M Is FOR MASHUP - August 14th, 2019
What I Mashed This Summer
By DJ Useo
Howdy again, y'all. I hope you're dealing okay with the heat wave. It's mighty hot here in Austin, also, but then, it always is. It's good weather to stay indoors, & make mashups. So, That's what I've been doing. Here's some of the ones I think y'all might like best.
01 - "Me and Julio Down By The Destination Unknown" ( Paul Simon vs Replicants vs Statik )
70s Pop vs Modern Techno Rock.
( sowndhaus.audio/track/13663/dj-useo-me-and-julio-down-by-the-destination-unknown-paul-simon-vs-replicants-vs-statik- )
02 - "Sgt. Rock Is So Heavy" ( The Beatles vs XTC )
60s Classic Rock vs 80s New Wave.
( sowndhaus.audio/track/13662/dj-useo-sgt-rock-is-so-heavy-the-beatles-vs-xtc- )
03 - "Carry On My Digital Love" ( Kansas vs Daft Punk )
Vast genre clash of 70s Classic Rock vs 00 Electronic.
( sowndhaus.audio/track/13603/dj-useo-carry-on-my-digital-love-kansas-vs-daft-punk- )
04 - "Bizarre Love Silence" ( Depeche Mode vs Blur vs New Order )
Floorfilla X 3.
( sowndhaus.audio/track/13580/dj-useo-bizarre-love-silence-depeche-mode-vs-blur-vs-new-order- )
05 - "I Am The Lucy" ( Elton John vs The Beatles )
A sublime combo.
( sowndhaus.audio/track/13557/dj-useo-i-am-the-lucy-elton-john-vs-the-beatles- )
I hope you find one you love. Meanwhile, I'm now working on Halloween Mashups for October release. IMHO, it's going well.
Now, go & hydrate. I'll catch you soon.
DJ Konrad Useo
Recommended Reading
from Bruce
Paul Krugman: Useful Idiots and Trumpist Billionaires (NY Times Column)
Greed, ego and willful blindness at the top.
David A. Graham: Jeffrey Epstein's Final Act of Impunity (The Atlantic)
Once more, a member of America's elite has escaped accountability for his alleged crimes.
Ideas (The Atlantic)
Arguments. Essays. Inquiries.
Donald Clarke: Once Upon a Time in … Hollywood review: An exhilarating, infuriating, meandering film (Irish Times)
It's not about the murder of Sharon Tate and her friends in 1969. It's about the end of eras.
Patrick Freyne: "George RR Martin: 'Science fiction has conquered the world'" (Irish Times)
THE MAN WHO CREATED THE WORLD OF GAME OF THRONES ON SNOBBERY, FANDOM AND WHY DUBLIN'S WORLDCON NEXT WEEK WILL BE LIKE A FAMILY REUNION.
Brian Kateman: Yes, algae is green and slimy - but it could also be the future of food (The Guardian)
Algae could be a way for vegans and vegetarians to get the right kinds of omega-3 fatty acids in their diets.
Caspar Salmon: Why Universal shouldn't have cancelled The Hunt (The Guardian)
Kowtowing to Donald Trump's political machinations by censoring artists is not the way to go and commentators should condemn it.
David Bruce's Amazon Author Page
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Presenting
Michael Egan
Reader Suggestion
Michelle in AZ
from Bruce
Anecdotes
Bonus Links
Jeannie the Teed-Off Temp
Reader Comment
Current Events
Linda >^..^<
We are all only temporarily able bodied.
Thanks, Linda!
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
JD is on vacation.
Visit JD's site - Kitty Litter Music
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
So far, none of the newly potted passiflora have died, and there's a lot of leaf damage, which is a good thing.
Leaf damage means something is eating them, but I haven't found any eggs or caterpillars - yet.
"A Grotesque New Low"
George Takei
George Takei's position as Lieutenant (then Captain) Hikaru Sulu has long made him the revered goofy grandpa of nerd-dom, with the now 82-year-old actor parlaying his Star Trek fame into a career as his inimitably droll, sonorous, and happily self-parodying self. And, as he showed Seth Meyers while whipping out a double-handed Vulcan salute on Monday's Late Night, he's all too happy to give the fans what they want. "We have lived much longer than we expected," said Takei.
