Month: July 2017

Cottenham War Memorial – A fishy tale

UPDATE: It’s definitely not a dolphin in Cottenham.

Who else has noticed the large “fish” leaning head down against the back of the legs of the serviceman featured in Cottenham’s War Memorial? Friend of the blog Patrick Coughlan certainly has and he wonders what it’s all about..

According to one web site it perhaps alludes to the designer’s naval past. However, another suggests that it’s not a fish, but a dolphin, a mammal frequently associated with the Grey Funnel Line (the Royal Navy) and marine regiments. Indeed, Cottenham’s war memorial is similar to the one in St John’s Churchyard, Stokesay, Shropshire, which has a large dolphin at the serviceman’s back. Locals there say it is indeed an allusion to the sea but perhaps also to the mythology of dolphins bearing dead heroes in the afterlife.

Classic Chords #23 Rush Tom Sawyer

Tom Sawyer is perhaps the best known Rush song. It was the Canadian power trio’s breakthrough hit in terms of sales and popular appeal and was the opener on their 1981 album Moving Pictures. I remember listening to it on vinyl the day it came out and wondering how on earth I was going to work out what Lifeson was playing in terms of chords.

Lyrically, the song strikes out as the eponymous rebel with words by Rush drummer/lyricist Neil Peart and Pye Dubois who wrote lyrics for fellow Canadian rockers Max Webster. The opening power chords that share Le Studio space with Geddy Lee’s Moog synths and a spaced out backbeat from Peart are not your common or garden no-third power chords as you’d imagine, nor were they anything like the open, up-the-neck chords he’d been using in the previous decade (cf The Hemispheres chord).

If they were standard power chords, it would probably just be a big E-major followed by a D and an A and then jumping down to the C. But, Lifeson, who pleads ignorance of most of the chord names in the video tutorial he recorded for the song in 2007, is playing some interesting variations on the power chord idea. In them, an open top E string rings out in the intro on three of four chord variations that give us the progression.

There is (admittedly) a massive E-major power chord at the seventh fret (although by definition because it’s got the third note of the scale of E major (G#) it’s not really a proper power chord). Open bottom E string leads the riff into the sustained power chord. The second chord is an Asus4 (but with the open top E string to add chorus-like resonance to the E fretted on the B string, that too kicks off with an open E string for the riff. The third chord starts with the open A string instead and sustains an A7sus4, which lifts that almost jazzy-sounding second chord, the As4. And, finally kicking with the bass E string open again we move two frets down from the second chord shape to give us a hybrid chord a Cadd2 (basically a C major chord with the second note of the scale of C major, the D, added, you might also called it a Cadd9).

I remember the chords in the Rush music book I had as a kid, they had it as E, Dsus4, A, and then C. It was wrong…well…it was simplifed if not wrong. Any tab and chord sites that talk of E, D, A and C major power chords as being the chords in Tom Sawyer are just plain wrong too. Some seem to get it half right, but Alex himself shows you exactly what he plays here and that’s how I’m playing it on this snippet:

Just caught this thieving young magpie

Eurasian magpies (Pica pica) obviously have a special place in the heart of any Geordie, their black and white plumage with a hint of blue being the football strip colours of Newcastle United, obviously.

The birds’ reputation as thieving magpies is misplaced, although like most corvids (crows), the bird is attracted to objects such as coins and buttons which it might use to decorate its nest or simply collect because they imagine such objects are seeds.

As I think I’ve mentioned before, corvid cognition is much higher than one might anticipate based on brain structure of these descendents of the dinosaurs. Crows seem to be far more intelligent than our understanding of the brain based on mammalian biology (think clever rats and monkeys) suggests. The same also applies to parrots and related species and perhaps all birds.

These photos were snapped of a juvenile on one of the jetties overlooking an old gravel pit pond at Milton Country Park north of Cambridge. The bird was stood on the fence and started doing his song and dance routine when he saw us and the dog. It was a bright, but fairly grey day and his bright white and deep black means getting light readings and setting bracketing for a decent shot before he flew off was next to impossible. I quickly fired off as he squealed and flapped and then nudged the levels in the photos to get the most dramatic tones.

