Alpha is the second studio album by British rock band Asia, released in 1983. It was certified Platinum in the United States, eventually selling close to two million copies.
Released one year before the departure of guitarist Steve Howe, Alpha was the last album with the band's original line-up until 2008's Phoenix, after the original members reunited in 2006, and the last album with Howe until Aqua in 1992.
Alpha is dominated by the songwriting tandem of John Wetton and Geoff Downes. All the tracks on the album are written by Wetton/Downes, except for "The Smile Has Left Your Eyes", by Wetton only. Steve Howe, guitarist and a key songwriting contributor on the debut album, was left out due to reasons not entirely clear. His only songwriting credit was for "Lyin' to Yourself" (Wetton/Howe), the B-side of the single "The Smile Has Left Your Eyes".
Alpha was recorded during the spring of 1983 at Le Studio in Morin Heights, Quebec and Manta Sound in Toronto.
ALPHA or alpha-ethyl-3,4-methylenedioxybenzylamine, is a lesser-known psychedelic drug and a substituted benzylamine. It is also the benzylamine analogue of MDA. ALPHA was first synthesized by Alexander Shulgin. In his book PIHKAL (Phenethylamines I Have Known and Loved) in the MDA page, the threshold dosage is listed as 10 mg. At mild threshold dosages (around 10 mg) there are eyes-closed "dreams" with some body tingling, at higher doses (up to 140 mg) was reported to produce a pleasant, positive feeling. This compound is not anoretic at any dose. It lasts about 3 hours. Very little data exists about the pharmacological properties, metabolism, and toxicity of ALPHA.
The Alpha 21064 is a microprocessor developed and fabricated by Digital Equipment Corporation that implemented the Alpha (introduced as the Alpha AXP) instruction set architecture (ISA). It was introduced as the DECchip 21064 before it was renamed in 1994. The 21064 is also known by its code name, EV4. It was announced in February 1992 with volume availability in September 1992. The 21064 was the first commercial implementation of the Alpha ISA, and the first microprocessor from Digital to be available commercially. It was succeeded by a derivative, the Alpha 21064A in October 1993.
The first Alpha processor was a test chip codenamed EV3. This test chip was fabricated using Digital's 1.0-micrometre (µm) CMOS-3 process. The test chip lacked a floating point unit and only had 1 KB caches. The test chip was used to confirm the operation of the aggressive circuit design techniques. The test chip, along with simulators and emulators, was also used to bring up firmware and the various operating systems that the company supported. The production chip, codenamed EV4, was fabricated using Digital's 0.75 µm CMOS-4 process. Dirk Meyer and Edward McLellan were the micro-architects. Ed designed the issue logic while Dirk designed the other major blocks. Jim Montanaro led the circuit implementation. The EV3 was used in the Alpha Development Unit (ADU), a computer used by Digital to develop software for the Alpha platform before the availability of EV4 parts.
"Pilot", also known as "Everybody Lies", is the first episode of the U.S. television series House. The episode premiered on the Fox network on November 16, 2004. It introduces the character of Dr. Gregory House (played by Hugh Laurie)—a maverick antisocial doctor—and his team of diagnosticians at the fictional Princeton-Plainsboro Teaching Hospital in New Jersey. The episode features House's attempts to diagnose a kindergarten teacher after she collapses in class.
House was created by David Shore, who got the idea for the curmudgeonly title character from a doctor's visit. Initially, producer Bryan Singer wanted an American to play House, but British actor Hugh Laurie's audition convinced him that a foreign actor could play the role. Shore wrote House as a character with parallels to Sherlock Holmes—both are drug users, aloof, and largely friendless. The show's producers wanted House handicapped in some way and gave the character a damaged leg arising from an improper diagnosis.
House is a Canadian drama film, released in 1995. Written and directed by Laurie Lynd as an adaptation of Daniel MacIvor's one-man play House, the film stars MacIvor as Victor, an antisocial drifter with some hints of paranoid schizophrenia, who arrives in the town of Hope Springs and invites ten strangers into the local church to watch him perform a monologue about his struggles and disappointments in life.