That's a sentiment that echoed through most of Takei's appearance on Monday, really. There technically to plug his role (as actor and consultant) in the second season of AMC's The Terror (called The Terror: Infamy), Takei (whose Broadway musical Allegiance also chronicled his harrowing early life) told Meyers how his now well-known personal experience with the WWII American policy of rounding up Japanese-American citizens in camps like the one recreated for the AMC series has always informed his view of America's past-and now, unthinkably, its present. Noting how the 6.5 acre set for The Terror: Infamy brought back complicated memories, Takei praised the series for replicating everything he remembers of that time, including the under-barracks crawlspace he and his brother used to hide under with their adopted puppy. "To me, it was kind of a nostalgic return," intoned Takei, explaining that, for a five-year old boy, the experience of the camps was often one of innocently unaware adventure.
Of course, as Takei noted, that was because he had his parents there "to protect us from the reality that was surrounding us." That reality, Takei pointed out, was that "They were American concentration camps for Americans of Japanese ancestry." Saying that the term "Japanese intenrment camps" is a linguistic bit of whitewashing that's always served to drive him "up the wall," Takei explained, "we were in Japanese-American internment camps." Takei-a longtime vocal opponent of Trump, and other bigots more generally- then responded to Meyers' prompting about parallels to the current Trump administration policy of "children, being torn away from their parents" by saying that it represents a "grotesque new low" for the country.
Unsparing in his thoroughly informed assessment of Don-Old Trump (R-Cheap Veneers) and the Republican Party's choice to bring back (but with the added horror of filthy conditions and family separation) a once thought unrepeatable American crime against (non-white) humanity, Takei called out the administration's woefully "incompetent" efforts to follow court orders to reunite immigrant families, and called the scattershot dispersement of children in places as far away from their border-held parents as New Jersey, Minnesota, and Wisconsin, "intentional cruelty." "Evil," Takei followed up that assessment, with the gravitas of someone who recognizes the familiar face of such evil from a long time ago.
George Takei
VetsAid Heads to Houston
Joe Walsh
Joe Walsh's VetsAid charity concert will take place November 10th, 2019 at the Toyota Center in Houston, Texas with a lineup that includes the Eagles guitarist, ZZ Top, Sheryl Crow, Brad Paisley and Jason Isbell. Tickets go on-sale Friday at 10:00 am via the venue's website with prices ranging from $25 to $199.50.
"It's about time we brought VetsAid down to Texas," Walsh said in a statement, "and who better to share the stage with than my old buddies and Houston's own ZZ Top! With Brad, Sheryl, Jason and more special guests to be announced joining us too this will be yet another historic night of incredible music for our vets… This is a night where all are welcome to celebrate the things that unite us as Americans: good friends, open hearts and great music!"
Walsh first staged VetsAid September 27th, 2017 at the EagleBank Arena in Fairfax, Virginia. That lineup included Zac Brown Band, Keith Urban and Gary Clark Jr. Last year, it was held at the Tacoma Dome in Tacoma, Washington. Don Henley, James Taylor, Chris Stapleton, Haim and surprise guest Ringo Starr played alongside Walsh that night.
The proceeds from VetsAid benefit numerous veterans charities. Over the past two years, they have raised over a million dollars. The cause is of particular importance to Walsh because his father died in a plane crash over Okinawa during World War II when the musician was just 20 months old.
Joe Walsh
New Deepfake Video
Bill Hader
Now that Hollywood has officially endorsed the aesthetics of deepfakes with the mangled celebrity faces of the upcoming Cats remake, it seems like there's no longer anything holding the technology back. Last week, we bore witness to the chilling sight of Michelle Tanner's baby-sized head playing host to Nick Offerman's grown man eyes and mustache. And now, in an even wilder example of the reality-bending practice, deepfake creator Ctrl Shift Face is here with a Bill Hader interview where the comedian seamlessly transforms into Tom Cruise and Seth Rogen as he performs impressions.
