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“The point is to try to come to terms with what the thing is, and what is it about it that’s so innovative and exciting. It’s been an incredibly influential album. Many people have claimed it as being an influential record, and lots of people frankly hate it and can’t stand it.”
Samuel Andreyev is a Canadian composer living in France. In this video he breaks down the one hundred seconds of “Frownland” by Captain Beefheart and its complicated structure. If you like dry talks, this is the video for you!
posted by Going To Maine at 10:43 PM PST - 9 comments

In 1980, two recent graduates of U.C. Berkeley managed to ride every one of the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency's bus lines in a single day. Today, two San Francisco Chronicle reporters managed to repeat the stunt in 18 hours: #TotalMuni2018 [more inside]
posted by oneirodynia at 10:27 PM PST - 16 comments

Sometime before 1931, Zora Neale Hurston visited Plateau, Alabama and interviewed the 95-year-old man who was the last survivor of the Middle Passage. “I want to know who you are and how you came to be a slave; and to what part of Africa do you belong, and how you fared as a slave, and how you have managed as a free man?” His head was bowed for a time. Then he lifted his wet face: “Thankee Jesus! Somebody come ast about Cudjo! I want tellee somebody who I is, so maybe dey go in de Afficky soil some day and callee my name and somebody dere say, ‘Yeah, I know Kossula.’ ” 87 years after she tried to publish Barracoon, his story is now in print.
posted by ChuraChura at 7:24 PM PST - 49 comments

"I think I was inspired by Nausicaä. I like that movie and watched it many times. I didn’t want to admit it, but I think it did affect my design. In regards to Dune, I actually only saw it for the first time a couple weeks ago. Many people have mentioned similarities between Panzer Dragoon and Dune, so I finally watched it. I was very impressed with the product design in the movie." Panzer Dragoon Saga: An oral history
posted by Bangaioh at 6:20 PM PST - 6 comments

Simone Giertz has a brain tumor. She explained in an email to her Patreon subscribers.

Good news in all of this is that it's probably noncancerous, and there's a very small risk that I'll die from it. Bad news is, well yeah, I have a brain tumor.

I really feel like I should put more jokes in here to make sure that you know that I'm alright. Because I really am.

posted by Miss Cellania at 5:14 PM PST - 33 comments

We have to stop treating people like we’re in Fallujah. In time, he came to believe that the most meaningful application of his training and expertise—the only way to exemplify his beliefs about American security, at home and abroad—was to become a community police officer in Savannah, where he grew up.
posted by bitmage at 4:28 PM PST - 15 comments

PetaPixel: This Photographer Caught a Bird That Caught a Shark That Caught a Fish
posted by oulipian at 3:42 PM PST - 17 comments

What it took to learn to fly in the early 1900s. Lots of interesting info on what Ames Iowa was like, such as wooden squares as paving, and how she made her plane. Here's the link to the MessyNessy Snook which has the best photos.
posted by MovableBookLady at 1:54 PM PST - 7 comments

The first film ever streamed on the internet is kind of crazy: Beekeeping, alien planets, and the limits of narrative as technology. [more inside]
posted by sapagan at 1:53 PM PST - 24 comments

"There is no explanation for how or why Helen, out of all the women running for her train in all of London, gets to experience these two lives. There is no fairy godmother or Virgin Mary to thank—no ghosts of Christmas past, no good witch with a magic spell. The film trusts the audience completely to understand this is wish fulfillment in its purest form: the desire to check in with all our parallel selves, to see those near-misses and almost-was and what-ifs given back through movie magic and nothing more." The Almosts and What-ifs of ‘Sliding Doors’
posted by everybody had matching towels at 1:36 PM PST - 13 comments

"The term bushido calls forth ghosts of Japan's hallowed samurai class. A class so bent on preserving honor, they'd rather slit their own bellies in ritualistic suicide than live a shamed existence. In The Last Samurai, bushido melds with Nathan Algren's soul, curing the troubled American of alcoholism, war trauma, and self-loathing. What powerful medicine! A reinvigorated, purified Algren turns his back on his employers to join rebel samurai bent on defending bushido, their dignified honor-code of loyalty, benevolence, etiquette, and self-control. At least, that's what popular culture would have us believe. In reality the term bushido went unrecognized until the early twentieth century, long after Nathan Algren's fictitious character joined the factual Satsuma Rebellion and years after the ousting of the samurai class. In all likelihood samurai never even uttered the word."
posted by josher71 at 12:51 PM PST - 27 comments

