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posts for august 13, 2007.

while searching for bands making similar music to the israli progdeath band orphaned land, i recently stumbled across another isreali band named distorted. i would describe their style as very progressive melodic oriental death metal, featuring a female clean voice besides the usual (male) death voice.
when i first stumbled about their homepage and started reading their member profiles, i was stunned: many of them are inspired by and listen to music which i like a lot:

  • guy, their bass player, lists for example orphaned land, opeth and porcupine tree as his influences, and his top album of all time is orphaned land’s mabool;
  • benny, their guitar player, mentions nevermore as one of his musical influences, and also lists mabool as his top album of all time;
  • miri, their (clean voice) singer, lists the gathering, nevermore and opeth in her musical influence list, and mentions nevermore’s ingenious dead heart in a dead world, opeth’s deliverence, the gathering’s mandolyion and nevermore’s dreaming neon black as her top albums of all time;
  • raffy, their (death voice) singer and guitarist, names tool, nevermore and opeth as his influences and lists tool’s aenima, nevermore’s enemies of reality and opeth’s deliverance as his top albums of all time.

well, this is a > 100 % increase of people i know who like pretty much the same music than me :-)
after seeing this and listening to one of their tracks (redemption) from their debut album (memorial) which they put online, i decided that i have to order their album. and so i did. it took some time until it arrived, but then, listening to it at a whole, i was pretty much blown away. it is simply great! it combines the oriental influences form orphaned land with the progressive death metal from opeth, adding a female voice (i know some of you will be sceptical about the latter, but i’d say it fits well and i don’t want to miss it). for me, this is one of the best albums (or maybe even, the best?) i’ve heard this year.

here’s a list of concerts i’ve been at this year, for historical reasons. not taking in account some classic concerts.

  • 07.02.2007: therion, grave digger and sabaton were playing at the z-7 in pratteln (symphonic orchestral metal, and some more thrashy/whatever metal);
  • 21.02.2007: amplifier and cloudride were playing at abart in zürich (progressive art rock);
  • 24.02.2007: blackfield and pure reason revolution were playing at the z-7 in pratteln (progressive rock, art rock);
  • 04.03.2007: …and you will know us by the trail of dead and forget cassettes were playing at the rote fabrik in zürich (alternative rock);
  • 29.03.2007: morgana lefay, sacred steel, serenity and bitterness were playing at rock city in uster (various kinds of metal: death, prog, power, true, …);
  • 09.04.2007: moonsorrow, swallow the sun and some band whose name i forgot played at the z-7 in pratteln (pagan metal, doom metal, death metal);
  • 10.04.2007: circle ii circle, savage circus, tomorrow’s eve and tempesta were playing at the z-7 in pratteln (metal);
  • 13.04.2007: moonspell, napalm death, behemoth, gojira and dew scented were playing at the z-7 in pratteln (death and black metal, metalcore);
  • 16.05.2007: spock’s beard was playing at the z-7 in pratteln (progressive rock);
  • 27.05.2007: trivium, annihilator and some band which was playing before the official opening time were playing at the rohstofflager in zürich (thrash metal);
  • 29.05.2007: arena was playing at the z-7 in pratteln (progressive rock);
  • 31.05.2007: anathema and moondawn were playing at the z-7 in pratteln (atmospheric rock with metal influences);
  • 01.06.2007: machine head, type o negative, cataract and zatokrev were playing at the volkshaus in zürich (thrash metal, doom metal, metalcore and death metal);
  • 27.06.2007: dream theater and megadeth were playing at the volkshaus in zürich (progressive metal, thrash metal).

if i’ll find the motivation (and if anyone cares), i might write a few words about some of these.

sometimes i wonder why mathematics is working so smooth as it is. for me, this is one of the most intriguing things around, next to the questions on why do we live and on whats the question to the answer 42… based on a small set of axioms, nobody knowing whether they are free of contradiction, an enormous building of constructions and proofs has been built. so huge, that no one can learn about all of it in one lifetime. and inside this building, between lots of dirty corners with ugly computations and hard work, there sit so many beautiful small and big results, sometimes showing surprising connections to completely different parts of mathematics. this connectivity is what surprises me most. every time again. that’s what i like about mathematics, and that’s what’s keeping me doing math. and makes me even more curious about the question on why it is working so smooth.

posted in: math thoughts
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here’s a list of concerts i plan to attend during the last four months of this year. if i put a link to a bands’ homepage, this means i’m going to that concert to see this band (and as a side effect, also the non-linked ones).

unfortunately, i will miss finntroll playing in the z-7 on 05.12.2007…