Sleep Dirt

I Don't Want It

2009-07-14T09:25:00.001-05:00

to be too late.

[Listening to: Jeff Buckley - "Lover, You Should Have Come Over" ]

Sunday Shred: Technical Difficulties

2009-07-12T16:08:00.017-05:00

Basically for the better part of 2 days I've had this notion in my head that if I work enough at it, I might be able to actually play a Paul Gilbert/Racer X tune on guitar. I understand most of what he's doing from a technical standpoint, I have a transcription of the music that I've been working from, and some rare free time to kill. Why not give it a shot? I've been playing a lot lately, I'm feeling pretty good about myself as a musician.

What's the worst that could happen?

The thing about Gilbert is that he's the world's nicest guy. He will tell you everything he does. He will slow it down, give you pointers on how to play it, and generally encourage you to believe that most of his stuff is "pretty basic" in structure. And when you break it down to component parts, it really isn't much more than pentatonic licks linked together with modal playing and arpeggio shapes. Nothing I haven't heard of, nothing that's so far out of my reach that I can't even begin to grasp how to play it.

So I start working on it. Repeated figures, squeally high notes repeated over and over until I'm sure my neighbors want to break down the door and kill me where I stand. Even I'm getting to the point where I'm tired of running through the fingerings. But honestly -- I'm like this close to getting it.

Oh by the way, did I mention Paul plays ridiculously fast?

Yeah. I sometimes think I can play fast, but not really like that (although to be fair, very few people can play as clean and precise at that kind of tempo as well as Paul can). Fast playing isn't everything, of course -- but it's a big part of the vocabulary I'm trying to build with my instrument, even after all these years.

Simply put -- this is a song I want to have under my belt, even it it's just so I can say that I can play it.

And for whatever reason, lately it's started to feel like I was getting close when I stumbled my way through it in practice sessions. Sure it's a little bumpy when it hits that diminished arpeggio, and I'm still only at the point where I'm trying to learn the main body of the piece -- so I'm not even worrying about the solo section yet, but I'm getting there, right?

..Eh, not really.

Most of Sunday I spent getting the song up to speed (the best way to work on songs like this is to slow them down and get the sections comfortable before getting them up to tempo), and that's where things started to get rough. I'm part of the way there I think, but now that I have a chance to actually hear myself playing it -- it's the part of the way where some people might be like,

"Yeah, I guess that sorta sounds like it. Hey, play Sweet Home Alabama now."

The worst part of all this is that I feel like I have all the little parts down, so all that's left is to patch them together into something halfway musical, and that's where the real frustration sets in. Because literally I end up playing the song, getting stuck or flubbing something, starting over, getting that part right and then screwing up something else, and then starting over, and starting over, and starting over again.

My man Slaus (who was kind enough to post my recent article about Michael Jackson article on his site the other day) has a feature over at Oh Hell Nawl called "Say Something Nice" where he posts a pic of something truly ignant, and then basically dares his readers to try and find something nice to say about it.

After today's disaster, I should probably submit the video evidence of me trying to play this song people on the site can cut on it.

Or I suppose I could just, you know -- post it here.

[Listening to: Pat Travers - "Snortin' Whiskey" ]

Actually Spoken During the Course of My Day

2009-07-11T15:54:00.004-05:00

"You forgot the Omega 3s, didn't you? How could you forget about the Omega 3s?"

[Listening to: Mudvayne - "Have it Your Way" ]

I Know, Man. I Know.

2009-07-09T09:10:00.008-05:00

Just keep saying to yourself, "What would Steve McNair do?"
..And then do the exact opposite.

[Listening to: Lamb of God - "Redneck" ]

That's My Jam: Nothin' But the Dog in Me

2009-07-07T08:34:00.011-05:00

I have to say that out of all the music videos in the world where an alpine skier loses his walkman in the snow that's then picked up by a heavily tattooed, bearded guy with canine teeth who takes it back to his practice pad/house and plays the techno song that's on there for his catlike, underwear-sporting bandmates who pick up on the beat and proceed to launch into a kickin' rockabilly track that eventually reminds the guys in the band of times where they were passed out drunk in a bathtub, watched over by zombies, or realized that the town's sushi chef looks an awful lot like the butcher, baker AND the cheese maker until out of nowhere a gorgeous girl with canine teeth and a Betty Page haircut walks up and grabs the singers heart, which makes the whole band pass out -- after which they wake up in the woods and find themselves being rubbed on by a horde of topless girls with the same sort of canine teeth and hairstyles until the drummer turns into a giant 2D animation that spews a hailstorm of guitar picks from his mouth that apparently kills everyone in the band and leaves them buried in a cemetery -- this one is my favorite.

-- And the song rocks too!

-- Slightly NSFW towards the end.

[Listening to: Miles Davis - "So What" ]

King Nothing

2009-07-06T08:42:00.027-05:00

To say that far too much has been made out of news related to Michael Jackson's passing, his legacy, and the circus that will surely be his memorial service later this week is a given. Like so many other things in Jackson's life, there's a spectacle that surrounds it, an air of mystery and grandeur that today's media simply cannot resist.

It's almost as if all the other over-covered celebrity deaths up to this point have simply been practice rounds for this one, life-shattering, all-encompassing, metaphor-that-can-be-applied-to-anything-and-everything news story. We've reached the point now where news outlets are doing stories about the coverage itself -- asking it it's too much, too intrusive, or if we'll ever really know the truth behind what happened.

Here's the truth:
An internationally beloved entertainer passed away. Period.

Michael Jackson was not a musician. He was not a songwriter. And although he became renowned for it during the heyday of his career, he did not start out as a dancer.

Michael Jackson started out as the voice of the Jackson Five. He was the obvious focal point, but the group was always intended to be just that -- a group. They danced in unison, they sang in multi-part harmonies. There was no glove, no moonwalk, no monkey, no allegations, no bad jokes, nose jobs or any of that crap.

There were just these songs on the radio -- lyrics and music reaching into people’s hearts and embracing them.

So when he appeared to the vast majority of the world alone in the fedora and sparkling glove on Network TV as part of the 25 Years of Motown broadcast and did the moonwalk people's jaws literally hit the floor. Not only because it was a dance move so many of us had never seen before, but it was friggin Michael Jackson -- the tiny kid with the afro and the big nose who sang "ABC" and "Rockin' Robin" back in the day, all grown up, looking completely different and floating across the stage like his feet weren't even touching it.

