#music nerdery

[rionsanura]

tumblr likes tam lin, right? my friend elliot wrote a whole half-hour show of it

[plainxte]

Okay I do get the um, creative approach to history that OFMD does but a too-modern violin bow? Really? 😩

Ah, well. Yes I realise my priorities are off, thank you

[iggy-licious]

I got the Important Blue Checkmarks™ for this blog, to give a little monetary love to Tumblr, 💙 and also because it seems like something that would make Iggy laugh.

[therealgchu]

what happens if they're pentatonic chemicals? they'd be really minor.

[davidtennantpussytulpa]

people who say starkid is a good entry point for people getting into musicals i feel like youre insane. like just bc its parodies of popular stuff still doesnt mean people will find it appealing

[entomophagouserisian]

Incoming: some weeb shit I've folded one of my favorite math things into (permutations)

So I recently went back to Revolutionary Girl Utena because my girlfriend hadn't seen any of it yet and I hadn't seen much beyond season 1 (I know it's a foundational work of sword lesbianism and regret not having gone harder on it before).

I was kind of laughing with her about how edgy the translated lyrics of Zettai Unmei Mokushiroku (Absolute Destiny: Apocalypse, the song that plays during the scene where Utena climbs up to the arena every episode) and I noticed that there wasn't a translation for a chant at the end of it that hits my ear in a very pleasing way.

The chant in question:

Mokushi Kushimo

Shimoku Kumoshi

Moshiku Shikumo

The reason there is no translation is that it's mostly gibberish. They took the word "Mokushi" (Apocalypse) and rearranged the syllables in all possible ways to create this particular piece of poetry. The repetition of syllables in this way ends up feeling really good to my brain when I hear it and I have therefore been alternating between trying to memorize it and analyzing its structure for the past few days.

Unfortunately in order to present my process for this analysis I'm going to have to teach you some basics of the mathematical conception of permutations.

(The following aside into math is actually wholly unnecessary to my overall analysis, so feel free to skip to the clearly marked conclusion at the end if it feels like too much or you just don't feel like engaging with it)

A permutation is any reordering of a set of objects. Note that it's just reordering, it doesn't include deletions or the introduction of new elements or new copies of old elements. Commonly if we want to analyze permutations directly, and more specifically to talk about the permutation where the first object goes to 2nd position, second object to 3rd, third object to 1st, we use (123) (read as 1 goes to 2, 2 goes to 3, 3 goes to 1). As well, if the 3rd object stays put and the first two swap places, we would use (12) (read as 1 goes to 2, 2 goes to 1) to describe that. If no change is made, we usually just use (1) (read as one goes to one or the identity) to describe that. (This is very much lacking the rigor and generality that I would've preferred, but this post would've been substantially longer if I'd gone into that much detail, so I'm kind of hoping someone can come in with just this much explanation and understand what comes after)

So my first step in my analysis was to try to record how each of the "words" related to the base/actual word Mokushi (this is admittedly where it would be quite useful for me to change over to hiragana, but I don't know it and don't have a keyboard downloaded for it and don't feel like downloading one just for this post or copy/pasting the hiragana repeatedly, sorry to those of you who study/enjoy Japanese)

So, rewriting the chant as the permutations applied to Mo-Ku-Shi (written this way to emphasize the 3 objects being permuted):

(1) (132)

(123) (12)

(23) (13)

It was fun but didn't get me anywhere (other than verifying every possible ordering was present, but I was already pretty certain of that) so I instead chose to look at what permutation is happening at each step in the sequence rather than just how they compared to the original:

* (132)

(132) (13)

(132) (132)

Here, we see a much more obvious pattern. For all but one transformation, we are permuting by taking the first syllable and pushing to the end, moving the other two toward the beginning of the "word". To hear it, it is very easy to recognize the 2-syllable repeats happening throughout that first pulled my attention. However, this one permutation couldn't be done exclusively if they wanted to cover all possible permutations, as applying (132) 3 times brings you back to the original word, so the third Permutation is instead (13) which just reverses the syllables in this case since there's only 3 of them, but this also notably changes them to a "word" not yet seen which can bring us to the two we are still missing by applying (132) two more times.

