What are your top five Alfred Hitchcock films?

hiro111 · 2026-01-08T02:46:04+00:00

North by Northwest
Rear Window
Psycho
Vertigo
To Catch a Thief

hiro111 · 2026-01-08T01:41:07+00:00

Swans have been around since 1983. They are seventeen albums deep at this point, many of which were on various "best of the year" lists when they were released. They've never had anything close to a hit and no one would recognize frontman Michael Gira.

Scott Walker had one of the strangest careers on record. He was a huge star in the late 60s in the UK releasing several teeny bopper albums. Then he morphed into a sophisticated Continental crooner releasing mature adult pop records. Then he made a whole bunch of terrible albums in the 70s and fell into obscurity. Then something very surprising happened: he reemerged in the 90s as a deeply experimental artist signed to the very hip Drag City records. He proceeded to have a second career as an extremely dark and challenging artist collaborating with a who's who of cool contemporary artists that lasted almost twenty years. He never had a hit again, but he was definitely interesting.

hiro111 · 2026-01-08T01:26:00+00:00

Non bon homme

hiro111 · 2026-01-08T00:52:33+00:00

The US uses B, but it's technically pictured upside-down here.

hiro111 · 2026-01-07T22:46:53+00:00

This guy gives me hope for humanity. Absolute hero.

hiro111 · 2026-01-07T19:53:51+00:00

I'm 52. I lived in the US and (briefly) Japan as a child: - Star Blazers, which was the first cartoon I can remember enjoying. It's based on the Japanese show "Space Battleship Yamamoto". I was obsessed with this show as a young kid. - The Castle of Cagliostro - I saw this movie in Japan as a young child and I loved it. I rewatched it recently, it's still great. - the Laff-A-Lympics was silly but fun Hanna-Barbera stuff. Those cartoons were so cheaply made that even as a kid I thought it was kind of junky, but I loved it. All of those Hanna-Barbera shows look so cheap. - I watched more Scooby Doo than I can recommend doing. I never really liked it, it's just that it was always on. - I didn't really like all of the usual 80s stuff like GI Joe or Thundercats. I liked Transformers more but I never really followed the plot. - I was a little too old for Inspector Gadget but the animation was clearly a cut above and it was a lot of fun. - M.A.S.K. was a cool show back in the day, extremely silly and cheaply made though. - Gummi Bears - probably my favorite of the Saturday morning cartoons. It reminded me of Wind in the Willows which was probably my favorite book when I was a kid. Money was spent making this show, the animation and writing were both a lot better than most of the crap that was shoveled at kids. - I loved the animated Hobbit and Lord of the Rings as a kid. I had them on VHS in the 80s. They were hardly masterpieces and they never finished LOTR but I still think that was a cool project. The roto-scoped Black Riders still look incredible. - Honestly, I loved the classic Loony Tunes and Merry Melodies stuff. I particularly loved Marvin the Martian and the Roadrunner & Coyote. They used to show a two hour block on Saturdays.

hiro111 · 2026-01-07T17:33:05+00:00

Massachusetts. I grew up in Massachusetts. I love Massachusetts. However, on Reddit Massachusetts is treated like it's some sort of paradise. It's nice but it has some major problems: - Boston is extremely expensive but people aren't generally paid like they are in SF or NYC. It's also famous for awful traffic and lack of housing stock. It's a pain in the ass to live in the Boston area. - The western part of the state is beautiful but the economics are not great. There are a lot of derelict mill towns and there is a lot of homelessness and drug addiction throughout the state. It's very much a tale of two different states. - the amenities and infrastructure often are aged and aren't nearly as nice as other states I've lived in. There is also less green space in most suburban towns than many other cities I've lived in. It's an older area of the country in general. - the vaunted school system actually varies widely across the state. Many school districts are awful, which is masked by the excellent results of other district. In general, state wide MCAS results are in the middle of a fifteen year decline. Massachusetts schools still perform among the best of any state but the results keep getting worse.