Incidentally, my reference to them being shy is that usually adults out in the countryside will take to the air and head for the middle distance or the nearest trees almost as soon as they see you, which is often before you see them. This youngster was in a relatively busy area and maybe hadn’t yet learned to recognise the risk of dogs and humans.

Another pause for thought

I’ve mentioned the comma butterfly (Polygonia c-album) previously on Sciencebase, but at the time didn’t have a photo of the underwing marking which gives it its name. Well, I do now, after a visit to RSPB Ouse Fen Reserve (spotted it resting on a bush just as I was heading back to the car park). You can see the white “comma” very easily, there’s one on each wing. Also, note the curled up proboscis which butterflies all use to get to the nectar in flowers.

 

RSPB Ouse Fen Reserve

UPDATE: There are several accessible chunks to this reserve now in addition to the Needingworth side: The Over side, which is the shortest route to the Reedbed Trail via a very rough drove, parking is potholed, but the section is beautiful, the Earith entrance which is relatively new, good parking. Also, you can access the Barleycroft Lake section from another reserve RSPB Berry Fen. At some point, these will all be joined by trails so you should be able to park in Earith and wend your way through to the Reedbed Trail, across the Great River Ouse and through the Needingworth side.

I am bit reluctant to tell you about the little jewel I have found. It’s not three quarters of an hour’s drive from Cambridge. Although the title of this blog post sort of gives it away…

It’s a lovely picturesque place, lots of decent footpaths, trees, ponds, hedgerows, reed beds, and lakes, and lots of bird life. And, there was nobody else there almost the whole time I wandered around, I only saw one couple when I arrived and a couple of people as I was leaving.

Admittedly, it’s a former gravel works/quarry and is flanked by active quarrying, which is feeding materials to the A14 roadworks, I reckon. The site will no doubt be rendered as a nature reserve when they have scooped out the last of the shingle and sand. Of course, many a nature reserve emerges from quarried land, better than it being used as a landfill site.

Anyway, we had hail this morning, thunder and lightning, and torrential rain. My plans to visit were almost scuppered, but the clouds cleared a little and I jumped in the car, camera in hand. By the time I got there the clouds had regrouped and it was spitting with rain, half a mile into the reserve and there was thunder and no little lightning. I was too far away from the Faraday cage of my car, so I clung to the hedgerows and kept camera dry in my coat until the storm passed and the clouds broke again. By mid-afternoon it was too hot and I had no water.

So..the birdlife, lots of green woodpeckers (Picus viridis), juvenile pictured above. They’re also known as yaffles around here and generally feed on ants along the footpaths and on the clear spaces, there were common terns winging it over the lakes, moorhens, swans and numerous reed warblers (Acrocephalus scirpaceus) in the, you guessed it…reeds (top photo). I inadvertently scared a buzzard (Buteo buteo) from its woodland perch into flight, I turned out of that wooded area and caught sight of a red kite (Milvus milvus) pictured below. You’ll notice both of those latter scientific binomials are tautonyms, that means they repeat the first part of the name and it implies that this species is the “type” of the family, the achetypal species one might say.

I heard at least a couple of turtle doves (Streptopelia turtur) in the undergrowth of another wooded area, but didn’t see them. Saw one or two reed buntings (Emberiza schoeniclus), but heard many more. Rare was the sound of chiffchaff (Phylloscopus collybita), until after three hours of walking I’d got back to the car. I don’t think I heard nor caught sight of a willow warbler (Phylloscopus trochilus) at all.

In abundance, however, were goldfinches (Carduelis carduelis), another tautonymic bird, whitethroats, blackbirds, starlings, long-tailed tits, great tits, blue tits (all three species with juveniles in tow), wood pigeons, wrens, lapwings, yellowhammers, dunnocks, common tern (below) and a few unidentified LBJ (little brown jobs). There were even oystercatchers around.

More intriguing though were the warbler-type birds at the farthest point away from the (free) car park. I certainly saw a few more reed warblers, perhaps a sedge warbler, in this area of the reserve (the reedbed trail). But, looking at the shots I got I cannot positively identify some of them as they were flitting among bushes and out of sight. Others, it turns out, are whitethroats (Sylvia communis). The barbed shot below is a juvenile, Mrs Sciencebase suggests.