The video starts, innocently, with Hader guesting on an old episode of the Late Show With David Letterman, talking about having recently filmed Tropic Thunder. Soon enough, though, he mentions Tom Cruise and for a quick second-so briefly that the viewer is encouraged to think they're losing their mind-his face transforms into Cruise's. Every time after this, Hader's impression is accompanied by his features melting into the other actor's and back again. The same thing happens when he does a Seth Rogen voice and, because Cruise is still in the story, all sense of normalcy vanishes as the blank slate sitting next to Letterman switches between Rogen, Cruise, and Hader in quick succession.
It's creepy in the way all good deepfakes are, but what's most impressive is how weirdly organic the effect seems when facial features slide around to form various celebrities. Hader ends up looking like some sort of deranged wizard, displaying his dark powers with ease. Letterman and the crowd laugh and applaud as if nothing extraordinary is happening in front of them, and that juxtaposition just makes everything even eerier. For today at least, it's the most unsettling deepfake to date.
But hey, if there's one silver-lining, it's that this technology has now enabled producers to enjoy all the box office benefits of Cruise's ticket-selling face without having to give money to him-and whatever new Scientology nightmare scheme he's surely involved in now. If big Hollywood cash can go to Bill Hader and the tech-sorcerers needed to transform his face instead, well, that's some minor consolation for having damaged our sense of reality, right?
Bill Hader
$40,000 Every Month
Mike Tyson
Mike Tyson appears to be enjoying his retirement - though he may be enjoying it a bit too much.
In a recent episode of Tyson's podcast, "Hotboxin' with Mike Tyson," Tyson opened up about his marijuana use, an industry he has ventured into since his last fight in 2005.
But he doesn't just grow marijuana. Apparently he's an avid user, too.
"What do we smoke a month?" Tyson asked his co-host, Eben Britton, before finishing his thought. "It's about $40,000 a month."
Britton put that amount into a different, yet equally alarming figure. "We smoke ten tons of weed on the ranch a month," Britton said.
Mike Tyson
Indicted by Grand Jury
Chrisleys
Reality stars Todd and Julie Chrisley were indicted by a federal grand jury on Tuesday for tax evasion, as well as other financial crimes, according to local news station WSBTV.
The indictment was handed down in Atlanta-Georgia Northern District. The Chrisley Knows Best stars' former accountant, Peter Tarantino, is reportedly facing the same charges.
The night prior to the indictment, Todd, 50, released a lengthy Instagram where he predicted the news and denied any wrongdoing on behalf of himself and his wife, 46. Instead, he pointed blame at an unidentified ex-employee who he claimed had stolen from his family, created "phony documents" and forged signatures years ago.
While Todd said that he wouldn't "go into details," he claimed that the case "involved all kinds of really bad stuff like creating phony documents, forging our signatures, and threatening other employees with violence if they said anything."
Although Todd believed the case was over, he claims the former employee "persuaded a different set of" U.S. Attorney's Office investigators to reopen the case.
Chrisleys
Concerts Canceled
Placido Domingo
Two music companies canceled appearances by Placido Domingo and the Los Angeles Opera said Tuesday it would launch an investigation in response to an Associated Press story in which numerous women accused the opera legend of sexual harassment and inappropriate behavior spanning decades.
Domingo has been general director of the LA Opera since 2003 and previously served as the company's artistic director, jobs that gave him the power to cast roles and - his accusers say - make, or break, careers.
Some of the women told the AP that Domingo used his power at the LA company and elsewhere to try to pressure them into sexual relationships, with several saying that he dangled jobs and then sometimes punished them professionally if they refused his advances.
On Tuesday, the Philadelphia Orchestra and San Francisco Opera announced they would cancel upcoming performances featuring the star, regarded as one of the greatest opera singers of all time.
New York's Metropolitan Opera said it would await the results of LA Opera's investigation "before making any final decisions about Mr. Domingo's future at the Met," where he is scheduled to appear next month.
