M Is FOR MASHUP - July 1st, 2020
Pride Time Mashups The Album
By DJ Useo
Now, I can't swear for certain when I first heard a mashup by E.T.K. ( aka Eternal Khaos )
( eternalkhaos.bandcamp.com/ )
, but I'm sure it was after 2007. From the beginning of my exposure to his output, I found a common theme of satisfaction in his mixes. His tracks made their way into my head, & into my set lists.
Nowadays, E.T.K. continues a familiar pattern of infrequent, but impressive new posts & contributions to many popular themed mashup albums. He's thrilled us again & again over the course of comps like "
Mashups To Knock Your Teeth Out! (100% Punk, Rock, Metal)"
( audioboots.com/M2KYTO ) ,
"80's Mashed"
( audioboots.com/80smashed3/ ) ,
& "Audioboots Presents Mashers Choice"
( audioboots.org/Albums/MashersChoice/ )
His newest release is a superb 10-track album titled "Pride Time : An LGBTQ+ Mashup Album".
( eternalkhaos.bandcamp.com/album/pride-time )
I've listened to it already for you, & I assure you it's got the goods that'll make you happy, with pairings like Diana Ross vs Dead Or Alive, Eurythmics vs Lipps, Inc, Talking Heads vs Belinda Carlisle, plus 7 more.
To put it in his own words, here's E.T.K.'s own words - "This album is a compilation of works I made for a while and with a theme which is songs focusing on the LGBTQ+ community.
The tracks are either based upon anthems or songs that's involved to the community or are tracks made by someone that's part of it, it's something I wanted to present given that I'm myself am part of the group.
I also include two previously-released tracks as well as a new mix of a old track I made back in 2012. The only thing I have anything else to say at this point is hope you enjoy this album and Happy Pride Month 2020 to everyone."
You'll be playing these tracks repeatedly all Summer, so be sure & get started now, so as to increase your bliss. This comp has a fine theme that's celebrated with high bootleg appeal. Big thanks to E.T.K. .
- DJ Konrad Useo
from Bruce
Anecdotes
Presenting
Michael Egan
has returned to semi-retired status.
In memory.
BRUCE'S RECOMMENDATION
BANDCAMP MUSIC
BRUCE'S RECOMMENDATION OF BANDCAMP MUSIC
Music: "Beach Bunny" from the album PAISLEY BEACH
Artist: Los Venturas
Artist Location: The record company is Green Cookie Records, located in Thessaloniki, Greece.
Info: "Los Venturas have to offer a warm, varied, powerful and danceable instrumental live set, with one single purpose at heart: throwing a decent party and set the scene for one hell of a night."
All tracks by Los Venturas except:
"Mr. Rebel" by Eddie Bertrand
"Caravan" by Duke Ellington / Juan Tizol
"Mathar" by Dave Pike
Price: Name Your Price (Includes FREE) for Track; price for seven-track album is €7 (EUROS)
Genre: Surf
Links:
GREEN COOKIE RECORDS
PAISLEY BEACH
Other Links:
FREE BRUCE'S RECOMMENDATIONS PDF
FREE YOU'VE GOT TO BE KIND PDFS
FREE davidbrucehaiku PDFs #1-#10
FREE davidbrucehaiku PDFs #11-?
David Bruce's Amazon Author Page
David Bruce's Smashwords Page
David Bruce's Blog #1
David Bruce's Blog #2
David Bruce's Blog #3
David Bruce's Lulu Storefront
David Bruce's Apple iBookstore
David Bruce has over 140 Kindle books on Amazon.com.
Reader Suggestion
Michelle in AZ
New Venture
Michael Egan
Bonus Links
Jeannie the Teed-Off Temp
Reader Comment
Current Events
Carl Reiner told one of the funniest stories I've ever heard on Johnny Carson's Tonight Show. He talked about being at one of the Catskill Resorts with his good friend Mel Brooks. Mel and his lovely bride Anne Bancroft were honeymooning; Carl & his wife were enjoying the amenities of the resort. Carl said, early one morning he decided to swim in the lake-not realizing that several mountain streams fed into the lake.
Carl jumped in. The water was so frigidly cold that he could feel his entire body seize up. As his organs were starting to shut down, he looked to the shore and saw his dear friend and his lovely bride about to jump in. Carl said he summoned every ounce of strength he had and managed to shout to his dear friend…COME ON IN!….The water's fine!
It's always fun to mock convicted drunkard & Cuban pool-boy "parent" Florida Man AKA Matt Gaetz, but the below article was especially fun--love that MattGaetzIsATool trends repeatedly; also love the movie poster at the end:
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
JD is on vacation.
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Still finding Q-Tips - this time in the garage, under the car.
80th Birthday Charity Show
Ringo Starr
Ringo Starr turns 80 on July 7th, and he's planning to celebrate with Ringo's Big Birthday Show, a virtual charity concert that will hit YouTube at 8 p.m. EST that night. The show will include a mix of at-home performances and unearthed concert footage from Paul McCartney, Sheryl Crow, Gary Clark, Jr., Sheila E, Ben Harper, and others. "I love birthdays," Starr says in the latest episode of the Rolling Stone Interview: Special Edition. "This year is going to be a little different. There's no big get-together, there's no brunch for 100. But we're putting this show together - an hour of music and chat. It's quite a big birthday."
