This morning I played Querencia on my guitar, from In the Arms of Love, and thought that it might work really well as a longish (one and a half minutes) intro to Turkish Night. We recorded Turkish Night for the Opium album in 1996. The name was inspired by a memorable night at a fabulous hotel on the Bospherus. After performing earlier that evening the band was sitting in the hotel bar with a couple of German friends who had come to Istanbul to see me. After we drank the bar out of orange juice (lots of screwdrivers), one friend, who was a journalist for German TV in the Turkish capital, suggested cherry jiuce, which is the Turkish juice of choice. So we started drinking cherry juice with vodka. I think we drank the bar out of cherry juice, too. I have to say that cherry juice plus vodka leaves more of a hangover, perhaps because cherries are sweeter than oranges.

Nagra III, IV, IV-s, IS and SN reel to reels – (YouTube)
Lovely video explaining the different models of Nagra tape recorders. Gear porn.

Culture – GOOD
Protesters Are Awesome: Egyptians Form Human Shield to Protect Antiquities

MSNBC Photoblog
An Egyptian anti-government activist kisses a riot police officer following clashes in Cairo, Egypt, Friday, Jan. 28, 2011.

I love that photo!

Philip K. Dick’s Ampek (he turned Ampeg into Ampek) plant, from the book The Simulacra… originally published in 1964!

Now imagine having plants doing some of our computing… Biotech will be the next major wave. Forget silicon and motherboards – that’s so 20th century.