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1000 results for “Buxton_Vienna”
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@tishkova I agree, I can't understand this at all......every time there was anything even vaguely sexist or racist (or even classist) in any #discworld books, then #sirterry was actually showing how ridiculous or petty the bigots were being. The slavery of goblins, Cherry the Dwarf wanting to dress in a feminine way, the criticism of royalty and kings becoming leaders by birth, rather than ability.....what is problematic about the way he wrote any of that?
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@tishkova I agree, I can't understand this at all......every time there was anything even vaguely sexist or racist (or even classist) in any #discworld books, then #sirterry was actually showing how ridiculous or petty the bigots were being. The slavery of goblins, Cherry the Dwarf wanting to dress in a feminine way, the criticism of royalty and kings becoming leaders by birth, rather than ability.....what is problematic about the way he wrote any of that?
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@tishkova I agree, I can't understand this at all......every time there was anything even vaguely sexist or racist (or even classist) in any #discworld books, then #sirterry was actually showing how ridiculous or petty the bigots were being. The slavery of goblins, Cherry the Dwarf wanting to dress in a feminine way, the criticism of royalty and kings becoming leaders by birth, rather than ability.....what is problematic about the way he wrote any of that?
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@Coney_von_1Land Wir hatten schon sowas ähnliches auf der #Vetmeduni in #Wien. Das Programm hieß #Vetwoman 🥰♀️ Kann ich nur empfehlen mitzumachen, allein die andere Frauen kennenzulernen war es wert. 3 Jahre später und wir treffen uns noch regelmäßig als Freundinnen und unterstützen einander #womeninscience #womeninscienceday
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@ApNudd Thank you for posting (tooting?) this. I am still quite new here and a bit lost. My local timeline (mas.to) seems extremely random, but #science and #academia ones were all closed to new people when I began my #birdsiteexodus . I'm a #veterinarian in #Austria and teach at university here. Have followed you now 😀
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Didn't have time to post till now....living and working in #Austria, I am used to some beautiful scenery but there's still #NoPlaceLikeHome #PeakDistrict. We spent a great Christmas Eve as a family for the first Xmas together since 2019 #TeggsNose #homesick
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Everytime I mention Mastodon on the #birdapp the Tweet fails to send! I tried the #movetodon but only found 21 Twitter friends over here ☹ So much for #FreeSpeech! I suppose people can't share where they are on here without censorship #birdappimploding
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Everytime I mention Mastodon on the #birdapp the Tweet fails to send! I tried the #movetodon but only found 21 Twitter friends over here ☹ So much for #FreeSpeech! I suppose people can't share where they are on here without censorship #birdappimploding
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Everytime I mention Mastodon on the #birdapp the Tweet fails to send! I tried the #movetodon but only found 21 Twitter friends over here ☹ So much for #FreeSpeech! I suppose people can't share where they are on here without censorship #birdappimploding
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Tarlung – Axis Mundi Review By TymeVienna, Austria’s Tarlung has been coughing up thick clouds of resinous doom and smoky sludge since 2013, when, after just six months in existence and having never performed live, they released their eponymous debut album. Now, with two additional full-lengths—2017’s Beyond the Black Pyramid and 2021’s Architect—and some healthy touring under their belts, Tarlung braces to bring their fourth album in nearly five years, Axis Mundi, to the masses. With a catalog predicated on fair to middling sludgy doom, I was curious to hear if Axis Mundi would be the product of a Tarlung doing more of the same, or if the album would represent a defining ‘center’ in the discography and, per its namesake, link the Tarlung of old to the Tarlung that’s progressing into the future.
Tarlung remains devoted to the almighty riff, but with a sound that has become increasingly less fuzzy over the years. Guitarists Rotten and Phillip Seiler deliver massive doses of ear-drum damage via swampy, thick riffs bristling with taut, chuggy muscle (“State Noise,” “Between the Earth and Moon”) and bluesy swagger (“Swans”), which serve as the bong water for most of these melodies to bubble up through. Seiler’s chesty, Akerfeldtian roars are ever-present, which, along with Marian Weibl’s beastly drum beatings, provide the excess sonic weight Tarlung has become increasingly known for. Purveyors of Crowbar, High on Fire, and Dopethrone will find warm pockets of familiarity here. Yet, Axis Mundi indeed signals a progression as Tarlung evolves its sound, introducing elements of refined psychedelia and vocal variation.
Axis Mundi takes marked steps to set itself apart from the rest of Tarlung’s catalog. With an airy, soft-strummed melody and some subdued, clean vocals to start, “Burning Out” evokes a feeling akin to lying alone in a country field, exhaling smoky clouds of organic green and staring at kaleidoscopic prisms of light as they filter through dew drops on sun-dappled daffodils. Even after the track picks up a little steam with a chugging riff that seems to build more speed than it does, and Seiler’s growls return, the warm feeling doesn’t dissipate. Follow-up “Sea of Drowned Souls” continues down an experimental path, as its mournful melodies merge with clean vocals from Thérèse Lanz and Casey Rogers of Mares of Thrace in pensive passages that keep giving me Alice in Chains vibes. Particularly effective here, too, is the vocal interplay between Seiler and Lantz as each takes brutal swipes at the mic; Lantz’s visceral, blackened screams serving as a satisfying counterpoint to Seiler’s guttural grumblings. These two tracks really stood out to me and make up the core of my overall Axis Mundi experience.
Axis Mundi represents Tarlung operating at its most mature. Beautifully simplistic and wildly effective songwriting that, with repeated spins, did nothing but chip away at my critiques. What first seemed like a lagging back half continued to sink its claws into my brain. Before long, I was looking forward to the laid-back melodies of “Full Circle,” where Seiler channels his inner Matt Pike (High on Fire) to significant effect, and anticipating the very Crowbaric pounding of album closer “Axis Mundi.” Running just thirty-eight minutes, it became easier and easier to hit that replay button every time. There are moments when the melodies seem to trip over themselves, like on the bluesy main riff of “Swans,” which gets a bit muddy at times, but not so much that it took me out of the experience.Fans of Tarlung are in for a special surprise, and if you’re just now getting to the party, Axis Mundi is an excellent place to get started. I hadn’t spent any time at all with this power trio before writing this review, and I can wholeheartedly say Tarlung has won me over. After a more than cursory dive into the bands previous efforts I can say without a doubt, Axis Mundi is the best Tarlung album to date. A slow-paced ride that delivers riffs for days and melodies that settle in, wrapping you in blankets of crushing warmth for one helluva satisfying experience.
Rating: 3.5/5.0
#2026 #35 #ArgonautaRecords #AustrianMetal #AxisMundi #Crowbar #DoomMetal #Dopethrone #HighOnFire #Jan26 #Review #SludgeMetal #StonerDoom #Tarlung
DR: 6 | Format Reviewed: 320 kb/s mp3
Label: Argonauta Records
Websites: Bandcamp | Facebook
Releases Worldwide: January 30th, 2026 -
Our new Android attack, #TapTrap, is getting media coverage. Here's a quick explainer.
It's a new tapjacking technique that exploits Android's UI animations to hijack user taps without requiring any permissions. @beerphilipp will present it at #USENIX Sec'25.
Unlike classic tapjacking, TapTrap uses Android's built-in activity transition animations to launch a transparent activity on top of the attacker's app. The user thinks they're tapping a harmless button, but the tap goes to a permission/system prompt, a browser, or a sensitive app without notice.
It works on Android 15 & 16, while @GrapheneOS has recently issued a fix. Major browsers such as Chrome and Firefox promptly patched after we disclosed the vulnerability. We also analyzed ~100K Play Store apps finding that TapTrap is currently not being exploited in the wild.
This effort is the result of a collaboration with @beerphilipp, Sebastian Roth and @lindorferin. Kudos to Philipp for discovering the issue and doing the heavy lifting. And thanks Vienna Science and Technology Fund (WWTF) for making this research possible and supporting us ♥️
See you at #USENIX in Seattle next month!
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The Irrepressible Mr Binko: the thread about the Engineer and Edinburgh’s first Electric Railway
My sources tell me it is was Electrification Friday and although I was saving a picture for another day it seems right to share it now. Behold! Mr Binko’s Electric Railway!
Mr Binko’s Electric Railway. © Edinburgh City LibrariesThe passengers in the car are the Prince of Wales (future King Edward VII) and his wife Princess Alexandra, Princess of Wales. Regular viewers may recognise the backdrop as Donaldson’s Hospital.
Donaldson’s Hospital. CC-BY-SA 3.0, David MonniauxIt was the setting of the First International Forestry Exhibition of 1884 – held in a grand, wooden, temporary pavilion on the Hospital’s lawns – and that was the reason for Mr Binko bringing his railway to there. When the Royal Party toured the exhibition and rode his railway on 22nd August they became the first British Royals to be moved by electric power.
The 1884 exhibition, colour oil painting © Museums & Galleries EdinburghThe carriage was named Alexandra after the Princess of Wales and was made locally by coachbuilders John Hislop & Son. The carriage was “richly upholstered in silk plush of the Royal scarlet, while the sides and roof were elegantly decorated. In the centre of the roof a brilliant prismatic lamp was placed, lit within by electricity… and by an ingenious arrangement a beautiful bouquet on the centre table was lighted up by miniature lamps on a button being pressed”. The only other time the carriage was officially used was for the visit of William Ewart Gladstone – four time Prime Minister – and a (grand) son of Leith. He is seen on the right in the car below.
William Ewart Gladstone at the Edinburgh Exbibition of 1884, photograph by John Moffat. CC-by-NC National Galleries ScotlandZooming in, we see some of the occupants seem more enthusiastic than others. Mr Binko is seen on the right of shot, he with dark hair and moustache infront of the carriage window and clutching his top hat.
Gladstone, seated in the carriage, does not look impressed! Mr Binko is on his right, holding his top hat.In the background we can make out a showbill to do with Electricity. An experimental display of electric lights was also part of the Exhibition.
This was the first electric vehicle in Edinburgh and its inventor and promoter was the splendidly named Mr Binko. Henry Bock Binko was born in Vienna in 1836, becoming a naturalised British citizen in 1881. He brought to Edinburgh a modified version of an electric locomotive that he had exhibited in London in 1882. His experiments were a few years behind Werner von Siemens who had exhibited the worlds first practical electric railway in Berlin in 1879. In 1883, Magnus Volk opened the first electric railway to the public in Britain with his Volk’s Electric Railway on the sea front in Brighton (remarkably, it’s still going!). However, as far back as 1842 the Scottish inventor Robert Davidson had trialled an electrically powered locomotive using batteries on the Edinburgh to Glasgow Railway, his Galvani could unfortunately only propel itself at walking speed and could pull no useful load. The inability to recharge its batteries rendered it completely impractical.
Volks Marine Electric Railway, CC-BY-SA Robert CuttsBinko was described as a chemist, and seems to have been a serial inventor and patentee, intent on making his fortune by licensing out his contraptions to others. His Spectrograph achieved some success, and it was advertised for a reasonable sum as a money making scheme, the idea being people could get one and then duplicate photographs for sale by using it. Binko later fell out with the licensees.
Advert for a Binko patent SpectrographThe locomotive brought to Edinburgh was called Ohm and was a rebuild of the Volta that he had exhibited in London. “The line was eventually opened as a ½ mile circular route in the grounds, the charge being 3d (three pence) for the 2.5 minute journey.” 30,000 passengers were carried by the railway during its time at the exhibition. The Railway News reported;
It has been met with extensive public patronage, besides being honoured by a journey taken by the Prince and Princess of Wales and their family and subsequently by Mr and Mrs Gladstone. The length of the line laid down at Edinburgh is about double the length of that at the Crystal Palace and traverses the length of the exhibition building on the outside twice, besides making a wide sweep for turning.
Railway News – 6th September 1884Power came from a stationary 8hp Robey steam engine coupled to a dynamo which supplied DC electric power through the rails. Speed was changed by resistors built into the locomotive. The locomotive or “guiding car” weighed about 2 tons and that the whole train weighed 6 tons when loaded. It could pull up to 3 passenger cars, each with capacity for 10, and it was noted that each car had its own motor, so the train was what we would nowadays call a DC EMU or Direct Current Electric Multiple Unit.
All was not well for Binko and his railway however. Construction over-ran and it was not ready for the opening. When it finally got going on July 17th, technically it was a triumph but financially proved a disaster. Binko was unable to pay his creditors, having borrowed heavily to finance the scheme, and one of them seized his railway before it was even in operation. An arrangement was made with the creditor that he would lease it back off of them for £650 to work off the debt, payable over 13 weeks in instalments. However, even though he was making up to £20 a day (approximately £2,800 in 2022) off of ticket sales, he remained seriously in debt and the creditors lost patience. Well before the end of the exhibition they advertised the whole thing for sale – obviously they had decided that Binko could or would never pay them what he owed and storage costs would be too high. On 30th September the electric railway was cancelled and Binko locked out from using it any more.
Advert selling Binko’s Electric Railway, Scotsman 20th September 1884On 10th October 1884, Binko was taken to court in London and bankrupted, still owing the creditor £100. Being in Edinburgh with his railway, he did not appear in person to defend himself. The court heard that now that the exhibition had ended, Binko did not have any way to recoup any more money from it to settle his debts, but had not provided any accounts of his income from it during the exhibition. The court adjourned to give him time to prepare the accounts and to appear in person.
But that wasn’t the end for Binko in Edinburgh. The reason he hadn’t come to London to face court was that somehow he managed to convince the Edinburgh Street Tramways Company to undertake an experiment in electric traction. He somehow managed to convince his creditors to allow him the use of the steam engine, dynamo and mechanical components from the Ohm. A few hundred yards of copper strip were laid between the horse tram rails between the exhibition at Donaldson’s Hospital and Haymarket Station, the moving parts from the Ohm were bodged into a horse tram of the Street Tramways Co. and the whole lot was hooked up to the dynamo and steam engine. On 11th October 1884, with 10 passengers on board, Mr Binko’s Electric Tram became the first electric tram to run in the British Isles when it haltingly made the short journey between Donaldson’s and Haymarket. Three journeys were made, the third (and final) hauling a second horse tramcar, and then no more was heard of Henry Bock Binko or his experiments in electrical traction.
For now.
An Edinburgh Street Tramway Company horse tram of 1884 of the the sort electrified by Mr Binko © Edinburgh City LibrariesBut once again this was not the end of the irrepressible Mr Binko and his experiments in electrical traction. He resurfaced in 1886 in Great Yarmouth where he tried to start up a seaside railway, but ended up being tried for unlawfully obtaining credit while being an undeclared bankrupt – it having transpired that he was bankrupted in 1871. He was eventually acquitted, largely on the grounds of his reputation from the 1884 railway in Edinburgh being taken in evidence that his schemes were serious and practical and not just a swindle. He died in London in 1911, being recorded on censuses in the last 10 years of his life as being employed as an electrical engineer.
Electric railways returned to Edinburgh the same year at the 1886 International Exhibition of Industry, Science and Art held in the Meadows.
The 1886 pavilion of the International Exhibition on the West Meadows, a temporary building believe it or not! Peter Fletcher Riddell bequest to National Galleries ScotlandThis scheme had nothing to do with Henry Binko and seems to have been something of a collaboration, directed by the energetic architect, builder and local politician Sir James Gowans, who was the organiser of the exhibition. The scheme is described as being a line 500 yards long, with electricity supplied to a central live rail by a 7 horsepower static steam engine. An electric locomotive hauled two tram cars sent by the Northern Metropolitan Tramway Company, a double decker with 20 inside and 26 outside upstairs and an open single decker with 25 seats. It could make 10 miles per hour. The steam engine was by Marshall & Co. of Gainsborough and the rails were made to Gowans’ own design (he had engineered Edinburgh’s first horse tramway some 15 years before), being supplied complimentary from a foundry in Barrow-in-Furness. The electric equipment was provided by King, Brown & Co. of Rosebank in Edinburgh. The fare was 2d and in the course of the exhibition it carried 80,000 passengers.
Ground Plan of the 1886 Edinburgh International Exhibition, the electric railway is highlighted in yellowDespite all the engravings and photos taken at the exhibition, I have struggled to track down a good picture of the electric railway, but you can see a bit of it in the corner of the larger photo of the Exhibition pavilion. You can make out a sheeted vehicle, possibly the tram car, on the left behind the flag pole. The rails run parallel to the fence, off to the right.
Hints of the 1886 Electric Railway, Peter Fletcher Riddell bequest to National Galleries ScotlandNote to readers: unfortunately in April 2026, a third-party plug-in more than exceeded its authority and broke many of the image links on this site. No images were lost but I will have to restore them page-by-page, which may take some time. In the meantime please bear with me while I go about rectifying this issue.
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#Lochend #Logan #Restalrig #StMargaret -
Tarlung – Axis Mundi Review By TymeVienna, Austria’s Tarlung has been coughing up thick clouds of resinous doom and smoky sludge since 2013, when, after just six months in existence and having never performed live, they released their eponymous debut album. Now, with two additional full-lengths—2017’s Beyond the Black Pyramid and 2021’s Architect—and some healthy touring under their belts, Tarlung braces to bring their fourth album in nearly five years, Axis Mundi, to the masses. With a catalog predicated on fair to middling sludgy doom, I was curious to hear if Axis Mundi would be the product of a Tarlung doing more of the same, or if the album would represent a defining ‘center’ in the discography and, per its namesake, link the Tarlung of old to the Tarlung that’s progressing into the future.
