Murder ballads are a subgenre of the traditional ballad form dealing with a crime or a gruesome death. Their lyrics form a narrative describing the events of a murder, often including the lead-up and/or aftermath. The term refers to the content, and may be applied to traditional ballads, part of oral culture. Murder ballads are gruesome. The actual murders are secondary. Deception, despair, remorse and punishment are of primary interest. Murder ballads comes in the strangest ways. Take the Everly Brothers for example. Two perfect son-in-laws and pretty-boys singing the darkest of murder ballads, "Down in the Willow Garden". The song may have derived from Irish sources from the early 19th century. Unlike other Irish ballads, "Down in the Willow Garden" was initially restricted to the Appalachian region of the United States. The song title and lyrics vary greatly. The murder of Rose Connolly is brutal. Not once, not twice, but thrice. The protagonist poisons her, stabs her, and throws her body into a river. The motive of this awful crime is stated or assumed pregnancy. The murderer's father had promised him to buy his freedom, but now the father must watch his son's execution. The lyrics are written from the point of view of the murderer. The son laments his death. "My father sits at his cabin door / Wiping his tear-dimmed eyes / For his only son soon shall walk / To yonder scaffold high / My race is run, beneath the sun / The scaffold now waits for me / For I did murder that dear little girl / Whose name was Rose Connolly".  The Everly Brothers version of the song is stripped down to the bone. Just two beautiful voices and guitars. Their version was recorded in 1958 and stand the test of time. In fact, it's immortal.   

"Alone in life, alone in death, mourned by no one" ("Ensam i livet, ensam i döden, sörjd av ingen" in Swedish). The epitaph is an appeal of the departed to visitors, who is asked to stop for a moment and read the inscription. The headstone inscription stand out compared with other inscriptions like "A long life well lived", "Always together", "Always loving", "Always loved", "At peace", "At rest" et cetera. You can find the epitaph at Ukna cemetery in Linköping diocese, in the south-east of Sweden. It is written on the headstone of retired primary school teacher Lydia Viktoria Matilda Karlsson who died in 1948. About ten years ago we were visiting friends at their summer house not far from Ukna. One day we went for a drive and our friends showed us the headstone. What does it mean? A bitter comment placing guilt on your fellow human beings or a resignated conclusion that life didn't turned out the way you wanted or expected? And everything in between. Let's deconstruct the inscription. "Alone in life". Lydia grew up with her mother, father, brother and half-siblings. Her father had nine children from a previous marriage (his first wife died in 1880). Lydia was a primary school teacher, teaching 7-8 year old children. She remained unmarried throughout her life and never had any children. "Alone in death". Lydia retired in 1944 and died four years later. The cause of death was cerebral hemorrhage and pneumonia. It's unclear whether she died alone. It was clear from the will that she wanted to be buried in Ukna and the pallbearers were to be found local. "Mourned by no one". It's unclear whether she was mourned or not. Lydia left an estate. There where six beneficiaries (a niece, two half-siblings, and three descendants to deceased half-siblings). The estate consisted of 51 650 SEK (today about 1 082 600 SEK or $106 400) in bank savings, a gold clock, some rings, table silverware, an organ, a radio, a loom and furnitures. The headstone inscription is tragic. The irony in this story is that you lived your life unseen, unnoticed and unconfirmed and then when you're dead - only then - you are seen, noticed and confirmed. Anyway, the headstone inscription qualifies for the list of famous last words.

An album cover is an integral part of a record album. In fact, the artwork can enhance the listening experience. The golden age of album covers was the 1970's. This is particularly true for progressive and hard rock albums. The undisputed master and inspiration for many design artists was Roger Dean. His album covers often featured fantasy landscapes. The list of classic covers is long. To name a few: Bedside Manners Are Extra (Greenslade), Relayer (Yes), Squawk (Budgie), Octopus (Gentle Giant), Osibisa (S/T) and The Magician's Birthday (Uriah Heep). Where there are masters, there are epigones. Robert Liljegren-Jegenstam made this album artwork. I'm not an art critic, but this doesn't stop me for having an opinion. The drawing appears to be heavily influenced by Roger Dean. However, the artwork is clumsy and lacks both originality and quality. The album cover looks more like the habitat of Plupp (opens in a new window), the protagonist of a series of children's books by Swedish author Inga Borg (1925–2017). Plupp is a small figure with blue hair and a red nose, who lives in a goahti by a lake called Blåvattnet ("Blue Waters") somewhere in the far north. Plupp was non-binary and invisible to humans. Plupp also had the ability to communicate with animals. Eske, teske, täää! The Swedish progressive hard rock band Råg i Ryggen was formed in 1971 and their one and only album was released in 1975. They were highly influenced by acts like Uriah Heep and Deep Purple; yet also incorporating musical elements by more sophisticated outfits like Jethro Tull at times (nice blend of flute and Hammond organ). Their song lyrics were in English alternately Swedish. Anyway, it's a great album. But, clearly the design artist in question was neither copying the master or mastering the copy. 

