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Last Notes

2026-09-10 06:20:21 CEST

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I think you'd probably like this, though it's a bit far away from Bruno Mars.

2026-09-10 04:59:12 CEST

“Sixteen Men Swinging” by Count Basie on vinyl (2xLP).
One of the best jazz albums I’ve ever heard.
And this thing is actually a reissue of 2 earlier records from 1953–54: Dance Session and Dance Session, Vol. 2. Put them together and now you’ve got Sixteen Men Swinging.
This was a BIG moment for Basie. The orchestra had been reborn, the so-called “New Testament” band, with arrangements by Neal Hefti, Ernie Wilkins, and Frank Foster.
And damn, they swing.
Smooth, danceable, driving as hell.
Count Basie’s band is the truth here. Not one dud across either disc. Over 1 hour and 33 minutes, the whole thing stays tight and locked together.
The drums THWACK.
The brass ATTACKS.
And Basie just works those keys.
Sometimes I wonder why I’m still messing around with vinyl. The prices get stupid. The whole hobby gets stupid.
Then I find something like this. $3 at a flea market. Barely played.
And suddenly I remember why it’s all worth it.
This has to be one of the best double albums I own.
If you’re a jazz fan, hear it.
If you’re not, this might be the one that gets you.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/1b972187af51cc39aacae55359a046933ecc1d62a841b1a2b3275baa4f2d2731.jpeg

2026-09-10 04:25:25 CEST

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Seeing that, it's no wonder classical music fans were thrilled about the invention of the CD.

2026-09-10 03:36:06 CEST

@[email protected] Have you heard this song from Aaron Frazer yet? I think this would totally be up your alley.
I’m glad the Neo-Soul movement is still going strong after Charles Bradley and Sharon Jones passed on.
https://youtu.be/sv1-XxN0Yn8

2026-09-10 02:45:29 CEST

Funko Pops are to Millennials what Precious Moments are to Boomers.
There, I said it!

2026-09-10 02:41:43 CEST

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I was born in 1981, so I guess I would be someone you know who likes Earthworm Jim and was born before 1983.

2026-09-10 01:51:41 CEST

Earthworm Jim on SEGA Genesis.
Got it for $60. That is the most I’ve ever paid for a used game, and it was for this.
Usually, I’m thrifty. Buy things when nobody wants them. Dig around until I find something cheap.
But in this case? Shucks.
It’s Earthworm Jim.
I rented this game again and again from Rogers Video. I’d stay up all night playing the damn thing because I knew the next day it had to GO BACK.
A friend of mine had the SNES port. It was all right. I played the DOS version too, and that one is great.
But there’s something about the Genesis version because that’s how I experienced it.
Midnight. Can of Diet Coke on the coffee table. My sister upstairs blasting Pearl Jam.
Earthworm Jim.
Sometimes I get after people for dropping big money on collectibles because they start treating the stuff like investments.
But if something actually means something to you? Yeah, sometimes it’s worth dropping the extra coin.
Because Earthworm Jim?
That was a moment when I was happy.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/7e6cd03f0fe875d80461541c58daeb46e7fe1e2be61abd49d2362039b082a41a.jpeg

2026-09-10 00:47:22 CEST

*How to Talk to Girls at Parties* on DVD.
I’m a sucker for coming-of-age movies about teenagers discovering punk rock and finding first love. I’ve watched *so* many movies in this genre.
Most of them are horrible.
And yet I keep eating at the trough because, well, I’ll be honest: I was a teenage punk. And being a teenage punk, I desperately wanted to meet a girl, introduce her to my taste in music, have her find it so entrancing that she’d become a punk rock girl.
Never happened. But *damn*, that was the fantasy.
So going into *How to Talk to Girls at Parties*, I expected the usual deal. Kid living in 1970s London discovers The Clash, bumps into some sheltered sweetheart, shenanigans happen, and they fall in love forever.
And this kind of happens.
Except the girl is a LITERAL ALIEN.
And the reason she’s sheltered is because she DOESN’T LIVE ON EARTH.
That alone kicks the whole teenage punk romance sideways. But then it gets even more ridiculous: what if these aliens are so completely batshit insane that the punks—the people who are supposed to be the paragons of outrageousness—start to panic?
I laughed my ass off at this movie. I mean crying, clutching my stomach, because I haven’t seen something this ridiculous in a while.
And Elle Fanning is a tour de force. It reminded me of her in *The Neon Demon* because she somehow manages to match the weirdness of *that* movie, and that thing was pretty damn bizarre. She’s been in so many stellar roles that I’m shocked she’s only 28 years old.
Alex Sharp is also stellar as the protagonist, a wannabe punk constantly trying to get in with the in crowd, who gradually starts to understand exactly what kind of predicament he’s gotten himself into.
Then there’s Nicole Kidman, playing this elder mother figure among the punks, clearly modelled after Vivienne Westwood. She is *delicious* as the countercultural authority.
This movie was *not* a hit when it came out. It only made $385,733 at the box office, and the critical reception was mixed.
I bought the DVD for $2 at London Drugs.
And now I’m thinking about buying the Blu-ray.
Because this has become one of my favourite punk rock movies. In all its ridiculousness, it feels more true to punk rock than a lot of the more earnest stuff because it actually has some ATTITUDE.
Delightful and worth seeing.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/d897fa106b9574806247b407c838cedc0ebc1b5719b13e5c7ed8cf15aaee988b.jpg

2026-09-09 23:47:02 CEST

Today’s tea is Hibiscus Rose—which is a tisane, not a tea—sold by Vahdam Tea.
It’s a mix of hibiscus, rose, cardamom, and fennel.
And this stuff has some BITE.
Sour and sweet, almost like berries, with a little pine hanging around in there. Good body and finish. Best part is I can actually taste every ingredient instead of having the whole thing collapse into one big floral blur.
I made it with 200mL of boiled water, poured into a mug, then let the teabag sit there for 5 minutes.
Why a teabag this time? Because again, this isn’t tea.
Tea is a leaf. Leaves expand. Hibiscus and rose are flowers. Cardamom is a seed pod. Fennel is a seed.
So in this case, loose leaf versus teabag doesn’t make a damn bit of difference to me.
Good beverage. I’d drink it again. Might even try it as a cold brew.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/fad389b955d1b0e6e32dacdb57e28c0134059189ed8306bcf190258370079b22.jpeg

2026-09-09 22:51:56 CEST

*Shame-Based Man* by Bruce McCulloch on CD.
I first heard this album when I was a teenager and thought it was the funniest damn thing ever. I laughed my ass off—and made DAMN sure my parents didn’t hear any of it because I knew they’d be scandalized.
If you’re Canadian, Bruce McCulloch is a household name. He’s a member of The Kids in the Hall which, along with SCTV, is considered one of the greatest Canadian sketch comedy series ever.
Bruce also has deep roots in Canadian music. In the late ’70s and early ’80s, he played in the Calgary punk band The Audience, and that experience later inspired the TV series *Young Drunk Punk*. Then through the ’90s and 2000s, he became a well-known music video director. He even shot the video for The Tragically Hip’s “My Music at Work.”
But *Shame-Based Man* is a comedy album, and it’s a WEIRD little animal: Bruce doing spoken word over punk-adjacent alternative music. Brian Connelly of Shadowy Men on a Shadowy Planet plays guitar—the same guy whose band composed the iconic *Kids in the Hall* theme.
A bunch of the tracks come from classic *Kids in the Hall* sketches. “Doors.” “Daves I Know.” Fan favourites.
But some of this stuff gets way too dark for TV. “Grade 8” is about all the drugs and booze Bruce consumed when he was young. “Stalking” has a stalker casually talking to the woman he’s stalking. “Heroin Pig” is about a girlfriend taking copious amounts of heroin.
Then it can suddenly get light. “Answering Machine” is about the pure joy of NOT answering the damn phone because the machine can do it for you.
But the real standout for me is “Daddy’s on the Drink,” about Bruce coming home every day and watching his dad get plastered on the couch—and the trauma that came with it.
That’s *Shame-Based Man*. Funny as hell, then dark enough to bite.
A classic Canadian comedy album. Still hilarious all these years later, and if you’re a *Kids in the Hall* fan, this thing is a must-hear.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/6b268d1a7241cc5bd553913b9cc17d424d469f33cef88ab1394ffcf2023c53ac.jpg

2026-09-09 22:08:21 CEST

Just discovered my wife’s binder full of movie discs.
And I’m impressed by all the rare stuff in it.
Check out these VCDs of City Hunter and My Neighbor Tototo!
https://atomicpoet.org/media/7269256910ca61a613e3e404d61da492ac64f260b90e952dcaefaa94aea0c45e.jpeg

2026-09-09 21:54:42 CEST

Your propaganda ain’t working on us, Jamieson Greer.
Trying to erase Canadian cultural protections for the French language and dictate who we can trade with around the world?
That ain’t negotiation.
That’s WAR.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/trump-tariffs-canada-unhinged-us-trade-jamieson-greer-9.7337101

2026-09-09 21:35:46 CEST

Before the Internet, the big fear was TV taking over our lives.
People were supposedly going to spend all day sitting on the couch, staring blankly at a screen, never going outside, never talking to anyone, and letting their brains turn to mush.
I wonder what happened to all those couch potatoes.
What are they doing now?

