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The flowers spilled their humid sheen in flight; the sleek, bright beasts played, whirling and climbing; the birds chimed with bliss, soaring and dipping. I, a blinded, quaking beggar, stood at the edge of the road, and within my beggar’s soul the selfsame thought kept prattling: Cry out to them, tell them—oh, tell them that on the most splendid of God’s stars there is a land—my land—that is dying in agonizing darkness.
Complexity classes such as NP do not measure the difficulty of any specific problem instance but rather describe the rate at which difficulty grows as a function of problem size. If we can solve an order-n Sudoku, how much harder will we have to work to solve a puzzle of order n + 1? For problems in NP, the effort needed grows exponentially.
Most discussions of the complexity of Sudoku refer to the work of Takayuki Yato and Takahiro Seta of the University of Tokyo, whose analysis relates the task of solving Sudoku to the similar problem of completing a partially specified Latin square. The latter problem in turn has been connected with others that are already known to be in NP. This process of "reduction" from one problem to another is the standard way of establishing the complexity classes of computational problems. Yato and Seta employ an unusual form of reduction that addresses the difficulty of finding an additional solution after a first solution is already known. In Sudoku, of course, well-formed puzzles are expected to have only one solution. Yato and Seta say their result applies nonetheless. I don't quite follow their reasoning on this point, but the literature of complexity theory is vast and technical, and the fault is likely my own.
We provide a simple linear time transformation from a directed or undirected graph with labeled edges to an unlabeled digraph, such that paths in the input graph in which no two consecutive edges have the same label correspond to paths in the transformed graph and vice versa. Using this transformation, we provide efficient algorithms for finding paths and cycles with no two consecutive equal labels. We also consider related problems where the paths and cycles are required to be simple; we find efficient algorithms for the undirected case of these problems but show the directed case to be NP-complete. We apply our path and cycle finding algorithms in a program for generating and solving Sudoku puzzles, and show experimentally that they lead to effective puzzle-solving rules that may also be of interest to human Sudoku puzzle solvers.
Bert Williams, largely forgotten today, was the first African-American star: the most famous “colored man” in America during the early years of the twentieth century. The team of Williams and Walker put together the first all-Negro musical comedy to play a major Broadway theatre...their popularity among audiences both black and white allowed them to force the integration of first-class theatres around the country...through it all he continued to perform in blackface, embellished by giant lips painted over the cork, an ill-fitting suit, a preternaturally unhurried style of locomotion, and a cringing “Uh-huh, boss” lazy drawl. According to another Follies colleague, W. C. Fields, Williams onstage was the funniest man he ever saw, and offstage was the saddest.
Both Williams’s reputation and the remaining record of his work—a number of scratchy vocal tracks, some suggestive photographs and reels of film—make one long to ask: What on earth was he thinking? How does a mind maintain its balance when professional pride is so bound up with personal shame?...
On the eve of the release of Beck's Guerelito, we
offer a Beck remix you won't find on the remix CD:
"Que Onda Guero (Team Shi Latino 96.3 Remix)"
So much of Beck's '90s output was a mythologizing of
the 80s Los Angeles he grew up immersed in –
lowriders, mariachi, turntables and microphones. Sure,
it's patronizing at times – "Odelay" was his gringo
approximation of "orale," as in "orale vato" – but for
some, it's the perfect whiteboy synthesis of
pre-Rodney King Riots Los Angeles.
However, the sound of the city has changed. With this
remix, local L.A. surprise punks The Mae Shi have
tried to capture the sound of a summer in Los Angeles
in 2005 – the sound of Daddy Yankee selling out
Staples Center, the sound of narcocorridos booming
from the car next to you as you drive down Pico Blvd.
This year saw a new radio station take over the
streets of Los Angeles, Latino 96.3, a bilingual
station "blazing reggaeton and hip-hop." In the hot
windows-down summer of 2005, the station was
impossible to ignore, and its rise in public presence
coincided with Daddy Yankee's newfound ubiquity (as
well as his ability to sell out Staples Center).
