Science explains Freddie Mercury

Science doesn't just listen to old Queen records. Science tries to understand old Queen records.

Science has decided that Freddie Mercury was basically like those Tuvan throat singers:

Those guys are so flamboyant.

Science doesn't say that Fred ever quite matched them for subharmonics, but science says he came close:

Subharmonics help "in creating the impression of a sound production system driven to its limits, even while used with great finesse," write the Austrian, Czech, and Swedish researchers in the Logopedics Phoniatrics Vocology journal. "These traits, in combination with the fast and irregular vibrato, might have helped create Freddie Mercury's eccentric and flamboyant stage persona."

I think the outfits might have helped a little.

Science is now working on trying to fathom out Brian May.

Looking for a revolution

The scientific inquiry into music revolutions is interesting:

The evolution of western pop music, spanning from 1960 to 2010, has been analysed by scientists.

A team from Queen Mary University of London and Imperial College London looked at more than 17,000 songs from the US Billboard Hot 100.

They found three music revolutions - in 1964, 1983 and 1991 - and traced the loss of blues chords from the charts, as well as the birth of disco.

But it's fundamentally flawed, isn't it? If you want to know what's happening in music, the very worst place to look would be the American charts. It'd be like a seismologist restricting themselves to measuring only the smallest of aftershocks.

Just as a for instance, that methodology means that punk is more or less ignored and the revolutions spotted are timed about two years too late.

Still, as a guide to what sorts of music American radio was prepared to play, it's a useful exercise.

The illustrated Friends: Your chromosomes

"I'm a friend of your chromosomes" insists Adam. It's a little hard to imagine how that friendship could occur without - at the very least - a spot of alarming behaviour.

On the other hand, it's possible that your chromosomes are off somewhere, making music. UCLA has been diligently trying to turn DNA sequences into music; Nomunak has gone one better and, er, actually created videos to go with the songs.

This is Collagen Recognition by Integrin for Signal Transduction:



[Part of the Illustrated Friends]

Miley Cyrus has killed God

Miley Cyrus was taken with a photo of Lawrence Krauss, so much so, she shared it with her Twitter followers.

It had this quote from Krauss attached:

“You are all stardust. You couldn’t be here if stars hadn’t exploded, because the elements (carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, all the things that matter for evolution) weren’t created at the beginning of time. They were created in stars. So forget Jesus. Stars died so you can live.”

I know what you're thinking: how could he have left out mentioning how we have to get back to the garden, right?

That, though, isn't what has caused a storm of stupid to come raining down on Cyrus' head:

“You seriously believe that crap? It’s so ridiculously stupid. Go to hell,” one person tweeted at her, while another added, “So are you no longer a Christian? Forget Jesus??? Seriously? What has happened to you out there in the famous world? What????

Cyrus has politely rolled her eyes and, well, raised them to heaven:

It makes me sad to think the world is this way. Like Einstein says "Science without religion is lame. Religion without science is blind."

— Miley Ray Cyrus (@MileyCyrus) March 6, 2012

I'm not entirely sure that trying to win round people who don't believe in scientific origins of the Universe with a quote from Einstein is going to be effective, but kudos for not taking the career-minded route of issuing a cringing apology.

It's surprising that Miley Cyrus turns out to be one of our bravest pop stars; it's depressing that we live in times where quoting Krauss is brave.

Glastonbury 2011: No drug test run-off

Dr John Ramsey is a disappointed man this weekend. No, he didn't buy tickets for the festival thinking it was some sort of Prince gig; he's a scientist from ULU and wanted to do some analysis on sewage from the site to see if there were any traces of drugs:

"It would have been a golden opportunity to test the technology and find out the actual levels of the use of 'legal highs' and new psychoactive compounds," he said.

He said that Glastonbury, with its ethos that "British law applies, but the rules of society are a little bit different, a little bit freer" provided the ideal demographic.

Seems fair enough, right? But Eavis has said no.

Festival's founder Michael Eavis said in a statement: "The drug culture these days has changed beyond belief. What a cheek to even suggest there's a problem."

Erm, Michael: police had made 34 drug arrests by Wednesday.

But even if people didn't take drugs at Glastonbury, why would you not let Dr Ramsey have a bit of poo? If you're convinced the place is cleaner than Emily Bishop's conscience, surely you'd welcome the chance for a university-endorsed report saying that there's not so much as a hint of LemSip in the portaloos?