Tarlung remains devoted to the almighty riff, but with a sound that has become increasingly less fuzzy over the years. Guitarists Rotten and Phillip Seiler deliver massive doses of ear-drum damage via swampy, thick riffs bristling with taut, chuggy muscle (“State Noise,” “Between the Earth and Moon”) and bluesy swagger (“Swans”), which serve as the bong water for most of these melodies to bubble up through. Seiler’s chesty, Akerfeldtian roars are ever-present, which, along with Marian Weibl’s beastly drum beatings, provide the excess sonic weight Tarlung has become increasingly known for. Purveyors of Crowbar, High on Fire, and Dopethrone will find warm pockets of familiarity here. Yet, Axis Mundi indeed signals a progression as Tarlung evolves its sound, introducing elements of refined psychedelia and vocal variation.
Axis Mundi takes marked steps to set itself apart from the rest of Tarlung’s catalog. With an airy, soft-strummed melody and some subdued, clean vocals to start, “Burning Out” evokes a feeling akin to lying alone in a country field, exhaling smoky clouds of organic green and staring at kaleidoscopic prisms of light as they filter through dew drops on sun-dappled daffodils. Even after the track picks up a little steam with a chugging riff that seems to build more speed than it does, and Seiler’s growls return, the warm feeling doesn’t dissipate. Follow-up “Sea of Drowned Souls” continues down an experimental path, as its mournful melodies merge with clean vocals from Thérèse Lanz and Casey Rogers of Mares of Thrace in pensive passages that keep giving me Alice in Chains vibes. Particularly effective here, too, is the vocal interplay between Seiler and Lantz as each takes brutal swipes at the mic; Lantz’s visceral, blackened screams serving as a satisfying counterpoint to Seiler’s guttural grumblings. These two tracks really stood out to me and make up the core of my overall Axis Mundi experience.
Axis Mundi represents Tarlung operating at its most mature. Beautifully simplistic and wildly effective songwriting that, with repeated spins, did nothing but chip away at my critiques. What first seemed like a lagging back half continued to sink its claws into my brain. Before long, I was looking forward to the laid-back melodies of “Full Circle,” where Seiler channels his inner Matt Pike (High on Fire) to significant effect, and anticipating the very Crowbaric pounding of album closer “Axis Mundi.” Running just thirty-eight minutes, it became easier and easier to hit that replay button every time. There are moments when the melodies seem to trip over themselves, like on the bluesy main riff of “Swans,” which gets a bit muddy at times, but not so much that it took me out of the experience.Fans of Tarlung are in for a special surprise, and if you’re just now getting to the party, Axis Mundi is an excellent place to get started. I hadn’t spent any time at all with this power trio before writing this review, and I can wholeheartedly say Tarlung has won me over. After a more than cursory dive into the bands previous efforts I can say without a doubt, Axis Mundi is the best Tarlung album to date. A slow-paced ride that delivers riffs for days and melodies that settle in, wrapping you in blankets of crushing warmth for one helluva satisfying experience.
Rating: 3.5/5.0
#2026 #35 #ArgonautaRecords #AustrianMetal #AxisMundi #Crowbar #DoomMetal #Dopethrone #HighOnFire #Jan26 #Review #SludgeMetal #StonerDoom #Tarlung
DR: 6 | Format Reviewed: 320 kb/s mp3
Label: Argonauta Records
Websites: Bandcamp | Facebook
Releases Worldwide: January 30th, 2026 -
Tarlung – Axis Mundi Review By TymeVienna, Austria’s Tarlung has been coughing up thick clouds of resinous doom and smoky sludge since 2013, when, after just six months in existence and having never performed live, they released their eponymous debut album. Now, with two additional full-lengths—2017’s Beyond the Black Pyramid and 2021’s Architect—and some healthy touring under their belts, Tarlung braces to bring their fourth album in nearly five years, Axis Mundi, to the masses. With a catalog predicated on fair to middling sludgy doom, I was curious to hear if Axis Mundi would be the product of a Tarlung doing more of the same, or if the album would represent a defining ‘center’ in the discography and, per its namesake, link the Tarlung of old to the Tarlung that’s progressing into the future.
Tarlung remains devoted to the almighty riff, but with a sound that has become increasingly less fuzzy over the years. Guitarists Rotten and Phillip Seiler deliver massive doses of ear-drum damage via swampy, thick riffs bristling with taut, chuggy muscle (“State Noise,” “Between the Earth and Moon”) and bluesy swagger (“Swans”), which serve as the bong water for most of these melodies to bubble up through. Seiler’s chesty, Akerfeldtian roars are ever-present, which, along with Marian Weibl’s beastly drum beatings, provide the excess sonic weight Tarlung has become increasingly known for. Purveyors of Crowbar, High on Fire, and Dopethrone will find warm pockets of familiarity here. Yet, Axis Mundi indeed signals a progression as Tarlung evolves its sound, introducing elements of refined psychedelia and vocal variation.
Axis Mundi takes marked steps to set itself apart from the rest of Tarlung’s catalog. With an airy, soft-strummed melody and some subdued, clean vocals to start, “Burning Out” evokes a feeling akin to lying alone in a country field, exhaling smoky clouds of organic green and staring at kaleidoscopic prisms of light as they filter through dew drops on sun-dappled daffodils. Even after the track picks up a little steam with a chugging riff that seems to build more speed than it does, and Seiler’s growls return, the warm feeling doesn’t dissipate. Follow-up “Sea of Drowned Souls” continues down an experimental path, as its mournful melodies merge with clean vocals from Thérèse Lanz and Casey Rogers of Mares of Thrace in pensive passages that keep giving me Alice in Chains vibes. Particularly effective here, too, is the vocal interplay between Seiler and Lantz as each takes brutal swipes at the mic; Lantz’s visceral, blackened screams serving as a satisfying counterpoint to Seiler’s guttural grumblings. These two tracks really stood out to me and make up the core of my overall Axis Mundi experience.
Axis Mundi represents Tarlung operating at its most mature. Beautifully simplistic and wildly effective songwriting that, with repeated spins, did nothing but chip away at my critiques. What first seemed like a lagging back half continued to sink its claws into my brain. Before long, I was looking forward to the laid-back melodies of “Full Circle,” where Seiler channels his inner Matt Pike (High on Fire) to significant effect, and anticipating the very Crowbaric pounding of album closer “Axis Mundi.” Running just thirty-eight minutes, it became easier and easier to hit that replay button every time. There are moments when the melodies seem to trip over themselves, like on the bluesy main riff of “Swans,” which gets a bit muddy at times, but not so much that it took me out of the experience.Fans of Tarlung are in for a special surprise, and if you’re just now getting to the party, Axis Mundi is an excellent place to get started. I hadn’t spent any time at all with this power trio before writing this review, and I can wholeheartedly say Tarlung has won me over. After a more than cursory dive into the bands previous efforts I can say without a doubt, Axis Mundi is the best Tarlung album to date. A slow-paced ride that delivers riffs for days and melodies that settle in, wrapping you in blankets of crushing warmth for one helluva satisfying experience.
Rating: 3.5/5.0
#2026 #35 #ArgonautaRecords #AustrianMetal #AxisMundi #Crowbar #DoomMetal #Dopethrone #HighOnFire #Jan26 #Review #SludgeMetal #StonerDoom #Tarlung
DR: 6 | Format Reviewed: 320 kb/s mp3
Label: Argonauta Records
Websites: Bandcamp | Facebook
Releases Worldwide: January 30th, 2026 -
Tarlung – Axis Mundi Review By TymeVienna, Austria’s Tarlung has been coughing up thick clouds of resinous doom and smoky sludge since 2013, when, after just six months in existence and having never performed live, they released their eponymous debut album. Now, with two additional full-lengths—2017’s Beyond the Black Pyramid and 2021’s Architect—and some healthy touring under their belts, Tarlung braces to bring their fourth album in nearly five years, Axis Mundi, to the masses. With a catalog predicated on fair to middling sludgy doom, I was curious to hear if Axis Mundi would be the product of a Tarlung doing more of the same, or if the album would represent a defining ‘center’ in the discography and, per its namesake, link the Tarlung of old to the Tarlung that’s progressing into the future.
Tarlung remains devoted to the almighty riff, but with a sound that has become increasingly less fuzzy over the years. Guitarists Rotten and Phillip Seiler deliver massive doses of ear-drum damage via swampy, thick riffs bristling with taut, chuggy muscle (“State Noise,” “Between the Earth and Moon”) and bluesy swagger (“Swans”), which serve as the bong water for most of these melodies to bubble up through. Seiler’s chesty, Akerfeldtian roars are ever-present, which, along with Marian Weibl’s beastly drum beatings, provide the excess sonic weight Tarlung has become increasingly known for. Purveyors of Crowbar, High on Fire, and Dopethrone will find warm pockets of familiarity here. Yet, Axis Mundi indeed signals a progression as Tarlung evolves its sound, introducing elements of refined psychedelia and vocal variation.
Axis Mundi takes marked steps to set itself apart from the rest of Tarlung’s catalog. With an airy, soft-strummed melody and some subdued, clean vocals to start, “Burning Out” evokes a feeling akin to lying alone in a country field, exhaling smoky clouds of organic green and staring at kaleidoscopic prisms of light as they filter through dew drops on sun-dappled daffodils. Even after the track picks up a little steam with a chugging riff that seems to build more speed than it does, and Seiler’s growls return, the warm feeling doesn’t dissipate. Follow-up “Sea of Drowned Souls” continues down an experimental path, as its mournful melodies merge with clean vocals from Thérèse Lanz and Casey Rogers of Mares of Thrace in pensive passages that keep giving me Alice in Chains vibes. Particularly effective here, too, is the vocal interplay between Seiler and Lantz as each takes brutal swipes at the mic; Lantz’s visceral, blackened screams serving as a satisfying counterpoint to Seiler’s guttural grumblings. These two tracks really stood out to me and make up the core of my overall Axis Mundi experience.
Axis Mundi represents Tarlung operating at its most mature. Beautifully simplistic and wildly effective songwriting that, with repeated spins, did nothing but chip away at my critiques. What first seemed like a lagging back half continued to sink its claws into my brain. Before long, I was looking forward to the laid-back melodies of “Full Circle,” where Seiler channels his inner Matt Pike (High on Fire) to significant effect, and anticipating the very Crowbaric pounding of album closer “Axis Mundi.” Running just thirty-eight minutes, it became easier and easier to hit that replay button every time. There are moments when the melodies seem to trip over themselves, like on the bluesy main riff of “Swans,” which gets a bit muddy at times, but not so much that it took me out of the experience.Fans of Tarlung are in for a special surprise, and if you’re just now getting to the party, Axis Mundi is an excellent place to get started. I hadn’t spent any time at all with this power trio before writing this review, and I can wholeheartedly say Tarlung has won me over. After a more than cursory dive into the bands previous efforts I can say without a doubt, Axis Mundi is the best Tarlung album to date. A slow-paced ride that delivers riffs for days and melodies that settle in, wrapping you in blankets of crushing warmth for one helluva satisfying experience.
Rating: 3.5/5.0
#2026 #35 #ArgonautaRecords #AustrianMetal #AxisMundi #Crowbar #DoomMetal #Dopethrone #HighOnFire #Jan26 #Review #SludgeMetal #StonerDoom #Tarlung
DR: 6 | Format Reviewed: 320 kb/s mp3
Label: Argonauta Records
Websites: Bandcamp | Facebook
Releases Worldwide: January 30th, 2026 -
Tarlung – Axis Mundi Review By TymeVienna, Austria’s Tarlung has been coughing up thick clouds of resinous doom and smoky sludge since 2013, when, after just six months in existence and having never performed live, they released their eponymous debut album. Now, with two additional full-lengths—2017’s Beyond the Black Pyramid and 2021’s Architect—and some healthy touring under their belts, Tarlung braces to bring their fourth album in nearly five years, Axis Mundi, to the masses. With a catalog predicated on fair to middling sludgy doom, I was curious to hear if Axis Mundi would be the product of a Tarlung doing more of the same, or if the album would represent a defining ‘center’ in the discography and, per its namesake, link the Tarlung of old to the Tarlung that’s progressing into the future.
Tarlung remains devoted to the almighty riff, but with a sound that has become increasingly less fuzzy over the years. Guitarists Rotten and Phillip Seiler deliver massive doses of ear-drum damage via swampy, thick riffs bristling with taut, chuggy muscle (“State Noise,” “Between the Earth and Moon”) and bluesy swagger (“Swans”), which serve as the bong water for most of these melodies to bubble up through. Seiler’s chesty, Akerfeldtian roars are ever-present, which, along with Marian Weibl’s beastly drum beatings, provide the excess sonic weight Tarlung has become increasingly known for. Purveyors of Crowbar, High on Fire, and Dopethrone will find warm pockets of familiarity here. Yet, Axis Mundi indeed signals a progression as Tarlung evolves its sound, introducing elements of refined psychedelia and vocal variation.
Axis Mundi takes marked steps to set itself apart from the rest of Tarlung’s catalog. With an airy, soft-strummed melody and some subdued, clean vocals to start, “Burning Out” evokes a feeling akin to lying alone in a country field, exhaling smoky clouds of organic green and staring at kaleidoscopic prisms of light as they filter through dew drops on sun-dappled daffodils. Even after the track picks up a little steam with a chugging riff that seems to build more speed than it does, and Seiler’s growls return, the warm feeling doesn’t dissipate. Follow-up “Sea of Drowned Souls” continues down an experimental path, as its mournful melodies merge with clean vocals from Thérèse Lanz and Casey Rogers of Mares of Thrace in pensive passages that keep giving me Alice in Chains vibes. Particularly effective here, too, is the vocal interplay between Seiler and Lantz as each takes brutal swipes at the mic; Lantz’s visceral, blackened screams serving as a satisfying counterpoint to Seiler’s guttural grumblings. These two tracks really stood out to me and make up the core of my overall Axis Mundi experience.
Axis Mundi represents Tarlung operating at its most mature. Beautifully simplistic and wildly effective songwriting that, with repeated spins, did nothing but chip away at my critiques. What first seemed like a lagging back half continued to sink its claws into my brain. Before long, I was looking forward to the laid-back melodies of “Full Circle,” where Seiler channels his inner Matt Pike (High on Fire) to significant effect, and anticipating the very Crowbaric pounding of album closer “Axis Mundi.” Running just thirty-eight minutes, it became easier and easier to hit that replay button every time. There are moments when the melodies seem to trip over themselves, like on the bluesy main riff of “Swans,” which gets a bit muddy at times, but not so much that it took me out of the experience.Fans of Tarlung are in for a special surprise, and if you’re just now getting to the party, Axis Mundi is an excellent place to get started. I hadn’t spent any time at all with this power trio before writing this review, and I can wholeheartedly say Tarlung has won me over. After a more than cursory dive into the bands previous efforts I can say without a doubt, Axis Mundi is the best Tarlung album to date. A slow-paced ride that delivers riffs for days and melodies that settle in, wrapping you in blankets of crushing warmth for one helluva satisfying experience.
Rating: 3.5/5.0
#2026 #35 #ArgonautaRecords #AustrianMetal #AxisMundi #Crowbar #DoomMetal #Dopethrone #HighOnFire #Jan26 #Review #SludgeMetal #StonerDoom #Tarlung
DR: 6 | Format Reviewed: 320 kb/s mp3
Label: Argonauta Records
Websites: Bandcamp | Facebook
Releases Worldwide: January 30th, 2026 -
Prepared for War, Focused on Strategy: India After Operation Sindoor
Operation Sindoor was launched as I was finishing this piece, arguing against the case for war. I had to start all over again this morning. And this is the kind of rework that makes me the happiest.
At precisely 01:15 hours on the morning of May 07, India’s tri-services led precision strikes hit nine identified terrorist launchpads across the LoC. These were not speculative targets. They were terror hideouts and camps, carefully selected based on intelligence inputs, surveillance data, and satellite confirmation. The surgical nature of the strike matters, but so does the symbolism.
The name pays tribute to the 26 women widowed in the Pahalgam terror attack of April 22, a religiously motivated act of brutality that took the lives of their husbands. Only Prime Minister Narendra Modi could have named a mission with such deep meaning and purpose. It wasn’t Operation Revenge. It wasn’t Operation Vengeance. It was Operation Sindoor, a mark of dignity, love, and quiet strength.
Now that these precision strikes have been executed with purpose and clarity, the real question is: What next?
A salute to restraint, not weakness
Let me say this upfront: I am impressed beyond measure by the composure and tactical brilliance of the Narendra Modi-led government. In a nation as emotionally charged as ours, not responding to public sentiment with boots and bombs takes immense courage. India’s decision to hold fire, despite having both the capability and the political will, was not about fear. It was about foresight.
Choosing not to go to war with a collapsing, cornered neighbor is not a weakness. It’s wisdom. Let’s not forget that Pakistan today is not a rival with parity. It is a state gasping for economic oxygen, politically unstable, diplomatically isolated, and dangerously desperate.
Measured retaliation, not escalation
Let’s begin with what this operation tells us. Despite the sheer magnitude of national anger, hawkish media debates, and roaring calls for full-blown retaliation, the government did not target Pakistani military establishments. It did not initiate a cross-border escalation beyond tactical bounds.
Instead, India hit only what it had to: terrorist infrastructure, not sovereign command. That distinction is not accidental. It is intentional and extremely telling.