Now, I’ve told you about the place, I would recommend a visit if you enjoy the peace and quiet of a nature reserve, although there is a bit of industrial traffic and the endless churning of the gravel conveyor belt for the quarry, but don’t let that put you off. Looking at the RSPB map for the site, I see now, that in my three hours, I only saw half the site, so another visit is needed…might even get a shot of an adult yaffle!

Classic Chord #22 Elbow Bones

Elbow are a magnificent band, their proto-musical roots perhaps lie in singer Guy Garvey’s admiration of Genesis-era Peter Gabriel although the early elbow song Newborn was, he told interviewers, modelled on a song from “A Trick of the Tail”, namely Ripples, which was post-Gabriel Genesis. Nevertheless, they continue to write and play enigmatic and evocative music of which the song The Bones of You is a fine example.

Now, the ubiquitous guitar tab sites have all sorts of versions of the chords guitarist Mark Potter is purportedly playing on this song. Weird, twisted things that are almost impossible to move between without a lot of digital contortions and attendant noise. Moreover, none of the versions I saw sounded even remotely like the harmonies Potter is producing with six strings on the album or live.

So, I took a quick look at a clip of the band playing the song with the BBC Orchestra. One thing is immediately obvious, Potter, as many guitarists, is efficient. He’s not contorting, it’s just him shuttling between two simple chord shapes. Of course, it’s in an odd time signature against the main beat, as you often expect with this genre and there are some of the same open strings ringing the same notes in both chords.

The two chords which fill the song are a D6/9 chord and A minor-9, the latter with an added D (there’s an implied F# with the bass and vocal melody, giving an Am6/9. The song implies the D6/9 has an added A implying an E7sus4. However, that’s not the end of it Potter is playing with a capo at fret three, so the above discussion is up three semitones: the main chords are thus F6/9and Cm9, with their attendant passing notes C on top of the F6/9 and an A on the Cm9.

Here’s a quick snippet of me playing the two chords with capo 3, not exactly the rhythm Potter plays on The Bones of You but close enough for a demonstration.

More Classic Chords here.

How to Instagram photos from your PC

UPDATE: If you don’t want to or cannot use the hack described below, then simply install a plugin or browser extension that acts as a user-agent switcher. Such an extension basically lets your browser pretend it is an Android phone, an iPhone or indeed any other type of browser. I tried uploading to Instagram with this user-agent switcher extension installed under Chrome and it seemed to work fine.

You have been able to access your Instagram account from a desktop browser for quite some time but you cannot post a photo without a workaround. The workaround is quite straightforward. You simply log into Instagram on your desktop browser, switch to developer mode (right-click “inspect” in Chrome) and choose a mobile device view. Full instructions are here.

I just tried it successfully with my recent kingfisher photo…seems to have worked. Saves me having Instagram running on my phone as it drains the battery really quickly even with the app supposedly “inactive”.

Developer or “inspect” mode in Chrome lets you make your browser look like it’s a mobile browser running on a Galaxy, Nexus, iPhone, iPad etc. If you want to see what a site looks like (perhaps testing your own for instance), this is a useful tool. I’m sure there are mobile only sites out there that people use, this is a workaround for that too, so you don’t have to use an actual mobile device. (I assume it’s simply doing a user-agent switch within the dev mode, which reverts to normal browser when close the dev window). It’s a tiny bit more complicated for Safari on a Mac, but the instructions are in the link.

How to use a guitar capo properly

One guitarist friend, Ted from local band The Lonely, refers to the guitar capo as the “Devil’s Clamp”. We all know what he means, it’s a necessary evil sometimes if the singer needs to be up a tone or two to match their range but the guitarist really doesn’t want to re-learn the song with all those altered chord positions and inversions. Moreover, using a capo keeps the sound of the song similar. After all, playing the basic CAGED chords with open strings is very different in terms of timbre and sustain etc to playing them at second, third, fourth positions. Same applies to melodic riffs.

