And compare it to the White Strips

If you go listen to Icky Thump, it all very similar in style. I don't know Tegan and Sara too well, so I looked them up. You Tubing around finds a bunch of their songs and they've all gone different direction then Icky Thump. Which leads me to believe that Jack and Meg heard this lone song and liked it's style, so they covered it. (I'm not saying they don't like the others.) After all it does groove with their sound. It's nice to discover where some of their musical influences come from.

Walking With a Ghost front cover

Method and means for creating anti-gravity illusion

No wires just shoes.

It's fascinating to watch these videos, but boy is he ever weird.

It was made for a Gizmondo competition by "Noriko" — Composed with sounds of a failing Hitachi hard-disk. I lost his link, but you can probably google for it. It's really quite beautiful and peaceful. Though once I was diagnosing a laptop and this song came on and freaked me out. You never want want to hear these sounds coming from your computer.

Oh and if you ever do hear these sounds coming from your computer, turn it off (pull the plug) and call me. ;-)

–Francis

But…
The TV show house uses Tear Drop by Massive Attack as it's theme song.

It also seems to have been heavily inspired by the music video for it's title credits.

By the way I encourage you to listen to more Massive Attack.

*Update* A video showing a lot of these parallels.

____________________

It can't be love `1
For there is no true love `2
It can't be love
For there is no true love

Sure I'm C.F.K. `3
But you gotta love me `4
The cost, no man can say `5
But you gotta love me

Well, I'm sorry but I'm not interested in
Gold mines, oil wells, shipping or real estate `6
What would I liked to have been?
Everything you hate `7

'Cause it can't be love
For there is no true love
It can't be love
For there is no true love

There is a man `8
A certain man
And for the poor you may be sure
That he'll do all he can
Who is this one
Whose favorite son
Just by his action has the traction
Magnets on the run?
Who likes to smoke
Enjoys a joke
And wouldn't get a bit upset
If he were really broke?
With wealth and fame
He's still the same
I'll bet you five he's not alive
If you don't now his name

You said, "The Union forever" `9
You said, "The Union forever"
You cried, "The Union forever"
But that was untrue, girl

—————-
CONTEXTUAL NOTES:

`1 "It can't be love"
Performed by Bob Haymes and The Vagabonds in 1944 (after "Citizen Kane")

`2 "It can't be love / For there is no true love"
SINGER: It can't be love for there is no true love, no true love
I know I've played at the game like a moth in a blue flame
Lost in the end just the same, just the same
All these years my heart's floating around in a paddle of tears

`3 "C.F.K."
Charles Foster Kane

`4 "But you gotta love me"
Kane: Whatever I do, I do because I love you.
Susan: You don't love me. You want me to love you. "Sure, I'm Charles Foster Kane. Whatever you want, just name it and
it's yours. But you've gotta love me!"

`5 "The cost, no man can say"
NARRATOR: For wife two, one-time opera singing Susan Alexander, Kane built
Chicago's Municipal Opera House. Cost — Three million dollars.
Conceived for Susan Alexander Kane, half-finished before she
divorced him, the still unfinished Xanadu. Cost — No man can
say.

`6 "I'm sorry, but I'm not interested…"
COWORKER: It's from Mr. Kane.
THATCHER: Go on.
SECRETARY: "Sorry. But I'm not interested in gold mines, oil wells, shipping or real estate."
THATCHER: Not interested?

`7 "What would I like to have been? / Everything you hate"
THATCHER: Yes, yes. But your methods! Do you know, Charles never made a single investment? Always used money to–
KANE: To buy things. Buy things. My mother should have chosen a less reliable banker. Well, I always gagged on that
silver spoon. You know, Mr. Bernstein, if I hadn't been very rich, I might have been a really great man.
THATCHER: Don't you think you are?
KANE: I think I did pretty well under the circumstances.
THATCHER: What would you like to have been?
KANE: Everything you hate.

