Piano, Warden, X, Epiphany, Witch
How One Instrument Defined A Generation
12tone | YouTube | 10th July 2020
Invented in 1982, the Yamaha DX7 "allowed the end user almost complete control over the timbre, or tone, of the instrument," but its most popular preset was E Piano 1, a sound which utterly dominates 80's pop songs. In-depth tonal analysis of why the E Piano 1 timbre is more "digital" sounding than the piano it imitates (the Fender Rhodes), and why it arrived at just the right time (11m50s)
Interview With An Executioner
Soft White Underbelly | YouTube | 26th June 2020
Fascinating window into an Alabama executioner's mind. "I didn't put 'em there – I didn't go out and arrest 'em, and sit in judgment on 'em. Once they got there, that was their problem. And they knew that. And I tried to treat 'em in such a way that when the time came, we could look 'em in the eye" (16m06s)
Whatever Happened To The X Rating?
Entertain the Elk | YouTube | 15th July 2020
A wistful postmortem of the X Rating, which "eventually became a death sentence to a film," because "though G, R and later PG-13 were trademarked, X never was. With no registered trademark, the X could legally be self-applied to any film, a loophole that the pornography industry happily exploited" (11m31s)
How Dolly Parton Led Me To An Epiphany
TED | YouTube | 16th July 2020
An Arab journalist, raised in Tennessee, realizes that "Dolly's Tennessee mountain home, looks exactly like [his] dad's home in the mountains of Lebanon." He reevaluates country music, which had always alienated him, as the music of immigrants. A journalistic revelation (13m07s)
Humorous Video Of The Week
In 1590, three fishwives try to escape the King's witch hunt
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