[Part of Glastonbury 2011 full coverage]

Bookmarks - Internet stuff: We to me

Ben Goldacre abstracts some research into American song lyrics:

Over time, use of words related to self-focus and antisocial behavior increased, whereas words related to other-focus, social interactions, and positive emotion decreased. These findings offer novel evidence regarding the need to investigate how changes in the tangible artifacts of the sociocultural environment can provide a window into understanding cultural changes in psychological processes.

Darkness at 3AM: It's the Google-eyes

Oh, the 3AM Girls are excited this morning:

We knew that U2 were big - but now they're visible from SPACE!

The amazing giant claw that is the centrepiece to their 360 tour party is so huge Google Earth can pick it up as it moves around the world with Bono and the boys.

I don't want to really blow their minds, but you can see the table on our patio on Google Earth, should you wish to.

Michael Jackson: A thing of beauty is a joy forever

Thanks to Karl T, who brings a story from the Mail On Sunday to my attention - indeed, the science section of the Mail:

Michael Jackson set to be embalmed at the O2 Centre after missing the deadline for cryogenic freezing

Perhaps unsurprisingly, this total bollocks is just credited to a "Daily Mail reporter" - nobody is going to want to have this one following them around for the rest of their lives:

Von Hagens said that he spoke with representatives of the Jackson family 'many months ago' and it was agreed that his body will be plastinated and placed next to Bubbles, his late pet monkey who was plastinated a number of years ago and is exhibited at The Body Worlds & Mirror Of Time exhibition at the O2 Centre in London.

Von Hagens also confirmed it was one of Michael's final requests to be reunited with Bubbles.

Ah. It's handy to know that the Jackson family were making plans for his corpse to be plasticated many months ago. And that Michael - apparently aware he was about to die - was busy making final requests. The Mail doesn't bother to undermine its own fantasy by trying to come up with a plausible explanation as to how Von Hagens is supposed to know what Jackson's final requests were.

As if this wasn't shameful enough tosh for the paper - which once used to at least pretend to be serious - to be slapping out, it then swerves into a discussion of cryogenics, which at least it has the sense to accept isn't happening. It includes this line:

No-one has ever been revived using this process although it is a popular subject in science fiction films such as Forever Young featuring Mel Gibson.

Presumably the Mail is suggesting that Forver Young featuring Mel Gibson is some sort of proof of concept? I'm looking forward to next week, when the paper informs its readers that nobody has yet lived forever, but if they did, it'd be a bit like Highlander III, the one with that Daniel Do in.

So with an autopsy on Michael Jackson expected 24 hours after his death, it's already too late for the Peter Pan of pop who never wanted to grow up.

Oh, lord. Even if you can't get the science right, you'd have at least thought the Mail would be able to tell the difference between Cliff Richard and Michael Jackson.

Karl's email:

Either the Sunday Mail has started channeling The Onion, or has given up any pretention to serious journalism.

Apparently, Gunther Von Hagens is going to plastinate Michael Jackson for display at the O2 Arena. Yo know, someone in the Jackson camp should really have checked the non-performance clause in the contract for the summer shows.

Disappointing headline too. I would've gone for 'World's creepiest human being to embalm world's second creepiest human being', or 'Human freakshow to appear in, er...'. That's probably why I'll never get to write for a wholesome family newspaper like the Mail

If Jim Morrison had lived

Let's imagine that Jim Morrison hadn't died at the age of 27. Okay, he'd probably have died at 28, or 29, or 30. But what if - somehow - he had lived. What would he look like today? Like Kurt Russell, reckon some scientists who have produced an computer-aged image of him. They've only done the face, though, and haven't gone as far as to stick him in a studio recording an album with Rick Rubin, or halfway down the Sunday bill at Glastonbury.

Is it real, or is it Memorex

For reasons that aren't entirely clear, scientists at the University of Granada have come up with a way of telling the difference between "genuine" and "pirated" CDs:

Through the new technique proposed by the scientists of the Department of Optics of the UGR it is possible to identify if a CD has been recorded using a method or a device different to those used in industrial processes, which allows to differentiate between original CDs and copies. This technique uses the phenomenon of light diffraction on a CD surface to appreciate the differences between original and bootleg CDs, as they generate different types of diffraction models.

Of course, a cheaper way is to compare if you've bought the CD from a shop, or off that bloke Dave who works with Aileen down the council depot. But you don't, presumably, find the same level of research funding for that technique.