2026-09-09 20:22:25 CEST

“The Who Live at Leeds” by The Who
This was recorded onstage at the University of Leeds in February 1970, and some people regard it as one of the greatest live performances ever caught on tape.
Vinyl collectors go nuts for it.
But I got mine for $2 at a flea market—because it’s a cassette.
Actually, I got three other Who albums for the same damn price.
And if you want a true analog experience without paying through the nose, cassette might be the sneaky way in. Get yourself a high-end deck, have it serviced properly, then start hunting for old classic rock tapes.
Anyway, this catches The Who right in their “maximum R&B” phase, back when rock and R&B were rubbing against each other hard enough that people rightly understood there wasn’t some giant wall between Pink Floyd and Funkadelic.
And this thing MOVES.
You get “My Generation” and “Magic Bus,” only nastier and more blistering than the album versions. Then they tear into covers like “Summertime Blues” and “Shakin’ All Over.”
The dynamics are stellar too.
The Who understood something simple about playing loud: sometimes you’ve got to get quiet first.
That push and pull is a huge reason this album is so damn riveting.
Definitely worth hearing.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/167b5ead969bd36cb2603550c7007e6bb69d24c1e01c0f7ab47fdd9a77b12127.jpeg

2026-09-09 20:18:25 CEST

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The CD has indeed been ordered.

2026-09-09 19:51:37 CEST

Here’s a *big* argument for keeping a CD player around:
*Electronic and Computer Music* by João Pedro Oliveira is a groundbreaking piece of electroacoustic and computer-synthesized music. The big trick was taking complex mathematical processes and making them *move* with the explosive physical force of an acoustic instrument.
Oliveira painstakingly mapped algorithmic parameters so the digital synthesis would hit with attack, decay, friction, and the kinetic pressure of somebody actually striking an instrument.
That’s the whole damn point. Computer music that doesn’t just sit there blinking at you. It *hits*.
You can stream the album on Apple Music. Problem: it isn’t lossless. And you can hear defects as a result.
The album only ever got one physical release, on CD, back in 1993. Never reissued.
So if you want to hear the thing lossless, there’s no magic streaming button waiting for you.
You order the CD, and somebody mails the sucker to your house.
https://youtu.be/cQrvdS6ASf0

2026-09-09 17:09:55 CEST

Wait.
Dogstar bassist Keanu Reeves is also an actor?
How the hell did nobody tell me about this?

2026-09-09 08:06:20 CEST

Double Feature – Billy Bathgate starring Dustin Hoffman, and Blaze starring Paul Newman. Both crammed onto the same Blu-ray disc.
The main reason I bought this was Billy Bathgate. It’s a gangster movie about a particularly infamous ’30s mobster, played by Dustin Hoffman.
Problem is, Billy Bathgate—the guy whose NAME is on the movie—is boring as hell. Loren Dean plays him like this “gee willickers” kid who’s dumb as a bag of rocks. The movie tries to juice things up by throwing Nicole Kidman at him as a love interest, but there’s just no chemistry there.
And the mobsters themselves seem so… I don’t know.
Like they’re attending a dentists convention.
Sure, Dustin Hoffman slaps people around for a bit, but mostly he just seems angry that he’s stuck in this movie.
This thing was ATROCIOUS to sit through.
Blaze seemed better. It’s about a 1950s state governor dating a stripper.
Problem is, I just can’t watch movies about American politicians anymore.
So after half an hour, OFF it went. I doubt I’m going back.
And the Blu-ray itself stinks. You get the movies. That’s it. No subtitles. No sound adjustments.
Into the thrift-store donation pile it goes.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/3832b1ec24df37c796acd210a28ef9222ef00982ac873eb83bbb8c32942cb6cf.jpeg

2026-09-09 05:18:11 CEST

“Lucille” / “Lolita Ya-Ya” by The Ventures on 7-inch 45 RPM vinyl
Remember Little Richard’s “Lucille”? Absolute scorcher. One of the best songs he ever made.
Well, The Ventures got their hands on it. And it works!
The guitar takes over Little Richard’s original vocal melody and just tears through it. No singer needed. The whole thing still has the same kick.
The B-side is another cover: “Lolita Ya-Ya,” the main theme from Stanley Kubrick’s *Lolita*.
Naturally, there’s guitar reverb all over the place. But this one also has background vocals mixed in.
It’s not as good as “Lucille,” but there’s nothing wrong with it either.
Great single from a legendary surf band.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/a3a12f34dd3729ccd67fef1d62e961c32bfb2e90a9efc8d4dc97f7b6f69cfe7b.jpg

2026-09-09 02:07:22 CEST

I’m tired of Americans saying Trump anti-Canada rhetoric is “just a distraction”.
It seems like a distraction for you because—quite simply—you don’t want to care.
And the reason you don’t want to care is because you believe it won’t impact your life.

2026-09-09 01:16:20 CEST

Lots of wailing and gnashing of teeth from CD collectors about the rising price of CDs.
Now, I don’t necessarily buy this whole “CD comeback” thing. Last year was nearly a 40-year low for CD sales. When you’re crawling around that close to the floor, practically any increase can be called a “comeback.”
Nevertheless, prices ARE going up at thrift shops.
For how long? Don’t know.
But I remember what vinyl cost in the late ’90s and early 2000s, and maybe we should be thankful CDs are still as cheap as they are. Look what happened to vinyl. New releases are now getting slapped with $50–70 price tags.
I’ve watched the same thing happen with video games. There was a time when you couldn’t *give away* 8-bit and 16-bit games. Now people look at old cartridges like they’re going to fund their kid’s college.
That said, I’m skeptical about where this is going, and for good reason.
The RIAA would love for *all* physical media to come roaring back, especially now that streaming has plateaued. If CDs, cassettes, and vinyl can be turned into pure collectibles—things people buy just to stick on a wall—then everybody gets fatter royalty cheques.
But knowing the music industry and its track record, I think they’re just as likely to kill the golden goose.
You only have to look at concerts to see what greed has done. Primary tickets routinely get smacked with service fees, facility charges, and processing fees that can inflate the face-value price by 30% to 80%. Then you’ve got real-time demand algorithms, like airline pricing, jacking up the face value the second demand gets hot. Throw in scalpers using automated bots to suck up inventory, and the whole thing becomes intolerable.
And now concert sales are down.
Total attendance across North American venues dropped 5.6%. Small venues have been hit even harder, with an 18.6% drop in gross revenue over three years.
The music industry has beaten the average music fan like an overworked donkey, and now they’re standing there shocked because the donkey won’t move.
So what happens next?
Stars like Beyoncé get *more* outrageous and charge nearly $1,000 for what amounts to an empty box.
No joke—an empty box made from untreated pine.
A few members of the Beyhive bought it so they could flex on social media, but the average person looks at that thing and sees exactly what it is: greed.
And after years of neglecting the humble CD, doing an abysmal job with mastering and packaging, the music industry suddenly wants to reclaim it. *Now* it’s hip. *Now* it’s happening.
Well, where else are they going to go?
They already squeezed the concertgoer. They squeezed the vinyl enthusiast. And the only reason Spotify costs what it does is because the music industry is trying like hell to stop people from pirating. A *little* money is better than *no* money.
But there’s one big problem.
The music industry spent decades telling the average music fan that CDs were DEAD.
They stubbornly refused to die.
And now that CD sales in 2025 were lower than they were in 1986, suddenly we’re supposed to believe there’s a comeback?
Yeah, I’m right to be skeptical.

2026-09-09 00:10:40 CEST

*The Who by Numbers* by The Who on CD
A good album, but nowhere near as brilliant as The Who at their peak. If this hadn’t come right after *Quadrophenia*, I might like it more.
This is The Who stripped down. Straight meat-and-potatoes rock. No big grand concept hanging over it. If you like the band leaner and more basic, that’s a plus.
It’s also *way* more personal than the albums before it.
Most of the subject matter is basically Pete Townshend realizing he’s an adult. For most people, big deal. But this is the same guy who wrote “My Generation” and sang, “I hope I die before I get old.”
So yeah, suddenly getting older matters.
And realizing that the rock star life ain’t all it’s cracked up to be would hit even harder a few years later with the death of Keith Moon.
The problem is that this isn’t always a fun listen. Sometimes the personal stuff gets too melodramatic. “How Many Friends” is where that really starts grinding on me.
There are some real killers, though.
“Squeeze Box” is a *bop*. As far as I’m concerned, that song can stand right beside anything The Who ever made.
And the CD itself sounds really nice. The SPARS code is AAD, so this is a direct analog transfer. The case even warns you about it, like tape is some poor wounded thing and mighty *digital* has come to save the day. Funny, because in my experience, AAD CDs often sound better than fully digital discs.
So where do I land on *The Who by Numbers*?
Good album. Decent. Just not genius.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/204d6898dbad848fbc85d8047eacde5e42e5ef9d5cebed808d4887c318af983d.jpg

2026-09-08 23:37:44 CEST

This is actually how Trump supporters think.
They're *actually* agitating for a war with Canada.
They want Trump to do to Canada what Putin did to Ukraine.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/80ac8c68d98260818c660d433217079647e7b2d30a024eae537d0300efdd5748.png

2026-09-08 22:48:51 CEST

“Who’s Next” by The Who
There’s probably nothing I can say about this album that hasn’t already been said. Who’s Next is nailed down hard in the classic rock canon.
And yeah, the hits are all here: “Baba O’Riley,” “Going Mobile,” “Won’t Get Fooled Again”—among others.
The Who started on this album after abandoning a rock opera.
Thank God.
Because whatever they might have cooked up instead, I have a hard time believing it would’ve been more interesting than this.
I found this copy at a flea market for $2, and it works great.
Try getting even a used vinyl copy for that now.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/b1ae1af26416e1ce87c35118bcb7945207a730ce79be22b795e17e64aaabd7e5.jpeg

2026-09-08 20:36:53 CEST

Alien vs. Predator is considered the best game on the Atari Jaguar. For a lot of people, it’s THE reason to own the console. It was also an important step in console first-person shooters.
What’s less well known is that it got a sequel in 1999, made by the same developers: Aliens Versus Predator.
No console release this time. Windows only—although you can run it on Linux through Proton.
Same deal as the original: you can play as an alien, a predator, or a space marine.
And believe it or not, the sequel is every bit as good as the Jaguar game. Maybe better, because now you’ve got a mouse. That alone changes the whole damn thing.
And updates to the game now allow multiplayer crossplay between Steam and GOG accounts.
But this is my physical copy.
And I play it on my Windows XP laptop because if I’m going to play a game from 1999, I like having the whole old-computer stink with it.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/b932482b229467520f399b577385304940809b188c6fc53c90602420ce0606d3.jpeg

