Hear the 1962 Beatles Demo that Decca Rejected: “Guitar Groups are on Their Way Out, Mr. Epstein”

in Music | November 27th, 2012

It’s been called the biggest mis­take in music his­to­ry. On New Year’s Day 1962, Dec­ca Records had the oppor­tu­ni­ty to hear two new bands. One was Bri­an Poole and the Tremeloes. The oth­er was an obscure group from Liv­er­pool called the Bea­t­les. Of course, Dec­ca chose the Tremeloes. “Gui­tar groups are on their way out, Mr. Epstein,” was what the label’s senior A&R man, Dick Rowe, report­ed­ly said to Bea­t­les man­ag­er Bri­an Epstein. The Bea­t­les, who at that time includ­ed Pete Best on drums, record­ed 15 songs on New Year’s Day at the Dec­ca Stu­dios in Lon­don and select­ed 10 for their demo tape. The orig­i­nal 10-song tape (see the hand-writ­ten list of tracks below) will be auc­tioned today in Lon­don. Orga­niz­ers expect it to sell for around $30,000. Despite all the pre-auc­tion hype, the demo tracks them­selves have been around for decades on boot­leg and “grey mar­ket” records. And they’re online. You can lis­ten below and decide for your­self: If you were a record com­pa­ny exec­u­tive, would you have signed the Bea­t­les?

  1. “Like Dream­ers Do” (Lennon-McCart­ney)
  2. “Mon­ey (That’s What I Want)” (Gordy/Bradford)
  3. “Till There Was You” (Mered­ith Will­son)
  4. “The Sheik of Ara­by” (Smith/Wheeler/Snyder)
  5. “To Know Her is to Love Her” (Phil Spec­tor)
  6. “Take Good Care of My Baby” (King/Goffin)
  7. “Mem­phis, Ten­nessee” (Chuck Berry)
  8. “Sure to Fall (In Love with You)” (Cantrell/Claunch/Perkins)
  9. “Hel­lo Lit­tle Girl” Lennon-McCart­ney)
  10. “Three Cool Cats” (Leiber/Stoller)
  11. “Cry­ing, Wait­ing, Hop­ing” (Bud­dy Hol­ly)
  12. “Love of the Loved” (Lennon-McCart­ney)
  13. “Sep­tem­ber in the Rain” (Warren/Dubin)
  14. “Bésame Mucho” (Con­sue­lo Velásquez)
  15. “Searchin’ ” (Leiber/Stoller)

Relat­ed con­tent:

The Mak­ing of the Bea­t­les Song ‘Tomor­row Nev­er Knows’

‘Here Comes the Sun’: The Lost Gui­tar Solo by George Har­ri­son

The ‘Straw­ber­ry Fields For­ev­er’ Demos: The Mak­ing of a Bea­t­les Clas­sic

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New MOOC Introduces You to the Wonderful World of Infographics & Data Visualization

in Education, Online Courses | November 26th, 2012

Hans Rosling, a pro­fes­sor of glob­al health at Sweden’s Karolin­s­ka Insti­tute, became some­thing of an inter­net celebri­ty because of his knack for pre­sent­ing data in extreme­ly imag­i­na­tive ways. As you’ll see above, he’s the mas­ter of data visu­al­iza­tion. Now, thanks to a new MOOC from the Knight Cen­ter for Jour­nal­ism in the Amer­i­c­as at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Texas at Austin, you can devel­op some of these skills your­self. The free course, Intro­duc­tion to Info­graph­ics and Data Visu­al­iza­tion, begins on Jan­u­ary 12th and runs 6 weeks. The course is not taught by Rosling (sigh), but the cur­rent ver­sion of the course has drawn more than 2,000 peo­ple from 109 coun­tries. Intro­duc­tion to Info­graph­ics and Data Visu­al­iza­tion has been added to our col­lec­tion of our Com­plete List of MOOCs and Cer­tifi­cate Cours­es.

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Existential Moments with Theo Jansen and His Amazing Kinetic Sculptures, the Strandbeests

in Art, Life | November 26th, 2012

One gets the impres­sion that Theo Jansen sub­scribes to Dan­ish Philoso­pher Soren Kierkegaard’s max­im : Once you label me, you negate me.

(Aw hell, just acci­den­tal­ly negat­ed Kierkegaard again…)

In any event, no sin­gle label can suf­fice where Jansen is con­cerned. A mak­er of kinet­ic sculp­tures who resists defin­ing him­self as an artist. A trained physi­cist who cel­e­brates evo­lu­tion as a ‘mir­a­cle.’ An ear­ly morn­ing opti­mist. An evening depres­sive. An engi­neer of life, pre­oc­cu­pied by death.

All this is to say, Theo Jansen is an orig­i­nal, as com­pelling as the awe­some, lum­ber­ing crea­tures he con­jures from plas­tic tub­ing and wind. Hear him speak for him­self, above. Watch his Strand­beests in action below. And don’t feel bad if the labels you’ve spent a life­time amass­ing begin to feel a bit nar­row com­pared.

