Brain Lab 7

A Stare-Off I'd Like to See

I don't sit around trying to come up with this shit. It just occurs to me once in a while, and if I don't expel it somewhere, the goblins in my brain will use it for fuel. For the record.

As Robbie Fulks delivers the spoken intro to this song (on the Corporate Country Sucks video podcast), looking into the camera, he kind of looks and sounds like Dwight Schrute. Right? Yes.

Assorted Assortments

My friend Paul is interning at NPR at the moment, and he's specifically been working on the Web-only program Open Mic. What will my ecstatic fellow music dork cull from the bins of the Great Unsigned next?

It appears the other day was "Don't Look Directly At The Camera Day" at The A.V. Club. See?



The day before that, my Mark Linkous interview was totally at the top of the page, hence Milwaukee editor Steve and I dominated, bringing a little Wisconsin-power back to AVC for one glorious day, as he pointed out. Or something. Speaking of new guys, the company's announced that it's launching a D.C. print edition soon, so if you or someone you know is an awesome entertainment writer/editor up there, bug my boss.

My other boss recently lost his oldest cat. R.I.P., Oscar Phipps. Once I watched Keith's pets for a weekend. Oscar spent most of the time posturing like a pissed-off, feline Judi Dench on the dining-room table, and indeed, as frail old cats go, he was dignified and slightly threatening. I liked his style.

I'd Use Church As An Excuse to Skip Northwestern Games*, But...

I really try my hardest to forget about the inanities of life at my alma mater, but an Obscure Store posting took me back to the ridiculousness for a minute. A Muslim student group at Northwestern wants a space to pray in during home football games, and I suppose there are valid arguments both for and against that, but what really made me laugh was the response from an athletics official:

"This is a request we took seriously," he said. "We appreciate all student support, but we didn't feel there was a suitable area for prayer. There's not enough space in the arena."

It's an arena! Officially, it seats 8,117 people, and, well, it's pretty damn big and it's near another large building, if I recall.

(*If I were religious.)

Brain Lab 8

I'm Back, With Post-Holiday Bargains

Sometimes You Rise Above it, Sometimes You Sneak Below: My Favorite Lyrics of 2006

With A.V. Club's '06 music issue coming up, I got into a best-of-the-year frame of mind, which was odd, because I've never worked on a best-of list, and I'm pretty new to the paper and to writing about entertainment professionally. I'm still glad I got to put my piece in, because I like my job and the folks I work with. Rather than pretend to speak with some kind of authority twice over, I figured I'd just pull some of my favorite lyrics from the year's releases (no ranking, though). Here goes.


Hamell On Trial, "Hey Boss," from Songs For Parents Who Enjoy Drugs

You might wonder, what's my political affiliation,
well, I consider it to be one of extreme moderation,
I'd love to ride up Pennsylvania Ave. and see the right
with all their heads mounted on poles and I'd like 'em at the same height.
(I'm a Libra, I need that balance.)

Actually, the funniest tracks on this album are two sketches called "Maddy's," in which Ed Hamell places a delivery order to Maddy's Fascist Diner. Overall, I think this album was my favorite this year.


Alejandro Escovedo, "Sacramento And Polk," from The Boxing Mirror

I never could jump from high enough
I never could jump from high enough
I never could jump from high enough
A third-story jump ain't high enough,
It's just a mess on Market Street
(Chorus) I'm under a spell her name

Palo Alto Hotal at Sacramento and Polk
The neighbors spend their days
Washing their socks and staring out the windows
In a thorazine haze
They don't know what to do with their hands
They vaguely remember some plans
But that was so long
That was so long ago
(Chorus) I'm under a spell her name

The Thermals, "An Ear For Baby," from The Body, The Blood, The Machine

So pull out your dead roots,
pull out your best suit,
you know, the one they're gonna bury you in

Good luck getting God on the phone
good luck getting even a tone
you can trust me, it's not a test
and I won't leave you in this mess
Any questions?
You, in the back

Pernice Brothers, "Cruelty To Animals," from Live A Little

In the coming years, let's try and milk a fortune off them
I think we're qualified by now

Alouette, gentille alouette,
Head to toe so thoroughly until we're both dismembered
Alouette, gentille alouette,
Naive, yes, but none the worse, spinning glue back into horses...

