Here is a short photo post illustrating the melting of Greenland's ice sheets. The speed and scale of the melt moving far more quickly then predicted, with startling changes over the past number of years.
Greenland ice sheet, 1992 vs. 2002 (via BBC):
Greenland ice sheet, 2005 (via Union of Concerned Scientists):
According to scientists, glacial surface meltwater is a factor in ice sheet collapse. As water melts at the surface, it flows downward through the ice through crevaces and moulins where it breaks up ice pacs from the inside and lubricates the surface between glacial undersides and rock.
A river flowing over the glacial surface into a large moulin (via Nasa). 
A glacial surface lake 4.5 Miles South of Swiss Camp, inland from Disko Bay in West Greenland (via Greenpeace). 
Aerial view of a meltwater pond (via The Flight Academy).
Courtesy of Daily Kos, here is a story outlining the science behind the potentially rapid and devastating melting of the Greenland ice sheets.
For many, the view of climate change is one of a slow creeping process where seas rise at a rate of the odd millimetre per year; however, following the 2002 collapse of Antarctica's massive Larsen B iceshelf, scientists now realize the startling speed of glacier collapse. In the case of Larsen B, an ice plate 650 miles long and weighing 500 billion tonnes broke apart in just 35 days.
Sea level didn't rise then because that ice was already located on the water surface. If the landlocked ice sheets of Greenland were to collapse in a similar way, global sea levels would increase by 7m.
Follow the link for the full science behind glacier break-up.
Sea the next post for photos of the glacier melt in Greenland.
There are actually three faces in this image. Not counting the one at the bottom. So look hard...but don't stare..she might just jump out of your computer and grab you.
The Conservatives campaigned hard on bringing improved accountability to Ottawa. They are about to face there first test.
It was reported today that the Conservatives may have illegally accepted up to 1.7 million dollars in donations last year because they "didn't understand political financing laws". This amount includes corporate donations, which have been illegal since 2004.
Aside from the obvious point that its pretty tough to be an upright member of any community if you do not understand the laws that apply to it, this is also the latest in a series of issues that this government apparently has little understanding of.
Yesterday, Environment Minister Rona Ambrose scrapped two popular climate change programs, the One-Tonne Challenge and the Energuide program, despite strong warnings from her own department that these programs were fundamental to addressing climate change.
I am not saying that these programs were offering all the answers to Canada's climate change commitments, but if you are going to scrap two initiatives that are successfully addressing the nations greatest problem, then at the very least you should be introducing new programs to pick up the slack.
My prediction is that we can look forward to a great deal more of this type of decision making. The Conservatives are proceeding according to their own agenda accross a host of issues, regardless of the opinion of Canadians and the advice of experts. It will be left to ordinary Canadians during the next election to provide real accountability at the ballot box.
A heads up that Al Gore will be appearing on Jon Stewart's The Daily Show tonight. If you can't catch it on television, check out the video posting from Comedy Central after it airs.
Also, remember to see the Truth, if you haven't already.
For some time, I have been attempting to reduce my impact on the environment. For me, like most women, a large proportion of my cotton consumption resided in disposable products such as tampons and those cotton pads for make-up removal. Well, no more.Last month, I got myself a mooncup. If you're a male reader, I suggest that clicking on the link will probably provide far too much information
It's 5:15 A.M. in Tampa, Florida. I've been up for 15 minutes. What I thought must be the loudest alarm/wake-up call in any hotel I have ever visited turned out to be a fire alarm. Yay. Shortly after the alarm went off we were told to stay in our rooms. This was followed 15 minutes later with the following announcement:
"The emergency response team has determined this alarm to be a non-emergency. Please return to normal business."
Normal business? Like what, sleeping?! My ears are still ringing, I'm quite sure I'm awake for the morning and ready to go to work.
In 18 months of traveling this is the second time that the fire alarm has gone off in my hotel. The last was during the winter in Washington, DC. I looked damn funny in a pair of flimsy shorts, a t-shirt, jacket and dress shoes (the first ones I could find) standing outside in 30 degree F weather. At least its warm outside this morning...
I need to take a dip into the spring and get some motivation for doing some more polaroids. I haven't felt it lately. Usually I do a couple every now and then, just odd ones left over from the last shows. Flashback......there use to be this hot-spring in California. We use to go camping there all the time. It was out in the middle of $#@$% no where. Not many people knew about it. Anyway, we use to go there and drink and do other things but what I remember most is sitting in that spring and coming up with ideas and things that I wanted to work on....and not just in the art world but in my life. Looking back on it, it was like every time you left that place you had a new outlook on life. This Polaroid is based on on that spring. When I make it back to Cali.... that will be the first place I'll go.
I think there was this one episode of Coach where basically Coach and the mime had hell of tension between them. Like Coach was in a really bad mood because his team had lost and the last thing he wanted to do was spend time with the damn mime, but his daughter was all: “Daddy,” (she probably called him Daddy) “you had promised that you would take Stuart to [some place] and that you’d really make an effort to get to know him!” or something. And Coach really didn’t want to do this but he is a man of his word, so he and Stuart headed out in to the woods for a camping trip or like maybe went to some other place. Then I think there was some sort of event that trapped them somewhere. Like, maybe they got trapped in a cabin and for some reason they couldn’t get to safety for a while. Maybe there was too much snow or something. Then probably they talked for a long time and began to see eye to eye on things and probably Coach ended by saying something like: “well, Stuart, if my daughter loves you, that’s good enough for me.” And then the audience made an audible “awwwwww” sound. And then Coach probably said something like: “just make you sure you don’t [do some effeminate thing you had done earlier in the episode]”. The audience probably laughed at this.
