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In his effort to shed light on medical marijuana use, comedian Doug Benson documents not smoking pot for 30 days and then smoking pot for 30 days in a row in Super High Me.
comment posted at 3:07 PM on Apr-13-08

The most challenging scenario(video) of communion distribution in the upper deck of Yankee Stadium. See the Pope on 5th Avenue or vote for your favorite papal skateboard design. Other activities. Itinerary. Security. Via.
comment posted at 7:08 AM on Apr-12-08

Whole Lotta Shakin' Going On ---- Tutti Frutti ---- Hound Dog ---- Long Tall Sally ---- Good Golly Miss Molly ---- Great Balls of Fire ---- Good Lovin'.
comment posted at 5:22 PM on Apr-8-08

Illustrated Quixote is a Brown University Library digital project--one of many inspired by the 400th anniversary of Don Quixote in 2005--that allows you to search/browse and view illustrations of Don Q produced between 1725 and 1884. There are a number of other excellent sites devoted to illustrations and paintings of the novels, as well as to the publishing history of the novel itself, notably The Cervantes Project, OSU's Digitized Historical Editions of Don Quixote, Georgetown U's Tilting at Windmills, and the Don Quixote de la Mancha digital exhibit.
comment posted at 5:27 PM on Apr-8-08

James Brown was known as the hardest working man in show business. Most people concentrate on his musical legacy while others see him as a central figure in the civil rights movement. And while there are many who view Mr. Brown as a "moral conscience for black people" those inside his his private world seem to have viewed him as a drug fueled maniac who grew up in a whore house and had little regard for women. via
comment posted at 6:57 AM on Apr-6-08

After just eleven months of operation, Skybus has ceased operations and declared bankruptcy. It's the third American airline to do so in the past week. That, plus the fact that the FAA is coming under fire for its failure to spot missed inspections, makes this a pretty ugly week in American aviation.
comment posted at 3:37 PM on Apr-5-08

You are the New Day, recorded by the Kings Singers, the Searchers, and ten thousand school choirs around the world, was written by hard-rocking bass player John David, long of Dave Edmunds’ band. You Are the New Day is that rarest of things...
comment posted at 11:43 AM on Mar-23-08

First, and foremost, here is La Caíta - El Pájaro Negro. Could there be singing anymore heartfelt than this ? I wonder. And here she is, in an ancillary role, with the Amaya family. Also, from Spain, here is Tchavolo Schmitt, Dorado Schmitt & Hono Winterstein - Kali Sara & Tchavolo swing. From Romania, here are Taraf de Haïdouks and, from them, here is Taraf de Haïdouks and of them, here is Balada Conducatorolui - Nicolae Neacsu. From the Thar of Rajasthan, here is the very charismatic Talab Khan Barna, and here, from Egypt, is Bambi Saidi. And let the etymological connection between Egypt and gypsy be noted here and now, by the way.

All of these are. of course, excerpts from Latcho Drom.
comment posted at 5:26 PM on Mar-20-08

For over the past year, John Seavey has been reading through Marvel's Essentials and DC's Showcase Presents reprints in order to examine the title comic's storytelling engine. From classic characters to barely-footnotes, much of the bedrock of Silver Age heroes are represented in the column's archives.
comment posted at 4:28 PM on Mar-18-08

Ola Brunkert, drummer for Swedish pop superstars ABBA, dead in tragic accident.
comment posted at 4:24 PM on Mar-17-08

"These photographs of McClellan Street by David and Peter Turnley, taken in 1972-73, help us understand how America came to be the country that it is today." — John G. Morris
comment posted at 8:08 AM on Mar-15-08

Queens of Carnatic singing: Nithyasree Mahadevan: 1, 2 and 3. Sudha Ragunathan: 1, 2, 3 and 4. And the legend of the legends, M.S. Subbulakshmi, in her film appearances from decades past: 1, 2 and 3, and as an elder stateswoman of Carnatic vocal artistry: 1, 2, 3 and 4.
comment posted at 7:57 AM on Mar-15-08

They sure don't make 'em like they used to.
comment posted at 7:16 AM on Mar-15-08

Another King Records RnB artist covered by The Aerosmiths is Cleveland's own Bullmoose . Jackson. Here's Jackson's original recording of Big ten inch record (1952).
comment posted at 4:13 PM on Mar-11-08

Someone asked "What does it take before a song becomes a pop standard? Four generations? Five?
The Train Kept A Rollin' is a garage rock classic, but the original by Tiny Bradshaw (rec. 25-jul-1951 -- sax solo: Red Prysock) was played in a very different style. So who was Tiny Bradshaw? And what about all those covers?
comment posted at 6:47 PM on Mar-10-08

