The first vibrations were recorded around 7:30pm, part way through the Tenacious D set, but the biggest shakes started at 8:20pm when the Foo Fighters took the stage, and then it all went quiet at 11pm when the gig ended. The concert vibrations were recorded as a semi continuous harmonic signal with a peak osculation of 3Hz, ie the ground was shaking 3 times per second in a nice rhythmic motion. There are lulls in the signal between the songs and peaks in signal intensity during the songs.

The cause of the shaking is most likely the weight of the 50,000 fans dancing, as 50,000 fans is equal to around 5,000 tonnes of mass moving(or moshing)on the ground for the duration of the concert. This set up a nice harmonic vibration in the ground which was recorded in our nearby borehole seismometers.

Perhaps, in the future, bands will compete to have the most seismically active concerts.

Link -via I Heart Chaos | Image: Wairakei GeoNet

“An argument can be made for and against every song mentioned,” he said before adding “That’s All Right Mama” is a better fit than all of the other tunes.

This song came out in September 1946 as a rockabilly piece with a blues melody line over top.

“It’s sung with power, may contain the first guitar solo break, and, as a remake, became one of Elvis’ first singles,” Burns said.

The origin of the term “rock ‘n’ roll” is straightforward, he believes.

“It started as a nautical phrase meaning the movement of the boat up and down and back and forth,” Burns said. “Sometime in the late 1800s to early 1900s, gospel and jubilee music co-opted the term and used it to mean being rocked and rolled in the arms of the Lord. In fact, the first recorded use of the term in a song was ‘Camp Meeting Jubilee’ in 1916.”

You can listen to “That’s All Right Mama” here.

Link via The Presurfer | Photo by Flickr user Never Slim used under Creative Commons license

Here’s his rendition of Ozzy’s Crazy Train at Ellen Show (taken when he was 9). Watch his face at the end, when he got a nice surprise. Link [embedded YouTube Clip]

Keith Moon: The Who’s Who of Drummers

Rockers who find novelty in trashing hotel rooms should bow their heads in shame and take a lesson from the original master, Keith Moon. Dubbed “Moon the Loon” for his frenetic craziness, the infamous drummer for The Who took mess-making to heights unseen outside the closets of teenage girls. One famous incident happened after a hotel manager told Moon to turn down the “noise” in the lobby (which just happened to be Moon playing some of The Who’s songs on cassette). This could have been the manager’s way of subtly letting Moon know that rocking out to his own music is about as lame as wearing a Who T-shirt to a Who concert, but the drummer didn’t see it that way. In response, Moon walked the manager back to his hotel room and had him wait in the hall while while he trashed the place in true rock star fashion. Then just to ensure a grand finale, the drummer blew the door off its hinges with a cherry bomb. He then turned to the manager and said, “That was noise.” The two returned to the lobby, where Moon restarted the tape deck and said, “This is The Who.” (image credit; Wikimedia user Leahtwosaints)

John Bonham: Led’s Head Case

When a guy’s drumsticks are so big and heavy that they’re referred to as “trees”, you probably don’t want to pick a fight with him-even if he, say, throws you off stage during your own performance. Such was the case with Led Zeppelin drummer John “Bonzo” Bonham, who had a habit of making it very clear when he thought someone else’s drumming was sub-par. According to Zeppelin manager Richard Cole, Bonham saw nothing wrong with jumping up on stage, replacing the other band’s drummer, and giving the audience “the best show” he could muster. In similar stage-hog form, Bonham was known to take his trademark “Moby Dick” and extend it to a masochistic hour-long experience, leaving one to wonder why fans didn’t take a lesson from Bonham and jump on stage to end the ego-fest. (Image credit: Flicker user Dina Regine)

