Author: Mark Alexander

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Visualize the Perp Walk. Make It So.

I went to bed last night really upset that this orange moron is planning a coup in front of the cameras and there is just no reaction from most of the Republikkkans.

In fact many Republikkkan governors are already planning on helping him try to pull off an election night coup d’etat.

But then I woke up this morning realizing that this is more gaslighting from a man desperate not to lose, knowing that losing the whitehouse means going to jail for fraud, tax evasion and probably rape.

He wants us to give up on the idea of voting, to believe that he will send in troops to gather up mail in ballots and impound them and that our votes won’t matter.

The Biden teams knows he’s going to pull any number of shenanigans and they have a team of lawyers ready able and willing to kick up a shit storm when he does and folks, the lawyers that Trump has been using have been losing case after case after case.

Yes, he’s going to cheat.

Yes, he’s going to fight to stay in the office.

Remember Hillary got almost 3 million more votes than he did and a lot of people have already realized CheetohStalin must be stopped.

We can do this. Let’s all just visualize his perp walk while we vote.

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A Reimagined Star Wars

What would it look like?

Okay, it was one of those weird laying-awake-at-4am-because-the-world-is-collapsing thoughts I had today.

After seeing Denis Villeneuve’s imaging of both Blade Runner and Dune, I wondered, “What would a Villeneuve STAR WARS look like?” Okay, we know wresting the property from Disney will never happen, but just imagine an adult rendering of the STAR WARS story; one that included all the gritty details of what life was actually like under the Empire and drove home exactly why there was a rebellion in the first place.

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Vinyl Nerd Talk

The last phono cartridge I bought with my own money was a Shure M97xE  for $60 back in 2005. (It’s still available, but now selling for around $500. Don’t ask me why.) It replaced the Ortofon Nightclub S (no longer available) that I’d been spinning with since getting back into vinyl in 1997. I was amazed at how much better the Shure sounded; probably because it had a brand new, unworn stylus and was a “Hi-Fi” cartridge designed for home use, and not a “DJ” cartridge as was the Ortofon.

Several years later I received a gift cartridge from my friend John (yes, the same John that supplied me with that connector back in July) that he’d pulled from the stockpiles of equipment he’d inherited from our mutual friend Joel, owner of The Turntable Factory, who’d passed away in 2007.

Among them was a Shure V-15 Type IV, a legendary piece of kit from back in the late 70s. John admitted it wasn’t new, but assured me it there was very low mileage on the stylus.  I gave it a spin, and I loved it. It became my daily driver for many years (probably way more than it should have), but I rationalized its continued use by saying I really wasn’t playing that much vinyl, thereby keeping the stylus wear to a minimum. That is, until the day arrived that I had to admit it was quite overdue for replacement.

Shure was obviously no longer making stylii for what was then a 35 year old cartridge, and even if they had been, I wasn’t swimming in cash at the time, making even the third-party after-market replacements that were available prohibitively expensive. (I told you this had been a good cartridge.)

After discussing this with John and admitting I didn’t have a clue what to replace it with (and after living with it for several years I couldn’t easily return to the M97—which also needed a new stylus at that point—John told me not to sweat it; he had others in his inventory he would gladly send me.

The next care package to arrive (back in 2015 or thereabouts) contained an Ortofon OM 5E. The sound was okay. I mean, I was in a vinyl lull, not buying much anyway and the sound was definitely better than the worn Type IV, so I got used to it. When it came time earlier this year to replace its stylus and I was faced with the same dilemma of keeping and replacing the cartridge or replacing the whole thing with something else, John came through with another new OM as well as a spare stylus.

Admittedly, the new stylus made a world of difference, and was happy with the sound…until.

Until I got the new loudspeakers in August.

The sound I got from the OM was good enough for my old Infinitys, but the new JBLs are unforgiving, pointing out that the OM was just lacking. Lacking in what I couldn’t exactly say. Even keeping in mind my severely limited high frequency hearing, the sound just seemed dull. (Getting old is a bitch. I don’t recommend it.)

So I got off my ass and started doing research. I’d heard the Orofon 2M Red was good (after all it’s what Technics is pre-mounting on their new 1500C turntable), but after reading reviews and watching more YouTube videos than I care to admit, I decided to take it up a notch and ordered an Ortofon 2M Blue.

It arrived today.

After having spent only about two hours with it so far, I’m absolutely blown away. I wasn’t expecting much—the reason I bought it from Amazon, ensuring an easy return if I decided it wasn’t worth it—but it’s exactly as good as everyone described. And it hasn’t even broken in yet! Even with my old-age hearing loss, it’s like I’ve been running around with cotton in my ears all these years. From a brand new pressing of Dave Brubeck’s Take Five to a 40 year old copy of Fern Kinney’s Groove Me, the sound is phenomenal.

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Visions of DUNE

I ran across this artist, Alex Jay Brady (his Instagram) the other day and wanted to share. IMHO, his vision of DUNE is amazing, especially the worms:













From The Battle of Arakeen:

Guild Highliners:







Alex presents an interesting take on Giedi Prime, home of the Harkonnens. I’d always envisioned the planet as a dark, perpetually polluted hellscape, but Mr. Brady has a different view:




His interpretation of the ornithopters (in multiple panels above and pictured below on Caladan—something that was never explicitly stated in the books, but upon reflection would have to have been obvious) is also much more aligned with how I pictured them upon reading the novel, even moreso than Denis Vileneuve’s vision in the upcoming film:



From Book 3, God Emperor of DUNE, the worm/human hybrid himself, God Emperor Leto II:


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