The message to Pakistan is loud but nuanced: We’re capable, we’re watching, and we will act, but we still don’t want war.
Not because we can’t. But because we shouldn’t.
Make no mistake, India has the political will, public support, and military capacity to launch a full-scale war. But a strong nation is not one that fights every time it can. It’s one that knows when not to.
War with Pakistan at this moment would be giving a collapsing neighbor what it desperately wants, an excuse to reframe its economic failure as patriotic resistance, and its international isolation as victimhood.
Pakistan’s economy is in ruins:
- External debt: $131+ billion (World Bank, 2024)
- Forex reserves: Below $15 billion
- Inflation: Above 23%
- IMF bailout conditions are barely met; another default looming.
A war now would allow Pakistan to seek debt waivers from the IMF, World Bank, and allies like China and Saudi Arabia, arguing “force majeure.” It would divert attention from their governance collapse and let them play the perennial card: Kashmir + victimhood.
As former diplomat and strategic analyst Shivshankar Menon once noted, “Desperate states don’t fight rationally. They fight like they have nothing to lose. That’s when things get dangerous.”
Here are 5 good reasons India should not go to war with the rogue state of Pakistan
1. The beggar state’s bait: War as economic escape
Pakistan owes over $131 billion in external debt (World Bank, 2024). Its foreign exchange reserves hover around $9–15 billion, barely enough to cover two months of imports. Inflation is above 23%, and the country is teetering on social unrest. And yet, there’s a perverse incentive to provoke war.
A war gives Pakistan the perfect alibi to plead with the World Bank, IMF, and bilateral lenders to waive or reschedule its debt repayments. In diplomatic circles, there’s already chatter that Pakistan could request “debt relief due to regional conflict.” It’s a trap, one designed to cloak failure under conflict.
Going to war would unwittingly play into that narrative.
2. Military prowess is not the question, nuclear desperation is
India’s defense forces are robust, modernized, and battle-ready. Pakistan’s military, on the other hand, is overstretched and reliant on outdated hardware, external funding, and Chinese hand-me-downs. Militarily, the match is uneven. But this is exactly what makes the situation volatile and dangerous.
A cornered enemy is unpredictable. Pakistan’s nuclear doctrine allows for first use in case of a perceived existential threat. Multiple international analysts, including Vipin Narang (MIT) and Michael Krepon (Stimson Center), have warned that Pakistan may lower its nuclear threshold in desperation.
In blunt terms, they might press the red button not because they hope to win, but because they’ve already lost everything else.
3. A war India cannot afford, not in rupees but in momentum
Let’s do some arithmetic. During the Kargil War in 1999, India spent nearly ₹5,000 crore ($1.2 billion) over two months. Today, a sustained war would drain upwards of ₹25,000 crore ($3–5 billion) per month, given inflation and modern warfare costs. Add the cost of rebuilding infrastructure, displacement, and global investor nervousness, and we’re staring at a 10-year economic setback.
According to S&P and Morgan Stanley, India is poised to become the third-largest economy by 2027. A war with Pakistan would throw that trajectory into chaos, delay key infrastructure and welfare initiatives, and dampen investor confidence.
Why should a fast-moving train care to halt to kick a collapsing donkey-driven cart?
4. Tactical, not emotional: The smarter path to pressure
War is not the only language of retaliation. India has already begun a silent siege, tactically precise and diplomatically sound. Here’s what this playbook includes:
- Suspending the Indus Waters Treaty (IWT): While India has maintained the moral high ground by adhering to the IWT even during the wars of 1965 and 1971, under the Vienna Convention, it did not hesitate to hold it in abeyance now. The reallocation of water would disrupt Pakistan’s already fragile agricultural base.
- Diplomatic isolation: India has mobilized allies across the UN, G20, and OIC to present fresh dossiers on Pakistan’s terror funding, training camps, and role in cross-border militancy. Even traditional backers like the UAE are more muted in support.
- Trade cancellation: India already revoked Pakistan’s MFN status in 2019, reducing bilateral trade to a trickle. Now, further trade embargoes in pharmaceuticals, electronics, and fertilizers are on the table.
- Airspace closure: A repeat of the 2019 strategy, where India barred its airspace to Pakistani carriers, would cost Pakistan millions a month. According to Dawn, PIA’s previous losses due to Indian airspace restrictions exceeded PKR 500 million in just 3 months.
- Port and transit route restrictions: Karachi Port is already choking. India could push for blockade-level economic isolation, including influencing friendly naval allies to reconsider maritime permissions.
- LoC abeyance: Now that the LoC is in abeyance, India is free to selectively retaliate on key launchpads and smuggling corridors, not all-out war, but high-impact precision response.
- Targeted sanctions: India can lead the effort to impose travel bans, asset freezes, and defense restrictions on key Pakistani political and military figures, especially those with offshore holdings.
- Digital bans: India can block and ban all social media channels and handles of Pakistani citizens and media in India.
- Leveraging Balochistan to Pakistan on the tetherhooks: For decades, the Baloch have accused Pakistan’s establishment of genocide, disappearances, and cultural erasure. A 2023 report by the UNPO and Human Rights Council of Balochistan documented over 1,300 enforced disappearances in just one year. India need not (and should not) militarize Balochistan. But strategic engagement with Baloch activists, amplifying their human rights demands in global forums, and media visibility of Pakistani oppression in Balochistan can keep Islamabad perennially uneasy. This creates pressure without conflict. It disrupts their internal stability. And it balances the Kashmir narrative with Pakistan’s own darkest secret. In short: What Kashmir is to Pakistan emotionally, Balochistan is to Pakistan existentially.
This is not pacifism. This is modern-day warfare, just by other means.
5. Global optics: The China and Muslim bloc variable
While India enjoys deep strategic relations with the US, France, Japan, and Australia, a war could alter equations, especially if Pakistan spins the conflict into a religious narrative. And knowing Pakistan, it will.
Countries like Turkey, Malaysia, and Azerbaijan have already signaled moral support to Pakistan. China, too, has reiterated its “unwavering support” for Pakistan amid rising tensions.
Worse, a war gives China a pretext to stoke tension in Eastern Ladakh or Arunachal, forcing India into a two-front war, a scenario no strategist desires.
India must keep the moral upper hand. Because in global diplomacy, perception often precedes truth.
Now what? War isn’t our goal. But if it must be, we’re more than ready.
India didn’t take the bait. India responded like a nation aware of its stature and its goals.
We are not a weak nation choosing inaction. We are a strong nation choosing strategy.
With Operation Sindoor now public, we must brace for Pakistan’s next move. It may retaliate with proxy terror. It may resort to LoC shelling. It may just barge into our territory with their fighters. It may press the nuke. Or it may raise the diplomatic pitch at the UN. Or it may choose to be act wise, and lick their wounds in private. Anything is possible.
But now, the burden of escalation lies with Pakistan. India has done what it needed to: precise, proportionate, and public.
India has nothing to establish by bombing bunkers and waving flags on burning borders. Our soldiers remain ever-ready. Our arsenal is loaded. But our brains are sharper. We know that war with a poor, isolated, nuclear-armed beggar-state is not a badge of honor. It’s a drain. On resources. On time. On progress.
Sources
- Economic Times (2025): Can Pakistan fight India on borrowed money
- World Bank (2024): Pakistan Economic Update
- Stimson Center: Krepon, Narang on South Asia Nuclear Risk
- UNPO & HRCB Reports (2023): Human rights in Balochistan
- MEA Briefing (2025): Official statement on Operation Sindoor
- Shivshankar Menon, Choices: Inside the Making of Indian Foreign Policy
#BalochistanIssue #crossBorderTerrorism #history #india #IndiaDefenseNews #IndiaDefensePolicy #IndiaMilitaryResponse #IndiaNationalSecurity #IndiaPakistanBorderTension #IndiaPakistanConflict #IndiaPakistanLatestUpdates #IndiaRetaliationPolicy #IndiaVsPakistan2025 #IndiaVsPakistanEscalation #IndiaSMilitaryDoctrine #IndiaSWarReadiness #IndianAirForceStrikes #IndianAirStrikes2025 #IndianForeignPolicy2025 #IndianGovernmentResponse #IndoPakTensions #ModiForeignPolicy #ModiGovernmentResponse #NarendraModiStrategy #news #nuclearThreatSouthAsia #OperationSindoor #OperationSindoorAnalysis #pakistan #PakistanEconomicCrisis #PhalgamTerrorAttack #politics #precisionStrikesIndia #SouthAsiaDiplomacy #SouthAsiaGeopolitics #strategicRestraintIndia #surgicalStrikesIndia #warPreparednessIndia
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Sentynel and Twelve’s Top Ten(ish) of 2023
By sentynel
Sentynel
Is it that time already? Whew. 2023 has raced past me, carried by a blizzard of endless Stuff. I need a goddamn break, which is currently tentatively scheduled for about 2025. As a result, I’ve been desperately behind on my listening for most of the year. I barely scraped together five reviews, all for bands I knew and liked, and was impressed by… one of them. I was nervous about my list all the way through to about November. Fortunately, I have once again ended up with a solid list of great albums, though the best doesn’t quite top last year’s The Otolith. I have lost track of what a normal selection looks like for me at this point, but this year’s big genre winner is apparently instrumental prog, while I felt it was a slightly weak year for post-metal. I also suspect I have more overlap with some of the cooler members of staff than I usually do, amongst all the records you already know are going to be on my list.
Despite a heavy year, contributing to Angry Metal Guy dot com continues to be one of my favorite hobbies. The other staff continue to have questionable taste, but I’ve found music that brings me joy anyway. We have new writers, I’ve met a couple of last year’s crop, and they’re all pretty chill despite their opinions on music. Everyone continues to put a huge amount of free work into this weird little corner of the internet. And my server load stats confirm that you, the readers, are still out there, using my bandwidth.
Finally, following Twitter’s ongoing trainwreck killing off the review autoposting there, we are now available on a slightly experimental basis on Mastodon and compatible platforms. Simply follow @[email protected]. (Note that comments don’t sync in from Mastodon, so you’ll still need to come to the site in order to tell us we’re wrong.) Of course, RSS and Facebook continue to be available.
#ish. Angus McSix // Angus McSix and the Sword of Power – I’ll defend last year’s Fellowship record to the death as serious music. The sophistication of its writing and the adulthood of its themes proves that upbeat, catchy power metal doesn’t have to be silly or lightweight. I offer no such defense for this record. This is incredibly silly. Honestly, between the track titles and how nakedly the whole thing leans on Winkler’s previous role, I was expecting to write this off as a failed attempt to recapture past glories without the wit—another soulless, forgettable pop-power metal band going through the motions. And yet it works. The fun feels genuine, the runtime too brief to be self-indulgent, the songwriting too varied to be a lazy cash-in. It’s infectious, it’s miles better than the new Gloryhammer record, and I’ve ended up listening to it a lot. I embrace the upcoming savaging in the comments section.
#10. Nuclear Power Trio // Wet Ass Plutonium – Speaking of silly, it’s the guys in creepy dictator masks. As I said when I wrote about this album, after a great EP they’ve stuck the landing on the album as well, cementing their position as serious musicians and not a one-off novelty. Fun, triumphant, soaring, Wet Ass Plutonium is an absolute blast to listen to. The musicianship is fantastic, and in particular I’ll highlight again just how great Putin is. (On bass.)
#9. Sermon // Of Golden Verse – Starring a rather more seriously masked musician, this is an emotional, gripping prog album. The only thing holding this back from a higher list placing is that I haven’t found myself compelled to listen to it all the time, which is definitely a me problem (see intro). The moment I actually do put it on I’m hooked. The dynamic, catchy songwriting has an urgent edge to it that gets under your skin and sets it apart from a lot of other prog metal, which can lack a bit of bite. I absolutely love the vocal performance here in particular, but the whole thing is written and performed thoughtfully and impactfully.
#8. Ok Goodnight // The Fox and the Bird – In the best tradition of prog, this is a weird album. It tries to do a lot of things and manages nearly all of them. Williams’ charismatic, mood-changing vocals carry this whimsical tale. The first few times I listened I wasn’t sure it was going to stick, but I kept finding fragments of her lines in my head. With a few more listens, the whole thing settled. There are still a few little stumbles where weird and shifting gives way to just disjointed, but I find the rest of the album far too addictively, earwormily interesting to mind too much.
#7. Scaphoid // Echoes of the Rift – I owe this record more complete thoughts than I have space for here—there’s a TYMHM piece due, but see the intro for why it probably hasn’t appeared yet. In short: I’m a huge fan of this sort of pretty, thoughtful instrumental prog. I loved Absent Passages, and Echoes of the Rift is an improvement in effectively every meaningful way. Hobart has developed as a composer, and as a result it’s shorter, tighter, more varied, and more memorable. As with a lot of music on this list, my love for it is in the mood it conjures. It’s thoughtful, meditative, exploratory, and has been a favorite work and travel soundtrack for me.
#6. Sanguine Glacialis // Maladaptive Daydreaming – This record is A Lot. I mentioned it to Dr. Wvrm, who described it as “like Cradle of Filth bodysnatched Epica, then showed up to the studio and found it double booked with Nik Sundin hanging out with a jazz quartet. And instead of throwing them out being like ‘yea you know what let’s do all of it at once'”. Frankly, I have nothing further to add to this bit of poetry. If this sounds utterly horrifying, you’re not going to like Maladaptive Daydreaming. But if you’re maybe interested, know that it’s way more cohesive than it has any right to be and a lot of fun. The main thing holding it back is an inexplicably loud mastering job.
#5. Night Crowned // Tales – Here’s an interesting study in genre and reviewers’ tastes. Thus, who is far more brvtal than me, describes this as “symphonic/melodic blackened death.” I, meanwhile, relate to this as a folk metal album, though one much more interesting than the genre typically delivers. Just listen to that hurdy-gurdy or the styling of the vocals. (The female vocals really remind me of the Witcher 3 soundtrack’s Eastern European folk, for example. It’s notable that the cover art here features the Wild Hunt.) Either way, Tales is a wild ride and a certified banger through and through.
#4. Fires in the Distance // Air Not Meant for Us – This is so pretty. That seems like an odd thing for melodic death metal to be striving for, but there’s really no other word for it. Soaring guitar melodies, sweeping strings, and airy piano tug at your heartstrings. But a core of heavy riffs and harsh vocals keeps it anchored. The two mesh startlingly well. Fires in the Distance really lean into the lilting piano at times—if you’d told me a band were going to put this much piano into a melodeath record and everyone would love it, I would have laughed at you. You’d think it would sound insubstantial against the rhythm section, but it never does. Genuinely beautiful.
#3. Helga // Wrapped in Mist – This record reminds me of Gåte (who put out a good EP this year!) gone atmospheric, both in the folk composition but also in the slightly unusual vocals. There’s also some hints of Meer. It’s been criticized, not unfairly, for imperfectly mixing its folk takes on post-metal and airy dream-pop. I like both, but the more I listen, the less I think that separation is the right lens to view it through. Both these genres are characterized by a prioritization of atmosphere and feeling over immediacy, and that’s where Wrapped in Mist’s success lies. I’ve spoken before about my love of music that feels like a witches’ forest ritual, and this is the exact button Helga presses for me. Wherever it sits among its contributing genres, it conjures that feeling.
#2. Essence of Datum // Radikal Rats – Wildly underrated by some hack at little-known music blog Angry Metal Guy, “a heavier God is an Astronaut do the Mass Effect soundtrack” is right up my alley. Even then, I’ve been surprised by how much I’ve listened to this album. It’s not the world’s most challenging record, which has probably contributed to me reaching for it so often over a difficult few months. But don’t confuse that with a lack of impact. It’s cleverly written and impeccably performed, catchy, interesting and varied. This would be a fantastic soundtrack to a top-notch sci-fi film. (I listened to it a lot while reading the new Murderbot book.) As I said above, this has been a good year for instrumental prog, and the placement of this record despite two other strong contenders in the genre should speak volumes.
#1. Wayfarer // American Gothic – This one shouldn’t come as a surprise if you read my thoughts on Lathe on last year’s list. I’m a sucker for the micro-genre I’ll call industrial bluegrass, and last year Lathe mixed it with post-metal with unexpectedly successful results. Wayfarer, meanwhile, bring in black metal, a genre I normally find myself bored by. Indeed, A Romance with Violence didn’t quite do it for me. American Gothic though absolutely knocks it out of the park. The genre blend is utterly seamless, to the extent that to simply call it black metal does it a disservice. This is the best of bleak country painted with the instrumentation of black metal. Electric guitars pick up melody lines from banjos with a twang. Distorted slide guitars get that pedal steel feeling. There’s even a honky-tonk piano. It’s all deceptively melodic, and it helps there’s a heavy twist of post here. This seems to have put some members of the staff off—the second half is less immediate than the first—but these people are wrong. The atmosphere that results is pitch-perfect. The vocals and the lyrics are great. This is not an album that I expected, nor did I expect to love it like this. But it shot to the top of my list within the first couple of listens, and I love it a bit more with every spin.
Honorable Mentions
- BRIQUEVILLE // IIII – I saw these guys play at ArcTanGent this year and was dead impressed. This is really slow-burn post, but it’s worth it.
- Mutoid Man // Mutants – Another ATG band, although from many years ago. Not a big departure from their prog/punk usual, but a lot of fun.
- healthyliving // Songs of Abundance, Psalms of Grief – “Bloom” narrowly missed out on my Song of the Year. The rest of the album is also really good post-metal, with a great vocalist.
