[PHOTO] Eighteen photos from the Guillermo del Toro show at the AGO (@artgalleryofontario, #gdtago)

I procrastinated until the 6th of January to see the Guillermo del Toro exhibit at the Art Gallery of Ontario, the day before it closed. It was crowded, but worth it. The richness of the sources of del Toro's imagination is as stunning as that of this imagination's products.

The below are only a few of the photos I ended up sharing. In addition to being viewable at my Instagram and Flickr pages, they are all assembled in an album on my Facebook account, here.

[BLOG] Some Thursday links

• The Broadside Blog's Caitlin Kelly talks about her love for New York's famous, dynamic, Hudson River.


• Centauri Dreams notes the amazing potential for pulsar navigation to provide almost absolutely reliable guidance across the space of at least a galaxy.


• Far Outliers notes the massive scale of German losses in France after the Normandy invasion.


• Hornet Stories looks at the latest on theories as to the origin of homosexuality.


• Joe. My. God remembers Dr. Mathilde Krim, dead this week at 91, one of the early medical heroes of HIV/AIDS in New York City.


• JSTOR Daily takes a look at what, exactly, is K-POP.


• Language Log notes that, in Xinjiang, the Chinese government has opted to repress education in the Mongolian language.


• Lawyers, Guns and Money suggests that the risk of war in Korea is less than the media suggests.


• At Chronicle's Lingua Franca, Ben Yagoda looks at redundancy in writing styles.


• The NYR Daily looks at the complex relationship of French publishing house Gallimard to Céline and his Naziphile anti-Semitism.


• The Planetary Society Blog looks at the latest images of Venus from Japan's Akatsuki probe.


• The Power and the Money's Noel Maurer notes the apparent willingness of Trump to use a wall with Mexico--tariffs, particularly--to pay for the wall.


• Spacing reviews a new book examining destination architecture.


• Starts With A Bang's Ethan Siegel considers what I think is a plausible concept: Could be that there are plenty of aliens out there and we are just missing them?


• At Strange Maps, Frank Jacobs shares a map of "Tabarnia", the region of Catalonia around Barcelona that is skeptical of Catalonian separatism and is being positioned half-seriously as another secessionist entity.


• Window on Eurasia notes that an actively used language is hardly the only mechanism by which a separatist identity can exist.

[URBAN NOTE] Seven Toronto links: crime, politics, mass transit, Old City Hall, renters

• Florin from G+ was the first person to share the news that someone has been arrested for first-degree murder in the case of the disappearances of two queer men. This is shocking news; I am so sorry for the people affected by these losses. CBC reports.


• Doug Ford is continuing to campaign for the mayoralty, despite an official warning that he should not start campaigning before the campaign legally starts. Ford Nation lives yet. The Toronto Star has the news.


• Global News reports on a new tactic by pro-transit groups to try to get people behind the Downtown Relief Line. Good; we need it.


• Controversy over a bike lane on Yonge Street in North York continues. The Toronto Star reports.


• blogTO reports on the appealing suggestion that Old City Hall might be turned into a library and a museum. I would quite like this, actually.


• Tess Kalinowski reports on how rising rents in Toronto are pushing more people to the 905 region, to Toronto suburbs like Mississauga and Vaughan, over at the Toronto Star.


• John Lorinc at Spacing is harshly critical of an Ontario affordable housing policy that actually does little to ensure affordable rent, giving developers and municipalities effective vetoes over development.

[URBAN NOTE] Six cities: Saint John, New York City. Brooklyn, Cape Town, Kingston, Istanbul, Dubai

• The metropolitan area of Saint John, in New Brunswick, is investigating the possibility of a general municipal amalgamation. Myself, I suspect cost savings would be limited. Global News reports.


• Having been in Brooklyn--having, in fact, been in Williamsburg--I can only imagine the catastrophe that the extended shutdown of the L subway line will have on local nightlife. I hope they can adapt. VICE reports.


• A Cape Town that faces a possible water shortage--perhaps a probable water shortage, given weather patterns--is going to feel a lot of pain. MacLean's reports.


• If Kingston is moving away from honouring Canada's first prime minister and hometown son, John A. MacDonald, on account of his governments' policies towards indigenous peoples, this indicates a sea change. Global News reports.


