the brandensite

Toto, David Lynch, and Brian Eno: Dune 2024 Nov 19
Steve Lukather, from the band Toto, on sharing a credit with Brian Eno on the soundtrack to David Lynch's 1984 Dune:

I’ve never met Brian. Love his work, but he wrote a 30-second theme and basically got the same credit as us. They used him because of his name value, so people attributed our work to him and his work to us, and it was confusing. It was much hipper to say Brian Eno wrote the score than Toto at the time. If they didn’t like the movie, they’d go after us. If they liked it, they’d give Eno all the credit. I have no beef with Brian Eno, I have no beef with David. That’s what he wanted so he should have it. I love Brian Eno.

And later in the interview, David Paich, the primary songwriter for Toto, on visiting David Lynch's home:

I remember when I went to his house, he had this haunting, low, whistling sound. I said, “What is that?” He said he went to Scotland up into the hills where there was supposedly a haunted castle. This was the wind whistling through the castle, and he recorded that. He puts it on all of his movies. This low wisp of a sound. It’s almost like a foghorn.

This is not a photograph 2024 Nov 16
The wonderfully vibrant photography of Edwina Hay, who specializes in musicians and portraiture.

Open Letter to President Trump 2024 Nov 14
I wholeheartedly agree with and have added my name to the letter to President Trump written by Rabbi Rick Jacobs and Union for Reform Judaism over which he presides and of which I am a member:

Dear President Trump,

I hope and pray that in your next term in office, you will be a president for all Americans, advancing the principles of democracy, justice, and commitment to rule of law that have been sources of strength for our nation throughout its history.

As an American and a Reform Jew, I am committed to the protection of the orphan, the widow, and the stranger. I will support any serious effort by your administration to combat antisemitism, and I will champion a strong U.S.-Israel relationship that fosters democracy in and security for the Jewish state and demands the rights, well-being, and national aspirations of Palestinian civilians in Gaza and the West Bank are upheld.

At the same time, I will join in fierce opposition to any further efforts to eviscerate reproductive rights, to target the safety and rights of the LGBTQ+ community, to harm communities of Color, or to undermine the health of our air, water, and land. I will join in defense of the security of immigrants and the right to claim asylum. I will vehemently oppose the weaponization of political power against individuals and institutions that are core to our democracy, including the courts and the press. And above all, I urge an end to the repeated demeaning of women, the use of hateful language against those who hold different views, and the persistent coarsening of our political culture.

We are all made more whole when we treat others with the respect every human being deserves. Please, help heal the wounds our nation bears and govern as a president for all Americans.

Why America is in such a mess 2024 Nov 13
Excerpts from a July 2022 The Sunday Times article written by the Oxford scholar who directs their America Institute:

None of us have seen the United States as divided and distressed as it is now.

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Watch the talk shows and listen to people in the streets: both sides genuinely believe that if the other wins, everything they hold dear will be destroyed.

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And while division is now more serious than for decades, a longer historical perspective suggests that extreme polarisation is not the exception in American politics but the norm.

Until the 1950s, the Supreme Court allowed states huge latitude to evade constitutional provisions which, on parchment at least, guaranteed equal rights to all citizens. The so-called “Jim Crow” apartheid laws in the South meant that, for people of colour at least, travelling across state lines meant moving into dramatically different legal regimes. Maintaining racial segregation required authoritarian government including a heavily armed police and equally heavy restrictions on freedom of speech and private life. Policing sexual politics was an essential part of the system.

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And then there was the actual Civil War of the 1860s, a conflict in which three-quarters of a million people died (in proportional terms the equivalent of about seven million today). Over the century and a half since the South was defeated in that war, a huge amount of emotional and literary effort has been expended on making the case that the war was a tragic accident, which somehow brought the country together, that despite taking up arms against the government the white South were somehow still fighting for American values.

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Perhaps the harsh truth is that the United States has always been a nation divided by a common flag.

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But if they share a reverence for their Revolution, Americans have never agreed on what it means. Did the rebellious colonists of 1776 create a republic dedicated to the radical idea of human equality? Or did they create a fundamentally conservative republic, shaped by Christian values? ... The most dangerous moments in US politics have been fights over who is “really” an American.