- Svalbard // The Weight of the Mask – This didn’t blow me away like When I Die, but it’s not for lack of quality; it’s a great album still, it’s just not a huge evolution.
- Tribunal // The Weight of Remembrance – A really solid bit of classic doom. As with any well-trodden genre it takes a lot to stand out, and Tribunal nail it with some great interplay—on vocals and instruments—between the duo.
Disappointment of the Year
Repeatedly giving poor-to-middling reviews to bands I like. Also, the production on that Anareta album, which I wanted so badly to love.
Song of the Year
Vienna Teng “The Riversitter” – I’m not even going to pretend to claim that this is metal, though I did of course first hear Teng on this very website. She is my favorite lyricist ever, and one of my favorite musicians in general. It’s been a long ten years since Aims, and it’s fantastic to have new music from her again. This is a pretty, moving piece, based on a short story, about not overthinking or overplanning, community, beauty, and building on each other’s ideas. I can’t fully explain why I’ve been so gripped by this song, but it spoke to me. I’m not normally a “same song on repeat” person, but I’ve listened to this song over three times as often as anything else this year.
Twelve
Up until a few weeks ago, I’d have said this was a pretty solid year, all things considered—but alas, here I am, ending the year on a low note. 2023 felt both very long and very quick, and we weren’t too far into it when I realized my contributions to this here blog were pretty much abysmal. Thankfully, my fellow writers and alternate personas are very understanding people, but it’s still rough to realize that the year has ended to mark my lowest output yet here at Angry Metal Guy.
At least the music was solid. While I was off doing who-knows-what offline, a whole bunch of talented and wonderful writers ghostwrote a whole bunch of compelling reviews and recommendations here that have come to dominate my listening. So before I properly dive into sharing my top albums for 2023, I’ll take a second to thank every one of them, from the newest n00b to the oldest olde, for a level of dedication and talent I just didn’t reach this year. I’m looking forward to the next one, and the one after that as well.
Anyway…
#ish. David Eugene Edwards // Hyacinth – Usually there’s a space or two on this list for the most exciting neofolk that comes my way in a given year, but this year was a quiet one on that front. In its absence, however, the dark country tellings of David Eugene Edwards are quickly becoming a favourite. It’s not a style I’m very familiar with—hence the #ish—but owing to the gorgeously ominous storytelling on Hyacinth, that’s something I’m determined to fix in 2024.
#10. Sacred Outcry // Towers of Gold – Life™ works in mysterious ways; when I was unable to review Towers of Gold following my excitement at Sacred Outcry’s debut, I felt pretty badly. Thankfully, Holdeneye’s account captures what is so special about this power metal odyssey better than I’d have been able to at the time. An adventure for the whole family, and an impressively emotive power metal opus.
#9. Theocracy // Mosaic – Speaking of power metal, I also loved Mosaic in a way I haven’t been taken by a Theocracy album in some time. The balance of joyful and serious themes is something the band does really, really well here, and it’s a splash of positivity that I was happy to receive just as the weather began to turn cold. Not to mention it’s impressively heavy on top of it all, and the choruses stick around long after the album is done.
# 8. The Ocean // Holocene – I’ve said in a couple of places that I don’t care much for post metal, but I do like it when The Ocean does it. The trend continued this year with Holocene, which felt more experimental, less heavy, and altogether weirder than a lot of their past work. This all works great for me, and I found I kept returning to Holocene as the year went by. “Atlantic” in particular may be one of my most listened-to songs for the year. High defeatism, am I right?
#7. Warfarer // American Gothic – Blistering, beautiful black metal; a heartfelt reason for the anger; influence from the wild, wild West to keep it all fresh. What could there possibly be to not like about American Gothic? In the past, Wayfarer haven’t quite captured my attention, but this album broke through my resistance and pummelled it to the ground within the first four seconds of “The Thousand Tombs of Western Promise.” A phenomenal album, through and through.
#6. Briqueville // IIII – IIII is not an album I expected to list here; in fact, one of the first things I did when I saw Charcharodon’s 4.0 review for it was ignore it. More fool I. I thought I had this list down when I finally spun Briqueville’s latest for the first time and it tore its way up these IIII spaces astonishingly fast. Dreamy, experimental doom atmospheres are not easy to pin down, but the songwriting here is incredible. The time passes so quickly, and then what’s left to do but to spin the whole album over again?
#5. Godthrymm // Distortions – Rounding out the other half of my top doom metal albums of the year is Distortions, essentially because this album is heavy. I love the straightforward style, the well-produced misery, and the way Godthrymm is able to so cleanly convey such powerful emotions. This album is a testament to doom metal done well, and it’s been a welcome companion since the first time I heard it—I was hooked pretty much instantly.
#4. Burden of Ymir // Heorot – If you read my reviews, you already know that the accordion is the way into my heart. This feast of black metal incorporates exactly that, and makes for a heavy, folky journey, an amazing album with a story to tell and a ton of heart. It’s also a sneaky album, the kind that grows on you the more you listen to it, with small details hidden in clever songwriting. It’s hard to ask for more; this is an album that feels made exactly for me.
#3. Angus McSix // Angus McSix and the Sword of Power – Speaking of albums that feel made exactly for me, Angus McSix is some of the most fun you can have listening to power metal. I am a sucker for cheesiness, and Angus McSix’s debut dials the cheese factor up to the maximum. The other, crucial side of the dial, however, is the songwriting. Thanks to that, everything works in a way that makes the album more than the sum of it’s ridiculous concept1. It’s a very strong album, and one that’s only grown on me with time.
#2. Sodomisery // Mazzaroth – I can only imagine that Dr. A. N. Grier and I have dramatically different year-end lists, but his review of Mazzaroth is spot-on, and I’m certain we’ll share this entry. As orchestral black metal goes, this album is grand, heavy, and huge, making for a phenomenal opus that is my top black metal album of the year. The vocal performance, the orchestrations, the songwriting—everything on Mazzaroth is top-tier, larger-than-life, incredible black metal.
#1. Vanishing Kids // Miracle of Death – It will be difficult to sum up my appreciation for Miracle of Death in the short blurb I have before me. From the first seconds of “Spill the Dark,” this album takes me to a cold, comfortable place. It’s emotional, but it feels like numbness; it’s quiet, but leaves a huge impression. Everything about this album works to create atmospheres of bleakness and hopelessness, and any time I’ve felt low throughout the year, Vanishing Kids has been there2. Miracle of Death is, in that regard, an amazing album, and one that was always going to take this spot on my list. Truthfully, I’m shocked to realize this only came out a couple of months ago—it’s been so right for my 2023 that it feels like it’s been there since January 1.
Honorable Mention
- Suotana // Ounas I – I had a lot of fun reviewing Ounas I, and have had a lot of fun listening to it since. The black/melodeath/power metal thing Suotana does so well lends itself to an extremely fun, energetic album that is just so solid. This is an album done well, and I’m still recommending it to pretty much all of you!
Song of the Year
Sometimes, you just need to have some fun. No matter how difficult, irritating, or otherwise negative this year may have been, “Ride to Hell” has been the pick-me-up song to deal with it. This is a terrific power-meets-traditional metal anthem, and the enthusiasm in which Angus McSix performs it is a huge part of the appeal. It’s catchy, it’s fun, it’s wildly addictive—it’s everything you need when times are rough and you don’t know any supernatural motorcyclists in the real world. It’s also a great song when you’re having a good day already and want to make it better.
#2023 #AngusMcSix #BlogPost #Briqueville #BurdenOfYmir #DavidEugeneEdwards #EssenceOfDatum #FiresInTheDistance #Godthrymm #healthyliving #Helga #Lists #Listurnalia #MutoidMan #NightCrowned #OkGoodnight #SacredOutcry #SanguineGlacialis #Scaphoid #SentynelSAndTwelveSTopTenIshOf2023 #Sermon #Sodomisery #Suotana #Svalbard #TheOcean #TheOtolith #Theocracy #Tribunal #VanishingKids #ViennaTeng #Wayfarer
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Sentynel and Twelve’s Top Ten(ish) of 2023
By sentynel
Sentynel
Is it that time already? Whew. 2023 has raced past me, carried by a blizzard of endless Stuff. I need a goddamn break, which is currently tentatively scheduled for about 2025. As a result, I’ve been desperately behind on my listening for most of the year. I barely scraped together five reviews, all for bands I knew and liked, and was impressed by… one of them. I was nervous about my list all the way through to about November. Fortunately, I have once again ended up with a solid list of great albums, though the best doesn’t quite top last year’s The Otolith. I have lost track of what a normal selection looks like for me at this point, but this year’s big genre winner is apparently instrumental prog, while I felt it was a slightly weak year for post-metal. I also suspect I have more overlap with some of the cooler members of staff than I usually do, amongst all the records you already know are going to be on my list.
Despite a heavy year, contributing to Angry Metal Guy dot com continues to be one of my favorite hobbies. The other staff continue to have questionable taste, but I’ve found music that brings me joy anyway. We have new writers, I’ve met a couple of last year’s crop, and they’re all pretty chill despite their opinions on music. Everyone continues to put a huge amount of free work into this weird little corner of the internet. And my server load stats confirm that you, the readers, are still out there, using my bandwidth.
Finally, following Twitter’s ongoing trainwreck killing off the review autoposting there, we are now available on a slightly experimental basis on Mastodon and compatible platforms. Simply follow @[email protected]. (Note that comments don’t sync in from Mastodon, so you’ll still need to come to the site in order to tell us we’re wrong.) Of course, RSS and Facebook continue to be available.
#ish. Angus McSix // Angus McSix and the Sword of Power – I’ll defend last year’s Fellowship record to the death as serious music. The sophistication of its writing and the adulthood of its themes proves that upbeat, catchy power metal doesn’t have to be silly or lightweight. I offer no such defense for this record. This is incredibly silly. Honestly, between the track titles and how nakedly the whole thing leans on Winkler’s previous role, I was expecting to write this off as a failed attempt to recapture past glories without the wit—another soulless, forgettable pop-power metal band going through the motions. And yet it works. The fun feels genuine, the runtime too brief to be self-indulgent, the songwriting too varied to be a lazy cash-in. It’s infectious, it’s miles better than the new Gloryhammer record, and I’ve ended up listening to it a lot. I embrace the upcoming savaging in the comments section.
#10. Nuclear Power Trio // Wet Ass Plutonium – Speaking of silly, it’s the guys in creepy dictator masks. As I said when I wrote about this album, after a great EP they’ve stuck the landing on the album as well, cementing their position as serious musicians and not a one-off novelty. Fun, triumphant, soaring, Wet Ass Plutonium is an absolute blast to listen to. The musicianship is fantastic, and in particular I’ll highlight again just how great Putin is. (On bass.)
#9. Sermon // Of Golden Verse – Starring a rather more seriously masked musician, this is an emotional, gripping prog album. The only thing holding this back from a higher list placing is that I haven’t found myself compelled to listen to it all the time, which is definitely a me problem (see intro). The moment I actually do put it on I’m hooked. The dynamic, catchy songwriting has an urgent edge to it that gets under your skin and sets it apart from a lot of other prog metal, which can lack a bit of bite. I absolutely love the vocal performance here in particular, but the whole thing is written and performed thoughtfully and impactfully.
#8. Ok Goodnight // The Fox and the Bird – In the best tradition of prog, this is a weird album. It tries to do a lot of things and manages nearly all of them. Williams’ charismatic, mood-changing vocals carry this whimsical tale. The first few times I listened I wasn’t sure it was going to stick, but I kept finding fragments of her lines in my head. With a few more listens, the whole thing settled. There are still a few little stumbles where weird and shifting gives way to just disjointed, but I find the rest of the album far too addictively, earwormily interesting to mind too much.
#7. Scaphoid // Echoes of the Rift – I owe this record more complete thoughts than I have space for here—there’s a TYMHM piece due, but see the intro for why it probably hasn’t appeared yet. In short: I’m a huge fan of this sort of pretty, thoughtful instrumental prog. I loved Absent Passages, and Echoes of the Rift is an improvement in effectively every meaningful way. Hobart has developed as a composer, and as a result it’s shorter, tighter, more varied, and more memorable. As with a lot of music on this list, my love for it is in the mood it conjures. It’s thoughtful, meditative, exploratory, and has been a favorite work and travel soundtrack for me.
#6. Sanguine Glacialis // Maladaptive Daydreaming – This record is A Lot. I mentioned it to Dr. Wvrm, who described it as “like Cradle of Filth bodysnatched Epica, then showed up to the studio and found it double booked with Nik Sundin hanging out with a jazz quartet. And instead of throwing them out being like ‘yea you know what let’s do all of it at once'”. Frankly, I have nothing further to add to this bit of poetry. If this sounds utterly horrifying, you’re not going to like Maladaptive Daydreaming. But if you’re maybe interested, know that it’s way more cohesive than it has any right to be and a lot of fun. The main thing holding it back is an inexplicably loud mastering job.
#5. Night Crowned // Tales – Here’s an interesting study in genre and reviewers’ tastes. Thus, who is far more brvtal than me, describes this as “symphonic/melodic blackened death.” I, meanwhile, relate to this as a folk metal album, though one much more interesting than the genre typically delivers. Just listen to that hurdy-gurdy or the styling of the vocals. (The female vocals really remind me of the Witcher 3 soundtrack’s Eastern European folk, for example. It’s notable that the cover art here features the Wild Hunt.) Either way, Tales is a wild ride and a certified banger through and through.
#4. Fires in the Distance // Air Not Meant for Us – This is so pretty. That seems like an odd thing for melodic death metal to be striving for, but there’s really no other word for it. Soaring guitar melodies, sweeping strings, and airy piano tug at your heartstrings. But a core of heavy riffs and harsh vocals keeps it anchored. The two mesh startlingly well. Fires in the Distance really lean into the lilting piano at times—if you’d told me a band were going to put this much piano into a melodeath record and everyone would love it, I would have laughed at you. You’d think it would sound insubstantial against the rhythm section, but it never does. Genuinely beautiful.
#3. Helga // Wrapped in Mist – This record reminds me of Gåte (who put out a good EP this year!) gone atmospheric, both in the folk composition but also in the slightly unusual vocals. There’s also some hints of Meer. It’s been criticized, not unfairly, for imperfectly mixing its folk takes on post-metal and airy dream-pop. I like both, but the more I listen, the less I think that separation is the right lens to view it through. Both these genres are characterized by a prioritization of atmosphere and feeling over immediacy, and that’s where Wrapped in Mist’s success lies. I’ve spoken before about my love of music that feels like a witches’ forest ritual, and this is the exact button Helga presses for me. Wherever it sits among its contributing genres, it conjures that feeling.
#2. Essence of Datum // Radikal Rats – Wildly underrated by some hack at little-known music blog Angry Metal Guy, “a heavier God is an Astronaut do the Mass Effect soundtrack” is right up my alley. Even then, I’ve been surprised by how much I’ve listened to this album. It’s not the world’s most challenging record, which has probably contributed to me reaching for it so often over a difficult few months. But don’t confuse that with a lack of impact. It’s cleverly written and impeccably performed, catchy, interesting and varied. This would be a fantastic soundtrack to a top-notch sci-fi film. (I listened to it a lot while reading the new Murderbot book.) As I said above, this has been a good year for instrumental prog, and the placement of this record despite two other strong contenders in the genre should speak volumes.
#1. Wayfarer // American Gothic – This one shouldn’t come as a surprise if you read my thoughts on Lathe on last year’s list. I’m a sucker for the micro-genre I’ll call industrial bluegrass, and last year Lathe mixed it with post-metal with unexpectedly successful results. Wayfarer, meanwhile, bring in black metal, a genre I normally find myself bored by. Indeed, A Romance with Violence didn’t quite do it for me. American Gothic though absolutely knocks it out of the park. The genre blend is utterly seamless, to the extent that to simply call it black metal does it a disservice. This is the best of bleak country painted with the instrumentation of black metal. Electric guitars pick up melody lines from banjos with a twang. Distorted slide guitars get that pedal steel feeling. There’s even a honky-tonk piano. It’s all deceptively melodic, and it helps there’s a heavy twist of post here. This seems to have put some members of the staff off—the second half is less immediate than the first—but these people are wrong. The atmosphere that results is pitch-perfect. The vocals and the lyrics are great. This is not an album that I expected, nor did I expect to love it like this. But it shot to the top of my list within the first couple of listens, and I love it a bit more with every spin.
Honorable Mentions
- BRIQUEVILLE // IIII – I saw these guys play at ArcTanGent this year and was dead impressed. This is really slow-burn post, but it’s worth it.
- Mutoid Man // Mutants – Another ATG band, although from many years ago. Not a big departure from their prog/punk usual, but a lot of fun.
- healthyliving // Songs of Abundance, Psalms of Grief – “Bloom” narrowly missed out on my Song of the Year. The rest of the album is also really good post-metal, with a great vocalist.
- Svalbard // The Weight of the Mask – This didn’t blow me away like When I Die, but it’s not for lack of quality; it’s a great album still, it’s just not a huge evolution.
- Tribunal // The Weight of Remembrance – A really solid bit of classic doom. As with any well-trodden genre it takes a lot to stand out, and Tribunal nail it with some great interplay—on vocals and instruments—between the duo.
Disappointment of the Year
Repeatedly giving poor-to-middling reviews to bands I like. Also, the production on that Anareta album, which I wanted so badly to love.
