Babel: The multilingual, multicultural online journal and community of arts and ideas

Rob O’Connor of Y! Music provides a list of 25 of the most gleeful musical masturbations of all time.

To Western Orientalists, he was little more than a crude embarrassment, trying to take away the validity of their study simply because they were born into colonial countries, yet the specter of Edward Said still haunts the political and academic landscape today when discussing the study of history of the Middle East.

Wired has an article on a way to pep up your memory.

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The greatest fiction writer of the 20th Century is featured in a biography.

You couch potatoes can rejoice: Netflix has just come up with a device to make it even easier (as if it wasn’t easy enough) to rent movies quickly.

HT- New York Times (must log in).

- Rudy Carrera.

Literature (in English) for children, when I was growing up in India, was limited to Enid Blyton and Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys. Though I read every book I could get my hands on, the books talked about a reality that I didnt know (long summer days? scones? crumpets?). Some years ago, a publisher in Madras (now Chennai) set out to rectify this situation.

One of my favourites is this one - a retelling of the Mahabharatha by an 11 year old girl. It is in two parts and a wonderfully fresh perspective un-coloured by a need to conform.

A must-read if you like mythology and/or children’s literature.

-radhika

According to this article, Behzod Abduraimov, a 17-year-old Uzbek may be the future of piano music. May he have much success, as the kid has a long career ahead of him.

Rufus Harley, A LOVE SUPREME, Washington D.C. 1987

Yes, this really is free jazz with bagpipes.

“When you get the sound right … it enters the lower brainstem, below the level of intelligence. It’s primal and subliminal.”
- Fred Newman

In a recent interview, sound effects man Fred Newman credits Mel Blanc as a major influence:

The first movie I worked on was “Gremlins,” directed by Joe Dante. And it also was the first time anyone had access to the Warner Bros. cartoon library of sound effects.

Joe wanted a specific classic sound, the sound of a duck being caught by the throat (making the noise perfectly), but we didn’t know what it was called so we couldn’t look it up on the file cards they had. I had to recreate it.

Later an old sound effects guy heard it and told us it was called “trombone garble,” and sure enough, we looked it up and there it was. Mel Blanc did it himself into a trombone!

The energy of those sounds is incredible. If seeing is believing, hearing is feeling. I tell people that, in a movie, the information is on the screen but all the emotion is on the soundtrack.

When you get the sound right, the emotion is there, and that is the beauty of radio sound too. It enters the lower brainstem, below the level of intelligence. It’s primal and subliminal.

- Fred Newman, interviewed by Ken Deutsch @ rwonline: 5.07.2008: Link.

Mel Blanc @ Wikipedia

Fred Newman @ Wikipedia

Newman is best known for his work with A Prairie Home Companion.

~ Karl Jones

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A rather sublime piece of music by the Swans‘ former front man and his new band.

The Grammys of the web-designer-geek world is here!

- Rudy Carrera.

I have to say this story left me pleasantly surprised. Perhaps the Kingdom of the Prophet (pbuh) is opening up a bit and may wish to learn about her Western neighbors. If true, this is a wonderful sign.

- Rudy Carrera.

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The Guardian features the genius of former Talk Talk frontman Mark Hollis, whose eponymous album left me gobsmacked by its fragile, elegant beauty. Here he is singing “I Believe In You.”

- Rudy Carrera.