>> ^imstellar28:
Three men walk into a bar. Two go and find a seat while the other heads to the bar to buy the first round. As he approaches the barman, the barman can't help but notice how well-to-do this man looks. He is covered head to toe in the finest garments and jewelry, he is even wearing a crown, a monocle, and carrying a scepter. In short, all the trappings of a cartoon billionaire. As the bar man is pulling the pints he remarks to the gentlemen: "I hope you don't think I'm prying, but, I couldn't help but notice you seem pretty well off. How, may I ask did you come into such a fortune?"
the man replies:" Well, me and my friends over there found a genie in a beer bottle outside, and he granted us each a wish"
barman:"So, I take it you wished to be the richest man in the world"
The man puts one finger on his nose, and points at the barman with the other hand, as you would in a game of charades
barman:" Not a bad choice at all if i do say so"
The man nods politely, pays for the round and goes over to his friends
After a while, the second man goes up to the bar. This man is notable only insofar as he can barely be seen for all the beautiful woman draped around him, seemingly caressing every available inch of his body. He orders another round which the barman dutifully pulls. As he finishes off the last pint he can't help but comment: "I hope you don't mind me asking but, you are a friend of that wealthy gentlemen over there aren't you?"
"I am indeed" murmurs the man from beneath the pile of beauties.
"And you wished to be the most attractive man in the world"
"Pretty much, yeah"
"Excellent choice sir, enjoy your round" says the barman with the kind of knowing smile you tend to see on people vicariously appreciating the implied sexual exploits of a stranger. So he shuffles back to the table and him and his friends have their drinks. Not long later the third man approaches the bar and asks for another round. The barman cannot help but notice this man has an orange for a head. But he carries on pulling the pints in silence, until he cannot contain himself any longer and asks
"You found the genie too right?"
"That's correct" replies the man with an orange for a head.
"And what did you wish for, if you don't mind me asking?"
"I wished to have an orange for a head"


That's so funny I forgot to laugh!

(betcha neva herd dat)

Three men walk into a bar. Two go and find a seat while the other heads to the bar to buy the first round. As he approaches the barman, the barman can't help but notice how well-to-do this man looks. He is covered head to toe in the finest garments and jewelry, he is even wearing a crown, a monocle, and carrying a scepter. In short, all the trappings of a cartoon billionaire. As the bar man is pulling the pints he remarks to the gentlemen: "I hope you don't think I'm prying, but, I couldn't help but notice you seem pretty well off. How, may I ask did you come into such a fortune?"

the man replies:" Well, me and my friends over there found a genie in a beer bottle outside, and he granted us each a wish"

barman:"So, I take it you wished to be the richest man in the world"

The man puts one finger on his nose, and points at the barman with the other hand, as you would in a game of charades

barman:" Not a bad choice at all if i do say so"

The man nods politely, pays for the round and goes over to his friends

After a while, the second man goes up to the bar. This man is notable only insofar as he can barely be seen for all the beautiful woman draped around him, seemingly caressing every available inch of his body. He orders another round which the barman dutifully pulls. As he finishes off the last pint he can't help but comment: "I hope you don't mind me asking but, you are a friend of that wealthy gentlemen over there aren't you?"

"I am indeed" murmurs the man from beneath the pile of beauties.

"And you wished to be the most attractive man in the world"

"Pretty much, yeah"

"Excellent choice sir, enjoy your round" says the barman with the kind of knowing smile you tend to see on people vicariously appreciating the implied sexual exploits of a stranger. So he shuffles back to the table and him and his friends have their drinks. Not long later the third man approaches the bar and asks for another round. The barman cannot help but notice this man has an orange for a head. But he carries on pulling the pints in silence, until he cannot contain himself any longer and asks

"You found the genie too right?"

"That's correct" replies the man with an orange for a head.

"And what did you wish for, if you don't mind me asking?"

"I wished to have an orange for a head"

Haha, I remember seeing this after work walking toward the station.

Everyone was in a state of alert. Some of them had their mobile phone out to take pictures, and I could overhear others quietly murmuring 'it's 9/11 again!'

