Attack of the drunken birds/Kepler mission launch
March 2, 2009
This past Friday I was alerted to the presence of 6 dead birds outside the Starbucks that’s located in the lobby of the building in which I work at Vanderbilt- the Student Life Center. Low and behold, there were indeed 6 dead birds of the same species lying outside the window. I’m used to finding one or two dead birds every now and then… obviously victims of a recent cleaning of the large pane windows along one of our hallways. But SIX at once? I just dismissed it as a strange coincidence and that they were just flying in a tight flock at night. But this morning I noticed a story link on Nashvillest about drunken Cedar Waxwings causing minor chaos in Memphis, and I had a slight “eureka!” moment. These Memphian birds had ingested fermented holly berries and were literally drunk from the alcohol in the pulp. The berries were fermented because of the recent roller-coaster temperatures; the warm snap caused the berries to begin to bud, then the cold snap froze the individual cells which causes them to rupture, allowing yeast to ferment the sugars in the pulp, resulting in alcoholic berries. I looked up photos of Cedar Waxwings, and sure enough the birds outside my building were all Cedar Waxwings. After a quick call to Nashville Metro Public Health, my suspicions were confirmed, and I conclude that we did indeed have a case of drunken birds in Nashville. Kind of funny in a sick, twisted way…
Copyright Steve Cross
Check out the Nashville Cream/Spin review of the super-secret Features/Lambchop/Cortney Tidwell house show last friday. Sorry I couldn’t post anything about it, it was a very secret show intended mainly for the attendees of the Alliance of Independent Media Stores (which apparently has no website) conference that was being hosted by Grimey’s last week. You can see the awesomeness vicariously through me via my pics in the slideshow.
As you may remember, last week NASA’s Orbiting Carbon Observatory failed to reach orbit after a launch malfunction, dooming it to crash into the ocean somewhere near Antarctica. Well, (thankfully) NASA is being extra careful and taking another day to inspect the Delta V rocket that is scheduled to carry the Kepler Observatory into orbit this friday. Thank GOD! The LAST thing we need is for the expensive and extremely important Kepler mission to fail. As I’ve reported before, the Kepler mission is VERY VERY likely to discover an earth-twin orbiting another star, hopefully in the next 3 or so years. Its goal is to stare at a large swath of sky with its incredibly sensitive instruments and look for the miniscule dimming caused by a planet crossing in front of one of those stars it’s looking at. This mission is IMPERATIVE to the search for an earth-like exoplanet, and eventually the discovery of extraterrestrial life. Losing it would be DEVASTATING. I applaud NASA for taking extra precautions to make sure the Kepler mission does not see the same fate of the OCO. Check my friday post for an update on the status of the launch. Happy Monday!
Copyright Vanderbilt University
The initial shortlist of artists playing at this year’s Rites of Spring festival at Vanderbilt has been released. The Flaming Lips will likely be headlining friday night, with another yet-to-be-announced headliner that will likely play saturday night. The friday/saturday thing is purely an educated guess on my part. Also announced: Okkervil River, N.E.R.D., Santigold (formerly Santogold), Q-tip, Black Joe Lewis & the Honeybears, and Grand Ole Party. Personally, aside from Flaming Lips, I’m looking forward most to Santigold and Okkervil River. Source: the Vanderbilt Hustler.
MGMT is apparently suing French President Nicolas Sarkozy because his campaign did not compensate them properly for usage of their song “Kids” as the Sarkozy campaign soundtrack.
Remember those literal music videos of “Head Over Heels” and “Take On Me?” Well they’re at it again, this time with Billy Idol’s “White Wedding.” I must say, it’s really hard to top “Take On Me.” I don’t think it’ll ever be done. It’s one of those things where the humor just is never the same after the first time.