Well it's official. Creation Northeast 2006 has been cancelled. Here's what was said in the press release:--Creation 2006 Northeast schedule for June 28 - July 1, 2006 has been postponed until June 27 -– June 30, 2007. This difficult decision has been made after much prayer and consideration. Due to the large amounts of rain that have fallen in the past 48 hours and the additional heavy rain
It's the first day of the Wimbledon tennis championships, and lo! It is pouring with rain. It's nice to know that some traditions are upheld. Current plans are to queue for tickets on Friday, by which time I am confident that it will be 30C and sunny. Now, if it could just rain constantly until Thursday afternoon, there might be some good matches on the outside courts on Friday as the
Audio
Derailleur - Repeat Offender - Dust Science Recordings
Adem - Lauch Yourself - Domino
The Black Dog - 43ss 555 (Vince Watson Remix - System 23 Edit Version) - Dust Science Recordings
Bruce Cockburn - See You Tomorrow - Cooking Vinyl
MJ Hibbett and the Validators - The Gay Train - Artists Against Success
Big Bill Broonzy - Black, Brown and White - Munich Records
Chicken Legs Weaver - Desert Rose - Riverside Records
Elaine Palmer - Blue Sky - Cosmos - `
Fes Parker - I will be there - Pressupable Records
Ridder - Cheap Flights of Fancy - www.ridderonline.com
The Haddenham One - 40 Miles of Dickson Road - Pump
Saizmundo - Ers Dyddia Datblygu - C&P Recordiau Slacyr
The Russian Futurists - Paul Simon - Memphis Industries
The Knife - We Share Our Mother's Health - Brille
Good Shoes - All in My Head - Brille
Nighmares on Wax - 70s 80s - Elevation
Regina Spektor - Fidelity - Warner Brother
De Rosa - Father's Eyes - Chemikal Underground
Test Icicles - Circle Square Triangle (Spank Rock Remix) - Domino
The Delgados - Pull The Wires from The Wall - Chemikal Underground Records
Smog - Rock Bottom Riser - Domino
The Twilight Sisters - I'M Ready - One Little Indian
Yellow6 - Rain (Again) - RROOPP
Yellow6 - Machine - RROOPP
This was the first polaroid. I actually stuck the text to the back by placing it in water. It didn't work very well. I went back through my old CD's and looked at some of the first collages. There are some pretty funny ones! Its really weird to see the progression from the first ones created to the ones being created today. There is a big difference. I will post them so you can take a look at them. Let me know what you think.
For the last six weeks or so, Cowboy and I have been working on securing the means of our next adventure. Well, it was mainly Cowboy, because he's the one with the earning potential that would enable us to do what we want. I'll be doing worthy work in a portacabin somewhere, earning tuppence if I'm lucky.In (hopefully) late September, we will be moving to New Zealand. It's radical, exciting,
Chin Chin used to call me "Bean Bex".
I forgot all of the variants of Saxe beginning with F:
Mr. Fax
Mr. Faxe
Mr. Facks
etc...
And the wife reminded me that I was "Mi' Dean" (pronounced like mister without the ster!) and she was "Miz Dean".
Heh.
James, as usual, has some interesting stuff on his blog. I personally liked the Pizza Name story. While I don't have a long last name (Saxe, if you didn't know already), it is one that is notoriously difficult for people to hear correctly over the phone or spell correctly. So, I am one of the following:
Mr. Sacks
Mr. Sachs
Mr. Saks
Mr. Sax
Mr. Sex (hmm, nothing wrong with that one)
Mr. Zacks
Mr. Zax
etc.
(I'm killing myself trying to remember what Chin-Chin II called me when they used to deliver Chinese food to my house...)
Although, my favorite still is from my ex-neighbor, Gary. Gary was a poor schlub who only wanted to go to work, make some money, come home and sit on the front stoop drinking a beer and watching the world go by. Preferably, he was drinkiing a beer that he came and got out of my fridge. Gary was a huge mooch. Anyway, to Gary I was "Mistuh Dean". Of course, that meant that Steph was "Mizzuz Dean".
This was a common conversation:
"Hey there Mistuh Dean!"
"Hi Gary."
"Mistuh Dean, you got $20 I can borrow 'til Friday" (I replied no, even though I had $500+ in cash on me from my roommate's rent!)
Ah, yes, I have fond memories of living in East Atlanta... but at least I didn't have to deal with a crazy HOA.
So I'm traveling all over the northeast this week for Foundstone's Software Security Roadshow. I started by flying to NYC on Sunday and took the Acela Express train to Philadelphia last night. Right now I'm traveling down to DC on the Acela Express train.
THIS ROCKS! I could totally get into traveling by train more. Its comfortable, spacious, has 120V AC power plugs at every seat and I can get internet access via EV-DO. Why, oh why, don't we use trains in the south? I'd much rather take a longer train ride to other southern cities and have these amenities than take a short flight, deal with the TSA stupidity and be crammed onto a plane like a damn sardine.
Enough ranting... back to work.