"Que Onda Guero (Team Shi 96.3 Latino Remix)" is The
Mae Shi's attempt to capture the sound of 2005 in the
same way Beck captured the sound of 1985.
She was talking to the audience about the problems she’s been having with Sony and someone shouted “Shut up and sing!” This seemed to touch a nerve with dear Nellie. After politely explaining to the miscreant that “If this continues with Sony, I will leave the music business, BITCH. And NEVER SING AGAIN,” she started screaming and crying and “They say I’m just pulling a Barbra Streisand,” and “You have NO IDEA WHAT I’M GOING THROUGH,” and corporations are raping the world, etc.
My God, I've lost touch. Who the fuck is Nelly McKay and why should I care? Write more articles about Rick Springfield, for Christ's sake, man! I care about REAL entertainers!
Personne dans mon cœur
Mes propos orduriers n’attirent que les fumiers,
comment leur expliquer qu’je suis sage?
Nobody is in my heart
My dirty language only attracts lecherous men,
how to explain that in reality I am a good girl?
I was born here but I left when I was three and a half. So just being back, in the midst of the quotidian and the unremarkable, is profound in a very private, intimate way. It's more than just being a visitor to a place one cherishes; it's like playing tourist in another course of events, sightseeing the attractions of a life I might have led if it weren't for, you know, global politics and war and all. Everywhere and everything is a could-have-been for me, superficially strange and foreign but, in an emotional way, also deeply familiar. It's weird, it's fun, and the food is amazing.
They say
the first love's most important.
That's very romantic,
but not my experience.
Something was and wasn't there between us,
something went on and went away.
My hands never tremble
when I stumble on silly keepsakes
and a sheaf of letters tied with string
— not even ribbon...
...When he listened to music, he listened with his whole body, as longingly as a condemned man aches for the sound of distant feet perhaps bringing news of his release. When spoken to, he didn't hear. Music dissolved the world around him just as it dissolved the laws of artistic unity, and at such moments Konrad ceased to be a soldier.
One evening in summer, he was playing a four-handed piece with Henrik's mother, when something happened...They were performing Chopin's Polonaise-Fantaisie and Henrik's mother was playing with such passion that the whole room seemed to shimmer and vibrate...It was as if music was levitating the furniture, as if some mighty force were blowing against heavy silk curtains, as if every ossified, decayed particle buried deep in the human heart were quickening into life, as if in everyone on earth a fatal rhythm lay dormant, waiting for the predestined moment to begin its fateful beat. The courteous listeners realized that music is dangerous. But the duo at the piano had lost all thought of danger. The Polonaise-Fantaisie was no more than a pretext to loose upon the world those forces that shake and explode the structures of order which man has devised to conceal what lies beneath. They sat straight-backed at the piano, leaning away from the keys a little and yet bound to them, as if music itself were driving an invisible team of fiery mythical horses riding the storm that circled the world, and they were bracing their bodies to maintain a firm grip on the reins in this explosive headlong gallop of unshackled energies. And then, with a single chord, they ended...
...The Officer of the Guards...said, "Konrad will never make a true soldier."
"Why?" asked his son, shocked.
...calmly, with the assurance of an expert, he said, "Because he is a different kind of man."
It's [Robert Kaplan's Imperial Grunts] about stories of individual soldiers and Marines—not generals and colonels, but sergeants and corporals. They don't lose morale, they don't get discouraged. On the ground, American soldiers and Marines speak a common language where they communicate very directly without nuance. It's a world of practicality, of mechanics, of doing things. It's not about thinking or imagining, it's about doing. What I've found is, never ask a sergeant what he feels; ask him what he does and he'll talk for hours...
Look, once we're fifty, all of us wonder, What would it have been like if we had done something different? That's very normal. I've been very satisfied with being a freelance writer for the last third of a century. I've had a great life. But if I were forced to choose an additional life, being a career soldier certainly would be something that would appeal to me. I think I would have enjoyed it better as a non-commissioned officer.
