Dance Of Electricity-Laurie Anderson

[ti:Dance Of Electricity] [ar:Laurie Anderson] [al:United States Live] [by:] [offset:0] [00:00.00]Dance Of Electricity - Laurie Anderson [00:01.38]A while ago I got a call from the Tesla Institute [00:06.60]In Belgrade long distance The voice was very faint [00:12.00]And it said "Understand do we that much of your work [00:15.99]Has been dedicated to Nikola Tesla and do we know the [00:19.56]Blackout of information about this man in the U S of A [00:22.14] [00:22.72]And so we would like to invite you to the Institute as [00:27.13]A free citizen of the world as a free speaker on American [00:30.88]Imperialist Blackout of Information Capitalist resistance [00:34.15]To Technological Progress the Western World's obstruction [00:38.93]Of Innovation So think about it " He hung up I thought: [00:45.56]Gee really a chance to speak my mind and I started doing [00:48.09]Some research on Tesla whose life story is actually really sad [00:53.69]Basically he was the inventor of AC current lots of kinds [00:58.38]Of generators and the Tesla coil His dream was wireless energy [01:04.99]And he was working on a system in which you could plug [01:08.97]Appliances directly into the ground A system which he never [01:13.28]Really perfected [01:14.91] [01:16.00]Tesla came over from Graz and went to work for Thomas Edison [01:20.00]Edison couldn't stand Tesla for several reasons One was that [01:24.98]Tesla showed up for work every day in formal dress--morning coat [01:28.53] [01:29.47] spats top hat and gloves--and this just wasn't the American [01:33.51]Way at the time Edison also hated Tesla because Tesla invented [01:37.79]So many things while wearing these clothes [01:42.49] [01:44.09]Edison did his best to prevent conversion to AC and did [01:53.39]Everything he could to discredit it In his later years Edison [02:00.21]Was something of a showman and he went around on the Chautauqua [02:03.33]Circuit in upstate New York giving demonstrations of the evil [02:07.51]Effects of AC He always brought a dog with him and he'd get [02:13.93]Up on stage and say: "Ladies and gentlemen I will now demonstrate [02:18.05]The effects of AC current on this dog " And he took two bare [02:23.64]Wires and attached them to the dog's head and the dog was dead [02:28.43]In under thirty seconds [02:29.93] [02:31.09]At any rate I decided to open the series of talks in Belgrade [02:35.28]With a song called "The Dance of Electricity" and its beat is [02:40.70]Derived from an actual dance--an involuntary dance--and it's the [02:47.93]Dance you do when one of your fingers gets wedged in a live socket [02:51.48]And your arms start pumping up and down and your mouth is slowly [02:56.29]Opening and closing and you can feel the power [03:00.20]But no words will come out.