Ned Raggett
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nedraggett.bsky.social
Ned Raggett
@nedraggett.bsky.social
9.3K followers 1.7K following 18K posts
Hi! I write about music at various spots (@thequietus.com, @thewiremagazine.bsky.social, Shfl and my Patreon, also in the past @allmusic.com, @pitchfork.com, @bandcamp.com etc. etc.). Plus podcasting about #Tolkien with friends at @bythebywater.bsky.social
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nedraggett.bsky.social
Ned Raggett @nedraggett.bsky.social · Nov 14
Well, it's time for some honest to god Bluesky lore.

A year ago, the site was still invite only, and one morning I posted something random and didn't think much about it beyond my own amusement.

This is the story about the #ChristianSkydivingBaby and how it completely took over @bsky.app (1/x)
nedraggett.bsky.social Ned Raggett @nedraggett.bsky.social · Nov 14
Given the very specific circumstances, I'd either check to see if I'm on drugs or if the baby is on drugs and if the latter find out where I could get some because clearly those are some gooooood drugs.
A supposed Quora question: "Atheists, imagine you're going skydiving with a Christian baby. Suddenly the baby tells you he won't open his parachute until you renounced atheism and accept Jesus as your lord and savior. What would you do?"
Reposted by Ned Raggett
paranoiacs.bsky.social
Reflecting again on how John Cale’s piano playing on Nick Drake’s “Northern Sky” is one of the single most moving things I’ve ever heard, and also how it's like the thirtieth most historical thing to occur over the course of his career in music. A remarkably passionate oracle. Truly no one like him.
November 27, 2025 at 5:18 AM
Reposted by Ned Raggett
darthbluesky.bsky.social
ok it is time for me to hibernate for the season
i am thankful for all of u keeping me company here on the blue sky during this year
be well
November 27, 2025 at 12:07 AM
Reposted by Ned Raggett
pattymo.com
Tomorrow I will defeat my family.
November 27, 2025 at 2:26 AM
Reposted by Ned Raggett
sarahweinman.com
WAKE UP DEAD MAN might be my favorite of the three but the line that got me to bust up most was uttered by the person sitting behind me: “Give ‘em some atropine!”
November 27, 2025 at 2:43 AM
Reposted by Ned Raggett
mcnutcase.bsky.social
No wonder K2 has a deep and abiding hatred of people.
jonfmorse.com ʝօռ ʍօʀֆɛ @jonfmorse.com · 2h
TIL the first "serious" attempt to scale K2 included Aleister fuckin' Crowley and it all makes sense now
November 27, 2025 at 4:22 AM
Reposted by Ned Raggett
therafischwartz.bsky.social
“Sisu” can be a thanksgiving movie if you want it to be. No law says it can’t, you can check.
November 27, 2025 at 12:41 AM
Reposted by Ned Raggett
ohrobin.bsky.social
You guys are laughing, but he barely has time to measure and log his son’s nocturnal emissions.
November 27, 2025 at 4:54 AM
Reposted by Ned Raggett
hayao.lol
I've been exploring #shoegaze like an obsessed freak for years now and I am *still* finding great 90s bands I'd never heard of

love this genre
You Never
YouTube video by The Curtain Society - Topic
music.youtube.com
November 27, 2025 at 4:42 AM
Reposted by Ned Raggett
runwithskizzers.bsky.social
I stopped buying boar's head after that horrific shit dropped about how no one knew who actually ran the company bc it was just like a constant listeria factory
November 27, 2025 at 3:29 AM
Reposted by Ned Raggett
unenthusiast.com
"I say we take off and nuke the site from orbit. It's the only way to be sure."
Norman Rockwell's Freedom of Speech but it's Ellen Ripley
November 27, 2025 at 2:30 AM
Reposted by Ned Raggett
nikostratis.com
best we've got right now is Murdoch Mysteries, a detective show set in late 1800's Toronto, where the lead characters regularly invent modern technology by accident. Detective Murdoch created the Roomba. Tatiana Maslany's brother plays a gay jewish cop. It's incredible.
