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Rising food prices could spark riots in the UK, senior economist warns
03.09.2011
07:10 pm
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Although commonly used in Europe these days, a term we seldom hear in the US (not yet at least) is “fuel poor” which is to say, people who can’t afford to heat their homes in winter if they want to, you know… eat.

Now that the price of food is rising alongside of fuel, so what is the proletariat supposed to do??? What’s left?

From Australia’s Herald Sun:

A senior economist at the worldwide bank HSBC has warned of civil unrest in Britain if food prices continue to soar, Sky News reported yesterday.

Karen Ward cautioned that the UK was not immune to the kind of “food riots” seen in other countries around the world.

“Even in the developed world I think we have very, very low wage growth, so people aren’t getting more in their pay packet to compensate them for food and energy, and I think we could see social unrest certainly in parts of the developed world and the UK as well,” she told Sky News.

She went on to highlight the link between high food prices and the escalating cost of crude oil.

“More and more we are seeing that some of these foodstuffs are actually substitutes for energy itself, particularly biofuels. So I think the energy markets are a significant contributor to these food price gains,” she said.

The comments came as the United Nations warned the cost of food is now at the highest level for 21 years and set to rise further.

Food costs have gone up for eight months in a row, with the UK’s National Farmers Union forecasting the trend will continue for the rest of 2011.

The cost of basic foodstuffs has been caused by increasing demand and extreme weather destroying crops - and has been partly to blame for the unrest sweeping the Arab world, which in turn is putting pressure on oil prices.

Thank you, Shane Wynn of Birmingham, AL!

Posted by Richard Metzger
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03.09.2011
07:10 pm
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Ivor Cutler: Looking for the Truth with a Pin
03.09.2011
06:39 pm
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Ivor Cutler was a poet, humorist, singer/song-writer, and performer, who was, by his own admission, “never knowingly understood.” Born into a Jewish middle-class family, in Glasgow’s south side, Cutler claimed his life was shaped by the birth of younger brother:

“He took my place as the center of the Universe. Without that I would not have been so screwed up as I am and therefore as creative. Without a kid brother I would have been quite dull, I think.”

Being so usurped, the young Cutler attempted to bash his brother’s brains in with a poker. Thankfully, an observant aunt stopped him. As more siblings were born, another brother and two sisters, Cutler’s resentment lessened after he discovered poetry and music. When he was five, he discovered politics after witnessing the bare-foot poverty of his school friends, and aligned himself to the Left thereafter.

After school, he worked at various jobs before he settled as a school teacher, teaching 7-11-year-olds music and poetry. His work with children inspired and reinforced his own unique view of the world:

He recalled how, in an art class, “one boy drew an ass that didn’t have four legs, but 14. I asked him why and he said it looked better that way. I wanted to lift him out of his cage and put my arms around him, but my intellect told me not to, which was lucky, because I probably would have been sent to prison.”

In the 1950s, Cutler started submitting his poetry to magazines and radio, and soon became a favorite on the BBC. His poetry was filled with “childlike wonder of the world”, created through the process of “bypassing the intellect.” He was, by his own account, a “stupid genius,” , as the London Times explained

Such genius derived from his ability to view life from the opposite direction to that taken by society, and his ability to empathise with the implications of that viewpoint, as in his one-sentence poem: “A fly crouching in a sandwich cannot comprehend why it has become more than ordinarily vulnerable.”

Cutler had a cult following of loyal fans, which included John Lennon and Paul McCartney, who cast him in their The Magical Mystery Tour film; DJ John Peel, who devotedly played Cutler’s releases; Morrissey and more recently Alan McGee and Oasis.

Ivor Cutler: Looking for Truth with a Pin was made shortly before Cutler died. The program has contributions from Paul McCartney, Robert Wyatt, Billy Connolly and Alex Kapranos, and is a fitting testament to the great man, who made life so much more fun. More interesting. More mysterious.

Admittedly, he might not be everyones cup of warmth, but as Cutler said himself:

“Those who come to my gigs probably see life as a child would. It’s those who are busy making themselves into grown-ups, avoiding being a child — they’re the ones who don’t enjoy it.”

I hope you enjoy.
 

 
More truth from Mr Cutler’s pin, after the jump…
 

READ ON
Posted by Paul Gallagher
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03.09.2011
06:39 pm
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Scientists examine ‘fever’ around Eric Clapton guitar auction
03.09.2011
04:42 pm
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There is an interesting article the New York Times about the fever caused by an upcoming charity auction of some of Eric Clapton’s guitars. “Fever” is the right word apparently, because the desire for these guitars (and other once celebrity-owned fetish items) seems to be somehow socially contagious:

Fortunately, social scientists have been hard at work on the answers. After conducting experiments and interviewing guitar players and collectors, they have just published papers analyzing “celebrity contagion” and “imitative magic,” not to mention “a dynamic cyclical model of fetishization appropriate to an age of mass-production.”

