Tuesday, 20 April 2010

'Yaka-Wow' hits Boing Boing!

yakawow.jpg
Are you a breezy person who goes, "Yaka-wow!"? Maybe you already were, and just didn't know it. Alice Bell, science communication lecturer at Imperial College, London, explains:
The main reason we've all been saying yakawow is simply because it's a cool word. It should be used more. Try saying it yourself out loud - yakawow, yaka-wow. Doesn't it just make your mouth happy?
More specifically, yaka-wow is the accidental brainchild of British neuroscientist Susan Greenfield. In the UK, Greenfield is known for holding the rather controversial position that use of computers and video games irreparably damages children's brains—unless, of course, said children are using her computer games, in which case they will become smarter. You see the problem. Last Thursday, Greenfield gave an interview to the London Times, which led to this fabulous exchange:
She doesn't think computer games are life-threatening, like smoking, but she says that they are as much of a risk to mankind as climate change. [...] She is concerned that those who live only in the present, online, don't allow their malleable brains to develop properly. "It's not going to destroy the planet but is it going to be a planet worth living in if you have a load of breezy people who go around saying yaka-wow. Is that the society we want?"
Within hours, yaka-wow had inspired a Twitter stream, poster, T-shirt and burgeoning personal philosophy. But why yaka-wow? Bell says it's probably a fortuitous typo:
As it turns out, Greenfield wasn't just making up an odd phrase. It seems to be a transcription error of "yuck and wow", a phrase Greenfield has often used to describe the way people act online, running quickly from one sensation to another. Greenfield famously refereed to the banality of twitter as, "Marginally reminiscent of a small child saying, 'Look at me, look at me mummy! Now I've put my sock on. Now I've got my other sock on.'"
Naturally, that quote inspired mathematician Matt Parker to thoroughly wow the web by pulling both his socks on at the same time.
 
Image courtesy the brilliant mind of Adam Rutherford.
...but especially for you Dray 3-0!

In prosperous South Korea, a troubling increase in suicide rate

Iran bans the country's two remaining official opposition parties

Iranian authorities banned the country's two remaining official opposition parties Monday after two of their leaders received prison sentences.
The move, subject to confirmation by Iran's judiciary, effectively silences the last parties legally permitted to promote political change in Iran and prevents foes of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad from gaining power through elections.
The parties, the Islamic Iran Participation Front and the Mujaheddin of the Islamic Revolution Organization, advocated more civil liberties and changes in Iran's system of Shiite religious rule. Together they formed one of the country's main political blocs.
The action follows the sentencing Sunday of two of the parties' leading ideologues -- Mohsen Mirdamadi of the Front and Mostafa Tajzadeh of the Mujaheddin -- to six years in prison. They were also banned for 10 years from political activities after being found guilty of illegal assembly, conspiring against national security and propagating falsehoods against the state.
Both were among the leaders of young militants who seized the U.S. Embassy in Tehran in November 1979 and held 53 Americans hostage for more than a year. They backed Ahmadinejad's main challengers in Iran's presidential election last June.
Iran's main political opposition group, the Green Movement, is not a recognized party and has never had permission to operate. Its leaders, former prime minister Mir Hossein Mousavi and Shiite cleric Mehdi Karroubi, ran independently of party affiliation when they challenged Ahmadinejad in last year's election.
After Ahmadinejad was declared the winner by a landslide, Mousavi, Karroubi and the opposition parties silenced Monday charged that the election was marred by massive fraud and backed street protests against the results. 
Thomas Erdbrink @'Washington Post'

Coming soon...

WORDS OF ADVICE
WILLIAM S. BURROUGHS ON THE ROAD

A Film by Lars Movin and Steen Moller Rasmussen

 
In 1983, the counter culture icon and author of the cult classic Naked Lunch (1959), William S. Burroughs (1914-1997), traveled throughout Scandinavia making a series of personal appearances. Twenty years later, filmmakers Lars Movin and Steen Moller Rasmussen found never-before-seen footage of his Copenhagen visit and set out on the road to record new material, telling the story of the acclaimed authors later work – especially what is known as The Last Trilogy - and his unique performance skills. The result is Words of Advice: William S. Burroughs on the Road, a compelling portrait of one our most enigmatic public figures.
Featuring:
James Grauerholz, John Giorno, Hal Willner, Jennie Skerl, Ann Douglas, Regina Weinreich, and others.
Music by:
Bill Laswell/Material, Patti Smith, Islamic Diggers, and others..
Extras include:
- A nearly complete documentation of Burroughs reading in Copenhagen,
Oct. 29th 1983.
- A statement by Ann Douglas, Professor at Columbia University, New York.
- Two short tribute films, One Shot I + II.