It was after all of this that I properly noted that that middle step reversed the previous "word" and I mentally zoomed out to notice

~~~~Conclusion~~~~

the chant is set up to mirror itself. The pairs 1&6, 2&5, and 3&4 are all the reverse of one another, ordered such that for all but one pair heard in sequence, there is a 2-syllable repetition when moving from one word to the next. (Yes it took me this long to notice it was mirrored. No all that permutation work was definitely not necessary, but forgive a [likely autistic] math nerd for her indulgences.)

It's just a silly chant in a cartoon but it made me happy to see permutations in it and I am sincerely moved by the poetry of making gibberish out of a dark and serious word like apocalypse by listing off anagrams.

[bookgeekgrrl]

the slowest-climbing chart-topper ever

the oldest living person to score a No. 1 song in America

the longest gap between career chart-toppers

the Hot 100’s first-ever septuagenarian chart-topper, but with a song she recorded at age 13

[clatterbane]

10 Songs On Repeat

Tagged by @fivekoboldsinacoat. Put the Spotify "on repeat" playlist on shuffle and share the first ten results, then tag ten people. (Or, I guess, if you don't use Spotify, share your top ten songs you listen to on repeat.)

Also, following his lead in linking to YouTube for accessibility. I preferentially went with live performances where possible, unless the sound quality sucked too bad by my own totally subjective standards. Just didn't have the spoons for more translation work today, but I also included a few lyric snippets where I could because why not.

The "On Repeat" can be pretty dangerous, dealing with somebody who is as prone to going off on neurospicy kicks as I am. Instead of, say, a couple of weeks of nonstop Delta blues, '80s synth, or Latin American metal? This time, we've apparently got wall-to-wall Swedish punk-adjacent stuff. (Which is more likely than most other genres here to not be English language. Handier for me learning Swedish than for most of y'all!) It's also mostly from newer bands.

Heavily featuring both Bäddat För Trubbel, who spent the 2010s (roughly) paving the way for trouble here in Malmö--and Trubbel, who evidently already found it in Gothenburg!

Mascara Snakes - "Vakternas Skräck" (live) - ("The Terror Of The Guards")

Bäddat För Trubbel - "Bäddat För"

Svart Katt - "Våld Mot Tjänsteman" ("Assault Against Officer")

Trubbel - "Tro På Mig" ("Believe In Me")

Viagra Boys - "Down In The Basement" (live). (Out of Stockholm, but their singer grew up in the Bay Area. I am still mad I missed seeing them across the bridge in Copenhagen a few months ago.) How're you going to explain your sex life to your wife?

Bäddat För Trubbel- "Bättre Män Än Mig" ("Better Men Than Me")

Viagra Boys - "Worms" (live) - (From an awesome session.) Also, one rather bizarre Korean horror movie (?) fan video I just ran across.

Hjelle - "Arbetsförmedlingen Ringde" (live) ("The Employment Agency Called")- (Yeah, same guy from Bäddat För Trubbel. I've been enjoying his voice and sense of timing, OK? 😅)

Svart Katt - "Bara En Spegel" ("Only A Mirror")

Trubbel - "Gbg City" (This live video is quite the extravaganza of pasty jorts-clad flesh, from last summer. In best Gothenburg style, evidently.) - Better audio studio version.

Continuing on to Spotify's "Repeat Rewind", for some wider representation over the medium term lately. Still pretty heavy on the punk-adjacent stuff, but I guess that's where my head has been.

1. Gnome - "Ambrosius" (These guys out of Antwerp are pretty awesome in general, for what I guess you'd file under stoner/doom metal with a sense of humor--where you can actually hear the bass in the mix. There's no real choreography in this particular lvideo, which is a shame.)

You can eat from the ground

2. Refused - "Summerholidays Vs. Punkroutine" (live) - (Also a Swedish band, btw. In a good 2012 performance.)

And I'm still certain that what motivates me is more rewarding

Than any piece of paper could be...

Rather be forgotten than remembered for giving in

3. Suicidal Tendencies - "Till My Last Breath" (Yeah, really feeling it today.)

But I'll never let all this emptiness win

Until my last breath I'll be a fighting man Not just with my fist, but my mind and I got a plan...

Until my last breath, I ain't nobody's bitch Until my last breath, I'll keep pissin' on the rich Until my last breath, I'm gonna do it, I ain't gonna just try Until my last breath, I'm gonna hold my head up high...

I'm never letting go Until my last breath, the whole world's gonna know Until my last breath, I'll be keeping a score Until my last breath, I'll be fighting for more

4. Ramones - "Mental Hell" (Not their best album, but I still have a weak spot for it.)

I'm not feeling very well

5. Viagra Boys - "Milk Farm"

They say that you can get delirious from layin' off the sauce

But I don't know nothin' 'bout that

'Cause I ain't ever laid off

6. Alien Nosejob - "Television Sets" (live) - (And I finally just thought what one part of this reminds me of. Major flashing lights warning on that video.)

I don't need no cigarettes

I don't need no booze

I don't need the TV set

I don't need the news

7. Riddarna - "Vi Kommer Att Dö" (Keepin' the titles cheery over here: "We're Going To Die". But, better make the most of it!)

