Saturday, December 29, 2012

Shall I Play For You pa rum pum pum pum

Shall I Play For You pa rum pum pum pum: Christopher Lee - A Heavy Metal Christmas

Rhapsody of Fire and Christopher Lee - The Magic of the Wizard's Dream



Manowar and Christopher Lee - Dark Avenger [The Narrator starts at about 2:30]



Christopher Lee - The Bloody Verdict of Verden



Christopher Lee discusses Heavy Metal, Opera and Manowar





Sir Christopher Lee Previously, Previously, Previously, Previously, and Previously

Xmas Eve Eve Eve 2012 Xmas Present: Johnny ''Guitar'' Watson

Xmas Eve Eve Eve 2012 Xmas Present: Johnny ''Guitar'' Watson: Some say that surf guitar started here: Johnny Guitar Watson - Space Guitar

Young John Watson's first appearance on wax: Chuck Higgins & his Mellotones - Motor Head Baby

Also back in the day: Johnny "Guitar" Watson - The Bear

And not so far back in the day - a Frank Zappa jam with Tuva throat Singers, Chieftains and Johnny ''Guitar'' Watson

And for the meat and potatoes part of the post: Johnny "Guitar" Watson - In Concert

Christmas Can Be Green And Bright

Christmas Can Be Green And Bright: "Mele Kalikimaka" (Ukelele cords) is a Hawaiian-themed Christmas song written in 1949 by Robert Alex Anderson. The phrase is borrowed directly from English but since Hawaiian has a different phonological system - Hawaiian does not have the /r/ or /s/ of English and doesn't have the phonotactic constraints to allow consonants at the end of syllables or consonant clusters - "Merry Christmas" becomes "Mele Kalikimaka". Enjoy the canonical version with Bing Crosby And The Andrew Sisters (lounge remix) or by KT Tunstall or Bette Milder or Jimmy Buffet or Gianni And Sarah or The Puppini Sisters or Reel Big Fish or Country Western style or pared down instrumental or Celtic Rock style or performed on the Metro by Pokey LaFarge or ..whatever the hell this is.

Beatles harmony tutorial videos

Beatles harmony tutorial videos: Galeazzo Frudua, of Bologna, Italy, possesses an uncannily good ear for harmony, and has produced a series of videos that painstakingly and expertly analyze and demonstrate for you the vocal harmonies employed in various Beatles songs. His perceptive commentary, his very, very capable singing voice, unassuming manner, impressive video editing skills and, hey, his charming Italian accent all combine to create tutorial videos that are fun and educational viewing. Start with the first one he made, for Nowhere Man, and then, well, just check 'em all out. You won't be disappointed.

Farewell to funky diva Marva Whitney

Farewell to funky diva Marva Whitney: Funk singer Marva Whitney, who was dubbed Soul Sister #1 by her mentor James Brown, has passed away at the age of 68. Backed by the whip-crack James Brown band (the JBs), Whitney's raw expression was just what the doctor ordered for those who wanted their funk uncut. Witness the supreme grooving goodness of It's My Thing (live TV appearance), Unwind Yourself, What Do I Have To Do To Prove My Love To You, I Made a Mistake Because It's Only You, and Things Got to Get Better (another live TV appearance, with James Brown himself conducting the band and Whitney resplendent in platinum blonde afro). Here she is in a southern-flavored soul ditty recorded for Excello in 1972 called Live and Let Live. Later in her career she cut an album with a JBs soundalike band from Japan called Osaka Monaurail, which included a recreation of the James Brown hit Give It Up or Turnit a Loose. And here's a radio interview from 2006, in which she reminisces about meeting James Brown and working under his wing. Heaven is a funkier place tonight. RIP Marva Whitney.

The first video link in this post is a live version of her reworking of the Isley Brothers' classic "It's Your Thing", which Marva changed to "It's My Thing". Here's the original recording of the song.



Marva Whitney, here at Metafilter just a few months previously.

You wanna hear a story?