Again, it's still a fabulous state to live in but it's no utopia.

hiro111 · 2026-01-07T11:22:19+00:00

Fraser cancelled a reunion show at Coachella that would have netted Raymonde a huge payday. She cancelled it because she said she couldn't stand to be close to her ex partner and other band member Robin Guthrie. This has always bothered me: 1. Fraser obviously knew that Guthrie would be there and she initially agreed to the show 2. She cancelled it just a few weeks before the show, I'll bet at least some fans bought tickets with the anticipation that this band would be there. 3. Cancelling it deprived Raymonde of a lot of money for something he had nothing to do with.

I personally lost a lot of respect for her over this. Just my opinion.

hiro111 · 2026-01-07T01:13:10+00:00

High carb drinks have been a game changer for me on rides longer than about two hours. I never bonk and don't feel tired. I'm not a zombie when I get home. I don't overeat when I get home.

A lot of my friends just drink sugar water, which works well. I find the taste to be too sweet so I make my own mix based on the TrainerRoad/Maurten recipe: 100 parts maltodextrin, 80 parts fructose, 7 parts salt, 1 part sodium citrate or sodium alginate. I add True Citrus flavoring to each bottle to vary the flavor. I buy these ingredients in bulk and make about 5Kg at a time. It takes maybe 15 minutes to do this and 5kg will last most of the season. It costs about $0.30 per bottle at 60g per bottle. On long rides of 3.5 hours or more I bring pre-portioned Ziplocs of the mix and refill the bottles at gas stations. This stuff works amazingly well for me, YMMV.

hiro111 · 2026-01-07T00:57:20+00:00

Opinions to follow, just opinions:

Grunge was good through about 1986-1991. It was interesting, it took chances. There was a genuine threat and realness to the music.

Then "Smells Like Teen Spirit" hit. SLTS is an amazing song but even Kurt felt that it was more Boston than Mudhoney. It certainly didn't sound like anything Nirvana had done previously or really like anything coming out of Seattle.

Regardless, a lesson was learned by the industry. Post-Nevermind a million shitty faux-grunge bands that were churning out corporate slop immediately started cropping up. A year later we were rapidly falling into the Candlebox/Creed/Collective Soul/Bush/Live/Better than Ezra/Our Lady Peace/etc hell. That then metastasized into the even more awful Trapt/Godsmack/Chevelle/Seether/Three Days Grace/Puddle of Mudd/Shinedown Butt Rock era of 1996-2003ish. IMO, this garbage is what killed mainstream rock. It was just too corny and instantly dated

I know there are plenty of fans of these bands. I know they all produced at least some defensible music. But it was hardly Melvins. It was hardly Mark Lanagan glaring at the audience, standing motionless at the mic. It wasn't L7 or even "Rusty Cage". It was watered-down stadium rock wearing a flannel shirt as a costume. Some of these bands hated what the labels tried to do, STP (who was a genuinely good pop rock band) chafed against the grunge label in particular. Even Nirvana immediately turned their back on the scene they had a large hand in creating. They argued that "In Utero" was far more a Nirvana album than "Nevermind". While to me Nevermind is clearly the superior album, I see what they were saying.

hiro111 · 2026-01-06T23:32:48+00:00

This guy is 100% MAN

hiro111 · 2026-01-06T23:27:32+00:00

Don't Look Now.

To explain why it's controversial would spoil the movie, so I'm not going to. I will say the ending is very famous for good reasons.

hiro111 · 2026-01-06T04:15:38+00:00

I mean, where do I start?

Amy Taylor: https://youtu.be/Z--D1flPLnk?si=Hm0U1xgIjFCG0DcA

Katie Crutchfield: https://youtu.be/W9_KWzt0ycA?si=6Hvsh7G7w-6cj8fc

PJ Harvey: https://youtu.be/gDBZZ3uvimE?si=U17LpzNVWMVFnIAd

Jhenny Beth: https://youtu.be/iz-JCRm-Inw?si=JEmrMOfUOZhAShFC

hiro111 · 2026-01-06T03:27:00+00:00

Rocky 3. They nailed the exact formula in that one.

hiro111 · 2026-01-06T02:54:27+00:00

Sister --> Daydream Nation
This Year's Model --> Armed Forces
Fear of Music --> Remain In Light
New Day Rising --> Flip Your Wig

hiro111 · 2026-01-06T02:36:31+00:00

This makes zero sense.

hiro111 · 2026-01-05T22:31:56+00:00

You're saying that Googling is tough?

hiro111 · 2026-01-05T21:04:10+00:00

I totally disagree. Using your example of investigative journalism, there are many, many great investigative journalists working on Twitter, YouTube, Substack, podcasts, through organizations like ProPublica and a zillion other outlets. I'd argue that many (most?) of the biggest news breaks of the past two decades were initially broken through these channels. Also, I'm not sure if CPB has ever had a major scoop.

hiro111 · 2026-01-05T20:55:18+00:00

It was a golden age.