`8 "There is a man…"
SINGER: Good evening, Mr. Kane. There is a man.
DANCERS: There is a man.
SINGER: A certain man.
DANCERS: A certain man.
SINGER: And for the poor you may be sure that he'll do all he can. Who is this one?
DANCERS: Who is this one?
SINGER: This favorite son.
DANCERS: This favorite son.
SINGER: Just by his action has the traction magnets on the run. Who loves to smoke?
DANCERS: Who loves to smoke?
SINGER: Enjoys a joke.
DANCERS: Ha ha ha ha.
SINGER: Who wouldn't get a bit upset if he were really broke. With wealth and fame
DANCERS: With wealth and fame
SINGER: He's still the same.
DANCERS: He's still the same.
SINGER & DANCERS: I'll bet you five you're not alive if you don't know his name.
KANE: I don't know how to dance.
SINGER: What is his name?
BERNSTEIN: What is his name?
DANCERS: It's Charlie Kane.
EVERYONE: It's Mr. Kane. He doesn't like the Mister. He likes good old Charlie Kane.
SINGER: Who said the Miss
EVERYONE: Who said the Miss
SINGER: Was made to kiss?
EVERYONE: Was made to kiss?
SINGERL: And when he meets one always tries to do exactly this. Who buys the food?
EVERYONE: Who buys the food?
KANE & SINGER: Who buys the drinks?
EVERYONE: Who buys the drinks?
KANE & SINGER: Who thinks that dough was made to spend and acts the way he thinks?
SINGER: Now, is it Joe? No, no, no, no.
EVERYONE: No, no, no, no.…

`9 "The Union forever"
KANE (as a child): Come on, boys! The Union forever!
MRS. KANE: Be careful, Charles!

Last.fm is a music tracking service that lets you see what you've listened to and recommended what's good. Part of their terms of service is that all your data is yours, free to delete and copy and access at all times. (Google has a similar outlook but I still haven't seen ways of getting all your data out..) Now because that ticker is bound to change (and it will, the next time I listen to music) I'll take a screen shot or what it says right now.

That's 81 plays in the past week not counting my ipod. I'm in love with Louis XIV and their sexy lyrics and their rocking beats. I was seduced by Paper Doll and it's flaunting of sex and grittiness of it's lyrics and singing. (The fact it was the music for Suicide Girls video I found a couple years ago didn't hurt.) So I went and got the entire "The Best Little Secrets Are Kept" album and was blown away.

Now singing about sex and drugs and free love and the girl who (possibly) faked her death down the street is nothing new. (I still don't understand "A Letter To Dominique) If that was the draw then I probably would have played out the tracks by now. It's the course vocals (which I love because it doesn't require me to sing well) and the amazing guitar work that has kept it fresh. My buddy (and music aficionado) Brian remarked he heard a lot of influences from Jimi Hendrix and Lenny Kravitz. Which isn't light praise. (In a particular song which was probably my most listened to one Illegal Tender) They are some riffs that make me want to go learn how to play guitar.

Now I know I do this. I'll find some new music and play it to death. I ruined some fatboy slim for Andrew a while back, which he responded with trying to ruin placebo for me (he failed it, even though his according to last.fm 1,634 plays completely dwarfs my 342). And maybe 81 plays of any band in just over a week is overkill (well.. don't forget my ipod.. which has 95 plays! For a grand total of 176 plays!) but I'm in love with it and I'll take too much of a good thing. =)

I recommend;
Finding Out True Love Is Blind
Paper Doll
Illegal Tender
Pledge of Allegiance
Hey Teacher

And in a class of it's own (the last two songs are nice and slow)
Ball of Twine (which you should hear more then you should read)

–Francis

I looked into your eyes
And pushed your buttons and levers
You said you'd see until we agree and kindly said whatever
And you like my loving better
Cause' you said so in a letter, that said return to sender
My illegally illegal tender

It takes a lover, it takes a lover
It takes a lover that will love me like no other
It takes a lover, it takes a lover
It takes a lover that knows I love her like no other
(Louis XIV:Illegal Tender)

My favorite nerd core hip hop star MC FontalotM was on National Public Radio yesterday.

He's going to rule the world one day.

Anyone ever listen to any of those?

–Francis

I was looking for a link on the penny arcades but I found nothing that just showed what it was (it counts the coins) but I did find out that they're easy to rip off. Apparently a bunch of them have been robbed. I just hope when I go to rob a bank my first instinct is to go for the spare change. I just hope they don't have this guy working security. I took that friday night.