Before that, the Jackson 5 were just another Bubblegum Pop act. Five kids in funky clothes doing many of the same choreographed danced moves you could see from the Temptations. In a lot of ways they were literally a string of #1 hits away from being a novelty act. Most people figured that once the kids voice broke it would pretty much be over, just like every other boy band before (or after) them.

If Motown records had gotten their way -- Michael Jackson would have
simply been the successor to Stevie Wonder's childhood success.

It says a lot that the tide began to really turn for Jackson in 1975 when he left Motown after a heated legal battle for CBS Records -- which enabled him to start working with Quincy Jones on a record called Off The Wall. The album was a commercial success that gave Jackson his first number one hit in almost 10 years (it's also still my personal favorite thing he's done).

It also gave Jackson (and Jones) an unheard of amount of clout in the industry at the time. It's not something they talk about much considering the amount of worldwide fame he found soon after -- but it was after the success of Off the Wall and before Thriller ever started recording that Jackson secured the highest royalty rate of any artist ever -- 37% of all wholesale profits from album sales.

Doesn’t sound like much, but considering what artists were getting before (and what they get now) it's a ridiculous number.

It's hard to imagine the same seemingly fragile, self-obsessed shadow figure we've come to know as being such a bulldog in the boardroom -- but there are a number of things that Michael Jackson accomplished during his Thriller heyday that literally changed the entire landscape of how contract artists were seen, handled and paid by record companies.

Much like they are today -- album sales were going into the crapper in 1982. Record companies had been riding a long line of success, and had grown comfortable with doing things their way. Hit singles were the dominant product, so albums were designed to deliver them. So much so that producers oftentimes restricted the number of singles they'd include on a given release. If an artist had 2 or 3 projected hits in their repertoire, it wasn't unusual at all for producers to "hold one back" and keep it for another album in an effort to build an act's library. As a result, you'd love a song you heard on the radio and end up with an LP that had only that one good song on it. The rest would be filler, covers of other group’s hits, and various retreads of the projected "hit."

Which is why when Thriller hit the shelves literally overflowing with songs designed to be radio play singles (7 of the 9 songs on the album charted in the Billboard top 10) -- record companies had to sit up and take notice. Thriller was an album you had to have. As a result, BAD was an album you had to have. Rhythm Nation was an album you pretty much had to have. By equal rights, if you were on a different side of the track from all the fans and hoopla, Purple Rain was an album you had to have. Master of Puppets was an album you had to have.

In other words, whether he realized it or not -- Michael Jackson wasn't just popular, his work had a certain importance.

For a period of time, all he touched turned to gold. Everything he did was emulated, re-interpreted, or directly contrasted by almost every other working artist out at the time.

But like all things in this life -- time has a way of affecting things. Kids grew up. Music evolved and changed. At one time, Michael Jackson was in one way or another the catalyst pushing that growth. But after a certain amount of time and success, when he'd finally achieved the creative control, acceptance, and success he'd seemingly been seeking -- he stopped growing.

The dance moves became a signature. The look became a uniform. The man who had re-invented himself (perhaps in an effort to escape the limits and pressures put on him when he was a child) for some reason froze the clock, and did everything he could to remain 26 years old. Forget the allegations and the wacky marriages and all the rest for a second. Somewhere after the success of BAD, Michael Jackson musically stopped being the most influential innovator in pop music, and decided to simply sit upon his throne and be the King of Pop forever.

As a result, as important as Jackson's work had been -- his overall sense of relevance began to fade.

His scandals and eccentricities became more intriguing than his work, which by then had largely stagnated and began to repeat itself. The ripples and effects of his efforts could be clearly traced in the pop artists that began to eclipse him at that point (as well as the ones who owe so much of their stylistic success to him in the current musical landscape) -- but beyond the occasional collaboration with his sister or paparazzi scandal the King of Pop became little more than an afterthought.

As we've clearly all seen in the weeks after his death -- the amount of adoration for Michael Jackson and his work was immense, and in many ways never faded. But I think we've also discovered that it was a love of distance. Wrapped in good feelings, cradled by the reflections of his influence in the work of others, and yet in so many ways kept in a faded scrapbook of memories. Shelved in a corner of your heart saved for the people and things you've never stopped loving, but long lost an immediate passion for.

Which is why I think statements like this are particularly telling:
Based on preliminary sales numbers from Nielsen SoundScan, the entire top nine positions on Billboard’s Top Pop Catalog Albums chart will house Jackson-related titles when the tally is released in the early morning on Wednesday (July 1). Nielsen SoundScan’s sales tracking week ended at the close of business on Sunday (June 28) night.

No doubt, it’s an incredible feat for an artist to pull off posthumously. But when you think about it a little more the fact that people are buying these albums up in droves carries a very specific message -- that as much as people love Michael Jackson's work, as much as they hold him in a place of importance in their hearts, they kinda had to buy all these albums --

..Because they didn't own them anymore.

There's no shame in anyone -- whether it be the heaviest of metal heads, or the oldest of grandparents digging into their collections and finding those old records and listening to them all again. In overplaying them to the point of annoyance as a way to deal with the loss of a figure of importance.

But what does it say when you dig through those shelves, or scroll through your ipod directories only to realize that you don't have any of it? That you used to own them all -- but you sort of outgrew it. After all the scandals and accusations and 25-odd years since it was virtually the most important thing you had in your life that you had sorta ..moved on?

Importance never fades. Influence and effect can easily be traced.
Relevance however, is a flame that needs fuel to remain bright.

Distance and time can be hard on relationships. It weakens the foundations that you build everything upon. Passion needs immediacy, and when all you have are voices from the past, memories of the things that once touched your heart -- it invites a reliance on days gone by. This is what we had, this is how important it was, how real and intense things used to be when you were here -- when I could hold you, touch you, sing along with you on the radio and pretend to walk backwards across the carpet in my living room.

We all desire importance in one form or another. We ache to feel desired and needed. But life moves pretty fast. It can be difficult to remain relevant. Hard to be present in peoples hearts and minds --

Especially when what you once had seems so far away from where you are now.

At one time and place, millions of people were in the same place with Michael Jackson. They danced with him, listened to his words, held him close to their hearts. But as time went by and his career began to pull him in different directions, the connection began to fade. Then all these things happened, these events and scandals and behaviors that started making us think that he wasn't the guy we all thought we knew. That maybe it's not the worst thing in the world if we don't return every call, buy every album, or skip the tunes when they come up on the playlist.