Animal: A Split Personality

Who’s the craziest drummer of all time? Jim Henson’s Animal, of course. The drummer in the all-Muppet group Dr. Teeth and the Electric Mayhem Band, Animal’s Ritalin poster-boy ways were inspired by none other than Keith Moon. But not even “Moon the Loon” could claim to be covered in hair, or wear broken shackles around his neck and wrists. It took not one, but TWO, behind-the-scenes talents to pull of such an impersonation. Frank Oz performed the voice of Animal (he was also responsibel for the vocal stylings of Miss Piggy and Yoda from “Star Wars”), but had no part in the drumming itself. For that, Henson hired Britain’s leading big-band drummer Ronnie Verrall. Ironically, it was Verrell’s turn as the “WO-man” crazy Animal that would finally allow him to collaborate with drummer/idol Buddy Rich, as well as some not-so-sought-after idols: a pig, a frog, and a Gonzo.

Stewart Copeland: A Sting and a Miss

If it weren’t for Stewart Copeland, the famed rock group The Police would probably have never formed. Of course, if it weren’t for Stewart Copeland, they probably wouldn’t have broken up. Copeland and lead singer Sting were constantly at each other’s throats, resulting in creative arguments, sabotage, and yes, even fisticuffs. Copeland, who felt his creation slipping away as Sting’s popularity eclipsed his own, often resorted to completely throwing out Sting’s musical compositions in favor of his own re-worked arrangements. In retaliation, Sting would often have Copeland isolated in a separate studio during recording sessions. Which, we suppose, is another way of saying, “Don’t stand so close to me.”

Buddy Rich: Little Drummer Boy

Practice might make perfect for some people, but not for Bernard “Buddy” Rich. Easily the world’s greatest jazz drummer, Rich never took a lesson and refused to even consider stooping to something as silly as rehearsing. The son of vaudeville performers, Rich hit the stage in 1921 when he was only four years old (where he was billed as “Traps, the Drum Wonder”) and soon became the second-highest paid child entertainer in the world. Later in his career, he led some of the most successful big bands ever, and played with such greats as Tommy Dorsey, Dizzy Gillespie, and Louis Armstrong. But his driven and competitive nature came complete with a volatile temper, which Rich was happy to showcase. He was notorious for screaming at his band members for hours on end (which they secretly recorded) and fearlessly ridiculing pop stars during public interviews. Oh, and Rich also always needed to have the last word, even on his deathbed. While lying in a hospital after surgery, a nurse asked Rich if anything was bothering him. His response: “Yes … country music.”

John Fishman: Vac to the Future

Most drummers are known for their ability to play (shocker!) the drums, but John Fishman rolls his eyes at such a cliche notion. Chief envelope-pusher of the envelope-pushing band Phish, Fishman, besides being a drummer, is also a gifted virtuoso on the 1965 Electrolux vacuum cleaner. By putting the device in reverse mode s that it blows air out of the tubing, Fishman is able to create a squealing sound when he covers the opening with his mouth. It seems like an, er “acquired taste” to us, but the band’s, shall we say, unique audience gleefully accepts it as music, so who are we to judge? In fact, the instrument is so popular that Fishman created a similar device called the “bag-vac” by combining an Electrolux vacuum with a set of bagpipes, which (finally) legitimized housecleaning in a kilt. Men of the world, rejoice! (image credit: Flickr user Dan Shinneman)

Wanted: Drummer Who Won’t Die

While rock drummers are notorious for dying too young, no band has had more trouble keeping the slot filled than legendary (and utterly fictional) rock group Spinal Tap. Here’s a recap of how just a few of their so-called drummers have disappeared.

>>In 1969, original drummer John “Stumpy” Pepys, also known as the Peeper, is killed in a bizarre gardening accident that the police claim is “best left unsolved.”

>>Eric “Stumpy Joe” Childs (from the band Wool Cave) is hired, yet tragically dies in 1974 from choking on someone else’s vomit. The originator of the vomit is still unknown however, because -as Tap bassist Derek Smalls so insightfully points out- “you can’t really dust for vomit”.

>>Peter “James” Bond steps in but dies from spontaneous human combustion.

>>Mick Shrimpton is hired to fill Bond’s shoes (and sticks), but he, too, spontaneously combusts.