• Ezgi Tuncer examines how Syrians displaced to Istanbul have integrated into their new home through, among other things, selling their traditional foods to Syrians and Turks alike, over at Open Democracy.


• Is Dubai truly a good example of a modernized Middle Eastern economy? I wonder. Bloomberg makes the argument.

[MUSIC] The Cranberries, "Linger"

I was getting ready to leave Brooklyn's Bay Ridge early Monday afternoon when the news broke on Facebook that Dolores O'Riordan of The Cranberries had died. I was taken aback; The Cranberries is one of those bands that defines my mid-1990s experience of watching music television, Canada's MuchMusic, and to have yet another star gone prematurely ... Sharing their breakthrough song "Linger" was the only response I could think of as I walked those chill street.

Watch on YouTube

Oh, I thought the world of you
I thought nothing could go wrong
But I was wrong, I was wrong
If you, if you could get by
Trying not to lie
Things wouldn't be so confused
And I wouldn't feel so used
But you always really knew
I just want to be with you

The Independent has a nice feature explaining the genesis of the song, how the young O'Riordan took a song written by Noel Hogan and introduced her own lyrics, talking about her own teenage heartbreak at a nightclub.

Stephen Thomas Erlewine wrote at Pitchfork about this song, more evidence of O'Riordan's "flinty open heart".

It was one of the first songs the band completed after O’Riordan joined, when they were just in their late teens. It’s a tale of love, deceit and the lingering feelings of desire for an impossible relationship, an impossible situation, and an impossible partner who broke the contract of love. “It's ruining every day / For me I swore I would be true / And fellow, so did you / So why were you holding her hand? / Is that the way we stand?” asks O’Riordan. “Were you lying all the time? / Was it just a game to you?…” Yeah, you don't want to be on O’Riordan’s emotional hit list.

Then the fireworks come. The twinkling guitars and staccato strings rise with her oh-so-recognizable voice and she nails the unforgettable lyrics thousands of fans have sang back to her at festivals and concerts across the globe these past 25 years: “But I’m in so deep / You know I'm such a fool for you / You've got me wrapped around your finger / Do you have to let it linger? Do you have to, do you have to, do have to let it linger?” [Shakes head. Places palm over heart.]

(Erlewine goes on to write about how the marketing practices of the music industry in the 1990s helped make "Linger", along with "Dreams" and "Zombie", such memorable songs, appearing on soundtracks and being associated with iconic moments of pop culture. Recommended.)

It was iconic, was a song that mattered to me even before (almost a decade before) I could actually get the feelings involved. "Linger" is a profoundly honest song, and Dolores O'Riordan felt like an honest person, the sort of person I'd like to know. I wasn't alone in connecting, or buying that song's album and is successors; O'Riordan's strongly Irish voice connected globally.

William Goodman at Billboard also wrote movingly about O'Riordan, how her voice was not just distinctive but distinctly Irish, perhaps symbolizing dynamic Ireland's moving forth in the world as modern but still itself.

As a kid, this was one of my first introductions to wistful alt-rock drama. In an era of male-dominated guitar rock, I discovered the Cranberries by sneaking into my older sisters’ rooms and listening to their CDs. The cover of the Cranberries’ debut, Everybody Else Is Doing It, So Why Can't We?, released at the height of the grunge era in March 1993, showed the band cloaked in black, perched on a couch (as would their next release... they liked couches). It was easy to sit in awe of a vocalist commanding so much emotional power, and so in control of her dynamic, unique instrument. It's a voice that left deep and lasting marks.

“Linger,” along with the LP’s other single “Dreams,” would launch the band’s career -- and go on to sell five million copies worldwide. The group would ultimately sell over 40 million records across the globe. The grittier rocker “Zombie” would become perhaps their most recognizable song, but it’s always their dreamy side that stunned the most—the gliding choruses and lyrics that were like a swan dive off the Cliffs of Moher.

And now O'Riordan is gone. The police say it wasn't a suspicious death; the suspicion seems to be that, in the context of her openness about abuse she had suffered, that this was an accidental overdose or something intentional. I am so sorry for that: we all need more musicians like her. All I can do, from my vantage point as a distant fan, is to be thankful we had her for as long as we did, and that she gave us songs like "Linger."