Opening the Ark in Raiders? Really?
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"Antiheroine Skin Rule: In a Horny Teen-ager Movie, the 'bad girl' who is the object of the hero's desire will always expose more flesh than the girl whom he ends up with at the end of the film, despite equal sexual activity. If the 'good girl' is shown topless in a love scene, it must be accompanied by slow music. In a Dead Teenager Movie, the girl who exposes the least skin is inevitably the only survivor."
I just discovered the World Passport podcast at ethnomusic.podmatic.com, which has tons of cool Calypso, Kompa, Highlife, jazz, and Kinshasha guitar music for your delectation and delight. I've been listening to "J'Ouvert Morning Calypso"—classic old-school Calypso—all morning, which is coaxing me out of my first-cold-of-the-winter funk. "Suck Me Soucouyant," indeed.
And yes, Stephen, it has lots of classic salsa, too!
The programs, at least in the genres I'm familiar with, seem very carefully constructed. I'm looking forward to hearing the six (!) programs dedicated to Havana son…
Bruce Schneier, coiner of the phrase "security theater," writes that we've "opened up a new front on the war on terror. It's an attack on the unique, the unorthodox, the unexpected; it's a war on different. If you act different, you might find yourself investigated, questioned, and even arrested -- even if you did nothing wrong, and had no intention of doing anything wrong. The problem is a combination of citizen informants and a CYA attitude among police that results in a knee-jerk escalation of reported threats.
"This isn't the way counterterrorism is supposed to work, but it's…
Honest Jons' Son Cubano NYC is a compilation of very hot tracks released by mostly obscure artists during one wonderful decade of music, 1972-1982. It is an outstanding collection, and I hope you'll seek it out. The liner notes alone are worth the price of admission. Before going into harder language and larger claims, the notes begin with quiet strength: "Salsa is the sound of Cuba in exile."
I had no idea there was such a rift between advocates of salsa and others who simply wanted to preserve the traditional sounds of Cuba. Why should a rift even exist? It's not an…