This is my niece, at two days old. Look at the size of those feet! I predict she'll be tall.Not that I know anything about babies or children or anything, but I think she is pleasing to the eye. Essentially, though, she's a baby. She doesn't do anything; she just is. I imagine that when you're the parent of a baby, the fluttering of an eyelash is enough to send you running for the Nikon, but to
My friends evidently love French people. So we have now attended our second wedding of the year where an English maiden marries a French monsieur.Because it was an hour from London, we managed to only have one slight detour involving missing the turn-off to the M25 (the giant orbital road that surrounds London). And we drove there during Engerland's first World Cup football match, thus achieving
Audio
Blackbeard (Dennis Bovell) - Cut After Cut - EMI
Blackbeard (Dennis Bovell) - River to the Bank - EMI
Dennis Bovell - Brain Damage - EMI
Dennis Bovell & The Dub Band - Dub Master - EMI
Dennis Bovell / 4th Street Orchestra - Ah Who Seh - EMI
Winston Francis - Mr Fix It (Dub) - Rude Rich Records
International Peoples Gang - This One - Em:t Records
Ammoncontact (feat. Cut Chemist and Brother J) - Drum Riders - Ninja Tune
MJ Hibbett and The Validators - Better Things to Do - Artists Against Success
Bardo Pond - Cry Baby Cry - All Tomorrow Parties
Now - Ra - Pickled Egg
Regina Spektor - On the Radio - Sire
David Alvin - Blind Love - Yep Roc
Paul the Girl - Human Bun - Inconvenient
Leeroy Stagger - Stupid Love Song - Boompa
Jaroslav Budnyk - My Friend - Demo
The Maytals - Louie Louie - Trojan
Bob Andy - Walk a Mile in My Shoes - Sanctuary Records
Dan Reeder - Clean Elvis - Oh Boy Records
Issa Bagayogo - Nogo - Putumayo
Pape Diouf - Partir -
Mogwai - Travel is Dangerous - Play it Again Sam
De Rosa - Camera - Chemikal Underground
Zukanican - Trawling for Horses - Pickled Egg
Tuxedomoon - Vulcanic, Combustible - Crammed Disc
DDR is cool. It's a fact. If you've never played DDR (Dance Dance Revolution) then you are missing out. Basically a bunch of arrows show up on screen and you have to dance on the corresponding arrows in order to keep going and win.When you first start you feel like an absolute fool, and then you get good, and still feel like a fool but hey at least your having fun now.I am such a freaking geek
In terms of the things I have actually written about in this blog, compared with the things I wish I could write about in this blog, as a ratio we are talking in the region of 1/10.Over the last few weeks my life has 'flip-turned upside-down', as I believe the Fresh Prince once ruminated.On 2nd June, I resigned my job. My job went from bad, to off-the-scale-evil in the space of a month. Though
Even though I remember him being basically a peripheral character, I think that occasionally the athletic director for Minnesota State would have a somewhat central role to whatever the hell was going on on Coach. I don’t remember what his name was, but I remember that he was bald and he was hell of fidgety. It was as if the guy that played the athletic director decided to base his entire acting repertoire on a terrible attempt at some sort of understated Don Knotts caricature. I don’t remember much about him, but I think he was always super-stressed out about Coach’s antics. This was sort of a weird dynamic, because it was as if there were this history of Coach always getting in to trouble and the athletic director always having to cover for him and getting totally stressed out. I think this resulted in a lot of jokes about why the athletic director was bald.
I’m somewhat unclear as to how the employee/employer hierarchies work in major university athletic departments. Is the athletic director of a school necessarily the football coach’s boss? Or is it more like an administrative supervisor role where the athletic director isn’t a boss so much as an overseer of proper procedure? I don’t really know, but in either case I don’t think the bald guy had any reason to get so stressed out all the time. If he really was Coach’s boss and Coach’s zany antics always left him all stressed, why didn’t he just fire Coach? And if he wasn’t his boss, why the hell would he put so much pressure on himself when Coach was too busy getting into hilarious situations to do his job? But then again, Coach seemed to have a fair amount of job security, so he must have at least been passably decent when it came to coaching football.
What the hell was the athletic director so worried about all the time? I think all of his scenes ended with like, some sort of nervous double-take or Coach maybe knowingly giving him a hard time right before he left Coach’s office. Then maybe he'd say something again once the door closed; you know, just like, to one-up the scared, nervous athletic director. Atta way, Coach. Show 'em who's boss.
A little while ago it was my nephew's first birthday. Cowboy and I attended his party. Nearly six weeks later, I have recovered sufficiently to write about it.We arrived at Cowboy's older brother's (M) house to a chorus of children screeching 'EEEEEEEEEEEE!'. I immediately requested urgent assistance from Cowboy's younger brother, who directed me towards the location of the alcoholic beverages.