The show will also include the debut of a new, guest-laden version of Starr's 2017 song "Give More Love," with Jackson Browne, Jeff Bridges, Elvis Costello, Willie Nelson, and others. Starr will also debut a series of tribute performances on his YouTube channel, from artists including Steve Earle, Peter Frampton, and Judy Collins. In addition, Starr is asking fans to "say, think, or post #peaceandlove at noon their local time on July 7th." The YouTube broadcast will benefit four charities: Black Lives Matter Global Network, The David Lynch Foundation, MusiCares, and WaterAid.
In his just-posted episode of the Rolling Stone Interview: Special Edition, Starr looked back on his entire life, from first playing drums while he was hospitalized with tuberculosis as a child to the early years of his solo career and much more.
Ringo Starr
Following BMI's Lead
ASCAP
President Donald Trump (R-Failure) may be looking for a new walk-off song at his campaign rallies now that the Rolling Stones and BMI have put him on notice and threatened to sue if he ever again uses any of their songs licensed by the giant performing rights organization. And now fellow performing-rights group ASCAP says that Trump won't be allowed to use any of the Stones' songs in its repertory either - a playlist that includes "Start Me Up," "Emotional Rescue," "Waiting on a Friend" and "Angie."
"At this time, the 2020 Trump campaign has not applied for an ASCAP license and therefore currently is not authorized by ASCAP to perform any songs in the ASCAP repertory (unless they have licensed those works directly)," an ASCAP spokesperson told Deadline. "As is our practice with all campaigns, if the 2020 Trump campaign requests an ASCAP license, ASCAP will inform the campaign of music that is excluded from our license upon execution of the license agreement. At present, notable among the ASCAP members who have asked that their songs be excluded from the 2020 Trump campaign ASCAP license agreement are Neil Young, the estate of Tom Petty, and ASCAP-licensed works by The Rolling Stones."
Like BMI, ASCAP has a Political Campaign License agreement that provides "a blanket license to perform any or all of the millions of compositions in the ASCAP repertory. However, ASCAP members may ask ASCAP to exclude specific songs from a particular political campaign's license. In that event, ASCAP will notify the campaign of the excluded works."
ASCAP has more than 11.5 million licensed songs, and BMI has some 15 million.
Numerous other acts have publicly objected to the use of their songs at Trump's campaign rallies over the last four years, including Neil Young, whose "Rockin' in the Free World" was played when Trump announced his candidacy after descending an escalator at the Trump Tower in New York in June 2015; Queen for his use of "We Are the Champions" at the 2016 Republican National Convention in Cleveland; Rihanna, for the use of her hit song "Don't Stop the Music" at a 2018 Trump rally in Tallahassee, FL; Pharrell Williams, whose Oscar-nominated "Happy" was played at a Trump rally hours after 11 people were killed at a Pittsburgh synagogue in October 2018; Panic! at the Disco's Brendon Urie, whose "High Hopes" played at Trump's Phoenix event this week; and the estate of the Tom Petty, whose "I Won't Back Down" also was played at Trump's rally last week in Tulsa.
ASCAP
Gritty In Philly
Queer Eye
After five tear-jerking seasons on Netflix, is there anyone who can't be improved by the Queer Eye crew? The revived Fab Five have helped reinvent dozens of lucky nominees over the past few years, but what happens when they encounter an utterly perfect individual-one who needs no change, because they are a vessel of pure, unhinged goodness let loose upon the world? Enter: Philadelphia Flyers mascot Gritty.
While officials finalize the logistical nightmare that undoubtedly is the upcoming NHL season, it leaves a lot of free time for those in the league waiting to return to the ice. After being nominated by close friend, the Philly Frenetic Fanatic, the Queer Eye boys met up with the large, overly orange, potential leftist provocateur to give some of their standard life coaching and style tips, only to quickly realize that Gritty needs absolutely nothing changed about him.
The Philly season of Queer Eye is available to stream on Netflix now.
Queer Eye
Triptych Sells For $84.6 Million
Francis Bacon
Francis Bacon's "Triptych Inspired by the Oresteia of Aeschylus" fetched $84.6 million at Sotheby's, giving the high-end art market a boost after a months-long slump caused by the pandemic.
Estimated at $60 million to $80 million, the 1981 trio of paintings was the top offering at the marquee sales of contemporary, Impressionist and modern art sales. Sotheby's guaranteed the work, consigned by the foundation of Norwegian businessman Hans Rasmus Astrup, who has displayed it at his private museum in Oslo since 1993. Proceeds from Monday's sale will help expand and diversify the museum collection, Sotheby's said.
The global art market has been in a rut since March. The three consecutive evening sales generated $363.2 million, topping Sotheby's low estimate of $326 million for the entire series. The auctions are crucial in setting a new bar for investment-grade works, dealers said. Sotheby's, Christie's and Phillips typically hold their marquee semi-annual sales in May and November, but the May 2020 events were postponed.
