Month In Tunes Administration: So Relatively Fucked

In "Month In Tunes Administration," World's Biggest Corporation will sample the music used in our FDA-condemned seasonal-affective disorder experiments.


FEBRUARY 2008

A 30-degree day seems like a treat right now: Stupid people are less irritating; food tastes better; everyone's more attractive. Still, it's been hard to get excited about a whole lot of shit. In fact, the well-circulated "recorded in a lonely Wisconsin cabin" story behind Bon Iver's For Emma, For Ever Ago made it all the more tempting to retreat back into the album when Jagjaguwar formally released it this month. A mega-hyped indie record that sounds like the opposite of mindless chatter: That kind of balances out psychologically, right? So, anyways, February at least provided a few ideal records for being left the fuck alone to. Yay!

Earth, The Bees Made Honey In The Lion's Skull (Southern Lord): This post is late because I got my hands on this pretty late in the month and deserved a few good, slow listens. Seven instrumentals basking in open spaces and some amazingly patient playing. Also, album cover of the month goes to Arik Roper:


Promotional snack tie-in, anyone?

Spires That In The Sunset Rise, Curse The Traced Bird (Secret Eye): If Earth's latest recalls a gauzy sunset over a canyon, Spires That In The Sunset Rise recalls, say, a fever with a side of fleas. Ghastly, beautiful vocals scratch up against the sounds of mbira, spike fiddle, and abused banjo. Eastern-folk sounds unravel into free-flowing disorientation.

Vid Libert, A Return To Mayaguez (s/r): Vid Libert is a Madison singer-songwriter. When he pokes his head out, he's arguably the best in town. Here's the intro from my local A.V. Club feature on him:

Vid Libert’s new album, A Return To Mayaguez, dips into an isolated seam between his own little world and the real one. Following up on 2005’s Mayaguez, the Madison singer-songwriter filled his eight-track recorder with his own unassuming voice, drums, guitars, melodica, percussion, keys, toy instruments, and more, spacing it all out with a dub-inspired ear for warm layering and reverb. It’s a very good record, to borrow phrase from his song “Make No Mistake,” for getting through the day, whether Libert’s calmly philosophizing about fulfillment on “Maybe That’s Enough” or drifting through the glittery instrumental “Oh, Osho.”

Headlights, Some Racing, Some Stopping (Polyvinyl): Reviewed here.

Todd Barry, From Heaven (Comedy Central): February got a crucial Valium-powered cheer-up from Todd Barry's latest. It matched not only the pace of life, but also the graying snowbanks. "I challenge you comedically!" "No, honey! Not again! Remember when we went to that play and you wanted to challenge that actor theatrically? You got your ass handed to you!"

American Music Club, The Golden Age (Merge): February got a crucial Valium-powered cheer-up from American Music Club's latest. It matched not only the pace of life, but also the graying snowbanks. "Will there be a band? God, I hope not!" Song of the month: MP3: "All The Lost Souls Welcome You To San Francisco"

Random-ass surprise: My friend Shelby was kind enough to introduce me to the work of western-swing standby Bob Wills. Despite his talents as a bandleader, it's hard not to giggle (and improvise along) when he cheers on his bandmates in that ridiculous Mickey Mouse voice (see "Quoted"). Also, hardly random, but I didn't get around to picking up St. Vincent's 2007 album, Marry Me, until a few days ago. Same goes for Pissed Jeans' second album, Hope For Men:

Shows of the month:The Blind Shake (2/6, High Noon Saloon, Madison); The Midwest Beat and Plexi 3 (2/9, Crystal Corner Bar, Madison); Icarus Himself and Sleeping In The Aviary (2/16, Mother Fool's Coffeehouse, Madison); Say Hi (2/21, Project Lodge, Madison); Sleeping In The Aviary, The Dark Horse Project, The Scarring Party, Crochetd Machete, and The Cowboy And The Frenchman (2/23, Project Lodge, Madison);
Dub Trio (2/25, High Noon Saloon, Madison); Zebras and Czarbles (2/28, Nottingham Co-op, Madison).

Untimely Ript: Where They Pour Coca-Cola Just Like Vintage Wine

"I wish that I could push a button and talk in the past and not the present tense..."


