Whatcha reading?

[Dr. Medulla]

Me super love those.

(Do you have access to high quality versions of those files? I'd be keen on getting a shirt made with the London Calling one.)

I took them from a Pinterest site but I might be able to produce a high res image with my software. Will get back to you tomorrow.

Yippity zippity! Thanks!

[101Walterton]

Me super love those.

(Do you have access to high quality versions of those files? I'd be keen on getting a shirt made with the London Calling one.)

I took them from a Pinterest site but I might be able to produce a high res image with my software. Will get back to you tomorrow.

Yippity zippity! Thanks!

They are great.

[Silent Majority]

75) Red Rosa - Kate Evans. Graphic novel. A biography of the Marxist revolutionary Rosa Luxembourg drawn in a style which is not my cup of tea in terms of artwork but isn't objectionable and does not detract from the brilliant true story.

[Marky Dread]

Dr Medulla...

Here you go as promised.

[Dr. Medulla]

Giggity! Gonna see if that place I've used before will accept it (they've stumped before over image quality).

[JennyB]

Dr Medulla...

Here you go as promised.

That's amazing.

[Silent Majority]

76) Perfecting Sound Forever - Greg Milner. Paperback. This is a good one, but I personally found the story of recording sound less interesting the deeper into the twentieth century the story got. It really is a game of two halves with pretty much everything changing when digital comes into the picture. I'm far more drawn, for my research purposes and just generally, to the history of this stuff up to 1950. The narrative of sound engineers clipping Red Hot Chili Peppers albums has just less inherent glamour than Edison hollering nursery rhymes into a non-electric tube.

[Dr. Medulla]

76) Perfecting Sound Forever - Greg Milner. Paperback. This is a good one, but I personally found the story of recording sound less interesting the deeper into the twentieth century the story got. It really is a game of two halves with pretty much everything changing when digital comes into the picture. I'm far more drawn, for my research purposes and just generally, to the history of this stuff up to 1950. The narrative of sound engineers clipping Red Hot Chili Peppers albums has just less inherent glamour than Edison hollering nursery rhymes into a non-electric tube.

rcs is no longer with us, but his neo-wax cylinderism lives on!

[Silent Majority]

76) Perfecting Sound Forever - Greg Milner. Paperback. This is a good one, but I personally found the story of recording sound less interesting the deeper into the twentieth century the story got. It really is a game of two halves with pretty much everything changing when digital comes into the picture. I'm far more drawn, for my research purposes and just generally, to the history of this stuff up to 1950. The narrative of sound engineers clipping Red Hot Chili Peppers albums has just less inherent glamour than Edison hollering nursery rhymes into a non-electric tube.

rcs is no longer with us, but his neo-wax cylinderism lives on!

One fun thing Milner highlights is that the tech for an non-electric wax cylinder has been possible since at least the bronze age. So there was potential for the ancient Egyptians to record sound. Shit, maybe they did and the stuff just rotted away.

[Dr. Medulla]

76) Perfecting Sound Forever - Greg Milner. Paperback. This is a good one, but I personally found the story of recording sound less interesting the deeper into the twentieth century the story got. It really is a game of two halves with pretty much everything changing when digital comes into the picture. I'm far more drawn, for my research purposes and just generally, to the history of this stuff up to 1950. The narrative of sound engineers clipping Red Hot Chili Peppers albums has just less inherent glamour than Edison hollering nursery rhymes into a non-electric tube.

rcs is no longer with us, but his neo-wax cylinderism lives on!

One fun thing Milner highlights is that the tech for an non-electric wax cylinder has been possible since at least the bronze age. So there was potential for the ancient Egyptians to record sound. Shit, maybe they did and the stuff just rotted away.

Wow, that's fascinating. Curious that such technology wouldn't have been developed before the late 19th c, then. Cultural inhibitions that keep people from pursuing the possibility, perhaps?

[Silent Majority]

76) Perfecting Sound Forever - Greg Milner. Paperback. This is a good one, but I personally found the story of recording sound less interesting the deeper into the twentieth century the story got. It really is a game of two halves with pretty much everything changing when digital comes into the picture. I'm far more drawn, for my research purposes and just generally, to the history of this stuff up to 1950. The narrative of sound engineers clipping Red Hot Chili Peppers albums has just less inherent glamour than Edison hollering nursery rhymes into a non-electric tube.

rcs is no longer with us, but his neo-wax cylinderism lives on!

One fun thing Milner highlights is that the tech for an non-electric wax cylinder has been possible since at least the bronze age. So there was potential for the ancient Egyptians to record sound. Shit, maybe they did and the stuff just rotted away.

Wow, that's fascinating. Curious that such technology wouldn't have been developed before the late 19th c, then. Cultural inhibitions that keep people from pursuing the possibility, perhaps?

I think the concept just never occurred to anyone before the nineteenth century.

[Silent Majority]

77) Adolf Hitler: My Part In His Downfall - Spike Milligan. Audiobook read by the author. Milligan was a childhood hero for his kid's poetry and while I find the Goons unlistenable (despite, or maybe because of, their influence on things like Python) I've remained on good terms with the guy's work despite a very 1930s attitude to joking about race. This memoir, which the author charmingly finds funny enough in places not to suppress his giggles while reading, is the first of a series of books about his time in WW2. This one focuses on his training and first few weeks at sea. Some very good writing and laugh out loud in places, I did find it annoying. I didn't always parse the difference between jokes that Milligan made up for the book and his actual experience which was somewhat disorientating.

[Dr. Medulla]

76) Perfecting Sound Forever - Greg Milner. Paperback. This is a good one, but I personally found the story of recording sound less interesting the deeper into the twentieth century the story got. It really is a game of two halves with pretty much everything changing when digital comes into the picture. I'm far more drawn, for my research purposes and just generally, to the history of this stuff up to 1950. The narrative of sound engineers clipping Red Hot Chili Peppers albums has just less inherent glamour than Edison hollering nursery rhymes into a non-electric tube.

rcs is no longer with us, but his neo-wax cylinderism lives on!

One fun thing Milner highlights is that the tech for an non-electric wax cylinder has been possible since at least the bronze age. So there was potential for the ancient Egyptians to record sound. Shit, maybe they did and the stuff just rotted away.

Wow, that's fascinating. Curious that such technology wouldn't have been developed before the late 19th c, then. Cultural inhibitions that keep people from pursuing the possibility, perhaps?

I think the concept just never occurred to anyone before the nineteenth century.

Right, but why not? Human beings had long realized the value of recording events as text on paper or as paintings. That it serves to maintain memory and history and validate arguments. So the concept of preservation of the past in physical objects already existed. That this wasn't extended to the aural is a bit odd to me, especially given that pre-20th century, all human cultures were primarily oral. A technology that maintains the primacy of oral tradition would appeal—or maybe it would counter the perhaps sacred nature of orality (I dunno). That it was possible for such technology to exist thousands of years ago yet no one stumbled upon the basics and built on them thru trial and error over the centuries is fascinating as hell to me.

[Marky Dread]

Robyn Hitchcock & The Egyptians

[Dr. Medulla]

A new Scarfolk book just came out—The Scarfolk Annual—and while the humour has always been very black, this collection is stygian. A few examples: