Knuckledragger

I've mentioned Martin Sturtzer on H-C many times over the years. He is a German ambient artist who lives in Wuppertal, Germany (home to the coolest tramway in the world.) He has an impressive synth collection and the single best behaved synth kitty I have seen in my life. He is not happy. Also, Spotify sucks balls.

Putting this here, because I live under the delusion that I will some day get through the "Check out this music (fuck VEVO)" thread. As I mentioned elsewhere, a DJ I knew for over 25 years died recently. Periodically, he'd send me a link to a remix he thought I might like. I used Faecesbook's "see friendship" and found a few of them yesterday. Maneater needs no introduction. It's a summation of early 80s synth pop to a T. It's infectious, over the top and will be stuck in your head for days. It's not an easy song to remix properly and do anything original. Certainly there are a legion of remixes out there, most significantly faster than the original's ~90 BPM. Flying White Dots went in the opposite direction, stripping out most of the original and making sparing use of sparse elements while dubbing the absolute fuck out of things. I have sneaked this remix into more than a couple downtempo sets over the years. On the other end of the energy spectrum, The Reflex Stems turn Lennon's diss track against McCartney (that is as much autobiographical as it is about Paul) into a nearly 10 minute epic. In spite of its length, there isn't too much wasted space here. The Reflex wisely left enough time before John's vocals come in to make it easy to work this remix into more conventional downtempo. For me, this is a great "late into the set" track. Both remixes exemplify Matt's ear for quality. I played both of them (unmixed) over my main sound system last night as a tribute.

*snip* This should not be public.

Greg Brown, Co-Founder of Cake and Writer of 'The Distance,' Passes Away. Pretty much the perfect pop song in my jaded opinion.

Linus Tech Squeaks have announced a new line of USB-C cables. Video is mostly fluff, because Linus. On the plus side, the cables are marked and while not TB certified, some in fact are. Given what I've paid for TB3/TB4 cables, even with shipping these things are a bargain.

Demond Wilson, Last Main Cast Member of ‘Sanford and Son,’ Dies at 79. You big dummy!

"🇬🇧🇬🇧 it has six lenses 🇬🇧"

RIP Sly Dunbar, 1/2 of the greatest rhythm section of all time. Robbie Shakespeare preceded him 4 years ago.

I realize there are "what are you watching?" and "check out this track (Vevo sucks balls)" threads. With that said, now that Stranger Things has finished, and the final season of it parallels the last season of Game of Thrones in terms of quality and popularity, I've started watching. Season 1 isn't bad, but with the 6th sense of hindsight, I can see how the show's writing is ultimately going to be the weakest link. Already season 2 is significantly worse. Where am I going with this? I watched the halloween episode and while I was amused by the inclusion of the Ghostbusters theme, it felt off for me. After a bit I figured out why. A decade ago, Neil Cicierega permanently re-arranged my memories of the 1980s. Also, fun fact: the line "bustin' makes me feel good" is removed at a very key moment in the original Ghostbusters film. It's pretty clear the line was in the original edit and most likely some stuffed suit objected to it.

I have been going down the anamorphic rabbit hole for ages now. The more I learn, the less I know. I have discovered some fascinating bits of trivia along the way. This guy's 🇫🇷 accent is something else, but the camera is spectacular in its insanity. Also, Cool Story Bro: the fence at the 4 minute mark in the video is a rather famous one in Paris. A guy I know on Flickr photographed it in 2006 with an 85L. Note the 1/8000 shutter speed. His 5D classic was crying.

Peter Doig built a sound system using parts from old cinemas and then Brian Eno did a DJ set on it.

The official photographer for the president of Poland has a run-in with Larry the cat.

‘Dilbert’ creator Scott Adams dies at 68. He, uh, made some comic strips in the 90s that resonated with office workers.