Welcome to Untimely Ript, WBC's little showcase for tunes jacked from just about any damn year. Everything will be lovingly yanked from vinyl and full of crackly goodness. I was initially planning to do this as a separate blog altogether, but then I realized I might as well put some more content on the shitty content-starved blog I already fucking have. Plus, if every annoying jackass in America started up a new blog every time he fell out of bed with some gimmicky new idea, there wouldn't be enough room on the Internet for all the world's over-enthusiastic music bloggers to share buckets of MP3s. Right?

Don't expect a great deal of recent stuff, except perhaps the occasional cool 7". It isn't that vinyl is better, or that the past was better, or any of that crap. It's that what you get in the vinyl bins, especially at thrift stores and used-record places and street fairs and whatnot, makes for so many surprises. It's mediated in a strange, arbitrary, and unpredictable way, but not by distributors.

But before getting into all that, I'll share the opening track from a record I really love, in a non-fleeting, non-kitschy way: "Brilliant Mistake," from Elvis Costello's King Of America. It is one of his best albums. I tried to explain why in this A.V. Club piece, so I'll leave it at that for now. It is also totally worth buying in non-crackly MP3 or CD format.

Unwanted Heaviness Bummers!

"Every time you eat a steak, a hippie's hacky sack goes into the sewer." —Patton Oswalt

Two instances, all in a Sunday afternoon's strolling:

1. Browsing in a bookstore. There's a poetry reading going on in the middle of the place, and you kind of have to maneuver through the audience to get from section to section. Lots of middle-aged faces knotted up into dazed smiles that say, "Isn't poetry just delightful? Wow, what a wonderful world unfolds for me every time some other fellow steps up to the podium to declaim! Now if only I could track down a taste bud-sizzling bowl of farina..." Still, easy enough to ignore, until one fellow starts cranking up the discomfort, belting out some half-assed satirical rhyme about (I'm paraphrasing here) fossil fuel-burning Bush and his grand greedy schemes. Chuckles and claps after every zinger. The performance ends with a booming cry of "...American GREEEED!" So, there you have it. A little slice of intellectual life in America, and maybe a clue as to why the left seems just a little bit helpless against the reign of Fuckface. Since that encompasses half of my adolescence and all of my adult-ish life so far, I gotta wonder why I don't respond better to the blind anger and mockery it has inspired. Maybe because that shit starts to sound pretty damn dull and useless in its eighth fucking year?

2. Catching up with my pal and his girlfriend in a shop around the corner. My friend, definitely better than I am at stirring up conversations with strangers, has the clerk on a roll about her book in progress. She's got a slightly challenging idea about sexism, gender, and, in short how men have it tough these days. At first I want to lump this in with the previous experience, but it's nice to see some actual effort going on in someone's head, and maybe a bit of modesty too. And then it's time to goof off for the rest of the afternoon. Yay!

Assorted Shit

Here is an Arrested Development-inspired band name: Dad Likes Leather. It is up for grabs. No need to thank me.

Hell Date: This godless piece of teleshit isn't nearly tough enough on its victims. OK, the dwarf in the little devil suit popping out to deliver the news that, yep, "You're on Hell Date!" is pretty fucked-up, but the meat of the date adds up to rather mild discomfort, at least when one considers the scope of human suffering. Seriously, has anyone on this show ever genuinely feared for his/her life? Better, more deeply fucked ideas to follow.

I'm still not entirely clear what "lumberjack chic" is, but The Walrus has compiled a gallery of expensive Canadian doo-dads. I also don't know anything about photographing expensive doo-dads, but I believe that particle-board backgrounds class up everything.

Readers of 2008, let me tell you a bit about yourselves. 45 percent of you believe in elves; at least three of you are reading this in sweaty socks that rise up too high and emphasize your calves, which is funny because your calves are flabby and do not need to be shown off or further insulated; you represent five legally recognized counties; all of you were involved in extracurricular activities and/or sports in kindergarten; and you'll all get kick-ass reader-appreciation gifts if the current season of Celebrity Rehab With Dr. Drew ever comes out on DVD.

