Coordinates: 56°24′29″N 4°02′38″W / 56.408°N 4.044°W / 56.408; -4.044

The Central Lowlands or Midland Valley is a geologically defined area of relatively low-lying land in southern Scotland. It consists of a rift valley between the Highland Boundary Fault to the north and the Southern Uplands Fault to the south. The Central Lowlands are one of the three main geographical sub-divisions of Scotland, the other two being the Highlands and Islands which lie to the north, northwest and the Southern Uplands, which lie south of the associated second fault line.

The Highland Boundary Fault, runs from Lochranza on the Isle of Arran in the south and west through the Isle of Bute and Helensburgh, then forms the northern boundary of Strathmore before reaching Stonehaven in the north east. The fault was active during the Caledonian orogeny, a plate tectonic collision which took place from Mid Ordovician to Mid Devonian periods (520 to 400 million years ago), during the closure of the Iapetus Ocean. The fault allowed the Midland Valley to descend as a major rift by as much as 4000 metres and there was subsequently vertical movement. This earlier vertical movement was later replaced by a horizontal shear.

Sam Rainsy (Khmer: សម រង្ស៊ី IPA: [sɑːm reə̯̆ŋsiː]; born March 10, 1949) is a Cambodian politician.

Sam Rainsy was born in Phnom Penh in 1949. His father, Sam Sary was assassinated in 1959 when Sam Rainsy was ten, while his mother was thrown into prison. He moved to France in 1965, studied there and then worked as an investment manager and executive director in a variety of Parisian financial companies. He became a member of the Cambodian Funcinpec Party, and after returning to Cambodia in 1992 was elected a member of parliament for Siem Reap Province the following year. He became Minister of Finance, but was expelled from the party after losing a vote of no-confidence in 1994. In 1995, he founded the Khmer Nation Party (KNP), which changed its name before the 1998 elections to the Sam Rainsy Party (SRP) to avoid registration issues. [1] Sam was elected a member of parliament for Kompong Cham province in those elections, and the party polled 14% of the vote. In the 2003 elections, it polled 22% of the vote.

Amy Macdonald (born 25 August 1987 in Bishopbriggs, East Dunbartonshire) is a Scottish recording artist. Macdonald rose to fame in 2007 with her debut album, This Is the Life (2007) and its fourth single, "This Is the Life". The single charted at number one in six different countries worldwide, and charted inside the top ten in another eleven countries worldwide.

The success of the single achieved Macdonald success in the American music market, where she was a guest on shows such as The Ellen DeGeneres Show and The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson in 2008, where she performed two singles from the album, leading her album, This Is the Life to reach ninety-two on the Billboard 200. In the European Union, This Is the Life reached number one in six European countries, including the United Kingdom, Denmark and the main European album charts. This is the Life has sold three million copies worldwide.

"Don't Tell Me That It's Over" was released in March 2010 as the lead off single from Macdonald's second studio album, A Curious Thing which was released on March 8, 2010. Five singles have since been released from A Curious Thing. The album's lead single, "Don't Tell Me That It's Over" was released worldwide on March 1, 2010 and this was followed by the release of a second single "Spark" on May 10, 2010. Further singles were released, with the third being "This Pretty Face" which was successful in European countries such as Germany, where MacDonald holds a strong fanbase. A further two singles were released, "Love Love" and "Your Time Will Come" which were both released in late 2010. Worldwide, A Curious Thing, the album has sold 1,000,000 copies worldwide.

Paul Mounsey (born 15 April 1959) is a composer, arranger and producer from Scotland.

He lived for over 20 years in Brazil. A graduate of Trinity College, London, where he studied with Richard Arnell, he has written for film, television, theatre, advertising and also for the Latin American pop market. He lectured for a short while at Goldsmiths College before moving on as creative director of Play It Again, one of the biggest commercial music houses in Brazil. He has also written articles on various aspects of music. He’s written pop hits for Mexican boy bands, has received commissions for chamber and multimedia works, has lived with and recorded the music of indigenous communities in the Amazon rainforest, and to date has released five solo albums. Paul's music has featured in the television and cinema adverts for tourism boards such as VisitScotland. He is currently based in Los Angeles working as composer, orchestrator and programmer in the film industry.

To date, Paul Mounsey has released 5 solo albums:

Hudson Mohawke, (Ross Birchard) also known as Hudson Mo or HudMo, is an electronic music producer/DJ from Glasgow, Scotland, affiliated with the LuckyMe collective. He is signed to Warp Records and released his debut album on Warp, called Butter in October 2009. He attributes his production style to an early involvement in turntablism.

At the age of 15, Birchard (under the name DJ Itchy) was the youngest ever UK DMC finalist. His earliest gigs as a club DJ were with Glasgow University's Subcity Radio where he first appeared as part of the culture city kids show and later as part of other shows including Turntable Science with Pro Vinylist Karim and Cloudo's Happy Hardcore show. Birchard became Hudson Mohawke after seeing the name engraved on a statue in the hallway of his accommodation. Alongside friend and affiliate Rustie, Hudson Mo is a purveyor of the hip-hop/electronic offshoot that is sometimes known as aqua-crunk or wonky, although Hudson does not accept these labels. In 2009, Hudson Mo signed to Warp Records, despite a very limited track record of official releases; in fact, the bulk of his releases were unofficial tracks and DJ mixes circulated on the Internet. His first official release to get major notice was entitled "Spotted" on the Rush Hour beat compilation Beat Dimensions Vol 1, which then lead to a release entitled "Free Mo", a track on the Ubiquity Records various-artists compilation Choices, Vol. 1 (2007); subsequently, he was featured as a remixer on Choices, Vol. 2 (2007). In 2008 his 12" EP Ooops! on LuckyMe/Wireblock became an underground sensation, particularly once word spread of his recording contract with Warp.