2026-09-08 19:06:20 CEST

Today’s tea is coffee milk tea, otherwise known as yeun-yeung, sold by Van Cheong.
What happens when I can’t decide whether I want coffee or tea?
Hell with it. I’ll have BOTH.
Traditionally, yeun-yeung is 3/4 Ceylon black tea and 1/4 coffee, and making the stuff properly can be a pain in the ass.
Thankfully, I don’t have to do any of that work because mine comes as a powder.
One teaspoon. 200 mL of boiled water. Give it a good, hearty stir.
Voila. Coffee and tea are now living in the same mug.
Now some of you are probably making a face.
“Ew. Gross. Coffee mixed with tea?”
Yeah, I won’t lie. It’s an acquired taste.
But after years of eating at Hong Kong cafés, I’ve come around to the stuff. It has KICK. Coffee comes through, tea comes through, and the whole thing gives you a little slap.
Drinking yeun-yeung builds character.
Only thing missing right now is some congee and a Chinese donut.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/9058065fbd29efab05c63b068d26fb4a107b35e7234a200b7769f490545022d4.jpeg

2026-09-08 18:28:02 CEST

Today, I learned that Sabrina Carpenter’s audience is overwhelmingly female.
75.8% women, with the biggest chunk sitting in the 18-to-24 age bracket.
And that kind of scrambles the usual story about her performing for the male gaze.
Because if the audience is mostly young women, then maybe the real show is something else entirely: women watching another woman crank heterosexuality up until the dial snaps off.
Hyper-heterosexuality, performed for women.
https://medium.com/marketing-in-the-age-of-digital/is-sabrina-carpenters-venture-into-the-metaverse-a-mistake-64039a5d5c0d

2026-09-08 09:51:00 CEST

“Inner Child” by Shanice
R&B is hard to find in Vancouver, BC.
Whenever I see R&B on vinyl, CD, or tape, I grab it. You’re way more likely to find alternative or classic rock kicking around here than R&B in the wild. Hell, you’re probably more likely to find city pop and Cantopop.
Then I watch thrift store videos from the US and see wall after wall of R&B, soul, and hip hop.
And I am full of envy.
So when I spotted this Shanice cassette at Value Village for $2, I jumped on the damn thing.
Shanice might not be that well known nowadays, but she is ASTOUNDING. She has this huge soprano voice that cuts straight through the instrumentation and grabs you. There’s something almost mythical about the way she sings. And those runs? Good God.
Inner Child has her huge hit “I Love Your Smile,” which is an absolute bop. I suspect even if you don’t know Shanice, you know that song. You can still hear it on urban radio and even the occasional Top 40 station today.
And Shanice was crazy talented. She appeared on Star Search while 11-years-old and won in the junior vocalist category. By the time she made Inner Child, her second album and first for Motown, you could really hear that talent busting loose.
She could sing. She could rap. She could write music. She personally co-wrote several tracks on this album. Obviously there were other writers involved too, but that’s pop music. That’s how the machinery works.
The album did well around the world too. It only reached No. 83 on the Billboard 200, but it went Top 20 in Australia, Germany, Norway, Sweden, and Switzerland, and hit No. 21 in the UK.
Nowadays, though, this album is slept on—just as Shanice herself has been seriously slept on.
I think she was every bit as good as Mariah Carey or Whitney Houston. A five-octave soprano range is nothing to sneeze at.
It’s too bad she stopped releasing albums. Her last one came out in 2006.
But what she gave us is DYNAMITE.
And I just hope she’s out there living the good life.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/1396e85cef2e5349e2456ab1ae0cafafd94bfe92e16e60497807e01fab46499a.jpeg

2026-09-08 09:25:27 CEST

Voidwrought on Steam Deck
I’m having a hell of a time writing about my video games.
And I think the problem is that I can’t quite get across how personal all this stuff is to me.
A screenshot just doesn’t carry the same personal investment as physical media. It’s an image on a screen. It doesn’t show the thing I actually own and play.
But in my eyes, a Steam Deck does use physical media. The data is physically sitting on a micro-SD card, same as data sitting on a disc.
And I like Voidwrought a LOT.
It’s a great 2D metroidvania. The hand-drawn animation is beautiful, the atmosphere is spooky, and I’d rather sit there playing this thing than most of the cartridges and discs staring at me from my shelf.
So I’m going to chew the cud on this problem for a while and figure out how I want to approach it.
Because I know this much about myself: when I write about something, it makes me want to go DO the damn thing.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/126f78747e3a8c6902754f4da376062facf8263d4835b551748a77ce17e79018.jpeg
https://atomicpoet.org/media/06bab9df172219ce8d680b488d61c9324152102632e3393d50315d2c2f2ce51f.jpeg

2026-09-08 07:51:28 CEST

Mary Poppins on Blu-ray.
My daughter watched this for the first time today. She already knew the songs, but she’d never seen the movie itself.
And on Blu-ray, it looks GREAT. I’m especially happy Blu-ray has gotten so cheap because this cost me $3. Three bucks for better picture and sound than I’d get streaming it. Who needs Disney+?
The movie is every bit as good as I remember, and my daughter loved it too. She loved the live action mixed with animation, the songs that stick in your skull, and of course Mary Poppins herself, who is damn near perfect.
When I was a kid, I just thought the whole thing was magic. Chimney sweeps, dancing penguins, flying around, all of it. And when Mary Poppins left, I was sad. Why the hell did she have to go?
Watching it as an adult, I finally get it.
SPEND TIME WITH YOUR KIDS.
That’s the whole nerve of the movie. You only get so much time with them. One day they’re kids, then suddenly they aren’t, and all those little bits of time are gone.
So now I understand why Mary Poppins had to leave.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/8e9c1d64d398c20c5905ab1724a0769d7cf379e7aa3ef33d2098531743a05e43.jpeg

2026-09-08 07:32:19 CEST

“Devil’s Night” by D12
I bought this because I remembered their hit “Purple Hills”—which I now know is actually “Purple Pills.”
Well, DAMN.
That changes the meaning of the song completely. And suddenly it’s a lot sadder.
For context, D12 was Eminem, Proof, Bizarre, Kon Artis, Kuniva, and Swift. The group was actually formed before Eminem got famous, and they’re foundational to Detroit’s hip hop scene.
Devil’s Night was their major-label debut. It hit number 1 on the Billboard charts and sold 4 million copies.
And Devil’s Night has not aged well. It’s edgy, homophobic, misogynistic, and petty. None of this is exactly a surprise.
But listening to it now, I also get this profound sense of sadness because these people were simply not well. Don’t get me wrong—they sound like they’re having the time of their lives. But eventually the party has to stop.
Then comes the reckoning.
Devil’s Night now feels like foreshadowing for Eminem’s near-fatal overdose and Proof’s murder. Obie Trice, who appears on a skit, was the victim of a drive-by shooting. And all those beefs eventually fed paranoia and hypervigilance, with the group surrounding itself with armed security and unable to live normal lives.
And all that edgy humour? Clearly there to mask trauma.
That doesn’t absolve D12. Not even close. It just helps explain where some of it was coming from.
Musically, though, the wordplay is decent and the beats are more than competent. The album runs 75 minutes, and somehow it still didn’t feel overly long.
Nevertheless, this is NOT getting ripped to my iPod.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/2ba0be06d9c6860aa01480baf0ef1c00ada1abdc9e434692ddbca3b0d72d0060.jpeg

2026-09-08 01:35:10 CEST

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The idea would be that if you don't have a Bluetooth receiver nor a dedicated CD player, you can transmit over your stereo receiver.
Super niche use case but it's there.

2026-09-08 00:40:52 CEST

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Yep, I’ve recorded quite a few CDs to MP3. Something you should be aware of, though, is that it doesn’t rip—it records as the CD plays. So each album ends up being one big MP3.
The most practical application is for audio books. There’s nothing I hate more than having to carry 10 CDs for one audiobook. Recording to a micro-SD card is so much nicer.

2026-09-08 00:27:57 CEST

I have several portable CD players, but this KLIM Discover is my favourite.
First off, you can SEE the disc spin.
Most CD players hide the damn thing. But in a world where music increasingly comes out of nowhere and lives nowhere, I like seeing the physical media actually doing the work. The disc is right there, spinning its guts out.
Also: wood grain.
I grew up with wood grain TV sets, turntables, and video game consoles. So yeah, slap fake wood on some electronics and apparently I’m already halfway sold.
Then the features start getting ridiculous. One headphone jack? Fine. TWO headphone jacks? FM radio? Sure. FM transmitter too? Plays MP3s? Records to MP3?
What the hell did they cram into this thing?
It also has a demonstrably better DAC than my Sony Walkman CD player. The Sony gives me ear fatigue, which is why I stopped using it. This one sounds markedly better—as long as I stick with wired headphones.
And then there’s the killer feature: a built-in rechargeable battery.
No digging around for AA batteries. No opening the drawer and finding two dead ones staring back at me.
That alone is one hell of a quality-of-life improvement.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/1fac23f33c406ddea3c68751addbd9ad57d3c5d091661da79c359bf5d4258ae7.jpeg

2026-09-07 23:15:26 CEST

CDs have a theoretical dynamic range of 96 dB.
Then pop mastering comes along and SQUASHES the damn thing down to 2–3 dB.
What the hell?
I don’t know about you, but that feels like a complete waste of what CD can actually do.
Where’s my other 93 dB?
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/228909198_The_effect_of_dynamic_range_compression_on_the_psychoacoustic_quality_and_loudness_of_commercial_music

