Journal Archive - October, 2007

ok, so it turns out that 'sunshine' was released in the uk and did fairly well there.
it was also released in the u.s, but i don't know anyone who saw it here or even knew about it's release, so it can't have been marketted all that aggressively.
what a shame, cos it really is a remarkable science-fiction movie.
-moby

1-the hive queen and the hegemon are whom?

enders brother and sister in 'enders game', well, their alter-ego's.

2-what is a sand trout?

weird creatures that live on arrakis/dune, paul atreides grandson(?)covers himself
with these creatures and becomes a worm.

3-(here's an easy one...) grok. explain.

yup, stranger in a strange land.

4-will riker's imzadi is whom?

counselor troi.

5-doogie howser played a psy-ops officer in which movie?

starship troopers, the most underrated film of all time, hands down.

6-arthur c. clarke did what in addition to write great books?

yup, geo-synchronous satellite.

7-(another easy one...)the original 'solaris' was directed by which russian director?

tarkovsky.

8-prune juice is a warriors drink. explain.

according to worf.

9-what is a mentat?

an objective assessor in dune

thanks.
i guess i still stand as the biggest nerd.
great.
moby

oops, #8 in my list of david lynch films should've been 'wild at heart'.
i was sleepy when i wrote it.
i love 'lost highway', i didn't love 'wild at heart'.
lots of little blogs lately.
moby

and everyone who loves them.
i've said it before, but whenever i hear about the red sox doing well i think of my great grandmother who lived in cape cod and used to sit by her radio listening to games whenever the sox were playing(she never got around to getting a television).
she would sit by her radio wearing her little red sox hat, even into her late 90's.
assuming that people in heaven can get excited about sports events on earth i assume that she's out dancing on a car roof waving her little red sox hat in the air.
assuming that they have car roofs(and air) in heaven, as well.
oh, to put it in perspective she was alive in 1915 when the sox first won the world series. she talked about it like it was yesterday.
so, congratulations red sox, and congratulations nanee(that's what i called my great-grandmother).
moby

and, as you might know, i'm a sci-fi nerd.
it's true.
the reason that i mention this is that i just watched the movie 'sunshine', and it was fantastic.
forgive my ignorance, but was this movie ever released in the states?
it's one of the best science-fiction movies i've seen in the last 20 years.
am i the only sci-fi nerd on the planet who doesn't know about this movie?
is it maybe being released in the states later this year?
what a fantastic science-fiction movie.
beautifully made, plausible, good science, remarkably well acted, etc(kind of a terrible title, but that's the only bad thing about the movie).
sort of equal parts 'solaris' and '2001'(i know, that might sound like heresy to other sci-fi geeks, but it really is a good movie).
i don't have internet access here over the atlantic ocean, but when i get home i'm going to do some geek sleuthing and figure out if either:
a-it was released and ignored
or
b-it wasn't released.
or
c-it was released and lauded and i'm just the last sci-fi geek on the planet to know about it.
-moby

p.s-oh, here's a handy test i just made up that you can take to see if you, too, are a sci-fi nerd...

1-the hive queen and the hegemon are whom?
2-what is a sand trout?
3-(here's an easy one...) grok. explain.
4-will riker's imzadi is whom?
5-doogie howser played a psy-ops officer in which movie?
6-arthur c. clarke did what in addition to write great books?
7-(another easy one...)the original 'solaris' was directed by which russian director?
8-prune juice is a warriors drink. explain.
9-what is a mentat?

ok, now i've completely shredded the last remaining vestiges of whatever cool credibility i might've ever had. oops.

'mulholland drive', i loved this movie, but i don't know if it's a fully fledged movie, as it started as clips for a tv show. it's still great, but for some reason i don't think of it in the same category as the others.
'straight story'. oops, i always forget that he made this movie. it's very nice.
'grandmother'. is more of a short, i do love it, though.
'dune' is really fun, but for some reason i leave it off of my best of list.
ok, not that anyone was asking, but those are the reasons i left these films off of the list.
thanks
moby

i flew over to dj, and it was really fun.
before dj'ing i went to a david lynch talk at bafta, here in london.
at one point david lynch was asked about whether the twin peaks soundtrack had been a top 10 record and he responded:
'ask moby, he's here'.
sorry if it sounds like i'm self-aggrandizing, but it's not everyday that you get a shout-out from your cinematic hero.
i've always had great love and admiration for david lynch, but 'inland empire' sealed the deal for me.
i wrote about it before, when it was released, but i'll write about it again.
it really is one of the most remarkable movies of the last 20 years.
if you haven't seen it i think that you should.
you might hate it, i don't know.
it's beautiful and powerful, and it has a strong narrative, although it's a very unconventional narrative, or, rather, it's a narrative presented in an unconventional manner.
i think it's the best movie in david lynch's ouvre.
if that's how you spell 'ouvre'.
i went to the david lynch talk tonight thinking that he'd be talking about transcendental meditation, but a retrospective talk about his career was just as good.
although they didn't talk about 'lost highway', which i personally think is david lynch's second best film.
if i had to rate his movies i'd go with:

1-inland empire
2-lost highway
3-the elephant man
4-fire walk with me
5-eraserhead
6-blue velvet
7-dune
8-lost highway

i know, 'lost highway' is my least favorite of his films. it's a good movie, it just didn't speak to me. maybe you love it and it's your favorite.
if so, good.
it just didn't resonate with me at all.
maybe it's because he didn't write it?
i dunno.
but inland empire is one of the most remarkable movies i've ever seen.
and it was really fun dj'ing tonight.
and it's 6 a.m and i'm going to sleep.
g'night.
moby

you might want to turn your speakers down, as it gets really piercing towards the higher register.
maybe it also functions as a hearing test or an online dog-whistle.
moby

http://gizmodo.com//gadgets/parlor-games/

oh, just in case you were curious about the fluoride debate...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/water_fluoridation_controversy

-moby

and years ago i was part of a study at columbia university which examined the role of co2 in panic attack onset.
the study pretty clearly demonstrated that elevated levels of carbon dioxide can trigger panic attacks.
("it has been known for years that small amounts of carbon dioxide provoke a panic reaction."
-university of maastricht)
i'm not a scientist(uh, clearly), but i was thinking recently:
'aren't co2 levels rising globally?'
and it got me to thinking:
'well, if elevated carbon dioxide levels can trigger panic attacks, and carbon dioxide levels are rising globally...well, could elevated global levels of carbon dioxide create an environment wherein people are generally more prone to anxiety and panic?'
again, i'm not a scientist, but it seems like a potentially interesting subject for some smart person(i.e-not me)to investigate.
and it got me to wondering about concentrations of co2.
we talk of global levels of co2, but wouldn't it make sense that co2 levels vary from place to place?
i would guess(perhaps incorrectly)that co2 levels might be higher, say, at a tool booth plaza next to a coal fired power plant than, say, in the woods.
and it made me wonder if people in places with elevated co2 levels might be more prone to anxiety and panic than people in places with less elevated co2 levels.
again(he says for the 3rd time), i'm not a scientist.
but i think this is a potentially interesting subject for investigation.
and fluoride, too(as an aside...).
just google:
fluoride problems
and see what comes up.
i'm still stumped as to why they put fluoride in drinking water.
i can sort of maybe understand the topical application of fluoride on teeth, but why in the world do we constantly ingest it?
(an aside; the unions representing the environmental protection agency have called on congress to ban fluoride in drinking water...i mean, i'm not saying anything, just trying to draw your attention to the fact that a known neuro-toxin(fluoride)is routinely put into our drinking water even though ingesting fluoride has never been shown to prevent tooth decay...again, the topical application of fluoride might perhaps prevent tooth decay. but ingesting it? i mean, does anyone eat suntan lotion to protect against sunburn?).
-moby

oh, i added 3 old songs of mine to my myspace page.
3 old electronic songs from the early 90's.
not necessarily songs that were dance hits in the early 90's, but electronic songs that i played at the weird, sporadic, underground dance events that weirdly and sporadically happened(in an underground manner) in good old nyc in the early 90's.
-moby

my friend archer helped make this for the bronx zoo.
it's great, try it out.

http://www.buildyourwildself.com/

-moby

i mean, what's the point?
the drug market works, ironically, according to free market principles. when suppliers and producers and distributors are disrupted in one area they just move to another area.
that's what happened with colombia and mexico.
for years colombia was the center for narco production and trafficking in the americas, but after the u.s' 'war on drugs' dented colombian drug production and trafficking the drug lords just moved to mexico. shut them down in mexico and they'll move to another country.
the only thing that fighting the war on drugs in south and central and north america accomplishes is driving up prices for drug consumers, and that rarely dampens demand.
and, ironically again, the u.s invasion of afghanistan has been a huge boon to heroin production and consumption worldwide.
the taliban, for all of their faults, actually were quite effective at shutting down opium production in afghanistan. but now with the taliban gone from afghanistan, opium and heroin production have
resumed in full force.
i mean, just imagine you're a farmer in afghanistan. you could grow soybeans and make barely enough money to feed your family. or you could grow poppies and make enough to buy a new car and new farm equipment and new clothes for your children.
kind of an obvious choice for the afghani farmer, no?
it's clear that the 'war on drugs' just isn't working.
the u.s has spent billions and billions of dollars fighting the 'war on drugs', and yet drug production and consumption are higher than they've ever been.
i'm not saying that we should just give up, but clearly the war on drugs isn't working.
maybe the money should be spent educating consumers as to the dangers of drugs?
except, well, looked at honestly and from a statistical perspective, drugs aren't always that dangerous.
i'm not advocating drug use, but most people in the western world have done illegal drugs and have gone on to lead happy and healthy lives.
even our current president used to be a cocaine addict.
maybe someone should finally stand up and say:
'you know what? people seem to really like drinking and taking drugs. maybe as a concerned government we should educate people as to the deleterious ramifications of drug abuse. but maybe we should just accept that people do seem to really enjoy ingesting substances that alter their neurochemistry and allow people to do what they want to do to themselves.'
i don't know, it just seems that from an empirical perspective the war on drugs not only isn't working, but hasn't worked from day one and has just ended up wasting billions of dollars and filling our prisons with people who are only guilty of selling the general public what the general public seems to really like.
-moby