November 26, 2025 at 7:38 PM
Reposted by Ned Raggett
nikostratis.com
I think if Canada wants to have a strong cultural identity we need to go back to doing what we're best at, making the weirdest fucking TV shows you've ever seen
November 26, 2025 at 7:33 PM
Reposted by Ned Raggett
nedraggett.bsky.social
Hell with it, I'm just going to post the whole thing here via screencap and alt text. It's Kaleb Horton, man, his writing always deserves the second read, especially since it could have just easily been lost forever like so much else. Read it, share it.
A look at forgotten Hollywood landmarks By Kaleb Horton Let's say you come in from down south, and you're looking for an unsung movie landmark. So you fly in to LAX, rent a car, blow right past Hollywood, leave Los Angeles county heading north, go over the Grapevine, gape at the monumental hills and, wow, there really is a Smokey Bear Road, then you turn off the air conditioner when the sign tells you. Once you come down the grade too fast and see the world's loneliest Denny's, you're well on your way to what you're looking for – the middle of nowhere. You're going to Kern County to find the spot where Alfred Hitchcock filmed one of the greatest scenes in movie history, the crop duster sequence from "North by Northwest." It takes place in Indiana, of course, but the Indiana road sign and the imported corn field can't deceive this Bakersfield native. The parched and desolate heat of the scene feels too much like Kern County. The scene people know off-hand — Cary Grant running from an airplane — isn't why "North by Northwest" is a classic. The film's greatness, as was often the case for Hitchcock, lies in its build-up, its suspense, its mood. The plane moment is almost anticlimax. It is those five minutes before Grant's desperate escape that constitute a mathematically perfect suspense scene. So expert is Hitchcock's hand that he creates suspense, a slow burning dread, with no camera tricks and no music in broad daylight. Grant's character is a prototypical James Bond. His perfect suit, fast wit, high-alcohol tolerance and effortless charisma have got him out of every predicament so far. In the city, among people, he has powers. Take him away from people, put him nowhere, and he's just like us — totally helpless. He has no powers: His suit is no good out here; his million-dollar tailoring and perfect haircut is just vanity now. No amount of pretending can provide escape. Here, is the one place where he can die, and he gets by on the grace of God. All he can do is wait for what's coming. So when you seek the lost landmark of this scene, you're looking for an idea as much as a place. You're on Highway 99 now, going 30 miles north of Bakersfield, looking for an unassuming patch of dirt that carries spiritual weight. The scene was filmed neart Garces Highway to the west of Delano. You'll think there's a handy exit for it. There's not. You'll probably get lost in Delano, counting on a connection. You're at once a million miles from Hollywood and a hundred miles away. It's lonely. The horizon sprawls forever like there's nothing past it. There are broken down trucks on the side of the road, plumes of smoke from faraway fires. You'll find Garces eventually. You'll pass a bar called Rosy's Place, abandoned houses, an oil field, a prison, a cemetery, a sign that says "we clean headstones," and a whole lot of gold-on-brown punctuated by an occasional trailer or car going faster than you. You're looking for where Garces meets Corcoran Road. That's where this "North by Northwest" scene was filmed. You'll get a vague idea where it is but you'll never be exactly sure, since there's little impetus for clear signage 10 miles from a prison. Maybe Corcoran Road is unlabeled. Besides, that Indiana sign and the prop cornfield haven't been there in 56 years. If you're anything like me, you'll lose the light and call it a day, unsatisfied with the route you took. You return to I-5 northbound. From the 5, you'll meet Route 46, and go through a place called Lost Hills, then back in to the location from Corcoran Road instead. That's how Hitchcock probably did it. More intuitive. Still in the middle of nowhere, but on your way to Corcoran Road, you're right next to another Hollywood landmark: Blackwells Corner, James Dean's