#mark stent

[nofatclips]

Cracker Island by Gorillaz featuring Thundercat - Directors: Jamie Hewlett & Fx Goby

#music #gorillaz #thundercat #greg kurstin #remi kabaka jr. #samuel egglenton #mark stent #matt tuggle #julian burg #stephen bruner #damon albarn #music video #jamie hewlett #fx goby #dave hunt #florian caspar #germán díez #françois xavier goby #ricky patel #dave slade #rodrigo aquino verdun #video #stephen lee bruner

[lashton-is-my-drug]

Track credits for BLENDER, according to Genius

#5sos #5 seconds of summer #ashton irwin #ashton 5sos #luke hemmings #luke 5sos #michael clifford #michael 5sos #calum hood #calum 5sos #BLENDER #blender credits #peter thomas #jake torrey #jacob scesney #saxophone #matthew pauling #matt wolach #chris gehringer #mark stent #bmg #july 13 #2022 #5sos5 #new music #summer 2022 #ashton fletcher irwin #luke robert hemmings #michael gordon clifford #calum thomas hood

[john-taylor-daily]

#john taylor #simon le bon #duran duran #mark ronson #spike stent

[shcherbatskya]

NOTHING is better than being prev tagged when you said the most horrendous thing in the tag. truly feeling loved.

#sorry for saying that about mark antony. i meant it and won’t take it back i stents by it till i die. #samael speaks

[jay-lea]

Gonna be sulky about my body for the longest time now sorry

#sudden weight gain that made me have to try binding alternatives and a cyst the size of a lemon growing #plus spider veins and stretch marks from just one day of work that was too hard #and sciatica and kidney stones and a stent and recurring headaches bc #im still not fully over covid in 2 weeks #makes me feel like im in a strangers body and nothing is familiar to me

[eretzyisrael]

Hamas didn’t invade Israel on Oct. 7 for its amusement. The barbaric sneak attack is a part of the pogrom intended to wipe out the Jewish state. It was a crime against humanity, and not just because of its savagery. We would all be worse off if Israel ceased to exist. The same cannot be said for Islamic terrorists.

Israel’s contributions to the modern world are momentous. When not dodging bullets, rockets, and homicide bombers, Israelis have since 1948 developed:

Copaxone and Rebif, drugs that treat multiple sclerosis, and Exelon, which treats mild to moderate dementia in Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s patients.

The PillCam, “a minimally invasive ingestible camera in a capsule that allows visualization of the small bowel.”

The water desalination process.

The Sniffphone, “that can actually ‘sniff out’ diseases.”

And SpineAssist, “​​the first-ever spine robot” that has the “ability to provide real-time intraoperative navigation.”

The Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot, Israel, responsible for some of the inventions listed above, has also produced diabetes and flu vaccines, is using T-cells to treat damaged spines, and is a pioneer in industrial — and medical — uses nano materials. 

Other impactful Israeli products include drip irrigation, a revolutionary microprocessor called the 8088, the ​​NIR heart stent, voice-over-internet protocol, the ​​USB flash drive, the Waze navigation app, ReWalk, “a commercial bionic walking assistance system,” and “the first commercially viable firewall software.” 

Our own security has benefited from Israel’s labor and work ethic.

“Many Israeli innovations are present in upgrades to U.S. Air Force fighters and Army equipment,” says the international law firm Smith, Gambrell & Russell. One important advance in particular is the helmet-mounted display system for the new F-35 Joint Strike Fighter.

So we have a country of 9.23 million, mostly desert, that is only 75 years old, is “surrounded by enemies” and in a constant state of war, which has “no natural resources,” yet “produces more start-up companies on a per capita basis than large, peaceful, and stable nations and regions like Japan, China, India, Korea, Canada, and all of Europe.” It is the only nation outside of the U.S. that Warren Buffet invests in.

Have the Palestinians or Hamas, currently at war with Israel, done anything that compares to what the Israelis have achieved? More broadly, beyond the Allahista terrorist groups, what has Islam contributed to the modern world?

Not much.