One of their conclusions is that the seemingly illogical yearning for a Clapton relic, even a pseudorelic, stems from an instinct crucial to surviving disasters like the Black Death: the belief that certain properties are contagious, either in a good or a bad way. Another conclusion is that the magical thinking chronicled in “primitive” tribes will affect bids for the Clapton guitars being auctioned at Bonhams in Midtown Manhattan.

Some bidders might rationalize their purchases as good investments, or as objects that are worth having just because they provide pleasant memories and mental associations of someone they admire. But those do not seem to be the chief reasons for buying celebrity memorabilia, according to a team of psychologists at Yale.

The researchers asked people how much they would like to buy objects that had been owned by different celebrities, including popular ones like George Clooney and pariahs like Saddam Hussein. People’s affection for the celebrity did not predict how much value they assigned to the memorabilia — apparently they were not buying it primarily for the pleasant associations.

Nor were they chiefly motivated by the prospect of a profit, as the researchers discovered when they tested people’s eagerness to acquire a celebrity possession that could not be resold. That restriction made people less interested in items owned by villains, but it did not seriously dampen their enthusiasm for relics from their idols.

The most important factor seemed to be the degree of “celebrity contagion.” The Yale team found that a sweater owned by a popular celebrity became more valuable to people if they learned it had actually been worn by their idol. But if the sweater had subsequently been cleaned and sterilized, it seemed less valuable to the fans, apparently because the celebrity’s essence had somehow been removed.

“Our results suggest that physical contact with a celebrity boosts the value of an object, so people will pay extra for a guitar that Eric Clapton played, or even held in his hands,” said Paul Bloom, who did the experiments at Yale along with George E. Newman and Gil Diesendruck.

As someone who was bitten—hard—by the collecting bug, I can certainly attest to the fact that you want that personal touch. And since there have also been various points in my life where I’ve had the money to indulge my mania, I can also tell you that a “collector”—if they’ve got the bank balance necessary to cover the cost—WILL blow it ALL on the right item. Been there, done THAT… and more than once, too.

Had I not gotten married, I’d have continued such behavior probably for the rest of my life. Once I got married, it became harder to justify why I needed to spend $300 on yet another signed William Burroughs first edition! My wife beat the collector out of me!

Below, Derek & The Dominos performing “It’s Too Late” on The Johnny Cash Show in 1970:
 

Posted by Richard Metzger
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03.09.2011
04:42 pm
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Motorhead slow waaaay down for French beer commercial
03.09.2011
04:41 pm
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Last year Dangerous Minds featured the Kronenbourg beer ad in which Motorhead play “Ace Of Spades” at half speed (see the link below). Well, here’s a documentary about the recording sessions that led to the commercial.
 

 
Here’s the finished product: French beer commercial with Motorhead doing acoustic version of “Ace Of Spades.”

Posted by Marc Campbell
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03.09.2011
04:41 pm
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New film and video releases for Die Antwoord
03.09.2011
03:45 pm
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Korine and Die Antwoord
 
Here’s the brand new video for Die Antwoord’s “Rich Bitch” with a lot of Yo-Landi.

In additional Die Antwoord news, Harmony Korine will be screening his new short film Wat Kyk Jy (“watcha lookin’ at?”) starring Ninja and Yo Landi at SXSW on March 15. The press release for the film reads:

“Big dreams, big blunts, big rims, and big guns. It’s time to get gangsta gangsta. Ninja and Yo-Landi are wheelchair-bound lovers and real gangstas. They live in the outskirts of civilization, they shoot guns for fun, smoke massive joints, and sleep in the woods. They don’t have any bling to show for their gangsta cred, but the world deserves to know who they are. They’re tramps, and their wheels are starting to fall off. Ninja become despondent over their vagabond existence, but Yo Landi won’t let him give up. What ensues is straight up gangsta mayhem, the realist of the real, true gangsta shit.”

I’ll be there, so stay tuned.
 

Posted by Marc Campbell
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03.09.2011
03:45 pm
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Wild animation: ‘One Minute Puberty’
03.09.2011
03:34 pm
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Well, it’s actually 1:41, but who’s counting? (NSFW-ish)

Written and animated by Alexander Gellner. Music and sound design by Niklas A. Kröger.

(via Nerdcore)

Posted by Tara McGinley
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03.09.2011
03:34 pm
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The Chosen One: Sarah Palin part of Bible prophecy?