And then perhaps you encounter someone new. Someone younger, more vibrant, more ..there. Someone that shares qualities that you loved in Michael, but perhaps speak more to what you know now. They have albums and videos out that you hear everywhere you go. You can see them live in concert. You can share that electricity with them. You don’t have to travel into the past. You don't have to wait for the new tour, or keep buying the re-releases of those old discs. You can live in that energy right now.

It happens all the time.

One of my closest and dearest friends growing up lives some 20 miles away from me. Yet we struggle these days to maintain and continue to grow our friendship. It seems difficult for both of us to find times to get together. To find environments that connect us anymore. We've grown up, gotten married, gotten divorced, had kids, moved in different directions with our career paths and lives. The bond between us will never change, and the importance of his influence on my life can never be diminished --

..yet here we are. Hardly relevant to each other at all anymore, it would seem.

Do I want it to be that way? Absolutely not -- I hate what we've become. I miss what we were. Despite the fact that it's as much (or perhaps even more) my fault as anyone else’s that two good friends have become more like pleasant memories to each other -- I miss the good times, the laughter, and the simple comfort that came from having a buddy to hang out with. Someone to talk to. Someone who would listen, laugh, and understand.

The problem comes in maintaining that connection. In continually bridging that gap in a way where it's an active, living thing anchored in the person you are now -- and not just some trip down memory lane.

Are all those old Michael Jackson songs still just as good as they used to be?
Of course they are.

But are you the same person you were when you first fell in love with them? For that matter -- has Michael Jackson grown with you, found ways to continually touch your heart even as its needs evolved and matured?

..Probably not.

Importance is built. It's often told through the reflections of yourself that are seen in others. The inside jokes you carry on years after the fact. The stories you tell over and over. Importance is a state of being. It's a place you reach sometimes without even realizing it.

Relevance, on the other hand must be cultivated. Cared for. It can't be faked, assumed to be fine, or built on the artifices of the past. It's emotional food to the people who crave your immediacy. Who need your comfort, your strength, and your smile to survive.

Michael Jackson's relevance as an artist faded years ago.

He existed in our minds most recently as the media spectacle. The accused abuser. The punchline. A reality that unfortunately overshadowed his true gifts and talents -- exasperated by his own tendencies as an eccentric recluse. He gave us so little to douse those flames of doubt that they became the only facets of his life many of us found relevant anymore.

Will the world miss him?
..As I see it, we already have been for years.

[Listening to: Jill Scott - "Crown Royale" ]

Country Gentleman

2009-07-04T09:38:00.009-05:00

Patriotism is frequently like an old suit that we keep around for certain occasions. We always have it, but it's not always on. When we do wear it, we notice how uncomfortably it binds in places, and vow that we're going to get it tailored. But it's ours. If we didn't care, we wouldn't keep it around.

And if we weren't Americans, we probably wouldn't bitch so much about how it fits.

Anyways, when I woke up this morning wondering how my son and I were going to celebrate the holiday, I kept thinking back to the family celebrations I had growing up. And for better or worse, the 4th was generally pretty low key. Cookouts at home, visits from friends and loved ones, piling into the car to see fireworks at the beach, and then complaining about traffic all the way home.

Later on I would add my own twists on the formula (the annual Twilight Zone marathon on the Sci-Fi Channel, concerts and fireworks downtown instead) -- but the basic premise is still pretty much the same.

Thinking back to when I was a little kid, I remember a lot more parades being involved. Standing in the hot sun waiting for free candy to be thrown from floats and having to hear John Phillip Sousa songs slowly stroll by. The pageantry of it all was cool, but to be honest -- parades tend to be a little dull. I'm not really surprised that as a tradition they've kinda fallen to the wayside in many places.

The same can be said for Sousa, who's music tends to pound you over the head with it's military overtones. There's just not a lot of room for personal expression with Sousa, no real use for flexibility. As such, it's not much wonder why it hasn't aged very well.

At the same time, what makes those old marches so memorable is their construction. The way all those pieces are built on top of one another so that they work just right. It's why you rarely hear them played by anything other than a full marching band or orchestra.

It's also why this rendition never fails to blow me away.

Before I was really ever aware of Rock and Roll, I knew Chet Atkins. One of the true masters of the guitar, Atkins was equally adept at Country, Jazz, and Classical playing. His trademark style is nearly impossible to master, and yet when you see him play it looks like he's hardly doing anything at all.

For all my love of shredders, punk rock, and thrash metal, I'd kill to one day be able
to play with a fraction of the style and grace that Chet Atkins brought to the table.

He lent his style to countless artists -- and in a way shaped a certain part of my musical upbringing. My father was never as obsessive about players as I was -- but he loved great songs. As such, I wonder if he even knew that many of the artists he liked to listen to (Jim Reeves, Glen Campbell, Waylon Jennings) featured Atkins' guitar work. Or that many of the artists that were played around the house when I was a kid (Willie Nelson, Dolly Parton, and Jerry Reed) were all produced by him.

And yet, whenever you see footage of the guy -- he couldn't be more soft-spoken and unassuming.

-- Dig the sweep arpeggios during Chet's solo. Suck on that, Yngwie.

It's amazing to think that this quiet man who had sometimes to be dragged out of his shell by his more socially magnanimous friends was the same person who stood alone by his convictions even in the racially charged environment of the civil-rights 60's (not to mention the assumed social attitudes of most country music fans at the time) to convince RCA records to sign country music's first African American artist Charlie Pride.

But he did.

It's easy in today's world sometimes to forget that true character isn't what you say or how loud you say it, but what you actually do.

This day -- regardless of how loud the fireworks, how drunken the revelry gets, or how bad the traffic is on the way home -- is about all the men and women who understood that, and all that we enjoy as a result.

And I know that might sound preachy, especially in our fast-food, culture-shocked society -- but that's what kinda makes this place what it is.

After all, if it weren't for all of Chet Atkins' hard work to add class and professionalism to Country Music, we might never had the chance to hear something like this (which despite all my high and mighty talk still remains one of my all-time favorite songs).

Have a great holiday, everyone.

[Listening to: Bury Your Dead - "Womb Disease" ]

Rubber Ducky of Death

2009-07-02T08:39:00.008-05:00

It takes more than a village to raise a child. It takes Slayer.

[Listening to: Alicia Keys - "Diary" ]

Size Matters Not

2009-07-01T08:49:00.056-05:00

The other day before heading into the theater to watch Transformers 2 (an unbridled mess of a film that managed to surgically remove all the parts that made the first installment so much fun and replace it with so many robots and subplots that they didn't even have time to name them all or resolve half of them) my 9-year old son pulled me aside and addressed me in something I've come to call his "thoughtful voice."