Live fast, die young, leave some pretty research

There is a serious message at the heart of the study by Mark Bellis of the Centre for Public Health at Liverpool John Moores University. This is the report which seems to claim being a pop star is bad for your health, and upon the discoveries Bellis hangs a plea for everyone to take more care of our pop stars:

"Pop stars can suffer high levels of stress in environments where alcohol and drugs are widely available, leading to health-damaging risk behaviour.

"Their behaviour can also influence would-be stars and devoted fans.

"Collaboration between health and music industries should focus on improving both pop star health and their image as role models. Public health consideration needs to be given to preventing music icons promoting health-damaging behaviour among their emulators and fans."

Which, you know, it's hard to argue against when Pete Doherty's due in court and William Hill have been taking bets on whether or not Winehouse will turn up for the Mercury Awards.

But we're not sure that either the methodology of the study, nor its conclusion, are right.

The contention that rock and pop stars are more likely to die than non-pop stars is based on

1,064 US and European rock musicians and singers who featured in an all-time top 1,000 albums chart compiled in 2000.

The conclusion from looking at this subset is that:

Overall, 100 pop stars included in the study had died, with chronic drug or alcohol-related problems or overdose accounting for a quarter of deaths. The average age of death was 35 for European stars and 42 for those from the US.

Between three and 25 years after becoming famous - defined as appearing in the charts - pop stars were found to be 1.7 times more likely to die. Twenty years after first achieving chart success, 10 per cent of US stars and four per cent of those in Europe were dead - twice the normal rate.

But are the people who made albums in an 'all-time best-of' chart a fair cross-section of rock and pop stars? Isn't there an extent to which the best-known stars, the one whose records are remembered later on, who continue to sell, are the ones whose early death makes them notorious?

In other words, how can Bellis be sure these people are dead because they're on the chart, and not on the chart because they're dead?

Then there's the question of if Kurt Cobain and Ian Curtis, and the other rock and roll suicides, would not have killed themselves had they not been in the music industry? To paraphrase Nick Hornby, are they sad because they're rock stars, or are they rock stars because they're sad? Could 'being a musician' be a symptom of a tendency to suicide, rather than a cause?

And is it fair to compare 'rock stars' with the general population? If you're going to blame the fame and success of selling records as being a cause of an early death, would it not be more appropriate to compare the death rates with other jobs where young people suddenly become well-known and/or incredibly rich in a profession high on dangerous air-travel in private jets and long periods of not having much to do?

Not to mention how, the "twice as likely to die" for European rock stars seems to be quite a large claim based on a small sample and a comparison between 2 per cent and 4 per cent - how much of that would disappear in a margin of error?

Still, it's always nice to see the social sciences being treated seriously.

Mills plans a life of education

She's the new Shirley Valentine: Heather Mills is planning to go to university. She wants to be able to argue with scientists - not, of course, that Mills believes there are any gaps in her knowledge, though:

intends to study for a degree “so that I can argue with scientists about global warming and meat and milk”.

Heather — dubbed Mucca because of her porn past — explained: “Even though I obviously know about all these things, if I’m not a full-fledged scientist nobody will listen to me.”

The Sun still hasn't grasped that if you have to explain a nickname every bloody time you use it, it's not actually a nickname at all.

We love, though, Mill's "obviously" - obviously she knows about all these things. And what scientists is she planning on having the "arguments" about global warming with?

Sun exclusive: Doherty wobbly

In news which will come as a shock to the easily shocked, a top graphologist has told the Sun Pete Doherty "shows signs of instability."

They ask this chap to have a look at pages of Doherty's journals, and to say what the handwriting reveals. Originally, they were going to do his tealeaves instead, but apparently Doherty uses bags. This is the graphology verdict:

"We look at stroke measurement, not what he's written. The size and depth of the writing and any slants.

"Pete Doherty's handwriting shows him to be a quick and fluent conversationalist who can rapidly absorb other people's ideas.

"He also has an enquiring mind, yet at times he can be mentally lazy.

"Pete's writing shows a level of emotional instability.

"He tends to have a constant state of internal chaos and may have a difficulty separating reality from fantasy."

Now, even if there was a scientific basis to assigning character type on the basis of if they draw a circle to dot their Is or not - and, frankly, it's only a step away from deciding who might be a mass murderer according to how they lace their shoes - since he clearly knows he's looking at a page of Pete's writing, doesn't that throw up the merest hint of a possibility that the expert could be influenced by factors other than the downstroke on Doherty's Ps? "This double underlining hints at being part of a chart-topping double act based on a strong friendship which has, to judge by this exclamation mark's angle, been superseded by a comedy double-act with a person in the fashion industry."