___________________________

Marching to the Beat of a (Very) Different Drummer is reprinted with permission from the Scatterbrained section of the March/April 2005 issue of mental_floss magazine.

Be sure to visit mental_floss‘ entertaining website and blog for more fun stuff!

Songs About Drugs:

“Got To Get You Into My Life” by The Beatles
This track really sounds like a love song written for a love interest with lyrics like, “Ooh, I suddenly see you/Ooh, did I need you/Every single day of my life.” Despite how it sounds though, this one is about the first time Paul tried marijuana and his instant love affair with the drug. What more would you expect from soneone who also named a romantic love song (Martha My Dear) after his dog?
Source Image Via Gonzalo Barrientos [Flickr]

“Motorhead” by Hawkwind and Motorhead
Even a lot of Motorhead fans don’t actually know that the name is a slang for a speedfreak. Lemmy wrote the song for the group Hawkwind first and then took it to be the title song for his post-Hawkwind group. Here’s some of the song’s lyrics that really give it away, “Motorhead, you can call me Motorhead, alright/ Brain dead, total amnesia/ Get some mental anesthesia.”
Source

“Hey Mr. Tambourine Man” by Bob Dylan
This one’s a little less certain. You see, although it is widely accepted that this song is about a man looking to score from his dealer, Bob claims none of his songs are about drug use. While I’m usually inclined to accept the artist’s word on his own songs, Mr. Dylan also claims that “Rainy Day Women # 12 & 35” A.K.A. “Everybody Gets Stoned” is especially not about drugs. I may be able to concede that he may have meant the song to be more about stonings and social outcasting, I have a hard time accepting a poet as prolific and intelligent as Bob Dylan didn’t realize and fully intend the double meaning of the chorus.
Source Image Via MarkyBon [Flickr]

Songs Not About Drugs:

“Hotel California” by The Eagles
With lyrics like “you can check out anytime, but you can never leave,” it’s easy to see why so many people associated the song with drug use. The reality is that the song is more about the hedonism of the Southern California lifestyle the group was exposed to in the seventies, which, to be fair, did include heavy drug use. Still, the drugs would be no more than a minor part of the song’s deeper meaning. Eagles drummer and writer Don Henley, said it was “basically a song about the dark underbelly of the American dream and about excess in America, which is something we knew a lot about.”
Source Image Via Saguayo [Flickr]

“Mirror in the Bathroom” by The English Beat
While many people assume any songs involving mirrors, particularly when the mirror is in a bathroom, must be references to cocaine, this one is actually about narcissism. The writer, Dave Wakeling, said he was inspired to write the song while he was looking in the mirror at himself debating whether or not he could skip work that day. He then started thinking about the self-involvement and narcissism. The line about “a restaurant that’s got glass tables” was actually a direct reference to a fancy restaurant that opened near him that, would you guess it, had glass tables. Funny enough, the success of the song may have helped lead the band into cocaine addictions; Dave later remarked about it that, “songs can become sort of strangely prophetic.”
Source

“Puff the Magic Dragon” by Peter, Paul and Mary
This song really is about a growing up and abandoning an imaginary friend who happens to be a dragon. Although it’s merely a tale of lost childhood innocence, the release of the song in the drug-fueled sixties led to many people assuming that anything with the word “puff” was actually a reference to marijuana. Co-writer Leonard Lipton once said, “I can tell you that at Cornell in 1959 [when the song was written], no one smoked grass.” So, if you were hoping for the song to actually have been about drugs, you almost certainly have already lost that childhood innocence referenced in the song.
Source Image Via CelestialSpirit13 [Flickr]

Update: The quiz wasn’t working earlier, but it’s been fixed now.

The casket is in good condition, having some minor rust damage and a little lime sentiment that shows water once entered the outside vault, although it seems the interior never suffered water damaged.

If you’d like to see the item in person before you place a bid, it is currently on display in the Texas Musicians Museum.

Link Via BoingBoing