Ulytau, new age/folk/metal from Kazakhstan

I found this band, as always, by accident, and I have to say that I like it very much. The title of this entry pretty much describes what type of music they play. Hailing from Kazakhstan, one of those ex-soviet republics nobody knew about before the fall from the Berlin Wall and afterwards, they combine rock influences with Huno-Kazakh instruments and traditions, pretty much sounding fresh and different, but at the same time very accesible. I found some videos on YouTube, one of them showing them sharing the stage with none other than Steven Seagal, the martial artist-actor (of sorts) that sometimes dabbles in music. And the result is nice enough. And I have to say, the violinist/singer happens to be one of the prettiest women I have ever seen.

Here's a live rendition of the song "Teriskakpay" (I have no idea what that means, okay?)



And here we have "Adai", and it seems to be patriotic of sorts.



Now, I have no idea of the name of this song. I am getting the CD soon, and this song is pretty cool and that violin lady looks quite fetching.



And here we have something really energetic, "Jumyr-Kylysh", or "The Legend of the Gray Wolf", and according to the video, seems to portray a traditional huno-turk hero similar to Kipling's Mowgli. Anyway, this song is pretty rocking and the video is cool.



As always, please enjoy and comment.

Very cool short movie about Lucifer

I'll just leave as it is, with no comments. Just see it and let me know if you like it or not. By the way, I was looking for something related to Lucifer, the post-Jovian sun on "2010." But this is a nice find anyway. I particularly love the body design for the dragon, more in line with animal geometry on Earth than the traditional renderings. Save for the head, of course.

Darwinian God or irresponsible father?

God, as I said before, if it really exists, could pretty well be classified, on scientific terms, as a mayor motherfucker and a bastard. How else could you explain the wanton destruction and devastation caused by natural disasters or the damage inflicted on Earth life by mankind? As a father, mother or whatever, God is lousy: He/she/it is letting the kids play with matches and pour gasoline all over the floor, while he/she/it is trying to watch "Cristina" or "Maury" on TV.

Or maybe the big guy/gal/thing is more interested in the evolutionary process of a species than in just preserving it because it's something with a sentimental value. While not intervening as an active force, God weeds the most unviable elements by just letting them be consumed by their own mistakes and their incapacity to deal with potentially obliterating changes in the envinroment. The survivors of nuclear war, ecology disasters, or a gamma ray burst from another galaxy would be very much suited for whatever may come afterwards. In the end, God's favourite children could turn out to be a bunch of roaches.

As a parent, the whole idea seems awful to even consider. But, who's to say we are in such privileged position in the order of creation that we are of a special value to a deity whose existence can as easily be proven and disproven? Now, if we take an atheistic route, we have to consider life on Earth as an accident, something that just happened by a set of circunstances manifested at the same time. And accidents can happen again and again, at least until something critical breaks and the whole machine falls apart. Without an engineer to fix it, the machine is bound to decay.

In any case, as with most situations, the only peoples (or species) worth saving may be those who try to save themselves. Like in Aesop fables, ask divinity for help only if you plan on do something yourself. But if you suceed by your own effort, then the whole plea to the gods ends up being pointless. Maybe there's no God, or God is just inexcrutable.

A consideration about aliens

I have been reading the first two books on the "Space Odyssey" series, namely "2001" and "2010." I went to Wikipedia to check for some information regarding them and found out that the late Arthur C. Clarke created what he called an "orthoquel" to the stories, a set of elements that move on a paralel fashion, not directly related, to the original Odyssey. According to the Wiki entry for the Time Odyssey series, "not-so-benevolent godlike aliens start an endless mission to regulate the development of sentient life in the Universe, in order to prevent all other species from harnessing too much of its energy, which would only accelerate the inevitable entropic death of the Universe, thus rendering sentient life impossible at the end of the universe. Consequently, these 'Firstborn' are destroying all intelligent species."

Somehow the idea got me wondering about how it could relate to the UFO situation at present. As far as we know, no verificable contact with other intelligences has ever been made, and it would seem as they are either not that interested in us or are trying to avoid us. If so, and if we accept the existence of the UFO phenomenon as interplanetary visitations, then the whole idea of them monitoring us with friendly intentions has no sense, unless we are a subject of study on the same level monkeys and meerkats are to us, interesting to behold, but not worth the possibily of contact. Now, how about if we are being monitored in order to keep us in check, to see that we don't have access to technologies that could potentially endanger not just us, but some other species as well. So far, all our destructive potential has been focused on us (as species) and maybe someone wants to see that it remains that way.

Also, I have to expose another idea. Regarding meerkats an monkeys again, if we had a tribe of those animals suddenly developing a technology that would harm many individuals, like meerkats developing fire or flint weapons, and engaging in warfare with other tribes, would human naturalists intervene? Certainly not, that would be against the spirit of scientific observation. Maybe they would pick some corpses and save some live specimens for study. I think the same could apply to alien observers on Earth. Don't count on them to save humanity, just the spoils of war/ecological degradation/cosmic disaster. That won't make them good or bad, just plainly scientific.

Anyway, on a side note, I just found I have the original and complete soundtrack for "2001: A Space Odyssey" on a cassette tape that has been forgotten on my office desk for years. Maybe I should digitize it in order to keep it for posterity.

Nightwish - While Your Lips Are Still Red

To start things up, here's a song that got me ridiculously romantic. Enjoy.

Nightwish - While Your Lips Are Still Red