i'm probably the only person on the planet who kind of appreciates spam.
my favorite spams are:
a-the 'please give me your account # so that i can wire money from the bank of lagos, nigeria to you.'

b-the random 'watch sailboat insect monkey bug' spam selling watches or viagra

today i received this:

"fire your boss and grow your member

do be endeavour waking sand"

so that shall be my goal today:
to be waking sand.
maybe this is spam from a taoist website?
or some fans of antonin artaud?
i used to be obsessed with antonin artaud.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/artaud

i mean how can you not admire someone who was rejected by the surrealists for refusing to join the communist party and who believed that he owned a walking stick that had been used by both jesus and the devil?
endeavour waking sand.
i just had this vision of someone standing on a beach yelling 'wake up!' over and over again at the sand.
moby

things are bad in iraq, right?
yes, they're bad.
very very bad, for all involved.
for iraqii's.
and for u.s soldiers.
and now they're going to get tragically worse.
for starters:
turkish forces were attacked by kurdish rebels based in iraq.
so now the turkish military are going to start attacking kurds in northern iraq.
the kurdish part of iraq was the only quasi stable part of iraq.
no longer.
it's such a shame, especially the way that turkey has been treated by the european union and the united states over the last few years.
turkey, like most countries, has a very long and very complicated history.
but turkey is a secular state that has long desired closer contact and involvement with the west.
and the west has, in many ways, pushed it away.
what a shame, a terrible shame.
i was in turkey a few years ago, and it still stands as one of the most beautiful and most wonderful countries i've ever visited.
and i'm not an expert on the plight of the kurds, but i do know that kurdish rebels are killing turkish soldiers, and now the turks are going to attack the kurdish areas of iraq unless the bush administration can figure out some magical way of defusing the situation(with nuanced diplomacy not exactly being a strong suit
of the bush state department).
and the 3 great tragedies are that:
a-iraq will be further destabilized(the current president of iraq is kurdish, for example).
b-more turks will die at the hands of kurdish terrorists.
c-innocent kurds(not all kurds are pkk)will once again be killed and displaced.
the other things that have happened recently in iraq are the blackwater massacre and the battle in sadr city yesterday.
both of these events involved the well-publicized(within iraq)deaths of many, many innocent iraqii's. and now the iraqii's(especially the shi'ites)are furious.
again, it's such a shame, because the u.s military had been making a lot of progress at actually reaching out to regular iraqii's and learning iraqi customs and actually earning the trust of many iraqii's.
but whenever innocents are killed(especially galling when they're killed by private security companies)so much of the military's good work just gets flushed down the toilet.
iraq is such a mess and such a shame.
would that this worthless war had never started.
now things are just going to get worse.
-moby