Since 1901, Jews, who total 0.2% of the world’s population, have won 189 Nobel prizes for physics, medicine, chemistry and economics. Over that same period, Muslims, who make up nearly a quarter of the global population, have won four.

If it seems as Islamic groups, Hamas and Hezbollah prominent among them, are more interested in spreading nihilism, committing atrocities, and destroying civilization than making the world a better place, well, then there’s a good reason for it. That is exactly what the heroes of an increasingly large number foolish Westerners are aiming for.

Meanwhile, Israelis see themselves “as having a role in the world to repair the world,” says Chemi Peres, managing partner and co-founder of the venture capital firm Pitango, chairman of the Peres Center for Peace and Innovation, and son of the late Israeli Prime Minister Shimon Peres.

“We call it tikkun olam, and here at the Peres Center we have a mission statement, which is to introduce innovation and new ideas and new technologies, not only for ourselves but to solve the problems of the world.”

Islam is part of that world, but too many of its adherents live to do just the opposite. 

— Written by the I&I Editorial Board

#hamas gaza #crime against humanity #islam #gaza #hamas #hezbollah #israeli innovation

[demifiendrsa]

Grammy Awards 2024 Winners:

Album Of The Year: Midnights, Taylor Swift; Jack Antonoff & Taylor Swift, producers; Jack Antonoff, Bryce Bordone, Zem Audu, Serban Ghenea, David Hart, Mikey Freedom Hart, Sean Hutchinson, Ken Lewis, Michael Riddleberger, Laura Sisk & Evan Smith, engineers/mixers; Jack Antonoff & Taylor Swift, songwriters; Randy Merrill, mastering engineer

Record Of The Year: “Flowers,” Miley Cyrus; Kid Harpoon & Tyler Johnson, producers; Michael Pollack, Brian Rajaratnam & Mark “Spike” Stent, engineers/mixers; Joe LaPorta, mastering engineer

Best New Artist: Victoria Monét

Song Of The Year: “What Was I Made For? [From The Motion Picture Barbie],” Billie Eilish O’Connell & Finneas O’Connell, songwriters (Billie Eilish)

Best Pop Vocal Album: Midnights, Taylor Swift

Best R&B Song: “Snooze,” Kenny B. Edmonds, Blair Ferguson, Khris Riddick-Tynes, Solána Rowe & Leon Thomas, songwriters (SZA)

Best Country Album: Bell Bottom Country, Lainey Wilson

Best Musica Urbana Album: MAÑANA SERÁ BONITO, Karol G

Best Pop Solo Performance: “Flowers,” Miley Cyrus

Dr. Dre Global Impact Award: Jay-Z

#Grammys #Grammys 2024 #Taylor Swift #Miley Cyrus #SZA #Phoebe Bridgers #Boygenius #Killer Mike #Victoria Monet #Fred Again #Andre 3000 #Jack Antonoff #Billie Eilish #Bela Fleck #Jason Isbell #Lecrae #Finneas O' Connell #Paramore #Karol G #Lainey Wilson #music #awards #long post

[blindrapture]

so I got Peter Gabriel's newest album, i/o. I was curious about it; I've never owned a Peter Gabriel solo album before. ("I loved him in early Genesis" would be an understatement. just, never got around to his solo work!) so this is my first. I like the man himself, I love his singing voice, I admire him as a public figure. and this album looked... rather interesting!

because, see, it's an album with three faces. there's 12 songs on three discs. each disc has all 12 songs, but each disc is mixed by a different person with a different approach to audio engineering. so there's a Bright Side Mix (mixed by Mark 'Spike' Stent, described as like a painter's approach to the album), a Dark Side Mix (mixed by Tchad Blake, described as like a sculptor's approach to the album), and an In-Side Mix (mixed by Hans-Martin Buff, a very fancy mix that makes you feel like the music is happening all around you). so. to listen to this album is, ultimately, to hear it three different times.

anyway, so, I've listened to the Bright Side to start with. I've listened to some of the songs multiple times, as some of them got my attention right away and I already love them. and I've begun a sort of... comparative listen to the Dark Side, so I'll be listening to the Bright Side songs again and then immediately following up with the Dark Side version.