Capital Radio - The Tommy Vance Show (July 16 1977)

Johnny Rotten on Capital Radio
The interview was a turning point in people's perception of John Lydon and his public image. Malcolm McLaren and  Glitterbest hated it. They never wanted him to do it; and were horrified  at his record selections. However, this wasn't just a case of  breaking rank – if it ever even was – it was about music. MUSIC"Just play the records. They'll speak for themselves. That's my idea of  fun…" The records highlighted John's eclectic musical tastes, and his open-mind. Reggae, folk, soul, avant-garde, and good  old rock'n'roll, it was all there. And not a Stooges or Dolls record in sight.
Full transcript and tracklist @'Fodderstomph'
Handwritten recommendations for further reggae listening from Lydon
Get it 
(Thanx Stan!)

Longy over at 'Punk Friction' has an interview that JR and Sid did with John Tobler for Radio 1 in 1977.
You can grab that
HERE

Lost and Found

Balls!

Green means Go: U.S. Government Permits the Export of Anti-Filtering Technology to Iran

The Internet has its enemies: Iran, China, Burma, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Cuba, and more. As an increasing number of countries attempt to restrict Internet access, the U.S. government made freedom of expression on the Internet a primary foreign policy goal. A step toward achieving that goal was demonstrated in a press release issued April 13, 2010 by Censorship Research Center (CRC) announcing the acquisition of the license required to export their anti-filtering software, Haystack, to Iran.
Anxious to learn more about what this authorization means for the people of Iran and provide a follow-up on a recent post, "Effective Tools and Strategy: Kicking it up a Notch in Cuba and Beyond," I interviewed CRC Executive Director, Austin Heap. He shared his journey to this pivotal development, the technology behind Haystack, as well as both the considerations and limitations involved in disseminating this same type of filter-circumventing software to other countries similarly affected by government controlled Internet filtering. Heap's commitment to upholding Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights -- that all people have the right to seek, receive and impart publicly available information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers -- is abundantly clear. From learning his first programming language at 8-years-old and knowing code in 20+ languages at the age of 26, Heap is thrilled to see technology being used to tear down walls that inhibit tolerance and promote human rights. While I was aware of this recently developed tool, I wondered how many people the software can empower and if there are limits to its impact. In a candid interview, Heap explained how the Haystack software works securely and CRC's hopes to provide this complex anti-filtering software around the globe.

2010-04-14-AustinHeap.jpg

"This license permits CRC to provide safe and uncensored Internet access via our Haystack software to those in Iran who live under government-imposed limits on free speech. Any organization looking to do humanitarian work in a sanctioned country has to go through the license application process. We are deeply committed to the idea that everyone has a human right to free expression, and censorship is a direct infringement of that right," he says. "This project is our attempt to make the world a better place by safeguarding the peoples right to free expression and access to information."
Heap claims authorities can block Haystack only by entirely disabling access to the Internet. According to him, their Haystack permits users to securely use normal web browsers and network applications while hiding traffic from the user inside other Internet traffic between ordinary web connections to innocuous sites. "To a computer, anyone using Haystack appears to be engaging in normal, unencrypted web browsing, which raises far fewer suspicions than many encrypted connections." Heap adds, "We would like to see as many people as possible assert their right to free expression. While Haystack is free-of-charge, CRC is dispersing it by invitation only while they build out capacity and organizational resources. To start, we aim to provide secure and uncensored Internet access to as many people as possible in Iran."
Haystack may be successful in other countries but CRC has not yet discovered the similarities and differences in the censoring methods used elsewhere. Heap explained to me that each country has a specific set of issues when it comes to online censorship and the way it's performed. While Cuba, Iran,and China all filter the Internet, the way it's done from a technical standpoint is different and may not be the exact same thing as what he and his partner, Daniel Colascione, developed for those in Iran. "Right now, our focus is Iran. Haystack was developed specifically to target the methods in which [the Iranian government] filters the Internet although we look forward to the opportunity to providing the freedom of speech to citizens of many more oppressed countries sooner than later," says Heap.
Ultimately, there's no way for CRC to know who is using their network. Part of the protection built into Haystack is meant to protect them from the users and the users from us, "That's just the nature of the dragon!" says Heap. When I asked how CRC intends to stop opposition authorities from discovering how Haystack works and creating a block specifically for Haystack, Heap acknowledge the charge as "difficult to rebut." "Under normal conditions, 'security through obscurity' is indeed false security, but Haystack has several properties that make it unique. To start, we do not rely on "obscurity" for protecting our users' privacy -- everything that one of ours users sends and receives is encrypted and it would take centuries for all the world's computers to decipher one of our users' browsing sessions even with full access to the Haystack source code," explained Heap. Their thorough design, however, is obscure as it was developed to make it very hard to find the software, let alone the user.
Heap and Colascione are not planning on leaving well-enough alone. They anticipate authorities will invest resources into finding a way to do prevent Haystack from being effective. Should they succeed, Heap is confident it will be temporary. "We will diligently refine our software and issue a new version that circumvents the restrictions. We will not, however, give the authorities any assistance in this process. By retarding their efforts, we ensure that the Haystack network operates more robustly for longer periods," Heap stated assuredly. When pushed further on the development of any solution for those affected by government initiated censorship, Heap could not have made his stance on safeguarding the peoples right to free expression and access to information more clear, "We are deeply committed to the idea that everyone has a human right to free expression, and censorship is a direct infringement of that right. As Martin Luther King Jr. once said, 'Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.'"