Song of the Year
Vienna Teng “The Riversitter” – I’m not even going to pretend to claim that this is metal, though I did of course first hear Teng on this very website. She is my favorite lyricist ever, and one of my favorite musicians in general. It’s been a long ten years since Aims, and it’s fantastic to have new music from her again. This is a pretty, moving piece, based on a short story, about not overthinking or overplanning, community, beauty, and building on each other’s ideas. I can’t fully explain why I’ve been so gripped by this song, but it spoke to me. I’m not normally a “same song on repeat” person, but I’ve listened to this song over three times as often as anything else this year.
Twelve
Up until a few weeks ago, I’d have said this was a pretty solid year, all things considered—but alas, here I am, ending the year on a low note. 2023 felt both very long and very quick, and we weren’t too far into it when I realized my contributions to this here blog were pretty much abysmal. Thankfully, my fellow writers and alternate personas are very understanding people, but it’s still rough to realize that the year has ended to mark my lowest output yet here at Angry Metal Guy.
At least the music was solid. While I was off doing who-knows-what offline, a whole bunch of talented and wonderful writers ghostwrote a whole bunch of compelling reviews and recommendations here that have come to dominate my listening. So before I properly dive into sharing my top albums for 2023, I’ll take a second to thank every one of them, from the newest n00b to the oldest olde, for a level of dedication and talent I just didn’t reach this year. I’m looking forward to the next one, and the one after that as well.
Anyway…
#ish. David Eugene Edwards // Hyacinth – Usually there’s a space or two on this list for the most exciting neofolk that comes my way in a given year, but this year was a quiet one on that front. In its absence, however, the dark country tellings of David Eugene Edwards are quickly becoming a favourite. It’s not a style I’m very familiar with—hence the #ish—but owing to the gorgeously ominous storytelling on Hyacinth, that’s something I’m determined to fix in 2024.
#10. Sacred Outcry // Towers of Gold – Life™ works in mysterious ways; when I was unable to review Towers of Gold following my excitement at Sacred Outcry’s debut, I felt pretty badly. Thankfully, Holdeneye’s account captures what is so special about this power metal odyssey better than I’d have been able to at the time. An adventure for the whole family, and an impressively emotive power metal opus.
#9. Theocracy // Mosaic – Speaking of power metal, I also loved Mosaic in a way I haven’t been taken by a Theocracy album in some time. The balance of joyful and serious themes is something the band does really, really well here, and it’s a splash of positivity that I was happy to receive just as the weather began to turn cold. Not to mention it’s impressively heavy on top of it all, and the choruses stick around long after the album is done.
# 8. The Ocean // Holocene – I’ve said in a couple of places that I don’t care much for post metal, but I do like it when The Ocean does it. The trend continued this year with Holocene, which felt more experimental, less heavy, and altogether weirder than a lot of their past work. This all works great for me, and I found I kept returning to Holocene as the year went by. “Atlantic” in particular may be one of my most listened-to songs for the year. High defeatism, am I right?
#7. Warfarer // American Gothic – Blistering, beautiful black metal; a heartfelt reason for the anger; influence from the wild, wild West to keep it all fresh. What could there possibly be to not like about American Gothic? In the past, Wayfarer haven’t quite captured my attention, but this album broke through my resistance and pummelled it to the ground within the first four seconds of “The Thousand Tombs of Western Promise.” A phenomenal album, through and through.
#6. Briqueville // IIII – IIII is not an album I expected to list here; in fact, one of the first things I did when I saw Charcharodon’s 4.0 review for it was ignore it. More fool I. I thought I had this list down when I finally spun Briqueville’s latest for the first time and it tore its way up these IIII spaces astonishingly fast. Dreamy, experimental doom atmospheres are not easy to pin down, but the songwriting here is incredible. The time passes so quickly, and then what’s left to do but to spin the whole album over again?
#5. Godthrymm // Distortions – Rounding out the other half of my top doom metal albums of the year is Distortions, essentially because this album is heavy. I love the straightforward style, the well-produced misery, and the way Godthrymm is able to so cleanly convey such powerful emotions. This album is a testament to doom metal done well, and it’s been a welcome companion since the first time I heard it—I was hooked pretty much instantly.
#4. Burden of Ymir // Heorot – If you read my reviews, you already know that the accordion is the way into my heart. This feast of black metal incorporates exactly that, and makes for a heavy, folky journey, an amazing album with a story to tell and a ton of heart. It’s also a sneaky album, the kind that grows on you the more you listen to it, with small details hidden in clever songwriting. It’s hard to ask for more; this is an album that feels made exactly for me.
#3. Angus McSix // Angus McSix and the Sword of Power – Speaking of albums that feel made exactly for me, Angus McSix is some of the most fun you can have listening to power metal. I am a sucker for cheesiness, and Angus McSix’s debut dials the cheese factor up to the maximum. The other, crucial side of the dial, however, is the songwriting. Thanks to that, everything works in a way that makes the album more than the sum of it’s ridiculous concept1. It’s a very strong album, and one that’s only grown on me with time.
#2. Sodomisery // Mazzaroth – I can only imagine that Dr. A. N. Grier and I have dramatically different year-end lists, but his review of Mazzaroth is spot-on, and I’m certain we’ll share this entry. As orchestral black metal goes, this album is grand, heavy, and huge, making for a phenomenal opus that is my top black metal album of the year. The vocal performance, the orchestrations, the songwriting—everything on Mazzaroth is top-tier, larger-than-life, incredible black metal.
#1. Vanishing Kids // Miracle of Death – It will be difficult to sum up my appreciation for Miracle of Death in the short blurb I have before me. From the first seconds of “Spill the Dark,” this album takes me to a cold, comfortable place. It’s emotional, but it feels like numbness; it’s quiet, but leaves a huge impression. Everything about this album works to create atmospheres of bleakness and hopelessness, and any time I’ve felt low throughout the year, Vanishing Kids has been there2. Miracle of Death is, in that regard, an amazing album, and one that was always going to take this spot on my list. Truthfully, I’m shocked to realize this only came out a couple of months ago—it’s been so right for my 2023 that it feels like it’s been there since January 1.
Honorable Mention
- Suotana // Ounas I – I had a lot of fun reviewing Ounas I, and have had a lot of fun listening to it since. The black/melodeath/power metal thing Suotana does so well lends itself to an extremely fun, energetic album that is just so solid. This is an album done well, and I’m still recommending it to pretty much all of you!
Song of the Year
Sometimes, you just need to have some fun. No matter how difficult, irritating, or otherwise negative this year may have been, “Ride to Hell” has been the pick-me-up song to deal with it. This is a terrific power-meets-traditional metal anthem, and the enthusiasm in which Angus McSix performs it is a huge part of the appeal. It’s catchy, it’s fun, it’s wildly addictive—it’s everything you need when times are rough and you don’t know any supernatural motorcyclists in the real world. It’s also a great song when you’re having a good day already and want to make it better.
#2023 #AngusMcSix #BlogPost #Briqueville #BurdenOfYmir #DavidEugeneEdwards #EssenceOfDatum #FiresInTheDistance #Godthrymm #healthyliving #Helga #Lists #Listurnalia #MutoidMan #NightCrowned #OkGoodnight #SacredOutcry #SanguineGlacialis #Scaphoid #SentynelSAndTwelveSTopTenIshOf2023 #Sermon #Sodomisery #Suotana #Svalbard #TheOcean #TheOtolith #Theocracy #Tribunal #VanishingKids #ViennaTeng #Wayfarer
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@andi @ActionRetro @andre_igler @Katti @datacop Nachdem es beim ersten Zusammenbau neulich das Filament im Schlauch für die Verlängerung des originalen Einschaltknopfes abgeklemmt hatte & so der Einschalter nicht mehr ging, haben wir das Gehäuse noch einmal aufgeschraubt & seit dem letzten Mal offen liegen lassen. Das hat wohl dazu geführt, dass Teflon & Filament sich angepasst haben, denn gestern ging es einfacher zu & der Button geht. Yay!🎉 #G4M4k #DesperateHousehackers
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This is welcome, but the also axed Paris-Vienna route still has no replacement.
New sleeper services will run from Paris to Berlin next year | Rail travel | The Guardian
#NightTrains
https://www.theguardian.com/travel/2025/nov/12/new-european-sleeper-service-berlin-vienna (#TrackingCookieAlert ) -
I just signed the campaign: Sauvons les trains de nuit Paris – Berlin et Paris – Vienne !
Save the night trains Berlin-Paris & Paris-Vienna !For slow, lower carbon travel, it would be great if you could also add your name to this important issue. Every name that is added builds momentum around the campaign and makes it more likely for us to get the change we want to see.
Will you join me by taking action on this campaign?
https://agir.greenvoice.fr/petitions/sauvons-les-trains-de-nuit-paris-berlin-et-paris-vienne
#Rail #NightTrains #SlowTravel -
2/3 More of 66 Parallel Trail:
-sound walls are tall, bike for scale
-raised 2-way flexpost protected bike lane & bus stop near Vienna Metro
-poor design: no sensor, no bike signal, just “use ped signal” requires sidewalk button push
-trail terminus near Dunn Loring Metro
#bikeVA #BikeTooter -
This is the cover of the #WomenInTechBook! "It's Never Just You" – a #nonfiction, part-#memoir book on how women come into tech jobs and what makes them stay. Hope, you like it. =)
The #Kickstarter prelaunch page is up. Hop on over and klick the button to get notified when the campaign launches.
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Prepared for War, Focused on Strategy: India After Operation Sindoor
Operation Sindoor was launched as I was finishing this piece, arguing against the case for war. I had to start all over again this morning. And this is the kind of rework that makes me the happiest.
At precisely 01:15 hours on the morning of May 07, India’s tri-services led precision strikes hit nine identified terrorist launchpads across the LoC. These were not speculative targets. They were terror hideouts and camps, carefully selected based on intelligence inputs, surveillance data, and satellite confirmation. The surgical nature of the strike matters, but so does the symbolism.
The name pays tribute to the 26 women widowed in the Pahalgam terror attack of April 22, a religiously motivated act of brutality that took the lives of their husbands. Only Prime Minister Narendra Modi could have named a mission with such deep meaning and purpose. It wasn’t Operation Revenge. It wasn’t Operation Vengeance. It was Operation Sindoor, a mark of dignity, love, and quiet strength.
Now that these precision strikes have been executed with purpose and clarity, the real question is: What next?
A salute to restraint, not weakness
Let me say this upfront: I am impressed beyond measure by the composure and tactical brilliance of the Narendra Modi-led government. In a nation as emotionally charged as ours, not responding to public sentiment with boots and bombs takes immense courage. India’s decision to hold fire, despite having both the capability and the political will, was not about fear. It was about foresight.
Choosing not to go to war with a collapsing, cornered neighbor is not a weakness. It’s wisdom. Let’s not forget that Pakistan today is not a rival with parity. It is a state gasping for economic oxygen, politically unstable, diplomatically isolated, and dangerously desperate.
Measured retaliation, not escalation
Let’s begin with what this operation tells us. Despite the sheer magnitude of national anger, hawkish media debates, and roaring calls for full-blown retaliation, the government did not target Pakistani military establishments. It did not initiate a cross-border escalation beyond tactical bounds.
Instead, India hit only what it had to: terrorist infrastructure, not sovereign command. That distinction is not accidental. It is intentional and extremely telling.
The message to Pakistan is loud but nuanced: We’re capable, we’re watching, and we will act, but we still don’t want war.
Not because we can’t. But because we shouldn’t.
Make no mistake, India has the political will, public support, and military capacity to launch a full-scale war. But a strong nation is not one that fights every time it can. It’s one that knows when not to.
War with Pakistan at this moment would be giving a collapsing neighbor what it desperately wants, an excuse to reframe its economic failure as patriotic resistance, and its international isolation as victimhood.
Pakistan’s economy is in ruins:
- External debt: $131+ billion (World Bank, 2024)
- Forex reserves: Below $15 billion
- Inflation: Above 23%
- IMF bailout conditions are barely met; another default looming.
A war now would allow Pakistan to seek debt waivers from the IMF, World Bank, and allies like China and Saudi Arabia, arguing “force majeure.” It would divert attention from their governance collapse and let them play the perennial card: Kashmir + victimhood.
As former diplomat and strategic analyst Shivshankar Menon once noted, “Desperate states don’t fight rationally. They fight like they have nothing to lose. That’s when things get dangerous.”
Here are 5 good reasons India should not go to war with the rogue state of Pakistan
1. The beggar state’s bait: War as economic escape
Pakistan owes over $131 billion in external debt (World Bank, 2024). Its foreign exchange reserves hover around $9–15 billion, barely enough to cover two months of imports. Inflation is above 23%, and the country is teetering on social unrest. And yet, there’s a perverse incentive to provoke war.
A war gives Pakistan the perfect alibi to plead with the World Bank, IMF, and bilateral lenders to waive or reschedule its debt repayments. In diplomatic circles, there’s already chatter that Pakistan could request “debt relief due to regional conflict.” It’s a trap, one designed to cloak failure under conflict.
Going to war would unwittingly play into that narrative.
2. Military prowess is not the question, nuclear desperation is
India’s defense forces are robust, modernized, and battle-ready. Pakistan’s military, on the other hand, is overstretched and reliant on outdated hardware, external funding, and Chinese hand-me-downs. Militarily, the match is uneven. But this is exactly what makes the situation volatile and dangerous.
A cornered enemy is unpredictable. Pakistan’s nuclear doctrine allows for first use in case of a perceived existential threat. Multiple international analysts, including Vipin Narang (MIT) and Michael Krepon (Stimson Center), have warned that Pakistan may lower its nuclear threshold in desperation.
In blunt terms, they might press the red button not because they hope to win, but because they’ve already lost everything else.
3. A war India cannot afford, not in rupees but in momentum
Let’s do some arithmetic. During the Kargil War in 1999, India spent nearly ₹5,000 crore ($1.2 billion) over two months. Today, a sustained war would drain upwards of ₹25,000 crore ($3–5 billion) per month, given inflation and modern warfare costs. Add the cost of rebuilding infrastructure, displacement, and global investor nervousness, and we’re staring at a 10-year economic setback.
According to S&P and Morgan Stanley, India is poised to become the third-largest economy by 2027. A war with Pakistan would throw that trajectory into chaos, delay key infrastructure and welfare initiatives, and dampen investor confidence.
Why should a fast-moving train care to halt to kick a collapsing donkey-driven cart?
4. Tactical, not emotional: The smarter path to pressure
War is not the only language of retaliation. India has already begun a silent siege, tactically precise and diplomatically sound. Here’s what this playbook includes:
- Suspending the Indus Waters Treaty (IWT): While India has maintained the moral high ground by adhering to the IWT even during the wars of 1965 and 1971, under the Vienna Convention, it did not hesitate to hold it in abeyance now. The reallocation of water would disrupt Pakistan’s already fragile agricultural base.
- Diplomatic isolation: India has mobilized allies across the UN, G20, and OIC to present fresh dossiers on Pakistan’s terror funding, training camps, and role in cross-border militancy. Even traditional backers like the UAE are more muted in support.
- Trade cancellation: India already revoked Pakistan’s MFN status in 2019, reducing bilateral trade to a trickle. Now, further trade embargoes in pharmaceuticals, electronics, and fertilizers are on the table.
- Airspace closure: A repeat of the 2019 strategy, where India barred its airspace to Pakistani carriers, would cost Pakistan millions a month. According to Dawn, PIA’s previous losses due to Indian airspace restrictions exceeded PKR 500 million in just 3 months.
- Port and transit route restrictions: Karachi Port is already choking. India could push for blockade-level economic isolation, including influencing friendly naval allies to reconsider maritime permissions.
- LoC abeyance: Now that the LoC is in abeyance, India is free to selectively retaliate on key launchpads and smuggling corridors, not all-out war, but high-impact precision response.
- Targeted sanctions: India can lead the effort to impose travel bans, asset freezes, and defense restrictions on key Pakistani political and military figures, especially those with offshore holdings.
- Digital bans: India can block and ban all social media channels and handles of Pakistani citizens and media in India.
- Leveraging Balochistan to Pakistan on the tetherhooks: For decades, the Baloch have accused Pakistan’s establishment of genocide, disappearances, and cultural erasure. A 2023 report by the UNPO and Human Rights Council of Balochistan documented over 1,300 enforced disappearances in just one year. India need not (and should not) militarize Balochistan. But strategic engagement with Baloch activists, amplifying their human rights demands in global forums, and media visibility of Pakistani oppression in Balochistan can keep Islamabad perennially uneasy. This creates pressure without conflict. It disrupts their internal stability. And it balances the Kashmir narrative with Pakistan’s own darkest secret. In short: What Kashmir is to Pakistan emotionally, Balochistan is to Pakistan existentially.
This is not pacifism. This is modern-day warfare, just by other means.
5. Global optics: The China and Muslim bloc variable
While India enjoys deep strategic relations with the US, France, Japan, and Australia, a war could alter equations, especially if Pakistan spins the conflict into a religious narrative. And knowing Pakistan, it will.
Countries like Turkey, Malaysia, and Azerbaijan have already signaled moral support to Pakistan. China, too, has reiterated its “unwavering support” for Pakistan amid rising tensions.
Worse, a war gives China a pretext to stoke tension in Eastern Ladakh or Arunachal, forcing India into a two-front war, a scenario no strategist desires.