Ahead of Friday’s intra-Korean summit, the South put an end to its pop music assault at the border. But the country’s catchy music is a potent psychological weapon.
posted by bq at 11:50 AM PST - 9 comments

Nothing in the Rulebook interviews Dr Chuck Tingle. Includes the best top ten list for a good life that I have ever seen.
posted by seanmpuckett at 10:52 AM PST - 27 comments

Best Products is a now-defunct catalog showroom chain that had some really cool and really unusual store designs.
posted by DRoll at 10:32 AM PST - 41 comments

After one young entrepreneur lost a loved one, she created an avatar to help her grieve. Now her AI platform helps millions of users find their own digital besties.
posted by BekahVee at 10:23 AM PST - 24 comments

Palm Oil, Peat Fires, Nutella and the Anthropocene [more inside]
posted by the man of twists and turns at 10:14 AM PST - 6 comments

Ok, if you're a cult follower of Grey Gardens, then you know this already. (If not, some people think that you should see the HBO drama first to get a good introduction.) You know that in 1972, the Maysles brothers shot some footage of Lee Radziwill and her relatives with the idea of making a documentary about the Bouvier childhood. You know that the Maysles decided that her aunt and cousin made better footage, and Grey Gardens was born. Long thought lost, this early footage has now been turned into an 80-minute film called "That Summer," opening May 18. Here's the trailer, and the Variety review. But you knew that.
posted by Melismata at 8:36 AM PST - 11 comments

“Within the Mont Pelerin Society, the problem of how to end colonialism without destroying property rights was much debated. The English economist William Hutt imagined that voting power in postapartheid South Africa could be made proportional to economic weight. Milton Friedman agreed that one man, one vote would be terrible for South Africa, and Hayek worried that putting sanctions on South Africa would upset the global order. They didn’t favor apartheid, but they were against almost anything that might bring it to an end.” - WORLDS APART - Patrick Iber discusses the roots and causes of neoliberal/“Post-Ford” ideaology, it’s growth in European economic circles, and it’s destabling effects on nations and democracies worldwide. (The New Republic)
posted by The Whelk at 7:59 AM PST - 15 comments

During two periods in 1937 and 1941, Croatian artist Maxo Vanka was commissioned to provide murals for the inside of St. Nicholas Croatian Catholic Church in Millvale, PA, across the Allegheny River from Pittsburgh. These striking, affecting murals "pay tribute to faith while expressing his passionate beliefs about social justice, injustice, [and] the horrors of war." [more inside]
posted by soren_lorensen at 7:26 AM PST - 9 comments

Shirley Bassey? Pulp? Alice Cooper? All writing Bond themes? What could possibly go wrong? [Cue ejector seat.] Better than what they picked? You be the judge! The James Bond 007 themes that didn't make it. [Thanks deezil for the title.]
posted by Juso No Thankyou at 6:50 AM PST - 30 comments

Theologian James Cone has died. The founder of black liberation theology, Cone sought to interpret Christianity through the lens of the black freedom struggle in America, showing that being true to the Gospel requires standing against racial oppression. Cone was the author of several books, including The Cross and the Lynching Tree and God of the Oppressed. A remembrance by Adelle Banks. From 2015, an introduction to Cone's work by Daniel José Camacho.
posted by Cash4Lead at 6:19 AM PST - 16 comments

Étienne Terrus was a French painter, one of the precursors of Fauvism. He has a museum dedicated to him in his birthplace of Elne. Unfortunately it has just been discovered that 82 of his paintings there - over half - are fakes. [more inside]
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 2:19 AM PST - 28 comments

Things That Cannot Save You is a semi-Lovecraftian "catalog of your doom", a collection of images and screengrabs of things the curator wishes to point out will provide no protection from Cthulhu or other horrors of the Great Old Ones. Among the 'things' are Delicious Snack Cookies with Creamy Filling, DVD and Book Sets, Drugs of Inferior Quality, Micky Dolenz (although he is clearly very groovy), These Cats, The Family Circus, Hair Rental, the Atheist Agenda, Floating Pie Head Lady, Star Trek Next Generation memes, Candelabra Hats, Colored Pills and Capsules, A Sassy Mug, Oscar Mayer All Meat Wieners with Mild Barbecue Sauce Packed in Brine and Amphibious Cars... and those are just from the first week of the last two years. So, dive in and have fun, just don't expect to be saved. [more inside]
posted by oneswellfoop at 2:11 AM PST - 19 comments