The Explorer’s Club did a session on Daytrotter. These live takes are pretty good, but I must say that these songs need the polished production that’s present on their full-length album. It’s evident that some of the vocal harmony arrangements are VERY difficult and they guys hit some odd notes on these live recordings. But the fact that they’re even able to pull off any of those harmonies is utterly amazing, and these guys deserve major kudos for even being in the ballpark. I highly reccomend seeing this band live because they are a lot of fun, and you will thoroughly enjoy it.
In the science world, some good news for NASA comes from Obama’s first budget propsal which was released yesterday. Overall, NASA will (hopefully) see a $2 billion increase in funding in 2010. I’m quite pleased to see this, even in these tough times. Cutting-edge science and research is one area that should be way down on the list of things to get cut when facing tough economic times. Don’t get too excited though; this is not the final version. It was also evident that Obama plans to go ahead with the retirement of the Space Shuttle next year, and continue with Bush’s vision of returning to the Moon by 2020. (The only thing on which I actually agreed with Bush.) Source: Universe Today.
Beatles mystery chord/No Doubt reunites for tour/Name that node
February 26, 2009
Well, they never really broke up officially, but No Doubt will be “reuniting” for a tour this summer. It’s a big one, too, with none other than TN’s own Paramore, kicking off at NJ’s Bamboozle Festival. Via Stereogum.
Jensen Sportag got mentioned on Pitchfork yesterday via a Max Tundra remix of the track “Cocktease” that they posted. Go get it now. Pretty awesome that Nashville’s electronic scene is getting such national attention. And here’s another treat for your hard drive via Nashville Cream:
Jensen Sportag-Jackie
The Fucking Weather. Simplicity is amazing. Via Yewknee.
Have you noticed that new skyscraper going up in downtown Nashville and wondered what it’s for, who’s occupying it, etc?? I thought so. Here’s an article from NewsChannel 5 that will answer all your questions about it.
The opening chord to the Beatles’ Hard Day’s Night has been somewhat of a mystery to musicians for 40 years. No one could quite figure out just what was being played…. until last October, when mathematician Jason Brown gave a whole new meaning to the phrase “math rock” by using a calculation called the Fourier transform to breakdown and analyze each tone present in the recording. Through this process Mr. Brown deduces that there’s a piano chord present, along with Harrison’s 12-string guitar, Lennon’s 6-string, and McCartney’s bass. This part was probably played by producer George Martin. Via Daily Galaxy.
After several delays, NASA has finally targeted March 12th as the launch date for the Space Shuttle Discovery on a mission to continue construction on the International Space Station. Let’s hope they keep this one.
NASA is also holding an online poll to determine what the official name of the next US-built space station node should be. Right now “Serenity” is winning by a landslide. I’m inclined to agree with the majority vote.
Crazy street art/Tinted Windows/Comet Lulin details
February 25, 2009
Don't Jump!
While I’ve seen several images/web posts about this type of perspective-based street art before, this one is the biggest scale I’ve seen thus far. Edgar Muller lives and works in Germany, and even with several helpers, his projects take several days to complete. This one is called “Ice Age.” This type of art is all based on viewing from one very specific vantage point, creating an amazing 3D optical illusion. I’ve never seen one of these in real life before, but I’d like to. You’d think an artist this talented/successful would be able to afford a decent website design though…. ugh.
One of the few “new” bands that I’m really digging lately is the Morning Benders. They recently did a Daytrotter Session and the results are pretty cool. They did a spaced-out version of one of my favs Doctor, Doctor. If you’re into them, go grab the mp3’s for sure.
Remember when I posted about the new supergroup Tinted Windows comprised of James Iha, Taylor Hansen, Bun E. Carlos, and Adam Schlesinger? Well, they have an album coming out April 21st, and Billboard has the track “Kind of a Girl” posted for streaming. It’s pretty much exactly what you would expect from that lineup. But it sounds very generic and well… just listen for yourself. They’re also playing a showcase at SXSW this year.