India must keep the moral upper hand. Because in global diplomacy, perception often precedes truth.
Now what? War isn’t our goal. But if it must be, we’re more than ready.
India didn’t take the bait. India responded like a nation aware of its stature and its goals.
We are not a weak nation choosing inaction. We are a strong nation choosing strategy.
With Operation Sindoor now public, we must brace for Pakistan’s next move. It may retaliate with proxy terror. It may resort to LoC shelling. It may just barge into our territory with their fighters. It may press the nuke. Or it may raise the diplomatic pitch at the UN. Or it may choose to be act wise, and lick their wounds in private. Anything is possible.
But now, the burden of escalation lies with Pakistan. India has done what it needed to: precise, proportionate, and public.
India has nothing to establish by bombing bunkers and waving flags on burning borders. Our soldiers remain ever-ready. Our arsenal is loaded. But our brains are sharper. We know that war with a poor, isolated, nuclear-armed beggar-state is not a badge of honor. It’s a drain. On resources. On time. On progress.
Sources
- Economic Times (2025): Can Pakistan fight India on borrowed money
- World Bank (2024): Pakistan Economic Update
- Stimson Center: Krepon, Narang on South Asia Nuclear Risk
- UNPO & HRCB Reports (2023): Human rights in Balochistan
- MEA Briefing (2025): Official statement on Operation Sindoor
- Shivshankar Menon, Choices: Inside the Making of Indian Foreign Policy
#BalochistanIssue #crossBorderTerrorism #history #india #IndiaDefenseNews #IndiaDefensePolicy #IndiaMilitaryResponse #IndiaNationalSecurity #IndiaPakistanBorderTension #IndiaPakistanConflict #IndiaPakistanLatestUpdates #IndiaRetaliationPolicy #IndiaVsPakistan2025 #IndiaVsPakistanEscalation #IndiaSMilitaryDoctrine #IndiaSWarReadiness #IndianAirForceStrikes #IndianAirStrikes2025 #IndianForeignPolicy2025 #IndianGovernmentResponse #IndoPakTensions #ModiForeignPolicy #ModiGovernmentResponse #NarendraModiStrategy #news #nuclearThreatSouthAsia #OperationSindoor #OperationSindoorAnalysis #pakistan #PakistanEconomicCrisis #PhalgamTerrorAttack #politics #precisionStrikesIndia #SouthAsiaDiplomacy #SouthAsiaGeopolitics #strategicRestraintIndia #surgicalStrikesIndia #warPreparednessIndia
-
Prepared for War, Focused on Strategy: India After Operation Sindoor
Operation Sindoor was launched as I was finishing this piece, arguing against the case for war. I had to start all over again this morning. And this is the kind of rework that makes me the happiest.
At precisely 01:15 hours on the morning of May 07, India’s tri-services led precision strikes hit nine identified terrorist launchpads across the LoC. These were not speculative targets. They were terror hideouts and camps, carefully selected based on intelligence inputs, surveillance data, and satellite confirmation. The surgical nature of the strike matters, but so does the symbolism.
The name pays tribute to the 26 women widowed in the Pahalgam terror attack of April 22, a religiously motivated act of brutality that took the lives of their husbands. Only Prime Minister Narendra Modi could have named a mission with such deep meaning and purpose. It wasn’t Operation Revenge. It wasn’t Operation Vengeance. It was Operation Sindoor, a mark of dignity, love, and quiet strength.
Now that these precision strikes have been executed with purpose and clarity, the real question is: What next?
A salute to restraint, not weakness
Let me say this upfront: I am impressed beyond measure by the composure and tactical brilliance of the Narendra Modi-led government. In a nation as emotionally charged as ours, not responding to public sentiment with boots and bombs takes immense courage. India’s decision to hold fire, despite having both the capability and the political will, was not about fear. It was about foresight.
Choosing not to go to war with a collapsing, cornered neighbor is not a weakness. It’s wisdom. Let’s not forget that Pakistan today is not a rival with parity. It is a state gasping for economic oxygen, politically unstable, diplomatically isolated, and dangerously desperate.
Measured retaliation, not escalation
Let’s begin with what this operation tells us. Despite the sheer magnitude of national anger, hawkish media debates, and roaring calls for full-blown retaliation, the government did not target Pakistani military establishments. It did not initiate a cross-border escalation beyond tactical bounds.
Instead, India hit only what it had to: terrorist infrastructure, not sovereign command. That distinction is not accidental. It is intentional and extremely telling.
The message to Pakistan is loud but nuanced: We’re capable, we’re watching, and we will act, but we still don’t want war.
Not because we can’t. But because we shouldn’t.
Make no mistake, India has the political will, public support, and military capacity to launch a full-scale war. But a strong nation is not one that fights every time it can. It’s one that knows when not to.
War with Pakistan at this moment would be giving a collapsing neighbor what it desperately wants, an excuse to reframe its economic failure as patriotic resistance, and its international isolation as victimhood.
Pakistan’s economy is in ruins:
- External debt: $131+ billion (World Bank, 2024)
- Forex reserves: Below $15 billion
- Inflation: Above 23%
- IMF bailout conditions are barely met; another default looming.
A war now would allow Pakistan to seek debt waivers from the IMF, World Bank, and allies like China and Saudi Arabia, arguing “force majeure.” It would divert attention from their governance collapse and let them play the perennial card: Kashmir + victimhood.
As former diplomat and strategic analyst Shivshankar Menon once noted, “Desperate states don’t fight rationally. They fight like they have nothing to lose. That’s when things get dangerous.”
Here are 5 good reasons India should not go to war with the rogue state of Pakistan
1. The beggar state’s bait: War as economic escape
Pakistan owes over $131 billion in external debt (World Bank, 2024). Its foreign exchange reserves hover around $9–15 billion, barely enough to cover two months of imports. Inflation is above 23%, and the country is teetering on social unrest. And yet, there’s a perverse incentive to provoke war.
A war gives Pakistan the perfect alibi to plead with the World Bank, IMF, and bilateral lenders to waive or reschedule its debt repayments. In diplomatic circles, there’s already chatter that Pakistan could request “debt relief due to regional conflict.” It’s a trap, one designed to cloak failure under conflict.
Going to war would unwittingly play into that narrative.
2. Military prowess is not the question, nuclear desperation is
India’s defense forces are robust, modernized, and battle-ready. Pakistan’s military, on the other hand, is overstretched and reliant on outdated hardware, external funding, and Chinese hand-me-downs. Militarily, the match is uneven. But this is exactly what makes the situation volatile and dangerous.
A cornered enemy is unpredictable. Pakistan’s nuclear doctrine allows for first use in case of a perceived existential threat. Multiple international analysts, including Vipin Narang (MIT) and Michael Krepon (Stimson Center), have warned that Pakistan may lower its nuclear threshold in desperation.
In blunt terms, they might press the red button not because they hope to win, but because they’ve already lost everything else.
3. A war India cannot afford, not in rupees but in momentum
Let’s do some arithmetic. During the Kargil War in 1999, India spent nearly ₹5,000 crore ($1.2 billion) over two months. Today, a sustained war would drain upwards of ₹25,000 crore ($3–5 billion) per month, given inflation and modern warfare costs. Add the cost of rebuilding infrastructure, displacement, and global investor nervousness, and we’re staring at a 10-year economic setback.
According to S&P and Morgan Stanley, India is poised to become the third-largest economy by 2027. A war with Pakistan would throw that trajectory into chaos, delay key infrastructure and welfare initiatives, and dampen investor confidence.
Why should a fast-moving train care to halt to kick a collapsing donkey-driven cart?
4. Tactical, not emotional: The smarter path to pressure
War is not the only language of retaliation. India has already begun a silent siege, tactically precise and diplomatically sound. Here’s what this playbook includes:
- Suspending the Indus Waters Treaty (IWT): While India has maintained the moral high ground by adhering to the IWT even during the wars of 1965 and 1971, under the Vienna Convention, it did not hesitate to hold it in abeyance now. The reallocation of water would disrupt Pakistan’s already fragile agricultural base.
- Diplomatic isolation: India has mobilized allies across the UN, G20, and OIC to present fresh dossiers on Pakistan’s terror funding, training camps, and role in cross-border militancy. Even traditional backers like the UAE are more muted in support.
- Trade cancellation: India already revoked Pakistan’s MFN status in 2019, reducing bilateral trade to a trickle. Now, further trade embargoes in pharmaceuticals, electronics, and fertilizers are on the table.
- Airspace closure: A repeat of the 2019 strategy, where India barred its airspace to Pakistani carriers, would cost Pakistan millions a month. According to Dawn, PIA’s previous losses due to Indian airspace restrictions exceeded PKR 500 million in just 3 months.
- Port and transit route restrictions: Karachi Port is already choking. India could push for blockade-level economic isolation, including influencing friendly naval allies to reconsider maritime permissions.
- LoC abeyance: Now that the LoC is in abeyance, India is free to selectively retaliate on key launchpads and smuggling corridors, not all-out war, but high-impact precision response.
- Targeted sanctions: India can lead the effort to impose travel bans, asset freezes, and defense restrictions on key Pakistani political and military figures, especially those with offshore holdings.
- Digital bans: India can block and ban all social media channels and handles of Pakistani citizens and media in India.
- Leveraging Balochistan to Pakistan on the tetherhooks: For decades, the Baloch have accused Pakistan’s establishment of genocide, disappearances, and cultural erasure. A 2023 report by the UNPO and Human Rights Council of Balochistan documented over 1,300 enforced disappearances in just one year. India need not (and should not) militarize Balochistan. But strategic engagement with Baloch activists, amplifying their human rights demands in global forums, and media visibility of Pakistani oppression in Balochistan can keep Islamabad perennially uneasy. This creates pressure without conflict. It disrupts their internal stability. And it balances the Kashmir narrative with Pakistan’s own darkest secret. In short: What Kashmir is to Pakistan emotionally, Balochistan is to Pakistan existentially.
This is not pacifism. This is modern-day warfare, just by other means.
5. Global optics: The China and Muslim bloc variable
While India enjoys deep strategic relations with the US, France, Japan, and Australia, a war could alter equations, especially if Pakistan spins the conflict into a religious narrative. And knowing Pakistan, it will.
Countries like Turkey, Malaysia, and Azerbaijan have already signaled moral support to Pakistan. China, too, has reiterated its “unwavering support” for Pakistan amid rising tensions.
Worse, a war gives China a pretext to stoke tension in Eastern Ladakh or Arunachal, forcing India into a two-front war, a scenario no strategist desires.
India must keep the moral upper hand. Because in global diplomacy, perception often precedes truth.
Now what? War isn’t our goal. But if it must be, we’re more than ready.
India didn’t take the bait. India responded like a nation aware of its stature and its goals.
We are not a weak nation choosing inaction. We are a strong nation choosing strategy.
With Operation Sindoor now public, we must brace for Pakistan’s next move. It may retaliate with proxy terror. It may resort to LoC shelling. It may just barge into our territory with their fighters. It may press the nuke. Or it may raise the diplomatic pitch at the UN. Or it may choose to be act wise, and lick their wounds in private. Anything is possible.
But now, the burden of escalation lies with Pakistan. India has done what it needed to: precise, proportionate, and public.
India has nothing to establish by bombing bunkers and waving flags on burning borders. Our soldiers remain ever-ready. Our arsenal is loaded. But our brains are sharper. We know that war with a poor, isolated, nuclear-armed beggar-state is not a badge of honor. It’s a drain. On resources. On time. On progress.
Sources
- Economic Times (2025): Can Pakistan fight India on borrowed money
- World Bank (2024): Pakistan Economic Update
- Stimson Center: Krepon, Narang on South Asia Nuclear Risk
- UNPO & HRCB Reports (2023): Human rights in Balochistan
- MEA Briefing (2025): Official statement on Operation Sindoor
- Shivshankar Menon, Choices: Inside the Making of Indian Foreign Policy
#BalochistanIssue #crossBorderTerrorism #history #india #IndiaDefenseNews #IndiaDefensePolicy #IndiaMilitaryResponse #IndiaNationalSecurity #IndiaPakistanBorderTension #IndiaPakistanConflict #IndiaPakistanLatestUpdates #IndiaRetaliationPolicy #IndiaVsPakistan2025 #IndiaVsPakistanEscalation #IndiaSMilitaryDoctrine #IndiaSWarReadiness #IndianAirForceStrikes #IndianAirStrikes2025 #IndianForeignPolicy2025 #IndianGovernmentResponse #IndoPakTensions #ModiForeignPolicy #ModiGovernmentResponse #NarendraModiStrategy #news #nuclearThreatSouthAsia #OperationSindoor #OperationSindoorAnalysis #pakistan #PakistanEconomicCrisis #PhalgamTerrorAttack #politics #precisionStrikesIndia #SouthAsiaDiplomacy #SouthAsiaGeopolitics #strategicRestraintIndia #surgicalStrikesIndia #warPreparednessIndia
-
Prepared for War, Focused on Strategy: India After Operation Sindoor
Operation Sindoor was launched as I was finishing this piece, arguing against the case for war. I had to start all over again this morning. And this is the kind of rework that makes me the happiest.
At precisely 01:15 hours on the morning of May 07, India’s tri-services led precision strikes hit nine identified terrorist launchpads across the LoC. These were not speculative targets. They were terror hideouts and camps, carefully selected based on intelligence inputs, surveillance data, and satellite confirmation. The surgical nature of the strike matters, but so does the symbolism.
The name pays tribute to the 26 women widowed in the Pahalgam terror attack of April 22, a religiously motivated act of brutality that took the lives of their husbands. Only Prime Minister Narendra Modi could have named a mission with such deep meaning and purpose. It wasn’t Operation Revenge. It wasn’t Operation Vengeance. It was Operation Sindoor, a mark of dignity, love, and quiet strength.
Now that these precision strikes have been executed with purpose and clarity, the real question is: What next?
A salute to restraint, not weakness
Let me say this upfront: I am impressed beyond measure by the composure and tactical brilliance of the Narendra Modi-led government. In a nation as emotionally charged as ours, not responding to public sentiment with boots and bombs takes immense courage. India’s decision to hold fire, despite having both the capability and the political will, was not about fear. It was about foresight.
Choosing not to go to war with a collapsing, cornered neighbor is not a weakness. It’s wisdom. Let’s not forget that Pakistan today is not a rival with parity. It is a state gasping for economic oxygen, politically unstable, diplomatically isolated, and dangerously desperate.
Measured retaliation, not escalation
Let’s begin with what this operation tells us. Despite the sheer magnitude of national anger, hawkish media debates, and roaring calls for full-blown retaliation, the government did not target Pakistani military establishments. It did not initiate a cross-border escalation beyond tactical bounds.
Instead, India hit only what it had to: terrorist infrastructure, not sovereign command. That distinction is not accidental. It is intentional and extremely telling.
The message to Pakistan is loud but nuanced: We’re capable, we’re watching, and we will act, but we still don’t want war.
Not because we can’t. But because we shouldn’t.
Make no mistake, India has the political will, public support, and military capacity to launch a full-scale war. But a strong nation is not one that fights every time it can. It’s one that knows when not to.
War with Pakistan at this moment would be giving a collapsing neighbor what it desperately wants, an excuse to reframe its economic failure as patriotic resistance, and its international isolation as victimhood.
Pakistan’s economy is in ruins:
- External debt: $131+ billion (World Bank, 2024)
- Forex reserves: Below $15 billion
- Inflation: Above 23%
- IMF bailout conditions are barely met; another default looming.
A war now would allow Pakistan to seek debt waivers from the IMF, World Bank, and allies like China and Saudi Arabia, arguing “force majeure.” It would divert attention from their governance collapse and let them play the perennial card: Kashmir + victimhood.
As former diplomat and strategic analyst Shivshankar Menon once noted, “Desperate states don’t fight rationally. They fight like they have nothing to lose. That’s when things get dangerous.”
Here are 5 good reasons India should not go to war with the rogue state of Pakistan
1. The beggar state’s bait: War as economic escape
Pakistan owes over $131 billion in external debt (World Bank, 2024). Its foreign exchange reserves hover around $9–15 billion, barely enough to cover two months of imports. Inflation is above 23%, and the country is teetering on social unrest. And yet, there’s a perverse incentive to provoke war.
A war gives Pakistan the perfect alibi to plead with the World Bank, IMF, and bilateral lenders to waive or reschedule its debt repayments. In diplomatic circles, there’s already chatter that Pakistan could request “debt relief due to regional conflict.” It’s a trap, one designed to cloak failure under conflict.
Going to war would unwittingly play into that narrative.
2. Military prowess is not the question, nuclear desperation is
India’s defense forces are robust, modernized, and battle-ready. Pakistan’s military, on the other hand, is overstretched and reliant on outdated hardware, external funding, and Chinese hand-me-downs. Militarily, the match is uneven. But this is exactly what makes the situation volatile and dangerous.
A cornered enemy is unpredictable. Pakistan’s nuclear doctrine allows for first use in case of a perceived existential threat. Multiple international analysts, including Vipin Narang (MIT) and Michael Krepon (Stimson Center), have warned that Pakistan may lower its nuclear threshold in desperation.
In blunt terms, they might press the red button not because they hope to win, but because they’ve already lost everything else.