You wanna hear a story?: A Conversation With Stephen King (NSFW language, MLYT)

Highlights Of King's Visit To UMass Lowell



The conversation

"Afterlife" premier

Q&A - On A Possible Theme Park, The Boston Red Sox & More



Stephen King On Twilight, 50 Shades of Grey, Lovecraft & More



Phone interviews

On How 'Carrie' Might Be Different If He Wrote It Today

On Writing A Musical & Working With John Mellencamp

On How Fear Is Used In The Media & More

On Why He Is Coming To UMass Lowell

On His Career, The Walking Dead & More

Thoughts On The Horror Genre

1 on 1 Interview

A Christmas Carol, A Vintage Radio Broadcast by Orson Welles and Lionel Barrymore (1939)

A Christmas Carol, A Vintage Radio Broadcast by Orson Welles and Lionel Barrymore (1939):

I wager that we could all recount the plot points of A Christmas Carol by heart. Furthermore, I wager that most of us inadvertently committed these to memory not by reading and re-reading Charles Dickens’ 1843 novella (available in our Free eBooks and Free Audio Books collections), but by having seen or heard a different adaptation of it each Christmas. The work has produced an almost confusing abundance of productions on film, television, and the stage, from Thomas Edison’s 1910 silent short to a Doctor Who Christmas special two years ago. Beyond that, we have countless reimaginings, like the animated Mickey’s Christmas Carol featuring Scrooge McDuck as Ebenezer Scrooge, and loosely Christmas Carol-inspired projects, like Scrooged with Bill Murray. The story has also made its way to the radio many times, most notably in the 1930s, when Campbell’s Soup would sponsor its yearly appearance. In 1939, the “Campbell Playhouse” brought in two especially formidable thespians, Orson Welles and Lionel Barrymore, and you can listen to the result at archive.org, or right below.
Welles, of course, came in as no stranger to adapting literature for radio; he’d pulled off his infamously realistic Halloween dramatization of H.G. Wells’ The War of the Worlds just the year before. My personal favorite of his adaptations remains the hauntingly askew Orson Welles Show version of Carl Ewald’s My Little Boy, but I can’t deny that he brings an entirely suitable tone of mild grandeur, initially stern but ultimately pleased, to A Christmas Carol. Barrymore, an actor of both the nineteenth and twentieth centuries who managed to succeed on stage, in silent films, and then in sound films, plays the now-archetypal miserly curmudgeon Ebenezer Scrooge with a style that, for my money, falls second only to Scrooge McDuck’s. But then, we can’t go comparing cartoon characters to flesh-and-blood performers, and Disney’s Scrooge surely drew his own signature miserliness and curmudgeonhood (not to mention his name) from Dickens’, a figure already firmly lodged in our collective holiday consciousness, thanks especially to performances like Barrymore’s.
Related content:
A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens
Orson Welles Vintage Radio: The War of the Worlds That Petrified a Nation
Celebrate the 200th Birthday of Charles Dickens with Free Movies, eBooks and Audio Books
Colin Marshall hosts and produces Notebook on Cities and Culture and writes essays on literature, film, cities, Asia, and aesthetics. Follow him on Twitter at @colinmarshall.
A Christmas Carol, A Vintage Radio Broadcast by Orson Welles and Lionel Barrymore (1939) is a post from: Open Culture. You can follow Open Culture on Facebook, Twitter, Google Plus and by Email.

Friday, December 28, 2012

The Recycled Orchestra: Paraguayan Youth Play Mozart with Instruments Cleverly Made Out of Trash

The Recycled Orchestra: Paraguayan Youth Play Mozart with Instruments Cleverly Made Out of Trash:
“One man’s trash is another man’s treasure” — it’s a saying they’re taking to heart in Cateura, Paraguay, a small town where impoverished families live along a vast landfill. Cateura’s residents can’t afford many things that American families often take for granted, and that includes buying new musical instruments for their kids. Indeed, in Cateura, your garden variety violin costs more than the average home. But that hasn’t stopped the town from assembling a youth chamber orchestra that performs music by Mozart, Beethoven and the Beatles. The instruments they play are made from the trash that surrounds them. Oil cans become cellos; aluminum bowls get forged into violins. And the music they make suffers not one bit. This inspirational story will be told in an upcoming feature-length documentary called Landfill Harmonic. You can keep an eye out for the film by following its Facebook page, and learn more about The Recycled Orchestra by reading this interview. H/T Kim
The Recycled Orchestra: Paraguayan Youth Play Mozart with Instruments Cleverly Made Out of Trash is a post from: Open Culture. You can follow Open Culture on Facebook, Twitter, Google Plus and by Email.