I am willing to go to lengths to experience this because, uh, this album fucking rocks??? not.. not like rocks, it's definitely not a rock album, it is far closer to a pop album. with my limited experience listening to entire pop albums, I can only really compare this to a few things-- Coldplay, Radiohead's A Moon Shaped Pool, Madonna or Poe. it sounds very modern. it is probably something other people will be much less impressed with, though may also really like straight away! the songs are all at consistently slow tempos, with soundscapes of synths, bass guitars, varied percussion, and a full string orchestra that comes in at cinematic moments on each track. it's.. like, it's not the kind of music I normally listen to outside of if it's in a film or a video game, I definitely don't normally listen to entire albums of this. and it's taking me a lot of focus to really dig into and notice things, learn the songs. but it having multiple mixes encourages that!!!

and. like. there are really a lot of slow songs on here, there's one that's entirely voice, bass, and piano, and there are some songs that I would consider "bops" but this is not a bop album. but. it's also not what I'd expect from pop-- and wikipedia classifies it as "art pop"-- because the average song is like 5 minutes long, there are a lot of 6 minute songs, and there's even a song approaching 8 minutes. though there aren't exactly loads of lyrics either; this album spends a lot of time just letting the music groove and breathe!!! I'm... super impressed with that.

what else. uh.

naturally, I've been mega curious about that whole... "three versions of each song" deal. I didn't know what to expect from it. and I'm only two songs into the Dark Side Mix, but I do have a clearer idea now. the Dark Side so far strips back some of the more melodic side instruments, where they're otherwise busy and add onto the verses and stuff, and instead cranks up the drums and the bass. even in the vocals, the lower parts are far more pronounced. gives a very different flavour to the many moments of groove and atmosphere. I would not consider it inaccurate to draw comparisons with how Sonic 3 & Knuckles handles its Act 2 mixes in later levels, where the songs aren't immediately different but there is a definite shift in focus. (plus, comparing things to Sonic is in character for me.)

like. specifically. track 1, "Panopticom," isn't all that different between mixes, and I can kinda give or take each version. I think that song's drum part can drown out the riff, so the Bright Side holds its own by mixing the drums a bit softer, making the whole song sound like... 80s/90s synthpop of some sort. but track 2, "The Court...." hoo boy. first of all, that song grew on me very quickly. it has a flow to it, it has a mood to it, it is really fun. both mixes are, frankly, great. and the Bright Side Mix is superior in exactly one place-- the line "we know that justice is blind" at the end of the song just.. sounds better here, I really like how it sounds. but "The Court," Dark Side........ ohhhh man. that is where the true excitement to this album began for me, my excitement at how they're doing this multi-mix thing. Bright Side got me to like the song, know what to expect, and I really liked the song! but then Dark Side.... brings up the drum and the bass...... and lets the stranger deeper ambient sounds throughout the song be heard..... and brings the vocals in the choruses lower, makes them more like an ethereal dreamlike chant. it is so good. I fucking love "The Court." I love it. and it wasn't even my favorite of the Bright Side songs!!! and there's still 10 other Dark Side tracks I haven't even listened to yet!!!

(incidentally, my favorite on Bright Side was probably "Four Kinds of Horses," which has a baffling name but is shockingly good. but some of those really slow stripped-back songs are a close second, especially "So Much." that song is.. breathtaking.... but "And Still" is also stunning??? holy shit that flute.... that mood....)

so. so.

I dunno, maybe some of you like your art pop. go check out Peter Gabriel. the new album's legit.

I leave you with The Court, Dark Side. but I also gave some other song names up there, go check those out.

I do love pop sometimes....

#peter gabriel #music #Youtube

[contentment-of-cats]

On bed rotting, a day of rest, and an anniversary.

I can't remember the last time I voluntarily spent the day in bed. My grandmother, born in 1906 spoke of 'taking to bed' - something the energetic but sickly child I was could not understand unless one was ill. As I grew older, weekends became productive time - to study, do homework, write papers, maintain my living space, run errands. The cup of life ran over and drowned the calendar. No rest, or precious little of it even as my body began to fail under a diagnosis of fibromyalgia in 2007. I'd had viral meningitis in 2004, and my immune system never turned off.