Well, boys and girls I have been talking about it for some time. I promised I would get old Bogy up on the blog and here he is. 16 Polaroids. I just wish the other two got scanned but, I ran out of time. So here you go. I hope you enjoy, tell your friends to drop by and say hello to Mr. Bogart...and remember Progress is our Most Important Product
As a person involved in the music and media industry, I've been exposed to many practices that I found detestable on a grand scale. From horrible edits done by radio stations (a la Clear Channel) to make songs fit into their pre-programmed pre-recorded 3 minute 30 second windows, to lyric edits done by record labels in order to make them more of what the record label would want to hear (not
Audio
Rosie Gaines - Welcome to my world - 12"Promo
David Morris - Midnight Lady - Expansion -
East West Connection - Love Music (Original Album Mix) -
Tony Allen - Moyege - Honest Jons
The Cuban Brothers - A Million Stories - Sunday Best
Senor Soul - Don't Lay Your Funky Trip on Me
Funkadelic - Standing on the Verge of Getting It On - Westbound Records
Jon Lucien - Would You Believe in Me? - BMG
Elektrons - Sunshine Love - Genuine
Carol Williams - Can't Get Away (From Your Love) - Soul Brother
Alexander O'Neil - Lord - BKO
Moses Mcclean feat. Nedra - Dream (isoul8 vox rmx) - Still Music
Antonio Adolfo feat. Brazuca - Transamazonica - Nascente
Four Flights - All I want is You - Soul Brother Records
Ray Robinson
280 West feat. Diamond Temple with Ray, Goodma and Brown - I Never Knew - Phuture Soul
Ron Hall & The Muthafunkaz feat. Mark Evans - The Way You Love Me - The Sound of Defected
Roman Andren feat. Gladys - Make It Happen - Soundscape
Kenny Thomas - Let It Rain - Curb
This Polaroid is based on a Historic character. He has been the subject of a lot of movies. Need a hint? He appears as a character in the film Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure, wherein he discovers a fondness for ice cream.....Hummm who could it be?
I've got a serious shoe-related problem. In sum, I have a posh wedding to go to. I bought a dress in a post-exam panic-buy frenzy last week, because I have literally been too busy to do anything (for example, I bought Cowboy's wedding anniversary gift a whole two days in advance of the anniversary) except fret and worry about my exam. However, the perfect shoe was nowhere in sight, and I was
I have been labled "Flower Boy" by a couple of my friends around town. Since my big show, I have only taken two flower pictures!!!! Hey hey!!! I'm going to make an effort to get out of the flower business. Flowers and Polaroids go together so well. Why I don't know.... Well enjoy the new post. I'm going to make an effort to not be an zombie this week...get out and do something...
This is my blog. So far it's been dominated by stories about technology. Yeah, and it's been REALLY boring. So beginning today I'm changing the way I post. I'll still have some tech stuff on it, because that's an interest of mine, however I'm not a one dimensional person (a reason I never went into computer science). I'm also interested in music, film, video games, photography, broadcasting
I received notification this morning that I passed the CISSP exam. I'm glad that's over and the books can all go back on the shelf.
There was this one episode of Coach where Coach’s team was playing in some bowl game in Texas. I think it was basically just the Alamo Bowl because I remember a bunch of stock footage shots of the Alamo, but I can’t remember what the bowl was called in the episode. Whatever it was it was some easily discernable pseudonym for the Alamo Bowl. Maybe the Antonio Bowl or something? Probably if I weren’t so conditioned to remember the Alamo Bowl this would be easier to recall.
In any case, the jokes in the episode were all about how hot it was in Texas when they were getting ready for the game. These were basically corollary jokes to the ones made in that episode about the Patriot Bowl, which were all about how cold it was. I think probably they did this because they didn’t want to alienate people that live in hot places who weren't able to relate to all the cold jokes.
I think also that all of the non-football characters (Christine, Coach’s daughter, the mime, etc.) came to the bowl game with Coach for some reason. Probably they all had a lot of personal issues to work out, which made Coach’s job that much harder considering he was supposed to be getting ready for the game. I think there were probably a lot of jokes about this as well.
For the past few months I have been reading Marley & Me off and on as I have had a few spare moments to devote to reading. I am within a few pages of finishing the book and it has definitely made me sad. Let me back up and explain why.
The book is about a big, boisterous and very bad dog named Marley. I can totally relate to the author, I have a lab mix named Java who is also prone to misbehave at the most inopportune times. When I read about Marley's exploits with the trash can, I think of Java. When I read about Marley running away, I think of Java. When I read about the big, dumb dog named Marley being the authors best friend, I think of Java. Thankfully, when I read about Marley being afraid of thunderstorms and destroying the authors house, I don't think of Java. (Lucy, on the other hand, is deathly afraid of thunderstorms. But she just shudders and shakes and runs under the bed or to her crate.)
JavaAs the author walks through Marley's life I see a lot of parallels with Java. As Marley gets older, they became more and more clear.
I rescued Java from the pound when he was just a puppy, weighing no more than 6 pounds. It was the summer of 1996 and the Olympics were coming to town. I was in graduate school at the time, working on the Ph.D. that I never did earn. Java was with me to see the Olympic torch run past Emory — as a puppy he would spend the day in the genetics lab with me — and later than night in VaHi. He went with me everywhere, including to bars, where he was a great chick magnet.
As I grew older, left school and got a real job, Java grew up too. He turned into a pain in the ass who would run away from me, dig in the trash, roll around in horse poop, break out of every fence, bust through front doors when people try to walk in the house and get picked up by the pound. Yet I still loved him, despite his flaws. He was, and still is, my companion. He has grown up and become older as well. However, he's aging much more quickly than I am and it's really starting to show.