Learn more about Censorship Research Group and how you can support Haystack by visiting www.CensorshipResearch.org. 

Stephanie Rudat @'HuffPo' 

(Maybe that can export it here if Conroy's filter comes into effect) 

WTF???

Mice?
Vaseline?
(Check the comments - I just couldn't help myself)

Awww!

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Smoking # 63

Kick Cameron

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Women to blame for earthquakes, says Iran cleric

A senior Iranian cleric says women who wear revealing clothing and behave promiscuously are to blame for earthquakes.
Iranian woman   Iran is one of the world's most earthquake-prone countries, and the cleric's unusual explanation for why the earth shakes follows a prediction by the president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, that a quake is certain to hit Tehran and that many of its 12 million inhabitants should relocate.
"Many women who do not dress modestly ... lead young men astray, corrupt their chastity and spread adultery in society, which increases earthquakes," Hojatoleslam Kazem Sedighi was quoted as saying by Iranian media. Women in the Islamic Republic are required by law to cover from head to toe, but many, especially the young, ignore some of the more strict codes and wear tight coats and scarves pulled back that show much of the hair. "What can we do to avoid being buried under the rubble?" Sedighi asked during a prayer sermon last week. "There is no other solution but to take refuge in religion and to adapt our lives to Islam's moral codes." Seismologists have warned for at least two decades that it is likely the sprawling capital will be struck by a catastrophic quake in the near future. Some experts have even suggested Iran should move its capital to a less seismically active location. Tehran straddles scores of fault lines, including one more than 50 miles long, though it has not suffered a major quake since 1830.
In 2003, a powerful earthquake hit the southern city of Bam, killing 31,000 people – about a quarter of that city's population – and destroying its ancient mud-built citadel.
"A divine authority told me to tell the people to make a general repentance. Why? Because calamities threaten us," said Sedighi, Tehran's acting Friday prayer leader. Referring to the violence that followed last June's disputed presidential election, he said: "The political earthquake that occurred was a reaction to some of the actions [that took place]. And now, if a natural earthquake hits Tehran, no one will be able to confront such a calamity but God's power, only God's power ... So let's not disappoint God."
The Iranian government and its security forces have been locked in a bloody battle with a large opposition movement that accuses Ahmadinejad of winning last year's vote by fraud.
Ahmadinejad made his quake prediction two weeks ago but said he could not give an exact date. He acknowledged that he could not order all of Tehran's 12m people to evacuate. "But provisions have to be made ... at least 5 million should leave Tehran so it is less crowded," the president said.
The welfare minister, Sadeq Mahsooli, said prayers and pleas for forgiveness were the best "formulae to repel earthquakes. We cannot invent a system that prevents earthquakes, but God has created this system and that is to avoid sins, to pray, to seek forgiveness, pay alms and self-sacrifice," Mahsooli said.
@'The Guardian' 
(Thanx Carolyn!)


(Thanx Lauren!)