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But even as Washington retired to his wife and slaves in Mount Vernon, bitter partisanship convulsed the republic, and it did so for the same basic reason that it does today—partisans genuinely believed only they were true patriots and that their opponents were enemies of the republic. If that’s what you think, naturally you will do anything to win, including, if necessary, overturning election results that don’t go your way.

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The United States has prospered, despite its divisions and institutional sclerosis, because – most of the time — it has given well-founded hope of prosperity to ordinary people. If that proves no longer to be true, then the game may finally be up.

The bloodiest Western gunfight you’ve never heard of 2024 Nov 13
In 1880 California the railroads (led by among others Leland Stanford) squared off against a group of former Confederate soldiers now squatting on speculated land in a place called Mussel Slough, in the southern Central Valley. When the conflict spilled over into violence, it resulted in a gunfight leaving 7 dead immediately. The incident's infamy was felt far and wide though, by those as far away as Karl Marx in London, with many siding with one interest or the other for their own ideological or political reasons. This linked well-researched 2015 blog post by historian Adam Smith goes into all the details.

Darién Gap 2024 Nov 11
Speaking of dying in Panama, the Darién Gap – that inhospitable, entirely undeveloped stretch of dense tropical rainforest-covered mountains outside the reach of civilization that separate Central America from South – had a record 520,000 people cross through it last year, more than double 2022 numbers and up from only 24,000 in 2019. The reasons for this are many, but two large ones are the 7 million people fleeing Venezuela and those, oddly, fleeing China. Them, plus others seeking refuge in North America, are forced through this lawless region where all the horrific things you expect to happen in a lawless place are taking place.

Building the Panama Canal had a huge human cost 2024 Nov 11
Sometimes relegated as a mere footnote to the Panama Canal's construction, the project claimed tens of thousands of lives and injured an uncounted swath more. Lost limbs were such a frequent occurrence that a charity in New York was created specifically to sent artificial legs to Panama. But the conditions for receiving the replacement limbs were strict, and many lives were left in tatters. Quoting directly a 1913 appeal directly from one of the laborers, Wilfred McDonald, from either Barbados or Jamaica:

I have ben Serveing the ICC [Isthmian Canal Commission] and the PRR [Panama Railroad] in the caypasoity as Train man From the yea 1906 until my misfawchin wich is 1912. Sir without eny Fear i am Speaking Nothing But the Truth to you, I have no claim comeing to me. But for mercy Sake I am Beging you To have mercy on me By Granting me a Pair of legs for I have lost both of my Natrals. I has a Mother wich is a Whido, and too motherless childrens which During The Time when i was working I was the only help to the familys.

Holy City 2024 Nov 10
San Jose's very own utopia-slash-cult, founded in 1919 just south of Los Gatos. Founded in San Francisco by a white supremacist misogynistic bigamist, the cult made money by masquerading as a roadside tourist trap on the route between San Jose and Santa Cruz, complete with carbonated liquor and peep shows. It was granted California's second ever radio station license, somehow getting the callsign KFQU, which became known for drifting away from its assigned frequency. By the time Highway 17's completion bypassed Holy City in 1940, their reputation for supporting Hitler's Nazi Germany had already set the place on the path towards destitution.

The land has since changed owners several times, but game respects game, and it is now owned by the Church of Scientology.

The surprisingly contentious boundaries of Santa Cruz County 2024 Nov 10
Linked is a recent blog post about the history of the borders of Santa Cruz County, since while we've always known where the city of Santa Cruz lies, we have not always agreed to what extent those smelly hippies should tame their surrounding chaos.

Zayante Tunnel 2024 Nov 10
In the 1880s, the Southern Pacific Railroad was built from Oakland to Santa Cruz. To reach through the Santa Cruz Mountains, tunnels were dug. One particular tunnel, a short 250-foot span in Zayante, isn't terribly remarkable. Except that, because it was bored through solid granite, when the railroad closed in 1940, the tunnel was deemed stable and sturdy, and the railroad left it open and intact.

And that way it stayed for twelve years, until, in the Cold War's escalating paranoia, a document retention interest purchased it and turned it into the Western States Atomic Vault Company – an underground vault not for people, but for documents. Eventually purchased by Iron Mountain, the facility is no longer in use, but this is a recent development, with day-to-day operation ending only in 2017.