last stop. It's a glorified Texaco, and gas is 50 cents a gallon more than it should be. They sell Jelly Bellys and '50s kitsch artifacts — plates with Marilyn Monroe's face on them, and so forth. They really figured out how to cash in on death. You don't want to stop here. But I stopped. I asked the kid at the Blackwells Corner counter how to get to Corcoran Road. He gave me a look that said "there's no reason to go there," and then wearily told me where to go anyway. I was about 8 miles from the destination. Going there is a meditative experience. You're not just going to the middle of nowhere. You're going to the perfect nowhere. Going alone, in the hypnotic heat of the Central Calfiornia Valley, you might even forget what year it is. There is no reason to believe the road would be so well preserved for half a century, intimately tied to the career of an actor born in Bristol 111 years ago, but it has been. There's an abandoned house. A barn with a cross on it. But almost nothing has changed in 56 years. At some point new lines were added on the road. There's overgrowth where there didn't used to be overgrowth. A couple discarded Budweiser cans from who knows when, but mostly it's identical. This is the same sleepy loneliness that Alfred Hitchcock used to make great art in 1959. And that may sound dull, but tranquility is the point. You stand on that dirt and there's no distraction from what's in your soul. It's an inner destination, not an outer one. I told my grandma about it when I got back to Bakersfield. She told me her Uncle Harold thought it was the prettiest road in America. And she showed me a picture of a Corcoran grade school class posing in the dirt with Grant and Hitchcock. It's just a field trip picture. The kids are fidgeting, many with arms folded, some shielding their eyes from the sun, all with obedient smiles. They'd all be in their sixties now, but they'd remember where this road is. It emphasized the ugliness of James Dean's last stop becoming a place to sell T-shirts. It's about what we preserve, and what we don't, and what we remember, and what we don't. It's easy to find shrines to morbidity and hard to find meaningful places. For those, you have to go looking.
November 26, 2025 at 9:52 PM
Reposted by Ned Raggett
lukeoneil47.bsky.social
It's just a field trip picture. The kids are fidgeting, many with arms folded, some shielding their eyes from the sun, all with obedient smiles. They'd all be in their sixties now, but they'd remember where this road is. 2/2
November 26, 2025 at 11:36 PM
Reposted by Ned Raggett
lukeoneil47.bsky.social
I told my grandma about it when I got back to Bakersfield. She told me her Uncle Harold thought it was the prettiest road in America. And she showed me a picture of a Corcoran grade school class posing in the dirt with Grant and Hitchcock. 1/2
nedraggett.bsky.social Ned Raggett @nedraggett.bsky.social · 8h
Hell with it, I'm just going to post the whole thing here via screencap and alt text. It's Kaleb Horton, man, his writing always deserves the second read, especially since it could have just easily been lost forever like so much else. Read it, share it.
November 26, 2025 at 11:36 PM
Reposted by Ned Raggett
nothingsmonstrd.bsky.social
This is a beautiful little piece of writing.

Place, memory, meaning —Cary Grant, James Dean, and the middle of nowhere.
nedraggett.bsky.social Ned Raggett @nedraggett.bsky.social · 8h
Hell with it, I'm just going to post the whole thing here via screencap and alt text. It's Kaleb Horton, man, his writing always deserves the second read, especially since it could have just easily been lost forever like so much else. Read it, share it.
November 27, 2025 at 12:13 AM
Reposted by Ned Raggett
pinksalad.bsky.social
Fantastic writing. Had no idea they filmed North by Northwest there, but the piece put me right back in the bench seat of my dad’s 1975 suburban, wishing the AC worked better and trying to remember when the next rest stop on the 5 would be.
nedraggett.bsky.social Ned Raggett @nedraggett.bsky.social · 8h
Hell with it, I'm just going to post the whole thing here via screencap and alt text. It's Kaleb Horton, man, his writing always deserves the second read, especially since it could have just easily been lost forever like so much else. Read it, share it.