2026-09-07 20:16:50 CEST

“Infected Generation” (1996) by Infected
Stumbled across this Ukrainian death metal band with a heavy grindcore streak. And Infected aren’t just some random band I dug out of a hole. They’re one of the most influential Ukrainian extreme metal bands, formed in 1991—right when the Soviet Union collapsed.
There’s that old saying that metal is basically surf rock with distortion. And yeah, there’s something to it. You can find demonstrations all over YouTube where people play metal riffs with clean guitar and suddenly there’s the surf underneath.
Infected are pretty much the same deal.
And I’m not complaining. This band is TIGHT. Precise double kick drums, crunchy guitar riffs, bass that THUMPS, and a vocalist who—like plenty of death metal singers—sounds like Cookie Monster.
I have never taken death metal particularly seriously, and I suspect a lot of death metal bands don’t either.
Take “Brown Tormentor - Unhappy Ending.”
It’s about a guy who enjoyed a nice meal, suddenly gets explosive diarrhea, and can’t find a toilet.
There it is. The human condition. I’m sure plenty of people can relate.
Is it a serious song? Hell no. But why does everything have to be serious?
The most musically adventurous track might be “Sova”—called “Coba” on Apple Music—which pulls from Ukrainian folk. And this thing is HIGHLY danceable. Actually, it’s funky.
So if you’re digging around Eastern European death metal, Infected are an important foundational band to know.
And they’re still active in Ukraine today.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/18b7667a70a53acf8ca6e19a13e38c712e0494fa4b8970f77a4035f8d80f4428.jpeg

2026-09-07 09:36:06 CEST

New Zealand Story for Turbo-Grafx 16, emulated on my Steam Deck.
I struggle to document the games I own and play.
And the reason is that I think people really WANT the authenticity of physical media. But the cold hard truth is that, as time goes on, it gets harder and harder for me to justify it.
Yeah. I’m saying this as somebody who constantly shows off physical copies of movies, music, and video games.
Here’s the problem: sometimes it’s just TOO MUCH.
I don’t even mean the money. I mean all the damn gear.
You can’t just hook a vintage console up to a new TV and expect it to look right. It doesn’t do the games justice. You need a CRT.
Great. I have a CRT. Actually, I have three of them.
But being chained to a CRT every time I want to play an old game is inconvenient as hell.
You know what isn’t inconvenient? Lying in bed with a Steam Deck.
And truthfully, emulation is just a much nicer experience than playing on authentic vintage hardware.
Save states alone make a huge difference. We didn’t have those back in the day. I remember pausing a game and leaving the whole console running just so I could go do a chore and come back later.
Now? Save exactly where I am. Turn off the Steam Deck. Come back whenever I damn well please.
And I don’t think that makes the experience any less authentic.
A game isn’t suddenly less genuine because I enjoyed it on a bus instead of sitting on a couch in front of a CRT.
We should be embracing emulation because, truth be told, it has already proven itself to be one of the best ways to preserve games.
Most people don’t own a Turbo-Grafx 16. Most people probably never WILL own one.
So if you want to experience this specific port of New Zealand Story, emulation is gonna have to do.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/e4e348990010fd0b07a009014ffe2f17c21be5a096f7856da4254602e290656c.jpeg

2026-09-07 08:09:50 CEST

“5150” by Van Halen on CD.
This album was considered a critical failure when it came out. Time has been a whole lot kinder to it, and now it’s considered one of Van Halen’s best.
I remember HATING the Sammy Hagar era because he just didn’t have the personality of David Lee Roth.
But over time, I’ve come around to something else: Sammy Hagar is the better singer.
Am I saying he was the better singer for Van Halen? Not necessarily. But on 5150?
Yeah. I’ll say it.
The first time I heard this album, I didn’t even realize it was the first one with Hagar on vocals. My immediate reaction was, “Wow! I don’t remember Diamond Dave having this kind of precision!”
That’s because he didn’t.
Hagar steps in and suddenly he’s the star of the show, singing his guts out and hitting everything CLEAN.
Not that he’s the only star. Come on. The band is called Van Halen for a reason.
It isn’t Van Halen without Eddie’s blazing arpeggios, and he throws them around with panache. Alex is solid as a rock behind him. That steady backbone is what lets the rest of the band tear around like this. And Michael Anthony keeps the bass grooves moving underneath the whole thing.
People love to dismiss the Hagar era. Hell, I used to do it too.
But this album outsold every record from the Diamond Dave era, went 6x platinum, and hit number 1 on the Billboard 200.
Whatever people thought when it came out, 5150 has stuck around.
This thing has stood the test of time.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/a8124ef04b6954d6156c7129733c45c0e561eb8669e8d24e62bb979768e1a240.jpeg

2026-09-07 07:12:07 CEST

Only Canadians can *really* appreciate Alanis Morissette because we remember this song of hers blaring on MuchMusic.
And we remember when she sang at shopping malls.
So it was incredibly bizarre when Jagged Little Pill came out. Most of us wondered if it was for real.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ar7afdfBHj4

2026-09-07 06:43:11 CEST

The most compelling teaser for a documentary EVER.
One minute. That’s all it took. I’m already completely hooked.
What we have here is Elizabeth Holmes—yes, Ms. Turtleneck herself—staring straight into Nathan Fielder’s eyes and swearing up and down that she is NOT deceiving him.
That alone has me crawling toward the screen.
And if this is about what I think it is?
I HAVE to see this.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GGJSRFWALTI

2026-09-07 06:10:23 CEST

“Bloodshot” by The J. Geils Band on cassette tape.
This is one of the oldest cassettes in my collection. Made in 1973. So old it doesn’t even have Dolby.
And somehow, the thing is still in pretty good shape.
Now, cassette tape in the early ’70s was nowhere near what it became in the ’80s. Hell, even modern cassette can sound better than this. If pure fidelity is what you want, there are better physical formats for *Bloodshot*.
But that’s not why I’m playing it. I’m listening for the *colour*. And old cassettes like this has colour all over the damn place.
The J. Geils Band was huge through the ’70s and ’80s, and you can still hear them rattling around classic rock radio. But they don’t seem to have the same recognition now as a lot of other bands from that era. For whatever reason, R&B-soaked blues rock just doesn’t pull the same crowd anymore.
Which is a shame, because this stuff comes from a time when rock was still *party* music. People got together, threw on a record, and DANCED.
Hell, the first song on this album is called “(Ain’t Nothin’ but a) House Party.”
That tells you plenty.
What really gets me about *Bloodshot* is how you can hear the whole damn family tree in there: ’40s boogie-woogie, ’50s rock ’n’ roll, ’60s soul.
And it all fits: hot, sweaty, and torrid. Something that makes your legs want to *move*.
You can even hear little hints of the J. Geils Band’s later new wave records, especially in Peter Wolf’s vocal style.
And for all that rawness, this band is *tight*. The drums are throwing out great fills. The bass *thunders*. The guitars stay funky, and the solos sound like they barely had to break a sweat.
Definitely a band worth digging up again.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/d0aa29a4d3016e38298d55f13c8556ecb491b5f78923ae3866cb242cd7fe06e7.jpg

2026-09-07 02:32:55 CEST

*District 9* on DVD.
Finally, I watched this damn film.
I’ve been wanting to see it ever since it was released in theatres, but I just never found the bandwidth to make it happen. This time, I sat down in my darkened home theatre and really took the whole thing in.
And damn, this is one of the most original sci-fi films I’ve ever seen. It flips a bunch of old sci-fi clichés right on their heads.
Usually, when aliens arrive on Earth, they’re invaders. But what if they’re refugees? And what if we humans do what we often do and stick them in a refugee camp indefinitely?
That camp is District 9.
Twenty years after the aliens arrive, a bumbling bureaucrat named Wikus van de Merwe gets the job of evicting them from District 9 and pushing them somewhere else.
Then he starts walking through the place. And things go BAD. Massively bad.
What happens next kicks off a chain reaction that doesn’t just change Wikus’s life. It changes *everything*.
Now, a lot of movies with this setup would probably hammer you over the head with a political message about helping people in need. *District 9* doesn’t make it that easy.
Like real life, the whole thing is messier than that. A bunch of questions are left hanging, and you’re forced to sit there and figure out what you think is likely to happen after the movie ends.
That’s exactly why I’m glad there hasn’t been a sequel. The uncertainty is part of what makes the movie so damn compelling.
Definitely a must-see for sci-fi fans.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/b8ee0ba08aea3f3f816dfef4ba93892ab639f0dabe7adc5a0875f0b5d3882c22.jpg

2026-09-06 23:40:10 CEST

Just bought tickets to the Barnside Harvest Festival—three days of concerts, September 11–13 in Ladner, BC.
And there are a few bands I’m STOKED to see:
* Mariana’s Trench
* Smash Mouth
* Grapes of Wrath
* Tom Cochrane
* Limblifter
And waaaaaay more. Seriously, far too many groups to even mention.
The whole three-day event is only C$205, which is a damn good price for that much music.
I don’t think nearly enough people realize this thing is happening.
So here’s the link:
https://www.barnsideharvestfest.com/

2026-09-06 19:00:16 CEST

Dolby S is NOT a gimmick.
I’ve been recording on Type I cassette tape. That’s considered the worst cassette type, although “worst” sure as hell doesn’t mean terrible. Still, without noise reduction, you’re looking at roughly 55 dB of dynamic range. Vinyl can hit around 70 dB.
Then you switch on Dolby S.
The tape hiss disappears, and the dynamic range gets a 24 dB kick.
On Type I, that puts you around 79 dB.
That’s enough to leapfrog vinyl.
And this isn’t just numbers crawling around on a spec sheet. I’ve been recording classical music and acoustic jazz off CBC Radio 2 onto tape, and the difference with Dolby S is MASSIVE.
Type I cassette suddenly gets damn close to the original broadcast.
Definitely worth it.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/a97e7715c3761fd9fffd93b098727f800a6d2ab417eed852510fc64834be00b8.jpeg

2026-09-06 09:37:28 CEST

Watched Gremlins 2 with my kid.
She saw the first Gremlins, and was excited to learn there was a sequel. So we got the DVD and watched it.
Her opinion: Gremlins 2 is better because it is funnier. And that is true. Plenty of gags, and there’s constant 4th wall breaking.
This is a lampoon of the entire concept of movie sequels.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/c08c996168d5bd32381f63c6404588b327dd145cc7758e731d58e60455ea380a.jpeg

2026-09-06 09:31:12 CEST

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It actually came out in 2024.