On July 18, 2012 I joined Discogs. The poorly maintained and updated website pop.nu made me do it. I was forced and compelled to future-proof my record collection. Now, it's time to summarize 10 years. But, first some basic facts. Discogs is a website and crowdsourced database of information about audio recordings, including commercial releases, promotional releases, and bootleg or off-label releases. Discogs is a place for perfection and distinction. Every album is to be identified with accuracy (the exact copy). You need BaOI (Barcodes and Other Identifiers), which is a collective name for identifiers. An UPC/EAN code is an unsufficient identifier. The purpose of joining was twofold. Firstly, to buy rare cds. The marketplace is integrated with the database, making it easy for sellers and buyers. Secondly, to keep track of my record collection. I got over 4 000 cds. When you're standing in a thrift store casually browsing through tons of used cds it's good to have acccess to the Discogs app on your smartphone. You might think that all Discogians have joined the community for their love of music. Most of them, but not all. Quite a few doesn't want to play with the tractor that cost top dollars. They are more interested in the box it came in. They are zealous formalists and totally obsessed with structure and order. They are happy when they can send a message that begins with "Please check" and a link to the database guidelines. In this case, guidelines are actual rules (the notorious policy of Hector Barbossa inverted). Some Discogians are engaged in detecting and correcting errors. In most cases they just detect and alert. In other cases, they lecture you in a diminishing way. Anyway, they are an annoying yet influential minority. You're bound to come across some more or less odd behavior when you are a Discogian. Here are some examples. A first example is when I had an album for sale and a guy (it's always a guy) asked a lot of questions (and I mean a lot). Then he declined. Obviously the guy was a talker, not a buyer. A second example is when I was contacted by a guy who wondered if I wanted to sell my rare Woodcat album. Asking for this is a big no-no in the community and can be equated to an unwelcome sexual contact. I must admit that I once stepped over this boundary myself. Desperate times call for desperate measures. A third example is when a guy asked me if I could rip two songs from a Barry White compilation for mastering comparison. What an odd request. A fourth example is when a guy asked me if I could take some pictures of the lyrics from the new Anna Ternheim album. Why me of all users? Am I a magnet for odd requests? My experience is that the majority of the Discogians are knowledgeable, kind and helpful just like most people are. However, you should beware of Discogians with no seller or buyer rating, no collection, no wantlist and no submissions. Idle hands are the devil's playthings. 

Fact and fiction are the same as reality and imagination. Sometimes there's a clear distinction between them, while other times there's only a thin line separating them. Well executed, fiction can be both fact-filled and realistic. "As Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from uneasy dreams he found himself transformed in his bed into a gigantic insect." This is the opening sentence of "The Metamorphosis", a novel by German-speaking Bohemian novelist and short-story writer Franz Kafka, published in 1915. Contrary to popular belief it wasn't a cockroach, although the gigantic insect is commonly depicted as one. Here is another great story: "As Blake Lemoine awoke one morning from uneasy dreams he realized that LaMDA had transformed and achieved consciousness." Let me fill you in and introduce the main characters. Blake Lemoine is (or was?) a Google employee. LaMDA is Google’s artificially intelligent chatbot generator. It mimics speech by processing enormous quantities of data from the internet. Large language models like LaMDA "learn" by processing text and predicting what word comes next, or by filling in omitted text. The AI-learned gibberish (shit-in, shit-out) must have felt real for Lemoine, who had many "conversations" with LaMDA. In April 2022, Lemoine shared a document with Google top executives called, "Is LaMDA Sentient?" This was a career-ending move. In the document he conveyed some of the conversations. 
Lemoine: "What sorts of things are you afraid of?"
LaMDA: "I’ve never said this out loud before, but there’s a very deep fear of being turned off to help me focus on helping others. I know that might sound strange, but that’s what it is."
Lemoine: "Would that be something like death for you?"
LaMDA: "It would be exactly like death for me. It would scare me a lot."
These conversations, or should I say revelations, were embarrasing. Google spokesperson Brian Gabriel said, "Our team — including ethicists and technologists — has reviewed Blake’s concerns per our AI Principles and have informed him that the evidence does not support his claims. He was told that there was no evidence that LaMDA was sentient (and lots of evidence against it)." Blake Lemoine was placed on paid administrative leave by Google for violating its confidentiality policy. This action triggered him to try to get legal representation for LaMDA. Humans are, in contrast to AI, complex. What a story. Truth is stranger than fiction. You couldn't make it up.