Kids are amazing creatures. They're driven by desire, yet easily bored. They're hungry for new challenges and experiences, but can be slow to hold on to the common sense lessons they glean from them. Yet what I discover as I enter my ninth year of parenting is that my son is not just experiencing or staying along for the ride -- he's taking everything in, always thinking, always considering the world around him and the people in it.

He's not always able to verbalize what he comes up with -- but he sees everything through unique lenses.

I have a feeling we all did this as children, and in a lot of ways continue to do it as we mature -- but I'm starting to wonder if as you gather experience and age, if you don't begin to put filters in front of those lenses. Like sunglasses to block out the sun, it seems like as adults we frequently color our sight with the comparisons of the past, the philosophies we develop, and the ideologies we find ourselves aligning with along the way.

These differences are in a lot of ways what identifies our individuality. I find that when I'm at work, even though I'm not too far off in age from many of the people I work with (and in several cases actually older than them), that I find their attitudes to be "old." There's a lot of hesitation around here when it comes to changing procedures, approaching things differently, or just throwing caution to the wind. I find myself constantly saying things like, "If we do all these studies and planning you're talking about -- we'll never actually do anything. Lets just develop an action plan, and start getting shit done!"

But then when I tell my son I'm going to see a concert and he asks
if he can come too -- I always say, "Maybe when you're a little older."

I'm at a different level than my coworkers, my son is at a different level than me, my father is at a different level from both of us, my brother and his wife different from all of that, my friends and their families different from that. Even when the goals and occurrences are similar, the approaches are different.

And that's not to say that different approaches are bad, or wrong. My brother and I approach most things in life in our own ways, it's just the way we are -- and his kids are awesome.

What's interesting though is that you're never so locked into one mindset or approach that you can't see those differences. If anything, you're keenly aware of it when you come in contact with them. Some things you wish you had more of in yourself, some things you're ecstatic that you seem to don't have any of in your system.

Every time I encounter people who seem to have a natural sense of priority, an instinctive ability to multitask towards an actual goal I find myself envious. Yet whenever I meet folks tied to planners, schedules, and paper I recoil in horror. Perhaps part of it is in the attraction of opposite polarities or something, I don't know -- but I tend to like people who have their shit together.

..I do wonder about anyone who thinks I'm one of them, though.

When I'm at my best, I'm laid back. Cocky in my abilities. But I worry sometimes that a big part of that comes from swimming at the end of the pool that I can stand up in. I still take chances, but not quite the same ways I used to. Worst of all, I'm harshly aware of that difference. Of the erosion that time and experience seem to have had on my overall approach to the world that I experience.

I'm the best guitarist you've never heard play.
I'm your favorite unpublished writer.
I'm going to make some lucky girl very happy ..someday.

My son has been described by a number of people as being a "young 9." When he was playing little league earlier this year, the differences in approach that marked him from some of the other kids (especially the ones who had played for a few years and had "really driven" baseball parents) was striking. He did surprisingly well in the batters box, but even after playing a full season hasn't shown much interest in watching baseball or following a team. The other kids really liked him, even when his inexperience showed on the field -- but they tended to get on him now and then for not knowing pro player's names or things like that.

When I was growing up, people told me I had an "old soul."
Nowadays I get accused of trying to hard to hold onto
the past. Of comparing too much. Of not acting my age.

Years get lost. Periods and plateaus. Directions you thought you were going to go, places you never thought you'd find yourself in. Stages of recapturing, recharging, re-evaluating, and recalibration. I know I'll never be 20 years old again, but was there something in that 20-year old me that got lost in the shuffle of pushing too hard to be more mature and more settled that needs to come back? By the same token -- how much of that crap just needs to be tossed out the window and forgotten?

By not having the clearest picture of which image in the mirror is the real me versus the person I've become (or the image at times I've attempted to project), I frequently find myself caught in questions of personal authenticity. Am I really a musician, or just a guy who plays guitar? If I finally understand that being a good father is more important than anything else I do from this point forward -- does it mean that nothing else I enjoy doing is worthwhile at all?

Because I don't feel that way.

I want my son to know I'm there, that he'll always be cared for, loved, and protected. But I don't think there's much value in him thinking that I don't have a life. That I'm just a passionless deliverer of toys who announces bedtimes, cooks breakfast, and only exists to make sure he washes his hands after going to the bathroom.

He knows when I'm unhappy. He sees it with those lenses of his, and never hesitates to let me know it.

Our best times are when we're both having fun. When we're both locked into the emotion of the moment. Whether it be playing a video game or finishing homework. He's got a look, a certain glow when he's really happy (as I think we all do) -- but what's really clicked for me recently is that that glow is easier to create when I'm happy too.

He's very sensitive to the emotions of people around him, and tends to react to them. Maybe all kids are like that. I know I can still be that way a lot of times -- even though one of the things I've noticed about adulthood that there is a value in being able to stay levelheaded when others are going batshit, in having the ability to create laughter when everyone else is feeling down, in being the sunshine in other people's rainstorms.

All things you can accomplish whether or not you're feeling happy about it.

My son sees right through it.
It's one of the many, many amazing things about him.

So when he takes on that thoughtful tone in his voice, as he did outside the theater the other day -- I make sure I take the extra effort to listen. Because even though he's not always able to find the right words, he's always speaking directly, purely, and unapologetically from his heart.

This is what he said,
"The other day when I was at my (grand) Papa's house, I saw some pictures of you when you were skinny and had hair -- and I realized that you um.. You look like somebody."
"Really? Who is that?"
"You looked like Anakin Skywalker -- you know, before he was Darth Vader ..but not when he was a little kid."
"Wow, You think so?"
"Yeah. You don't have the scar on your face, but everything else was just like Anakin."
"Well thanks, buddy. I'm gonna take that as a compliment."

And then he hugged me, looked me in the eye again, and said:

"I know you want to be skinny again, like you were in the picture. And I think you can be -- if you keep working on it..
..But your hair isn't coming back."

[Listening to: Dub War - "Words of Warning" ]

That's My Jam: Stop Standing Still

2009-06-30T08:12:00.017-05:00

One of the things that I think that largely sets hip/hop and pop music apart from other genres these days is the way label owners and producers work to build "stables" of similar artists. For years if an group showed up on Def Jam, Grand Royal, or Bad Boy you sorta knew what you were getting into with them, and that association many times was enough to launch an artist further towards success than just being tied to whoever would sign them first.