Tamam Shud


The band
The case

Spank!!! # 17 (the Two Gun Kid)

The best ads for Al-Jazeera are on CNN!

I love it when the title of a study is almost better than that a death metal number. This study goes: "When Blood Becomes Cheaper than a Bottle of Water: How Viewers of the English Version of Al-Jazeera Website Judge Graphic Images of Conflict". You gotta admit the first part is a kick-ass song waiting to be written.



"CNN and other Western media have abdicated their journalistic responsibility to provide balanced, objective news and have instead become a voice of the government -- not controlled by the government but controlled by the big multinational multimedia conglomerates that own them and by their own self censorship." Another respondent went further, claiming that American media is "controlled and censored by Bush and his cronies."

Fahmy said the dilemma that photo editors face of whether a graphic photo of war and conflict would be too shocking to view gathered around the breakfast table might no longer hold true in the current media environment.

"Younger audiences, especially the 'YouTube' generation, seek graphic visual images in a far different way than audiences did before the World Wide Web," Fahmy said. "This has serious implications for the news media. I think it's time for media organizations to amend their ethical codes to allow for more graphic visuals in an effort to provide a more comprehensive and realistic view of war and conflict to U.S. audiences."

Why women cry

(Click to enlarge)

HA!

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Kode9 DJ-Kicks tracklisting:



1. Lone Once In A While
2. Aardvarck Revo
3. Kode9 Blood Orange
4. Kode9 You Don’t Wash (DJ-Kicks exclsuive)
5. Cooly G Phat Si
6. Ill Blu Bellion
7. Ikonika Heston
8. Scratcha DVA Jelly Roll
9. Mr Mageeka Different Lekstrix
10. Grievous Angel Move Down Low
11. Sticky feat. Natalie Storm Look Pon Me
12. Sticky Jumeirah Riddim Sequel
13. Mujava Pleaze Mugwanti
14. DVA Natty
15. Aardvaarck Re Spoken (Nubian Mindz Released Mix)
16. Morgan Zarate feat. Sarah Ann Webb M.A.B.
17. Rozzi Daime Dirty Illusions
18. Zomby Spiralz
19. Kode9 It
20. J*DaVeY Mr. Mister
21. Digital Mystikz 2 Much Chat
22. Terror Danjah Stiff
23. Digital Mystikz Mountain Dread March
24. Zomby Godzilla
25. Digital Mystikz Mountain Dread March (Reprise)
26. Addison Groove Footcrab
27. Kode9 vs. LD Bad
28. Maddslinky Cargo
29. Ramadanman Work Them
30. Terror Danjah Bruzin (VIP)
31. The Bug Run (feat. Flo Dan)

The compilation is due out on June 21.

iPhone 4 - it's real


 Full Story
@'Gizmodo'  
"because it’s thinner, it feels even nicer in your pants." 
 More here.

Monday, 19 April 2010

New York Dolls to pay tribute to McLaren tonight in London

The New York Dolls have announced that they will pay tribute to their former manager Malcolm McLaren, who died earlier this month, during their encore at their gig at Koko in London tonight. The band will dedicate their song 'Jet Boy' to McLaren, and will be joined by a number of special guests, too. As well as this, McLaren's funeral takes place on Thursday, and the Humanade charity are asking fans to mark the occasion with a 'minute of mayhem'.
One less fugn idiot to worry about...
(Fat bastard killed by exercise equipment!)

Islamic Erotica

Church in worst credibility crisis since Reformation, theologian tells bishops

Sign of the Times

(Click to enlarge)
@'Boing Boing'
Yaka-Wow is endless. RT @ayasawada: Dear God, socks, flashmobs, T-shirts, WHERE WILL IT ALL END?? #yakawow

See this...
& coming soon @ Boing Boing!

TEDxVolcano 04/18/10 London


Susheela Raman/Sam Mills busking it live at the Ted X volcano event in London Sunday night. Live mix by Fritz Catlin.
Sam and Fritz are former members of 23 Skidoo.
(Music at 21 mins and then again at 1hour 53 mins).

Caleb Selah - The Sun Ra sound Radio Free HeadPress 11

     

Saturn the Universe Space Funk Spaceways
There is no description for this. It was presented to me, in a dream, by a man from the rings of saturn. His name is Haffa-Rool. It seems to tell in an hour what Sun Ra could think in a minute. He loves you all. I offer this with no desire to make money from it, is a gift from Ra and HeadPress to all.
Dedicated to Marshall Allen and John Sinclair... Peace 
(Thanx to the Devotional Hooligan!)

