Umberto Eco: "We Like Lists Because We Don't Want to Die'

Eco: I'm afraid that, by now, it might actually be 50,000 books. When my secretary wanted to catalogue them, I asked her not to. My interests change constantly, and so does my library. By the way, if you constantly change your interests, your library will constantly be saying something different about you. Besides, even without a catalogue, I'm forced to remember my books. I have a hallway for literature that's 70 meters long. I walk through it several times a day, and I feel good when I do. Culture isn't knowing when Napoleon died. Culture means knowing how I can find out in two minutes. Of course, nowadays I can find this kind of information on the Internet in no time. But, as I said, you never know with the Internet.

[ thx @amadad & @slavin ]

Epic BBC Krautrock Documentary

HIghlights are nothing but amazing footage from Cluster, Stockhausen, Can, Kraftwerk, Neu!, Iggy Pop drilling a coconut, Faust, bearsuit visitations, Wenders, Fassbinder, Herzog, Kraftwerk's neon nameplates, shopping for asparagus w/ Florian & Iggy, Harmonia, Eno comes knocking, Bowie, etc., etc., etc.

(Kraftwerk's 1st televised performance in Part 3 at ~8:25 is blowing my mind.)

[ thx Matrixsynth ]

Smuggler's Waltz, or Bronx Lullaby

 

Daggers of moonlight
Murder the sheets
And the stink of a four dollar room
And Daddy's gone a hunting
For a dime bag schoolboy
Tied up with a yellow balloon

So hush little baby, Daddy must go
I cover you up with a blanket of snow
By the time I make Jersey
You'll be in heaven
In a pretty blue shoe box I know

So sing a song of ten grand
With a pocket full of dough
And I can't take you to Baltimore
Wake God up in Heaven
Have him look down below
There's a little lost angel
Blooming in the snow