Stumpy Moose

After a week off due to technical difficulties (dead laptop), my attempt to review each and every one of the world's national anthems continues.

This week, Israel and Hatikvah ("The Hope"):

Stumpy Moose Review

Based on an 1878 poem by Naphtali Herz Imber, Hatikvah was set to music by Samuel Cohen 10 years later and adopted as the anthem of the Zionist movement in 1897. It then became the de facto Israeli national anthem when the state was founded in 1948 but wasn't officially adopted until 2004.

I was going to accuse Cohen of robbing off with the Vltava sequence from Czech composer Bedřich Smetana's Má Vlast but, according to Wikipedia, both pieces are based on a 16th century Italian song called La Mantovana. So that's alright then.

Nicking aside, Hatikvah is a lovely anthem, wringing more emotion out of the original madrigal than Smetana's version while still managing to sound pretty epic and anthemic.

For a song called "The Hope", it's a bit downbeat but that just adds to the fun.

Fun Israel Fact: Israel's national bird is the hoopoe, which beat the white-spectacled bulbul to the title in a 2008 poll.

Bonus Israel Fact: Natalie Portman was born in Israel.

8 out of 10

Source: Complete National Anthems of the World

National Anthems Leaderboard

A Flash-based synth/sequencer/drum machine combo in the ReBirth/Reason tradition, with plenty of knobs to twiddle.

Bonus Beats: It's got a cool name.

(Thanks to City Centre Runner for the link.)

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See Also: ToneMatrix

Posted on YouTube by jimmymagee77:

This week, Ireland's greatest martial arts movie, in all its glory:

Part 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mONk2U9y4aI

Part 3: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=buFDTO6wk5Y

Part 4: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KSGugS47TeE

Part 5: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rxg_nOJpIWg

Part 6: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yynfobTBCxA

Part 7: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eqPnyW5nv3w

Part 8: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y9SCorKGx8o

(Thanks to Rory Houlihan for the link.)

• For more moving pictures, see the Stumpy Moose YouTube Group

Our favourite songs about tea -- a genre we call "cuppadelia".

Fun with home-made explosives, via the Instructables site.

What could possibly go wrong?

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Posted on YouTube by MainStreetBitesBack (via SadAndUseless.com):

I can't improve on SadAndUseless.com's caption: Clowns Are Scary

• For more moving pictures, see the Stumpy Moose YouTube Group