Placido Domingo
Halliburton Back In The News
Bathroom Camera
The FBI has accused a Malaysian man of placing a camera in the first-class bathroom of a United Airlines flight earlier this year from San Diego to Houston.
A female first class passenger went to the bathroom mid-flight on May 5 and saw "an item with a blue blinking light," according to court documents filed in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas. The woman, unnamed in the document, wasn't sure if what she found was part of the aircraft but brought it to the flight crew.
Houston United Airlines Corporate Security determined the item in question was a video recording device. "After viewing the information on the device, a male was caught on video installing the device in the first class lavatory of this particular flight," per the document. While the man's face couldn't be identified in the video, his clothing and jewelry were visible. Footage of passengers boarding the aircraft in San Diego, and the man leaving the aircraft in Houston, helped the FBI track him down: Choon Ping Lee, a Malaysian citizen who works for Halliburton, an oil field service company. He was formally charged on August 5.
The FBI also uncovered there were deleted files on the camera, including "another aircraft bathroom/lavatory where at least two women/victims were caught on camera. After further review and research, it was determined the deleted files were of the Emirates Aircraft Lavatory. One of the women/victims caught on camera was wearing an Emirates flight crew uniform."
Bathroom Camera
2,000-Year-Old Shipwreck Graveyard
Aegean Sea
Ancient sailors courted adventure and risked death on the Aegean Sea. And now divers have discovered five of their approximately 2,000-year-old shipwrecks and a giant, granite anchor pole near the tiny Greek island of Levitha.
These ships were laden with goods - largely amphorae, which are ancient jugs with slender handles and narrow necks that usually held valuable liquids, such as oil and wine. The amphorae came from the cities of Knidos, Kos, Rhodes, Phoenicia and Carthage, according to the Hellenic Ministry of Culture and Sports.
Dating to just before the middle of the third century B.C., the goods were made during a time when the Ptolemaic and Hellenistic Antigonid dynasties ruled maritime trade in the Aegean, the ministry reported.
Among the findings was a 880-lb.(400 kilograms) granite anchor pole, spotted nearly 150 feet (45 meters) underwater, that dates to the sixth century B.C. The anchor is so enormous, it likely came from a "colossal" ship," the ministry said. (The statement was translated from Greek with Google translate.)
In addition to the five shipwrecks, the divers found other sunken vessels. One wreck had amphorae from the ancient Greek city of Knidos, located in what is now Turkey, that also dated to the third century B.C. Three other shipwrecks found nearby were carrying cargo that included cone (pointy-bottomed) amphorae. These wrecks dated to the second and first centuries B.C. and the second century A.D.
Aegean Sea
Prime-Time Nielsens
Ratings
Prime-time viewership numbers compiled by Nielsen for Aug. 5-11. Listings include the week's ranking and viewership.
1. "America's Got Talent," NBC, 9.66 million.
2. "60 Minutes," CBS, 6.76 million.
3. "Celebrity Family Feud," ABC, 4.78 million.
4. "The $100,000 Pyramid," ABC, 4.67 million.
5. "American Ninja Warrior," NBC, 4.63 million.
6. "Big Brother" (Sunday), CBS, 4.58 million.
7. "Bachelor in Paradise" (Monday), ABC, 4.38 million.
8. "America's Funniest Home Videos," ABC, 4.33 million.
9. "Bring the Funny," NBC, 4.21 million.
10. "Big Brother" (Wednesday), CBS, 3.99 million.
11. "Big Brother" (Thursday), CBS, 3.9 million.
12. "Beverly Hills 90210," Fox, 3.84 million.
13. "To Tell the Truth," ABC, 3.81 million.
14. "Bachelor in Paradise" (Tuesday), ABC, 3.58 million.
15. "Blue Bloods," CBS, 3.42 million.
16. "Dateline NBC" (Monday), NBC, 4.04 million.
17. "Press Your Luck," ABC, 3.57 million.
18. "Instinct," CBS, 3.5 million.
19. "Instinct" (10 p.m. special), CBS, 3.39 million.
20. "Tucker Carlson Tonight," Fox News, 3.36 million.
Ratings
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