Though it’s been in the news for several weeks now, I’ve not posting anything regarding the possible merger of Live Nation and Ticketmaster, which would result in virtual monopoly in the concert promotion and ticket business. I decided to change that today. Brooklynvegan posted a story about a hearing held yesterday on Capitol Hill regarding the merger. Thankfully it seems as though authorities are going to put this merger under a microscope. I don’t know that much about antitrust laws, but I can’t see how this merger would not be in violation of them. I mean, Ticketmaster is already enormous, and so is Live Nation in the promotion world… if this happens, concert go-ers are screwed because this one company will have the power to price-gouge all they want.
Now for some science-
Sky and Telescope posted a great guide to viewing newly discovered Comet Lulin. This week is the best for viewing, and even in light-polluted areas such as here in Nashville, you should be able to see it with a good pair of binoculars. You have to know exactly where to look, though. Check out the article for the deets and a good diagram. Via Universe Today.
Texas meteorites found/Scene gets more Pavement links
February 24, 2009
Quick update on the near-Pavement-reunion last weekend: The Scene’s blog got even more national press- including Rolling Stone’s blog and Stereogum. Wooo!
Apparently Tropicana Pure Premium Orange Juice, which is owned by PepsiCo, is reverting to its old carton design. The new design unveiled in January resulted in a lot of emails and letters from consumers who didn’t like the new look. Thus, they decided to appease the disgruntled customers and go back to the classic design. I personally liked the new typeface, but I agree that the straw-in-orange image was classic, and central to their message of pure, unaltered juice, straight from the fruit. I say return the straw-orange image, but keep the new typeface… but that’s just me. Via NY Times.
Credit: Rod Aydelotte/Waco Tribune-Herald
The first fragments of the Texas fireball from last sunday have been found, proving to the doubters that it indeed was NOT fragments from the satellite collision. They’re hoping to find much larger fragments in the near future. The Arizona group of meteorite hunters estimate that the original meteor was about the size of a refrigerator or even a little bigger. It would have to be that big to be seen in the daytime and cause a sonic boom. Very cool!
The whole field of environmental science and protection took a major blow early this morning when NASA’s new Orbiting Carbon Observatory crashed into the ocean near Antarctica. A shield intended to protect the 972-pound spacecraft failed to disengage about 3 minutes after lauch, and caused the overall assembly to fall short of orbit and crash back to earth. This satellite was intended to study CO2 levels in the atmosphere and better understand its natrual cycles. Sad, indeed.
Weekend shows/models take a tumble
February 20, 2009
This image links to a Huffington Post article about not one, but two model mishaps during Herve Ledger by Max Azria’s Fall 2009 fashion show in NYC’s Bryant Park on Sunday. It has a slideshow with several images from Getty capturing each moment of the falls. Some images slightly NSFW.
What to do this weekend?
Tonight- Cage the Elephant/Autovaughn @ Mercy Lounge… meh.
Saturday- THE ONLY THING HAPPENING IS MY BAND TIGERS CON QUESO WITH WE WERE THE STATES, BETTY RATS, AND COUNTRY DEATH @ SPRINGWATER. COME.
Sunday- Those Darlins @ the Basement
Sci-Fi geek-out alert: Stargate Universe is officially in the pre-production stage. Most of the cast is nailed down, the biggest name arguably being Robert Carlyle. More at my new favorite geek blog, iO9.
Why is science important? There’s a website dedicated to having people explain it in their own way. I like to put it simply, science IS EVERYTHING.
Last night at band practice our bass player/beard contributor Josh told me about this ridiculous ska song called “Jesus is my friend.” Today he sent me the video. I had to post it. WTF?
Foxes… dinosaurs… robots.
February 19, 2009
Science first today. Then we’ll get to the funny stuff.
