Knowing Is Half the Battle

The GI Joe movie is going to be terrible I'm sure. Why can't they make it like the new TV movie GI Joe Resolute (written by Warren Ellis?!) or these PSAs? I'm just sayin'.

X ON U2!!!

A lot of bands have unnecessarily long names, so I decided to create the nine-headed hydra of band names. I need to start a band just so I can call it this:

They Shoot Horses Don't They Clap Your Hands Say You Will Know Us By The Pains of Being Pure at Godspeed, You Black Rebel Motorcycle Soundtrack of Our Sunny Day Panic at The Brian Jonestown Massacre As I Lay Dying I Am The Plot to Blow Up The World Trade Social Club Does It Offend You, Yeah But I've Chosen The (International) Noise Conspiracy Through The Eyes of the Five Bodies Four Suburban Kids With Biblical Names With Blood Comes Thee Michelle Gun Elephant Bullet For My Airborne Toxic Black Moth Super Cute Is What We Aim For Everything But the Evolution Control Committee Against the Machines of Loving Makers of the Dead Travel Fast Training For Utopia On the Radio From The Crypt In Helsinki What Made Milwaukee Famous For The Painfully Pretty Girls Make Rich Kids On Scary Kids Scaring Handsome Boy Modeling School Presidents of the United States of America From Autumn to Saturday Looks Good to These Arms Are...Boris Yeltsin


Worst band name ever: Cute Is What We Aim For
Runners up: I Love You But I've Chosen Darkness, Suburban Kids With Biblical Names, and Five Bodies Four Graves

Any band names I left out?

Burton In Wonderland

I'll see you,too, in Wonderland on March 5th next year. But 'till then...

Seeking Staff for Hamburger Helper Beyonce Tour

That is NOT a joke. That was the real title for the following email:

Seeking Outgoing and Fit Females and Males for Hamburger Helper Promotion at Special Event!

Requirements:

- Fit and Attractive

- Must have previous experience demonstrating and promoting diet and fitness related products

- Friendly & Approachable

- Ability to sell and engage consumers

- Must be able to interact actively and informatively to consumers on the newest trends in exercise and healthy eating habits.

Event Details: Promote Hamburger Helper assist tour crew with any duties and event set up and breakdown and execution.

IMPORTANT: All staff must be very flexible with this schedule. Hours are subject to change! YOU MUST BE ABLE TO WORK ALL DATES. NO EXCEPTIONS.

The Truly Important Debates Continue

The pretentious bearded NY indie art "Harvard Grad Writing Program" alumni battle rages on with Brooklyn based Dirty Projectors. I don't really care about anyone else's reviews of Bitte Orca other than this one here (begin at 3:15):



Regardless of what I thought of Rise Above, the new album (especially "Stillness Is the Move") is pretty much amazing.

Ed. Note: Ok, I'm listening to the album while I write this, and I have to say that the guy singing kind of makes my brain want to kill itself. It's like Einar of The Sugarcubes or Fred Schneider of the B-52's (though Fred's voice is kind of endearing). Maybe they can survive on their own, but when compared to their female counterparts, it just sounds like Music Day at deaf camp.

"Surprise! You're Dead!"

My friend celebrated her 30th birthday last weekend with a "Death of My 20's" themed party. While at the party, gorging on three layer chocolate cake with tombstones made of Milano cookies, we got to talking about the Scary Stories books we all had as a kid. Well, everyone but me, as they were too damn scary to actually own. But I did read all of them, and more importantly, I had the incredibly disturbing images seared into my brain. I remember when the Scholastic Book Fair would come to my school and I would sit there reading the Scary Stories books, or borrow them from friends during lunch or recess.

I don't know what it is that's so hypnotic about the morbid imagery of those books; a disfigured head, a distorted horse skeleton, a bloated, rotting and gnarled image of "Sam's New Pet." It's the same way I always felt (and still feel to this day) about walking into the horror section of a good local video rental shop. I remember walking into Roy's TV and Appliance and picking up Ultraman on VHS then taking a furtive walk down the horror aisle (family section in the front right, then comedy, drama, and finally horror way at the back). I was never allowed to watch horror films as a kid, so I was left with the clamshell VHS box covers. Images from the covers of Nightmare On Elm Street, The Company of Wolves, Poltergeist (1 and 2), C.H.U.D., House, Puppet Master, Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 (it was the last movie on the bottom row of the second to last aisle), and Ghoulies stand out to this day.