^ I'd said "that I can recall in the last few years". Clinton is over 10 years ago. Condit I had to look up who he even was (and his scandal was 8 years ago). Other than Frank being gay, I had to look up what scandal you're talking about, and that one was 20 years ago.

Paterson didn't really have a scandal, so much as the day he was sworn in he said "here are all the skeletons in my closet", including admitting to an affair years before he'd become Lt. Governor.

I'll admit Ohio AG is sticks, but Kilpatrick was mayor of Detroit, and Blagojevich was Governor of Illinois. I'd forgotten about Newsom, but if Kilpatrick is sticks, so is the mayor of SF.

I've not heard much about the Charlie Rangel thing lately, but the whole thing seemed a bit tame, and more of a "he screwed up" than "he intentionally broke the law". You're also way overstating the Tim Geithner thing -- he owed back taxes, and paid them. The commentary surrounding the discrepancy was that it's a common mistake for people to make on their taxes, even if they use a professional.

Edwards, you make an interesting case. Perhaps as an outsider you might not know about how the party insiders reacted to his affair, but most people in the grassroots were furious with him -- not because we think his personal indiscretions disqualify him -- but because he was an early favorite in the grassroots, and had he won the primary he might've handed the White House to the gang of thugs known as the Republican party.

Lately there's been a quiet murmur about missing his voice on the issue of poverty, but I've not heard of any serious attempts for him to recover his image. To be honest, I'd like to see him try, because I think his voice would add to the party, assuming he can get public absolution for being a jerk to his wife (who the grassroots almost like more than him).

Personally, I don't care about sex scandals. They are really none of our business at all. I think people in office should be judged more on their execution of their state-granted responsibilities than what they do in their personal life.

I actually feel a slim bit of sympathy for Mark Sanford since he seems to have a rather serious personal issue to work through, and having public scrutiny doesn't help with that. But I think he needs to resign for the "I'm leaving the country for 10 days and telling no one" part of the story. I don't care that he was going away to have sex for those 10 days. In fact that was almost a relief to me, I was worried it'd turn out to be some ugly weapons deal or drug dealing kind of thing (like Reagan and Iran-Contra...).

enoch,

Its not the violence I'm concerned with, its the courage it took that girl to say "NO." The internal fortitude it takes to give up the safety of your slavery and risk your life for what you believe in.

I say Americans are cowards, because unlike the Iranians they don't have the courage to say "NO," they just quietly murmur "yes we can" while slowly marching to the death of old age, in shackles.

Cops are needed rougy. Given that they make bad decisions from time to time, and over exert themselves in more than one occasion.

But that is really a small price to pay compared to what it would be like when cops aren't there to help you.

Many of you are so pent up on this 'the big bully' image of cops that you really forget how necessary they are, and why they act certain ways.



And as for the 'cat and mouse' theory, again you can just flip that story and say that you guys shouldn't expect the worst and act like dicks in front of cops. They're there to help you out and inform you what's going wrong and what's legal. You don't wanna be bothered by the cops? Don't provoke them, and don't do retarded shit that's borderline illegal. Is that so hard?



When I was in college I was getting a ride from one of my friend. His right headlight happened to be out in the rain, and the cop stopped us for it.

We didn't give the guy any attitude. We said we were sorry and we weren't aware of it. Told the cop we'll fix it as soon as the shops open on this coming monday.

That's it, the cop let us go with just a warning.



Next case, typical college kids drinking beer on the front porch. The cops approach us while riding a bike. They see that a few kids were gathered up, so they just give us a warning not to get too rowdy. Okay, thank you, have a good night. That's it. But as soon as the cop walks past the road curve I hear one of my friends murmur 'fucking pigs'.

And I am sure the cop actually heard these words over his shoulder. But he chooses to ignore it, and goes back on his patrol route.

Now, what did this cop do so wrong anything other than to tell you to be careful? He was just informing you that such laws exists, and reminding you of it. Because he doesn't want you to get in trouble, and they don't wanna bust in a good going crowd and ruin your fun either. Why do you need to call them names?



A lot of you always put yourself in the 'individual' category, but I recommend you put yourself in the 'enforcers' perspective once in a while. Then you'll start to see why certain things happen, and why misunderstandings can happen.