An online bidder from China competed for the Bacon work up to $73.1 million. It sold to the client of Gregoire Billault, Sotheby's head of contemporary art in New York. The auction record for a Bacon was set in 2013, when his triptych of Lucian Freud fetched $142.4 million at Christie's.
"Untitled (Head)," a 1982 drawing of a skull by Jean-Michel Basquiat, fetched $15.2 million, a record for the artist's work on paper, surpassing the high estimate of $12 million.
Francis Bacon
Remain On The Bench
U.S. Judges
Judge Les Hayes once sentenced a single mother to 496 days behind bars for failing to pay traffic tickets. The sentence was so stiff it exceeded the jail time Alabama allows for negligent homicide.
Marquita Johnson, who was locked up in April 2012, says the impact of her time in jail endures today. Johnson's three children were cast into foster care while she was incarcerated. One daughter was molested, state records show. Another was physically abused.
Fellow inmates found her sentence hard to believe. "They had a nickname for me: The Woman with All the Days," Johnson said. "That's what they called me: The Woman with All the Days. There were people who had committed real crimes who got out before me."
In 2016, the state agency that oversees judges charged Hayes with violating Alabama's code of judicial conduct. According to the Judicial Inquiry Commission, Hayes broke state and federal laws by jailing Johnson and hundreds of other Montgomery residents too poor to pay fines. Among those jailed: a plumber struggling to make rent, a mother who skipped meals to cover the medical bills of her disabled son, and a hotel housekeeper working her way through college.
Until he was disciplined, Hayes said in an interview with Reuters, "I never thought I was doing something wrong."
U.S. Judges
96-Percent Error Rate
Facial Recognition
Detroit's police chief admitted on Monday that facial recognition technology used by the department misidentifies suspects about 96 percent of the time. It's an eye-opening admission given that the Detroit Police Department is facing criticism for arresting a man based on a bogus match from facial recognition software.
Last week, the ACLU filed a complaint with the Detroit Police Department on behalf of Robert Williams, a Black man who was wrongfully arrested for stealing five watches worth $3,800 from a luxury retail store. Investigators first identified Williams by doing a facial recognition search with software from a company called DataWorks Plus. Under police questioning, Williams pointed out that the grainy surveillance footage obtained by police didn't actually look like him. The police lacked other evidence tying Williams to the crime, so they begrudgingly let him go.
Now Vice's Jason Koebler reports that Detroit Police Chief James Craig acknowledged the flaws with its facial recognition software at a Monday event.
"If we would use the software only [to identify subjects], we would not solve the case 95-97 percent of the time," Craig said. "That's if we relied totally on the software, which would be against our current policy … If we were just to use the technology by itself, to identify someone, I would say 96 percent of the time it would misidentify."
As Craig notes, police officers in Detroit aren't supposed to arrest someone based solely on the results of a facial recognition search. And the Detroit police claimed that they didn't do that in the Williams case. A police spokeswoman told The New York Times that "the investigator reviewed video, interviewed witnesses, [and] conducted a photo lineup" before arresting Williams.
Facial Recognition
Eyeballs Covered in Tiny Teeth
Whale Sharks
Marine biologists from Japan say whale sharks have eyeballs coated in tiny teeth, in a discovery unique to this hulking but gentle aquatic species.
Marine biologists from Japan's Okinawa Churashima Research Center have found that whale sharks have eyes covered in dermal denticles, or modified teeth. These tiny structures represent a previously unknown form of eye protection, serving as a kind of armor to protect against the elements, according to the new research.
Whale sharks are the largest of the sharks, growing as long as 59 feet (18 meters). These behemoths are harmless to humans, feeding primarily on plankton and the occasional fish.
Whale sharks, unlike some other shark species, don't have eyelids. Also, their tiny eyes are located at the corners of their square heads, exposing their peepers to potential damage. That's where the protective eye denticles come in.
Sharks have dermal denticles elsewhere on their bodies. These marine animals don't have scales like other fish, but they do have placoid scales, which are made of dermal denticles. These modified teeth, with their hard enamel, provide sharks with armor-like protection, but they also work to reduce friction in the water, helping sharks swim with speed and stealth.
Whale Sharks
Insects' Dazzling Colors Preserved
Amber
When you think of the colour scheme sported by the prehistoric world of the dinosaurs, greens and browns typically spring to mind.
But more and more research has shown that millions of years ago, vibrant, vivid colours were everywhere in nature, just like they are today. The latest evidence - 99-million-year-old insects caught in amber with incredible colours of purple, blue, and metallic green.
One of the reasons it's so hard for us to know the colours of prehistoric creatures is due to what's left from them - a fossilised bone can't convey what colour the animal was. But lately, scientists have been working out pigments from fossilised feathers; or, in the case of this latest study, used Burmese amber to peer into the world of ancient colours.
"The type of colour preserved in the amber fossils is called structural colour. It is caused by microscopic structure of the animal's surface," explained palaeontologist Pan Yanhong from the Chinese Academy of Science.
Structural colour is what makes peacock feathers and butterfly scales appear iridescent; in this case, it was created by the outer cuticle of the insect's exoskeleton.
Amber
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