The Playa's

This book offers a unique and highly illustrated overview of the desert geomorphology of Iran. It describes the different landscapes and landforms of desert areas such as ergs and badlands offering a comprehensive insight into typical fluvial and eolian forms such as playas, alluvial fans, yardangs, salt domes, dunes, hoodoos and many more. The monograph elaborates the interaction of humans with the landscapes and discusses ongoing developments in geotourism, natural heritage sites as well as the potential for geoparks.

This music was written by Chris Jonas over the course of three years of winter solo camping during the pandemic. The location was the 2 million acre Barry Goldwater Missile Range in the far southwest corner of Arizona along the USA-Mexico border. Accessible by permit only, the scorched white playas or the Missile Range are bombed regularly, but the “sky islands” of its many mountain ranges are wilderness preserves that contain unique species of animals and plants that were stranded here after the ice age.

The three original members of Chambao La Mari, El Edi, and Dani made waves in the world music scene with their new brand of flamenco, called flamenco chill, which combined the passion and vocal style of traditional Andalusian flamenco with elements of electronica, specifically chillout. Formed in the early morning hours of the 2001 summer solstice in Malaga, Spain, Chambao first appeared to the greater public on the 2002 Sony compilation Flamenco Chill, to which they contributed eight songs, featuring Mari on vocals and the others on the instrumentation.