the gop(aka republicans)debated again tonight.
wait, in other news: hooray red sox.
i know, i'm a new yorker.
i was born within spitting distance of yankee stadium and i'm happy when the yankees or the mets do well.
but i still get excited when the red sox win, especially when they come from behind(as they're wont to do).
so, congratulations to the red sox and to red sox fans.
go sox.
or, phonetically, 'go sawks'.
hopefully it's not too heretical to be a new yorker who also happily supports the red sox.
if so, mea culpa.
when they won the world series in 2004 it was genuinely amazing.
ok, back to politics.
the republican presidential candidates are trying to out-conservative each other.
which begs the question: what the hell does it mean to be a conservative in 2007?
ok, here's how i understand conservativism in 2007:
a-you have to believe that jk rowling is a proponent of witchcraft.
b-you have to believe that dinosaurs pulled plows for farmers in ye olde biblical times(you laugh, but creationists actually believe this).
c-you have to believe that life is sacred when it's in the womb, but that life is cheap if you're a brown person in or out of america.
d-you have to be incapable of finding any country(including the u.s and a)on a map of the world.
e-you have to believe that saddam hussein had weapons of mass destruction and was responsible for 9-11(even if everyone in the bush administration has said that this isn't the case).
f-you have to believe in strict 'constitutionalism' as long as it applies to the right to bear arms, but you have to use the constitution as toilet paper as it applies to having a free press or freedom of assembly or freedom of speech.
g-you have to be pro-life, but pro-war and pro-death penalty.
h-you have to believe that homosexuality is a sin, even though jesus never talked about it.
i-you have to believe that capitalism is a god given right, even though jesus said it was a sin.
j-you have to believe that 'supporting the troops' means keeping them in the middle of a pointless war, and that to actually support the troops and work to bring them home is un-patriotic and cowardly.
k-you have to believe that leaders like gw bush and dick cheney are patriots even though they never served in combat, but leaders like john kerry and max cleland are cowards even though they were both wounded in active duty while serving in vietnam.
l-you have to believe that that people who take illegal drugs are terrible criminals, but rush limbaugh is a patriot even though he was arrested for taking illegal drugs.
m-you have to believe that the ultimate expression of patriotism is subsidizing oil companies who mainly do business with states that sponsor terrorism.
n-you have to believe that it's better to throw an embryo into the garbage than to use it to further medical research that could help millions of people.
o-you have to believe that even though osama bin laden is a saudi and that the majority of the terrorists who attacked america on 9-11 are saudi's, that the saudi's are our friends and allies(cos, well, the saudi's have long standing personal and business ties with the bush and cheney families, and bush and cheney couldn't have ties with terrorists, could they?).
p-you have to believe that subsidizing tobacco companies is ok, but taxing tobacco companies to pay for a childrens health bill is wrong.

how am i doing so far?
am i missing anything?
see, no wonder the gop presidential candidates are confused. they're all bright people, and they know that the contemporary conservative agenda is, well, insane.
ok, maybe it's not insane. maybe the right wing agenda is just the product of crippling ignorance and fear and provincialism.
in any case the right wing agenda is absurd, and i feel genuinely sorry for intelligent gop leaders who have to profess a belief in dinosaurs pulling plows for biblical farmers and life only being sacred in the womb.
ok, in summation:
congratulations red sox.
and the right wing republican agenda is pure, ignorant, fear-based lunacy.
thanks,
-moby

oh beautiful, for spacious skies...
another proud moment for all americans(or maybe just the fox news viewers in south carolina...).
-moby

p.s-i really do love the "randomly and arbitrarily toss a bunch of words in a pile and hope that they somehow form a coherent statement" approach to public speaking.

as some of you might know, i've been dj'ing a lot lately.
and i love it.
so, in the spirit of listening to electronic music at 5 a.m, i've put 3 old tracks of mine up on myspace.
these are 3 songs that i used to play in the early 90's when i dj'ed at small, underground parties in nyc(usually organized by carlos slinger, who i think is in brazil now).
they were also tracks that made particular sense at nasa at 5 a.m in 1993, 'protect write', in particular.
-moby

a-i see the spinning lady spinning clockwise. i try to see counter-clockwise but i can't. even if i take off my glasses and squint and shut one eye. she's always spinning clockwise for me.

b-disco party was really fun. and i looked excellent, i must say, in a powder blue polyester 3 piece suit. ah, disco.

c-more tea pedantry: all tea comes from the same plant. it's true. white tea, green tea, black tea, pu-errh, oolong, kukicha, etc.
the plant is camelia sinensis.
the differences come from:
1-when the tea is picked
2-how it's treated after picking(mainly to do with fermentation)
3-where it's grown

certain 'teas' aren't actually teas, like herbal 'teas'. you could just as easily call them herbal 'coffees'.
they are infusions.
and teas like earl grey have their distinct flavor from added flavors(earl grey coming from bergamot oil).
this is the sort of trivia you pick up when you own a tea company.
my favorite teas are silver needle(a barely processed white tea)and japanese matcha.
i also like gyokoru.
and if i'm hungover in an airport i really love good, cheap, black lipton.
ok, tea pedantry done for the day.
or maybe not. some people make a huge deal about water temperature(boiling for black tea, not quite boiling for white tea, etc)and the process(rinse tea pot with 205 degree water before adding leaves, let leaves sit in steamy tea pot before adding more 205 degree water, dispose of first steeping, etc). but you don't need to go crazy with the process, etc, unless it makes you happy.
ok, now i've really overindulged the tea pedantry.
'pedantry' is a good word.
instead of 'landed gentry' we could be the 'landed pedantry'.

d-we're putting out a vinyl single of 2 rave tracks from my next record. i think we're only going to make 1,000 or so copies. i'll let you know how to get this vinyl when it's released, in case you'd like a copy.
the songs are 'everyday it's 1989' and 'the stars'.
happy piano-driven rave tracks. yee-haw. i love piano-driven rave tracks.

have a good weekend.
moby

http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,22556281-661,00.html

moby