The eagle picks my eye
The worm he licks my bones
I feel so suicidal
Just like Dylan's Mr. Jones
Lonely wanna die
If I ain't dead already
Ooh girl you know the reason why.
Black cloud crossed my mind
Blue mist round my soul
Feel so suicidal
Even hate my rock and roll
Wanna die yeah wanna die
If I ain't dead already
Ooh girl you know the reason why.
So you heard that I'm a rebel with a heart made of stone.
I got a restless spririt that nobody can own.
If a picture tells a story won't you listen to mine,
I'm searching for the answer but it's so hard to find.
You'll see much deeper when you read between the lines,
'cause there's a fire burning in my eye.
Like a thief in the night, who can't get enough,
I am willing to fight,
'cause I'm a soldier of love.
Like a shot in the dark when the going gets rough,
I'ts a state of the heart
when you're a soldier of love.
I'm willing to fight.
In talking with Richards, you realize how humbling it is to tour like this: a man, a car, a map. Completely free of rock star posturing, Richards is doing some serious soul searching on this go-round. The same can be said of his music. He is touring to support Purple Blaze, a quiet and haunting affair recorded and mixed earlier this year.
Armed with his black, duct-taped guitar, Richards opened the set with one of the strongest songs in his solo repertoire, "Valerie Teardrop" -- a compelling number that brought to mind Gary Jules' cover of "Mad World" in its emotional resonance and delivery. The psychedelic freak-outs that were the one-two punch of "Hanging from the Grapevines" and "Up in My Window" dissolved into a fascinating (if troubling and noisy) collage of sound.
Purple Blaze has the material and the determination to become a dorm room classic, but the intelligence and restraint shown here lead to far more. It’s sentimental, explicit pop for people who don’t need their own pimply emotions whined back at them, and if Richards keeps up this level of quality on future releases, the world is his, ready to take.
What's to be made of Bloodshot Record's 11th anniversary compilation, For a Decade of Sin? It's not a retrospective, culling seminal tracks from the first decade of the self-proclaimed "insurgent country" label's releases, but rather all new/unreleased music. And a good chunk of the 42 artists represented on this compilation aren't even members of the Bloodshot family! Not that these facts makes the album any less enjoyable, but still: Weird.
(allegro)
I was always tired
I was always blue
I found something that'll cure my ills
I'm talkin' about those little white pills
(adagio)
Those little white pills got me feelin' fine
They hurt my stomach and sharpen my mind...
Teddy sniffed some glue, he was 12 years old
Fell from the roof on East Two-Nine
Kathy was 11 when she pulled the plug
on 26 reds and a bottle of wine
Bobby got leukemia, 14 years old
He looked like 65 when he died
He was a friend of mine
Those are people who died, died
They were all my friends, and they died
colour spelled by an American: Drop the "u." It doesn't make you sound any smarter.
tweeOoh look, it's turning into Indie Pop Day here at Pitchfork News! Rose Melberg's back in action, the Clientele are spicing up their vinyl with free MP3s, and now(from Pitchfork)
On this collection, remix and reverence co-exist comfortably. After all, Impulse never held preservation as a primary directive. It prioritized new sounds and new technologies, and treated all of its musicians as innovators, as revolutionaries in their own right. Perhaps that’s the label’s true calling card, the real reason behind the continued reverence. From the most challenging jazz to the most traditional, Impulse made it all sound equally, eternally modern.