Not to go too far off on a tangent, but I'm glad I was raised in the great horror filled world of the 80's instead of the depressing bland world of the 90's. Kids of the 90's were stuck with Scream and Deepstar Six and Dr. Giggles, and will never know what it was like to grow up in a world of The Fly and The Thing. Plus, no matter how bad the 80's movies were, the covers were always brilliant. In fact, the worse the movie, the more literal and flagrant the covers became.

Horror films are back to being amazing, and kids born in 2000 get to be traumatized by the likes of The Ring, Saw and The Descent (awesome movie cover).

In six months time, I'll be celebrating my 30th birthday, and three decades of horror film curiosity. In honor of this flashback down a darkened Memory Lane and a look towards a dystopia filled with Old Gods, here's a couple videos that incorporate some of my favorite things.




I love this video so much. Many tears of joy for using clips from Carnival of Souls, Plan 9 and Tarantula

A Threat to Marriage

I don't like to get political on these posts, but I think this story is something we all should worry about.


Conservatives Warn Quick Sex Change Only Barrier Between Gays, Marriage

He's Just Not That Into You

Joanna Newsom never looked better.

I went and saw Drag Me To Hell last weekend, and I left there feeling a whole lot of "meh," which translates in English to "that movie didn't really do anything for me, but I didn't hate it." Apparently I'm the only person in the world that feels this way, as Rotten Tomatoes, IMDB, and the four other people I saw it with (whose opinions pull more weight than the other two sites combined) all really enjoyed it. Personally, I'd rather just watch Army of Darkness or Evil Dead 2 again, and I just don't get what was so great about the movie.

Jump ahead to today, and I was listening to All Songs Considered (I know, I know. Someone's an aging SF hippie attempting to "stay fresh." Whatever. I love NPR.), and Bob Boilen was talking about bands he should love but doesn't. This has been on my mind a lot, as lots of people I trust are often times way into bands that I just don't enjoy, and I don't know what I'm missing.

Below is a list of bands that I'm just not that into (or flat out don't like).

1) The Clash (the later stuff in particular)
2) Pavement
3) Wilco
4) Elvis
5) REM
6) Devendra Banhart*
7) The Cure
8) Fleet Foxes
9) Morrissey*
10) Beach Boys
11) Joanna Newsom
12) Vampire Weekend*
*BARF!

For some bands it's easy to tell the problem, and it's an issue of hype being greater than the talent. Is Morrissey really that good? REALLY?! Does Vampire Weekend deserve to be Band of the Year or are they better as track 8 on some mix CD entitled Moderate at Best? Other times, like with Wilco, I get that the band is good (talented musicians/lyricist, etc. etc.) and see why others like them, but I just get a bit drowsy and wonder how long it takes to listen to a 3 1/2 minute song. Other artists (Elvis, Fleet Foxes) I have no reason or explanation. Don't expect me to have an answer (as I'm not nearly as self-aware or articulate as, say, Bob Boilen) as to why I don't like them.

I'd love to hear some feedback on bands that you can't get behind.

Note: If you ever need clarification on how to spell Devendra's name, here you go. Thanks Google. You knew what I was thinking.

Is Jarvis Cocker the Greatest Lyricist Ever?

"I am not Jesus, but I have the same initials."
-Dishes

I hopped out of the shower earlier today, and playing on my iTunes was the song "Leftovers" from Jarvis Cocker's latest album Further Complications. I usually don't pay attention to lyrics when I'm just mucking around the house, but I was caught by the first verse:

I met her in the museum of paleontology
And I make no bones about it
I said if you wish to study dinosaurs,
I know a specimen whose interest is undoubted

Good God. How horribly brilliant is that?! Who else could POSSIBLY sing lines that bad, delivered in a sea of syrupy emotion and yet still have it come across sincere? That verse is a self-deprecating yet somehow arrogant comment using a pun built around the word "paleontology". And the entire song (album, career) is just that good. He goes on to say:

Well, he says that he loves you like a sister
Well I guess, I guess that's relative
He says that he wants to make love to you
Well instead of "to", shouldn't that be "with"?

