New APPS

When I watch this I realize how stupid I was to take to heart Cobain's* claim that Pearl Jam was the 90's version of Boston. In this performance he's not doing that Jim Morrisony thing that he did in Pearl Jam's first album and that the lead singer of Stone Temple Pilots did too.

It's pretty powerful stuff, and wonderful to watch Roger Waters digging so much Vedder's performance. I'm going to go dig through Peral Jam's back catalog now.

[*DNA testing reveals that Cobain and I  share Gospatric, Earl of Northumbria** as an ancestor. All of the extant Cogburns and Cobains descended from him. This isn't actually that weird though; if you go back far enough any two people share a common ancestor. . . It would be nice if this fact led us to treat one another more nicely.

**One of the many lords in Saxon England whom the Normans displaced. The wikipedia article on the "harrying of the north" is pretty good. William the Conqueror was a real bastard. No less an authority than Orderic Vitalis wrote:

The King stopped at nothing to hunt his enemies. He cut down many people and destroyed homes and land. Nowhere else had he shown such cruelty. This made a real change.

To his shame, William made no effort to control his fury, punishing the innocent with the guilty. He ordered that crops and herds, tools and food be burned to ashes. More than 100,000 people perished of starvation.

I have often praised William in this book, but I can say nothing good about this brutal slaughter. God will punish him.

I remain obsessed with the Saxons, the very week they finally defeated the Vikings they were invaded by the Normans. Then a somewhat crap 80's hair metal band was named after them. Can it get much worse?]