Todd Snider, "The Devil You Know," from The Devil You Know

Better turn on my alarm and lock myself in
helicopters over the house again

Sometimes you rise above it
sometimes you sneak below
somewhere in between believing in heaven
and facing the devil you know

Frank Black and Reid Paley, "I'm Not Dead (I'm In Pittsburgh)," from Fast Man Raider Man

It's all just one big monkey house to me
Just living ain't the same as being free
Don't stop and think about it
It'll only make you sad
Come put me out of my misery

'Cause I'm not dead (I'm in Pittsburgh)
Where a man can lose his mind
I'm not dead (I'm in Pittsburgh)
They've got me suited up for crazy time

Hate to wank my own horn here, but my favorite bit from the interview I did with Frank Black:

AVC: Are there other musicians you'd like to work with?

FB: Do you know any nice guys? Introduce me to a nice guy, and he'll probably end up on my next record.

Brain Lab 6

Another Fine Dresser

I did an interview with Lisa Lampanelli in advance of her show here in Madison, and she told me to come say hi afterwards. I had to get a picture of what she was wearing, because it was just so stupendous. See?



Sorry for the shitty picture quality; I was in a rush to get to the DeVotchKa show across town.

I did like Lisa's set, although I wish she'd done more of the new material she's talked about. Well, maybe some of it was new, but it sounded like the familiar race- and gay-baiting stuff. I would have laughed harder if her two openers hadn't reminded me how unfunny comedy like that can be. Of course, Lisa's attitude would probably be "Fuck you, you part-Injun faggot, they're hard-working comedians." What I want to know is, after you've been inured by Lisa's act, how many laughs can you get out of Tracy Locke and Wendell (I know nothing about them and am probably misspelling Wendell's name), who basically came on and did a more coy, undeveloped version of what Lisa did? OK, Wendell's set focused a lot more on the "Yep, I'm a big fag and may be prone to doing things gays are often thought to be prone to doing!" stuff, but frankly I've exchanged better gay jokes with my gay friends. I can't remember any of them right now, but I do remember laughing harder at them.

I'm not even saying these two were un-funny, I'm saying that there's a point where pushing it isn't really pushing it at all. Lisa is friendly to the people she picks on, and she'll eventually say that she doesn't mean the stuff she's saying, but she's convincing as a racist, bitter bitch on a tear. She makes the crudest, dumbest jokes funny because she plows right into them without any of that cut-rate, huckster-y, "ain't-I-funny?" aftertaste that so many comedians (including Tracy and Wendell) have. Hey, I fucking know when I'm at a comedy show. I don't need a comedian's personality to constantly remind me that, "HEY HEY HEY, IT'S FUNNY TIME!!!!" Of course it's fucking funny time, and of course these people are just trying to have a decent career and have fun doing it and make people laugh, and yet a lot of these people just seem to be trying too hard. I'm not sure this is even a clear distinction, but some comedians act like comedians and some comedians (most of the ones I like) just act like people who say funny stuff.

Flavor-Off!

Reporting on development, local flavor, and whatnot eventually led me to question the whole idea of local flavor. I went to college in Evanston, IL, right as that city's condo struggle really started to heat up, and I decided I preferred new buildings that stuck out boldly in their neighborhoods to new buildings that stuck out blandly. The latter were always just kinda ugly and never actually looked like the neighboring older buildings anyway. So what about new things that more or less do fit in but are obviously new anyway? I was in Portland, Or., this weekend, and people there seem to pride themselves on keeping old signs on their shops and buildings. Even a Hilton downtown has light-up letters that have to be 20 years old. Then there's this.



I saw this and coined a new term: Flavor invaders. They come in from out of town and co-opt the local flavor. Flavor invaders. A few minutes later, I decided I really couldn't fault the Qwest people when I saw this over a long-established local Greek restaurant:

A Mensware Missive

Here come the only two firm, absolute statements I will ever make about clothes and/or fashion.

Dear American Males:

1. Stop Wearing Khaki Pants. Khaki pants seem to be the big thing for men these days. In fact, I'm convinced that one day, ugly-ass khakis will be as essential at '00s-themed costume parties as hot-pink sweatbands are at '80s-themed costume parties now. I know that khaki pants are part of an effort to bring a bright, breezy feel to otherwise formal attire. Problem is, I've never seen one person, ever, who looks good in khakis. And, as I'm known to leave my apartment once in a while, I have seen many, many men wearing khakis. I bet some other take on the light-brown scheme might work, but khakis just over-accentuate the legs and crotch. This is why jeans and blue and black pants are still better, even if one is perceived to be too informal and the others are perceived to be too stuffy.