Then there came the time when all I could do was rest, but it was miserable instead of restorative. Sickness, growing debility that I tried to deny and rationalize and bring to a doctor. Then hospitalization, tests and scans, diagnosis, preparation, and Stage 4a aggressive treatment. I came home and would sleep until I had to wake up and take Zofran, or in the really bad cases Ativan, or Clonazipine in order not to vomit myself into dehydration. After surgery, nothing but bed. Unable to lift anything heavier than a gallon of milk from November to April.

Today is second Monday in November, the anniversary of my big surgery, the removal of six feet of colon and intestines followed by a resection that literally gave me a new asshole. They removed my uterus and ovaries where the cancer had begun to spread. They re-sectioned my left ureter and bladder because the cancer was spreading there, too. They placed a uretal stent while I healed. I had an ileostomy done so my stitched-together innards could close. Finally, they removed 22 lymph nodes of which seven were found to be precancerous or cancerous. They say you forget the pain, and to an extent that is true. You forget the physical sensation, but you never forget waking up screaming, passing out, waking up again, and begging to die.

I know what a ten on the pain scale is like now. It's been revised up and up. Just when I thought I knew ten, I found out differently. My torso is marked by scars that look as if they were drawn in black Sharpie. I'm in remission, and far from wanting to be the busy, productive person I used to be, I find that I don't want to be anything. With my mother's death in the spring, the burden of daughterhood to a cluster b disordered woman, of shepherding her through dementia as I shepherded myself through cancer was lifted. I grieved the mother I wished for and she could sometimes be, but I was relieved that this stranger who came to wear my mother's body was finally gone. She could rest, and now so can I now that her energy has returned to the universe.

I am still working, but I am selfish now. My weekends are just for me. Despite being in remission, I don't know how many more I will have. That makes them precious. I cook, make jewelry, and 'watch telly' as Gran used to say. It was while I was rotting in bed on Sunday - my pre-Recession habit revived - that I came upon this interview in the Washington Post. Susan Gubar was a formative writer of my teen years, a time when the ERA failed because the male-dominated worldview (with a pushback spearheaded by 'traditional' women) didn't think we needed more rights than we already had, if anything they thought we had too many.

The Madwoman in the Attic, For Adult Users Only: The Dilemma of Violent Pornography, No Man's Land: The Place of the Woman Writer in the Twentieth Century : The War of the Words all ended up in my mother's shelves - she laid claim to my library when I moved out. With her death, I now get them back, plus more. My ten boxes of books donated in the first spate of Swedish Death Cleaning are nothing compared to my mother's hoard of books over her 80+ years of life. On top of that there are the books that she borrowed from me, that somehow also became hers.

Susan Gubar is a cancer patient in remission, and I have downloaded her two books on cancer and survivorship. Memoir of a Debulked Woman: Enduring Ovarian Cancer, and Reading and Writing Cancer: How Words Heal. I plan to rot in bed this pre-Thanksgiving weekend, and read. Also of note, her recent book Still Mad: American Women Writers and the Feminist Imagination. I'm delighted to find her all over again, a writer whose 1979 work spoke to me as much as Virginia Woolf's 'A Room of One's Own.'

Hey. Mom had my copy of that, too, dangit.

Perhaps I can get my library back. A snapshot of myself circa 1991. I know she borrowed my Bell Hooks and Audre Lorde. Angela Davis was someone Mom knew somehow and bought her books on principle. I read a lot of Second and Third Wave feminism, queer theory, psychology, sci-fi, fantasy, and comic books. My first copy of 'Our Bodies: Ourselves' - Mom had to buy that one for me, the bookstore owner refused to sell it to me despite my being female I was not a woman. My old D&D guides.

Perhaps my remission Sundays need to be spent rotting in bed, rediscovering the voracious reader I was all those years, before the busy-ness of life nibbled my time away.

It's a resolution, voted, and carried.

