in order to shave minutes off the lengthy program time. Two of the categories excluded from the ceremony are for writing, and given that there are only four writing categories in the Emmys to start with, There’s understandably some resentment. More than 100 television writers have signed a letter protesting the changes. James Hibberd at The Hollywood Reporterhas the letter, and further details:
We, the undersigned showrunners and executive producers of television’s current line-up of programs, oppose the Academy of Television Arts and Science’s decision to remove writing awards from the live telecast. This decision conveys a fundamental understatement of the importance of writers in the creation of television programming and a symbolic attack on the primacy of writing in our industry.
MÄN SOM HATAR KVINNOR (or, The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo)
WaPo Whining Called Out
The Time Gawker Put the Washington Post Out of Business
Spurred on by his editor, a Washington Post reporter complained over the weekend that we “stole” his profile of a ridiculous “generational guru” when we blogged about it on this site. Our question: where’s your outrage at your editors?
To summarize this little media controversy: reporter Ian Shapira profiled Anne Loehr, a consultant who gets companies to pay her to explain the mysteries of Gen Y. Our own Hamilton Nolan wrote an item about it in which he reprinted four of Loehr’s most laughable quotes and ridiculed them. After initially being pleased that his metro profile got some play on a widely read blog, Shapira changed his mind when he got an email from his editor: “They stole your story. Where’s your outrage, man?” This led Shapira, in a piece for the Post‘s Outlook section, to conclude that his job is doomed.
Clip ‘n Dales
Science Proves Cats Indeed Are Evil
Cat Call Coerces Can Opening
A study in the journal Current Biology finds that some cat purrs include a high-frequency plaintive component that gets people to do cats’ bidding. Karen Hopkin reports
Listen to this podcast:
Anyone who’s ever had a cat knows how demanding they can be. Let me out, let me in, give me food, give me different food. The list goes on. But how do these clever kitties convince us to do their bidding? A study in the July 14 issue of Current Biology suggests it’s all in how they ask.
Karen McComb of the University of Sussex started studying persuasive cat calls after realizing that her own pet used a hybrid between a purr and a cry to get her out of bed in the morning. McComb got recordings of other cat calls. And back in the lab, she found that humans thought purrs made by cats who were trying to solicit a snack were more urgent, and less pleasant, than those made when kitty was, say, relaxing on the sofa.
Turns out that the “feed me” purr includes a high-frequency component, absent from the contented purr, that makes people want to reach for a can opener just to make Fluffy stop. It’s obviously part of “Fluffy’s Master Plan (song) for World Domination.”
—Karen Hopkin
Video Of Largest Snake Ever Found
“Well, you see, Judge, it got all small and grew teeth – and so now she wants a divorce.”