WHAT?! That's even more incredible than the other verse! This time it's a pun on platonic versus romantic love with a side of incest, and a grammar/speech lesson all rolled up. It's a constant blast of brilliance, track after track. Just look at these song titles taken just from his solo career: "Caucasian Blues," "I Never Said I Was Deep," "Fat Children," and "Disney Time." Amazing.

Cocker is also the most over-the-top sexually charged lyricist, and yet at the same time a goofy, beady-eyed Brit, attempting to channel Michael Caine from (what else) the movie Pulp. He makes fun of sexuality while simultaneously indulging in it. But that's what makes his stuff (lyrics, charisma, projected personality, image) work so well. He's in on the joke. He can say "I know that you're engaged to him/but I know that you want something to play with baby," with a wink, but sincerely mean it at the same time. No one could possibly do what he does. Check out the Charlotte Gainsbourg album 5:55 (lyrics by Cocker) and you'll see that anyone delivering Jarvis' words other than Jarvis just doesn't work.

Perhaps it just really dates me ranting about someone so associated with 90's Brit Pop (does anyone other than Mojo still care about The Stone Roses?) but whatever. Jarvis (via Pulp) said it best 11 years ago:

You can dye your hair but it's the one thing you can't change.
Can't run away from yourself.
In the meantime we try, etc. Funny how it all falls away.
So help the aged....


Amazing video for the single off his last album Jarvis.

"Live Every Week Like It's Shark Week"

Today's the day everyone's been waiting for. It's the official release of Mega Shark Vs. Giant Octopus. For those of you who don't know, MSVGO is the brilliant movie about a shark that can be described only as "mega" and an octopus that adjectives fail to do justice, though the director describes it as "giant." And what's even more important than the plot is the fact that it stars Deborah "Not Tiffany" Gibson, and Lorenzo "The Renegade" Lamas! This is a movie that's so brilliant and amazing that it has completely overshot theaters and gone straight to DVD. Hopefully next week I can try to find some financial results for the flick, and we'll see how many thousands (no...MILLIONS) of DVD's it sells.

Really though, I know this is just going to be a situation where the trailer is better than the movie. Actually, I think that's what today's post should be. Trailers that are better than the full movie. So yeah, here's some random ones in no particular order. If anyone has some flicks to add, let me know!

1) Special
2) The Ten
3) Alfie (The Michael Caine one)
4) A.I.
5) Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
6) Final Fantasy
7) Corpse Bride
8) High Tension
9) I'll Sleep When I'm Dead
10 Sukiyaki Western Django

Why Is This The Greatest Website Ever...

...and why am I only now finding out about it? It's like my nightmares are having a psychadelic seizure. It's way past disturbing, but at least it makes me look at Harold and Maude in a new light.
It may possibly take over this page as my new favorite.

Strange Love Or: How I learned to Stop Wondering and Love the Frogs

Lately I haven't been able to stop listening to the album Histoire de Melody Nelson, and it got me wondering what it is about Serge Gainsbourg that makes him so awesome. I know that so much of his brilliance is in the puns and depth of his words, but I don't speak French. I'm definitely no Francophile that has to be into all things France. In fact I really don't care about Paris, the Eiffel Tower, the "romantic atmosphere" or anything like that. I can't take French rap albums seriously (picture Xzibit trying to rhyme the word "Sarkozy" for two hours) and escargot is stupid. It all just seems like The Emperor's New Clothes. People are told to love France, so they do. There are some great things that France has exported including Vincent Cassel, Air, French fries, the movie Fantastic Planet, and mimes. Other than that, there's not a whole lot there that inspires me to spend time thinking about the country.

So why Serge Gainsbourg? At first glance you might think he has a lot working against him. Was he a creepy looking troll? Yes. Was he an insane alcoholic degenerate dirt bag? Most definitely. Did he hang out with PETA friendly racist homophobes like Brigitte Bardot? Totally. Was he French? Oui. Really all he had going for him was that he was married to Jane Birkin and popularized a duet about underage incest pedophilia (sung with his daughter, Charlotte, no less).


