[Rictor]

It'll be on in 45 minutes here!  Finally us in Canada watching SPACE can see it at roughly the same time as you guys in the states.

It hasn't aired in Canada yet? Sweet! Due to my lack of a television, I actually saw it before the people who do have one. Suckers! See, it pays to be poor and backwards

[Axem]

Ha. I wasn't paying attention to SPACE at all and thought we'd have to wait another 6 months, so I snatched it via alternate means already. Oh well.

[Nuke]

one thing youre missing about battlestar iraqtica is that its our guys that are being the insurgents the the tosters being the occupying force. role reversals make good tv.

[BlackDove]

Anyone half-intelligent already figured that out. The rest are harping about "Noez suicide-bombingz have beens around since forevarz".

The only reason that suicide bombings were made a core of these few episodes is because a tangent needs to be drawn in contemporary war tactics when the viewer needs to decide who is doing stuff that's acceptable, as in, who's "good" and who's "bad" and where the line gets blurred. And the best way to do that is using something that most of the viewer base will be familiar with, such as suicide bombings.

Much like torture of Boomer and Gaius' blond woman was a key point to paint Pegasus' tactics/morals when torture was a hot topic in the news.

[Kosh]

Just finished watching it and........holy ****. I really didn't see some of this stuff happening, especially Lee being a fat ass. It was kind of interesting to see Adama come down on him, don't want to make that guy angry.


With the suicide bombing part, it only made me think of one thing: Iraq. I guess we shouldn't be surprised that they would find a way to made that a theme in this show. Damn, they seem to have just about everything here.

[Rictor]

Important question for you all: Does anyone know what music they have playing at the beggining, right after the intro. The chanting, Middle-Eastern sounding stuff. Jesus, I love that, but I've checked the BSG Wiki and they don't mention it. In fact, does anyone even know what the genre is properly called?

[Ford Prefect]

I assume it was written for the show. It'll probably be on the Season 3 soundtrack, whenever that's released.

[aldo_14]

I'm surprised no-one has mentioned the suicide bombing in Season 1......

[Unknown Target]

Exactly.

I personally loved the episode, although I got pissed at the even more unresolved new plot lines. Oh well, we'll see what happens. Truly a thriller episode though

[Col. Fishguts]

Season 3 takes it up right where it left in its awesomeness.

[IceFire]

Important question for you all: Does anyone know what music they have playing at the beggining, right after the intro. The chanting, Middle-Eastern sounding stuff. Jesus, I love that, but I've checked the BSG Wiki and they don't mention it. In fact, does anyone even know what the genre is properly called?

All the music is done by Bear McCreary for the TV show.  There are soundtrack CD's (for Season 1 and 2) available from the record company website: http://www.lalalandrecords.com/

The sequence played at the beginning is an amalgum of themes we've heard before but not together.  He does great work...and no there is no genre name for this music aside from soundtrack.  Its very worldly.

[BlackDove]

It's also being whored by a lot of music directors in various movies and games.

Hell, Harry Gregson Williams adopted one of these scores for the impending Guns of the Patriots.

Also, this genre of course has a name and falls under a specific category, but I was never such a middle eastern enthusiast to actually remember what the name of the category really was. I have vague memory of my father listening to **** like this when I was a kid, but it's been a long seventeen years since, so I can't remember the name.

[IceFire]

Maybe not even Bear knows what the genre he's producing is.  In the official BSG magazine they interview him...he says his only direction was to bring in as many influences as possible...worldly.  So thats why we have of middle eastern but also asian, classical european, and so forth.  There's in there.

[Ford Prefect]

Yeah, I was told that the lyrics are all taken from verses of the Upanishads.

[BlackDove]

There's in there.

There's no doubt that he stole from a lot of sources, everyone does that, but the prevalent sound piece I'm sure has a category.

[Ford Prefect]

It doesn't have to. The variations from piece to piece in instrumentation, mode, texture and meter really do place his work all over the cultural map. You'll probably find stuff like quarter tones in the vocalization against a western symphony orchestra. Music in this day and age doesn't have to have a genre. The classification system can't keep up with it.

[BlackDove]

While that's true and I agree, I still believe things do fall under the more general categories when they sound similar to the pieces of music within the same group.

This, as mangled and "worldly" as it is, is not indistinguishable from the genre the sound actually does come from.

[Ford Prefect]

I guess that's why provincial white people coined the term "world music"-- to describe anything "ethnic".

Anyway, I'm listening to the piece to which Rictor was referring, (from the first act of the episode on scifi.com). I can't call myself an expert but it sounds to me like the piece is using the harmonic Phrygian mode. It's that gorgeous raised third that sends shivers up your spine and immediately makes you think "Middle Eastern". I've never actually tried to find a whole CD of music like this, but my guess would be that you should look for more modern interpretations of Arabic music. (More traditional Arabic music uses that weird-ass tonal system that's beautiful in its own way, but a little more alien to western ears accustomed to the diatonic scale.)

Or that could be totally misguided advice. I dunno.

[TrashMan]

Everything is more or less fine in hte new BGS series...except for Cylons..they suck..big time.

[aldo_14]

Everything is more or less fine in hte new BGS series...except for Cylons..they suck..big time.