#cancer #remission #identity #rotting in bed #time well spent #stuff and death

[athena-cat-wizard-official]

Favorite technologies or coolest concepts in medicine?

stents. funky little guys with some really cool tech in getting them to fold into the surgical equipment and then unfold properly to prop open the vessel.

honestly though the entire concept of biologics (custom monoclonal antibodies) is cool as fuck. you can create an active drug ingredient that is designed from the ground up to target a specific receptor or hormone or whatever, and completely inactivate it or even mark it for immune destruction. it's a super customisable type of medical therapy that should have way less side effects and im really excited to see it become more mainstream

#catzard meows #medicine

[shallowseeker]

What is the most well-acted scene of SPN, in your opinion?

I think for a genre show, there are a lot of surprisingly hard-hitting moments. But today, I'm gonna say this:

CROWLEY: I'd like...to ask you a-a favor, Sam. Earlier, when you were confessing back there...what did you say? I only ask because, given my history...it raises the question... Where do I start...to even look for forgiveness? I mean...

///

Discussion:

I think Mark's voice, and his whole everything in this scene was among the hardest-hitting of Supernatural. It was so incredibly well-done.

Crowley has been brutal this season. He killed Kevin's girlfriend and tortured Kevin, and yet here he is, asking for forgiveness in a Church, a symbol of penance and forgiveness. As he spirals down from the high of the "roofied disinhibition" of "being a demon," he starts to feel everything again, and he despairs.

It's a callback to the demon Father Thompson cured, the one who ate his own children. It's a callback to Sam's hopped-up stent on demon blood.

In SPN Prime, John thought he was doing the right thing by his neglect and absence and violence, to toughen up his children and prepare them to defend themselves in a world that wants to kill them. And in doing so, John let his family down, and he died before they could fix it. Sam grieving John is not just about grieving the man lost, it's about Sam grieving the loss of potential for healing and repair.

If John Winchester could have lived and reckoned with his crimes of absence and neglect and cruelty, could he have done the same? Asked for forgiveness? Sam will never know. Sam would've forgiven him. There's nothing he wants to put in front of his family either, when you get down to it.

And Sam feels this guilt in himself, too, in his powering up on demon blood in order to do the righteous thing and protect the world. (We'll see in season 15 that this power would've corrupted him, eventually killing those very things he longed to protect.)

Also, there's the guilt for what he perceives as his run to escapism purely for the sake of escaping, serving up an incomplete version of himself in order to fit into an idealized normal (Amelia is to Sam as Kate was to John Winchester, perhaps). In doing so, he let his family down when they needed him the most. (He abandoned Kevin, Dean, Cas because he couldn't face the pain of fighting alone, like how John had to fight alone, and like how Mary has to fight alone in the AU Earth-world. Having siblings is like having built-in allies, and because of that, Sam's never had to fight alone.)

Sam, too, will ask for forgiveness in this church, the symbol of forgiveness. Sam still has living family members to connect to and heal with, and in this scene at least, family is about forgiveness. Dean will be compared to Church by Jody, and it's linking this idea that there are things in your life you can rely on, no matter what. Church is supposed to be a "communal family of forgiveness, not judgment" after all. (Example: Jody turns to Church when she's alone.)

Siblings can be a built-in church in the same way that they are built-in comrades. But Sam was not there for his only kin, and he despairs over not being a reliable brother, lamenting that Dean has turned to his “new brothers” over him. Dean capitulates to Sam's mental state here in this scene, affirming his sense of worth and that he'll always be there no matter what. Critically, this is to preserve Sam's life, because Sam is not in his right mind; he's suicidal.

(Eventually, Crowley too will try to repair things with his son Gavin, and he'll also reckon with Rowena's abandonment.)

The nifty thing about this scene, I think, is that while the Church is the symbol of familial forgiveness and penance, the actual institution of Heaven is brutal and unforgiving and judging. Outside, the angels are falling. The idea of it is more powerful than the reality of it. Heaven would not let Cas do penance.

#spn 8x23 #spn sacrifice #spn crowley #sam & crowley #tfw + forgiveness #spn + motifs #tfw + grief #sam + demon blood #spn + protection #when protecting the family hurts the family

[fettesans]

Left, photograph by Mark Sommerfeld (I couldn't find a title nor a date). Via. Right, Manuel Cornelius, Stent, 2024 silicone, polyethylene terephthalate, tights, pigment, lacquer, 58 x 22 x 38 cm. Via.

