Anfisbena degli alti deserti, l’antico serpente con due parti davanti
https://www.jacoporanieri.com/blog/?p=42113
#leggende #creature #mitologia #mostri #serpenti #misticismo #antichità #folklore #deserto #draghi #carnivori #mirmecofagi #veleno #filosofia #ipotesi #storia #medioevo #bestiari #natura #teorie
#pfas #veleno #ecologia #AVS #verdi
#AlleanzaVerdiSinistra #salute
Ho ricevuto questa petizione da Cristina Guarda, Europarlamentare del gruppo Verde. La rilancio perché la causa è giusta.
L'industria chimica si rifiuta di eliminare gradualmente i PFAS. Trae profitto dalla loro produzione, mettendo a rischio la salute di milioni di europei. Firmate.
Oggi #20gennaio è #BlueMonday, il giorno più #triste dell'anno.
Un articolo #OpenAccess di #Mde ci racconta come nasce un tipo di #blu, "Blu di Prussia", il primo #pigmento sintetico della storia, dalla sua scoperta all'impiego del suo componente, l'acido prussico o #cianuro, come #veleno nella camere a gas dei #lager nazisti.
⬇️ https://riviste.unimi.it/index.php/MdE/article/view/20675/?mtm_campaign=mastodon
Il complicato morso del remipede nel buio cosmico della caverna
https://www.jacoporanieri.com/blog/?p=41052
#animali #creature #crostacei #caverne #profondità #messico #veleno #salute #farmaci #sostanze #tossine #scienza #ipotesi #futuro #predatori #sottosuolo #acqua #nuoto
Record(s) o’ the Month – August 2024
By Angry Metal Guy
August of 2024 was a pretty good month. First, it marked my return from the Injured Reserve, where I’d been nursing a high ego sprain and nagging executive dysfunction issues. These aren’t perfectly fixed, but being back on the field has shown beyond a doubt that I’m still a force to be reckoned with. Second, August of 2024 was a particularly fecund month for potential Records o’ the Month. This surprised me.
I couldn’t remember August being a particularly productive month historically and as I went back through the archive, that seems sort of true. Between 2012—when the RotM was started—and 2023, the hit rate for August Record(s) o’ the Month landing on my Top 10(ish) list for the year is 73%. Only once has an August record reached the top spot—that would be Pale Communion—with Sophicide hitting #2 in 2012 and Lör’s In Forgotten Sleep getting a #3 spot in 2017. Turisas’ controversial Turisas2013 was a runner-up in August of 2013 and ended up at #5, while the actual winner—Witherscape’s excellent The Inheritance—took the #10 spot on that list. 2020 saw Havukruunu ending up at #7, and Crypta’s Shades of Sorrow took #9 last year. The rest is a sea of -ishes and honorable mentions: Cattle Decapitation (2015), Dialith and Eternal Storm (2019), and Pain of Salvation in 2020.
And in 2024? How many of these babies will follow me to the end of the year? I’ve got an inkling, but I’m curious to see what you think.1
Dawn Treader’s Bloom & Decay—out August 24th from Liminal Dread Productions [Bandcamp]—is one of the biggest surprises of 2024 so far. The ‘one-man black metal project’ is a minefield of absolutely terrible music that I tend to avoid at all costs. Yet the sophomore record from London’s Ross Connell is an album notable for its pathos, rich composition, and artistry. What makes Blood & Decay remarkable is how it draws inspiration from—and comparisons to—revered bands like Agalloch, Alcest, and Panopticon without falling into the common pitfalls. Typically, such comparisons raise concerns about excessive reverb, overly long songs, and toothless riffs. Yet Connell subverts these expectations by creating a dynamic, storytelling experience filled with emotional peaks and valleys, masterfully blending black metal’s rawness with atmospheric beauty. Connell’s addition of his own vocals for the first time elevates the project. His powerful delivery—and powerful use of samples—transforms each song into a vivid emotional journey. As Itchymenace gushed in his review: “Dawn Treader’s Bloom & Decay not only contains amazing songs that celebrate the highs and lows of the human experience, it also sounds great.” A surprisingly easy choice for Record o’ the Month.