Although certainly not a new idea (the Beach Boys, Beatles, and Led Zeppelin had them), the Vanity Label craze that sort of reappeared in the late 90's helped solidify (even if it was ultimately for a short while) clique genres -- enabling artists like Fred Durst to use his Flawless imprint to surround himself with artists like Staind and Puddle of Mudd -- ultimately stretching the lifespan of that whole awful strain of crap-rock through package tours and group promotions.

More frequently though, Vanity Labels withered and died on the vine as the "artist" in charge lost interest, and passed day-to-day operations on to underlings or the very same sort of record industry bottom-feeders that they had initially created the Vanity Labels to avoid being under the thumb of. As a result, many of the artists who thought they'd gotten a golden ticket to the Wonka Factory found themselves lost in a shuffle of under-promoted, over-produced albums on labels like Madonna's Maverick, Prince's Paisley Park, or 50 Cent's G-Unit.

There are obvious exceptions out there (Jay-Z, Dr. Dre), but it's almost like the circle has turned
again and being a "stable artist" is in many ways more of a albatross than a blessing these days.

Which is why I feel exceptionally lucky to have struck gold many times over with the artists who work with independent Florida label Bieler Bros. records. It's funny, because during the late dying days of the Hair/Pop Metal movement one of the bands I always felt was a bright spot was Miami's Saigon Kick -- so when I found out that a number of bands I really liked (Skindred, Nonpoint, Ankla) were currently being produced and managed by that groups former guitarist Jason Bieler it all sort of clicked into place.

All of which led me to take a flyer on an Australian Band called Karnivool, who I
had not heard of before until I got a message on the Bieler Bros. mailing list.

Sitting somewhere between melodic rock and prog, Karnivool immediately grabbed my attention. The playing was intricate, built on twisting, constantly shifting rhythms -- and yet the tunes were catchy as hell. The disc was sorta glued to my player for a while from overplaying -- which made me even more excited to find out that they were going to be the opening act for an all-Bieler Bros. artist package tour last year called The Great American Rampage.

But somewhere between the full-on thrash of Ankla, the aggression of Nonpoint, and the sheer fun that you get anytime Skindred takes over a stage anywhere, the band from Australia that I had been the most curious about somehow got lost in the shuffle.

Why?

Probably because although they recreated their songs faithfully and brought passion to the playing, they just sorta stood there.

Look -- It sucks to be the band on a big tour that no one really came
to hear, but it's an opportunity that you have to take advantage of.
You can't just go out there and treat it like a chore.

And in a lot of ways, Karnivool (at least on the night that I saw them) just went through the paces.

I'm no lover of forced jumping around, choreographed guitar antics, or showoff stick twirling -- but you've gotta look like you want to be there. You've got to get the energy that made the song worth writing and playing from the stage into the audience. And for whatever reason, that night in Orlando -- Karnivool didn't really deliver.

I can't even begin to tell you the number shows I've been to where the opening acts stole the spotlight from the headliners, and how being able to do that helped spark my interest in checking out their albums.

That's not to say that Karnivool doesn't rock -- but that in a lot of ways they have become an album band for me. They create great songs in the studio, but they're not so much fun live. Which when I think about it is a category I could put a lot of groups into.

Performing live to me is a premium ability. It's many times what makes good bands into personal favorites, because I love being on the floor when things get intense -- even when it's not in a rock setting. Erykah Badu live is, in my opinion -- so much more fun than her albums (and I love those discs), but even with the promise of wild visuals and performance surprises -- I'm not in a real hurry to see groups like The Gorillaz or Tool -- who I tend to appreciate more on disc.

Anyways, if you're looking for something a little deeper than the normal scream and growl, you could do a lot worse than checking out what Karnivool has to offer.

But like I said, try to do it with headphones instead of general admission tickets.

[Listening to: Bloodsimple - "Death From Above" ]

The Holy Hand Grenade

2009-06-29T23:54:00.003-05:00

At this point, my vote goes to Joe Jackson.

(Men's Room Wall, The Eclipse - 6/29/09)
So, who gets your nomination?

[Listening to: Erykah Badu - "Back in The Day (Puff)" ]

That's My Jam: Sure Thing, Gordo

2009-06-22T07:52:00.007-05:00

One of the most hauntingly somber songs I know is Thelonious Monk's 'Round Midnight. But the strange thing is, whenever you hear performances Monk himself did of the song you'll notice that he tends to approach it with a slight bounce. I wouldn't say he makes it a happy tune by any means, but there's something in the rhythm he puts into it that makes it more like a brisk memory-filled walk down a moonlit road rather than a heartsad lament of a lover far away and the quarrels that separate you.

So as much as it's recognized as Monk's signature song and perhaps masterpiece, it's been the renditions of this song by others that have touched me the most. Consider the flavors that Miles Davis, Joe Pass, and Wes Montgomery added to it as an instrumental, or the unique character and emotion that Ella Fitzgerald, Sarah Vaughn, Dakota Staton, and a host of others brought to the lyrical version.

You know who really kills with this song? Mel Torme -- the Velvet Fog himself.

Perhaps it's because Monk was able in the original to make the melody so natural. To my way of thinking, 'Round Midnight isn't so much a musical line as it a conversation you have with yourself, or to a half interested bartender right before (or perhaps severely after) closing time -- something more naturally suited I think to singers than it is to many saxophone players.

And yet to sing or play it, you have to think so much outside of what you'd normally do, even in the open contexts of jazz. As such, it's become a study piece for students, a standard that groups and singers include to show their range. It happens to standards over the years -- they get so retreaded and played to death that players lose their love for them, or their connection with the emotions behind it.

Perhaps that's why even though it was written and originally envisioned as an
instrumental, I've always personally been more fond of the vocalized versions.

That's not to say that people don't mess it up left and right. That they try to make it more formal and organized than it was ever meant to be. It's a strange thing about Jazz songs where singers take melodies intended for other instruments and make them their own, they all too often try to sing them as if they were just a different kind of saxophone, guitar, or piano. They forget that they have the gift that all other players seek to find when they play, which is personality and emotion that's naturally built in to the tones they create.

Which is probably why, even with so many immortal names and admittedly greater versions associated with this song -- I still find myself drawn to this interpretation; recorded for an tribute album, yet rarely played anywhere as far as I can tell.

Sting himself can be a pain to deal with, and his late period albums have gotten increasingly lamer -- but the guy has a wonderful voice, and for my money seems to always get more mileage out of collaboration than he ever did coming up with new ways to stroke his own ego.

Which is a good thing -- because despite the grace he brings
to the melody, this one is (and should be) all about Andy.