2026-09-06 07:37:53 CEST

Today in technology nonsense nobody except me could possibly care about:
I recorded CBC Radio 2 onto a Type I cassette using Dolby S noise cancellation.
On the machine I recorded it on, with noise cancellation on, it sounded impressive.
But when I put it in my Walkman—which doesn’t support noise cancellation of any kind—the mid sounded muffled with high sounding overly exaggerated.
So is Dolby S worth it? Sure, if my goal is to record radio—terrestrial or streaming—in the best quality possible for playback on one specific deck. That’s pretty much the best scenario for Dolby S recording.

2026-09-06 04:31:11 CEST

“Short n’ Sweet” by Sabrina Carpenter on cassette tape.
And nope, this ain’t some bootleg. It’s an official release. Bought it at Sunrise Records for my daughter.
It was $20.
And it sounds GOOD too.
Really glad we grabbed the cassette instead of the vinyl.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/099401a665c946b48ed3009b708bee113fbf8996cf224149a0801f7130ef25b9.jpeg

2026-09-06 01:53:11 CEST

In the context of the 90s, “boy power” meant something totally different from “girl power”.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/42e39b4dc62deec93972c76521b66dd7775cdf03c05e8c9307b877e1fea88e10.jpeg

2026-09-06 00:25:44 CEST

Beyoncé deserves mockery for selling this empty pine box for $948.01.
Which you can buy at Michael’s for $5.
https://www.ibtimes.co.uk/beyonce-backlash-948-bey-keeper-box-bday-anniversary-1818055

2026-09-05 22:46:41 CEST

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Sure, but it was the Republicans who took political advantage of it. They even have a term: flooding the zone. Flood all information channels with junk, dial up the outrage culture, pacify the opposition by making everything “entertainment”.

2026-09-05 22:35:16 CEST

I’m convinced performative liberalism on social media helped wreck the American Left.
Republicans figured out that a lot of people don’t actually want the fight. They want the dopamine hit of looking like they’re fighting.
They post, they grandstand, they get to feel righteous for five minutes, and there’s the dopamine rush they came for.
And once people got that dopamine from a screen, they had less reason to get out in the street and demand actual change.

2026-09-05 22:22:22 CEST

Either this guy is a bot or he’s more interested in the performance of opposing Trump than actually opposing Trump.
But I’ll say it again: it’s better to PROVE that the U.S. government is doing something rotten instead of merely saying it.

2026-09-05 20:44:10 CEST

What music format do you prefer?
I just did a blind test, and the winner for me was reel-to-reel tape, followed by Apple Lossless.
But here’s the part that surprised me: vinyl came DEAD LAST for sound quality.
I found it pretty mid. Less brightness. Less bass. Just not as much life coming through.
I actually preferred cassette to vinyl, although I think cassette could have done better with higher quality tape and a better deck. But I get what this test was showing: ordinary consumer-grade cassette equipment. And with a setup like that, yeah, you definitely lose some of the top end.
Still, cassette beat vinyl for me.
And this test also made me feel even better about completely avoiding Spotify.
I already hate the way they fool around with the original masters, and after hearing the differences blind, I’m even less interested.
https://youtu.be/6iohmhZWDNo

2026-09-05 10:07:25 CEST

Turns out, I love Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night.
I like it better than Castlevania. The caveat being I never played Castlevania past the 16-bit era, with the exception of Castlevania: Grimoire of Souls—which was just removed from Apple Arcade.
But Bloodstained is quite a tight game. I like the map and inventory system. And the boss fights are quite challenging.
I also think Bloodstained has a better story than Castlevania with more compelling characters too.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/65975dcd5d41f01ae7423038b20fb1de7e6820180b356c54eb112f81b2c1e0c5.mp4

2026-09-05 07:29:32 CEST

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Okay, have you looked deeply into Hermeticism?

2026-09-05 03:22:09 CEST

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Have you gone down the Hermetic rabbit hole yet?

2026-09-04 22:35:23 CEST

Hi, how are you?
https://atomicpoet.org/media/37249bad09a0bbcf5dbf6a33df53b524fee522d0be98ddbbc302715a78bc25ef.jpeg

2026-09-04 20:20:21 CEST

Looking at old photos of my wife and I.
This was 16 years ago.
God damn---what a BABE!
I don't know what she saw in me, but I'm glad she saw it---and that I locked her down! Because I knew, right when I saw her, I could *not* do any better!
https://atomicpoet.org/media/11fbda252957273e9fc7035ad424ee3c1e8577ad7f02e6b5203c357503d438a3.jpg

2026-09-04 18:45:29 CEST

The Internet is what you make of it.
I constantly hear people moaning that the whole thing is nothing but AI slop now.
Meanwhile, today I discovered the ’90s Filipino ska band Put3Ska, and they KICK ASS.
The only reason I know about them is because I’m always digital crate digging. I go looking for obscurities on purpose.
If you let AI-based algorithms do all your discovering for you, then yeah, you’re probably going to get slop.
But if you actually use your brain and dig into the stuff that interests you, there’s gold all over the damn place.
https://youtu.be/QwZ3462SLi4

2026-09-04 18:14:43 CEST

I am NOT joking.
The White House just released arcade.gov.
A collection of browser-based video games to push MAGA propaganda.
That is a real sentence I just had to write.

2026-09-04 07:43:45 CEST

I’m trying my god damn best to not feel melancholic about the march of time, and how so many things—and so many people—are gone.
Time is a thief.

2026-09-04 06:24:56 CEST

“Happy Birthday” by Altered Images
This is a perfect example of how completely ridiculous the vinyl market has become.
Back in 2010, I bought this for $6.99. The sticker is still sitting right there on the sleeve. I checked Amazon just now. Cheapest copy: $62.84. Discogs for a used copy? $48.04.
DAMN.
I’m glad I grabbed this thing when I did because Altered Images is one of my favourite post-punk bands. *Happy Birthday* came out in 1981, and it wasn’t just post-punk either. There’s twee in there. Jangle pop. Goth. All of it rattling around together.
And I love Clare Grogan’s vocals.
She has this bubbly effervescence that’s almost the complete opposite of Siouxsie Sioux, which makes it pretty funny that Grogan and two other members of Altered Images had once belonged to the official Siouxsie Sioux fan club.
What really gets me is how much she can change. One song, she’s sugary sweet. Another song, she can cut your head off.
*Happy Birthday* was a success in the UK. The title track hit number 2 on the Singles Chart and became the band’s biggest hit. The album itself peaked at 26.
It’s now regarded as a post-punk classic and has been reissued several times on CD and vinyl.
I’ve been listening to this band since I was 22 years old. Thanks to the Internet, I had just discovered post-punk and suddenly had access to all these great Scottish bands from the early ’80s, including Josef K and Orange Juice. I remember collecting a pile of songs I found, making my own compilation, and taping the whole thing with my boombox.
So when I finally got *Happy Birthday* on vinyl, I was thrilled.
Eventually I introduced my daughter to it too.
She loves Altered Images.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/d8df07215b8b954e0b4ec6c18986c3caa34b70407882a8ee62c5feac24bba526.jpg

2026-09-04 05:21:25 CEST

Back in 2008, I had this great grand idea: buy the greatest albums of all time on vinyl.
And for a while, I could actually do it. Nobody wanted vinyl. The stuff was cheap.
Then everybody wanted vinyl.
Suddenly even the most common new pressings were going for $50. Now some of them are pushing $70.
That pretty much killed the dream.
Then, about 12 years ago, I started noticing indie artists selling cassettes. Same analog deal, except I had way more nostalgia for tape than I ever did for vinyl.
So whenever the vinyl got too expensive, I bought the cassette instead. Turns out that was a damn good move. Most people still don’t want cassettes.
Which means they’re CHEAP AS HELL.

2026-09-04 04:53:46 CEST

What the hell did the Christians do to get themselves kicked out of Burning Man?
READS ARTICLE
Good golly.
These people sound like a NIGHTMARE to be around.
https://www.sfgate.com/travel/burningman/article/christian-missionaries-burning-man-22416243.php

2026-09-04 04:08:28 CEST

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I have a Kenwood KD-500 turntable that weighs over 30lbs. And it’s claim to fame is that is features an Anti-Resonance Compression Base. Basically, a dense, resin-concrete composite material designed to look like stone or marble.
Why such an over-the-top approach? To provide exceptional vibration damping, isolate the platter from external footfall, and curtail internal resonance.
I thought it was ridiculous. But then I had a kid. And she likes to stomp around and skip while beside the turntable. Not once has the arm ever flown off the groove.

2026-09-04 03:57:02 CEST

Vinyl enthusiasts swear that’s the best way to hear music.
Then you ask what kind of vinyl is best and WATCH OUT.
45 RPM or 33 RPM? Monophonic, stereophonic, or quadraphonic? Then they start chewing on each other over the stylus.
Hell, there’s even an argument over whether you should use a stylus at all.
Laser turntables exist.

2026-09-04 03:30:18 CEST

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All tea in Canada is imported. But if you want to know where this is imported from, it's from Fujian province in China. Generally speaking, the best tea in the world is from China.