Fleshgod Apocalypse // Opera [August 23rd, 2024 | Nuclear Blast Records | Bandcamp] — Fleshgod Apocalypse’s Opera, their first album since 2019’s Veleno, has marked a significant evolution for the band. Drawing from the Opéra Lyrique style, the album features soprano Veronica Bordacchini voicing characters like life, death, and hope, while her vocals have brought fresh dynamics to the band’s symphonic death metal sound. With a more streamlined, melodic approach, Opera leans into catchier, poppier elements without losing its technical edge. Songs like “I Can Never Die” and “Matricide 8.21” highlight this shift, adding emotional depth through Bordacchini’s diverse performances. Though some longtime fans may miss the more grand operatic and technical side—Opera is not King—the album is still a genuine triumph. Opera blends new ideas with the band’s established identity, creating a fresh, cohesive record that accomplishes both a stylistic shift and adds another great record to Fleshgod’s already well-respected oeuvre. As I vigorously exclaimed and defended in the comments, “Opera is simultaneously and undeniably fun, heady, and technically impressive.”
Amiensus // Reclamation Pt. II [August 30th, 2024 | M-Theory Audio | Bandcamp] — Amiensus’s Reclamation Pt. II, the companion to Pt. I released earlier this year, has marked a standout achievement in progressive melodic black metal. The album blends melancholic melodicism, blackened fury, and progressive elements to create a dynamic and cathartic experience. With tracks like “Sólfarið” and “Acquiescence,” Pt. II offers invigorating and emotionally charged compositions, Amiensus skillfully balances moments of atmospheric beauty with powerful black metal. While initially, Reclamation seemed disjointed in places, the album’s intricate songs and layered instrumentation grow with each listen, presenting some of the band’s most versatile material to date. Despite some production issues, the album features elite composition and great songs like “Orb of Vanishing Light.” Reclamation Pt. II stands as Amiensus’s current “magnum opus”—in tandem with its predecessor—and a highlight of the year’s metal releases. As Kenstrosity opined, “Reclamation Pt. II is a more energetic, smartly edited, and exquisitely arranged work that blooms brighter the longer I live with it.” That’s a fancy way of saying that it’s a grower.
#2024 #Amiensus #Aug24 #BlackMetal #Blog #BloomDecay #DawnTreader #DeathMetal #FleshgodApocalypse #LiminalDreadProductions #MTheoryAudio #NuclearBlast #Opera #ReclamationPtII #RecordOfTheMonth #RecordSOTheMonth #RotM #Veleno
Fleshgod Apocalypse – Opera Review
By Angry Metal Guy
Opera, the fifth full-length LP from the Italian symphonic death metal juggernaut Fleshgod Apocalypse, marks the band’s first record since 2019’s Veleno. Some may recall that in 2021, the band’s mastermind, Francesco Paoli (bass and vocals), suffered from a mountain climbing accident that landed him in the hospital. During the harrowing ordeal that followed, he and the band had little sense of the future of Fleshgod Apocalypse. It should come as no surprise that Francesco and the others burst into a creative frenzy upon improving and returning to band activities. From the remnants of this tragedy, Opera was born.
Opera marks a significant change in Fleshgod Apocalypse’s trajectory. Inspired by the Opéra Lyrique, a genre less grandiose than the opera you’re thinking of, Opera contains episodic dialogues or confessionals with the imaginary characters of Francesco’s episode. To accomplish this, Veronica Bordacchini—featured on the album’s cover—was enlisted to play the role of these companions: death, life, and hope.1 And while the band has not changed, with Francesco Ferrini (Piano), Fabio Bartoletti (Guitar), and Eugene Ryabchenko (“Drums”) filling out the act, Opera is not your Monarch’s Fleshgod Apocalypse.
The core of Fleshgod Apocalypse’s sound hasn’t changed markedly. Blasty, heavily replaced drums prop up guitars and orchestras that trade places as the leading musical characters. The mix sports audible but unremarkable bass, and Paoli’s guttural vocal attack over the top. In its peak—and most recognizable—form, Fleshgod Apocalypse is fast, heavy, and evokes Europe in the time when wigs were a common fashion accessory, with the guitars carrying melodies and engaging in Vivaldian gymnastics2 (“Morphine Walz”). Elsewhere, the sound is dark, dramatic, and heavy, utilizing grinding drums and blasting French horns or orchestral hits to create an undeniable tension (“At War with My Soul,” which recalls the excellent horn compositions from King). The songwriting isn’t progressive, but it sure as hell is technical, with ridiculous riffs that, at their best, dance on a bed made by lush orchestrations (“Per Aspera Ad Astra”). And when it’s less successful, the guitars take a Nightwishian backseat, leaving the orchestrations to do the heavy lifting.