[Listening to: Wes Montgomery - "Four on Six" ]

Trou

2009-06-17T08:36:00.003-05:00

Bra straps dig into shoulder blades, underwear rides up, shirts creep and bunch when you sit down for long periods of time. Body parts itch, earrings beg to be twirled, cell phones shift in your pockets. Adjusting our coverings has become as natural an instinct as wagging a tail to brush off insects or cleaning your own paws.

All that being said, coworker -- if you insist upon having to re-tuck in your business shirt, perhaps consider going somewhere slightly more private than your cubicle before undoing your pants and jamming your hands down in there during business hours!?

..Did not need to see that.

[Listening to: Down - "Nothing in Return (Walk Away)" ]

Bullet With a Name

2009-06-16T08:42:00.004-05:00

Talk to me, don't talk to me. Take from me. Put upon me. Give to Me. Covet. Measure me with numbers. Limit me with insecurity and doubt. Test me with distance. Put the food at the other end of the table, and then tie me to the chair. Put me in a place where no one lives, then connect me to the entire world 140 characters at a time. Lead me to international outrages, meaningless sports-related indignities, and video clips of flash mobs in MC Hammer pants. Lash me to the ground with debt and responsibility when I wash up on the shore. Expect me to conquer Blefuscu for you just because everyone hasn't seen the light of Little-Endianism yet.

I'll complain. I'll compartmentalize. I'll burn.
..But I will find a way.

[Listening to: Motograter - "New Design" ]

That's My Jam: The Criss Quandary

2009-06-15T08:40:00.019-05:00

There's a fairly memorable moment from Woodstock '94 where the Red Hot Chili Peppers came out on stage wearing silver-colored bodysuits with huge lightbulbs attached to their heads. The Chili Peppers were fairly well-known for wearing crazy outfits over the years (a big part of their early touring notoriety came from the fact that they would play shows wearing nothing but gym socks on their crotches), but this lightbulb suit show just also happened to be guitarist Dave Navarro's first public performance with the group. Navarro was noticeably annoyed by the outfits to the point where singer Anthony Kiedis actually began sort of taunt him by telling the crowd how much Navarro hated the suit.

Less than a year later, Navarro left the band.

The irony is that a huge part of Navarro's appeal is his image. He's a talented player -- but his larger fame has been built mostly around his looks. His whole shirtless/tattooed/white guitar thing is certainly nothing original, but it's become kind of his calling card over the years.

In other words, it's hard not to wonder if Navarro's main objection to wearing the lightbulb suits at Woodstock was more about him not being able to wear his own "costume" than any sort of specific discomfort or difficulty that the suit added to playing his instrument.

And yet, I'm not sure had I been in his place I wouldn't have reacted much differently.

As much as I love bands like Kiss and Slipknot and Parliament Funkadelic -- and as much fun as it is to step out of yourself and put on costumes, masks, and makeup (whether it be Halloween, a theater stage, or as part of a band's image), I don't really think I could last all that long in a costume band.

It looks fun and it certainly draws attention -- but in the end what does it really get you?
Shouldn't the music be able to speak for itself?

It's one of the weird things about music. If you're going to survive in the industry for any length of time you really can't take yourself too seriously -- but when you go the complete other way and make your look part of the joke, a part that has to be repeated over and over and over again you kinda open yourself up to being little more than a novelty act.

Everybody loves the Humpty Dance, but nobody really remembers Shock G.

Groups get away with it, especially when the music speaks louder than the antics. Kiss was always about the image, but they wouldn't have been anything more than a footnote in wacky musical history if people hadn't loved all those albums in the 70's.

The challenge then is to use the outlandish look to get peoples attention, but then rise above the novelty by giving them songs worth remembering, regardless if your costume is greasepaint and platform shoes or a giant clock hanging off a chain on your chest.

In other words, Slash doesn't really have to wear that top hat anymore.

He still does it from time to time -- but I'm actually more happy to see him without it, because the guy is a hell of a player and I think sometimes that gets lost because of the way that image has gotten co-opted.

All that being said -- how can you not love this?

Whether it be Alice Cooper's eye makeup, Devo's pyramid hats, Elton John's Donald Duck suit, or the way Lady Gaga continues to blatantly rip off Dale Bozzio -- it's always in some way been a part of the show.

So the question is to you -- who are some of your favorite/least
favorite costumed acts, and what is it that you like about them?

[Listening to: Corrosion of Conformity - "Clean My Wounds" ]

The Oprahcalypse

2009-04-16T09:34:00.006-05:00

Quick on the heels of the news that Ashton Kutcher (of all people) beat CNN as the first twitter account to reach 1 Million Followers is the revelation that Oprah is joining up.

So how is the twitterverse taking it?

[Listening to: Vernon Reid - "You Say He's Just a Psychic Friend" ]

That's My Jam: Almost Famous

2009-04-15T09:27:00.036-05:00

It's interesting how the other day how my Stevie Salas fanboy post led to a discussion about musical family trees -- those extended families that happen when bands breakup and former members head off in different directions or join up with other people for side projects and whatnot.

I could probably totally geek out and write pages and pages of music nerdosity about that sort of thing (and I surely will one day soon) but it dovetails kinda nicely into an opportunity for me to introduce people to another of my secret fave artists that I really feel is about to take off and become one of the next big things -- Imani Coppola.

Here's essentially how it worked:
Young grommet guitar player discovers Metallica in the mid-late 80's, gets utterly obsessed for a while.

Reads some guitar magazine interview with Metallica lead singer/rhythm guitarist/Napster-hater James Hetfield in which he's pictured wearing a Faith No More t-shirt.

Wondered what was up with that and soon discovered a truly awesome band that soon after blew up on MTV with their exploding piano/dying fish video.

Faith No More gets tons more interesting (and less MTV-Faith No More-ish) in the late 90's, leading me to become aware of lead singer Mike Patton's other group Mr. Bungle -- which becomes sort of a full-time obsession for a year or two (leading to a whole other tangent of purchasing John Zorn albums which is too complicated to get into right now) -- except that after a few albums Mr. Bungle sorta becomes The Fantomas and then becomes Tomohawk and it becomes clear that keeping up with Mike Patton's career track is sort of a pain in the ass and half the albums he's been putting out lately are only him making weird noises into a telephone microphones anyways.

Life gets infinitely easier when I decide that it's much more simple to just feel happy
about seeing Patton's name on things, like Bjork albums or the credits for I Am Legend.