Once the USB turntable is all set up at WBC headquarters, we'll commence acquisition of audio for Untimely Ript, a blog celebrating random garbage from the bog of forgotten vinyl. More crude stick-mutants and whatnot once outside logistical consultants finish work on our scanner.

Month In Tunes Administration: Now Is The Winter Of Our Psychedelic Indulgences

In "Month In Tunes Administration," World's Biggest Corporation will sample the music we virally market to our own employees via disposable Zunes issued in our 2,000 break rooms across the globe.



JANUARY 2008

We at World's Biggest Corporation didn't suck up a ton of records this month, due to the unexpected clusterfuckery of daily operations, the shit-ass Wisconsin weather, deteriorating attention spans, re-allocation of resources, and that pesky competition.

Hell, at one point early in the month, this place even had some guests: Louisville, KY band People Noise got caught in a bad pileup on the way into Madison, made it to the venue that night, and played a solid set for about, oh, 20 people. They crashed here while awaiting repairs and were very friendly, then made it out in time to bolt to a gig in Minneapolis. Last year's Ordinary Ghosts is a fine debut, slathered in glistening keyboards and mega-fuzzed guitars. Currently, the band has to sample the keys live, but that somehow doesn't make things stiff or awkward.

Dead Meadow, Old Growth (Feb. 5, Matador): Who knows, maybe this one will fall to the side after a couple weeks. It's a battle between how blatantly this band reaches back to all manner of olden psychedelia and blues-rock, and how sweet and earthy it all sounds.



Which brings us to...

Black Mountain, In The Future (Jagjaguwar): I won't even pretend that I've learned my way around this one yet, but I do think singer Amber Webber is one of the main reasons this record sticks. Whether she's on backing vocals or taking the lead, as on "Queens Will Play," she's got this frightening shudder in her voice--one of a few things that keep the band fresh as it stomps and riffs through some very familiar pleasures.



Drive-By Truckers, Brighter Than Creation's Dark (New West): Another one that's gonna take a few months to sink in, or maybe all year. "Self-Destructive Zones" is gonna have to be WBC's song of the month. If it's got any competition, it's another highlight from this album, "The Righteous Path."

The Magnetic Fields, Distortion (Nonesuch): The Magnetic Fields' habit of packaging albums with gimmicks really strikes me as a form of self-deprecation. "Let's write a batch of solid pop songs and give them a vaguely country-ish feel (The Charm Of The Highway Strip), make sure they all start with 'I' (I), or just release 69 of them for no reason (69 Love Songs)." This time, the band cheeses itself up with buckets of feedback and fuzz, arbitrarily paired with songwriting that, at heart, doesn't seem much different from anything else Stephin Merritt's ever done. "Old Fools" is just a step away from Highway Strip's "I Have The Moon," both unabashedly maudlin and affectionate songs. They're those moments where Merritt isn't afraid to lay down something universal, a little less disposable. If he weren't so self-conscious, kitschy, and clever, his body of work would make people cry themselves to death. (In a good way?) Hell, I know this is beside the point, but I'd almost like to see him do a completely humorless, gimmick-free record, just for the sake of experiment. At any rate, at least two songs on Distortion--"Please Stop Dancing" and "California Girls"--are new Magnetic Fields disposable-essentials, almost up there with "A Chicken With Its Head Cut Off" and "Two Characters In Search Of A Country Song."

Protest The Hero, Fortress (Vagrant): Imagine Dillinger Escape Plan backed up by a choir of magical horseys, and the mystical glitter-dust that implies, but rammed up against the staggering tightness of super-technical post-hardcore stuff. Weirdly enough, the most tricky-sounding shit here--the operatic vocals and classical-inspired guitar flurries on "Sequoia Throne"--adds a dreamy layer of lightness to the crunch and drudgery. Plus, it's really too bad this blog doesn't have a headwear-design award:



Dub Trio, Another Sound Is Dying (Ipecac): I still think New Heavy is better and more well-rounded, but this new one is pretty gratifying, too, especially for those who favor the instrumental band's brutal, smart-assed side. Also, album cover of the month goes to Martin Kvamme:



Wow, I didn't know you could leave them in the microwave that long. I'm here all week, folks...