Rather than being the “darker” or “heavier” album bands often tout in meaningless interviews, Opera is a significantly tighter and—Padre, perdonami—poppier record than its predecessors. Opera features short songs, including an instrumental intro and outro, and the album clocks in at a tight 44 minutes. This means there are eight episodes, none longer than roughly five and a half minutes. But rather than just tightening the writing, Paoli and company also made new stylistic choices that differentiate Opera from its predecessors. “I Can Never Die” features a piano breakdown of the chorus and a Eurovision key change. “Matricide 8.21” starts sounding like a Nightwish song from Once; no double kick, 4/4 time signature, and heavy on Veronica’s voice. More tellingly, the song also features simple melodies carried on the guitars, with almost no neoclassical affectation. Moments like these speak to a significant perspective shift.
The other major change is, as noted above, how Veronica’s voice becomes a shifting character throughout Opera. Rather than sticking to her opera soprano—as she did so charmingly on “Paramour” from King—Bordacchini performs different vocal interpretations meant to embody different characters. On “I Can Never Die,” she (mostly) eschews her formal technique for a straight tone, while “Bloodclock” finds her straddling an unaffected pop approach with operatic emphases. Veronica’s most effective and unexpected performance comes on “Morphine Waltz,” where she adopts an almost punky scream like Agnete Kjølsrud (Djerv). Of course, opera is her greatest strength and part of Fleshgod Apocalypse’s core idiom, and she does that frequently and well. But while Opera showcases Veronica’s ample gifts, the use of straight tone and poppy cleans unexpectedly pushes Fleshgod into territory fitting of Napalm Records.
The combination of all these elements gives the album an undeniably poppy feel. The varied songwriting that, at times, leans into more heartfelt and balladesque territory (“Till Death Do Us Part”) or seems to be drawing from pop writing (“I Can Never Die,” “Matricide 8.21,” “Bloodclock”). Prominent melodic vocals from Veronica, with clean, tight songwriting, give the creeping sensation that Fleshgod is trying to take a Nightwishian turn toward more accessible, less grandiose music. The final element is Opera’s slick and polished presentation. Working with Jacob Hansen again, the album clocks in at a DR6 and is loud, but well-balanced. Even though King’s drum tone was better, Hansen’s grip on Fleshgod’s sound is firmer on Opera. He deftly handles Ferrini’s orchestrations and helps the vocal arrangements to ascend into the same stratosphere as Turilli’s excellent vocal compositions. The choral parts are huge and lend operatic gravity to the band’s sound.
Opera does an excellent job of balancing the old and the new, and most importantly, it justifies its artistic choices. Framing Opera as a lyric opera is a brilliant strategic move because it discredits criticisms of a poppier sound by foregrounding the artist’s vision and post-traumatic growth of what was a harrowing time for Paoli and his compatriots. Furthermore, Opera is simultaneously and undeniably fun, heady, and technically impressive. While I suspect Fleshgod Apocalypse ‘lost’ its trvest death metal fans after Oracles, I can see Opera being a divisive record for current fans because of its novel traits. And yet, I find it hard to argue with quality and the ability to take a base of brutal death metal and forge a product this addictive and immediate. Despite not being in love with the idea of a future Fleshgod that eschews its brutal base and embraces more simplistic melodies and composition, that day has not yet arrived. So, while I miss King’s grand opera aspirations, I admire the execution of the unified vision from which the album benefits.
Rating: Great
DR: 6 | Format Reviewed: 192 kb/s mp33
Label: Nuclear Blast Records
Websites: fleshgodapocalypse.bandcamp.com | facebook.com/fleshgodapocalypse
Release Date: August 23rd, 2024
#LucaTurilliSLioneRhapsodyOfFire_ #2024 #40 #Aug24 #Blog #DeathMetal #Djerv #FleshgodApocalypse #King #Nightwish #NuclearBlastRecords #Opera #orchestralDeathMetal #Review #SyymphonicDeathMetal #Veleno
Al fior l’ape non trova una tale ricompensa, da giustificare il rischio d’incontrare la Belva
https://www.jacoporanieri.com/blog/?p=40775
#vespe #api #insetti #imenotteri #predatori #parassiti #riproduzione #nido #sottosuolo #veleno #natura #ecologia #pungiglione #ambiente #evoluzione #carnivori #scienza #biologia #uova #larve #fiori #nettare
La prima regola del saporito frutto dell’ackee: mai cogliere dal ramo (della morte) l’ackee
https://www.jacoporanieri.com/blog/?p=40578
#cibo #gastronomia #frutti #alberi #ingredienti #giamaica #caraibi #africa #tradizioni #società #colonialismo #schiavismo #piatti #ricette #pericolo #veleno #aminoacidi #organismo #storia #isole
La morte riscoperta che s’incontra serpeggiando a Yamma Yamma Trail
https://www.jacoporanieri.com/blog/?p=40383
#animali #serpenti #creature #veleno #pericolo #australia #queensland #specie #tassonomia #classificazione #specie #evoluzione #tossine #medicina #siero #ricerca #rettili #predatori #carnivori #entroterra #natura
Ogni anno oltre 100.000 persone perdono la vita a causa dei morsi di serpente: la diversità dei veleni rende complesso il trattamento. Un team di ricercatori ha identificato un anticorpo capace di neutralizzare il veleno di una vasta gamma di serpenti, avvicinandoci alla creazione di un antiveleno universale.
