¿Do you know Tom Ze?

                                             
This is Tom Ze, a composer and multi-instrumentalist from Brazil. He`s 80 years old, and began his career together with Gilberto Gil, Caetano Veloso and Maria Bethania, when all of they were very young and fast unknown. Into his musical references we can find the local folklore and the traditional afro-brazilian sambas, among others. He participated in a series of concerts with this musicians and the "Tropicalia movement" from Brazil.
In the 60`s, he joined a popular culture center that acted as a cultural resistance organization during the military dictatorship. Later he moved out of the plublic eye and began a period of experimentations with "hybrid" instruments, new composition styles, music full of irony, and some erudite music references. Due this strange music experimentations, he was always ignored by the industry and the audiences. Tom was so depressed at this time, that he decided to leave the music and return to his small hometown to work in a gas station, but In 1989 he was re-discovered by David Byrne. While visiting Brazil, David Byrne found a used copy of "Estudando o Samba" and he became amazed whith Tom Ze´s work. That was the beginning of a new career for Tom: Byrne did sign Tom as the first artist of his "Luaka Bop" record label. I knew Tom Ze in a documentary called "Fabricando e Tom Ze", I enjoy his work a lot and I think that he´s like a kind of brazilian "Florcita Motuda" (or Motuda a kind of chilenian "Tom Ze").

The grey shrike

                                    

This post is about one of the most terrifying animals in the whole world, who´s in this picture. Maybe you will think that I´m just joking or that I have almost lost my mind, or maybe you are asking yourself how could this lovely bird been one of the scariest and sadistic in the world.

It`s true that it seems like a funny and innocent little bird, but nothing could be farthest from that appreciation.

The “gray shrike” (in Spanish alcaudón gris) is a songbird specie who lives in northern Europe, Asia and Northamerica. It´s an migratory bird, and normally a solitary one too. It´s just about 24 cm long and it typically weighs is around 65 g.

It´s songs consists of lovely whistles and pleasant trinos (trrriii). This bird call with its songs and its mime to other singing birds (or other animals like rodents or lizards), imitating their own songs, but its intentions are really creepy. When the “gray shrike” finally gets the attention from the other birds and they arrive for its meeting, it captured them and hit them to death and make an impalement in pointed elements, like cords wires or great thorns. Then, it likes to show its victims and sometimes even enjoys to make a ring of impalement victims to mark territory...