2. Stop Wearing Pleated Pants. Especially pleated khaki pants, but pleated pants of any color ought to be burned. One can argue that pleats make pants more comfortable around the waist/crotch/hips, which means they are for people who are too lazy to find pants that fit them comfortably. In other words, pleats don't really need to be there. Why not add little frilly borders along with them. And all this pleated shit is invading the cheap-ass stores where I tend to shop, like Marshalls, Ross, etc. Stop it. Pleats are not for cheap people like me. I'm against clothes that generall have too much stuff that they don't need to have, and excess seems to be the trend in clothes today. It's hard enough to find a fucking pair of sneakers that aren't loaded down with logos, gel compartments, massage motors and whatnot. Pleats are for people who have too much money to spend. What's worse is when I see an otherwise good-looking, trim fellow wearing pleats. What is he thinking?

"I may be 35, in good shape, and in a fine, stable job, but you're never too young to look like you have one of those fatty crotch pouches."

Dressing badly is practically in my job description, but even I have standards.

Comedy Resurgence Now Official, Except for CoC

Far be it from me to criticize a trade publication for following the money, but this story in Variety smacks of "last-minute news analysis spun from the obvious." I really wanted to post something about it on the A.V. Club Newswire, but I got to it a few days late. The nut of the story is certainly something I'd like to hear more about: Stand-up comedy is on the rise. The story's main examples? Dane Fucking Cook, Dave Chappelle, Larry The Cable Guy, Comedy Central. Of course, Cook's sales are huge, but the point isn't that the entertainment world can support a few comedians of military-industrial popularity. The point is that the entertainment world can support tons of comedians at varying levels of popularity, and the story gets this, but it doesn't really delve into any of the more financially moderate success stories, or really many of the niches that comedy is starting to get into. Yes, it mentions the gay, Asian, and Latino comedy markets, but doesn't talk about, say, the people who come out to see tours like the Comedians Of Comedy, a group of comedians who for the most part are a hell of a lot funnier than Cook, and, for Christ's sake, got a documentary that aired on Showtime and Comedy Central.

Of course there's no way the CoC tour's making anywhere near what Cook is making, but they've stayed productive and they've reached picky people like me. Plus, CoC doesn't feel so goddamn cheap because it's well-rounded. A CoC date without Patton Oswalt? I could see it happening (maybe there've been a few of those; I'm honestly not sure). There'd still be Eugene Mirman, Brian Posehn, Zach Galifianakis, and/or Maria Bamford to choose from, and that would make for a pretty cool bill. A Tourgasm date without Dane Cook, but still billed as "Dane Cook's Tourgasm"? Oh, they're trying a whole bunch of those right now, and I honestly have no broad assessment of how that's going. However, I do know that a date scheduled here in Madison--a huge college town--got cancelled. (Ironically, this stop was planned for just four days after Cook's show at Madison Square Garden.) I'm also seeing cancellations in Baltimore and Portland. I really can't conclude anything from this because I don't know why. Maybe there are conflicts I don't know about, but then again it wouldn't surprise me if this ain't exactly selling out everywhere. Cook sold Tourgasm as his way of helping out other comedians who've been pounding the pavement for a long time, but let's see how long it takes any of those three guys to find the success and love that Mirman and Posehn have found independent of their tour's centerpiece. Smaller, weirder, better comedians who can succeed without piggybacking entirely on the big guy? That's news.

I hope this isn't an "other journalists should share my priorities/news judgment in their entirety" post. I just hate to see a good angle go to waste.

Dear Fellow Concert-Goers: Shut the Fuck Up Once In a While

Before I get into this: What I'm about to complain about didn't stop me from enjoying the two shows in this post. They were far more good than bad. But I still like to bitch. Contradictions onward!

My friend Julia and I went to see the Decemberists in Chicago this weekend, and, this being Chicago, which has awesome rock crowds, the show sold out and the Riviera Theatre was packed pretty damn tight. Not everyone there is going to be a Decemberists fanatic or a particularly big fan (I'd say I'm a moderate fan?), but when everyone has paid more than $30 for a ticket, it's a fair bet that their main point in coming is to hear the band's set. And drink beer and maybe talk a little (I'm not above making the occasional comment during a show or movie). Maybe it's just that I grew up so close to the Orlando Area Amusement-Industrial Gulag, but when I've bought a ticket to something, my attitude is always, "GOD DAMMIT, WE ARE GOING TO HAVE EVERY MEASLY DIME'S WORTH OF FUN, LIKE IT OR NOT!"