A "no-return, solo mission" to Mars? The comments - 179 of them as of the time of this post - are even more interesting than the article.
comment posted at 6:31 AM on Mar-8-08

Well respected as a player, instructor and scholar, Adam Gussow teaches blues harmonica online at Modern Blues Harmonica. For a fee.
On YouTube, as KudzuRunner, he also gives lessons. For free. He's put up around 145 videos now--145 videos with like about a million hits in return...
via Tom Muck's Blog
comment posted at 6:43 AM on Mar-8-08

Gram Parsons fans take note - there's a recent new biography and a release of 90 minutes of vintage Flying Burrito Brothers. Some rare footage has also recently surfaced online: performing with FBB and duets with Emmylou Harris 1, 2, 3. Other items of note: Emmylou talks about Gram in 2000; British biographical sketch; Keith Richards on Gram in Rolling Stone; an interview with Manuel, the designer of the famous Nudie suit.
comment posted at 6:57 AM on Mar-8-08

From The Mike Douglas Show circa 1967: Moby Grape - Omaha & 8:05
From somewhere else circa whatever: Moby Grape - Hey Grandma & Sitting By A Window
And, you can hear, albeit with registration, three free songs at Wolfgang's Vault: Moby Grape Fillmore Auditorium San Francisco, CA 02/26/1967
comment posted at 7:28 AM on Mar-8-08
comment posted at 12:07 PM on Mar-8-08

The Gayest Songs of All Time. To celebrate the 30th Anniversary of Sydney's Gay & Lesbian Mardi Gras, the Australian LGBT social networking site SameSame asked its members to vote on the campest of classics.
comment posted at 4:29 PM on Mar-6-08

American Airlines flies plane with 5 passengers from Chicago to London. Friends of the Earth charges Eco-Crime. The airline explains. Climate skeptics are skeptical. (previously)
comment posted at 4:31 PM on Mar-6-08

Drummer Buddy Miles has died. Another wonderful musician - one who played with Jimi Hendrix's Band of Gypsies - died far too young.
comment posted at 5:18 PM on Feb-29-08
comment posted at 5:22 PM on Feb-29-08

1 in 99.1 American adults are now incarcerated according to a new Pew Center study (pdf). Some interesting numbers from a NYT article on the report: 1 in 36 Hispanic adults are incarcerated, 1 in 15 blacks, 1 in 9 black men aged 20-34, 1 in 355 white women aged 35-39. Some context from the World Prison Population List (pdf).
comment posted at 4:12 PM on Feb-28-08

Postum, 1895 - 2008, RIP
comment posted at 4:39 PM on Feb-18-08

There was a time when it seemed that groups like Frederic Galliano presents Kuduro Sound System and Buraka Som Sistema would do for kuduro what groups like Diplo and Bonde do Role did for Funk Carioca: make it popular with hipsters in the United States. But it hasn't happened yet. Why?
comment posted at 6:47 AM on Feb-17-08

Titan find - The hydrocarbon lakes on Saturn’s moon may contain hundreds of times more liquid hydrocarbons than all of Earths known oil and natural gas reserves.
comment posted at 5:57 PM on Feb-14-08
comment posted at 5:59 PM on Feb-14-08

What makes a great portrait?
comment posted at 7:29 PM on Feb-8-08

Cleveland is dying, and it is beautiful. A collection of stark photographs of Cleveland as it is dying before our very eyes.
comment posted at 4:45 PM on Feb-7-08

Fritz Cam [german homepage] is a collection of pictures taken by a cat during his daily walkabout using an interval camera attached to his collar.
comment posted at 5:02 PM on Feb-5-08

Can a lightsaber cut through Superman? Through him it cuts, hmmmm?
comment posted at 12:17 PM on Feb-2-08

Here are 52 cover songs that Of Montreal have done over the years. via
comment posted at 2:21 PM on Feb-1-08

John Milton was born 400 years ago this year, and several excellent websites have been created to mark the anniversary. Two online exhibitions, Citizen Milton and Living At This Hour, celebrate Milton's achievement with a display of early editions and later artistic interpretations, while Darkness Visible offers an accessible introduction to Paradise Lost for readers encountering the poem for the first time, including an interesting discussion of Milton's influence on Philip Pullman (who responds here with his own tribute to Paradise Lost, 'the greatest poem by England's greatest public poet').
comment posted at 8:13 AM on Feb-1-08

YouTube in partnership with The Davos Forum has established a great "contest" although I don't think of it like that. YouTubers are asked to submit a video answering the question "What one thing do you think that countries, companies or individuals must do to make the world a better place in 2008?" I thought a long time about the question, and then, after approaching Mayor Gavin Newsom to be in the video, then getting caught up against deadlines, I had the answer: to end racism around the World. Here's the video. Here's Emma Thompson's response.
comment posted at 3:38 PM on Jan-27-08

