(Thrill Jockey) The US guitarist excavates the outer reachers of the famed collector’s work, pointedly – and beautifully – reinterpreting songs from nations touched by major US conflicts Behind this gorgeous collection of folk tunes from Southeast Asia, Soviet Russia and the Islamic and Arabic worlds lies the legacy of two Americans: the peyote-dropping 78rpm collector Harry Smith (whose 1952 Anth...
(Thrill Jockey) The US guitarist excavates the outer reachers of the famed collector’s work, pointedly – and beautifully – reinterpreting songs from nations touched by major US conflicts Behind this gorgeous collection of folk tunes from Southeast Asia, Soviet Russia and the Islamic and Arabic worlds lies the legacy of two Americans: the peyote-dropping 78rpm collector Harry Smith (whose 1952 Anthology of American Folk Music presented folk, blues and country recordings from the 1920s and 1930s) and the exploratory guitarist Marisa Anderson , whose back catalogue is steeped in tradition and improvisation. In 2023, she begged for time in Smith’s shuttered archives, discovering hours of non-American music, before learning to perform and share it. Here, Anderson interprets nine of these tunes, pointedly taken from regions shaped by major US conflicts since her birth in 1970. While her fascinating liner notes track what is lost and found when trying to translate these compositions, their universal musicality still cuts through. Opener Quodlibet is beautiful: an intricate, minor-key medley of Uzbek tunes originally performed on the dambura (a fretless lute), on which Anderson adds bluegrass techniques to counter her inability to play quarter-tones on her guitar. Her take on a qawwali vocal tune, Hamd, is also a highlight, her stacked guitar layers ringing with warmth and emotion. Continue reading...
Australia’s trade minister will visit China in an effort to shore up fuel supplies that have run short this year because of bottlenecks in the Strait of Hormuz during the US–Israeli war in Iran. Australian Trade and Tourism Minister Don Farrell told a press conference that he would travel to China to meet Commerce Minister Wang Wentao, after a stop in Japan on Monday. “Very much the topic of the d...
Australia’s trade minister will visit China in an effort to shore up fuel supplies that have run short this year because of bottlenecks in the Strait of Hormuz during the US–Israeli war in Iran. Australian Trade and Tourism Minister Don Farrell told a press conference that he would travel to China to meet Commerce Minister Wang Wentao, after a stop in Japan on Monday. “Very much the topic of the day will be how do we continue to ensure reliable fuel supplies into this country,” Farrell said,...
Britain Is Now Policing Thought Crime Authored by Ciaran Kelly via DailySceptic.org, If you want a snapshot of how far Britain has drifted from its liberal inheritance, consider the spectacle of a 78 year-old grandfather and retired pastor being warned by police that he must not preach from the Bible within a public area. His offence was not harassment, obstruction or intimidation. It was reciting...
Britain Is Now Policing Thought Crime Authored by Ciaran Kelly via DailySceptic.org, If you want a snapshot of how far Britain has drifted from its liberal inheritance, consider the spectacle of a 78 year-old grandfather and retired pastor being warned by police that he must not preach from the Bible within a public area. His offence was not harassment, obstruction or intimidation. It was reciting and commentating on a verse many learned as children: “For God so loved the world…” Clive Johnston’s alleged crime was breaching a ‘buffer zone’ around a hospital which houses a sexual health clinic where abortions are performed – despite the fact it was a Sunday afternoon when there were no scheduled abortions, and he made no reference whatsoever to abortion, nor motherhood, nor babies. The state maintains he risked “influencing” anyone accessing the clinic in relation to abortion or anyone working there – a crime punishable by fine. He was prosecuted, and this week found guilty for doing so. At this point, it is worth stating plainly: this is no longer about the cultural debate on abortion ethics. It is about whether the state may decide which ideas are permissible in public space and which must be confined to the private sphere. In footage from the initial confrontation with police now circulating on X, the policeman literally tells Johnston his religious views should be expressed only in a “safe” place like a chaplaincy – not out on the street, where anyone passing by might hear. Johnston’s case is the latest example in a pattern that has been building for years: the slow but unmistakable attempt to narrow the space in which Christians, in particular, are permitted to express their beliefs. Take the school chaplain, Dr Bernard Randall, referred to Prevent for discussing Christian teaching during a school assembly. Or the numerous street preachers removed from public areas simply for speaking about Christ. Or the growing list of individuals questioned by police for noth...
In recent days, Microsoft appointed former EY global chairman and CEO Carmine Di Sibio to its board and saw its overhauled OpenAI partnership formalized with a reported US$38 billion cap on revenue-sharing payments, while continuing to broaden AI collaborations and infrastructure investments. These moves highlight Microsoft’s effort to balance a large, but now capped, economic exposure to OpenAI w...
In recent days, Microsoft appointed former EY global chairman and CEO Carmine Di Sibio to its board and saw its overhauled OpenAI partnership formalized with a reported US$38 billion cap on revenue-sharing payments, while continuing to broaden AI collaborations and infrastructure investments. These moves highlight Microsoft’s effort to balance a large, but now capped, economic exposure to OpenAI with a wider, more independent AI ecosystem spanning new startup partnerships and internal...
Space stocks have been rallying since news of SpaceX's IPO dropped in March. Which of these two stocks is worth a look while you wait for SpaceX to go public?
Space stocks have been rallying since news of SpaceX's IPO dropped in March. Which of these two stocks is worth a look while you wait for SpaceX to go public?
Just_Super/iStock via Getty Images Few substances on Earth have a more extraordinary origin story than helium. Formed over millions of years through the radioactive decay of uranium and thorium deep underground, it slowly seeps through rock until trapped alongside natural gas. It is the lightest gas after hydrogen, chemically inert and small enough to slip through physical barriers most substances...
Just_Super/iStock via Getty Images Few substances on Earth have a more extraordinary origin story than helium. Formed over millions of years through the radioactive decay of uranium and thorium deep underground, it slowly seeps through rock until trapped alongside natural gas. It is the lightest gas after hydrogen, chemically inert and small enough to slip through physical barriers most substances cannot penetrate. When cooled to -269°C (4 Kelvin), just four degrees above absolute zero (-273°C or 0 Kelvin), it transforms into a superfluid that flows without friction and seemingly defies gravity. Helium is one of the most abundant elements in the universe, but it remains relatively scarce on Earth. It cannot be manufactured, is difficult to store and extract and has become indispensable to some of the world’s most advanced technologies. Most investors rarely think about helium, but the war in the Middle East may force them to. Why is helium one of the most irreplaceable materials? What makes helium so remarkable is that its most useful properties seem almost contradictory. It conducts heat better than any other gas yet cools systems to ultra-low temperatures nothing else can reach. It is the second-smallest atom, and it is that small size that makes it the world’s most sensitive leak detector. In addition, helium does not readily react, which is precisely what the most demanding industrial processes require. In semiconductor manufacturing, it cools silicon wafers during etching and helps maintain the vacuum conditions required for extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography, which is the process used to produce the most advanced AI chips. Tiny temperature fluctuations during this process can ruin yields, making helium essential. It is equally vital in MRI machines, where liquid helium cools superconducting magnets to 4 Kelvin. If supplies fail and the magnets warm, the resulting ‘quench’ can permanently damage the machine. Quantum computers depend on these same cryogenic c...