In some really depressing news, the Space Shuttle Mission to repair the Hubble Space Telescope one last time may be in serious jeopardy. That satellite collision last week, which you’ve undoubtedly heard about by now, was in the same general orbit level of Hubble, and the debris from the collision significantly increases the likelihood of a debris strike during the servicing mission to unacceptable odds. NASA estimates that the chance for a debris impact will be about 1 in 185, which is over their threshold of 1 in 200. Even a tiny piece of metal the size of a pea or even smaller could do serious damage to an astronaut’s space suit during a spacewalk, and since there were 5 spacewalks planned to service Hubble, well… you can see where this is going. The good news is, they’re pretty sure the International Space Station is not at much risk for impact from the debris, because its orbit is much lower than that of satellites. It’s just beyond the outer edges of earth’s atmosphere, which means there are just enough air molecules floating around to put a slight drag on any space junk at that orbit level, thus said space junk burns up relatively faster than junk at higher orbits. Thus, low earth orbit stays comparatively clear of debris.
Space.com reports on how the discovery of alien life could impact society. According to the article, a panel of scientists sponsored by the SETI Institute and the NASA Astrobiology Institute recently met over 3 days to discuss this and come up with a basic outline of what impacts they thought such discovery could have on human society.
Very good news for Hummer-haters (myself included!): The Tennessean reports that GM has announced that it will discontinue or sell the Hummer brand by March 31st. Let’s hope it’s the former, not the latter. In my opinion, there is no greater symbol of the wasteful and inefficient extravangance that helped get us into this economic shitstorm than the Hummer. Good riddance!
Remember my post about the movie Coraline from a week or two ago? At the time I was unclear as to the extent of They Might Be Giants’ contribution to the soundtrack. Well, turns out that 28-second jingle that plays through one of the TV trailers is it. Stereogum reports that they did some other material for the movie that got canned, because in the end it turned out not to be “dark” enough.
Dinosaurs fucking robots. Via iO9.
Foxes jumping on a trampoline. Via Yewknee.
Need I say anything else?
Breakfast cereal club/Texas has balls of fire…
February 16, 2009
Via Ironic Sans. Click the image to go directly to the post.
The official SXSW music schedule has been released. It’s pretty user-friendly, as you can sort by day or by alphabetical listing. As with any festival, it’s gonna be a game of saying, “ok, who do I really care the most about seeing?”
Two great links from Kottke.org, as always:
I’m officially going to attempt having people over to watch LOST and play the official LOST drinking game. Please, if you watch the show, go read this. And then do it on wednesday. Preferably at my apt. My favorite: take a drink whenever “The island jungle scenes look as if they were shot in someone’s backyard, or the oversize potted plant section of an Office Max.”
Some really cool chemistry experiment videos. HORRIBLE WEB DESIGN ALERT! Warning- this website looks like something straight out of 1997. But the videos are pretty cool nonetheless.
I saw a story on CNN.com yesterday about a fireball and corresponding sonic boom heard/seen over Texas sunday morning. While the story doesn’t say specifically that the fireball was falling debris from the satellite collision last week, it does seem to hint at it. But the Bad Astronomer doesn’t think so, mainly becuase the debris appeared to be moving too quickly. It’s more likely that it was indeed a large meteor that just happened to hit the atmosphere a few days after the satellite collision. But as you can see in the BA post, nothing is for certain just yet. It’ll be interesting to see what comes of this…
Finally, an interesting clip on the Daily Galaxy from an interview with astronomer Neil Degrasse Tyson on why the world will not end in 2012. I would embed the video here, but as far as I can tell, you can only embed YouTube and Google videos on WordPress blogs. Grr.
V-day/Exploding eggs
February 13, 2009
This is the cover art for the new Yeah Yeah Yeah’s album, It’s Blitz! which is coming out sometime in April. I think this is pure genius. This has to be one of the best album covers I’ve seen in a long time. I don’t normally get REALLY excited about cover art, but this is AWESOME. (And not just because it’s a photograph and I’m a photographer.) I’ve never been good at explaining in words why I really like or dislike anything…. but YES. Click the image to see a larger version on the Stereogum post about it.
Your daily dose of WTF?!?… Two German gay men who worked in a metal factory decided it would be fun for one of them to poke an unloaded air rifle up the other one’s ass and pull the trigger. The result? His intestines exploded. Via Vice Magazine.