Future Of The Left, Curses (Too Pure): The only record I heard this month that's snotty, bratty, and scary enough to excite me on that level.



...And it turns out they're a tad boring to look at. I guess I expected someone with more visible bones, and maybe some boils.

Vampire Weekend, s/t (XL): Review here. It's pleasantly underwhelming, I guess. VW's show in Madison this summer was fun as shit. Outdoors on a warm, breezy night on campus, with sailboats in the background--can't imagine a more ridiculously appropriate venue for it.

Random-ass surprise: The utterly perplexing, primal, and enticing Japan-funk of Yamasuki, as unearthed by Soul Sides.

Shows of the month: The Black-Eyed Snakes and Decibully at the High Noon Saloon, Madison, 1/5; People Noise, High Noon Saloon, Madison, 1/6; The Walkmen and White Rabbits, 1/19 High Noon Saloon, Madison; El Valiente, 1/11, King Club, Madison; The Runners-Up and Patchwork, 1/17, High Noon Saloon, Madison; Editors, 1/29, Majestic Theatre, Madison.

Concept Restaurants Part 2

(For the rest of our innovative food-service business plans, please see the first Concept Restaurants presentation.)

Escargot Escarmergency: If you can buy plastic bottles of Perrier by the dozen from Costco, life's other fine luxuries ought to catch up, eh? On the way to the yacht, swing through our drive-thru window to pick up a steamin' platter of snails. Visit us soon, and you'll get those little critters in a commemorative-edition Super Bowl XLII escargot dish (also available at participating Exxon locations). It goes without saying that once this bastard's turning a profit, we'll be rolling out the mail-order wing.
If it's your birthday: Enjoy a complimentary appetizer-sized serving of fugu poppers.

853 Woodcrest Terrace: The servers here are hardly servers at all, but nice, hospitable folks sharing the fruits of suburban life on the cusp of retirement. As they bustle about taking care of laundry and calling the kids (all grown up now), they'll occasionally turn to grab you a lemon bar or a beer from the fridge. If you're lucky, one of our hale and hearty "Pop" servers will reach into his special cabinet and share a jolt of that single malt he got for Christmas a couple years back. While the mild-mannered afternoon away with back issues of Reader's Digest, the family's photo albums, and the reassuring hum of the refrigerator (they used to call it "the ice box," you know).
If it's your birthday: It's awkward that you'd come hang with a stranger's parents on your goddamn birthday, but we'll do our best to cheer you up.

Troglodytes + Computers=This

What better way to convey mankind's wonderment at technology than with an image of a woman in crosshairs, holding up a huge "@" like it's a prized golden pumpkin? This image shows up on the login page of the Baltimore airport's pay wi-fi system. And seriously, it's better than Magic Headache Elixir and Hand-Shoveled Irrigation System combined. Check this shit out, o ye mighty!

Let us now weep for America's children, and the atrocious graphic design--no, shitty old-school Paint work--that gathers to brutalize their eyes. Not to mention all the horrid beige pantsuits they'll have to wear.

Peeling Off Your Jodhpurs: Year-End Music Addenda Part II

I hate making lists. It is now officially out of my system until November or so. In fact, this roundup of "other stuff I really liked in 2007" is still incomplete, and I can even name things that I've left out, but, well, fuck it.

Les Savy Fav, Let's Stay Friends (Frenchkiss): Likable, explosive, sweet, and funny from start to finish. Would've been at least an honorable mention, had I bought it sooner. Plus, who knew that horseback riding could be so sexually charged?



Wolves In The Throne Room, Two Hunters (Southern Lord): You know you're a Slate fan, and a relative metal novice, when you let that venerable web-mag tell you what metal to buy. Then again, Slate rarely disappoints me, so why the hell not? And why is black metal so improbably soothing?

The Zincs, Black Pompadour (Thrill Jockey): It feels kind of detached at first (what with song titles like "Rice Scars" and all). The songs have a way of warming up after a while, and some, especially "Head East Kaspar," turn out to be quite comforting.

Busdriver, RoadKillOvercoat (Anti): The sarcasm is going to drive some people away before they get in the door. But in any case, rap needs a brilliant spazz-clown with a sense of humor and brain-scrambling delivery.