--

If you’re born in a cubicle and grow up in a corridor, and work in a cell, and vacation in a crowded sun-room, then coming up into the open with nothing but sky over you might just give you a nervous breakdown.

Isaac Asimov, from Foundation, Volume 3, 1944. Via.

#diptych #reoccurrence #quotes #safe new world #head hitch

[terrence-silver]

Hi! this is kind of a weird topic… BUT I noticed this past the year or so of people getting literal microchips implanted into their hand and using the it to pay for groceries or unlocking doors in their house and there even was this big thing going around of Elon musk wanting to test (LITERALLY TEST ON PEOPLE) these brain chips that he claimed would make the blind see, the paralyzed walk, and eventually turn people in cyborgs??? It was rejected by the U.S regulators but it’s just so crazy and surreal to think abt but I was think if this was something Terry would do cause honestly would it be all that surprising from all the stuff that man has done? Like would he think about doing that to beloved to just track them? What I was thinking was he would cause again it’s Terry Silver but another part is thinking he wouldn’t cause where would beloved be going without him? They barely leave his house to begin with and is under watch.

---

Why do I think that after the 80's, Dynatox could've re-branded from handling toxic materials (and their often ethically questionable disposal) and went straight into the business of cyber-tech...among other things, of course. All the Billionaires are doing it, so why not Terry Silver, trailblazing along with Steve Jobs, Zuckerberg and Musk. A new company for a new age and a new, equally re-branded Terry. Allegedly re-branded Terry, of course. Also, it proved to be the marketing ploy of the century to have people conveniently forget Dynatox's undoubtedly numerous controversies from the past and draw in a hip, fresh, innovative crowd that thinks Dynatox's ultraviolet goggles are just the breakthrough of the decade and ignore the fact that Dynatox hasn't in fact 'gone green' and is still very much in the business of destroying the planet with dirty chemicals. And it works! Thing is, the court of public opinion has a notoriously short memory span when faced with consuming new technology. New things. People care more about having the next new thing than the fact that these new things are tested on other people. On animals. On destroyed environments. On nature. You give the public a new phone and they tend to neglect the fact it utilizes Third World sweatshops and child labor in the process of production.

Speaking of which, after it is deemed totally safe, of course beloved gets microchipped by Terry Silver and they don't even know it happened or maybe they consented not really realizing what they're consenting too. Their movements, their very life is literally something he can track from his phone like they're his property, which they are.

Not just that, as Terry Silver himself ages, it is not entirely unbelievable to think he'd replace organs that are failing or not functioning as well as he'd like, perfectionist that he is, that he'd have them exchanged for these cyborg-like augmentations, maintaining his prime, or what he deems as his prime for as long as possible. Just does miracles for his need to control everything, even the quality of his liver pumping out water, because he wouldn't accept a part of him having subpar quality. By-passes and Stents. Implanting new hearts from vetted donors. Blood transfusions. I can see Terry as the type to re-juvenate himself constantly at private, highly coveted clinics for the uber-wealthy, like a vampire, to keep himself vital and alive for as long as possible. In the best shape he can possibly be in. If he could insert a computerized heart made out of steel into his chest, he would. As for beloved? There's a miniscule, microscopic plate under their skin patented by Dynatox's scientists. They're quite literally marked. If they ever strayed or goodness my, ran, they would be found within hours. Minutes. There's an App for that. Hey, the wealth insure and secure their cars, estates, their antiques and their watches. Their goddamn branded Birkin bags.

Why wouldn't Terry Silver insure and secure the one he loves?

#terry silver #kk3 #cobra kai #dynatox #tw; unethical science #technology #microchips #tracking #tw; all the warnings #terry silver x reader #terry silver x beloved #not a weird topic at all #people always forget dynatox would undoubtedly do stuff like this

[shallowrambles]

My spiciest take is I do think you could take Demon Dean’s comments about running away, liking the disease, you humans actually much worse/evil than me morally, you’re nearly killing me to bring back my human weakness and stamping out my unfeeling “strength,” imprisonment, etc and shove it into the mouth of vintage Sammy and a whole lot of it would mostly work.