Cops are people too. Regular joes with friends and family. They're not here to ruin your day or out there just because they love to 'cap some ass'.


There's always been strong bias and wrongly placed animosity towards any types of authority by blue collar working class. And here in videosift we've got women's rights activists, environmentalists, pro-gay, pro-choice activists and what have you, fighting for individual rights and minorities. But Even YOU, VideoSifters aren't free from bias against authority figures, just because they have that title.

Damn.......I sound very republican right now don't I? LOL

Who decides when there will be general outrage? I mean, Clinton blowjob, outrage! Watergate, outrage! Nipplegate, outrage!
Criminal acts and lies by the president, only a murmur...

EDIT - Actually, instead of just listing it, I'll copy out my descriptions of them too since I already wrote this up for another forum:


1. The Flashbulb - Soundtrack to a Vacant Life | Instrumental | 4.5/5

Simply put, a seamless, sweeping epic of genres that dabbles in everything from sombre piano ballads, to upbeat flamenco, caustic electronica, serene ambience, rhythmic percussive tribal drum sections and haunting string sections, imposing every possible emotion on the listener. If anything, the sole weakness is that the rough 2-3 minute length of each of the 31 songs means they don't work so effectively as standalone compositions but as verses in a protracted poem, making the idea of listening to the entirety of it a tad daunting.


2. Protest The Hero - Fortress | Progressive Metal | 4.5/5

Metal that while relatively intricate yet melodic enough and hell, catchy enough to avoid divulging into incomprehensible technical wankery. Lyrics abound with references to goddesses and dethroned kings but it's decidedly tongue in cheek. Perhaps the biggest weaknesses resides in a lack of coherence, a tendency for the album to mesh together as a string of riffs, with little sense of a recurring chorus or verses within songs, but then you can take that as a plus depending on how you look at it. Besides that and a couple of immensely obnoxious vocal lines it's a pretty solid effort all around.


3. Blue Sky Black Death - Late Night Cinema | Instrumental Trip-hop | 4.5/5

One of the least expected surprises this year for me, partly because I generally despise anything that relates in any way to hip-hop or remixes yet I was sold on first listen. It’s just such a supremely chilled out but simultaneously melodically multilayered album which weaves hip-hop/trip-hop styling with a fairly significant utilisation of violins, trumpets, keyboards and an organ, capping it off with a distinct jazz tinge.


4. In Mourning - Shrowded Divine | Melodic Death Metal | 4/5

Genre-wise they’re probably best described as melodic death metal based but with progressive and doom influenced sections, reminiscent of Opeth, but not exactly the same. I initially junked this when I first picked it up but it’s grown on me immensely since then. There’s nothing immediately about them that sticks out as particularly impressive, the riffs aren’t all too complex, the melody isn’t overly diverse. If anything the drumming is quite good and both the harsh and clean vocals are solid. Nevertheless they clearly have a knack for creating memorable melody lines, and many minor touches such as the use juxtaposed clean and harsh vocals of essentially the same lines, coupled with a number of sexy breakdowns and a consistently bleak and permeating tone really make this album memorable in some indescribable way.


5. Transcending Bizarre? - The Serpent's Manifolds | Avant-Garde Black Metal | 4/5

Typical black metal brain mashing, but nicely broken up by violin sections to prevent migraines! Again it really feels like this band just clicks, but that not to say they can’t put out some impressively melodic riffs, and solos or bring it intensity-wise. In terms of criticism, there’s probably too much reliance on violin for a metal album, but that’s a very subjective disparagement, also a select few sections drag a bit ... oh and the intro is obnoxious and highly skipable. Oh and keyboards, oh the humanity! Run for the hills!