Collect Sounds Like Fireflies in the ‘Re: Sound Bottle,’ a Device that Creates Your Own Personal Soundtrack

Collect Sounds Like Fireflies in the ‘Re: Sound Bottle,’ a Device that Creates Your Own Personal Soundtrack:
Collect Sounds Like Fireflies in the Re: Sound Bottle, a Device that Creates Your Own Personal Soundtrack sound interactive device
Collect Sounds Like Fireflies in the Re: Sound Bottle, a Device that Creates Your Own Personal Soundtrack sound interactive device
Collect Sounds Like Fireflies in the Re: Sound Bottle, a Device that Creates Your Own Personal Soundtrack sound interactive device
Collect Sounds Like Fireflies in the Re: Sound Bottle, a Device that Creates Your Own Personal Soundtrack sound interactive device
The Re: Sound Bottle is the audio equivalent of running around in a field in the summer collecting fireflies in a jar. Designed by Jun Fujiwara from Tama Art University, the bottle is simple in its usage but absurdly complex in its design which relies heavily on software to handle the recording, storing, and playback of audio tracks. To use it you simply uncork the device and if sound is present it immediately snaps into recording mode. As you record more individual sounds, an audio database is formed and tracks are automatically selected to create rhythmic tracks, essentially like a miniature robot DJ in a jar. To listen, you again uncork the top and wait for your personal soundtrack to play. Jun says he hopes the Re: Sound Bottle (still just a concept) will help people interact more directly with music by recording the audio from their daily life. The bottle won a special judge’s prize at the 2012 Mitsubishi Chemical Junior Designer Awards earlier this year. (via jason sondhi)

Friday, December 21, 2012

"Shine Brighter"

"Shine Brighter": DJ Earworm has released his annual "United State of Pop" mashup of the year's 25 most popular songs according to Billboard's charts: Shine Brighter.

Related

* Lyrics Video

* Download the MP3 on SoundCloud

* Official Site



The Videos

* Gotye and Kimbra - Somebody That I Used To Know

* Fun - Some Nights

* Carly Rae Jepsen - Call Me Maybe

* Maroon 5 - One More Night

* Fun. and Janelle Monáe - We Are Young

* Maroon 5 and Wiz Khalifa - Payphone (Explicit)

* Ellie Goulding - Lights

* Rihanna - Diamonds

* Bruno Mars - Locked Out Of Heaven

* Ke$Ha - Die Young

* Kelly Clarkson - Stronger (What Doesn't Kill You)

* Flo Rida - Good Feeling

* Nicki Minaj - Starships (Explicit)

* The Wanted - Glad You Came

* Adele - Set Fire To The Rain

* Lumineers - Ho Hey

* One Direction - What Makes You Beautiful

* Flo Rida and Sia - Wild Ones

* Phillip Phillips - Home

* Bruno Mars - It Will Rain

* Katy Perry - Wide Awake

* Alex Clare - Too Close

* PSY - Gangnam Style

* Taylor Swift - We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together

* Flo Rida - Whistle



Past Remixes

2007: United State of Pop Previously

2008: Viva La Pop Previously

2009: Blame it on the Pop Previously

2010: Don't Stop the Pop Previously

2011: World Go Boom Previously



Previously and Previouslier

* Like, OMG Baby

* Party on the Floor

* Fly



Bonus

Rewind YouTube Style 2012. The site invited some of their members to star in an end-of-year mash-up. Included here solely for a moment of awesome: at 1:48 Felicia Day parodies "Call Me Maybe"

Recreating the sounds of the BBC Radiophonic Workshop

Recreating the sounds of the BBC Radiophonic Workshop: Explore the BBC sound of the 1960s with 4 demos of Radiophonic equipment.

Built with the new Web Audio API standard, each demo comes with commented code, so you can learn how to build your own audio applications.



Gunfire Effects

The BBC Designs Department produced a successful electronic alternative which sounded realistic and was capable of being used for a broad range of sounds which could not be made naturally.



Wobbulator

The versatile "wobbulator" was a sine-wave oscillator that could be frequency modulated. It consisted of a metal box with a few switches and one very large knob that could sweep the entire frequency range.



Tape Loops

Fragments of recorded sounds were manipulated and then spliced together to form compositions and tape loops ­ sometimes several metres long.



Ring Modulator*

The ring modulator works by taking two inputs and multiplying them together. In the original Ring Modulator a tape loop with a 30Hz sine wave tone was combined in real time as an actor spoke into a microphone. The diodes in the machine also gave the effect its characteristic distortion.



*The ring modulator is best known as the device used to create the terrifying voices of the Daleks and the Cybermen in Dr. Who.

