Act II, Signature Xvii - (1)
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We can also trace that peculiar social movement which led some factories, ships, restaurants, and households to clean up their backstages to such an extent that, like monks, Communists, or German aldermen, their guards are always up and there is no place where their front is down, while at the same time members of the audience become sufficiently entranced with the society's id to explore the places that had been cleaned up for them [Erving Goffman, The Presentation of Self (New York: Anchor Press, 1959), p. 247]. II — xvii — What Was That Good For? Coalition forces pour into Ossian. In Las Vegas, Roveretto Messimo ponders taking on a new client to pay his bills. A U.S. detachment breaks into the Impersonal Terrace while Fuald, deported back to Ossian, plots revenge by organizing the looting of the Hermitage. Charles, drugged by Ferguson’s alien soporifics, agrees to print an article exposing the eco– terrorist aims of the Founder’s League. In the 13th century, the fanatical inquisitor Conrad prepares to declare anathema against Fr. Anselm. ~ page 215 ~ This is the cover art for the single "War" by the artist Edwin Starr. The cover art copyright is believed to belong to the label, Gordy, or the graphic artist.* "War" Act II, Signature xvii - (1) *[Image & caption credit and following text courtesy of Wikipedia]: "War" is a soul song written by Norman Whitfield and Barrett Strong for the Motown label in 1969. Whitfield first produced the song — a blatant anti-Vietnam War protest — with The Temptations as the original vocalists. After Motown began receiving repeated requests to release "War" as a single, Whitfield re-recorded the song with Edwin Starr as the vocalist, deciding to withhold the Temptations ' version so as not to alienate their more conservative fans. Starr's version of "War" was a number-one hit on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in 1970, and is not only the most successful and well-known record of his career, but is also one of the most popular protest songs ever recorded. Its power was reasserted when Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band took their rendition into the U.S. Top 10 in 1986. Following the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, the song was placed on the list of post-9/11 inappropriate titles distributed by Clear Channel. The Temptations' version of "War," featuring Paul Williams and Dennis Edwards on lead vocals, was much less intense than the Edwin Starr version. Williams and Edwards deliver the song's anti-war, pro-peace message over a stripped-down instrumental track, with bass singer Melvin Franklin chanting a repeated recruit training-like "hup, two, three, four" in the background during the verses. The song was included as a track on the March 1970 Psychedelic Shack album, which featured the title track as its only single. The track's direct message, summarized by its chorus ("War, what is it good for? Absolutely nothin'!"), struck a chord with the American public and resonated with growing public opposition to the war in Vietnam. Fans from across the nation, many of them college students and other young people, sent letters to Motown requesting the release of "War" as a single. The label didn't want to risk the image of its most popular male group, and the Temptations themselves were also apprehensive about releasing such a potentially controversial song as a single. The label decided to withhold "War"'s release as a single, a decision that Whitfield fought until the label came up with a compromise: "War" would be released, but it would have to be re-recorded with a different act. Edwin Starr, who had become a Motown artist in 1968 after his former label, Ric-Tic, was purchased by Motown founder Berry Gordy, Jr., became "War's" new vocalist. Considered among Motown's "second-string" acts, Starr had only one major hit, 1968's number-six hit "Twenty-Five Miles," to his name by this time. He heard about the conflict surrounding the debate of whether or not to release "War," and volunteered to re-record it. Whitfield re-created the song to match Starr's James Brown-influenced soul shout: the single version of "War" was dramatic and intense, depicting the general anger and distaste the antiwar movement felt towards the war in Vietnam. Unlike the Temptations' original, Starr's "War" was a full-scale Whitfield production, with prominent electric guitar lines, clavinets, a heavily syncopated rhythm accented by a horn section, and with Whitfield's new act, The Undisputed Truth , on backing vocals. Upon its release in June 1970, Starr's "War" became a runaway hit, and held the #1 position on the Billboard Pop Singles chart for three weeks, in August and September 1970. It replaced "Make It With You" by Bread , and was