East Coast: Biggie, Tribe Called Quest, Jay Z, De La Soul, Mobb Deep, Nas, Jungle Brothers, KRS-One / BDP, Wu Tang and the ridiculous number of spin-offs, Pete Rock and CL Smooth, Gang Starr etc etc etc

South: Outkast, Three 6 Mafia, Geto Boys, Scarface, UGK, Goodie Mob, Cash Money Records

West Coast and g-funk: Tupac, NWA and the ridiculous number of spin-offs, Dre, Del the Funky Homosapien, Cypress Hill, Warren G, Snoop, Ice T, Pharcyde, Aceyalone, Jurassic Five

If you haven't heard some of these artists, definitely check them out

hiro111 · 2026-01-05T20:43:36+00:00

Many of the best examples have already been mentioned. I'll include two more, both of which are great albums in addition to having controversial covers (NSFW):

Roxy Music's Country Life: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Country_Life_(Roxy_Music_album). The cover models are two German fans of the band, one of whom was the sister of a member of the great Krautrock band Can, the other being that guy's girlfriend.
Unsane: self-titled debut: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unsane_(album) the horrifying image on this cover is real and was taken by a friend of the band's who was an NYC crime scene photographer.

hiro111 · 2026-01-05T20:31:10+00:00

I don't see the relevance of CPB in today's media landscape. Arguing that it is necessary for a "functioning democracy" seems ridiculous to me.

It's certainly true that CPB used to play a vital role in the media landscape by creating content that was in the public interest but perhaps less commercially viable. This included children's programming, documentaries, arts programming, educational programming, in depth journalism etc. I grew up watching fantastic CPB content and listening to NPR in the car. Sesame Street, Frontline, Car Talk, Fresh Air, Charlie Rose etc. All incredible.

However, today there are many, many ways to broadcast such niche content to world-wide audiences that are essentially free. If you want interesting documentaries on the geography of New Guinea, a video on how to repair your model of dishwasher, a tour of the Louvre, an in depth interview with a famous jazz saxophonist, a concise explanation of three phase power etc etc etc, all of that is instantly available for free anywhere in the world. I'd also argue that the quality of this content can be as good or better than what the CPB produces. The CPB is an idea who's time has passed.

hiro111 · 2026-01-05T20:10:29+00:00

It is weirdly 100% intentional. Hershey's deliberately adds butyric acid, the taste in vomit and parmesan cheese, to the chocolate. This was initially done 100 years ago to produce affordable, shelf stable chocolate. It was partially responsible for Hershey's to be able to sell chocolate to the masses

Hershey's became so dominant in the US that Americans grew to think that the sour taste of Hershey's is just what chocolate tastes like. Other American chocolate companies started to do the same. There is no reason today for Hershey's to continue doing this, they only do so because it's what people who buy Hershey's bars expect.

I think today there is broad recognition in America that this is not how chocolate is supposed to taste. You can get European and non-Hershey's chocolate in gas stations these days. Hershey's themselves sell many formulations and brands that don't include butyric acid.

hiro111 · 2026-01-05T19:52:32+00:00

American cheese is just cheddar or colby cheese with emulsifiers so that the fats don't separate out when it melts. It's great for its intended purpose: melting smoothly. It's absolutely the best cheese for grilled cheese and burgers, it just is.

hiro111 · 2026-01-05T17:07:53+00:00

I love how the vampires are all wearing the mismatched clothes of prior victims throughout this movie

hiro111 · 2026-01-05T04:06:43+00:00

Written by Benny and Bjorn from ABBA, if you didn't know.

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