10th July marks the 161st birthday of Nikola Tesla. Who is Nikola Tesla? He is the man you should spare a thought for every time you plug in your electric guitar or charge your smart phone or use the Internet!
Tesla Trivia: Tesla is the subject of a song by They Might Be Giants (the guys who sung the theme song for Malcolm in the Middle: You're not the boss of me now and you're not so big). This Tesla song appears on their 2013 album titled Nanobots.
Tesla
Brought the X-ray photo to the world
Brought the AC power to the world
It is claimed that Nikola Tesla filed over 700 patents. We have him to thank for Alternating Current (AC) and if things had gone well, we would have had him to thank for free electricity! Tesla pursued his innovative ideas for wireless lighting and global wireless electric power distribution in the experiments he conducted in New York and in Colorado Springs.
Colorado Springs is the name of a song by Math Rock band Jardin de la Croix, off their album "187 steps to cross the universe". The music video for Colorado Springs was #ROFFEKEOFFICIALSELECTION2015 and was edited by Manuel Pascual, who was also the cinematographer and the production manager. The scriptwriters were Pablo Peris and Manuel Pascual. Synopsis: "Last day of Nikola Tesla's life"
Here is a mind
That can see across space
Here is a mind soaring free
Sound turns to light
And light turns to waves
And waves turn to all things perceived
The Colorado Springs music video begins with the following information: "Nikola Tesla spent his last days in the New Yorker Hotel plunged into poverty and the oblivion. Sick and old, the ghosts of the past torture him. This film tells about his frustration against Thomas Edison who achieved success at Tesla's expense; his obsession in proving extraterrestrial life with Mary Orsic; his deep fear of intimate relationships, or as the Nazis and the FBI tried to appropriate his inventions like the Death Ray and the Philadelphia Experiment. Trying to enlighten our life, kept his in darkness."
Maybe that knowledge would drive one insane
How can that knowledge be tamed?
One of Nikola Tesla's famous quotes appears at the beginning of the music video: "Let the future tell the truth and evaluate each one according to his work and accomplishments. The present is theirs; the future, for which I have really worked, is mine." 125 years after Nikola Tesla was born, a band that was going to be named after him was born. City Kidd was renamed Tesla in 1986 during the recording of their first album titled "Mechanical Resonance". Tesla named some album titles and songs after events related to Nikola Tesla. For example:
The Great Radio Controversy - This 1989 album is titled after the controversy about the identity of the inventor of radio. It is posed that Nikola Tesla is the true inventor of radio, while Guglielmo Marconi took the credit.The album's inner sleeve tells this story. Six months after Tesla's death, the US Supreme Court ruled that all of Guglielmo Marconi's radio patents were invalid. The court then awarded the patents for radio to Tesla.
Tesla
Ushered the radio wave into the world
Ushered the neon light
Into the world
Psychotic Supper (1991) - The lyrics of Edison's Medicine speak volumes:
He was electromagnetic, completely kinetic,
"New Wizard of the West."
But they swindled and whined that he wasn't our kind,
And said Edison knew best.
Tesla Trivia: David Bowie played Tesla in the 2006 film The Prestige. One of the main characters gets Tesla to develop an electro replicating device.
Under an X-ray of Mark Twain's skull
The plan for the death-ray's design
Nikola Tesla was born during a fierce electrical storm. A midwife is said to have declared that the lightning was a bad sign. The music video for Colorado Springs ends with lightning and is very reminiscent of the ending from my all time favourite film, Powder.
The Hotel New Yorker
He's dead on the floor
The body of Nikola lies
With just his papers
No family to tell
Out of the windows birds fly
Tesla Trivia: It is reported that when Albert Einstein was asked how it felt to be the smartest man in the whole world, he replied: "I wouldn't know. Ask Nikola Tesla."
This blog offers a behind-the-scenes look at ROFFEKE. ROFFEKE is pronounced "rafiki" which is a Swahili word meaning "friend". 'Friendship, Fun, Freedom' is the motto of the ROck 'n' ROll Film FEstival, KEnya. The mission of ROFFEKE is to promote rock music in Kenya by dispelling rock 'n' roll myths and misconceptions via the medium of film. The Purpose of ROFFEKE is "Lighten the Burden".