3. A war India cannot afford, not in rupees but in momentum
Let’s do some arithmetic. During the Kargil War in 1999, India spent nearly ₹5,000 crore ($1.2 billion) over two months. Today, a sustained war would drain upwards of ₹25,000 crore ($3–5 billion) per month, given inflation and modern warfare costs. Add the cost of rebuilding infrastructure, displacement, and global investor nervousness, and we’re staring at a 10-year economic setback.
According to S&P and Morgan Stanley, India is poised to become the third-largest economy by 2027. A war with Pakistan would throw that trajectory into chaos, delay key infrastructure and welfare initiatives, and dampen investor confidence.
Why should a fast-moving train care to halt to kick a collapsing donkey-driven cart?
4. Tactical, not emotional: The smarter path to pressure
War is not the only language of retaliation. India has already begun a silent siege, tactically precise and diplomatically sound. Here’s what this playbook includes:
- Suspending the Indus Waters Treaty (IWT): While India has maintained the moral high ground by adhering to the IWT even during the wars of 1965 and 1971, under the Vienna Convention, it did not hesitate to hold it in abeyance now. The reallocation of water would disrupt Pakistan’s already fragile agricultural base.
- Diplomatic isolation: India has mobilized allies across the UN, G20, and OIC to present fresh dossiers on Pakistan’s terror funding, training camps, and role in cross-border militancy. Even traditional backers like the UAE are more muted in support.
- Trade cancellation: India already revoked Pakistan’s MFN status in 2019, reducing bilateral trade to a trickle. Now, further trade embargoes in pharmaceuticals, electronics, and fertilizers are on the table.
- Airspace closure: A repeat of the 2019 strategy, where India barred its airspace to Pakistani carriers, would cost Pakistan millions a month. According to Dawn, PIA’s previous losses due to Indian airspace restrictions exceeded PKR 500 million in just 3 months.
- Port and transit route restrictions: Karachi Port is already choking. India could push for blockade-level economic isolation, including influencing friendly naval allies to reconsider maritime permissions.
- LoC abeyance: Now that the LoC is in abeyance, India is free to selectively retaliate on key launchpads and smuggling corridors, not all-out war, but high-impact precision response.
- Targeted sanctions: India can lead the effort to impose travel bans, asset freezes, and defense restrictions on key Pakistani political and military figures, especially those with offshore holdings.
- Digital bans: India can block and ban all social media channels and handles of Pakistani citizens and media in India.
- Leveraging Balochistan to Pakistan on the tetherhooks: For decades, the Baloch have accused Pakistan’s establishment of genocide, disappearances, and cultural erasure. A 2023 report by the UNPO and Human Rights Council of Balochistan documented over 1,300 enforced disappearances in just one year. India need not (and should not) militarize Balochistan. But strategic engagement with Baloch activists, amplifying their human rights demands in global forums, and media visibility of Pakistani oppression in Balochistan can keep Islamabad perennially uneasy. This creates pressure without conflict. It disrupts their internal stability. And it balances the Kashmir narrative with Pakistan’s own darkest secret. In short: What Kashmir is to Pakistan emotionally, Balochistan is to Pakistan existentially.
This is not pacifism. This is modern-day warfare, just by other means.
5. Global optics: The China and Muslim bloc variable
While India enjoys deep strategic relations with the US, France, Japan, and Australia, a war could alter equations, especially if Pakistan spins the conflict into a religious narrative. And knowing Pakistan, it will.
Countries like Turkey, Malaysia, and Azerbaijan have already signaled moral support to Pakistan. China, too, has reiterated its “unwavering support” for Pakistan amid rising tensions.
Worse, a war gives China a pretext to stoke tension in Eastern Ladakh or Arunachal, forcing India into a two-front war, a scenario no strategist desires.
India must keep the moral upper hand. Because in global diplomacy, perception often precedes truth.
Now what? War isn’t our goal. But if it must be, we’re more than ready.
India didn’t take the bait. India responded like a nation aware of its stature and its goals.
We are not a weak nation choosing inaction. We are a strong nation choosing strategy.
With Operation Sindoor now public, we must brace for Pakistan’s next move. It may retaliate with proxy terror. It may resort to LoC shelling. It may just barge into our territory with their fighters. It may press the nuke. Or it may raise the diplomatic pitch at the UN. Or it may choose to be act wise, and lick their wounds in private. Anything is possible.
But now, the burden of escalation lies with Pakistan. India has done what it needed to: precise, proportionate, and public.
India has nothing to establish by bombing bunkers and waving flags on burning borders. Our soldiers remain ever-ready. Our arsenal is loaded. But our brains are sharper. We know that war with a poor, isolated, nuclear-armed beggar-state is not a badge of honor. It’s a drain. On resources. On time. On progress.
Sources
- Economic Times (2025): Can Pakistan fight India on borrowed money
- World Bank (2024): Pakistan Economic Update
- Stimson Center: Krepon, Narang on South Asia Nuclear Risk
- UNPO & HRCB Reports (2023): Human rights in Balochistan
- MEA Briefing (2025): Official statement on Operation Sindoor
- Shivshankar Menon, Choices: Inside the Making of Indian Foreign Policy
#BalochistanIssue #crossBorderTerrorism #history #india #IndiaDefenseNews #IndiaDefensePolicy #IndiaMilitaryResponse #IndiaNationalSecurity #IndiaPakistanBorderTension #IndiaPakistanConflict #IndiaPakistanLatestUpdates #IndiaRetaliationPolicy #IndiaVsPakistan2025 #IndiaVsPakistanEscalation #IndiaSMilitaryDoctrine #IndiaSWarReadiness #IndianAirForceStrikes #IndianAirStrikes2025 #IndianForeignPolicy2025 #IndianGovernmentResponse #IndoPakTensions #ModiForeignPolicy #ModiGovernmentResponse #NarendraModiStrategy #news #nuclearThreatSouthAsia #OperationSindoor #OperationSindoorAnalysis #pakistan #PakistanEconomicCrisis #PhalgamTerrorAttack #politics #precisionStrikesIndia #SouthAsiaDiplomacy #SouthAsiaGeopolitics #strategicRestraintIndia #surgicalStrikesIndia #warPreparednessIndia
-
Prepared for War, Focused on Strategy: India After Operation Sindoor
Operation Sindoor was launched as I was finishing this piece, arguing against the case for war. I had to start all over again this morning. And this is the kind of rework that makes me the happiest.
At precisely 01:40 hours on the morning of May 07, India’s tri-services led precision strikes hit nine identified terrorist launchpads across the LoC. These were not speculative targets. They were terror hideouts and camps, carefully selected based on intelligence inputs, surveillance data, and satellite confirmation. The surgical nature of the strike matters, but so does the symbolism.
The name “Operation Sindoor” pays a befitting tribute to the 26 women widowed in the Pahalgam terror attack of April 22, a religiously motivated act of brutality by Pakistan, that took the lives of their husbands. Only Prime Minister Narendra Modi could have named a mission with such deep meaning and purpose. It wasn’t Operation Revenge. It wasn’t Operation Vengeance. It was Operation Sindoor, a mark of dignity, love, and quiet strength.
Now that these precision strikes have been executed with purpose and clarity, the real question is: What next?
A salute to restraint, not weakness
Let me say this upfront: I am impressed beyond measure by the composure and tactical brilliance of the Narendra Modi-led government. In a nation as emotionally charged as ours, not responding to public sentiment with boots and bombs takes immense courage. India’s decision to hold fire, despite having both the capability and the political will, was not about fear. It was about foresight.
Choosing not to go to war with a collapsing, cornered neighbor is not a weakness. It’s wisdom. Let’s not forget that Pakistan today is not a rival with parity. It is a state gasping for economic oxygen, politically unstable, diplomatically isolated, and dangerously desperate.
As former diplomat and strategic analyst Shivshankar Menon once noted, “Desperate states don’t fight rationally. They fight like they have nothing to lose. That’s when things get dangerous.”
Measured retaliation, not escalation
Let’s begin with what this operation tells us. Despite the sheer magnitude of national anger, hawkish media debates, and roaring calls for full-blown retaliation, the government did not target Pakistani military establishments. It did not initiate a cross-border escalation beyond tactical bounds.
Instead, India hit only what it had to: terrorist infrastructure, not sovereign command. That distinction is not accidental. It is intentional and extremely telling.
The message to Pakistan is loud but nuanced: We’re capable, we’re watching, and we will act, but we still don’t want war.
Not because we can’t. But because we shouldn’t.
Make no mistake, India has the political will, public support, and military capacity to launch a full-scale war. But a strong nation is not one that fights every time it can. It’s one that knows when not to.
War with Pakistan at this moment would be giving a collapsing neighbor what it desperately wants, an excuse to reframe its economic failure as patriotic resistance, and its international isolation as victimhood.
Pakistan’s economy is in ruins:
- External debt: $131+ billion (World Bank, 2024)
- Forex reserves: Below $15 billion
- Inflation: Above 23%
- IMF bailout conditions are barely met; another default looming.
A war now would allow Pakistan to seek debt waivers from the IMF, World Bank, and allies like China and Saudi Arabia, arguing “force majeure.” It would divert attention from their governance collapse and let them play the perennial card: Kashmir + victimhood.
Here are 5 good reasons India should not go to war with the rogue state of Pakistan
1. The beggar state’s bait: War as economic escape
Pakistan owes over $131 billion in external debt (World Bank, 2024). Its foreign exchange reserves hover around $9–15 billion, barely enough to cover two months of imports. Inflation is above 23%, and the country is teetering on social unrest. And yet, there’s a perverse incentive to provoke war.
A war gives Pakistan the perfect alibi to plead with the World Bank, IMF, and bilateral lenders to waive or reschedule its debt repayments. In diplomatic circles, there’s already chatter that Pakistan could request “debt relief due to regional conflict.” It’s a trap, one designed to cloak failure under conflict.
Going to war would unwittingly play into that narrative.
2. Military prowess is not the question, nuclear desperation is
India’s defense forces are robust, modernized, and battle-ready. Pakistan’s military, on the other hand, is overstretched and reliant on outdated hardware, external funding, and Chinese hand-me-downs. Militarily, the match is uneven. But this is exactly what makes the situation volatile and dangerous.
A cornered enemy is unpredictable. Pakistan’s nuclear doctrine allows for first use in case of a perceived existential threat. Multiple international analysts, including Vipin Narang (MIT) and Michael Krepon (Stimson Center), have warned that Pakistan may lower its nuclear threshold in desperation.
In blunt terms, they might press the red button not because they hope to win, but because they’ve already lost everything else.
3. A war India cannot afford, not in rupees but in momentum
Let’s do some arithmetic. During the Kargil War in 1999, India spent nearly ₹5,000 crore ($1.2 billion) over two months. Today, a sustained war would drain upwards of ₹25,000 crore ($3–5 billion) per month, given inflation and modern warfare costs. Add the cost of rebuilding infrastructure, displacement, and global investor nervousness, and we’re staring at a 10-year economic setback.
According to S&P and Morgan Stanley, India is poised to become the third-largest economy by 2027. A war with Pakistan would throw that trajectory into chaos, delay key infrastructure and welfare initiatives, and dampen investor confidence.
Why should a fast-moving train care to halt to kick a collapsing donkey-driven cart?
4. Tactical, not emotional: The smarter path to pressure
War is not the only language of retaliation. India has already begun a silent siege, tactically precise and diplomatically sound. Here’s what this playbook includes:
- Suspending the Indus Waters Treaty (IWT): While India has maintained the moral high ground by adhering to the IWT even during the wars of 1965 and 1971, under the Vienna Convention, it did not hesitate to hold it in abeyance now. The reallocation of water would disrupt Pakistan’s already fragile agricultural base.
- Diplomatic isolation: India has mobilized allies across the UN, G20, and OIC to present fresh dossiers on Pakistan’s terror funding, training camps, and role in cross-border militancy. Even traditional backers like the UAE are more muted in support.
- Trade cancellation: India already revoked Pakistan’s MFN status in 2019, reducing bilateral trade to a trickle. Now, further trade embargoes in pharmaceuticals, electronics, and fertilizers are on the table.
- Airspace closure: A repeat of the 2019 strategy, where India barred its airspace to Pakistani carriers, would cost Pakistan millions a month. According to Dawn, PIA’s previous losses due to Indian airspace restrictions exceeded PKR 500 million in just 3 months.
- Port and transit route restrictions: Karachi Port is already choking. India could push for blockade-level economic isolation, including influencing friendly naval allies to reconsider maritime permissions.
- LoC abeyance: Now that the LoC is in abeyance, India is free to selectively retaliate on key launchpads and smuggling corridors, not all-out war, but high-impact precision response.
- Targeted sanctions: India can lead the effort to impose travel bans, asset freezes, and defense restrictions on key Pakistani political and military figures, especially those with offshore holdings.
- Digital bans: India can block and ban all social media channels and handles of Pakistani citizens and media in India.
- Leveraging Balochistan to keep Pakistan on the tetherhooks: For decades, the Baloch have accused Pakistan’s establishment of genocide, disappearances, and cultural erasure. A 2023 report by the UNPO and Human Rights Council of Balochistan documented over 1,300 enforced disappearances in just one year. India need not (and should not) militarize Balochistan. But strategic engagement with Baloch activists, amplifying their human rights demands in global forums, and media visibility of Pakistani oppression in Balochistan can keep Islamabad perennially uneasy. This creates pressure without conflict. It disrupts their internal stability. And it balances the Kashmir narrative with Pakistan’s own darkest secret. In short: What Kashmir is to Pakistan emotionally, Balochistan is to Pakistan existentially.
This is not pacifism. This is modern-day warfare, just by other means.
5. Global optics: The China and Muslim bloc variable
While India enjoys deep strategic relations with the US, France, Japan, and Australia, a war could alter equations, especially if Pakistan spins the conflict into a religious narrative. And knowing Pakistan, it will.
Countries like Turkey, Malaysia, and Azerbaijan have already signaled moral support to Pakistan. China, too, has reiterated its “unwavering support” for Pakistan amid rising tensions.
Worse, a war gives China a pretext to stoke tension in Eastern Ladakh or Arunachal, forcing India into a two-front war, a scenario no strategist desires.
India must keep the moral upper hand. Because in global diplomacy, perception often precedes truth.
Now what? War isn’t our goal. But if it must be, we’re more than ready.
India didn’t take the bait. India responded like a nation aware of its stature and its goals.
We are not a weak nation choosing inaction. We are a strong nation choosing strategy.
With Operation Sindoor now public, we must brace for Pakistan’s next move. It may retaliate with proxy terror. It may resort to LoC shelling. It may just barge into our territory with their fighters. It may press the nuke. Or it may raise the diplomatic pitch at the UN. Or it may choose to be act wise, and lick their wounds in private. Anything is possible.
But now, the burden of escalation lies with Pakistan. India has done what it needed to: precise, proportionate, and public.
India has nothing to establish by bombing bunkers and waving flags on burning borders. Our soldiers remain ever-ready. Our arsenal is loaded. But our brains are sharper. We know that war with a poor, isolated, nuclear-armed beggar-state is not a badge of honor. It’s a drain. On resources. On time. On progress.
Sources
- Economic Times (2025): Can Pakistan fight India on borrowed money
- World Bank (2024): Pakistan Economic Update
- Stimson Center: Krepon, Narang on South Asia Nuclear Risk
- UNPO & HRCB Reports (2023): Human rights in Balochistan
- MEA Briefing (2025): Official statement on Operation Sindoor
- Shivshankar Menon, Choices: Inside the Making of Indian Foreign Policy
#BalochistanIssue #crossBorderTerrorism #history #india #IndiaDefenseNews #IndiaDefensePolicy #IndiaMilitaryResponse #IndiaNationalSecurity #IndiaPakistanBorderTension #IndiaPakistanConflict #IndiaPakistanLatestUpdates #IndiaRetaliationPolicy #IndiaVsPakistan2025 #IndiaVsPakistanEscalation #IndiaSMilitaryDoctrine #IndiaSWarReadiness #IndianAirForceStrikes #IndianAirStrikes2025 #IndianForeignPolicy2025 #IndianGovernmentResponse #IndoPakTensions #ModiForeignPolicy #ModiGovernmentResponse #NarendraModiStrategy #news #nuclearThreatSouthAsia #OperationSindoor #OperationSindoorAnalysis #pakistan #PakistanEconomicCrisis #PhalgamTerrorAttack #politics #precisionStrikesIndia #SouthAsiaDiplomacy #SouthAsiaGeopolitics #strategicRestraintIndia #surgicalStrikesIndia #warPreparednessIndia
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The thread about the irrepressible Mr Binko and his Electric Railway
My sources tell me it is was Electrification Friday and although I was saving a picture for another day it seems right to share it now. Behold! Mr Binko’s Electric Railway!
Mr Binko’s Electric Railway. © Edinburgh City LibrariesThe passengers in the car are the Prince of Wales (future King Edward VII) and his wife Princess Alexandra, Princess of Wales. Regular viewers may recognise the backdrop as Donaldson’s Hospital.
Donaldson’s Hospital. CC-BY-SA 3.0, David MonniauxIt was the setting of the First International Forestry Exhibition of 1884 – held in a grand, wooden, temporary pavilion on the Hospital’s lawns – and that was the reason for Mr Binko bringing his railway to there. When the Royal Party toured the exhibition and rode his railway on 22nd August they became the first British Royals to be moved by electric power.