8. Dwight Yoakam - "Purple Rain" (live) - (Impressive tribute, when I already respected Dwight quite a bit. Studio version.)

9. Motörhead - "Tear Ya Down - B-Side - 'Louie, Louie'"

Gonna show you what I'm all about

I'm gonna shoot you down tonight

I don't really wanna freak you out

10. Orkan - "Rik Rikar Rikast" (live) - ("Rich Richer Richest" - Studio version with significantly better sound quality.)

To translate the chorus:

Have you forgotten what equality means?

Have you forgotten what solidarity means?

Have you forgotten what generosity means?

Have you forgotten what honesty means

I always feel awkward tagging people for this sort of thing. But, I will have a go this time: @soilrockslove @adrawatcher @theonewhopoops @floorbananamotherfucker @reddragdiva @kelpforestdwellers @queerdo-mcjewface @birdblogwhichisforbirds @supernini235 @ailurinae @katisconfused @ajax-daughter-of-telamon @soilrockslove @medleymisty

[wolven-maw]

get u a girl who can reference two niche and unrelated subgenres of music in the same sentence

[doctor-fancy-pants]

Crossed Wires

I started typing this out in Word, and then it got long, so probably that one's going on the Big Blog, but just because this is a crossing of the nerdy streams that absolutely delights me, have the short version here:

I have not been in a band in a long time, and there's stuff I've forgotten.

I found my passive DI box today, which I used for my bass guitar.

I could not remember how this fucking thing worked or what it was supposed to do. Attenuating switches. Filter switches. Input: 1/4" jack. Output: balanced XLR. Line thru: 1/4". what the fuck?!

Before googling it, I allowed myself a sigh of embarrassment, because I did know all this at some point in my life, it's just that when the info goes into long-term storage in my ADHD brain, figuring out where it is and digging it free is like traipsing into the junk yard with a metal detector.

Translation of that metaphor: a lot of things are going to go PING! and I fkn guarantee you that none of those things will be the droids you are looking for

except godfuckingdammit the droids would set off a metal detector, look, don't examine this analogy too closely, okay.

where was I?

oh yeah, that's right.

(yes, I am abusing bullet points, but it turns out that they just let fucken anyone use bullet points these days, there's not even a fucking license or anything, how wild is that?! Anyways, no one can stop me, suffer in ya jocks.)

My memory wasn't helping, so I googled the DI Box, and read the quick summary of what it's meant to do, and that process is more like some sleek futuristic pattern matching magnet technology, because it was like it was summoning the existing knowledge (which I had stashed and which was inaccessible. Bad sectors. Defragmentation needed) back into my brain.

(if you have personal and extensive experience of defragmentation: congratulations. You are old, and welcome on my porch. Rocking chair not provided. BYO shotgun.)

Quick summary: musical instruments (such as bass guitars) put out the kind of signal that is too messy and unbalanced for a mixing desk, which requires a gentler and more standardised touch. So, you run your bass patch lead through a DI box, which filters and (effectively) standardises that signal, and funnels it out to the mixing desk in a more manageable form.

Not only does this wreak less overall havoc, but it means that you can deal with the instruments and the vocal mics (and so on) on an even playing field (or at least, you can try to standardise everything else against the fucking drumkit-- no, do not ask).

The "line thru" jack is to carry out the un-filtered signal directly to your bass amp, because the bass amp can handle it as an independent Gigantic Noise Machine.

So. Why did I start giggling while reading this? Because I'm a diver. More specifically, I'm a professional assistant dive instructor.

(technically. I don't actually instruct. I'm qualified to instruct, assistively (so to speak), but I like guiding just fine, thanks. I get to give newbies handy hints and help them out and point out amazing marine life, but we get veterans as well; they're all qualified divers, though, so I do not have to actively supervise anyone at all times, and I do not usually have to carry anyone's gear, or dive in a pool.)

And I thought... the DI Box is a fucking first stage regulator, isn't it.

Like I'm not even kidding with this analogy, it's fucking perfect. The first stage regulator attaches to your tank valve. It wrangles the pressure of the air coming out of your tank (which is probably about 220 bar or 3200 psi to start with, and drops steadily throughout the dive as you breathe your way through it), wrestling it down to a much more chill 10 bar / 150 psi or something in that neighbourhood, and dumps this more amiably-managed air into the low pressure ports. Those hoses connect to your BC inflator (uh, BC = "floaty jacket"), your dry suit inflator if you have one, and your second stage regulators.

The second stage regulators are the ones you breathe from, but easier to say that they're demand valves. The pressure of that air is pretty much dictated by how hard you breathe in.