There is a caveat, of course, a capo on the first three or four frets doesn’t alter the overall sound of the guitar very much, but once you get past fret five and you’re capoing at fret 7 say you’ve lost most of the bottom end and are getting an almost mandolin sound now with very little sustain when compared to those open strings without the capo. Compare two fairly similar, folky songs – James Taylor’s Fire and Rain (capo 3) versus The Beatles’ Here Comes the Sun (capo 7).

Anyway, whatever your reasons for using or not using a capo and there are many, there are a few tips and tricks that can help you get the best out of it without causing problems for your guitar. I did a rough-and-ready video tutorial just to show you what I’m talking about, in the vid I’m using a spring-loaded Kyser capo.

  1. Don’t use a capo! Learn your chord inversions all the way up and down the neck, you’ll very, very rarely ever see a classical or jazz guitarist playing with a capo, they just learn how to play properly!
  2. If you really must use a capo, then use it but take it off as soon as you’re finished with it otherwise your strings will continue to bite into your frets all the while the guitar is on its stand or leaning against a wall and you’ll have to have those worn frets replaced or refinished as they become prematurely indented and damaged.
  3. Before putting on a capo, tune your guitar properly. Then once the capo is in place. Gently depress all the strings with the palm of your hand over the sound hole (or over your pickups if you’re capoing an electric). This should correct any disturbance caused by applying the capo as the strings will adjust under the clamp. Neverthelss, you may need to fine tune to the pitch the capo is giving you. Open strings are normally tuned to EADGBe, capo 3 means the strings will be tuned to GCFBbDg, for instance.
  4. Put your capo on carefully and clamp it at a slight angle so that the grip is slightly further back from the fret for the bottom, lower strings and closer to the fret for the higher strings. Ideally, about 1/3 of the way back from the fret for the low E string and about 1/5th of the way back from the high e string. This precludes harsh bending of the string over the fret.
  5. If you get string buzz, move the capo towards the fret a little. It might be that you have to clamp very close to the fret to avoid buzzing. If this is the case, try another type of capo and clamp normally. If there’s always buzzing, then it might be time to give your guitar new strings, a proper setup to adjust action and intonation, and perhaps even a fret redressing if they’re worn or indented.
  6. Make sure the capo only protrudes from the high e-string side of your fretboard enough to ensure the high e-string is properly capoed and no further otherwise the end of the capo can get in the way of your index finger fingering.
  7. Choose a decent quality capo whatever style you opt for. Quick release ones are the obvious choice for live performance when you might have to move it around and take it on and off through a set. But, the more robust clamp-type capos might be better in
    a recording session allowing more precise and stable tuning.
  8. One final tip repeats the one above! Take off the capo as soon as you’re finished using it and retune to pitch to avoid fret damage.You can hear my original songs via the Dave Bradley Music Bandcamp page and elsewhere. If you’re a guitarist, you might also like to check out the Sciencebase Classic Chords series, covering everything from Pink Floyd to The Rolling Stones by way of James Taylor and Nile Rodgers.

Don’t miss the beauty of the kingfisher

The common kingfisher (Alcedo atthis) I wrote about earlier in the year seems not to have taken up long-term residence where I photographed a female in January 2017. Mrs Sciencebase and myself saw others at WWT Welney, as one might expect. But despite watching and occasionally searching, even at a local nature site called Kingfisher Bridge, we didn’t see another until a trip to the National Trust site at Wicken Fen.

Common kingfisher

Over the pond at the Roger Clarke hide there was a family – male, female and three fledglings. Mrs Sciencebase saw all five while I was staring through a zoom lens and photographing the male who alighted on a branch very close to the hide.

I was hoping to find a current piece of scientific research about kingfishers to share. There was something last year about the kingfisher and other piscivores and tracking the foods they eat, but that wasn’t as interesting as scientific research that suggests that “kingfishers prey upon the most accessible types of prey.” Not quite the earth-shattering breakthrough I was hoping for, basically tells us that kingfishers minimize their energy expenditure when foraging…well, don’t we all?

The common kingfisher’s scientific binomial (the monicker most people call an animal’s “Latin name”) is Alcedo atthis. The word Alcedo is indeed Latin for kingfisher and is derived from the Greek word for kingfisher “halcyon”.

Atthis was the name of a beautiful young woman who in mythology lived on Lesbos and was a favourite of Saphos.