Bear Claw, Slow Speed: Deep Owls (Sickroom): Back in high school my friend Tony and I had an idea to start a band with two bass guitars. We had no idea that at least two awesome post-punk bands (Dianogah and Bear Claw) already had this covered. We still thought Dream Theater was cool. Sigh.

Nina Nastasia And Jim White, You Follow Me (Fat Cat): If I were one to neurotically obsess over past best-of lists, I'd declare myself a toad for not including this one. A toad, I say!



Low, Drums And Guns: See above. Sinners, never forget that Alan Sparhawk ate cake for you!



Saturday Looks Good To Me, Fill Up The Room (K Records): For such a mess of a band/collective/bedroom-pop project, SLGTM has proven remarkably consistent. "Make A Plan" and "Money In The Afterlife" count among Fred Thomas' best songs.



Bat For Lashes, Fur And Gold (Caroline): The mystery wears off after a few listens, but there's solid dark pop underneath. Plus, Natasha Khan actually pulls off the whole exotic-costume thing with some dignity intact. (Take that, Juliette Lewis!) I actually watched people attempting to dance to this song at a club in Orlando recently. Good laughs.



Figurines, When The Deer Wore Blue (Control Group): Merits both sincere appreciation and genuine or sarcastic "AWWWWW!"s.



Bishop Allen, The Broken String (Dead Oceans): This album's main single isn't its best song by far. The album glimpses at the band's very solid and agreeable songwriting—sometimes enjoyable enough, and sometimes close to greatness:

Wilford Brimley Not Included

John Carpenter's The Thing should eventually rank among history's finest horror movies. However, Ennio Morricone's score--a perfect companion to the movie's expanse of cold and foreboding--is a bitch to come by. Luckily, some dude has posted some of the tracks on YouTube.

Enjoy it before disputes intervene!

The Certainly-Not-Unwanted Things: Year-End Music Addenda, Part 1

Doing my second best-of list for The A.V. Club made me neurotic. I stand by it and all, but it's also worth measuring a year's music by the stuff one leaves off lists like this. Case in point, my ballot includes a list of "stuff I haven't had enough time to chew on but would likely give an honorable mention if I had"--was that supposed to get past my editors? So, what the hell, here's a whole bunch of other stuff that'll be worth chewing on in the future.

Dub Trio, Cool Out And Coexist (ROIR): It's dub, swampy instrumental metal, and the surprisingly vast territory between the two.

Tinariwen, Aman Iman (World Village): If it's NPR-approved world music, it does more than just get those turtlenecks undulating and lumbar-supportive Audi seats rocking. Tinariwen, from Mali of all places, restores the blues to its primal, thumping state, yet the guitar work can also get tender and melodic.

The Long Blondes, Someone To Drive You Home (Rough Trade): This album is too fucking long--16 songs, just over an hour--but "Only Lovers Left Alive" makes it worthwhile. It matches its obnoxious howling with the kind of wit that makes me wish I hadn't been such a lame high-schooler.

The Rosebuds, Night Of The Furies (Merge): Generally consistent and lush, but the second song, "Cemetery Lawn," is so catchy it makes the rest of the album a bit frustrating by comparison.

Baroness, Red Album (Relapse): Just getting in my first proper listen as I write this. In short, a meaty, mighty metal group that broods and noodles like a fine post-punk band.



Johnathan Rice, Further North (Reprise): Different on every listen, depending on what you're looking for. At the very least, a singer-songwriter record with some flaws and a bitterly memorable opening track:



Maximo Park, Our Earthly Pleasures (Warp): A brash command of hooks and songs full of sneaky cleverness. Also, Paul Smith is a crazy dude in a hat onstage and a nice-enough, if excitable, guy in interviews.



More to follow.

"Lights, Please..."

For some reason, I can't seem to find a clip of this nugget:

Peter: As we all know, Christmas is that mystical time of year when the ghost of Jesus rises from the grave to feast on the flesh of the living! So we all sing Christmas Carols to lull him back to sleep.
Bob: Outrageous, how dare he say such blasphemy. I've got to do something.
Man #1: Bob, there's nothing you can do.
Bob: Well, I guess I'll just have to develop a sense of humor.