Here's the other thing, right: there's even a "Line Thru". Yessiree, you got that high pressure port for hooking up the ol' Submersible Pressure Gauge (SPG), because that thing needs the STRAIGHT SIGNAL, unfiltered, unbalanced, unaltered, because... that's the thing that tells you how much air is left in your tank, in terms of pressure. You... really don't wanna regulate that.

This analogy does suggest that my SPG is basically like my old Behringer quad box (approx 60kg), except a good deal fucking lighter, much easier to get up two flights of stairs to our flat at the time, and much less inclined to get covered in cat hair.

(seriously the guy at the Music Swop Shop took my amp, looked it over, and said, "You have a cat, don't you?" because - for those who don't know - many amps are basically covered in scratchy carpet.)

(for anyone who doesn't know: yes, "Swop" is deliberately spelled with an "O", it's not a typo, don't @ me.)

Anyways, that was my anecdote, split into several anecdotes, and I can hear someone forming a Bullet Point Licensing Committee Advisory Group even as I type this, so I better skedaddle before I can be prosecuted for my crimes against formatting or narrative. Fortunately the sort of people who would be interested in that are not the sort of people who skip straight to "angry mob" -- I mean they get there eventually, but I have some lead time.

(there is a reason I called this thing "Anecdote Machine". You were warned.)

...okay but seriously the analogy is fucking perfect it's like the entirety of engineering as a concept - from maritime and scuba across to audio tech to computer and software - is just pretty much about trying to translate one type of energy into another so that one gadget will talk to another gadget and nobody gets blown up or set on fire.

oh shit. that's actually what engineering is, isn't it? you know there are some course guides that could have been a lot shorter, on reflection.

[edit: forgot to mention that the first stage actually drops the pressure from your tank a whole lot, actually, so anyways I have fixed that now...]

[rionsanura]

god it’s a jam though

[commentgoblin]

It doesn't matter how, but I just stumbled across a Russian rock opera based on the Witcher and I don't know what's happening but the music is cool.

I do not speak enough Russian or know enough about the Witcher to know if it's a good story or not but it sounds neat ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[myalchod]

WRITING PLAYLIST THINGY

RULES: List at least 4 songs from your current WIP playlist, or just a writing playlist you’ve been using lately, and the lyrics that speak to you the most! Then tag at least 4 people, or as many songs as you listed.

TAGGED BY: @rxnefairs

Three from the Alfieverse playlist and one that crawled into my brain and is why my most recent WIP file is tagged "welly boots and pain".

Black Tape for a Blue Girl - "bastille day, 1961": I would have changed all these things / But I had you, oh I had you / And maybe that's all it come down to? / I loved you, so remember

October Project - "Bury My Lovely": A shadow from another time / Is waiting in the night / Something happened long ago / Something that will not let go…

The Police - "Murder By Numbers": Once that you've decided on a killing / First you make a stone of your heart / And if you find that your hands are still willing / Then you can turn a murder into art

The Amazing Devil - "Welly Boots": If only you could hear my voice / But you are screaming far too loud to hear me swear / Just because I left doesn't mean that I'm not still there

Tagging: with apologies for anyone already tagged, @unreliablenarratorink, @lilshitwayne, @partiallypearl, and @relentlessescapism

[rottenbrainstuff]

Lmao so guess what I saw yesterday: a new korean production of Phantom: the Musical.

To call it an off-brand copy of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s show is not really correct, because this show is SO different. It would probably be more accurate to say it’s INSPIRED by phantom of the opera. It’s about a creepy dude in the basement who wears a mask and kills people, and he loves this singer that he gave music lessons to, and then after that, it’s pretty much different in every way.

I wouldn’t say it’s a BAD show… I mean it was screened at my local movie theatre for a reason, there is a really good ballet part in it, Christine has more technically demanding songs to sing which actually make her sound like someone who’s had mysterious singing lessons… but I wouldn’t say it’s a GOOD show either, some of the choices are really quite bizarre, some odd pacing, and a phantom that’s woobified too much for my personal taste. Mostly I left the theatre thinking “what in the hell did I just watch”.

I wonder if setting it in a different time period would have helped. Like maybe the 40s or something. Then maybe the really broad strokes it took with the plot would have felt less bizarre, it would have been more like, “ok I get that this is an interpretation of the story” and less like “ok this is like the Spirit Halloween version and I am so confused”.

Maybe.

I’m glad I saw it though, I love me a new Phantom of the Opera story to watch, however strange it is. Bring it on. I took my middle kiddo with me and she had fun.

[nerdery-and-murdery]

This weekend on Nerdery and Murdery, we talk about bad music