6. Thrice - The Alchemy Index - Vol.3 & 4 Air & Earth | Experimental Rock | 4/5

Partially successful but suffers from issues strangely distinct from the first two volumes. Whereas the first two could perhaps be argued to have taken the element concepts too literally both melodically and lyric-wise, this time around there are fairly tentative connections to the elements. With Air there’s simply a heavy use of reverb and echo to create the impression of an expansive soundscape, among a number of other tricks; whereas Earth is merely embodied by heavy use of stripped back and stark acoustic guitar with an American folk grounding. In all, neither really captures the concept as effectively as the haphazard, chaotic, distorting Fire; and if anything the biggest weakness of Air is it doesn’t distance it enough from the seeping smoothness that characterised Water to offer anything particularly distinctive. All in all it still remains an intriguing unconventional attempt with a number of standout songs, particularly the sonnets that outro each of the volumes oddly enough, led by consistently strong vocals.


7. Bar Kokhba Sextet - Lucifer The Book of Angels - Vol. 10 | Jazz | 4/5

I'm not really qualified to comment on or critique jazz as I'm very much a neophyte to it, but this is some excellent stuff.


8. Lights Out Asia - Eyes Like Brontide | Post Rock | 4/5

To me the main element any post rock effort needs to really be effective is a pervasive, consistent atmosphere, which this album abounds with. It doesn't fall into clichés such as blasting you into submission by badgering you with volume changes, or an over reliance on monotonous arpeggios, but builds upon subtle layers of sound to create a vast, rich soundscape of echoing guitars, staccato electronica beats and fleeting vocals.


9. Opeth - Watershed | Progressive Death Metal | 4/5

Disappointingly inconsistent by their standards, but still a pretty solid album all around. Some songs definitely drag massively, and certain parts sound technically overindulging and tiresome particularly the outro to Burden. On the other hand in my humble opinion it also has some of the best songs they have written, the way the progressive acoustic guitar section fades in and out in Porcelain Heart for example is seamlessly mesmerising, Hessian Peel is almost equally memorable. Regardless this is no Blackwater Park unfortunately.


10. Mutyumu - Ilya | Post Rock | 4/5

Post rock doesn't really give this band justice. It's like an odd mix of opera and hardcore Japanese vocals, with heavily piano reliant post rock grounding. Awesome? Somewhat. Half the time its carried by stirring complex but seemingly effortless piano and string sections unfolding at a blistering pace coupled with occasional strangely effective hushed murmurs, yet the other half of the time it cascades into almost unbearable droning repetition. Now given that, Prayer is damn well one of the best post rock songs I have ever heard and it really is a pity that the rest of the album wasn’t equally brilliant. I probably overrate this a tad too but well ... goshdarnit it’s all gotta be about job creation and shoring up our economy.

Kurt Vonnegut (RIP) said the following:

And now I want to tell you about my late Uncle Alex. He was my father’s kid brother, a childless graduate of Harvard who was an honest life insurance salesman in Indianapolis. He was well-read and wise. And his principal complaint about other human beings was that they so seldom noticed it when they were happy. So when we were drinking lemonade under an apple tree in the summer, say, and talking lazily about this and that, almost buzzing like honeybees, Uncle Alex would suddenly interrupt the agreeable blather to exclaim, ''If this isn’t nice, I don’t know what is.''

So I do the same now, and so do my kids and grandkids. And I urge you to please notice when you are happy, and exclaim or murmur or think at some point, ''If this isn’t nice, I don’t know what is.''

That’s one favor I’ve asked of you.

Now I’ve got another one, a show of hands. How many of you have had a teacher at any point in your entire education who made you happier to be alive, prouder to be alive than you had previously believed possible? Now please say the name of that teacher out loud to someone sitting or standing near you.

OK? All done? ''If this isn’t nice, I don’t know what is.''

riff sounds like murmur by john frusciante

Man so coool! Love the murmur with every note, Slam Stewart, Mose Allison, Rashaan Roland Kirk, a few more who's similar idiosyncratic interpretacious-improvisations this clip connects....
thanks for the synaptic trip-

The Laser Interferometer Gravitational Wave Observatory is spearheading the completely new field of gravitational wave astronomy and opening a whole new window on the universe. LIGO's exquisitely sensitive instruments may ultimately take us farther back in time than we've ever been, catching, perhaps, the first murmurs of the universe in formation.

Their first television appearance.

Yes, they DID once have energy and passion!
Yes, Michael Stipe DID once have hair!

Murmur, what an album.