The Bataan Death Mall

Arundel Mills Mall, Hanover, MD [Baltimore suburb]

Shout it from the turrets of Medieval Times or the temple of the Egyptian-themed Muvico multiplex: In a just world, Maryland's Arundel Mills Mall would be visible from space. According to Wikipedia, it is "the first enclosed mall to feature a Medieval Times." Sounds like society's got some catching up to do, folks! You can actually enter the MT from the mall, and while you're waiting for the tournament to begin, put away a draft of mead (note: more likely Michelob Ultra or something) at the bar. MT is the mall's southern bookend; at the northern extreme, behold the Muvico Egyptian 24.

Of course, Arundel Mills isn't the largest mall in America, and for all I know, plenty of malls far exceed it. It's most notable, though, for its particularly wearying floor plan, basically a very elongated oval, divided up into five "neighborhoods." Theme-wise, it already spans continents and centuries, and walking around it two or three times gives a person the same feeling. It must take quite a few trips around to get one's memory around the place; a point you remembered on the first trip around might seem to be just in front of you once more, but is in fact a few hundred yards ahead. The trek from FYE to Dairy Queen is particularly arduous, each storefront a bayonet prodding one ahead to a destination from which he'll have to move on again soon.

Exurbcakes: A Recipe

Brain Lab query: "What happens when flavor imitates life?"

INGREDIENTS
-3 sq. ft. richly tanned leather
-10 lbs. wet stucco, preferably dyed a frosting-like shade of pink or yellow
-5 lbs. Starbucks Espresso Roast ("Starbucks Coffee: Roasted over burning SUV tires!")
-1 box Franzia Vintner Select White Zinfandel
-Assorted Elton John, Barry Manilow, Kenny G, and NOW! compilation CDs
-1 pair pleated khaki shorts

PREPARATION
-Combine stucco and espresso in a large cement truck; process mixture into a viscous paste.
-Shape mixture into uniform circles (1" diameter is ideal), wrap with strips of leather.
-Remove CDs from cases--the cases may later be used for a creative presentation--and crush discs up into little shards. Sprinkle atop cakes to taste.
-Place cakes on car roof; pick a sunny day to drive around doing errands for 9 hours, using only outdoor parking options.
-Smoke over shreds of khaki shorts for extra flavor.
-Serve with energy drinks, Ensure, or any of Pepsi's "Jazz"-variety colas.

FURTHER READING
"Take A Ride To Exurbia": David Brooks, The New York Times, Nov. 9, 2004

Finely Woven Filth: Or, Horny For Presents

A John Waters Christmas + Lavender Diamond: Turner Ballroom, Milwaukee, 12/12/07

[Sorry, no photos. Camera broke.]

Connie Marble: Oh, I love you Raymond. I love you more than anything in this whole world. I love you more than my own filthiness, more than my own hair color. Oh God, I love you more than the sound of bones breaking, the sound of death rattle--even more than the sound of my own shit do I love you, Raymond.

Raymond Marble: And I, Connie, also love you more than anything that I could ever imagine: more than my hair color, more than the sound of babies crying, of dogs dying--even more than the thought of original sin itself. I am yours, Connie, eternally united through an invisible core of finely woven filth, that even God himself could never ever break.

Howdy from Baltimore!

As I write this, I can't be too far from the sidewalk off which Divine ate dog shit for John Waters' camera (at the end of Pink Flamingos). Just a few days before flying out here, I caught one of B'more's finest on his Christmas tour. Beyond those amazing and transgressive films is a snappy showman who's up for riffing about anything. He's just a cool motherfucker, not merely a prankster behind a camera. As he mentions at that link, he's a big Ike and Tina Turner admirer, and arrived in Milwaukee just in time to announce Ike's death.

On his annual Christmas tour, he pops out for an hour of breathless rambles about the holidays and whatever else he gets around to, including his desire to land on the cover of Parade magazine. He never lets up, never seems the least bit unsure of himself. Phrase of the night: "I'm horny for presents."