First it was little things. Glassy eyes indicate that he is getting cataracts. He doesn't jump up in the bed to join us for a "dog-pile" as readily as he used to. He's no longer quite so quick to try and make his escape through a partially opened door. This is possibly because I had an electric fence for years, but that has been inoperable for more than a year now and I don't think he's noticed yet. In the past year he's started having trouble getting up the stairs at night. On a few occassions he has refused to go up the stairs because his rear hips have arthritis. We've even had to carry him up the stairs on some occassions — no easy task with a 65 pound furry beast! Finally, he's unable to come with us on long walks or hikes. When we last took him for a 5 mile walk on the Silver Comet Trail, he was in obvious pain later that evening. He has trouble getting up to the top of Kennesaw Mountain and we don't even bring him along when we plan a longer hike. Steph and I both feel bad that we take Lucy along with us while he sits at home, alone.
I know as time goes on, his ability to do the things he once did will continue to decline. I am finding it more and more difficult to observe. I know he's not suffering, his quality of life is still generally quite good. I also know that some day in the future his quality of life may decline significantly leaving us to face some tough decisions about how best to care for him. And that scares the hell out of me.
Reading Marley & Me last night this all hit me like a ton of bricks. I found myself on the couch crying over the book and the inevitable reality that Java will not be with me forever. He's been a part of my life for so long, I'm not sure what it will be like without him. And I hope I don't have to find out for a very long time to come.
If you're a dog lover, you owe it to yourself to read this book. You'll cry too.
"Never heard of SIRA? That's the way Big Copyright and their lackeys want it, and it's bad news for you. Simply put, SIRA fundamentally redefines copyright and fair use in the digital world. It would require all incidental copies of music to be licensed separately from the originating copy."read more | digg story
This polaroid is based off the Tin Man in the Wizard of Oz.......Does anybody out there know how to start an online petition? I want to start one for the Polaroid SX-70 film. If you would like to help with this or have any advice please email me @
pearsonphoto@gmail.com
Yesterday Steph and I took our younger dog, Lucy, up to the Vineyard Mountain Trail (warning: PDF content) on Lake Allatoona. There is a doggie hike every Sunday morning, however, it conflicted with other plans we had made for today. Instead, we decided to go check things out yesterday morning so we could get our lazy asses moving again. We've been pretty sedentary since returning from the Grand Canyon...
From our place it is about a 45 minute drive to the trailhead which is located just off Interstate 75 near Cartersville, GA. We were one of four cars parked at the trail, so we knew it wouldn't be too busy, unlike Kennesaw Mountain. We took off up the trail with Lucy on leash, but that didn't last too long. Lucy is a complete wuss, so we knew she wouldn't go far if she was allowed to run free. So I unclipped her leash and off she ran, never more than 30 feet from either of us. Of course, she'd run ahead, then back to us and off to either side, so I'm sure her hike was at least twice as long as ours!
The hike was really nice. While not terribly difficult, it did have a number of downed trees across the trail provided some challenges for Lucy to figure out. Of course, she could just do an end run around the tree, but that would be too easy. Instead she had to figure out how to either go over or under the tree, but never around. That would take her off the scent trail that everyone else has left behind!
Lucy really impressed me, she's a great hiking companion! She was extremely well behaved the entire hike, even when we met up with a group of hikers with two Great Danes and another mutt. She was a little cautious at first, but quickly fell into her place in the pack with the humans and dogs. We hiked the last mile or so of the trail with the people we met, they showed us how it connects back to the park to make a loop. Based on the map we had, we thought the trail was an in-and-out for a total of 5 miles... we were clearly quite wrong and almost doubled our intended hike. However, since the terrain was relatively flat it didn't feel like a long or strenous trek.
This is definitely a hike we'll be doing again in the near future due to its proximity to the city and the lack of traffic on the trail early in the morning.
Electronic Arts along with Dice developed a game not so long ago called Battlefield 2. In this popular first person shooter, up to 64 individual players get to face off against each other using modern weaponry such as rifles, handguns, grenades, tanks, jets, attack choppers, and basically anything else you would find on a real world battlefield.Following the initial release of the game, EA and
At last. At LAST. My last ever sit-in-a-room-for-three-hours-and-write-like-your-life-depends-upon-it exam has finished. I will never again have to suffer the pain and drear of days and weeks of revision culminating in a less than confident feeling about the requirements being reached. At least this year it rained throughout the revision period, which was strangely comforting. Last year
Audio
Audio Active - Start Rec from -Apollo Choco -BRC-88( '97)
Audio Active - Mammoth Galactica from- Happy Happer- BRC-86(' 95)
Audio Active - Idle Dragon featuring I-Roy from- Idle Dragon- THC-01( '99)
Audio Active - Happy Shopper from -Happy Happer -BRC-86( ' 95)
