Gene Krupa (1909 – 1973) pioneered orchestral jazz and Big Band from the flamboyant drum side, pounding tom-toms, high hats, and cymbals through the 30s, 40s, and 50s, as one of the most remarkable percussionists out there.
Recent Posts
Loose Nuts: Edison Reveals Huge Gap in Safety at San Onofre
Toonman Collamer opines: Work crews transferring radioactive spent fuel (nuclear waste) at the San Onofre nuclear plant from cooling pools into dry storage discovered a loose bolt inside one of the canisters, prompting Southern California Edison to temporarily halt the relocation effort. — Los Angeles Times
The US Shame of My Lai in Vietnam
On the 50th anniversary of the My Lai massacre in the Vietnam War, we honor the efforts of Army helicopter pilot Hugh Thompson to stop the madness and endure the quest for truth, and share the Vietnamese-made documentary, ‘The Sound of the Violin in My Lai’.
The Lucrative and Violent Curse of Coltan Mining in Congo
One of Africa’s most rare-minerals-rich countries, the Democratic Republic of Congo, has endured Belgian colonization, slavery, and continuing atrocities, where militant groups control the extraction of “conflict resources.” The tech industry turns these extracted raw materials into components of mobile phones and computers. Yet the cost is deadly.
Iannis Xenakis and the Notion of a Cosmic Utopia
Iannis Xenakis, the Greek-French experimental composer and protege designer for the famous architect Le Corbusier, advanced theories of the vertical “Cosmic” city as the only sustainable way forward. Here, he wrote this essay in 1966, decrying decentralization (read: suburban sprawl) in favor of building up, up, up…5 million inhabitants to be housed in a single megastructure, a hyperbolic paraboloid of more than 3,000 meters high and 50 meters wide.
Anthropocene Arrives, Climate Collapses, and No One Cares
Clive Hamilton writes on how governments, people, corporations, the world continues to plan for the future as if climate scientists don’t exist. The greatest shame is the absence of a sense of tragedy.
Montecito Mudslides, Climate Chaos Impact Chumash People – EcoJustice Radio
Marcus Lopez Senior, member of the Barbareno Chumash Nation in California, speaks with Jack Eidt from SoCal 350 on climate chaos and the impacts on the Chumash people from fires, mudslides, colonization, land theft, gentrification, and offshore drilling.
Tales of the Fifth Dimension – The Fifth Fedora
Transformative tales that thrive in the world of Lost Souls, Fallen Angels, Shapeshifters, Extra-Planetary Dragons, and Lucky Charms. From an assortment of writers, now available from Borda Books and WilderUtopia Books is The Fifth Fedora: An Anthology of Weird Noir & Stranger Tales curated by Jack Eidt and Silver Webb.
Buy the book!
‘Medicine Walk’ Featured in SBLitJo
Santa Barbara Literary Journal
‘Bellatrix: Volume 3’, features adventurous fiction, poetry, essays, and lyrics, and an excerpt of Jack Eidt’s psychic-animism fiction, Medicine Walk.
Buy the book!