The 1884 exhibition, colour oil painting © Museums & Galleries EdinburghThe carriage was named Alexandra after the Princess of Wales and was made locally by coachbuilders John Hislop & Son. The carriage was “richly upholstered in silk plush of the Royal scarlet, while the sides and roof were elegantly decorated. In the centre of the roof a brilliant prismatic lamp was placed, lit within by electricity… and by an ingenious arrangement a beautiful bouquet on the centre table was lighted up by miniature lamps on a button being pressed”. The only other time the carriage was officially used was for the visit of William Ewart Gladstone – four time Prime Minister – and a (grand) son of Leith. He is seen on the right in the car below.
William Ewart Gladstone at the Edinburgh Exbibition of 1884, photograph by John Moffat. CC-by-NC National Galleries ScotlandZooming in, we see some of the occupants seem more enthusiastic than others. Mr Binko is seen on the right of shot, he with dark hair and moustache infront of the carriage window and clutching his top hat.
Gladstone, seated in the carriage, does not look impressed! Mr Binko is on his right, holding his top hat.In the background we can make out a showbill to do with Electricity. An experimental display of electric lights was also part of the Exhibition.
This was the first electric vehicle in Edinburgh and its inventor and promoter was the splendidly named Mr Binko. Henry Bock Binko was born in Vienna in 1836, becoming a naturalised British citizen in 1881. He brought to Edinburgh a modified version of an electric locomotive that he had exhibited in London in 1882. His experiments were a few years behind Werner von Siemens who had exhibited the worlds first practical electric railway in Berlin in 1879. In 1883, Magnus Volk opened the first electric railway to the public in Britain with his Volk’s Electric Railway on the sea front in Brighton (remarkably, it’s still going!). However, as far back as 1842 the Scottish inventor Robert Davidson had trialled an electrically powered locomotive using batteries on the Edinburgh to Glasgow Railway, his Galvani could unfortunately only propel itself at walking speed and could pull no useful load. The inability to recharge its batteries rendered it completely impractical.
Volks Marine Electric Railway, CC-BY-SA Robert CuttsBinko was described as a chemist, and seems to have been a serial inventor and patentee, intent on making his fortune by licensing out his contraptions to others. His Spectrograph achieved some success, and it was advertised for a reasonable sum as a money making scheme, the idea being people could get one and then duplicate photographs for sale by using it. Binko later fell out with the licensees.
Advert for a Binko patent SpectrographThe locomotive brought to Edinburgh was called Ohm and was a rebuild of the Volta that he had exhibited in London. “The line was eventually opened as a ½ mile circular route in the grounds, the charge being 3d (three pence) for the 2.5 minute journey.” 30,000 passengers were carried by the railway during its time at the exhibition. The Railway News reported;
It has been met with extensive public patronage, besides being honoured by a journey taken by the Prince and Princess of Wales and their family and subsequently by Mr and Mrs Gladstone. The length of the line laid down at Edinburgh is about double the length of that at the Crystal Palace and traverses the length of the exhibition building on the outside twice, besides making a wide sweep for turning.
Railway News – 6th September 1884
Power came from a stationary 8hp Robey steam engine coupled to a dynamo which supplied DC electric power through the rails. Speed was changed by resistors built into the locomotive. The locomotive or “guiding car” weighed about 2 tons and that the whole train weighed 6 tons when loaded. It could pull up to 3 passenger cars, each with capacity for 10, and it was noted that each car had its own motor, so the train was what we would nowadays call a DC EMU or Direct Current Electric Multiple Unit.
All was not well for Binko and his railway however. Construction over-ran and it was not ready for the opening. When it finally got going on July 17th, technically it was a triumph but financially proved a disaster. Binko was unable to pay his creditors, having borrowed heavily to finance the scheme, and one of them seized his railway before it was even in operation. An arrangement was made with the creditor that he would lease it back off of them for £650 to work off the debt, payable over 13 weeks in instalments. However, even though he was making up to £20 a day (approximately £2,800 in 2022) off of ticket sales, he remained seriously in debt and the creditors lost patience. Well before the end of the exhibition they advertised the whole thing for sale – obviously they had decided that Binko could or would never pay them what he owed and storage costs would be too high. On 30th September the electric railway was cancelled and Binko locked out from using it any more.
Advert selling Binko’s Electric Railway, Scotsman 20th September 1884On 10th October 1884, Binko was taken to court in London and bankrupted, still owing the creditor £100. Being in Edinburgh with his railway, he did not appear in person to defend himself. The court heard that now that the exhibition had ended, Binko did not have any way to recoup any more money from it to settle his debts, but had not provided any accounts of his income from it during the exhibition. The court adjourned to give him time to prepare the accounts and to appear in person.
But that wasn’t the end for Binko in Edinburgh. The reason he hadn’t come to London to face court was that somehow he managed to convince the Edinburgh Street Tramways Company to undertake an experiment in electric traction. He somehow managed to convince his creditors to allow him the use of the steam engine, dynamo and mechanical components from the Ohm. A few hundred yards of copper strip were laid between the horse tram rails between the exhibition at Donaldson’s Hospital and Haymarket Station, the moving parts from the Ohm were bodged into a horse tram of the Street Tramways Co. and the whole lot was hooked up to the dynamo and steam engine. On 11th October 1884, with 10 passengers on board, Mr Binko’s Electric Tram became the first electric tram to run in the British Isles when it haltingly made the short journey between Donaldson’s and Haymarket. Three journeys were made, the third (and final) hauling a second horse tramcar, and then no more was heard of Henry Bock Binko or his experiments in electrical traction.
For now.
An Edinburgh Street Tramway Company horse tram of 1884 of the the sort electrified by Mr Binko © Edinburgh City LibrariesBut once again this was not the end of the irrepressible Mr Binko and his experiments in electrical traction. He resurfaced in 1886 in Great Yarmouth where he tried to start up a seaside railway, but ended up being tried for unlawfully obtaining credit while being an undeclared bankrupt – it having transpired that he was bankrupted in 1871. He was eventually acquitted, largely on the grounds of his reputation from the 1884 railway in Edinburgh being taken in evidence that his schemes were serious and practical and not just a swindle. He died in London in 1911, being recorded on censuses in the last 10 years of his life as being employed as an electrical engineer.
Electric railways returned to Edinburgh the same year at the 1886 International Exhibition of Industry, Science and Art held in the Meadows.
The 1886 pavilion of the International Exhibition on the West Meadows, a temporary building believe it or not! Peter Fletcher Riddell bequest to National Galleries ScotlandThis scheme had nothing to do with Henry Binko and seems to have been something of a collaboration, directed by the energetic architect, builder and local politician Sir James Gowans, who was the organiser of the exhibition. The scheme is described as being a line 500 yards long, with electricity supplied to a central live rail by a 7 horsepower static steam engine. An electric locomotive hauled two tram cars sent by the Northern Metropolitan Tramway Company, a double decker with 20 inside and 26 outside upstairs and an open single decker with 25 seats. It could make 10 miles per hour. The steam engine was by Marshall & Co. of Gainsborough and the rails were made to Gowans’ own design (he had engineered Edinburgh’s first horse tramway some 15 years before), being supplied complimentary from a foundry in Barrow-in-Furness. The electric equipment was provided by King, Brown & Co. of Rosebank in Edinburgh. The fare was 2d and in the course of the exhibition it carried 80,000 passengers.
Ground Plan of the 1886 Edinburgh International Exhibition, the electric railway is highlighted in yellowDespite all the engravings and photos taken at the exhibition, I have struggled to track down a good picture of the electric railway, but you can see a bit of it in the corner of the larger photo of the Exhibition pavilion. You can make out a sheeted vehicle, possibly the tram car, on the left behind the flag pole. The rails run parallel to the fence, off to the right.
Hints of the 1886 Electric Railway, Peter Fletcher Riddell bequest to National Galleries ScotlandIf you have found this useful, informative or amusing, perhaps you would like to help contribute towards the running costs of this site – including keeping it ad-free and my book-buying budget to find further stories to bring you – by supporting me on ko-fi. Or please do just share this post on social media or amongst friends.
These threads © 2017-2025, Andy Arthur.
NO AI TRAINING: Any use of the contents of this website to “train” generative artificial intelligence (AI) technologies to generate text is expressly prohibited. The author reserves all rights to license uses of this work for generative AI training and development of machine learning language models.
#1886InternationalExhibition #DonaldsonsHospital #exhibition #Firsts #July17 #Railways #Tramways #transport #Transportation
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The thread about the irrepressible Mr Binko and his Electric Railway
My sources tell me it is was Electrification Friday and although I was saving a picture for another day it seems right to share it now. Behold! Mr Binko’s Electric Railway!
Mr Binko’s Electric Railway. © Edinburgh City LibrariesThe passengers in the car are the Prince of Wales (future King Edward VII) and his wife Princess Alexandra, Princess of Wales. Regular viewers may recognise the backdrop as Donaldson’s Hospital.
Donaldson’s Hospital. CC-BY-SA 3.0, David MonniauxIt was the setting of the First International Forestry Exhibition of 1884 – held in a grand, wooden, temporary pavilion on the Hospital’s lawns – and that was the reason for Mr Binko bringing his railway to there. When the Royal Party toured the exhibition and rode his railway on 22nd August they became the first British Royals to be moved by electric power.
The 1884 exhibition, colour oil painting © Museums & Galleries EdinburghThe carriage was named Alexandra after the Princess of Wales and was made locally by coachbuilders John Hislop & Son. The carriage was “richly upholstered in silk plush of the Royal scarlet, while the sides and roof were elegantly decorated. In the centre of the roof a brilliant prismatic lamp was placed, lit within by electricity… and by an ingenious arrangement a beautiful bouquet on the centre table was lighted up by miniature lamps on a button being pressed”. The only other time the carriage was officially used was for the visit of William Ewart Gladstone – four time Prime Minister – and a (grand) son of Leith. He is seen on the right in the car below.
William Ewart Gladstone at the Edinburgh Exbibition of 1884, photograph by John Moffat. CC-by-NC National Galleries ScotlandZooming in, we see some of the occupants seem more enthusiastic than others. Mr Binko is seen on the right of shot, he with dark hair and moustache infront of the carriage window and clutching his top hat.
Gladstone, seated in the carriage, does not look impressed! Mr Binko is on his right, holding his top hat.In the background we can make out a showbill to do with Electricity. An experimental display of electric lights was also part of the Exhibition.
This was the first electric vehicle in Edinburgh and its inventor and promoter was the splendidly named Mr Binko. Henry Bock Binko was born in Vienna in 1836, becoming a naturalised British citizen in 1881. He brought to Edinburgh a modified version of an electric locomotive that he had exhibited in London in 1882. His experiments were a few years behind Werner von Siemens who had exhibited the worlds first practical electric railway in Berlin in 1879. In 1883, Magnus Volk opened the first electric railway to the public in Britain with his Volk’s Electric Railway on the sea front in Brighton (remarkably, it’s still going!). However, as far back as 1842 the Scottish inventor Robert Davidson had trialled an electrically powered locomotive using batteries on the Edinburgh to Glasgow Railway, his Galvani could unfortunately only propel itself at walking speed and could pull no useful load. The inability to recharge its batteries rendered it completely impractical.
Volks Marine Electric Railway, CC-BY-SA Robert CuttsBinko was described as a chemist, and seems to have been a serial inventor and patentee, intent on making his fortune by licensing out his contraptions to others. His Spectrograph achieved some success, and it was advertised for a reasonable sum as a money making scheme, the idea being people could get one and then duplicate photographs for sale by using it. Binko later fell out with the licensees.
Advert for a Binko patent SpectrographThe locomotive brought to Edinburgh was called Ohm and was a rebuild of the Volta that he had exhibited in London. “The line was eventually opened as a ½ mile circular route in the grounds, the charge being 3d (three pence) for the 2.5 minute journey.” 30,000 passengers were carried by the railway during its time at the exhibition. The Railway News reported;
It has been met with extensive public patronage, besides being honoured by a journey taken by the Prince and Princess of Wales and their family and subsequently by Mr and Mrs Gladstone. The length of the line laid down at Edinburgh is about double the length of that at the Crystal Palace and traverses the length of the exhibition building on the outside twice, besides making a wide sweep for turning.
Railway News – 6th September 1884
Power came from a stationary 8hp Robey steam engine coupled to a dynamo which supplied DC electric power through the rails. Speed was changed by resistors built into the locomotive. The locomotive or “guiding car” weighed about 2 tons and that the whole train weighed 6 tons when loaded. It could pull up to 3 passenger cars, each with capacity for 10, and it was noted that each car had its own motor, so the train was what we would nowadays call a DC EMU or Direct Current Electric Multiple Unit.
All was not well for Binko and his railway however. Construction over-ran and it was not ready for the opening. When it finally got going on July 17th, technically it was a triumph but financially proved a disaster. Binko was unable to pay his creditors, having borrowed heavily to finance the scheme, and one of them seized his railway before it was even in operation. An arrangement was made with the creditor that he would lease it back off of them for £650 to work off the debt, payable over 13 weeks in instalments. However, even though he was making up to £20 a day (approximately £2,800 in 2022) off of ticket sales, he remained seriously in debt and the creditors lost patience. Well before the end of the exhibition they advertised the whole thing for sale – obviously they had decided that Binko could or would never pay them what he owed and storage costs would be too high. On 30th September the electric railway was cancelled and Binko locked out from using it any more.
Advert selling Binko’s Electric Railway, Scotsman 20th September 1884On 10th October 1884, Binko was taken to court in London and bankrupted, still owing the creditor £100. Being in Edinburgh with his railway, he did not appear in person to defend himself. The court heard that now that the exhibition had ended, Binko did not have any way to recoup any more money from it to settle his debts, but had not provided any accounts of his income from it during the exhibition. The court adjourned to give him time to prepare the accounts and to appear in person.
But that wasn’t the end for Binko in Edinburgh. The reason he hadn’t come to London to face court was that somehow he managed to convince the Edinburgh Street Tramways Company to undertake an experiment in electric traction. He somehow managed to convince his creditors to allow him the use of the steam engine, dynamo and mechanical components from the Ohm. A few hundred yards of copper strip were laid between the horse tram rails between the exhibition at Donaldson’s Hospital and Haymarket Station, the moving parts from the Ohm were bodged into a horse tram of the Street Tramways Co. and the whole lot was hooked up to the dynamo and steam engine. On 11th October 1884, with 10 passengers on board, Mr Binko’s Electric Tram became the first electric tram to run in the British Isles when it haltingly made the short journey between Donaldson’s and Haymarket. Three journeys were made, the third (and final) hauling a second horse tramcar, and then no more was heard of Henry Bock Binko or his experiments in electrical traction.
For now.
An Edinburgh Street Tramway Company horse tram of 1884 of the the sort electrified by Mr Binko © Edinburgh City LibrariesBut once again this was not the end of the irrepressible Mr Binko and his experiments in electrical traction. He resurfaced in 1886 in Great Yarmouth where he tried to start up a seaside railway, but ended up being tried for unlawfully obtaining credit while being an undeclared bankrupt – it having transpired that he was bankrupted in 1871. He was eventually acquitted, largely on the grounds of his reputation from the 1884 railway in Edinburgh being taken in evidence that his schemes were serious and practical and not just a swindle. He died in London in 1911, being recorded on censuses in the last 10 years of his life as being employed as an electrical engineer.
Electric railways returned to Edinburgh the same year at the 1886 International Exhibition of Industry, Science and Art held in the Meadows.
The 1886 pavilion of the International Exhibition on the West Meadows, a temporary building believe it or not! Peter Fletcher Riddell bequest to National Galleries ScotlandThis scheme had nothing to do with Henry Binko and seems to have been something of a collaboration, directed by the energetic architect, builder and local politician Sir James Gowans, who was the organiser of the exhibition. The scheme is described as being a line 500 yards long, with electricity supplied to a central live rail by a 7 horsepower static steam engine. An electric locomotive hauled two tram cars sent by the Northern Metropolitan Tramway Company, a double decker with 20 inside and 26 outside upstairs and an open single decker with 25 seats. It could make 10 miles per hour. The steam engine was by Marshall & Co. of Gainsborough and the rails were made to Gowans’ own design (he had engineered Edinburgh’s first horse tramway some 15 years before), being supplied complimentary from a foundry in Barrow-in-Furness. The electric equipment was provided by King, Brown & Co. of Rosebank in Edinburgh. The fare was 2d and in the course of the exhibition it carried 80,000 passengers.
Ground Plan of the 1886 Edinburgh International Exhibition, the electric railway is highlighted in yellowDespite all the engravings and photos taken at the exhibition, I have struggled to track down a good picture of the electric railway, but you can see a bit of it in the corner of the larger photo of the Exhibition pavilion. You can make out a sheeted vehicle, possibly the tram car, on the left behind the flag pole. The rails run parallel to the fence, off to the right.
Hints of the 1886 Electric Railway, Peter Fletcher Riddell bequest to National Galleries ScotlandIf you have found this useful, informative or amusing, perhaps you would like to help contribute towards the running costs of this site – including keeping it ad-free and my book-buying budget to find further stories to bring you – by supporting me on ko-fi. Or please do just share this post on social media or amongst friends.
These threads © 2017-2025, Andy Arthur.
NO AI TRAINING: Any use of the contents of this website to “train” generative artificial intelligence (AI) technologies to generate text is expressly prohibited. The author reserves all rights to license uses of this work for generative AI training and development of machine learning language models.
#1886InternationalExhibition #DonaldsonsHospital #exhibition #Firsts #July17 #Railways #Tramways #transport #Transportation