Iconic bassist and composer Charles Mingus' output on Impulse Records remains his most alive, his most soulful and his most contemplative. "II B.S." not only showcased Mingus' lyrical bass-playing (especially its momentous intro), but also the rebellious, fiery nature that colored Mingus' life. The RZA is the production mastermind behind the Wu-Tang Clan, the Staten Island collective that turned hip-hop on its head with their gritty, grimey street-reared albums over the last decade. RZA, who has become a masterful composer in his own right (check his score for Jim Jarmusch's "Ghost Dog," or Quentin Tarantino's "Kill Bill" movies), turns Mingus' original inside out, playing with the windblown horn stabs and chopping up the song's rhythms into a playful jazz-bounce.-from vervemusicgroup.com
Gabor Szabo's free-wheeling, self-taught guitar style, personified the limitless creative palette that jazz had appropriated in the late 1960s and early 1970s. This composition, from the 1972 album of the same name, was one of his most astounding. The gorgeous, original "Mizrab," has become a favorite of many jazz-heads through the years, so it is no surprise that Prefuse 73 aka Scott Heren, chose to remix it for his contribution to Impulsive. Prefuse 73, who splits his time between Atlanta and Barcelona, has a wonderfully experimental sensibility when composing music, using electronics, samples and new ideas in sound compression to create formed, melodic mosaics. Here, he replicates Szabo's passionate guitar playing with his own fractured electronic melodies and the result is pure elegance.- from vervemusicgroup.com
Carr was the most influential male blues singer and songwriter of the first half of the 20th century, but he was nothing like the current stereotype of an early bluesman. An understated pianist with a gentle, expressive voice, he was known for his natty suits and lived most of his life in Indianapolis. His first record, "How Long — How Long Blues," in 1928, had an effect as revolutionary as Bing Crosby's pop crooning, and for similar reasons. Previous blues stars, whether vaudevillians like Bessie Smith or street singers like Blind Lemon Jefferson, had needed huge voices to project their music, but with the help of new microphone and recording technologies, Carr sounded like a cool city dude carrying on a conversation with a few close friends.
...although Carr died of an alcohol-related illness shortly after his 30th birthday, what made him a key figure in American music was his records, not his lifestyle. His followers dominated blues for more than 20 years and affected every aspect of the African-American pop scene.
All four of these sonatas display a different personality. That's the great thing about Mozart, Hahn explains, "His writing is distinctive, and intriguing. You can identify his music immediately." The fact that Mozart was able to pull off composing one completely original work after another is a testament to his amazing ability. This new collection of Mozart sonatas with Hilary Hahn and Natalie Zhu is a wonderful testament to their talent, and to the legacy of a composer who has touched generations of music lovers.
When is an emergency not quite an emergency? According to a new study, the answer depends on how well your favorite baseball team is doing. A report published in the October issue of the Annals of Emergency Medicine reveals that the number of visits to emergency rooms in Boston-area hospitals was inversely related to how well the Red Sox performed in the 2004 World Series.
New Orleans is a jazz town, but also a funk town, a brass-band town, a hip-hop town and a jam-band town. It has international jazz musicians and hip-hop superstars, but also a true, subsistence-level street culture. Much of its music is tied to geography and neighborhoods, and crowds.
All that was incontrovertibly true until a week ago Monday. Now the future for brass bands and Mardi Gras Indians, to cite two examples, looks particularly bleak if their neighborhoods are destroyed by flooding, and bleaker still with the prospect of no new tourists coming to town soon to infuse their traditions with new money...
"A lot of the great musicians came right out of the Treme neighborhood and the Lower Ninth Ward," said the trumpeter Kermit Ruffins, temporarily speaking in the past tense...Mr. Ruffins, one of the most popular jazz musicians in New Orleans, made his name there partly through his regular Thursday-night gig over the last 12 years at Vaughan's, a bar in the Bywater neighborhood, where red beans and rice were served at midnight. Now Vaughn's may be destroyed, and so may his new house, which is not too far from the bar.
On Saturday evening Mr. Ruffins flew back to New Orleans from a gig in San Diego, having heard the first of the dire storm warnings. He stopped at a lumberyard to buy wood planks, boarded up 25 windows on his house, then went bar-hopping and joked with his friends that where they were standing might be under water the next day.
