Great Letterman bit. BMI & ASCAP are not to be trifled with.
Cunk History
I’ve been enjoying this series recently.
To say Cunk is an idiot is an insult to idiots—this is a person who stone-facedly inquires whether the pyramids were built from the top down. She calls the academics she speaks to “clevernauts” and “expertists” and then proceeds to ask these befuddled “boffins” about anal bleaching in ancient Rome. In between, she characterizes the advent of farming as a product of lazy hunters, math as a “tragic invention,” sports as “theater for stupid people,” the Model T as a “truly terrible car” and missionaries as “God’s bitches.” With her pop culture knowledge far outstripping her knowledge of literally anything else, she at least nails the name of the 5-part series’ religious episode: “Faith/Off.” Through all of it—even through the show’s inexplicable “Pump Up the Jam” leitmotif—Morgan never breaks. This is stupidity at its deadest seriousness.
When You Hustle, You Gotta Have A Hard Shell
Viva Schroeder
I read Peanuts over and over as a youngster. Our discussion of “Well-Tempered Clavier” triggered an old panel in my head. I couldn’t find it, of course, but seem to remember Schroeder’s involvement. It was a good springboard to look up his outstanding output.
I’m sure the classically-trained bastard among us can identify Schroeder’s enthusiastic tunes by a single measure.
NecronomiCon
“The weird is a way to connect with the world around us and make sense of it.”
So they say at the H.P. Lovecraft festival, held recently in Providence, R.I. There were film screenings, readings, academic presentations, concerts, live podcasts, walking tours of Lovecraft’s Providence, gaming, hardly any cosplay, and a Cthulhu Prayer Breakfast.
I like this crowd.
Pub Feed
Catchy Tuesday features Bastard-sanctioned outfit The Chats, with a classic band television interview.
Rip It Up
We may never know what happened to Elvis.
If only I knew some well-connected Memphians.
Enjoy Mr. Pop.
Are You Loathsome Tonight?
I think I could put almost any modern country song here, as they are nearly all appalling. The dopey two-step beats, the horrible twang, the cowboy hat affectation, the utter lack of curiosity or twist in the songwriting – i.e. it’s funny that you love your country when you haven’t explored it beyond your barn.
Enjoy!
All Your Face Are Belong To Us
For $29.99 a month, a website called PimEyes offers a potentially dangerous superpower from the world of science fiction: the ability to search for a face, finding obscure photos that would otherwise have been as safe as the proverbial needle in the vast digital haystack of the internet.
A search takes mere seconds. You upload a photo of a face, check a box agreeing to the terms of service and then get a grid of photos of faces deemed similar, with links to where they appear on the internet. The New York Times used PimEyes on the faces of a dozen Times journalists, with their consent, to test its powers.
PimEyes found photos of every person, some that the journalists had never seen before, even when they were wearing sunglasses or a mask, or their face was turned away from the camera, in the image used to conduct the search.
I’m sure that this technology will only be used for noble pursuits.