I know it's been a while since I've posted (so sue me, cancel your subscription), I've been working mostly, taking breaks for trips to beaches and birthday parties. (Matt, I found your dream girl by the way.) And occasionally the friday night game of pool with Jason.

I don't know if I ever mentioned my credit card fraud problem, I got most of my money back the other day (all but 4 bucks says quickbooks) and I'm sitting pretty about it. Now I just need to solve my no credit problem (more on that another day).

This is looking pretty attractive. There were talks with Tivo and netflix for a home "download" box where you could download your movies overnight and watch them as much as you want. Their always worried that it could be used for evil, like to copy the movies or something, but I can do that with dvds. I just did a quick Froogle Search I found out it runs around $600 bucks. No longer as attractive.

Don't get me started on $800 dollars in one day, if you've heard my rant then you know I want my money back. Unfortunately the people who need to give my money back haven't heard it yet. You know who you are! You best be better getting with the check writing you people you.
(I thank you Hawkeye Pierce)

On that note I watched The first DVD of Season 1 of Mash today. It's a lot better without Devry Commercials or a laugh track. I love this show, every eyeful.

Good night folks, I'll be here all week.

–Francis

PS Look for new Audioslave, Cold Play, and The White Stripes

Get them while they're hot.

Warning Link has lots of popups. Only Internet explorer seems to get them though. Firefox and Safari don't seem to have any problems. Toni called me up earlier telling me a story about how a lot of prono popups popped up when a professor walked in because she had clicked on the link.

Because of that I decided to deactivate the link above and copy the link's contents into the extended part of this post. So read more if you want the list ad free =)

Update: It seems I have found the maximum post size. I'm going the whole nine yards this time and reworking the html I stole off the site. It's filled with Div's I don't use and comments that we don't need.

Update: I've never seen SubEthaEdit choke so much, I guess it doesn't handel 200k lines very well. (The whole thing was one line) Either way it's all parsed and pretty and still to large for one post. So I'm uploading it instead.

Lots of music videos

I even took out the ones that didn't work.

Bulletproof Networks.
I've been reading up on vpns. Secure networks over insecure networks. Instead of paying lots of money for a secure line to your office you can use a cheep internet connection that is hardly secure. But over this insecure connection you can start another connection that is secure. That's what VPN's are all about anyway.

I've got a decent understanding of the concepts but I found a simple power point presentation that does a good job of describing them. A better job then I've done anyway. It concentrates on OpenVpn but it touches IPSEC and others.

In other news.
I speed up the gallery a little. The main page anyway, it was taking far too long to load. On the down side you won't see how many comments each gallery has listed on the main page. You can live with that.

Forgive my snippy captions, My heart just isn't in it today. Also if you look at the England gallery you might notice this comes before Westminster and Trafalgar Square, I missed this one, and the next one too. I'm trying to keep some semblance of chronological order.

So I found this site called digg. It's neat, the community submits links and rates them, not a bunch of editors. So the crap you find there is picked by your peers, switches the blame to everybody instead of specific people.

Anyway, I found a neat setup for iTunes playlists. It produces a nice mix of music you haven't heard with music you like. I have three different playlists total and varied a little from the suggested ones.

The first one has music that I haven't played more then 5 times and haven't rated 1 or 2 stars (which mean I think they suck). It's limited to 300 songs chosen randomly. The second has stuff I've played more then 3 times, has more then 2 stars (3 and above), and I haven't played in the last week. It's limited to 200 songs chosen by least recently played.

The 3rd playlist is just a combination of both. This playlist will play every song (unless I've already rated it a 1 or 2). Songs will randomly show up 5 times and if I haven't rated it at least 3 stars I won't see them again. If I have rated them at least 3 stars they'll be thrown into a nice rotating list of songs I like. The mix is 3 parts list one (or Infuser) and 2 parts list two (or Sprinkler).

It works well.

Ohh and until I fix it the random image is broken. I'll figure it out later I don't feel like it now. I'm in the middle of moving everything, so stuff might break in the process. *shrug* What ever.

–Francis

–Francis

PS And because I think if I don't do this now I never will. Here's my next England Gallery, my day at Stonehenge.

Anyway, I finally found this song that's been running through my head.

You Showed Me
The Turtles