2026-09-04 03:28:13 CEST

Think I was exaggerating when I said blooming green tea actually BLOOMS?
Here, take a look for yourself.
It starts as this tight little ball. Then you sit there beside the glass teapot and watch the thing slowly come apart. Five minutes later, you’ve got green, yellow, and pinkish-purple spreading through the water.
I had my daughter watch it happen with me. And by the end, was she excited to find out how it tasted?
HELL YEAH.
After her first sip, I asked what she thought. Her verdict: wildly delicious.
And that matters, because blooming green tea can put on one hell of a show, but if the flavour doesn’t back it up, who cares? Pretty flowers floating around in a pot only get you so far.
This stuff backs it up.
You get three infusions out of one ball. It takes a little longer to pull out the flavour than a typical tea, but I think it’s worth every minute because this is genuinely one of the best tea blends I’ve had for flavour.
If you know nothing about blooming tea, I can understand being skeptical. But seeing is believing. So is tasting.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/d4172e4114722a0e4b9bc9ca1eedb463e71f8008dc0c42aaad20ce6d4d2997c4.jpeg
https://atomicpoet.org/media/842e6743804f43f1c3e74c6f5e2b4ee3624d8759a0af4c3bf820ae5a0cbcfbe8.jpeg
https://atomicpoet.org/media/e41774fc06b36f46ba6067963979d78776a6e81c1df40d9918d551d1a2bb43d8.jpeg
https://atomicpoet.org/media/37d59fad34c17b6f33e39032fc1311aead7faec3c777e2525c6cfef34b07f81e.jpeg
#note1urk…7m43

2026-09-04 03:04:11 CEST

Today’s tea is blooming green tea.
And no, that name is not screwing around. This thing literally BLOOMS when you hit it with hot water heated to 80C. But not hotter—otherwise it gets bitter.
Give it about five minutes and the tight little ball starts coming apart, leaves unfurling until there’s a damn flower sitting in the pot.
And that ball is basically a bouquet. Green tea, jasmine, marigold, chrysanthemum, with amaranth sitting right in the middle like the star of the show.
Best part? It isn’t just some pretty little gimmick.
The tea tastes amazing.
This is one of the best tea blends you can find. You get that grassy green tea freshness, earthy undertones, honey sweetness, and then a clean finish that doesn’t hang around chewing on your tongue.
And these things are CHEAP.
$2 per blooming tea ball.
That is drastically less than plenty of so-called “premium” teas that show up wearing a fancy label and asking for your wallet.
If you’ve got company over, blooming tea is a complete show stopper. Put one in a glass teapot, get everybody around it, and watch the thing open up right in front of you.
Kids love it too. And it’s a great way to introduce them to tea because there’s actually something happening in the pot besides brown water getting browner.
I’m especially happy to have this today because yesterday I drank one of the worst teas I’ve ever had.
This right here?
THIS is the answer to that atrocity.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/6d23f4379c0ae5bc82ce381bc8d734f1e3b717e39d9715f8e90e302fb88c73cb.jpeg

2026-09-04 02:12:50 CEST

Today, I watched The Goonies with my daughter.
And buying the physical copy was absolutely worth it. $2! I prefer Blu-ray, sure, but my OLED TV has LG’s α8 AI Super Upscaling working on the picture and pushing it up to 4K. The result actually looks better to me than a lot of streaming services.
Then there’s the sound.
Getting the audio straight off the disc instead of having it compressed through streaming gives me much better 5.1 surround sound. That matters even more to me than the upscaling. I can tolerate a slightly softer picture. Bad movie audio mixing drives me nuts.
But forget all that machinery for a second.
Did my daughter actually enjoy the movie?
Yes. Immensely.
Thrills, comedy, romance, great characters, wonderful music. And come on. LOST TREASURE.
This is just a great adventure movie to watch with kids, even with a few off-colour moments rattling around in there.
A classic for a damn good reason.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/1f27dca52007aeb81ff31cbf9078ef8023b33aca120caf0d384e71412870060b.jpeg

2026-09-03 22:11:21 CEST

Today, I am doing open heart surgery on my cassettes.
The biggest cause of audio degradation on old tapes is a decaying or completely missing pressure pad. That little sucker sits there doing its job for decades, then one day it crumbles, falls off, and suddenly your cassette sounds like hell.
Luckily, this is easy surgery.
You can order replacement pressure pads online, complete with adhesive. Pull out the rotten old pad, stick in the fresh one, and the cassette gets another shot at life.
Today, the tape doctor is IN.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/f3a65daa3107a5cb2191cbb8d1b80fbc1612422a431693625f7a622d27d54b19.jpeg

2026-09-03 19:45:45 CEST

The “CD Revival,” as they’re calling it, is now officially in the news.
And I’m a little confused, because I don’t remember CDs ever completely going away. Dedicated music stores still sell the damn things. Go to a concert and there’s a good chance they’re sitting right there at the merch booth.
But the bigger problem is that all this “REVIVAL!” noise doesn’t really line up with the numbers.
According to Music Business Worldwide, CD sales were still getting kicked around last year. Unit sales fell 11.6% YoY to 29.5 million, while revenue dropped 7.8% YoY to $312.4 million.
That was the lowest year for CD sales since the ’80s.
Hell, more CDs were sold in 1986 than in 2025.
So why is everybody suddenly hollering about a revival?
Because during the first half of 2026, CD sales jumped 16% compared with last year. If that pace holds, and you throw in the usual holiday bump, we’re looking at something like 36 million CDs sold this year.
Sounds pretty good...
Until you remember that CDs sold 46.6 million units in 2021.
So a 16% jump from a historic 50-year low doesn’t scream REVIVAL to me. It looks more like the format finally stopped falling down the stairs for a minute.
And no, I’m not trying to piss on the party. I love CDs. I own well over 1,000 of them. I would be thrilled if people started giving a damn about physical music collections again.
But the statistician in me keeps scratching at this story.
Why does the “CD Revival” narrative exist when the numbers are still this weak?
I think part of it is that digital sales are starting to run out of juice. Streaming revenue only grew 3.1% during 2025, and that happened because Spotify raised prices and squeezed more ARPU out of each user. Digital downloads did even worse, falling 0.8% YoY.
So how do you squeeze more money out of physical music?
Vinyl becomes the shiny premium object. Charge $50 for it. Sell it as the aspirational format for “enthusiasts.”
That price is going to knock plenty of teenagers right out of the room.
But don’t worry, Jayden and Chloe.
There’s always the $25 CD.
At least, that’s how this is supposed to work if you can convince Gen Z that CDs are suddenly the hot new thing and everybody is doing it.
Maybe they will be.
But until I see CD sales crawling back even to where they were in 2021, I’m keeping one eyebrow up at this whole “CD Revival” business.
SOURCES:
https://youtu.be/Hpn3ERMCAHY
https://consequence.net/2026/07/the-cd-revival-is-getting-hard-to-ignore
https://www.musicbusinessworldwide.com/us-paid-music-streaming-subscriptions-hit-106-5m-in-2025-adding-6-5m-accounts-yoy-the-strongest-growth-since-2022/

2026-09-03 10:18:12 CEST

“In My Tribe” by 10,000 Maniacs
When I first discovered 10,000 Maniacs, I thought that name was promising me some nasty little punk band with busted teeth and bad intentions.
Nope, what I got instead was one of the defining American jangle pop bands of the ’80s.
Back then, the UK was the hotbed for this stuff. The Smiths. The La’s. The Sundays. Plenty of guitars ringing and chiming over there.
America had fewer bands working that vein, but the good ones hit HARD. People usually point to R.E.M. and the Bangles as the big names.
Those people need to hear 10,000 Maniacs.
Released in 1987, In My Tribe blasted the band into fame. It only peaked at 37 on the Billboard chart, but the damn thing still sold 2 million copies.
And the ace up their sleeve was Natalie Merchant.
That full, throaty voice. Clever, literate, socially conscious lyrics. All of it riding on this bright, bouncy instrumentation that keeps the songs moving even when the subject matter gets heavy.
Some people hate that kind of thing because they want the old rock star cliché. Fine, they can have their leather pants and the hotel room wreckage.
I find Natalie Merchant refreshing because she was sincere. She could sing about environmentalism, alcoholism, and the trauma of child abuse without being preachy and tedious. The songs were damn catchy, and they still moved.
And look at her contemporaries. Morrissey has fallen clean off the deep end.
Meanwhile, when was the last time you heard about Natalie Merchant acting like an ass?
This band deserves its classic status. They made “Hey Jack Kerouac,” for God’s sake. It never charted, but if I were making a mixtape of the best jangle pop songs ever recorded, that sucker would be on it.
Natalie Merchant’s solo career eventually eclipsed 10,000 Maniacs, and maybe that’s part of why people forget how much this band mattered.
They deserve another listen.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/35a8093e0edab983ae6147732d40ebb93f0f6350191c5833c8102b2d1a5aa590.jpeg

2026-09-03 07:57:13 CEST

How to make a goth Brian Wilson tulpa who only writes surf instrumentals

2026-09-03 07:35:44 CEST

Why did I drink Organic Super Ginger?!
I already KNEW this was going to be a shit show. Just look at the ingredients: ginger, rooibos, and *three different kinds of peppercorn*. Three! Somebody looked at a mug and decided what it really needed was the seasoning rack.
And yes, I was right. Nasty stuff. Absolutely nasty. The only thing more ridiculous than drinking it was that I somehow drank the WHOLE DAMN THING.
Listen, some things are not meant to become beverages. Peppercorn is one of those things. Put it on chicken. Grind it over dinner. Do whatever you want with it. Just keep it the hell away from my tastebuds when I’m trying to drink something.
Afterwards I asked my wife if there was any reason we should keep the stuff around.
“I don’t know, maybe useful if you get sick?”
But we already have so many health elixirs around here that we might as well use those instead. Besides, before I finally decided to try this thing, nobody in my house had even bothered opening the tin.
That should have been the warning.
So into the trash it goes.
I ain’t hoarding offensive concoctions like this anymore. If everybody in the house has been ignoring the tin, maybe the tin has already given us its answer about its worth.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/631d48719787b2558a389c883623ac0dc1b3d6792425819dbea272b964a291c3.jpeg
https://atomicpoet.org/media/66ac79a2f8ba4af61486dd84d4715d7a15f16ec4aaa7b3acafedfb6b2f4b5f45.jpeg
https://atomicpoet.org/media/cd3441fcc72191aebf5fb60ef22426a276d880936b04352f75d84757cf540e35.jpeg
https://atomicpoet.org/media/ae5ab6068623ff99fec2fcb06548c16c60b3860c83322c98030b2371d7deaf28.jpg