Audio Active - Electric Bombardment from- Happy Happer- BRC-86(' 95)
Audio Active - Weed Specialist from -Apollo Choco -BRC-88( '97)
Audio Active - Return of The Space Ape(Metalic -O Remix) from -Weed Specialist - BRE-3(' 97)
Audio Active - Space Children from- Audio Active - ( '93) / - Tokyo Space Cowboys - BRC-85(' 94)
Audio Active - Sunset Doesn't Mean That We Lose The Sun from- Tokyo Space Cowboys- BRC-85( '94)
Audio Active - Citizen Zombie from -Apollo Choco -BRC-88( ' 97)
Audio Active - Suckers from - Back to The Stoned Age- BRC-75(' 03)
Audio Active - Ala-Mecka-Bickally Dub from -Tokyo Space Cowboys -BRC-85( '94)
Audio Active - The Red Line District from - Back to The Stoned Age - BRC-75(' 03)
Audio Active - Wanna-na from -Tokyo Space Cowboys -BRC-85( '94)
Audio Active - Free The Marijuana featuring Bim Sherman from- Tokyo Space Cowboys- BRC-85( '94)
Audio Active - Kick The Bong Around from -Kick The Bong Around -THC-03( ' 99)
Audio Active - Open The Gate from - Start Rec- ON-U DP37( ' 96) / - Apollo Choco -BRC-88( ' 97)
Audio Active - Weed Back from - Back to The Stoned Age - BRC-75(' 03)
Audio Active - Robot War from - Apollo Choco - BRC-88( '97)
Audio Active - Stiff Wheel from -Weed Specialist - BRE-3( ' 97) /- Robot War - BRA-5( ' 97)
Audio Active - U.G. from- Apollo Choco - BRC-88( '97)
interlude
Audio Active - Coolness In My Foolishness from -Apollo Choco -BRC-88( ' 97)
Audio Active - Burning Of The Midnight Lamp from - Tokyo Space Cowboys - BRC-85(' 94)
Audio Active - Paint Your Face Red from- Apollo Choco - BRC-88( '97)
Audio Active - Audio Active Declaration from -Tokyo Space Cowboys -BRC-85( ' 94)
Audio Active - Auditory Nerve Dub from- Audio Active- (' 93) / -Tokyo Space Cowboys -BRC-85( ' 94)
Audio Active - Penalty Taker from- Start Rec- O N-U DP37(' 96) / -Apollo Choco -BRC-88( '97)
Audio Active - Heart Of L-ion from - Apollo Choco - BRC-88(' 97)
Audio Active - The Giants Garden from- Audio Active - ( '93) / - Tokyo Space Cowboys - BRC-85(' 94)
DJ 3000 - Pipas Poem - Submerge
Alias and Tarsier -Dr C - Anticon
Madtone - Calling Live on Channel - www.madtone.co.uk
Shamek Farrah - First Impression - Soul Brother Records
Explosions in the Sky - First Breath after Coma - Bella
Sekehe Gender Bharanta Muni - Gending Langiang - CMP
Max Richter - On the Nature of Daylight - Fat Cat
Kenny Larkin - Falle French - Peacefrog
Alemu Aga - Sele Sene Seqlet - Rough Guide
The Memory Band - This is how we walk on the moon - Hungry Hill Records
Skane Revisted - Milano Bass Machine - New Speak
Aurthur Russell - Arm Around You - Rough Trade
Freeform - Nothing to say - Skam
Four Tet - My angel rocks back and forth - Domino
Pedro - Folded Arms - (Melodic)
Ear Sugar - Guitar Splinters - (EarSugar)
Yellow 6 - Cale - RR01PP
With the "success" of shutting down The Pirates Bay, it looks like the heat and light are moving on to AllofMP3 and Russia. Will they be shut down as well?read more | digg story
This morning I logged on to my computer at work with its two 17 inch monitors and clicked on the live bookmark for Digg.com, expecting so see all the top stories at the moment. What I found was the notice of "Live Bookmark Loading"."Hmmmm, that's interesting," I said to myself. Soooo, then I tried to load the webpage itself. No dice. "What's going on here?" (I said to myself once again.)So
I can’t remember if Coach’s football team (Minnesota State) was good or not. On the one hand, I remember some episodes where they went to bowl games, but on the other hand, I also remember a lot of jokes about the team being bad. This was something of an easy joke that they could work in whenever they needed. Probably there were scenes where maybe Coach and Luther had to come up with some scheme to lie to Christine for whatever reason, and Coach would be like, “okay Luther, remember…” and then give some elaborate plan as to the lie they were going to tell, and then Luther would be all “gee Hayden, maybe if you spent this much time coming up with football plays we’d win a few more games.” And then the audience would laugh.
But I guess actually that’s a pretty accurate assessment. Coach seemed to spend a lot of time getting in and out of zany situations. Why didn’t he spend more time coming up with football plays?
In a follow up to the release of Ubuntu 6.06, get started with over 25 tips to tweak, personalize and otherwise polish the diamond that is Dapper Drake (aka Ubuntu 6.06). Tips include installing multimedia codecs, adding extra repositories, adding a Windows-like "Start" button, and much more!read more | digg story
Ubuntu is probably the most user friendly operating system in the Linux world. If you're sick of Windows XP or would just like to experiement. Give it a try, it's free!read more | digg story
BENGA
NEWSTEP
BENGA BEATS CD
Benga’s had this out via his own website earlier in the year, a set of fifteen tunes from the past couple of years. He first reached out from South London on the now epochal “Tempa DubStep AllStars Volume One” from DJ Hatcha about a year or so ago, prior to that putting out tunes on the Big Apple label out of Croydon, the epicentre of dubstep. With “Newstep” the scope of this music becomes even more defined, whereas the surfaces of Burial’s album can get grainy like gravel under foot, this can come clean like cold chrome on skin, closer now to those long forgotten UK electro sounds than any hip hop styling. There are cuts here that just make you gasp: “Dominion” is a choreographed march of demented Scientologists whooping and chanting for L. Ron, scary; imagine “Zombie Jig” and you have it, a gristly mechanical half-stepper. In fact, in common with other new dubstep there is something disturbingly ceremonial about many of the tunes here; it will be intriguing to observe the inevitably emerging dance attitudes.