Il Re Scorpione dell’allevamento, aspirante miliardario dei nostri giorni
https://www.jacoporanieri.com/blog/?p=39608
#animali #aracnidi #scorpioni #allevamento #nutrimento #medicina #salute #strano #iran #turchia #produzione #veleno #sostanze #ricerca #industria #commercio #dalmondo #imprese #aziende #fabbriche
La principessa? In un altro castello. Qui è la mosca che ghermisce l’uccello - jacoporanieri.com/blog/?p=38530
#animali #creature #insetti #predatori #artropodi #mosche #ditteri #natura #evoluzione #riproduzione #ambiente #ecosistema #ecologia #etologia #comportamento #rapaci #mostri #dal mondo #entomofagi #carnivori #veleno #pericolo
A fine anni ’90 sedici bambini furono allontanati dalle famiglie naturali tra i comuni di Massa Finalese e Mirandola, in provincia di Modena. Furono allontanati per sospetti di abusi e mano a mano che le indagini procedevano verità sempre più terribili e inquietanti prendevano consistenza.
Ho ascoltato Veleno, e ne ho parlato qui:
https://www.instagram.com/p/CvrfN--sP91/?igshid=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==
L’ombra che corre sui muri nella grotta dei centopiedi giganti
https://www.jacoporanieri.com/blog/?p=38429
#animali #artropodi #chilopodi #ecosistema #natura #biologia #predatori #carnivori #centopiedi #foresta #caverna #appartamenti #veleno #zampe #antenne #riproduzione #evoluzione #ambiente #insetti #sottobosco #borneo #colombia #sudamerica
Studio svela come la puntura di una formica può minare il sistema nervoso umano
https://www.jacoporanieri.com/blog/?p=38106
#animali #insetti #imenotteri #formiche #biologia #veleno #dolore #studi #scienza #sostanze #peptidi #tossine #paraponera #rituali #difese #predatori #natura #evoluzione #giungla
La lunga caccia della falsa vedova, ottuplice nemica di topi e pipistrelli d’Europa
https://www.jacoporanieri.com/blog/?p=37459
#animali #ragni #predatori #carnivori #ragnatela #veleno #media #comunicazione #ecologia #invasori #specie aliene #evoluzione #riproduzione #tassonomia #aracnidi #problemi #inghilterra #irlanda #europa #ambiente #natura
Piemeonte, 7 agosto. La causa della morte delle cinquanta vacche tutte gravide al pascolo a Sommariva Bosco (Cuneo) sembra essere il sorgo. Il cereale, a causa della #siccità, avrebbe sviluppato alcune tossine trasformandosi in un #veleno. Gli animali erano al pascolo quando una trentina di capi sono caduti a terra, morti quasi in contemporanea. In pochi altri minuti la stessa sorte è toccata a un’altra ventina di vacche, sotto gli occhi del proprietario.
Il bel regalo, che magari già conoscete, inviato nelle case dei piemontesi con timbro di qualità della protezione civile. Aiutiamoci cittadini perchè non è credibile, a questo punto, l'ignoranza dei governanti, questa è scelta ponderata. Non è possibile che nessuno, in nessun grado gerarchico, si sia accorto dell'attentato alla vita dei cittadini.
#Piemonte #mascherine #protezionecivile #verità #veleno #FATEGIRARE #insurrezionenonviolenta
Per questo Pablo Trincia che presenta #Veleno in seno a La Terra dei Padri ha l’effetto di beneplacito all’utilizzo della sua inchiesta come elemento della lettura complottarda su Bibbiano.
