If you have no idea what I am talking about, your next stop is to get hold of the Parliament album Mothership Connection.

And Sheila E., of course, has a Prince connection. If none of this rings a bell, your next film to watch is Sign “☮” the Times.

As I really enjoyed the previous CD, I’m really quite looking forward to this one as well. The double-disc album should be out in late August. Actually, knowing that the tracks are more or less finished by now and the release is so far in the future, it will be interesting to see whether Hayes can keep the CD in wraps under his own independent “Powdered Sugar” label, or whether some tracks will be leaked on the Internet, and thus becoming downloadable mp3s, as so often (somewhat unfortunately) happens these days.

Michael is said to be working on a new album to be released by the end of this year, so could this track give some idea about the direction that he is taking? I certainly hope not, as it sounds pretty much like something from his previous album Invincible, which I wasn’t too keen on.

The track has of course already leaked out on mp3, and can be downloaded from the usual places. You can apparently even catch it on some radio stations. Alternatively, you can go and see a fan-made video for the song at YouTube, or even head to Tempamental’s MySpace page, but I would rather you don’t as I truly hate MySpace for it is probably the ugliest and least navigable web community that there has ever been.

They say that “No Friend of Mine” was played over 100,000 times from Tempamental’s MySpace during the first five days that it was there. Clearly then, even when considering repeated listeners, Michael Jackson still generates quite some interest. Heck, even I am typing this now while what I should really be doing is watching Barcelona vs. Liverpool.

The past year or so has seen a lot of speculation on various online forums regarding the direction Tori will be taking on this album. She has remained rather tight-lipped about details, but has noted that while it will be see a return of the “fighter woman” in her, in terms of music it will not be a return to anything that she has done before.

For some reason (partly based on some cryptic remarks that she has made, and partly based on the type of music she has mentioned to be currently listening and has requested on radio shows), I have this feeling that American Doll Posse will be a rockier album than anything that we have heard from Tori before. And if it is, I wouldn’t be surprised to hear a sound at least vaguely similar to Nine Inch Nails, whose front man Trent Reznor is (or at least used to be) a good friend of Tori’s.

This all is of course complete speculation, and I guess it won’t be until May 1st when we will know what she’s been up to these past months. Unless, of course, downloadable mp3 tracks leak out and the fans get to download American Doll Posse before its official release. Tori has, however, in the past been very careful not to let her babies to be stolen. So much so that she has apparently pissed off some music reviewers with her copy protection methods, which at one point included inventing a completely new type of glue. (Google, and thou shalt find.)

The full official American Doll Posse press release can be read at Tori Amos – Undented, the default source for (unofficial) Tori Amos news. Be sure the check out the picture as well, and preferably in high resolution. The woman is scary as hell.

And what does this have to do with amino acids? Well, when my turn came, me and a good friend of mine talked about amino acids and how they are predominantly left-handed on our planet. We did this by reading what I think was a Stanislav Lem story that explanied the phenomenon by suggesting, if my memory serves well, that it was the result of two drunken intergalactic travellers, one of whom threw up on our planet, thus introducing Life here. And I think they, in their attempt to cover up the puke, mixed it so that it influenced how amino acids woud form on Earth from ever since.

After delivering this piece of information to the audience, we moved on to play what we called “the latest in computer music”, namely a tape with a Commodore 64 game on it (for those who do not know, if you play one of those tapes you get rather interesting non-static noise not much unlike anything you have never heard). Oh, the things you do when you are thirteen!

In any case, and to finally arrive to my point, it seems that scientists have now finally come closer to suggesting why amino acids are what they are, as reported by New Scientist, and the answer lies in water.