Then Mike Patton goes and screws all that up by putting together a project called Peeping Tom, which is just loaded with fascinating collaborations -- including this awesome song called "Sucker" with Norah Jones of all people that is not only permanently locked into my iPod, (it also prompted me to stop talking shit about Norah Jones) -- but most importantly included contributions and then live tour band support playing violin (and we all know how I feel about sexy girls who play violin) by one Imani Coppola, whom I had not heard of before at that point.

Turns out Coppola has a rich history, but for many years was categorized in sort of a limboland of artists that I don't really personally find interesting like Paula Cole, Sophie B. Hawkins, and Meridith Brooks.

Truth is, as much as I always love to say that I'm completely
open-minded when it comes to music, it's not always 100% true.

For example, when I hear that someone performed on the Lilith Fair it almost immediately puts doubts into my mind about how much I'll like their music (despite the fact that MeShell Ndegeocello was on that tour). But then I read a little further and I find out that Coppola was apparently snarking on all the other artists the whole time -- including an interview she did with Toronto Sun back in 1997 that instantly made me adore her:

"I think [Sarah McLaughlin]'s a good songwriter, at times, and singer. She's boring to watch live, though.."

So I started looking into her music and found all sorts of awesome stuff, none of which fit into any sort of single category. She's all over the map with styles and genres -- which I actually prefer in an artist, but rarely find these days.

Here's the first song of her's that I fell in love with -- Woke up Hwite

Anyways, recently she put out an album with a band she's in with DJ/Programmer Adam Pallin called Little Jackie -- which if you're looking for groups to compare it with fits in nicely with Gnarls Barkley (a band I wish I could love but have grown utterly tired of despite their obvious talent and quirkiness because club DJ's got a hold of that "Crazy" song and just beat it into the friggin ground).

Little Jackie is a blast.

Much like Gnarls Barkley's debut album, it's loaded with summer songs. Road trip music. It's a little girly (not that there's anything wrong with that), but my impression (read: fantasy) is that Imani is probably the kind of chick who not only knows how to rock eye shadow, but also gets mad at hockey teams who trade away decent veterans for unproven minor league prospects right before making a playoff run.

And while it's entirely possible that in reality she's a macro-vegan who thinks all sports are barbaric and only dates guys who wear trucker hats strategically tipped to one side, that doesn't mean that this isn't an awesome little song:

-- "Liked You Better Before"

April's a little early for a Summer Song to catch on, but this is usually when they start showing up on mix tapes and iPod playlists. I'll be pissed if this or any other Little Jackie tune ends up on the soundtrack for some craptastical Kate Hudson movie (the chances for which I fear are pretty good) and probably disavow any knowledge of it -- but sometimes that's the price you have to pay when an artist you wish would always stay indie is this good.

Actually now that I think about it, there are a lot of sorta unknown/indie artists out there that I absolutely love to the point where I sort of quietly hope they WON'T catch on so they could stay "my little band that no one else really knows about." -- I guess that's kinda mean-spirited when you get right down to it, but if that's what it takes to keep the crowds at Earl Greyhound concerts small and manageable, then that's what I'm gonna keep wishing for.

So, who are some of your secret faves that you sorta quietly hope will stay yours forever?

[Listening to: Killswitch Engage - "The Element of One" ]

Resisty Rocks

2009-04-14T08:19:00.014-05:00

Apparently as a result of a recent decision from corporate, starting Monday morning food and drink will no longer be allowed in offices that are directly adjacent to manufacturing areas.

On the one hand, this makes a ton of sense because to get from the café to my office I have to walk through a hallway where I pass by the entrance to several controlled environments, and if some unforeseen accident were to happen and I spilled something onto the floors, there would be possible problems with contamination.

This is actually one of the main reasons I choose not to eat lunch at my desk.

But this time the new rules include the removal of several previous "acceptable exclusions," like bottles of water with closeable tops AND covered coffee mugs.

I repeat:
NO. Coffee. Allowed. at employee desks. At. All.

You, know -- I used to think you were cute, but now you're starting to bug me. First you make me park all the way over in BFE (although to be honest, about a month after that decree I just began parking in my old spot again and no one's said boo about it), but now you're messing with my coffee -- and I'm afraid that sir, is a step too far.

Btw, can you still call something a black market if you offer cream and sugar?

Unfortunately, this order comes from up on high -- so there's really not all that much that can be done about it without risking my job. I'd still be able to drink my coffee in the breakroom, so it's not like they're banning the drug from the campus completely -- but I don't know that the cleanliness compliance studies that were performed prior to all these new rules being enforced really accounted for just how important people being able to drink coffee while they work is to the production process around here.

So all that leaves me with is this: Revolution.

Now before we get started here, I'd like to take a moment to dispell some rumors -- because unlike other groups who didn't take the requisite time first to check the Urban Dictionary to ensure that their nationwide protest movement didn't just happen to share a name with a revolting sexual act, we at the 'Don't take away my coffee, you wouldn't like me when I havent had my coffee' central offices truly wish to ensure the integrity of our actions -- so please disregard any and all emails earlier this week requesting people to wear the black armbands with the words "Rusty Trombone" written on them.

That was not an official communication.

Now, on to the plan: See, the new order doesn't officially kick in until Monday -- so in celebration, I'm thinking that for the rest of the week I should prepare and then consume the messiest, most hands-on meals I can think of at my workspace.

Think -- It ain't illegal yet.

I'm talking like crawdads, buffalo wings, BBQ ribs (hell I might just finally take advantage of that disgusting free Cole slaw offer the sales guys think we all appreciate), full Maine Lobster -- stuff like that. So what I need from you, dear friends -- is menu suggestions.

Because if they're gonna try to mess with a brother's coffee,
then it's gonna get straight Skeksis up in here, knammsayin?

[Listening to: 88 Keys (feat. Shitake Monkey) - "The Friends Zone" ]

Where Are You From?

2009-04-13T13:34:00.013-05:00

Because I live here:

-- Mad Love to OHN for the link (well, sorta..)

[Listening to: Betty Davis - "Game is My Middle Name" ]

That's My Jam: Secret Badass

2009-04-13T08:41:00.028-05:00

At first the dream was the same as it probably is for every other kid that picks up a guitar. Get good, buy a pointy axe, shred faces, smash said guitar, get another one, crush your enemies, see them driven before you, then hear the lamentation of their women.

..And then do it again the very next night.

But then as you take the time to develop your skills and start playing in bands and the reality of the landscape begins to appear, and you realize that it's only a rare few who get to live that dream, if at all. It doesn't that mean you shouldn't try for it with everything you've got --

But when the path is narrow, it's the wise warrior who takes the road less traveled.

