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Hear Grace Slick’s Hair-Raising Vocals in the...

Open Culture ·

2024/02/22

“One pill makes you larger and one pill makes you small…” Sometime in the summer of 2016, this isolated track of Grace Slick’s vocals for “White Rabbit”–probably the most famous Jefferson Airplane song and definitely one of the top ten psychedelic songs of the late ‘60s–popped up YouTube. As these things go, nobody took credit, […]

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Isaac Asimov Predicts the Future in 1982: Computers...

Open Culture ·

2024/02/21

Four decades ago, our civilization seemed to stand on the brink of a great transformation. The Cold War had stoked around 35 years of every-intensifying developments, including but not limited to the Space Race. The personal computer had been on the market just long enough for most Americans to, if not actually own one, then […]

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The Jazz Classic “Take Five” Played Beautifully on a...

Open Culture ·

2024/02/21

Above we have George Sakellariou performing Paul Desmond’s jazz classic, “Take Five,” on a vintage 1959 Viuda y Sobrinos de Domingo Esteso (Conde Hermanos) classical guitar. First recorded in 1959 by the Dave Brubeck Quartet, the track eventually became the best-selling jazz song of all time. It’s also a song frequently covered by other talented musicians. […]

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Scenes from Life in Paris During the 1920s, Colorized...

Open Culture ·

2024/02/20

Few cities have been as romanticized as Paris, and few eras in Paris have been as romanticized as the nineteen-twenties. This owes much to the famous expatriate artistic and literary figures residing there in that decade: Ernest Hemingway, Salvador Dalí, F. Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald, Pablo Picasso, Gertrude Stein, and Man Ray, to name just […]

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Watch a 1915 Film Adaptation of Alice in Wonderland...

Open Culture ·

2024/02/20

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland predates the invention of cinema by a couple of decades. Nevertheless, much like the “Drink me” bottle and “Eat me” presented to its young protagonist, Lewis Carroll’s fantastical tale has called out the same message to generations of filmmakers around the world: “Adapt me.” This century, though not even a quarter […]

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A Web Site That Lets You Find Your Home Address on...

Open Culture ·

2024/02/19

A cool tool. Software engineer Ian Webster has created a website that lets you see how the land masses on planet Earth have changed over the course of 750 million years. And it has the added bonus of letting you plot modern addresses on these ancient land formations. Ergo, you can see where your home […]

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The Red Hot Chili Peppers “Californication” Played on...

Open Culture ·

2024/02/19

We just had the chance to see the Red Hot Chili Peppers kick off a new tour, and so had to bring you this–Luna Lee performing RHCP’s “Californication” on the Gayageum, a traditional Korean stringed instrument dating back to the 6th century. Over the years, we’ve shown you her adaptations of Jimi Hendrix’s ‘Voodoo Chile;’ […]

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