Dean took on the mark to be stronger, and he liked being without pain and weakness. Dean’s early “moral code” was prone to moral rigidity (especially when stressed out) and black-and-white rules (parallels Cas).

Early Sam took in demon blood to be stronger. He was was objectively “more moral” re: saving human vessels than human hunters often were. Vintage Sam was prone to spiraling about moral relativism to the point of neuroses.

I think there is a tendency to minimize what Bobby and Dean did to Sam because it’s uncomfortable. But it’s as real and true to me as Sam not taking responsibility for his own behavior sometimes. And I think their problem-solving behavior affected his later problem-solving behavior. (He mimicked it to the point of extremes.)

They have different psychological signatures and motivations. But the parallels are there.

Both brothers go full corrupt with good intentions, and in both cases the trap of heroism terminates in the loss of self and inhibitions. (MOC Dean was ready to die and Sam was ready to die re: Lucifer and Hell trials.) I think addiction and disinhibition is the stronger analogy in both cases. The self-medication is a trap. Neither "addiction" represents a true self in my book so much as it represents "checking out" of humanity.

In a very real sense, MOC is like alcohol, blackout drinking, rages, and loss of memory. “Comfortable numbing.” (An early-days John-coded secondary psychopathy.)

For Sam, his drug reminds me of super-soldier type drugs, and his method of saving of ppl analogous in my head to him overpowering them without weapons/guns in a combat zone. It’s an unsustainable, dangerous approach with more personal risk. (In particular, his soulless stent makes me think of Pervitin, which can cause heart failure in the end.)

#oh the humanity #complex dean #complex sam #addiction #disinhibition

[melodiousmonk]

Peter Gabriel announces his first album of new material in over 20 years

i/o releases on 1 December, 2023

i/o is 12 tracks of grace, gravity and great beauty that provide welcome confirmation of not only Peter’s ongoing ability to write stop-you-in-your-tracks songs but also of that thrilling voice, still perfectly, delightfully intact. Throughout the album the intelligent and thoughtful – often thought-provoking – songs tackle life and the universe. Our connection to the world around us – ‘I’m just a part of everything’ Peter sings on title track i/o – is a recurring motif, but so too the passing of time, mortality and grief, alongside such themes as injustice, surveillance and the roots of terrorism. But this is not a solemn record. While reflective, the mood is never despondent; i/o is musically adventurous, often joyous and ultimately full of hope, topped off as it is, by the rousingly optimistic closing song, Live and Let Live.  

Recorded mostly at Real World Studios and Peter’s home studio, the lengthy gestation of i/o means it has a sizeable cast list. Peter has kept his trusty inner circle of musicians close to hand, which means guitarist David Rhodes, bassist Tony Levin and drummer Manu Katché are sterling presences throughout. Several songs bear the fingerprints of long-time associate Brian Eno, whilst there are notable contributions from Richard Russell, pianist Tom Cawley, trumpeters Josh Shpak and Paolo Fresu, cellist Linnea Olsson and keyboard player Don E. Peter’s daughter Melanie contributes warm backing vocals, as does Ríoghnach Connolly of The Breath, while Real World regulars Richard Chappell, Oli Jacobs, Katie May and Richard Evans collectively provide programming and play various instruments. Soweto Gospel Choir and Swedish all-male choir Oprhei Drängar lend their magnificent harmonies to a selection of tracks, and the mass strings of the New Blood Orchestra, led by John Metcalfe, both soothe and soar.

Renowned for being a boundary-pushing artist, i/o is not simply a collection of a dozen songs. All 12 tracks are subject to two stereo mixes: the Bright-Side Mix, handled by Mark ‘Spike’ Stent, and the Dark-Side Mix, as reshaped by Tchad Blake. “We have two of the greatest mixers in the world in Tchad and Spike and they definitely bring different characters to the songs. Tchad is very much a sculptor building a journey with sound and drama, Spike loves sound and assembling these pictures, so he’s more of a painter.” Both versions are included on the double-CD package, and are also available separately as double vinyl albums. And that’s not all. A third version – the In-Side Mix, in Dolby Atmos, comes courtesy of Hans-Martin Buff “doing a wonderful job generating these much more three-dimensional mixes” and is included in three-disc set, including Blu-ray.