- Ayun Hal­l­i­day built a Rube Gold­berg Device under duress.

 

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Introducing 200 Free Educational Resources for K‑12 Students: Spread the Word & Tell Us Your Favorites

in Education, K-12 | November 26th, 2012

We got busy dur­ing the Thanks­giv­ing hol­i­day and put togeth­er a long-planned col­lec­tion of free edu­ca­tion­al resources for K‑12 stu­dents and their par­ents and teach­ers. We’re just get­ting start­ed with the list, and we’re hop­ing you could help make it bet­ter with your own sug­ges­tions. Right now the col­lec­tion fea­tures 200 help­ful resources, includ­ing free video lessons/tutorials; free mobile apps; free audio­books, ebooks and text­books; qual­i­ty YouTube chan­nels; free for­eign lan­guage lessons; test prep mate­ri­als; and free web resources in aca­d­e­m­ic sub­jects such as lit­er­a­ture, his­to­ry, sci­ence and com­put­ing. We hope you make good use of it with your fam­i­lies. We hope you tell a friend. And, right now, we hope you’ll tell us what great resources we’re miss­ing. We’d real­ly appre­ci­ate it if you would send us your thoughts.

You can start brows­ing here: 200 Free K‑12 Edu­ca­tion­al Resources: Video Lessons, Web Sites, Apps & More.

You can find this list in the future by click­ing on K‑12 Resources in the top nav­i­ga­tion bar.

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Watch The Mind of a Chef, the Unconventional Travel-Cooking Show Online (for a Limited Time)

in Television | November 26th, 2012

Ear­li­er this month, PBS pre­miered The Mind of a Chef, a 16-episode series that fea­tures nar­ra­tor Antho­ny Bour­dain tak­ing view­ers inside the mind of the award-win­ning Kore­an-Amer­i­can chef David Chang. In the series pre­miere above, David “dis­sects the roots of his pas­sion for ramen dish­es and tsuke­men on a trip to Japan,” giv­ing you an overview of the famous noo­dle and tak­ing you right to a ramen fac­to­ry. If the first episode, um, whets your appetite, then you’ll want to spend time with nine oth­er episodes from the series. They’re now post­ed online for a lim­it­ed time, cour­tesy of PBS, and they each run about 20 min­utes. But don’t dil­ly dal­ly, some will go offline on Novem­ber 30.

via Kot­tke

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Wim Wen­ders Vis­its, Mar­vels at a Japan­ese Fake Food Work­shop

Woody Allen Lives the “Deli­cious Life” in Ear­ly-80s Japan­ese Com­mer­cials

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Johnny Cash Sings “Man in Black” for the First Time, 1971

in Music, Television | November 26th, 2012

Recent­ly we fea­tured a video of Neil Young per­form­ing on The John­ny Cash Show in 1971. Today we bring you anoth­er extra­or­di­nary moment from the very same episode: John­ny Cash intro­duc­ing his now-clas­sic song, “Man in Black.”

It’s from a spe­cial called “John­ny Cash on Cam­pus” which aired on Feb­ru­ary 17, 1971. The per­for­mance was taped in front of an all-stu­dent audi­ence at the Ryman Audi­to­ri­um in down­town Nashville. A few days ear­li­er Cash had trav­eled across town to vis­it stu­dents on the cam­pus of Van­der­bilt Uni­ver­si­ty and, as he explains here in the intro­duc­tion, an idea began brew­ing.

1971 was a time of wide­spread stu­dent protests over the Viet­nam War and oth­er issues. The Kent State shoot­ings had hap­pened the year before. As a protest song, “Man in Black” shows Cash’s abil­i­ty to reach across gen­er­a­tions and appeal to audi­ences much wider than those usu­al­ly afford­ed to coun­try music.

When Cash first played the song at Ryman Audi­to­ri­um it was so new he need­ed cue cards to fol­low the words. The video offers a rare glimpse of an artist try­ing out a major work when the paint was still wet.

Relat­ed con­tent:

John­ny Cash: Singer, Out­law and, Briefly, Tele­vi­sion Host

The 1969 Bob Dylan-John­ny Cash Ses­sions: Twelve Rare Record­ings

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The Coen Brothers Make a TV Commercial — Ridiculing “Clean Coal”

in Comedy, Film, Technology, Television | November 26th, 2012

When famous movie direc­tors shoot tele­vi­sion spots, they usu­al­ly focus on the mer­its of a par­tic­u­lar prod­uct: Wim Wen­ders and Stel­la Artois, Wes Ander­son and the Hyundai Azera, Jean-Luc Godard and Schick after­shave. Above, you’ll see one by Joel and Ethan Coen meant not to endorse but to oppose. Premised on the notion that the name “clean coal” masks a not-espe­cial­ly-clean tech­nol­o­gy, “Clean Coal Clean” dish­es it out against the coal indus­try — “the most trust­ed name in coal” — with a satir­i­cal pas­tiche of house­hold clean­ing spray com­mer­cials. I’ll say this: if any pair of film­mak­ers can get me to watch a video about the pol­i­tics of coal, the guys behind Rais­ing Ari­zona, Bar­ton Fink, and A Seri­ous Man can. The clip just below offers a look into the pro­duc­tion of anoth­er “Clean Coal Clean” par­o­dy com­mer­cial, and a rare chance to see the Coen broth­ers at work.