To teifidancer

Very diplomatic LOL!

This one's for you Rodda! (the oldest punk in Stroud)


(Thanx for the shout-out!)

Climategate Claptrap II

Smoking # 62

Sunday, 18 April 2010

Dub FX ft. Flower Fairy - LIVE @ tele-club


Melbourne's own 'beatbox' master...

Spank!!! # 16

Feminist protests are different in the Ukraine!

Download 'Fools Day' by

Free Speech

HA!

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Inspired by the Conservative manifesto, Armando Iannucci decided to take the law into his own hands

We are the generation We've been waiting for. We are the kingmakers. We are invited to form the next government because We are at the heart of all our lives which, in turn, are central to what We are and who We stand for.
I'm getting sick of We. We comes out on two occasions.
Firstly, when a party's been roundly defeated for a long period of time.
 Rather than admit that all their vote-losing policies were the product of reality-insulated politicos spending too much time in committee meetings and not enough time going to the shops or wondering why it takes at least eight visits from British Gas before a simple boiler can be fixed, defeated political parties relaunch themselves with the brainwave that if only politicians listened to what the decent, hard-working people of Britain had to say, then common political discourse would be irreversibly changed for the better.
So, throughout the Eighties Labour conducted many "listening" campaigns and, over the past 10 years, as their percentage share of the vote went down, Labour conducted a number of "Big Conversations", "rolling debates", "meet the people" events and other manifestations of Scum Engagement to show they'd really got the message.
The second outpouring of We comes when all the money runs out.
A Government or Opposition that knows there's no money to spend still has to look like it's got a whole raft of things to do if elected. Allowing the public to have more say in how things are run fulfils the need to look active while keeping things cheap.
It also has the welcome corollary of shunting responsibility on to the public so that when things do go tits up (as they do when you have no money to sort things out) you can turn to the public and say it was their fault.
This election is the first time in about 40 years when both sets of circumstances have coincided: the Tories have been out of office for 13 years, yet are trying to get back in when the country's destitute.
It's the Perfect Storm of We, so it's no surprise that David Cameron's unleashed the biggest wave of "From Now On You're In Charge" since Richard the Lionheart left for Damascus.
But this is ultra-We. It's not just a few pat phrases about consumer choice. Instead, it's a fully-thought-through philosophy about reducing the role of government and galvanising local communities into action.
Mr Cameron's rationale is that faster communication has made social networking a fact of life, so why not utilise this for everyone's benefit?
With that in mind, I tried some cyber-politics of my own this week.
I used Twitter to announce I wanted to set up my own police force.
I soon had a thousand volunteers, who christened it the Twitterforce.
We then took a vote on which part of the UK to police.
The wisdom of the crowd said "Wigan" so I charged my volunteers with the policing of Wigan's streets from midnight last Tuesday. In no time at all, I faced demands for a slogan to go with the force.
Suggestions flooded in, and I put the three best to the vote.
They were "Yes Wi-Gan!", "Things Are Going To Get Battered" and "A Fair Choice For Change".
Within seconds, voting websites were put up online, with bar-charts and graphs.
"Yes Wi-Gan!" triumphed, posters were designed and that evening were taken to the Wigan Athletic match.
Next, I faced demands from my swelling ranks of volunteers for some laws, so they knew what to arrest people for.
Again, everything was put to a network vote.
We, the People, spoke, and established that in Wigan you could be arrested for: whistling made-up tunes; carrying small dogs when they can clearly walk; starting talking when your turn is clearly over, and touching too much fruit or vegetables in the supermarket.
Soon copies of these laws were printed off and posted up round Wigan, and within seconds an arrest was made.
There were also strong demands for capital punishment for some of these offences, which is when I decided to shut the Twitterforce down on the grounds that this is how Hitler probably started. What Pol Pot would have done with a Facebook group only beggars belief.
So my experiment in We ended. I don't know what it taught me. Mr Cameron could claim it shows how much untapped energy there is in our communities.
My suspicion is it merely confirms how much actual energy we can put into mucking about while pretending to work. 

Twitterforce's arrestable offences

1. Touching too much fruit or veg in the supermarket.
2. Carrying small dogs when they can clearly walk (a la Paris Hilton).
3. Whistling made up tunes.
4. Specifying "wet" when ordering coffee.
5. Clapping when a plane lands.
6. Wearing sunglasses in dull weather.
7. Starting talking when your turn is clearly over.
8. Walking the dog without a dog.
9. Ordering Babycham ironically.
10. Looking confused in the cheese aisles. 
 

