You know you’ve been studying engineering law too much when …

… you think that you’d want to start a band called The Tortfeasors, with stage names derived from precedents: Hedley Byrne, Rivtow Marine, Junior Books, Donoghue Stevenson, Lambert V. Lastoplex

Then you realise that would be a bad idea. On every level. Not least that I wouldn’t know what to do in (or with) a band.

I’m resitting the legal part of my PPE for the PEO next Saturday. Was somewhat taken aback when I heard I’d failed it first time, but now studying again, and seeing my notes and sample answers from last time — what, if anything, was I thinking?

I’m still waiting

One of the side effects of Catherine’s Library Quest is that she digs through the sale books. She’s found a library getting rid of National Geographics for 25¢. September 1969’s issue, published when I was less than a season old, has a great and hilariously dated article The Coming Revolution in Transportation. It’s all hovercraft and personal transport pods (though none less than the Federal Highways Administration’s The Rambler cautions don’t blame the future when we read this article).

My favourite prognosis from the article is this one, on electric cars:

Electric cars should be common within a decade. They will be “pure” electrics, if batteries become lighter, more powerful, and longer lasting; otherwise, “dual-mode” vehicles—battery-powered in town but propelled by gasoline engines on cross-country trips.

It took just a little longer than this, and it sure wasn’t GM who brought the first ones to market, despite this picture of a hybrid Opel from 1969:

Hybrid Opel car from 1969 - National Geographic

low

I played some tunes tuned down to eBEG♯B. I like it; extreme plunky tones.

indigo’s most overpriced yet

I saw the most obscene markup in indigo this evening: the Linux Format OpenOffice.org special edition was priced at a hefty $34.95. This costs £10 in the UK.

The thing is, UK prices are quoted tax-inclusive. The ten quid you see is the ten quid you pay. Not so in Canada. In the most boneheaded move ever, our prices don’t include tax, so that $34.95 really costs you $39.84 (in Ontario, at least).

According to Google, £10 is $20.53. Indigo’s markup is almost 100%

skiffle is fun

I’m listening to “Skiffle – The Best Of”, and it’s interesting to see what pre-rock British artists did with folk, gospel and trad jazz tunes on the cusp of the 1960s.

It clearly came out of the Trad boom (to which my father is still very much attached) – not just because folks like Barber and Colyer played both styles – but there are weird echoes of rockabilly. In a way, it was a short-lived answer to the US “folk scare” of the time.

Some of it’s quite quaint and dated now. The faux American accents, untrained by constant US TV exposure are hilarious, hovering somewhere between New Orleans and Brooklyn. Lonnie Donegan’s is especially funny – “this man, he was thoisty” he sings in “Being Me A Little Water, Sylvie”.

2007 contenders

I’m going to play the blogger’s best of the year game differently this year, but I need to keep the rules roughly the same so that I am (for once) on the same planet. I’m going to choose ten best albums, but they’re what I discovered in 2007, not just those released in 2007.

So these are my contenders:

  • A Hawk And A Hacksaw And The Hun Hangár Ensemble — A Hawk And A Hacksaw And The Hun Hangár Ensemble
  • Air — Pocket Symphony
  • Akron/Family — Love Is Simple
  • Akron/Family — Meek Warrior (2006)
  • Animal Collective — Strawberry Jam
  • Architecture In Helsinki — Places Like This
  • Avey Tare & Kría Brekkan — Pullhair Rubeye
  • Bees — Octopus
  • Beirut — The Flying Club Cup
  • Black Lips — Good Bad Not Evil
  • Bonnie Russell and the Russell Family — Mountain Dulcimer Galax Style (1995)
  • Bright Eyes — Cassadaga
  • Caribou — Andorra
  • Cathy Fink — Banjo Talkin’
  • Colleen — The Golden Morning Breaks (2005)
  • Dan Jones and The Squids — Totally Human
  • Devendra Banhart — Smokey Rolls Down Thunder Canyon
  • Dock Boggs — His Folkways Years (1963-1968) (1998)
  • Donovan — Barabajagal (1969)
  • Donovan — Hurdy Gurdy Man (1968)
  • Donovan — Mellow Yellow (1967)
  • Donovan — Sunshine Superman (1966)
  • Enoch Kent — I’m a Rover (2006)
  • Erynn Marshall & Chris Coole — Meet Me In The Music
  • Feist — The Reminder
  • Fountains of Wayne — Traffic and Weather
  • Fred Spek’s Camp Combo — Rock Paper Scissors (2006)
  • Grinderman — Grinderman
  • Hamish Imlach — Cod Liver Oil & Orange Juice (2006)
  • Howe Gelb — ‘Sno Angel Like You (2006)
  • Ideal Free Distribution — Ideal Free Distribution
  • Jeffrey Frederick & the Clamtones — The Resurrection of Spiders in the Moonlight
  • Jesse Sykes & The Sweet Hereafter — Like Love, Lust, & The Open Halls of the Soul
  • Joanna Newsom — Joanna Newsom and the Ys Street Band EP
  • John Fahey — The Best Of John Fahey Vol. 2 1964-1983 (2004)
  • Johnny Cash — American I & II
  • Judee Sill — Judee Sill (2006)
  • Ken Reaume — Four Horses
  • Kevin Drew — Spirit If…
  • Kilby Snow — Kilby Snow: Country Songs and Tunes with Autoharp
  • Kimberley Rew — Ridgeway (2006)
  • Marissa Nadler — Songs III: Bird On The Water
  • Michael Hurley — First Songs (1964)
  • Mimi & Richard Fariña — Vanguard Visionaries – Mimi & Richard Fariña
  • Monica Grabin — Continental Village
  • Neil Young — Harvest (1972)
  • Of Montreal — Hissing Fauna, Are You The Destroyer?
  • Okkervil River — The Stage Names
  • Old Man Luedecke — Hinterland (2006)
  • Otha Turner — Everybody Hollerin’ Goat (1998)
  • Panda Bear — Person Pitch
  • Po’ Girl — Home to You
  • Porter Wagoner — Wagonmaster
  • Radiohead — In Rainbows
  • Ragged But Right — Down Harmony Road
  • Robert Force & Albert d’Ossché — Tiger Dreams
  • Sons of the Never Wrong — Nuthatch Suite (2005)
  • Stew — Guest Host (2000)
  • The Aliens — Astronomy For Dogs
  • The Apples in Stereo — New Magnetic Wonder
  • The Arcade Fire — Neon Bible
  • The Besnard Lakes — The Besnard Lakes Are The Dark Horse
  • The Carter Family — The Carter Family 1927-1934 (2001)
  • The Foggy Hogtown Boys — Pigtown Fling
  • The Harvey Girls — The Wild Farewell (2005)
  • The High Water Marks — Polar
  • The Houseplants — Livingroom
  • The Hylozoists — La Fin du Monde (2006)
  • The Icicles — Arrivals & Departures
  • The Ladybug Transistor — Can’t Wait Another Day
  • The Negro Problem — Post Minstrel Syndrome (2002)
  • The Polyphonic Spree — The Fragile Army
  • The Soft Machine — The Soft Machine (1968)
  • The Unicorns — Who Will Cut Our Hair When We’re Gone? (2003)
  • They Might Be Giants — The Else
  • Tiger Lillies (with Kronos Quartet) — The Gorey End (2003)
  • Uncle Dave Macon — Classic Sides
  • Various Artists — Skiffle – The Best Of (2006)
  • Various Artists — The Old Time Banjo Festival
  • Vashti Bunyan — Some Things Just Stick in Your Mind
  • Wendy Arrowsmith — Now Then…?
  • Wilco — Sky Blue Sky
  • Willie Nelson — Red Headed Stranger (1975)

(Before you freak out at the number of CDs I bought, I do subscribe to emusic, so a bunch of these were MP3 only.)

go ripley!

I drove past Ripley Wind Farm today. Looks like most of the turbines are energised (they were yawed into the wind) and one was running.

Chevrolet Tahoe Hybrid – 2008 Green Car of the Year … in parsley!

I don’t believe this … Green Car .com has named the Chevrolet Tahoe Hybrid 2008 Green Car of the Year [archive link]. This gargantuan obesemobile has a 6 litre engine which gets a dismal 21 mpg (about 11 l/100 km in real money). But it’s okay, because it’s a hybrid! Well, bravo Chevrolet! Your greed and stupidity is killing us all.

perfect Harmony

Got the Harmony back from Bruce Dowd last night – wow! The work he did on it was amazing, and the price very reasonable. The sound is beautiful – plunky and warm – and the Aquila nylon strings are stiff enough to make it easy to play.

I had difficulty keeping Nichol away from it last night. Looks like he’s got the nylon-strung bug too.