But everything that works against him is also what I love about him. How can I not like a guy that kept getting more and more famous for being a raging, hostile and insane yet lovably charming and self-loathing narcissist? The Vatican, BBC, and repressed political right also didn't like the guy, and if that's not worth giving him a holiday, I don't know what is. Hell, he even managed to make Bob Marley hate him! Throw in a concept album about a middle-aged man hitting a teenage girl with a Rolls Royce and then going on to seduce her, and you might as well make him the captain of the SS Asshole.

Anyways. Thank you for being a nutcase, Mr. Gainsbourg. Your misogyny and verbal abuse, particularly towards Whitney Houston, is nothing short of inspiring.

Whitney Houston vs Serge Gainsbourg
by BBBVIDEO

Now That's Just Lazy Awareness

Really? Just a walk? I think I'd probably run.

Lost World Goes 60's Psych...Cambodian Style

It's not often that I get to see a performance of somethng and have it blow my expectations to high hell. I usually have to set the bar pretty low (which says a lot more about the events I go to than anything else), but not this time. Tonight at the Castro Theater there was a screening of the 1925 movie The Lost World while the band Dengue Fever performed a score live. It was unbelievable! Definitely one of the best shows (if I can even just call it that) I've ever been to! From the opening credits to the close of the curtain, it was an incredibly moving and awesome experience. Dengue Fever's score was beautifully arranged, and it changed the entire movie. Whether they were performing a mysterious 60's psych sound driven by creeping organ music or a French accordion song or a frenetic dance beat as a Brontosaurus trampled through London, Dengue Fever played one of the most inspired sets I've ever seen. Every scene was so rich and dynamic, and the dramatic acting of the stars felt like they were performing to the same music I was hearing. The band's performance was tight and professional but organic and fluid. Dengue Fever earned every second of the standing ovation they got at the end of the night.

If I have to pick a favorite LA psych band that sings in Khmer, I'd have to go with this one.

Please go buy an album, purchase a song, see their concert or something.



PS,
I really see that without angry sarcasm to mask my inability to write, I just sound like a tool. Don't worry, I'll be back to my usual blend of insecurity hidden in a lovely sandwich of bitter humor by next post.

Cinco De Mayo: More Than a Cheap Trick

I've been obsessing over the Rudo Y Cursi soundtrack since I heard it a couple weeks ago. I don't know much about Mexican music, so hearing The Black Lips (radicool), Juana Molina, and Nortec Collective covering traditional Mexican songs was pretty mind blowing (expanding) for me, but then I saw this video:



This video has it all! Gael Garcia Bernal covering Cheap Trick in Spanish while Latinas gyrate in a field of flowers. Plus ponies and accordions. Now if only the video had chili flavored watermelon candy and the housekeeping staff of the Four Seasons, it would have every great Mexican export.

This more than makes up for the Swine Flu.

Moondog is the Blind Emerald Seer?

I know I'm going to lose everyone on this, but no one's reading anyways.

The question I pose to you:

Is Moondog the blind Emerald Seer from Krull?

If you haven't seen Krull or you haven't listened to Moondog, stop everything and rectify that. I don't recommend doing both at the same time or you're likely to make your head explode, Scanners style.

Emerald Seer


Moon Dog

Can People Distinguish Pâté From Dog Food?

Apparently they can't.

And to think I was called a jerk when I served dog food at a party in Sacramento and didn't tell anyone. I was just a forward thinker!

Britney's Back. And By Britney, I Mean Nic

So yeah, I'm back. I haven't been writing on here in a long time, but like any good hero, I had to disappear for the people to recognize the void left when I was gone. It was like A World Without Superman. Beautiful women and men in tights mourned my disappearance. It was also like that Paula Cole song. Where HAVE all the cowboys gone? They went the way of the dodo. Except for this cowboy, who went the way of the shark. I didn't have to evolve, I just had to keep moving; traveling.

So travel I did. I walked the earth like Caine in Kung-Fu, I shopped like Vivian Ward in Pretty Woman, and I read like the Frog Brothers in Lost Boys. I watched a few movies, went to a couple concerts, and ate a whole lot of cheese. I met Michael Chabon, saw the musical Wicked, and appreciated the hidden humor in Àbdu'l-Bahà's Some Answered Questions. I got a scooter the same week my friend got in a scooter accident, and I discovered that the old menu at Front Porch beats the new menu of Farmer Brown's. All in all it was good to stop writing for a bit, but I'm happy to be back.

Now you can breathe a sigh of relief.