Continuing the idea developed for Peter’s US and UP albums, he has again invited a range of visual artists to contribute a piece of art to accompany the music and each of i/o’s 12 songs were handed to a world-renowned artist to create an accompanying work, whether paint, photography, sculpture or even Plasticine. The dozen artists make an exceedingly impressive team of collaborators: Ai Weiwei, Nick Cave, Olafur Eliasson, Henry Hudson, Annette Messager, Antony Micallef, David Moreno, Cornelia Parker, Megan Rooney, Tim Shaw, David Spriggs and Barthélémy Toguo. 

Another visual link with Peter’s past work is the cover shot. Taken by photographer Nadav Kander, it echoes with the covers of his earlier albums, always present but, with the exception of So, intriguingly obscured or manipulated. 

These echoes of the past might resonate, but i/o is fundamentally an album of – and for – the here and now. Many of its themes may be timeless, but they’re also warnings that we’re living on borrowed time, both as a planet and as individuals. 

(Source: Peter Gabriel's mailing list)

#peter gabriel #i/o

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The Snuts’ new era has been marked with the premiere of the single Gloria as Clara Amfo’s Hottest Record on BBC Radio 1 tonight (May 23).

The single is the band’s first single since exiting Parlophone and setting up their own label, Happy Artist Records, in partnership with The Orchard.

Mixed by Spike Stent and produced by singer Jack Cochrane and longtime collaborator Scotty Anderson, Gloria arrives ahead of the Radio 1 Big Weekend on May 27.

“Immediately after releasing our last album into the world, we reflected as a team on our shared experiences of releasing our first two records,” said The Snuts frontman Jack Cochrane. “After being offered to re-sign with Parlophone for the next record we decided to respectfully decline. Throughout the last campaign it was clear our vision as artists and that of the label, had drifted apart significantly.

“We’ve always felt like an ‘indie’ band with strong ambitions to be a global act and have always had a very DIY, hands-on approach when it comes to making our art. The producers we’ve been lucky enough to work with in the last few years have allowed us to really learn our craft and be bold in the decision making that comes with it.”

He added: “The Orchard felt like a safe home we could transition to smoothly. It was clear from the offset they understood the core values of The Snuts and the community that comes with us. We decided to set up our own label, Happy Artist Records, after being told by a former label head, ‘There’s nothing worse than a happy artist’.

“Having total control of the production and promotion of our music is a dream come true. This type of freedom will flourish and grow inside all projects going forward with the band and allow us to focus on what really matters - the creation of the art and our ever growing community we make it for.”

The Snuts are set to play their biggest headline shows to date at SWG3 in Glasgow in July. The band will play the main stage at Reading & Leeds Festivals in August, with further touring including a run of dates in the US, their first headline tour of Australia and Summer Sonic festival in Japan.

The Snuts peaked at No.1 with 2021 debut album WL, which has sales to date of 61,140, according to the Official Charts Company.

Burn The Empire, released in the busy Q4 period last year, peaked at No.3 following a tight chart race involving Slipknot and George Michael. It has sales to date of 18,894.

“With The Orchard leading the way with an innovative and artist-centric approach to label services, their passion and drive for The Snuts is infectious and in keeping with our own vision,” said Adam Harris of Touchdown Management. “With a debut No.1 album and No.3 second album in the space of just 18 months and our biggest headline shows to date this summer, it feels like just the start for the band and we couldn’t be happier to be embarking upon this next stage with the global Orchard team."

“As managers, we’ve always done the heavy lifting to support our artist’s vision,” added Touchdown’s Callum Read. “Seeing the passion and excitement that’s coming from the band and new members of the team is really refreshing!”

The Snuts launch Happy Artist Records with The Orchard 23 May 2023

#the snuts #happy artist records