Even duct tape can't fix stupid...

Today's soundtrack: An Evening with John Petrucci and Jordan Rudess.

It used to be that a band toured to promote album sales. Now it's the touring that brings in the money. How things have changed. Read about it and the social aspects of recording technology in Breaking Down Walls of Sound.

A mobius strip of bacon. (Too bad it's a 3D printing, not the real thing.)

Mystery Science Theater 3000 was an LOL machine before LOL even existed. Totally hilarious. Ever wonder how they chose the movies they skewered?

From I Am Better Than Your Kids - the greatest example of irony

Last week, bookshelf porn. This week, what's hidden behind those bookshelves: secret doors.

Last week, urine wheel. This week, beer flavor wheel.

Find your favorites in this genealogical infographic of pop and rock music. (Note: no one in the image above is close to being my favorite.)

A map of U.S. drone strikes in Pakistan.

Hold on to your socks. Light has been caught behaving as a wave and as a particle. At. The. Same. Time.

Do you like art you can no longer see? Check out the Tate's gallery of lost art. For example, Kandinsky's Composition I (1910) was lost in a WWII bombing raid.

And now, a moment with Clyfford Still.

Clyfford Still's abstract paintings are rapidly becoming some of my very favorites. He may very well be one of the greatest American artists that no one knows about. To me, his paintings unveil tension that's hiding just beneath the canvas' surface. His brush work is finely detailed yet has the spontaneity of a knife's slash. His palette and use of color balances the shape of his forms. There is the sense that the paintings go on forever but we're just seeing a portion through the lens of the canvas. I can't wait for the opportunity to visit his museum in Denver.

Clyfford Still, 1944-N No. 1

You can come up to speed on Still's work by listening to a recent edition of the Modern Art Notes podcast in which art scholar and adjunct curator of the Clyfford Still Museum, David Anfam, talks about some of Still's influences.

Several paintings by Clyfford Still that I had the pleasure of seeing on a visit to the Albright-Knox Gallery in Buffalo.

To see more Stills, check out the collection at the San Francisco MoMA.

Not every vertical line in an abstract painting is a human figure nor is every horizontal line a horizon. But Still and Newman could both take credit for the zip.

Before returning to the gibberish, consider artist (and Syracuse University alum) Sol Lewitt. How do you make a film about a guy who didn't want to be photographed? How do you capture on film conceptual art that is "an obsession pushed to the limit of paradox and absurdity?"

And lest you think I have forgotten about Mark Rothko, here's a peak at the exhibit Rothko/Sugimoto at the Pace London in which we are asked to compare Rothko's later and darker works with Sugimoto's black and white seascape photos. Other than composition and perhaps artists' intent, I'm not feelin' it. Rothko vehemently denied including a horizon in his paintings. And while I'm admittedly not a huge fan of photography, the photos are a bit sterile by comparison.

Rothko (left) and Sugimoto (right) at the Pace London.

And now back to the gibberish.

History. Dullards wearing wigs, right? Nope. Check out the bonnacon - it sprays its pursuers with its caustic turds. I shit you not. No one less than Pliny the Elder wrote about it. What? You don't know Pliny the Elder? Perhaps you know his son Pliny the Younger through his writings about Pompeii.

Weird things programmers do.

Play this or that. For example, would you rather eat a million spiders or bite off a snake's head. EASY - snake.

Why so many videos?

I have no idea.

In one minute, the story of the world.

I have not yet had a chance to watch this video all the way through, but if you like electronic music of any kind check out I Dream of Wires: The Modular Synthesizer Documentary.

This is awesome: an animation set to jazz for the film Journey to Journey.

I have no idea what Pjoni - Chasm is about or where it comes from. It's animated. And it features an aircraft that looks like the XB-70. And that's what sold me.

Turning sounds into visuals.

Blue Note: A Story of Modern Jazz

Space. Outer Space.

Think you know the Space Shuttle? Then I suggest you read the blog of retired Space Shuttle Program Manager Wayne Hale. "A lot of people think NASA is risk averse; or even that our country is risk averse.  I think the opposite is true; we are willing to take great risks.  It’s just that sometimes we are not very smart about taking risks."

Speaking of space, how about this auction of space flight and aviation memorabilia?  A flag that flew on Apollo 11 has a minimum bid of $1,000.

How the heck did the Mars Science Lab take this self portrait?

...but it can muffle the sound.