October 05th, 2022

Hey, remember that awesome 1997 Jodie Foster movie "Contact" where as a SETI scientist she downloads plans to build a time traveling spaceship to meet with aliens from the Vega system and then have many confusing but likely profound interactions with the Head Vegan, who appears in the form of her father (David Morse), and so returns to Earth with the wisdom to save the planet from itself, if only people would just listen? Well, you always have to watch the film within the film, because if you look really close at this one shot, it soon becomes apparent that the real secret to alien contact, let alone spaceship downloading, is to very carefully dial up the ideal reverb settings on your Eventide DSP 4000 Ultra-Harmonizer, which right this second retails at your local Guitar Center for around $3,250 + tax, since that's exactly the piece of gear she's adjusting there. No doubt she wasn't getting quite the harmonic resonances she needed for that frankly pretty crappily streamed MP3 of Steely Dan's "Deacon Blues", since there's no question that Donald Fagan's quavering falsetto is the only thing likely to keep her from going mad for the grueling thousand light-year trip.