November 27, 2025 at 12:05 AM
Reposted by Ned Raggett
leavittalone.bsky.social
Oh god I was approached for this reboot
nedraggett.bsky.social Ned Raggett @nedraggett.bsky.social · 8h
Hell with it, I'm just going to post the whole thing here via screencap and alt text. It's Kaleb Horton, man, his writing always deserves the second read, especially since it could have just easily been lost forever like so much else. Read it, share it.
November 27, 2025 at 12:03 AM
Reposted by Ned Raggett
anothercultland.bsky.social
jesus, the man could _write_
November 26, 2025 at 10:12 PM
nedraggett.bsky.social
Hell with it, I'm just going to post the whole thing here via screencap and alt text. It's Kaleb Horton, man, his writing always deserves the second read, especially since it could have just easily been lost forever like so much else. Read it, share it.
A look at forgotten Hollywood landmarks By Kaleb Horton Let's say you come in from down south, and you're looking for an unsung movie landmark. So you fly in to LAX, rent a car, blow right past Hollywood, leave Los Angeles county heading north, go over the Grapevine, gape at the monumental hills and, wow, there really is a Smokey Bear Road, then you turn off the air conditioner when the sign tells you. Once you come down the grade too fast and see the world's loneliest Denny's, you're well on your way to what you're looking for – the middle of nowhere. You're going to Kern County to find the spot where Alfred Hitchcock filmed one of the greatest scenes in movie history, the crop duster sequence from "North by Northwest." It takes place in Indiana, of course, but the Indiana road sign and the imported corn field can't deceive this Bakersfield native. The parched and desolate heat of the scene feels too much like Kern County. The scene people know off-hand — Cary Grant running from an airplane — isn't why "North by Northwest" is a classic. The film's greatness, as was often the case for Hitchcock, lies in its build-up, its suspense, its mood. The plane moment is almost anticlimax. It is those five minutes before Grant's desperate escape that constitute a mathematically perfect suspense scene. So expert is Hitchcock's hand that he creates suspense, a slow burning dread, with no camera tricks and no music in broad daylight. Grant's character is a prototypical James Bond. His perfect suit, fast wit, high-alcohol tolerance and effortless charisma have got him out of every predicament so far. In the city, among people, he has powers. Take him away from people, put him nowhere, and he's just like us — totally helpless. He has no powers: His suit is no good out here; his million-dollar tailoring and perfect haircut is just vanity now. No amount of pretending can provide escape. Here, is the one place where he can die, and he gets by on the grace of God. All he can do is wait for what's coming. So when you seek the lost landmark of this scene, you're looking for an idea as much as a place. You're on Highway 99 now, going 30 miles north of Bakersfield, looking for an unassuming patch of dirt that carries spiritual weight. The scene was filmed neart Garces Highway to the west of Delano. You'll think there's a handy exit for it. There's not. You'll probably get lost in Delano, counting on a connection. You're at once a million miles from Hollywood and a hundred miles away. It's lonely. The horizon sprawls forever like there's nothing past it. There are broken down trucks on the side of the road, plumes of smoke from faraway fires. You'll find Garces eventually. You'll pass a bar called Rosy's Place, abandoned houses, an oil field, a prison, a cemetery, a sign that says "we clean headstones," and a whole lot of gold-on-brown punctuated by an occasional trailer or car going faster than you. You're looking for where Garces meets Corcoran Road. That's where this "North by Northwest" scene was filmed. You'll get a vague idea where it is but you'll never be exactly sure, since there's little impetus for clear signage 10 miles from a prison. Maybe Corcoran Road is unlabeled. Besides, that Indiana sign and the prop cornfield haven't been there in 56 years. If you're anything like me, you'll lose the light and call it a day, unsatisfied with the route you took. You