2026-09-03 06:39:10 CEST

“Digital Swing” by Les Brown & His Band of Renown
Right there at the bottom of the album: Les Brown’s 50th anniversary with his Band of Renown.
And what a hell of a band to keep alive for 50 years.
They made “Joltin’ Joe DiMaggio” with Betty Bonney, a number 1 hit. They backed Doris Day on “Sentimental Journey,” which went on to become a standard. And for nearly 50 years, they were Bob Hope’s house band.
When I was a kid, I couldn’t stand this stuff. It was old people music. Fedoras and cigars. Guys yelling at me about the rock and the rap.
But the older I get, the more I hear what was actually happening inside this music. The dynamism and energy. And the sheer musicianship is ridiculous. Swing has subtleties, and if you don’t understand them, you miss half the action.
Plus, you can DANCE to this stuff.
Go ahead. Try keeping your feet still.
And listening to Digital Swing, something finally clicked for me. When that brass starts ripping up and down the scale, hepcats must hear it the same way metalheads hear somebody shredding a guitar.
It’s a rush.
Kids now buy vinyl as a collector’s item. They’re afraid the record will get wrecked, so they stick it in a frame and hang it on the wall.
But, my God, I live for putting the damn vinyl on the turntable.
The point of music is to HEAR IT.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/8dd5419e2fc8cb0ac2fcce02211e3d80c63f1cba47f7372be783b28ba25c1631.jpeg

2026-09-03 05:22:55 CEST

I’ll never forget the time my mom bought a Tchaikovsky CD thinking, “Oh, classical music is so relaxing…”
Only to be met with the 1812 Overture.

2026-09-03 02:09:21 CEST

WOW!
For the first time in recorded history, a coyote has actually caught a roadrunner
This is absolutely true: no one has ever seen a coyote catch a roadrunner until now.
https://youtu.be/FTceZxXYZCw

2026-09-03 01:54:27 CEST

Today’s tea is Organic Super Ginger from David’s Tea—which is not actually tea at all. It’s a tisane.
And I am *not* looking forward to this.
This is one of those “health” brews David’s Tea sells. I’ve already had something similar, and it was terrible. But in the interest of being able to say I actually tried the damn thing, I’m going in.
I will probably throw it out afterwards.
The ingredients are ginger root, green rooibos, black pepper, white pepper, pink peppercorn, and stevia extract.
Oh, *come on*.
That does not sound appetizing. I want pepper on my chicken. I do not want three different kinds of it swimming around in my mug.
And to be clear, I did not buy this. Neither did my wife. Somebody gave it to us because people apparently enjoy gifting us tea.
Please, for the love of God, if you don’t drink tea yourself, DON’T GIFT TEA TO PEOPLE.
Nevertheless, I’m drinking it. If this stuff is actually good, I will happily eat crow.
But I am looking at that ingredient list, and the crow is feeling pretty safe.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/6ebd9aa0deb020a0a73e78d7ec7f308d022bd58fd4141d075ccfd6e99a8fb253.jpg

2026-09-03 00:40:36 CEST

WOW!
Yet another MLA just left the BC Conservatives.
And so did Kerry-Lynn Findlay's chief of staff!
So that's three important people who have left the Conservative Party in a single day!
This is an unprecedented meltdown.
https://vancouverisland.ctvnews.ca/vancouver/article/bc-conservative-exodus-continues-with-2-more-mlas-leaders-chief-of-staff/
#note1amv…7ck4

2026-09-03 00:30:24 CEST

“Break Every Rule” by Tina Turner
Tina Turner will always be the Queen of Rock ’n’ Roll.
Nowadays people hand that title to Joan Jett, and there’s *some* merit to it. But when you’re talking about somebody monumental to the foundation of rock, Tina Turner is standing right there with both feet planted.
This was a woman who started her career in 1956. Then the ’80s came along and she didn’t merely have some nice little career resurgence. She hit CAREER HEIGHTS. In her 40s.
Growing up in the ’80s, Tina Turner was part of my childhood. She was constantly on MuchMusic, and I remember completely falling for her when I saw *Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome*.
But her life didn’t really hit me with a whallop until I saw *What’s Love Got to Do with It*. It was a bio-film about her life, although I later learned it wasn’t completely historically accurate. Still, that was when the sheer size of what she accomplished in the ’80s really sank its teeth into me.
The breakout was *Private Dancer*, which I own on vinyl, and that record deserves every damn accolade it gets. 12 million copies sold.
Then came *Break Every Rule*.
Three Top 20 hits: “Two People,” “What You Get Is What You See,” and “Typical Male,” which climbed all the way to number 2. “Back Where You Started” won her a Grammy for Best Rock Vocal Performance, Female.
It didn’t sell as much as *Private Dancer*, but it still sold well.
And somehow, until recently, I had never heard it.
*Private Dancer* was the record that got its claws into me, so I kept going back to that one again and again. I never had enough curiosity to chase down the later records because when you’re a kid, you’ve got a limited budget. You buy what you can buy.
Then I spotted *Break Every Rule* at a flea market for $2.
Hey, why not?
Well, DAMN. I love this album.
There isn’t a weak song on it. Tina hits those notes with grit and expression, and the more I hear her sing, the more I wonder whether she might have been the truest pure rock vocalist ever.
And look at the people crawling all over this thing: tracks produced by Bryan Adams, Bob Clearmountain, Mark Knopfler, Rupert Hine. Phil Collins playing drums on “Typical Male.” Branford Marsalis blowing saxophone on “Paradise Is Here.” Steve Winwood on synths for “Afterglow.”
Tina Turner was pulling out all the stops.
$2 at a flea market, and today I finally got to hear the album that had slipped past me all these years.
I’m damn glad I did.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/dad6ef6b4f8052a7ac221e216a2c2c16f341ac52c6fdf7cdcfcba806206e2c12.jpg

2026-09-02 21:18:07 CEST

This is the first time I’ve ever been served an advertisement for music in all three mainstream physical formats at once.
And it’s pretty damn clear who they’re after: collectors, not audio enthusiasts.
Start with the vinyl. It’s 140g, not the now standard 180g, and the big attraction is obvious. LOOK AT THE COLOUR. The record itself is being sold as an object as much as something you’re supposed to hear.
Then there’s the CD. Look at that sleeve. It’s not very good, and they don’t even bother showing off the disc. That makes sense in the modern physical media pecking order, where CD has become the downmarket choice from vinyl: the thing you buy when you don’t want to cough up $50 for the record. Even then, the CD is $29, and I suspect that’s because people still largely buy CDs to actually listen to them.
And down at the bottom sits the cassette at $22.
There are a few reasons for that. Cassettes are the cheapest physical format to manufacture, even cheaper than CDs. But most people buying new cassettes aren’t listening to them. They’re buying collectibles. That’s why the advertisement makes damn sure you can see the actual cassette sitting there beside its case.
And if you do listen to one using a new cassette deck, boombox, or portable player, especially the stuff being sold on Amazon, the experience is going to be markedly worse than vinyl or CD.
So which one would I buy if I wanted this soundtrack?
The cassette.
Because cassette sound depends like hell on the gear playing it, and I just happen to have invested in good gear.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/8e0441ee986cf62679e41c8ad6e7ed394429e504a2a395643ffac8874c0a710c.png

2026-09-02 20:48:37 CEST

Eight BC Conservative MLAs have left the party to sit as independents.
EIGHT!
We are seeing a historic collapse of the right wing here in British Columbia. Even bigger than the SoCred collapse during the 90s.
https://www.reddit.com/r/britishcolumbia/s/W1sECHAVRe

2026-09-02 19:43:53 CEST

- reply

Raygun does do her own bit of swearing in the doc.

2026-09-02 19:20:29 CEST

My wife is watching the documentary Raygun: Breaking Badly.
And five minutes in, she's already swearing up a storm because she used to be a B-girl.

2026-09-02 08:59:20 CEST

Self-titled album by The Thousand Order
For lack of a better term, this is electro music. The genre started in the early ’80s, making it one of the earliest forms of electronic music, and it hit hip hop HARD, influencing Afrika Bambataa and Mantronix. It isn’t as popular now, but it keeps crawling back.
The Thousand Order gives it a nasty twist: the music is inspired by the Borg from Star Trek, aliens obsessed with assimilation and hivemind consciousness.
And it SOUNDS like it.
It is brutal, oppressive, and mechanical.
It’s also some of the best sounding music I’ve ever heard on cassette. Even my worst Walkman—bought off Amazon—can handle it well. On my newly repaired Sony TC-WR901ES? Holy hell.
The whirrs, pulses, mechanical noise, infectious rhythms—it’s aggressively sci-fi, yet somehow organic. Then the bass PUNCTURES the air.
I’m extremely glad I own a subwoofer.
It is a privilege to hear this album on cassette.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/44ba6f24d3627941171662669f89c270019bcd2cb545a865bc6c5ee2483fa3fc.jpeg

2026-09-02 07:30:40 CEST

No tea today because my own curiosity got ahold of me—and I tried to make a latte with Red Rose black tea.
I failed.
It was mostly milk and I could barely taste the tea.

2026-09-02 05:10:37 CEST

Just told my daughter that Mickey Mouse is now in the public domain. Which means everyone owns Mickey Mouse.
And she asked, “Does that mean I own Mickey Mouse too?”
I told her, “Yep, you also own Mickey Mouse!”
Now she’s really excited about that.