I’m officially ashamed of my state after hearing that FOUR state representatives from TN have agreed to be plaintiffs in a future lawsuit by a California man who is challenging Obama’s citizenship. Come on, people. We understand, you’re pissed off that you lost the election AND lost majorities in the Congress and Senate, but for fuck’s sake this is PATHETIC.
Scientists have mapped 60% of the Neanderthal genome, which will hopefully lead to a better understanding of the common ancestor of them and us moden humans, and why Neanderthals died out about 28,000 years ago. Via Clusterflock.
Speaking of DNA, scientists have also mapped DNA of the common cold (aka the human rhinovirus). This could finally lead to medications that treat the actual cause of the cold rather than just the symptoms. But it’ll still be a while, because there are 99 known strains of the virus, and if a person is infected with 2 strains at once, parts of the virus’ genetic code can get swapped out, resulting a new strain. So there are potentially HUNDREDS of different versions of this thing floating around out there.
I rarely post on weekends, so here’s an early treat for you from XKCD- a Sierpinski Valentine.
Trace Cyrus/the new stevecrossphotography.com
February 12, 2009
Totally tatts!
Like, TOTES OMG!
I think Hipster Runoff is my favorite new thing. I’ve linked to them a lot lately but it’s really worth it. Today they make fun of people obsessed with myspace, or “myspacers.” And who do they choose to pick on? None other than TRACE CYRUS. Let me explain why this is exceptionally hilarious for me. While in college I had a great friend named Blake Healy. We even lived together for a year. After graduation in the spring of 04, he moved to LA. A couple of years later, he joined this new band called Metro Station with, you guessed it, Trace Cyrus (and his friend Mason Musso). Now they’re getting pretty big. So yes, this is exceptionally funny because one of my best friends is in this guy’s band. They are becoming quite the synthpop tweenage sensation, and Trace is totally playing into that crowd with emo hair, tatoos, and being a “myspacer,” so I can’t really blame them. They know how to make make a lot of money and have fun and get famous while doing it. Wouldn’t we all love to be able to do that? Maybe not the famous part, but the money+fun.. hell yes!
More from the music world:
Ryan Adams is engaged to Mandy Moore. I didn’t even know they were dating. Shows you how much I care about Ryan Adams.
So we all know Conan is heading to LA to take over Jay Leno’s place on the Tonight Show. Pitchfork reports that he’s tapped his red & white buddies The White Stripes to play on his last edition of Late Night. Check the article, as they have a lot of good links to old WS performances on Conan.
I’m proud to announce the launch of my new photography website! The extremely talented Michael Eades (aka Yewknee) put it together for me. He also posted a blurb about it on his blog so make sure to head over and check that out, in addition to my website! www.stevecrossphotography.com
From the department of WTF?!? in the science world, apparently a breed of cattle exists in Belgium which has a mutation of the gene associated with Myostatin, a protein that limits muscle growth in some mammals, resulting in this:
Researchers are attempting to use this protein to treat muscular dystrophy. Via Kottke.org.
A U.S. communications satellite collided with a dead Russian military satellite yesterday, creating a huge debris field, further cluttering up the already dangerously crowded low-earth orbit sector of space. Scientists say that it shouldn’t pose a major threat to the International Space Station, and that the ISS can always execute evasive maneuvers to avoid a deadly impact. The military has sophisticated radar techniques that can track almost every little piece of space junk, so if the ISS or Space Shuttle is on a collision course with an object, they can let them know and the ship can avoid the object. You wouldn’t think tiny pieces of junk floating around would pose a major threat, but you have to remember that in order to be in orbit, that piece of debris has to be traveling at around 17,000 mph. That’s many, many times the speed of sound, and when even a piece of dust hits you at those speeds, it can cause serious damage. Thanks to Matt Sullivan for the tip.
steve cross loves music and science 