Throughout Waters' performance, a scary fat drunk lady behind us kept yelling stuff, though not enough to really disrupt things. It's a John Waters thing, so a few mental defectives are bound to emerge. Most of what she said wasn't memorable, though I recall that at one point she called out for a Pink Flamingos musical. During the Q&A portion of Waters' set, she started raving about her support for Dennis Kucinich: "HIS WIFE... HE HAS A GREAT... RED-HEADED WIFE..." Waters smoothed right through a brief exchange and went onto the next questioner, though the dumbass kept it up until the end.

For some reason, Waters brought along the band Lavender Diamond for an opening set. For once, it was hard to blame people for talking through the songs. These are precious little morsels of quirky folk that probably sound great when it's late and quiet, but it clunked onstage. Wearing a billowing white dress, singer Becky Stark looked like a cloud trapped inside a K-Mart; the three dudes backing her had zero stage presence. Except for the drummer, who played his minimal beats with greatly exaggerated movements that made him look even more useless. Still, why not bring some surprises to a tour like this?

Though a great filmmaker, Waters should do more of this speaking stuff. There's a killing to be made on the corporate banquet circuit, eh?

Shitty Photos Of Shitty Drawings

Some recent doodles for the sick fucks I know who enjoy this stuff... (Also, my scanner is not cooperating.)



Mega-Cycle Hippie, Minneapolis



The End Of The Conversation



How To Write

The Thermals, Yay

Took me friggin' forever, but I finally got out to a Thermals show at Logan Square Auditorium in Chicago this week. My camera's screwed up, so no photos/video. Of course, the set included the single "No Culture Icons" (from the band's first album, More Parts Per Million), alongside a bunch of selections from last year's The Body, The Blood, The Machine--all of which are superior songs, but "No Culture Icons" is still one of the best music videos ever:



The Sub Pop stickers over their mouths are a nice touch.

Chin Up Chin Up opened with a fine set of zig-zagging, pretty melodies, and a rather humble stage presence--hey, not every band can have a Kathy Foster.

Although I Search Myself...

Today I'm in line in the grocery store, and what should I hear but a song I consider a pop classic, Elton John's "Don't Let The Sun Go Down On Me." But it's not just any "DLTSGDOM." It's the Elton John-George Michael duet version of "DLTSGDOM."

A few things to note:

-My first exposure to pop music came through Elton. My dad loved his music long before I was born, and is still kind of obsessed. He's one of the suckers who bought The Captain And The Kid, Elton's sequel to his concept album Captain Fantastic And The Brown Dirt Cowboy.
-Elton's main songwriting collaborator, lyricist Bernie Taupin, wrote "DLTSGDOM" about the pressures of songwriting.

-Wow, has Elton John recorded some crappy songs in his time.

-Wow, has Elton John recorded some amazing, wonderful songs in his time.

-The song was one of the few redeeming moments of Caribou, an album that sorely needed redemption (other highlights: "The Bitch Is Back," and maybe the maudlin kid-on-a-rampage ballad "Ticking").

-In his duet with George Michael, Elton doesn't fucking play piano. It clearly shows another dude playing it for him, as Elton prances about in a shitty baseball cap. Hey, Elton, your retardulous fashion choices are supposed to make you more amusing, not less, remember?

-In any context, George Michael will look like an asswipe, and the asswipery will be infinitely compounded and refracted by whatever he's wearing and whatever hand/body gestures/supplementary vocals he provides.

-George Michael keeps wagging his left arm/side around as if he is paralyzed along his right side
-4:32: After many tense minutes of shared harmonies and exchanged lines, the two finally hop off their respective metal platforms and hustle toward each other across the arena's large, inhuman stage, like lovers reunited at a Hawaiian Tropic promotional event. Pause here to ready another beer/shot/bowl/syringe, as the "heavy memories" portion of tonight's post is fast approaching!

-Rewind to 5:14. What the hell kind of hat is Elton wearing? Rebar Workers' Union? Iron Cross? Knights Of Columbus? But that's nothing compared to the Crappy Elton Hat action you'll find here.

-5:30: After all this time, finally, the man-hug is consummated! Christ, I thought it'd never happen.