Let's pay a little visit, shall we, to everyone's favorite lasso twirlin', geetar strummin' stars of the Vaudeville stage, Otto Gray's Oklahoma Cowboys Then let's head for the South Pacific, for the "Hawaiian" sounds of Witt and Berg. And from the early days of the "talkie", Max Fleischer explains the new-fangled technology for us in the 1929 cartoon, Finding His Voice.
comment posted at 6:46 AM on Jan-26-08

The best/worst in Lithuanian music: the catchy Otter in Love, DJ Dago's rave music, Suopis ir Rambynas' folk music and Mr Valdas Karklelis and his creepy and [NSFW] pervy writhing .
comment posted at 4:21 PM on Jan-22-08

The Origin of Emotions by Mark Devon “I began thinking about emotions while studying evolutionary theory at Harvard University. Learning that adaptations do not evolve unless they help survival, I reasoned that each emotion must have a purpose that helped survival. If I could identify an emotion’s trigger, I could also identify its purpose."
comment posted at 4:37 PM on Jan-22-08

So we've already learned how babies are made in Germany. But we haven't seen Russia or Israel. Could be NWS if you work with people who don't know where babies come from.
comment posted at 4:51 PM on Jan-21-08

In the United States, most counties conduct local legal business in a centrally-located courthouse, which tends to be located in the county seat. Here is a flickr photo set of nearly all the county courthouses in the United States. From the [oldest] to the [most densly populated] to the [most populous], from the [ugly] to the [ornate], county courthouses present a remarkable variety of architectural styles. In some ways, these buildings seem to be the equivalent of European cathedrals -- they often represent the local community's largest and most expensive building, and they're designed with that in mind. Given our remarkable capacity for observer list keeping, I wonder why more people aren't courthouse spotters.
comment posted at 5:23 PM on Jan-15-08

Richard Forty's Dry Store Room No. 1 describes the archives of the British Natural History Museum. Not on display, among other things, is Proustite, it is a compound of silver, arsenic and sulphur that forms as blood-red crystals that fade, poetically, when exposed to light.' Via Things Magazine.
comment posted at 5:14 PM on Jan-15-08

10cc was NOT "The Worst Band in the World", but they played one on TV. And just about every song they recorded that didn't have 'Love' in the title ("I'm Not in..."), tested the limits of '70s Pop Music Oddness, starting with the stand-up/sit-down/doo-wop "Donna" (sitting by the telephone).
comment posted at 6:12 PM on Jan-9-08

Blogging the Qur'an The Guardian's Madeleine Bunting and cultural critic Ziauddin Sardar will blog a different verse or theme of the Qur'an each week. Bunting says its one of the most difficult books she's ever read, which is what a lot of non-muslims tend to think. The idea has been mooted before by those of a very similar political hue. Others are already blogging the the Bible.
comment posted at 6:18 PM on Jan-9-08

No to the skinny platform!
comment posted at 4:28 PM on Jan-4-08

George MacDonald Fraser, R.I.P. I fear this means we'll never know just what Harry Flashman did at the Battle of Gettysburg and elsewhere during the American Civil War. His creator died on Wednesday at the age of 82. He leaves behind a large body of work, and dedicated bands of followers. Previously.
comment posted at 6:50 PM on Jan-3-08

What have you changed your mind about? Why? - the latest installment of The Edge Annual Question
comment posted at 7:28 PM on Jan-1-08

Max's Kansas City closed 25 years ago this night. Although Hilly Kristal's CBGB's is more iconic and perhaps better known today, Mickey Ruskin's Max's Kansas City (and its infamous back room) was every bit as important to fostering the punk scene of the late 1970s and early 80s. Located a 213 Park Avenue South, just up the street from historic Union Square, Max's played host to the Heartbreakers, Bruce Springsteen, the Ramones, Wayne/Jayne County and the Fast, the New York Dolls, and quite a few others. What's standing there today? Why, the 213 Park Avenue South Deli, of course.
comment posted at 11:36 AM on Jan-1-08
comment posted at 7:07 PM on Jan-1-08

2007 was a year of extreme weather records, and 2008 could be worse, for example an unrelenting southeast drought could be devastating. 2008 will also be Bush's last year, and as the evidence for global warming mounts, Bush's agenda appears to be greening. "If global warming turns out to be a defining issue of this generation, advisers said, Bush does not want to be remembered as a roadblock."
comment posted at 12:41 PM on Dec-29-07