Five Bullets 10.4.24
Stephane Wrembel, The Terror, Fruit Flies & more
Good Morning and Happy Friday!
October is the month of painted leaves. Their rich glow now flashes round the world. As fruits and leaves and the day itself acquire a bright tint just before they fall, so the year near its setting. October is its sunset sky; November the later twilight.
-from Henry David Thoreau’s Autumnal Tints
It’s the first week of October and already we have later sunrises and lengthening shadows at day’s end. Dusk on an October evening is one of my favorite times to walk or read in a park. If you’re looking for a book to read this month, check out Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting which I wrote about earlier this year.
Last weekend I saw my favorite band Lettuce perform two nights at Brooklyn Bowl. It was the kind of weekend I dream about whenever Lettuce returns to the venue. The band has matured, steadily progressing each year and this year was without exception - the group were more restrained and not as high-volume as in earlier years but with a mindful calmness of dynamics and expression. There were a few jams which blew my mind, morphing from one tune to the next with some musical references sprinkled in for good measure. On Sunday night the band was joined by soulful vocalist Alecia Chakour, a frequent collaborator of the group. There was a family reunion atmosphere in the air that night as the band was also joined by drummer Adam Deitch’s father Bobby and a few words from Brooklyn Bowl founder Peter Shapiro (never miss a Sunday show!). While looking for a Lettuce video on Youtube, I stumbled on my old channel - I didn’t even know it was still up! - where I saved a few videos from 2010 of the group performing at Terminal 5 with jazz guitar legend John Scofield.
Just in case I don’t say it enough, a big Thank You to all those who send me stuff to read, watch or listen to! I greatly appreciate it and I love checking out all of your suggestions.
Have something to share? Leave me a comment!
Five Bullets:
Music: Last night I had a chance to check out Stephane Wrembel’s Django New Orleans which incorporates the sounds and flavors of traditional New Orleans music while paying homage to gypsy-jazz guitarist Django Reinhardt. You may have heard Wrembel before; he wrote one of the themes of Woody Allen’s Midnight in Paris. Wrembel is a master, playing with complete control and incredible dynamics - he makes it look easy!
NYC: New York City’s drinking water may taste different. One of the tunnels which connects the Catskill Delaware watershed to the city will be undergoing construction to fix leaks. The tunnel, built over 100 years ago, is the longest in the world and supplies 1 billion gallons of water to New York City every day. Water from the Croton watershed will be blended with water from the Catskills to make up the difference while construction on the leaking tunnel is expected to last up to eight months. [The Queens Museum has an interesting relief map of the city’s water system demonstrating the use of gravity to move the water.]
Science: Fruit Fly Brain Mapping. Scientists have finished the first complete map of a complex brain belonging to a fruit fly containing 140,000 neurons. 21 million pictures were taken of cross sections of the brain which were then used to create a 3D image of the complete system of neurons and cells. Scientists can follow neurons firing across the simulated brain. Check out the video in the link - it’s quite a trip to see the neurons activating in real-time.
TV: The Terror. I’ve been easing into spooky season with this historical fiction series based on Dan Simmons’s novel about Sir John Franklin’s lost expedition. Season One focuses on the crew of two British expeditionary ships sent to the northern hemisphere in search of the Northwest Passage as the crew battles the extreme weather, each other, and a supernatural predator. The series does a good job of portraying with historical accuracy how such an expedition might look.
Writing: What Kind of Writer is ChatGPT? There’s been many articles about the negative impacts of AI software. Here, Cal Newport (author of Deep Work) looks at the potential advantages to using ChatGPT while writing: “At first, I struggled to understand why anyone would want to write this way. My dialogue with ChatGPT was frustratingly meandering, as though I were excavating an essay instead of crafting one. But, when I thought about the psychological experience of writing, I began to see the value of the tool.”