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The mighty American Jesus blog brings us a new Sarah Palin viral video. Smug secular lefties will mock it. Conservatives will present it as an authentic example of a non-Caucasian’s enthusiasm for SP (and THAT it is!). This could be the start of a brand new bag for Mama Grizzly:

Today is Ash Wednesday- the beginning of the season of Lent.  It is a time when we reflect on our own humanity and recognize our need for the Chosen One.  To signify this, we use ashes and put the mark of the Chosen One on our foreheads.  That mark, of course, is a large capital “P” for Palin!  If your pastor/priest tries to draw a cross on you, just expose him as the socialist that he is and find a new church!

We try not to give in to stereotypes here, but if you thought that an African-American lady preacher would be the one to promote Sarah Palin as part of a Biblical prophecy- then kudos to you.

(The first part is a little slow, but things really get going around the 5 minute mark)

Boy do they! Fantastic!
 

 

Posted by Richard Metzger
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03.09.2011
03:27 pm
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Gingrich: My Adultery ‘Partially Driven By How Passionately I Felt About This Country’
03.09.2011
01:06 pm
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Of course it was, Newt. We’re all that fucking stupid…

Watch in amazement as cretinous, hypocritical blow-hard Newt tries to wiggle out of his past—and widely known—“indiscretions” with this ridiculously preposterous, transparently obvious attempt to connect with Christian votes on CBN. Where else does a Republican sinner go for absolution?

“There’s no question at times of my life, partially driven by how passionately I felt about this country, that I worked far too hard and things happened in my life that were not appropriate,” said Gingrich. “And what I can tell you is that when I did things that were wrong, I wasn’t trapped in situation ethics, I was doing things that were wrong, and yet, I was doing them.

“I found that I felt compelled to seek God’s forgiveness. Not God’s understanding, but God’s forgiveness. I do believe in a forgiving God. And I think most people, deep down in their hearts hope there’s a forgiving God. Somebody once said that when we’re young, we seek justice, but as we get older, we seek mercy. There’s something to that, I think.

“I feel that I’m now 67 I’m a grandfather. I have two wonderful grandchildren. I have two wonderful daughters and two great sons in law. Callista and I have a great marriage. I think that I’ve learned an immense amount. And I do feel, in that sense, that God has given me, has blessed me with an opportunity as a person.”

What a complete farce. This man’s unbelievable (in every sense) hubris is a gift to the nation’s comedians and satirists. The only good thing—besides the yucks—of a Newt Gingrich candidacy is that he’ll be soaking up political donation$ on the right with his no-hope presidential run.
 

 
Via TPM

Posted by Richard Metzger
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03.09.2011
01:06 pm
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Spock wastes time on the USS Enterprise browsing Facebook
03.09.2011
11:47 am
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Now we know what’s in Spock’s scanner. Mystery solved! 

 
(via HYST)

Posted by Tara McGinley
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03.09.2011
11:47 am
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And You Are There: Damon & Naomi’s collaboration with Chris Marker
03.09.2011
10:48 am
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Damon Krukowski and Naomi Yang, formerly of cult favorites, Galaxie 500, began recording in 1992 as Damon & Naomi. Their first album, More Sad Hits was produced by Bongwater’s Kramer (who produced Galaxie 500’s albums, too) and is one of my top favorite albums. It’s extremely pretty, has intelligent lyrics and one of the best guitar solos I’ve ever heard. The great Robert Wyatt said of that album: “Like real water in a world of soda pop.”

Too true! I was actually a silent onlooker in the studio when some of the record was being recorded and mixed, because Kramer and I were collaborating on a screenplay and they, and I, were house-guests at his Demarest, NJ home at the same time. It was a real treat for this fly-on-the-wall “rock snob,” I can assure you.

For their upcoming release, False Beats and True Hearts, the dreamy avant-gardists have just released a new “video” by French artist and filmmaker Chris Marker.

Naomi Yang writes on the Damon & Naomi blog:

We are delighted to announce a new “video” by visual artist Chris Marker. Consisting of a single still image set to a song from our forthcoming album, the project is being hosted by the Wire Magazine.

“The song, ‘And You Are There,’ is about the way time can compress when you are lost in a memory, something I have learned a lot about from Chris Marker’s work—his films (La Jetée, Sans Soleil), his writing (Immemory), his photographs. When the song was finished, I sent it to Chris with a note—since his work had provided inspiration for the song, I wondered, might he in turn have a visual response to it? He sent back this image, with the note:

“Dunno if it fits your pretty Proustian melancholy, but I thought it could… And thanks for linking me to music, the only real art for me as you know (cinema? you kiddin’...)”

Watch Chris Marker’s “video” for Damon & Naomi’s “And You Are There” here:
 

 
Below “E.T.A”—how incredible is this song?!?!
 

 
H/T Chris Campion of Berlin, Germany!

Posted by Richard Metzger
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03.09.2011
10:48 am
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