return to I-5 northbound. From the 5, you'll meet Route 46, and go through a place called Lost Hills, then back in to the location from Corcoran Road instead. That's how Hitchcock probably did it. More intuitive. Still in the middle of nowhere, but on your way to Corcoran Road, you're right next to another Hollywood landmark: Blackwells Corner, James Dean's last stop. It's a glorified Texaco, and gas is 50 cents a gallon more than it should be. They sell Jelly Bellys and '50s kitsch artifacts — plates with Marilyn Monroe's face on them, and so forth. They really figured out how to cash in on death. You don't want to stop here. But I stopped. I asked the kid at the Blackwells Corner counter how to get to Corcoran Road. He gave me a look that said "there's no reason to go there," and then wearily told me where to go anyway. I was about 8 miles from the destination. Going there is a meditative experience. You're not just going to the middle of nowhere. You're going to the perfect nowhere. Going alone, in the hypnotic heat of the Central Calfiornia Valley, you might even forget what year it is. There is no reason to believe the road would be so well preserved for half a century, intimately tied to the career of an actor born in Bristol 111 years ago, but it has been. There's an abandoned house. A barn with a cross on it. But almost nothing has changed in 56 years. At some point new lines were added on the road. There's overgrowth where there didn't used to be overgrowth. A couple discarded Budweiser cans from who knows when, but mostly it's identical. This is the same sleepy loneliness that Alfred Hitchcock used to make great art in 1959. And that may sound dull, but tranquility is the point. You stand on that dirt and there's no distraction from what's in your soul. It's an inner destination, not an outer one. I told my grandma about it when I got back to Bakersfield. She told me her Uncle Harold thought it was the prettiest road in America. And she showed me a picture of a Corcoran grade school class posing in the dirt with Grant and Hitchcock. It's just a field trip picture. The kids are fidgeting, many with arms folded, some shielding their eyes from the sun, all with obedient smiles. They'd all be in their sixties now, but they'd remember where this road is. It emphasized the ugliness of James Dean's last stop becoming a place to sell T-shirts. It's about what we preserve, and what we don't, and what we remember, and what we don't. It's easy to find shrines to morbidity and hard to find meaningful places. For those, you have to go looking.
November 26, 2025 at 9:52 PM
nedraggett.bsky.social
A random FB memory turned up a Kaleb Horton piece I am sure I'd entirely forgotten, done for an attempted revival of _Liberty_ magazine on old Hollywood landmarks, from 2015. You'll need to scroll way down on the archived page, but it's there. cc @quartzcity.bsky.social @andyzax.bsky.social etc
A look at forgotten Hollywood landmarks
An inside look at some significant, though forgotten, Hollywood landmarks.
web.archive.org
November 26, 2025 at 9:41 PM
Reposted by Ned Raggett
benmsmith.com
go see this one in a theater if you can, friends!
November 26, 2025 at 9:01 PM
Reposted by Ned Raggett
benmsmith.com
WAKE UP DEAD MAN: still fantastic.

Josh O’Connor really nails it as the heart of the movie.
November 26, 2025 at 8:43 PM
Reposted by Ned Raggett
wychstreet.bsky.social
One of the most important American artists who ever lived, his influence up there with the great jazz & bluesmen - I mean what he did was totally new & unique to where he came from
schulzmuseum.bsky.social Charles M. Schulz Museum | The home of Snoopy & the Peanuts Gang @schulzmuseum.bsky.social · 11h
“All I wanted to do was make people laugh.”—Charles M. Schulz⁠
⁠
🎂 Today, we celebrate the birthday of Charles M. Schulz, born in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on November 26, 1922. ⁠

Thank you, Mr. Schulz, for all the happiness and laughter.⁠
⁠
Photo by Michael Myers, c. 1954 © Schulz Museum.
November 26, 2025 at 8:54 PM
Reposted by Ned Raggett
sylvibullet.bsky.social
we should replace "actually frankenstein was the doctor" with "actually there was a fourth guy in the three musketeers"
November 26, 2025 at 6:51 PM