The original play was performed solely by MacIvor. For the film, Lynd added several other actors, giving the audience members some moments of direct interaction and intercutting Victor's monologue with scenes which directly depict the stories he describes. The extended cast includes Anne Anglin, Ben Cardinal, Patricia Collins, Jerry Franken, Caroline Gillis, Kathryn Greenwood, Nicky Guadagni, Joan Heney, Rachel Luttrell, Stephen Ouimette, Simon Richards, Christofer Williamson and Jonathan Wilson.
The film premiered at the 1995 Toronto International Film Festival in the Perspectives Canada series, before going into general release in 1996.
Babes in Toyland is an American punk rock band formed in Minneapolis, Minnesota in 1987. The band was formed by Oregon native Kat Bjelland (lead vocals and guitar), with Lori Barbero (drums) and Michelle Leon (bass), who was later replaced by Maureen Herman in 1992.
Between 1989 and 1995, Babes in Toyland released three studio albums; Spanking Machine (1990), the commercially successful Fontanelle (1992), and Nemesisters (1995), before becoming inactive in 1997 and eventually disbanding in 2001. While the band was inspirational to some performers in the riot grrrl movement in the Pacific Northwest, Babes in Toyland never associated themselves with the movement.
In August 2014, Babes In Toyland announced that they would be reuniting.
Babes in Toyland formed in 1987, after frontwoman Kat Bjelland met drummer Lori Barbero at a friend's barbecue. Originally from Woodburn, Oregon and a former resident of San Francisco, Bjelland had moved to Minneapolis to form a band. Over the following months, Bjelland convinced Barbero to play drums and formed Babes in Toyland in winter 1987. In its initial formation in 1987, in addition to Bjelland and Barbero, the band included Kris Holetz on bass and singer Cindy Russell. It has been widely believed that, following the departures of Holetz and Russell, the band briefly recruited Bjelland's friend - and former bandmate of the band Pagan Babies - Courtney Love on bass. However, it is known that Love had lied to the press on multiple occasions about her involvement with the band. Love, who later went on to form the successful band Hole, only stood in Minneapolis a number of weeks before leaving as she was not in the band, but rather a roommate of Barbero's. She then stole money from the band and left Minneapolis. Bjelland, in an interview, once stated:
My life is so successfull
I've got everything a man could ever need.
Got a 1000 dollar haircut
And I even have a talkshow on TV.
And I know I should be happy, but instead
There's a question I can't get out of my head.
What's the meaning of Stonehenge?
It's killing me that no one knows
Why it was built 5000 years ago.
Why did they build the Stonehenge?
How could they rasie the stones so high
Completely without the technology
We have today?
When I make my jalapeños
Calamri and prosciutto
I'm the king!
My wife applaud(s) me in the kitchen
When I tell her all I bought is from the local store
(And) When the kids have gone to bed, we're all alone
She gives me a smile
Then she plays with my balls
(But?) All I think of is Stonehenge
I think about it when I dream
The biggest henge that I have ever seen
What's the purpose of Stonehenge?
A giant granite brithdaycake
Or a prison far too easy to escape?
Stonehenge! Stonehenge! Lots of stones in a row! (chor)
They were 25 tons each stone, my friend
But amazingly they got them all down in the sand
And they moved it (Stonehenge! )
And they dragged it (Stonehenge! )
And they rolled it 46 miles from Waleeees! - Heeey (46 miles from Wales! )
What's the deal with Stonehenge? (chor) (Oh, what's the deal, what's the deal, what's the deal)
You should have left a tiny hint
When you made this fucking labyrinth, of stone! (Who the... )
Who the fuck builds a Stonehenge? (fuck builds a Stonehenge?)
Two Stone Age-guys wondering what to do
Who just said: "Dude, let's build a henge or two!"
I would give anything to know
About the Stonehenge (chor)
Yeah, I would give all I have to give
Would you give them your car? (chor)
(Mmm) Are you kidding me, of course I would have given the car
What car do you drive? (chor)
Drive a Civic, drive a Civic. Drive a Civic!
A car you can trust! (chor)
Never mind the car, let's talk about the henge
What henge is that again? (chor)
It's the Stonehenge, it's the Stonehenge!
God, it is the greatest henge of all!