Mar­la Dick­er­son in the Los Ange­les Times pro­vides back­ground on this “lat­est sal­vo in the media bat­tle between the coal indus­try and envi­ron­men­tal­ists over the role that car­bon fuels should play in the Unit­ed States’ ener­gy future.” Dick­er­son quotes a coal spokesman on how the “the indus­try spent more than $50 bil­lion since the 1970s installing pol­lu­tion-con­trol equip­ment and design­ing plants that are more effi­cient.” She also lays out the envi­ron­men­tal­ists’ argu­ment: “the coal indus­try’s mar­ket­ing cam­paign has left Amer­i­cans with the impres­sion that such ‘clean coal” tech­nol­o­gy already exists. Such a break­through has yet to be devel­oped,” she quotes the Sier­ra Cub’s coal cam­paign direc­tor as say­ing, “and may nev­er be at a cost that makes eco­nom­ic sense.” Of course, not even a genius auteur — not even two of them — can make up your mind on this issue. But with these spots, the Coen broth­ers and the Alliance for Cli­mate Pro­tec­tion reit­er­ate an invalu­able point: whether about house­hold clean­ers or ener­gy sources, nev­er believe the hype.

Relat­ed con­tent:

Wim Wen­ders Cre­ates Ads to Sell Beer (Stel­la Artois), Pas­ta (Bar­il­la), and More Beer (Car­ling)

Wes Anderson’s New Com­mer­cials Sell the Hyundai Azera

Fellini’s Fan­tas­tic TV Com­mer­cials

David Lynch’s Sur­re­al Com­mer­cials

Jean-Luc Godard’s After-Shave Com­mer­cial for Schick

Col­in Mar­shall hosts and pro­duces Note­book on Cities and Cul­ture. Fol­low him on Twit­ter at @colinmarshall.

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Khan Academy Releases New App for iPhone & iPod Touch, Giving You Mobile Access to 3600 Videos

in Education, iPhone, K-12 | November 26th, 2012

Non-prof­it Khan Acad­e­my, an orga­ni­za­tion ded­i­cat­ed to “pro­vid­ing a free world-class edu­ca­tion for any­one any­where,” does so pri­mar­i­ly through online video cours­es and lec­tures. The over 3600 videos are free and access is open to any­one (any­where), allow­ing K‑12 stu­dents to study math, sci­ence, com­put­er sci­ence, finance & eco­nom­ics, human­i­ties, and test prep. The orga­ni­za­tion was found­ed in 2006 by MIT and Har­vard grad Salman Khan, who began by tutor­ing rel­a­tives and friends in Bangladesh while he worked as a hedge fund ana­lyst in the States. His videos became so in-demand that he decid­ed to quit his job and dis­trib­ute them full-time, fund­ed by dona­tions from indi­vid­u­als and major donors like the Bill and Melin­da Gates Foun­da­tion.

While there is a healthy amount of skep­ti­cism about the effi­ca­cy of Khan’s meth­ods, there’s no short­age of demand for the kind of instruc­tion he offers to stu­dents all over the world. To fur­ther meet that demand, Khan Acad­e­my has just released an app for iPhone and iPod Touch. Unlike the app released this past March for the iPad, the iPhone ver­sion does not allow inter­ac­tiv­i­ty. Users can view videos but can­not, as with the iPad app, down­load playlists, read sub­ti­tles, and log progress, mak­ing this ver­sion “more for con­sump­tion rather than full inter­ac­tion.” Nev­er­the­less, and whether crit­ics like it or not, this rep­re­sents a fur­ther step for dis­tance learn­ing, as edu­ca­tion increas­ing­ly moves out of the class­room and into the hand­held devices of net­works of stu­dents no longer restrict­ed by geog­ra­phy or phys­i­cal mobil­i­ty.

The app has been added to our brand-spank­ing new col­lec­tion: 200 Free K‑12 Edu­ca­tion­al Resources: Video Lessons, Web Sites, Apps & More

Via Makeuse­of

Josh Jones is a doc­tor­al can­di­date in Eng­lish at Ford­ham Uni­ver­si­ty and a co-founder and for­mer man­ag­ing edi­tor of Guer­ni­ca / A Mag­a­zine of Arts and Pol­i­tics.

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