Thursday, December 20, 2012

LOU RAWLS: SO FRESH, SO CLEAN

LOU RAWLS: SO FRESH, SO CLEAN:

I was at Andy Zax‘s house recently and pulled out what had been one of his biggest white whales for me to check out: Lou Rawls Sings for Cold Power Powder.
This wasn’t an album; it was a 10″ upon which Rawls recorded ten short, minute-long ads for Cold Power washing detergent. The fact that big stars recorded ads is nothing new but the fact that any of these records, which were intended to be played on radio stations and later discarded, survived is pretty damn extraordinary.
Andy thinks H.B. Barnum is behind the production here and I see no reason to disagree; it’s certainly right for the late 1960s, which is when the EP was likely recorded and distributed. Musically speaking, it’s competent enough though nothing will necessarily blow your mind…except for listening to Rawls shill for a detergent company, which is its own kind of awesomeness.
Thanks to Mr. Zax!
Lou Rawls: Strange Dirt 1

When Washing Goes Wrong 2

From Lou Rawls Sings For Cold Power Powder (A&R, 1960s)

  1. Not quite like “Strange Fruit.”
  2. So ominous!

Music: Great Job, Internet!: Watch Big Boi's special reading of How The Grinch Stole Christmas!

Music: Great Job, Internet!: Watch Big Boi's special reading of How The Grinch Stole Christmas!:







In the latest permutation of “Celebrity X participating in Holiday Tradition Y,” the good people at Noisey have arranged for “Sir Lucious L. Left Foot, a.k.a. Daddy Fat Sax, a.k.a. Hot Tub Tony, a.k.a. Sylvester The Unskippable, a.k.a. Big Boi, one half of the mighty OutKast” to pay tribute to another, entirely different master of rhythm and rhyme—Dr. Seuss. Gather ’round the monitor as Mr. Boi performs a reading of Theodor Geisel’s classic tale, How The Grinch Stole Christmas!, complete with commentary on the Whos’ holiday hash and an impromptu transition into rapping the text. It doesn’t really look like he prepared for the reading in advance, but it’s Christmas, so don’t be a grinch about it.

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Saturday, December 15, 2012

Sangre, Bandera, Cruz

Sangre, Bandera, Cruz: Born in violent, divided Tijuana Mexico, Ruidosón, a musical movement blending chillwave, latin rhythms, and politics is attracting notice of critics north and south of the border.

Leaders of the movement:

Mariá y José [Myspace -- Soundcloud -- Sideproject: Tony Gallardo II]

Los Macuanos [Website -- Soundcloud]

Santos [Myspace -- Soundcloud]

Den5hion

Los Amparito (not from TJ but related) [Website -- Soundcloud]



Ruidosón mix on 8trax

More artists on Cocobass Records



via Tomorrowmag {Tomorrowmag previously}

You've been waiting forever / but you can make ever wait for you.

You've been waiting forever / but you can make ever wait for you.: The cryptic album Hawaii: Part II has finally been released after a months-long mystery, and it sounds like a mix between Katamari Damacy and early 20th century pop. Includes chiptune rapping, time travel, and the Erlking of German folklore. A bonus track, Variations on a Cloud, is also worth a listen.

Sephardic Music: A Century of Recordings

Sephardic Music: A Century of Recordings: Sephardic Music: A Century of Recordings is a discographic website charting the recording of Sephardic secular and liturgical songs. It includes great sections on 78 rpm recordings, early repertory, and modern recordings. Samples of songs are littered throughout, but many can be found in the Appendix section on 78 labels (at the bottom of the page) and the Songs section of the Appendix. There are many other parts of the site to explore, but the Bibiliography deserves a special mention, as does this page providing samples of 125! different recordings of the popular song A la una over the past 100 years.

Olivier Messiaen's "Vingt regards sur l'enfant-Jésus"

Olivier Messiaen's "Vingt regards sur l'enfant-Jésus": To say that Messiaen's Vingt Regards sur L'Enfant-Jesus (Twenty Contemplations on the Infant Jesus) is a masterpiece is a gross understatement. Over sixty years after its composition, it has rightfully earned the recognition of being one of the most important piano works of the 20th century. ... [It] is one of the most personal and intimate pieces Messiaen ever wrote, and it gives the listener a close look at Messiaen the person. Messiaen was a deeply religious person, and although his faith influenced every single piece he wrote, the Vingt Regards is almost like his own personal spiritual diary. - Keith Kerchoff

My kind of Christmas music:



I. Regard du Père ("Contemplation of the Father")



II. Regard de l'étoile ("Contemplation of the star")



III. L'échange ("The exchange")



IV. Regard de la Vierge ("Contemplation of the Virgin")



V. Regard du Fils sur le Fils ("Contemplation of the Son upon the Son")



The Pierre-Laurent Aimard performance in these clips seems to be the consensus recommendation - and can be found online in FLAC.

music has the right to metafilter

music has the right to metafilter: For your low-fi electronica fix: The Twoism forum presents One on Twoism: a mixed compilation series inspired by Boards of Canada.
◆ Volume 5 - mp3 download - lossless FLAC

◆ Volume 4 - mp3 download - lossless FLAC

◆ Volume 3 - mp3 download - lossless FLAC

◆ Volume 2 - mp3 download - lossless FLAC

◆ Volume 1 - mp3 download - lossless FLAC

"If I were to play nothing but Matteis all my life, I wouldn't mind at all."

"If I were to play nothing but Matteis all my life, I wouldn't mind at all.": The best classical performance you've never heard: the remarkable violinist Amandine Beyer plays the Diverse Bizzarrie Sopra La Vecchia Sarabanda Ò Pur Ciaccona, by 17th-century composer Nicola Matteis. Here she discusses trying to recreate Matteis's original violin technique, to understand why the Baroque composer, whose work pre-dates Johann Sebastian Bach, wrote his pieces the way he did. Previously, Beyer and her ensemble Gli Incogniti breathed life into one of classical music's most overplayed masterpieces, Antonio Vivaldi's Four Seasons.

Music: Great Job, Internet!: The Roots and their toy instruments provide a cure for the bah-humbugs with “All I Want For Christmas Is You”

Music: Great Job, Internet!: The Roots and their toy instruments provide a cure for the bah-humbugs with “All I Want For Christmas Is You”:







Back in June, The Roots and Jimmy Fallon taught us all that we actually love “Call Me Maybe,” especially if it’s played on classroom instruments. Well, they return today to teach us a valuable holiday lesson: It is in fact possible to improve upon what is arguably the best original Christmas pop song of the last 20 years, Mariah Carey’s “All I Want For Christmas Is You,” given the right performance. (Sorry, kid from Love, Actually, this wins.) Christmas-sweater-clad ?uestlove and Co. bust out the xylophone, melodica, and shakers, a choir of adorable moppets pop up to provide the holiday-mandated choral accompaniment, and Miss Mariah herself arrives (spectacularly overdressed, of course) to contribute her signature dog whistle to the mix. It’s a perfect cure for a case of the bah-humbugs, and a reaffirmation that—like mega-popular bubblegum pop singles—not all holiday music has to be awful ...

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Music: Great Job, Internet!: Yes, Sufjan Stevens has a Christmas-themed rap mixtape featuring Das Racist and Kitty Pryde

Music: Great Job, Internet!: Yes, Sufjan Stevens has a Christmas-themed rap mixtape featuring Das Racist and Kitty Pryde:







Not stopping after a five-disc Christmas album and a series of bizarre but festive infomercials, Sufjan Stevens now has a Christmas rap mixtape to keep spreading the holiday twee. The cleverly titled Chopped And Scrooged features artists like the now-defunct Das Racist, polarizing teenage wunderkind Kitty Pryde, and others rapping over music from Silver And Gold.


Even though most people thought she was kidding, Pryde announced the collaboration back in September when she wrote on her Facebook, "Just finished my christmas song for sufjan stevens………………..(:" Pryde raps on "Implants & Yankee Candles."
Perhaps instead of a record for each of the 50 states, fans should hassle Stevens to release an album and mixtape for every major holiday. Download the tape here.

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Music: AVQ&A: Our favorite songs of 2012

Music: AVQ&A: Our favorite songs of 2012:







Welcome back to AVQ&A, where we throw out a question for discussion among the staff and readers. Consider this a prompt to compare notes on your interface with pop culture, to reveal your embarrassing tastes and experiences, and to ponder how our diverse lives all led us to convene here together. Got a question you’d like us and the readers to answer? E-mail us at avcqa@theonion.com.
This week’s question is a simple one: What was your favorite song of 2012?
Jason HellerI gave Researching The Blues, the latest album by L.A. punk survivor Redd Kross, a decent grade in my A.V. Club review back in August. But if I’d only been judging the album’s best song, “Stay Away From Downtown,” it would have blown the top off the grading scale. Immaculately crafted, leanly muscled, and sparkling with jangle, the instant ...

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