BLACKDOWN
BLACKDOWN EP
KEYSOUND
Martin Clark is perhaps better know to date as a chronicler of the development of the dubstep scene on his own blackdownsoundboy blog and as a regular contributor to the excellently uninhibited Pitchfork Media site. The condition of observer will not last much longer as his Blackdown persona assumes greater control. With fellow artist Dusk he released “Drenched/Submerge” on the label co-created for their output, Keysound, so called to reflect the sonic keystone loops that coalesce the atmospherics of the track into the rhythm, a technique employed in common with fellow dubstep artist Burial. This latest one has a sampled vocal from Indian songbird Lata Mangeshkar floating behind the heavy bass drop and drone – sinodub excursions are planned for the future. The flesh of “Crackle Blues” must be probed to find an acapella of the traditional blues song “Jack O Diamonds” lurking underneath, a Lomax recording of Leadbelly perhaps that’s virtually discarded on the Burial remix, as is the boom of the bass, replaced by clattering wood and furiously skittering light percussion.
MARTIN CAMPBELL
SHOWCASE
LOG ON!! / CHANNEL ONE UK CD
Martin Campbell, British born but raised in Jamaica, is an artist whose entire reputation to date rests one single issued back in 1990, (“Why Must The) Wicked Rule”. A simple lyric, devastatingly delivered in a plaintive sufferer style, on top of a painfully pleading horn-riff, it was one of those tunes that just stepped out of time. And it still does, included here with its original horns version plus a strictly drum and bass stripped down dub, standing as it does at the forefront of the then burgeoning UK nu roots movement perhaps time is overdue for a proper reappraisal of that scene. Produced by Cambell in association with Channel One’s JoJo Hookim, with only three cuts on this showcase style set the rest of the space is occupied by dubs from house band Hi Tech Roots Dynamics and a great sax led instrumental from Bob Ormrod in tribute to the ‘other’ Channel 1 in Kingston “Roots Rock 29 Maxfield”.
CHALAWA/ DELIXX
EXTRA DUB: EXODUS DUB / UPRISING IN DUB
WESTONS CD
It’s always been a point that rankles, the fact that the Wailers had an outstanding body of work both pre and post the solo Marley years, but there has never been a satisfactory dubwise collection of their tunes. Most of the early Perry produced sides were instrumental run thoughs, with the glorious exception of the twelve inch cut of “Keep On Moving” that finds Scratch a flicker short of total dub distortion, and the occasional Tuff Gong single only nudged into the lower reaches of the dub satisfaction zone. The album “Chalawa Exodus Dub” appeared last around ten years ago after originally popping up not long after the release of Marley’s album, likewise the “Uprising” set. By no means a revelation, these sets remain a great tribute to the spirit of the originals with some of the versions raised above a jazzy lilt to a tougher dub level, cool curiosities.
DUB SPENCER & TRANCE HILL
NITRO
96 RECORDINGS / ECHO BEACH CD
It’s just impossible to dislike some albums that trade so unselfconsciously on the dub genre, like the recent Easy Allstars’ Floyd tribute “Dub Side Of The Moon” (“Radiodread” is shortly to be unleashed!). This debut full-length release from Swiss trio Dub Spencer & Trance Hill (Adrian Pflugshaupt, Marcel Stalder and Christian Niederer) is just one of those as the gang take a modern slant reggae’s old pre-occupation with the Wild West, especially the spaghetti westerns. Coming from nowhere these boys adopt the persona of cartoon heroes and ride rhythms into town where they dub the feuding locals into submission, it sounds cheesy, it shouldn’t work, but it does.
JOE GIBBS & THE PROFESSIONALS
AFRICAN DUB ALL MIGHTY: CHAPTER THREE
JOE GIBBS EUROPE LP
Volume three was the one; back in 1977 greeted with derision by some purists but welcomed by others as a potential step for the genre towards more mainstream recognition, in other words – sales. It never really happened, either for this volume or its three companions which have all reappeared simultaneously via the Joe Gibbs French outlet. Earlier volumes are more formal drum and bass outings but number three comes with the sounds of thunder, sirens, gushing water and all the usual dub efx thrown in with abandon by the usually restrained Erroll Thompson, the one that is the sucker DJ selection is the title tracks take on “Hypocrites” a bass line directly related to “King Tubby Meets Rockers Uptown” but there are other killer versions: “The Entebbe Affair” on Pablo’s “Cassava Piece” and “Jungle Dub” on the Mighty Diamonds’ “Ghetto Living”. In fact it’s all great fun from start to finish and essential for those new to the origins of the genre.
KIDDUS I
INNA DE YARD
INNA DE YARD CD/DVD
With the exception of the longtime hardcore or the more recent glut of moneyed reggae collectors the name of Kiddus I, aka Frank Dowding, was only known to those struck by his “Graduation In Zion” track from a brief early appearance in recently reissued ‘Rockers’, a truly remarkable document, masquerading as a feature film but managing to capture the excitement of Jamaica’s indigenous roots reggae scene of the late seventies. However Kiddus I never recorded an album and his entire work consists of a handful of singles on his own Sheperd (sic) label. Accompanied here by arranger and guitarist Earl "Chinna" Smith, who opened the Inna De Yard series experience with his own debut set, Kiddus I delivers a full manifesto of roots consciousness that has become unfashionable in these times. The package includes a bonus DVD with interview plus footage of the acoustic sessions.