We're doing some mild calisthenics to shake off the soporific fog of the opening act, Alasdair Roberts (I don't just mean he was boring, I mean that his set was pretty much audio-induced naptime), and a guy and his girlfriend squeeze through, saying they need to find their friends. Being nice folks, we let them. And then they plant themselves in front of us, blocking our view. "The bitch is shorter than the asshole, so why don't we switch places?" I say to Julia, who's a bit shorter than me. I'm standing two or three inches behind these fucking people, almost yelling, and they don't hear me. This is more than the crowd noise should cover up, and my intention is that they'll hear us, but they don't, which makes it even funnier. Hard heads, is all I'm saying. So we manage to squeeze to the side of them, enough that the view of the stage is a bit better, and it seems to be resolved.

A few minutes later, the Decemberists come out and start into "Leslie Anne Levine," and damned if they even get through a verse before the girl turns around to the guy and starts yapping full-bore. Not just an "I'm so excited! Colin Meloy's so dreeeeeamy!" or anything, but deliberate, prolonged windbaggery of the highest order. So I do something that can really creep people out, which is to fake a tubercular coughing fit, and because we're packed so close, I can't be blamed for coughing right at the back of her head. This seems to bug them for a minute, but then they're right back at it. And they keeps it up, through about three songs, and then we decide to find another place to stand. As we're moving out, we run into a couple who say, "Hey, we'll totally back you up, those people are assholes!" But it was frankly just easier to move. Thank you for your solidarity, Tall-ish Guy and Woman. The four of us could have stomped those two nitwits, but the show itself was just too damn good to interrupt for a brawl.

From further back, we can't hear Bitch and Asshole, but Julia can see them, and she tells me they're still talking. Who in the fuck pays $30+ to stand and fucking talk the whole time? If you've got to talk at a show, there are always lobbies, bathrooms, or the sidewalk. Places where people aren't actively listening to music, places where people will soon start finding your severed, bashed-in heads. When did this talking shit become acceptable? I'm sure there's always been a loud jerk or two at a given show, but when I read about concerts in the 70s and 60s, or listen to live albums from that period, I get the impression that crowds were generous and attentive for good sets (and this was a great set; given the chance I'd pay $30+ to see it again). I'm not saying we should all sit there like obedient little doggies, but for fuck's sake, let other people at least fucking hear the music without your mindless contamination. I'm sure I've been to shows where it's worse; most of the people in our area and closer to the stage just seemed to be singing along, dancing, etc., all of which actually make the concert fun and show the audience's gratitude to the band.

It could just be because I'm anti-social, and a lot of the social conversations I try to have end at awkward small talk. Then again, I've enjoyed of long, rambling conversations about a lot of dorky, silly stuff. I just don't believe in having them all the time, and I don't believe that running your jaw is inherently valuable. No one's above yammering about the stupid little details of his/her life or anything else, but there are times not to do it. One time: When you're watching a solo acoustic concert in a space where sound carries pretty well. Today, Chris Smither played a free concert here in Madison, and all the stray chatter in the audience reeally distracted me at times. Look, people, just can it once in a while. You probably won't miss anything important in your stream of verbal barf, and you'll actually fucking hear the music. Again: Sometimes you can't help talking a little, and that's one thing, but when you just keep talking incessantly, you're an asshole. I could almost understand if this were some crappy act, because this is one of those events people just kind of go to because it's there--like a couple of zoo concerts I wrote about this summer. But this is a guy who still writes fantastic songs, with a guitar style to match. Maybe I just happened to be near the few people who were talking. If it was important to them to have their conversations right then and there, why'd the come to a damn concert?

Alright, this is turning into a one-person PTA meeting.

I'm far too picky about some things, I know. There's just nothing worse to me than the din of dozens of people having dozens of useless conversations all at once. It's like listening to zombies feed.

Mis-trope

Brain Lab 5

"Shove 'Em Up There Again, Dennehy!"

Patton Oswalt and the Pennsylvania Macaroni Company CD EP

I was browsing about a couple weeks ago and discovered that Chunklet is selling this limited-edition CD, which captures the last 18.5 minutes of the Comedians of Comedy tour's stop in Chicago this spring (I was there). This is the only time I've paid $18 or so for something so short. Hell, I usually won't spend that on a full-length album 'cause it's a rip. This catches three bits after Patton Oswalt's set, when Eugene Mirman, Brian Posehn, and Maria Bamford joined him onstage. At this point in the evening, all four have done pretty damn good sets on their own and people are having a good time but are exhausted.

"If you guys are wondering, 'Oh, my God, I wish I could travel in a van with these great, funny, awesome people!' No you don't," Patton says, and the group recreates some of its road-spawned in-jokes, which turn out to be funnier than most of the road stuff in the Comedians Of Comedy documentary. These jokes are ways for the comedians to torture each other and/or themselves on the road, so at this point they're perversely dragging things out for the audience. It's like having a prank played on you and enjoying and admiring it from setup to finish.