replaced by another Motown single, "Ain't No Mountain High Enough" by Diana Ross. Notable as the most successful protest song to become a pop hit, earning compliments from contemporary protester John Lennon, "War" became Edwin Starr's signature song. Rather than hindering his career (as it might have done for the Temptations ), "War" buoyed Starr's career, and he adopted the image of an outspoken liberal orator for many of his other early-1970s releases, including the similarly themed "Stop the War Now" from 1971. It and another 1971 single, "Funky Music Sho Nuff Turns Me On", continued Starr's string of Whitfield-produced psychedelic soul hits. After 1971, Starr's career began to falter, and, citing Motown's reliance on formulas, he departed the label in the mid-1970s. Later in his career, after moving to the United Kingdom, Starr re-recorded several of his hits with British band Utah Saints . Starr's new version of "War" in 2003 was his final piece; he died on April 2 of the same year of a heart attack. Starr won a Grammy in 1971 for "War" for best R&B Male Vocal [citation needed]. In 1999, Edwin Starr's "War" was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame. de rigueur Act II, Signature xvii - (2) Main Entry: de ri£gueur Pronunciation: d„-(ƒ)r‡-‚g„r Function: adjective Etymology: French Date: 1833 : prescribed or required by fashion, etiquette, or custom : proper Rising smoke in Lochcarron forms a ceiling over the valley due to a temperature inversion (photo by S/V Moonrise, author JohanTheGhost), January 30, 2006.* inversion Act II, Signature xvii - (3) In meteorology, an increase of air temperature with altitude. Such an increase is a reversal of the normal temperature condition of the troposphere, where temperature usually decreases with altitude. Inversions play an important role in determining cloud forms, precipitation, and visibility. An inversion acts as a lid, preventing the upward movement of the air below it. Where a pronounced inversion is present at a low level, convective clouds cannot grow high enough to produce showers and, at the same time, visibility may be greatly reduced by trapped pollutants (see smog). Because the air near the base of the inversion is cool, fog is frequently present there. *[Image & caption credit and following text courtesy of Wikipedia]: In meteorology, an inversion is a deviation from the normal change of an atmospheric property with altitude. It almost always refers to a temperature inversion, i.e. an increase in temperature with height, or to the layer (inversion layer) within which such an increase occurs [http://www.nws.noaa.gov/glossary/]. An inversion can lead to pollution such as smog being trapped close to the ground, with possible adverse effects on health. An inversion can also suppress convection by acting as a "cap." If this cap is broken for any of several reasons, convection of any moisture present can then erupt into violent thunderstorms. Temperature inversion can notoriously result in freezing rain in cold climates. Under certain conditions, the normal vertical temperature gradient is inverted such that the air is colder near the surface of the Earth. This can occur when, for example, a warmer, less dense air mass moves over a cooler, denser air mass. This type of inversion occurs in the vicinity of warm fronts, and also in areas of oceanic upwelling such as along the California coast. With sufficient humidity in the cooler layer, fog is typically present below the inversion cap. An inversion is also produced whenever radiation from the surface of the earth exceeds the amount of radiation received from the sun, which commonly occurs at night, or during the winter when the angle of the sun is very low in the sky. This effect is virtually confined to land regions as the ocean retains heat far longer. In the polar regions during winter, inversions are nearly always present over land. A warmer air mass moving over a cooler one can "shut off" any convection which may be present in the cooler air mass. This is known as a capping inversion. However, if this cap is broken, either by extreme convection overcoming the cap, or by the lifting effect of a front or a mountain range, the sudden release of bottled-up convective energy — like the bursting of a balloon — can result in severe thunderstorms. Such capping inversions typically precede the development of tornadoes in the midwestern United States. In this instance, the "cooler" layer is actually quite warm, but is still denser and usually cooler than the lower part of the inversion layer capping it. Consequences. With the ceasing of convection, which is normally present in the atmosphere, a number of phenomena are associated with a temperature inversion. The air becomes stiller, hence the air becomes murky because dust and pollutants are no longer lifted from the surface.