KING TUBBY & FRIENDS
MOTION DUB SPECIAL – CLASSIC DUBS 1974-1978
MOTION CD
After an extended sabbatical the largely dub-themed revival label relaunches with a mid-priced compilation that turns out to be just like one of those great cassette selections that used to circulate amongst collections in the days before the CD revolutionised the market. Picking tracks from a back catalogue that may not have had the limelight of Blood and Fire or Pressure Sounds may seem risky but this is a pure joy right through with tracks that became instant and overdue classics on their reissue, such as the DJ’s delight, the ultra-funky “Fugitive Dub” from the Skatalites “Herb Man Dub” and Tubby’s seemingly respectful treatment of the old chestnut “Whispering Grass” which comes in for a severe binghi drum plunging after the guitar melody is stretched over a twisting reverb. Two tracks are included from the forthcoming Jacob Miller dub set both featuring Bernard “Touter” Harvey on an irresistibly fat and farting Moog synth over wah wah and wailing harmonica, but the jewel is the closing “Jah for I” a Rockstones dub from Niney the Observer a sparsely driven dubplate cut with martial horns dub at times acapella to seemingly reach up above the rhythm as if attempting to soar above Tubby’s swipe at the echo spring, as enormous a dub as the master ever created and all on an eight track.
SCIENTIST & PRINCE JAMMY
DUB LANDING VOLUMES 1 & 2
AURALUX CD
This album crept out in the UK back in 1981 as the last crest of the dubwave was hitting with the series of album cut by Scientist, in the main, for producer/entrepreneur Henry “Junjo” Lawes and released by Greensleeves in those great sleeves depicting Championship Fights, Space Invaders, Vampires and PacMan cartoon style in the sleeve art. The technique employed by Scientist had steadily moved the bass of the Roots Radics’ Flabba Holt up into a dominant position in the mix, which at its best was truly rockstone, and although those Greensleeves albums still remain popular this lesser known work is equally as riveting. Scientist judicious use of the more gimmicky dub tricks is put to good use and often lends the tracks further dynamics and colour in the absence of a horn section. Produced by Linval Thompson the set takes tunes from Al Campbell, Rod Taylor and Barry Brown out of their vocal shackles and into new elasticated zones best checked by the young mixer’s re-imagining of Freddy McKay’s “Hey Stranger” once a fairly prosaic roots tune and now an inter-dimensional battlezone. Perhaps the inclusion of Volume 2 explains why the best dub albums are always around thirty five minutes long – a rest is advised before starting back on this one
SEVEN DUB
DUB CLUB EDITIONS (ROCK WITH ME SESSIONS)
COLLISION CD
The fact that Seven Dub’s tunes have been licensed by Chicago’s Guidance label gives a good clue of what to expect here – the smoother end of club reggae, although vocals from Zap Mama’s Angelique and Paul St.Hilaire plus a guest appearance from the legendary DJ Lone Ranger is enough to generate an anticipatory frisson the heights get no higher than the early wah-wah and stumbling bass of “Intro” as a form of cocktail reggae dub soul numbingly takes over proceedings. Maybe there’s a chain of European corporately branded and harmonized dub lounges commissioning this stuff.
SKIN FLESH & BONES MEET THE REVOLUTIONARIES
FIGHTING DUB 1975-1979
HOTPOT CD/LP
Originally released in 1975 on the Love label “Fighting Dub” now reappears courtesy of Steve Barrow’s Hotpot label with eight extra tracks from producer Lloyd Campbell’s seventies output. The album itself is a competent enough outing with Erroll ‘ET’ Thompson at the desk turning out a crisp set of version, but the real star here turns out to be Vin Gordon whose trombone adds some beautifully unsettling tones to “Scotch Dub” particularly, a brooding cut where ET has the reverb set to max on all but the steady drum and bass. The bonus cuts supply most interest with Gordon on two extended later cuts with the Revolutionaries, “Soferno” is on the “My Conversation” theme and the “Cobra Rock” turns out to be a dub take on “First Cut Is The Deepest” voiced for Campbell by Joy White; also worth noting is the dub to Lloyd Hemmings “Africa” cut for Campbell when the singer was just fourteen, but the sparse mix predicts the darker regions explored by Scientist with the Radics a few years later.
LEROY SMART
DREAD HOT IN AFRICA
MAKASOUND CD/2LP
Briefly out on the strictly ‘press and push’ UK Burning Sounds imprint in the late seventies, this ‘so-called’ self production by the “Reggae Don” Leroy Smart has been unobtainable since. This time it comes with the addition of four crisp rockers cuts to make the double vinyl worthwhile, including one coruscating extended dub mix “Walk Away From Trouble”. With Tubby, Jammy and Channel One’s Jo Jo Hookim at the desk for voicing it would have been great to have some of the dubs, especially as the uncredited horn arrangements of the great Jimmy Radway (who gets no mention in the predictably self-laudatory interview) pop up on opener “Mr. Smart”. One detects the fleeting shadow of Bunny Lee who’s the only producer to get a check here. Indeed there must have been rhythms like dirt lying around Tubby’s studio floor as there are re-cycled versions galore here including a staple Yabby You tune a la “Chant Down Babylon Kingdom”, Horace Andy’s “Zion Gate” and the Abyssinians’ “Declaration of Rights”. Having said that, it’s still good to have an original album from a vocalist on top form who remains one of reggaes greats, albeit one who carries such a fearsome reputation that it’s maybe not surprising his work remains so under-represented.