From the notebook of Homer Dudley, inventor of the vocoder. December 12, 1932.

Krautrock by Jon Savage

Faust
Devil's music ... Faust. Photograph: Murdo Macleod
It began out of nothing, was given a joke name, and became the pop influence du jour: krautrock, kosmische musik, elektronische musik, or whatever you wish to call German experimental rock from the 1970s. Cited and adapted by artists as diverse as Q-Tip, the Horrors (whose epic Sea Within a Sea convincingly updates that Neu! motorik), Foals, Deerhunter, even Kasabian and Oasis (but don't let the last put you off).
The list is so long as to be almost meaningless, but a new Soul Jazz compilation, Elektronische Musik, reinforces just how wild German music from that period was. It also raises the question of why kosmische musik, which has impacted on pop for the last 30 years (just think of Afrika Bambaataa, Brian Eno and David Bowie, to name but three), is still so popular today.

It began out of the revolutionary student movement of 1967 and 1968: one strand formed communes and became political activists, others began to attempt a new German music that was not schlager, the mainstream music of the day. Their quest was given added impetus by the fact that many of these war babies knew their history had been erased. They had nothing, but that meant freedom.
This was their year zero. Informed by Karlheinz Stockhausen, the Mothers of Invention, the Velvet Underground and Pink Floyd, among others, the late 1960s and early 70s saw the formation of many key groups: Can, Faust, Amon Düül II, Organisation (later Kraftwerk), Guru Guru and Tangerine Dream, many of whom were released on German labels such as Ohr and Brain.

There are several DVD bootlegs covering this early period, as well as YouTube clips and the actual albums. What they record is a balls-to-the-wall experimental approach that takes ideas, feelings and competence as far as they can go, and then further. There are no limits. This first-time delirium continues the psychedelic upsurge of 1966-67 but gives it a tougher edge: it was, as Julian Cope wrote, "soaringly idealistic and hard as nails".
It was Cope's Krautrocksampler, published in 1995, that first organised and codified a history of "the great kosmische musik". Cope focused on the first wave of groups, many of whom were popular in England thanks to the visionary Andrew Lauder, who released Can and Amon Düül II on United Artists. (Then there was the 49p issue of The Faust Tapes.)
Since this groundbreaking study, the floodgates have opened; but the Soul Jazz compilation opens out the genre even further. If you go into the affiliated Sounds of the Universe shop in Soho, you'll see a rack for experimental German music alongside all the reggae 7"s, funk/disco 12"s, dubstep, free jazz and cosmic disco CDs. Put together by Stuart Baker and Adrian Self, the Elektronische Musik compilation totally fits that free-booting eclecticism.
It begins with Can's A Spectacle, sampled by Q-Tip on Manwomanboogie (from his 2008 album The Renaissance). There are the usual suspects: Faust, Neu!, Cluster – the last represented by the track Heisse Lippen, from their best album, Zuckerzeit – but there is a greater reliance on funky beats/breaks, and you get long improv epics such as High Life by Ibliss. The second disc ends with the blissed-out drones of Deuter's Soham, a higher-key masterpiece.
The implication is that there is more here than you ever thought. German music from this period is a bit like the Tardis: you got through a narrow portal into a huge, dynamic space. Kosmische's fertility is only matched by its desire to create something totally new, and it is that which has proved inspirational to successive generations of musicians from right across the spectrum.
Its increased resonance in the 21st century comes from the fact that Anglo-American rock has a six-decade history and has been thoroughly cannibalised. Tired of sixth-gen Brit indie groups? Sick of Americana apologists? Then let kosmische be your guide. Starting from nothing but their imagination, the 70s German groups continue to offer a third way: a long, straight road out of this cultural impasse.

Well I was wrong...


SPECTRUM /MGMT
Feb 27 2009 The Dome Tufnell Park
Ben Goldwasser & Andrew Vanwyngarden of MGMT are here performing with Pete Kember.
The new MGMT album, which is also produced by Pete Kember AKA Sonic Boom is a psychedelic monster!

Ash cloud sunset over Paris

Saturday, 17 April 2010

FDA Approves Depressant Drug For The Annoyingly Cheerful