The title joke gets more and more convoluted as it goes on. Patton's tourmates force him to make up songs, in the style of Leon Redbone, about the Pennsylvania Macaroni Company, which he spotted on the road near Pittsburgh. The subjects of the songs keep getting trickier to improvise around: Does the company have any specials today? Do you have any health-code violations we should know of? Can you tell us something about the founders? And what he says keeps getting more ridiculous. He refers to the last of those as a "fucking Cormac McaCarthy novel." Then Eugene asks him to list the company's pastas in alphabetical order, and he does that pretty well, and remember, he still has to answer in the form of a Leon Redbone-style song. I don't think I'd enjoy this as much if I hadn't been there, though--it just makes it better to know that the show had already been building for a couple of hours, with Patton drinking a lot of Scotch throughout. It's great to see four comedians just riffing off each other without any of them having to, say, take a shit in a bucket.

Brain Lab 4: Here is Your Throat Back, Thanks for the Loan

The Yes Man

Have you seen the Yes Man? The Yes Man is that guy at the show who believes he enjoys it more thoroughly and more actively than everyone else. Sure, you see people at shows who get drunk and yell a lot and make metal fingers at the band and all that shit, but the Yes Man is up to something else entirely. He is the audience member who thinks that overdoing it is essential to enjoying music, and, I bet, life in general. I could just be making this up, but I see a guy (yes, it's almost always a male) fitting this description at most of the shows I go to. He's not just there to have a good time; he's there to enjoy and appreciate the show as doggedly and thoroughly as possible, all while projecting how proud he is to be so good at appreciating.

I ended up sitting near a table of three Yes Men when I saw Rory Block last week. Block is a pretty good songwriter in her own right and a fine keeper of the acoustic blues—which of course is full of esoteric technique and lore, or, as one of the YM referred to it during a conversation I overheard, "mythos." (The YM doesn't have to be outright pedantic, but these fellows were.) So if a YM knows anything about Robert Johnson (which in this case would be important, because Block's latest album, The Lady And Mr. Johnson, consists entirely of Johnson covers), he's got a head start. He'll catch the in-jokes, the lyrics regarded as especially poignant or significant in blues-nerd circles, and all the soulfullest guitar licks and whatnot. And, in the case of this circle's ringleader (kinda overweight, ponytail), he'll smile and let it linger a little too long, wag his head back and forth as if to say "mm-mm-mm-mm-GOOD!" and even tap his foot for a measure two after a song is over. When I first noticed this YM's behavior, I wrote in my notebook that this is the kind of guy who plays air guitar with accurate chord fingerings. And a few minutes later, he started doing just that.

See, at this show, the artist was providing everything you could reasonably ask for (she's good live!)—a fine performance with a little necessary banter and self-promotion. But for the YM, that's not the whole picture. His experience isn't complete unless he reacts just-so.

Why do I mind? It's not as if these people were keeping me from seeing or hearing or enjoying anything. I think it's because, as Matt's told me, I have a tendency to project the audience onto the performer. Which is just his fancy way of saying this: If one guy's overreacting the whole mood of the show can seem forced to me. Which gets trickier when I'm seeing a band that's always going to have an "emo" label stuck on its ass, like The Appleseed Cast. OK, that's a stupid label, but it's part of the language now, so I try to deal with it. I know they have some whiny numbers, but a lot of the whining gets covered up a lot on their latest album, Peregrine. (I think they kinda make up for it with song titles like "Ceremony," "Woodland Hunter (Part I) ," and "Woodland Hunter (Part II)," if you're into that sort of thing.) In fact, if you want to mope out, you can still enjoy it on that level, and if you don't want to mope out, you can enjoy it as the layered, well-textured, mature (maturing, maybe?) rock it is. I think it's the drums that tie it all together for me. Well, a lot of things tie it together, but hear me out. TAC's drummer kicks ass on a purely musical level, but in every measure he hits a few really emphatic beats that basically sound like headbanging instructions for emo kids: "Hey kid, do it here, and put your back into it!"

The YM at TAC's show here on Saturday followed those instructions impeccably for a solid hour. Sometimes people see a guy acting like that and figure he's just messing with the band, but after seeing him deliberately keep it up for the whole show, you realize that nobody expends that much physical energy for irony. At least not without pay. Does some powerful figure in the record industry have voodoo dolls of these people?

Then again, I'm the guy at the show fussing with my notebook so I can remember all this stuff just-so for my blog. Where does that put me?

At the World's Fair

Never had he felt so close to nature—nor so far apart.

Brain Lab 3