-When I was in fourth grade or so, one of my classmates was this total smart-ass jerk we'll call SJ. Never had any reason to talk to me, except to say something hurtful. Also, I recall that he was good at soccer, so right off the bat, fuck him. However, one day I found myself talking about "DLTSGDOM," and he overheard and snapped to life: "Oh, the one where he sings with—" "Yeah, George Michael!" Keep in mind, this was just a year or so before kids like him discovered Nirvana and kids like me started to feel pretty oblivious. So, for one fleeting, tender moment, the union of these two overripe British pop loonies brought together the little nerdy kid and the jackass. Where the hell are you, SJ, and how many Wham! singles have you since collected on vinyl?

Tags Are Too Much Fun (Or Just Sad)

IMDB and allmusic never fail to help me out, say, a dozen times a day. That said, both are developing an ever-more-obsessive habit of tagging, taking this concept to the ball-dangling brink of its usefulness. Maybe this will be helpful for people who need to have a Mood Customized Optimal Entertainment Experience, and now. Need a perfect tune for staying in bed? A movie with hands in it? Nothing novel about silly tags, but they're more amusing on sites that also function as serious research tools.

Here are more.

Allmusic themes/moods:
Housework, The Sporting Life, Dinner Ambience, Pool Party, Knotty, The Creative Side, Guys Night Out ... efforts to locate "Trapped Under Car" and "Awkward Funeral" were unsuccessful.

IMDB plot keywords:
Lactation, Sunglasses, Fisticuffs, Title Spoken By Character, Vomit Scene, Wrist Watch... but even better, you can click your way around the "related keywords" field that accompanies each one until you've got just the right combination*.

*Also fits under Guys Night Out, The Creative Side, and Housework.

What A Prick I Was Back Then #1: The High Strung

"What A Prick I Was Back Then": In which I rethink past remarks with the benefit of several months' hindsight, or something.

This April I wrote a calendar item on The High Strung that's still in circulation among The A.V. Club's local concert calendars:

Hooks can’t exist without repetition, as The High Strung knows almost too well. Each song on the Detroit band’s recent Get The Guests shrink-wraps a few key phrases into three-minutes-or-less packages. It can make the band’s breezy songcraft sound a little trivial, but plenty of maturity shows through even in a sound this compressed, thanks to skittering basslines, impossibly pop-perfect vocals, and charmingly dopey wordplay (“Rimbaud /Rambo” is as delirious as the title suggests).

Indeed, the hooks come pretty fucking fast and the songs are shockingly tight, thanks to THS's near-constant touring and writing. Granted, this is a kind-enough blurb, but the "almost too well" was an intended backhand. For whatever reason, I wasn't in the mood for THS frontman Josh Malerman's lean, fast tunes and subtly wanted to warn readers of the danger of hook-poisoning, or something. After a few more (voluntary) listens Get The Guests also reveals its dark humor and variety, from the frantic shuffle of "He's Got No Soul" to the badass swagger of "The Baddest Ship." "Shrink-wrapped"? "Compressed"? More accurately, it's a travel-sized artillery of solid pop.

The Saddest Sign

Been noticing signs like these on public restrooms, dressing rooms, etc. lately. That's "family restroom" as in "distinct from the male and female restrooms, but absorbing the disabled bathroom while pushing the wheelchair dude to the side and making him significantly smaller in the grand scheme of bathroom symbolism."

The dad who brings his little kid into the multi-stall public restroom is one of the more unstable, insecure creatures you can observe in a public place. But I think normal bathroom-goers need to be nearby, to check his behavior—for the child's sake. Especially in places like airports, where I've most often seen this sign. Most likely, the family we're aiming for has been crammed into a single room in the Quality Inn 20 minutes from Disneyland for a week now, sharing two miserable twin beds and four shitty little plastic cups and a cracked, leaky ice bucket and a rented 1996 Tercel. This is the last group of people who should be locking themselves into a tiny room outfitted with sturdy porcelain fixtures and shiny railings. Especially if three of them have already been pushing wheelchair boy through the Space Mountain line and helping him dunk in the shitty motor-court swimming pool for several nights in a row. Yes, folks, force these people into the more-public public restrooms, where shame will restrain them from killing each other. A family that needs quality-private-bathroom time is a family that needs some fucking lithium.