2026-09-02 03:58:22 CEST

NEW PERSONAL BEST!
Seated calf extension: 410lbs. 1 set of 12 reps on the 4 dial.
That makes TWO days in a row with a new personal best.
I’m 44-years-old, and I’m much stronger now than I was at 22.
Every day you get another shot to do your best.
So hit it.

2026-09-02 01:13:07 CEST

There’s nothing stupider than drunk tourists in Thailand picking fights with locals.
Okay. There is ONE thing stupider.
Getting qualified immunity for confessing to Tupac’s murder, then turning around and WRITING A DAMN BOOK about how you did it.

2026-09-01 23:18:13 CEST

“Cool Boots” by Boots Randolph
Another absolute killer flea market find. $1 for one of the best saxophonists to ever do it.
You might not know the name Boots Randolph, but I guarantee you’ve heard the man.
“Yakety Sax” was his song. It was a huge hit, then the Benny Hill Show grabbed it and burned it into everybody’s skull. People are still using the damn thing in memes today.
And even if “Yakety Sax” somehow missed you, Boots was all over the place as a session player through the ’50s and ’60s. That’s him playing sax on Brenda Lee’s “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree.” That’s him on Roy Orbison’s “Oh, Pretty Woman.” Oh yeah, that’s also him on Elvis Presley’s “Return to Sender.”
Boots was especially important in country music. Saxophone was basically nowhere in the genre before he came along, but he shoved it in there anyway, and it later became a big ingredient in the Nashville Sound.
His own records, though, were jazz. Damn good jazz too.
Cool Boots is exactly what the title says: Boots Randolph taking a swing at cool jazz.
And I think he nails it.
Part of what makes Boots such a distinctive saxophonist is that bright, edgy, aggressive tone. He used a Bobby Dukoff D9 metal mouthpiece, and you can hear the bite in it. That sharp growl is a huge part of what made “Yakety Sax” jump out the way it did.
The trick on Cool Boots is that he keeps that tone but cools everything else down. The sax still has teeth, but now it floats. It growls and glides at the same time. That’s not an easy thing to pull off.
Every song here is a cover, but he finds something of his own inside each one. “Feelings” is a perfect example. That song has been stuck in my brain for years and still sounds corny as hell to me, but Boots somehow drags it into midnight. Suddenly it’s as though I’m at a bar, cigarette smoke everywhere, a beer going down my throat, and I know it’s about time to pay the bill.
Nothing on Cool Boots is innovative or game changing but it doesn’t need to be.
You get the feeling this is the kind of music Boots actually wanted to sit down and play. And he plays the hell out of it.
Sometimes it’s nice to hear something by someone who cares.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/6f335ef96ed40d544739134997448797c14cf557ae217582cb988320d951e543.jpeg

2026-09-01 20:41:15 CEST

Imagine trying to burn down a record shop because the owner doesn't want to buy your vinyl.
https://www.koin.com/local/multnomah-county/youre-a-dead-man-suspect-facing-multiple-charges-after-threatening-portland-record-store/

2026-09-01 20:30:02 CEST

“Take Your Time” by No Swoon
This band should be bigger than they are. You can say that about a lot of bands, sure, but I *especially* believe it about No Swoon.
I’ve been listening to *Take Your Time* for four solid years, and the damn thing still knocks me flat. It’s beautiful. It’s lush. It’s HUGE. In my opinion, this is the pinnacle of shoegaze, and it still amazes me that so few people seem to know about them.
The way Tasha Abbott and Zack Nestel-Patt paint these songs is stunning. Tasha has this incredible angelic voice with just a little yearning and sadness hanging off it, and then she comes in with these heavy guitar riffs that remind me of Black Sabbath. Zack gives the whole thing its atmosphere, wrapping those guitars and vocals in pulsing bass and ambient synths. Jonathan Smith handles the drums as a session musician, and he knows exactly where those rhythms need to go.
There aren’t many albums where I can say every single song is great. I mean every track. Every one of them is something I’d happily pull out and listen to by itself. *Take Your Time* is one of those rare beasts. Every track is killer.
Back in 2022, I got *extremely* lucky and grabbed this cassette. Only 100 were ever made, and somehow it was cheap too. I paid $8. And because I bought it off Bandcamp, I also got lossless files encoded at 24-bit/96kHz.
Today, once I finally got the cassette into my newly repaired deck, the sound just flattened me. It makes such a BIG noise. There’s so much happening across the frequency range, and the tape just pours the whole thing out.
And it looks like No Swoon is still alive and kicking. They *just* released a new single four days ago.
So I’m hoping there’s another album coming, because I absolutely believe they have another *Take Your Time* in them. Another great big beautiful thing.
https://noswoon.bandcamp.com/album/take-your-time
https://atomicpoet.org/media/e32a91b28e0266fbd50d313c442cfdedaa11433c88baa3a34cb4fccf2b9a4d19.jpg

2026-09-01 19:46:11 CEST

- reply

No, I’m not a Liberal partisan whatsoever. There’s lots of arrogance from decades of being “Canada’s Natural Governing Party”. And as long as I’ve been alive, they always been a party that campaigns on the left but governs on the right.
Ideally, we would have a Tommy Douglas-type leading the NDP and a John Diefenbaker-type leading the Conservatives.
But such is our times.

2026-09-01 19:33:46 CEST

- reply

I mean, what’s the alternative? The NDP leader isn’t even an MP yet, and the Conservative Party is full of traitors who want Canada to be the 51st state.
Sometimes you have to pick the lesser evil in order to fight the great evil.
Especially with American officials now openly pushing for annexation.

2026-09-01 19:23:48 CEST

Never voted Liberal in my life—until last election.
I have absolutely no love for the Liberal Party. I loathe Justin Trudeau.
But every damn day, I’m glad I parked my vote with Carney, because he’s doing the one thing I wanted him to do: stand up to Trump instead of rolling over for him.
That alone was worth the vote.

2026-09-01 18:30:28 CEST

Just watched Horror Hotel, starring Christopher Lee.
This thing is about witches, and it gets right down to business. A few hundred years back, a colonial witch is burned at the stake in New England. Problem solved?
Nope.
Jump ahead to the 60s. A college graduate gets interested in researching witchcraft, and her professor tells her about a hotel in the town where he grew up. So off she goes, poking around where she shouldn’t, with no idea that something evil has already got its claws into the place.
The movie was made in Britain but set in the northeastern United States. Over there they called it The City of the Dead. I don’t like that title much. It doesn’t even tell you what kind of meat you’re being served. The Americans called it Horror Hotel, and for once the Americans got the name right.
The performances are excellent, even though everybody is pushing things pretty hard. Nobody here is disappearing into some delicate little method performance. It’s big and grand. There’s ham on the bone. But that grandiosity fits the movie. Christopher Lee, as always, knows exactly how to stand there and make the air around him feel dangerous.
Horror Hotel flopped at the box office when it came out, but the thing refused to stay dead. It eventually picked up a cult following, especially among punk and metal people.
Scenes from it turned up in Iron Maiden’s 1990 music video “Bring Your Daughter… to the Slaughter.” King Diamond also used it in a music video. UFX, Rob Zombie, and The Misfits have all taken a bite out of it too.
What gets me is how mild the movie actually is. There’s no gore. Hardly any violence.
The damn thing is rated G.
And yet it got a cult following.
I think part of that comes from the devil worship. This was one of the first movies to use it explicitly as a plot device. When the movie came out in America, several lines mentioning Lucifer were cut.
Witches? Fine.
Devil worship? Fine.
But apparently a Yankee censor heard “Lucifer” and started sweating.
The other thing keeping Horror Hotel alive is the atmosphere. That part is thick.
I’m a sucker for high-contrast black-and-white photography, especially at night with fog everywhere, and this movie wallows in it. Black, white, night, fog—the whole thing looks cold and nasty.
And somehow, despite that G rating, it still manages to be unnerving. The body count is low. The violence barely shows its teeth. But the movie keeps that bad feeling crawling along underneath everything.
That works on me.
Apparently Horror Hotel was originally supposed to be a TV series starring Boris Karloff, and I can see it. That colonial American town feels like the kind of place where you could keep opening doors and finding another ugly secret behind each one.
Great movie.
Still more than watchable today.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/aab447287af1696f00b5caad26b7308483b6300b00f6ae9b2b368f6c5c0a88aa.jpeg

2026-09-01 08:51:24 CEST

10 years ago, I was gifted this tin box of horror films.
And I watched NONE of them.
The whole thing has been sitting there ever since, still sealed in shrink wrap, while I kept telling myself I’d get around to it. I never did. I just wasn’t in the mood for old-timey black-and-white horror flicks.
And it’s not like the movies suck. There are 10 films in this thing, and 1 of them is Nosferatu, so there has to be more good movies in the box.
Anyway, this tin was made in 2005. It has been sealed shut for 21 years. That ends tonight.
I’m ripping the shrink wrap off and finally letting the monsters out.
First up: Horror Hotel, starring Christopher Lee.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/05d1cc248cf5a6708d55c4175b825a0cd6a8096da862acfbc0ab82c1903b1fba.jpeg

2026-09-01 07:24:06 CEST

“Ghibli” by Savannah Funk.
It’s Monday night, and I’m in the mood for North African psychedelic funk.
This whole album is HOT. Bluesy guitar arpeggios sliding around, slinky rhythms underneath, and bass with plenty of meat on it.
When I first got this tape, I was mostly happy just to have something physical and analog. It sounded good. I liked the experience. But I always knew there was a little more hiding in there.
Now I’ve got the newly repaired Sony tape deck.
Damn. What a revelation.
The only way this could get better is if I were outside in a tent drinking Moroccan mint green tea while the tape rolls.
And I’m almost tempted. Almost. Then I remember the bugs—nah.
Better to stay right here and let the music do the work.
So that’s exactly what I’m doing.
Reclined. Headphones on. Letting Ghibli wash straight through me.
https://atomicpoet.org/media/1c0dbe20781dddddd18812de493761ff4e882564e0458470257511bba1ac4583.jpeg