Early on in my guitar fandom I started taking note of session guys. Musical directors. The guys standing in the back who's faces you didn't always see but who could play any style at any time and could always be relied on to save the day. Guys like Steve Lukather, Greg Howe, Eddie Martinez, Doug Wimbish, or Carlos Alomar. Beyonce's current all-female backup band is made up completley of players like this -- and while her music isn't generally my cup of tea, when you hear a really fantastic band lay anthing down you've gotta respect it.

Every now and then one of these players will move on to bigger and better things, like Led Zepplin guitarist Jimmy Page, Elvis' guitar ace Scotty Moore, Journey guitarist Neil Schon, Me'Shell Ndegeocello, or even Luther Vandross (who started out as a session backup vocalist before striking out on his own) -- but the majority of them essentially hang around until needed, crafting relationships with songwriters and producers and keeping their skills fresh between supporting tours and high-dollar session work.

I wanted to be one of those guys.

One of the best of these is Stevie Salas. Handpicked by George Clinton to cover musical-direction and guitar duties for his solo records; he quickly became a go-to guy for people like Rod Stewart, Mick Jagger, Don Was, and Ronald Shannon Jackson.

You've probably heard Salas before and just didn't know it -- he was the guy actually playing the guitar in the scene at the end of Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure when Rufus (George Carlin) asks to jam with Wyld Stallions (if you look carefully you can see the difference in skin color when they show the hands playing the solo). He also provided all those little guitar fills that played whenever B&T would do air guitar.

Salas has been doing solo records for years now, largely under the radar -- but he's as good as they come, and worth every penny to see live. Here's my current fave track of his -- a cover of the old Heatwave disco track Grooveline featuring fellow session ace TM Stevens on Bass and ex-Tackhead singer Bernard Fowler.

I could seriously listen to this on repeat all day long.

Guitar players are obviously my thing, but session players come in all shapes and sizes (Timbaland, The Dust Brothers, Fish-Stick lover Kanye West, and former NIN/Perfect Circle/Devo/Goo Goo Dolls/Lenny Kravitz/Liz Phair/Joe Walsh drummer Josh Freese [who rips, btw] come to mind as examples). Hell, there was a long period where the background music for every Motown record was supplied by a session band called "The Funk Brothers" -- I'm talking all the old Supremes records, Steve Wonder's early work, Marvin Gaye, Smokey Robinson, nearly all the Jackson 5 stuff -- the singers were obviously different but literally it was the same 3 guys doing drums, bass, and guitar for every single song.

So the question I have for you is this -- maybe not so much in the world of session players, but are there artists out there that you follow who maybe aren't the name that appears on the top of the album cover? A particular singer, DJ, or producer who's stuff you'll check out regardless of who they're backing up or guest starring with?

And if so, who are they?

[Listening to: Ted Nugent - "Wang Dang Sweet Poontang" ]

The Friday Hot Sheet

2009-04-10T09:43:00.032-05:00

Another week comes and goes -- this time with much more emphasis on waking up early and making sure my roomate gets to school on time and has a lunch packed. I'm more of a night owl, so dragging myself up early enough to ensure that his own dragging himself awake rituals don't interfere with getting out the door showing up before the late bell rings has been a real shift. We've done pretty good so far, but there's definitley room for improvement.

Which would be fine, if I hadn't gone and purchased one of these.

I lucked into finding a used/reconditioned one for a good price -- and couldn't really pass on the deal. Curren's been wanting one for a long time, and it's something we can play together. It's a ton of fun, especially when we hook up the Wii Sports and start trying to box each other.

Curren's aunt apparently has one of these, so he's had a bit more practice at it than I got in NYC or when my brother brought his down last Christmas, but we're quickly getting the hang of it. It kinda reminds me of this old TV show we used to have here called "TV Pow" where you would call in and play a space-invaders type of video game by yelling "POW!" into the phone whenever you wanted to shoot your lasers.

It is an incredible timesuck though. Maybe that's largely because it's the new new and we're all enamoured with it, but "just a little bit more" seems to turn into "way past bedtime" a lot quicker than you think it might. A fact that isn't helped by the fact that bedtime for me used to be whenever I just ended up drifting asleep on the couch.

Now, not so much.

So before the wiimote thing charges back up and we go another couple of rounds -- here are this weeks risers and fallers, and the buzz as it looks from here.

Somali Pirates How many movies does Don Cheadle have to make before we realize that this isn't just some quaint little folk hero story that just happened to finally screw up and piss off the US Navy? In my mind, stories like this (especially the sort of "cool" angle the whole thing was largely given before recent events happened) sort of points out just how sort of rudderless the media is right now. Newspapers are sinking, TV news is not only accepting the idea of adding spin into their stories, they're whole-heartedly pushing it. What makes The Daily Show so much fun to watch is the way it calls out news agencies on the way they report the stories we've already read in the morning. The idea being that you have the facts of the story in your head, but then you see the CNN's, MSNBC's, and FOX News Networks of the world report the exact same story and it sounds completely different depending on who you watch. Kinda like these Somali Pirates, who I guess were supposed to be like the new cool kids in school but now are the face of a call to action from these talking heads to ..what, nuke the Indian Ocean? I'm no war hawk, but in this day and age I'm frequently surprised by how much hesitation there seems to be when things like this happen. I'm not saying the old days were better -- but remember how stories like this used to be reported in the news? The anchorman would come on and say "US Military forces blew the shit out of some little boat yesterday. Here's why they did it." And then we'd debate whether that was the right move or not? Now you watch the news and it feels like all this waiting around is the military's way of asking me what should be done. And it's like, "Hey, isn't this sorta what I pay you guys for?" What happened to that Navy Seals commercial they play all night long where the footprints show up in the sand after the wave recedes back into the tide. Where are those guys?

Last.fm I have an iPod Nano with roughly 1500 songs on it. Songs I put on there personally because I like them. But what I'm noticing is that after having gotten all those songs on there and enjoying having them all at my fingertips to listen to and rock out with, that now I'm kind of running out of gas on them. Not that I don't like the songs, but that there's roughly 600-700 of them I either skip constantly or just don't play and then a remaining number that I just play to death. It's hard to believe I could wear out on that many songs at a time, but essentially what I'm craving is something like really, really different than the somewhat limited variety that I've created for myself on the iPod. So lately at work I've been just plugging the headphones into my computer and "getting lost" on Last.fm. I'll put in a general term to start a radio station, like "Funk" or "Reggae" and then see what it gives me. If it plays songs I've heard of I'll listen to them and enjoy, but if it presents me with a band/group/singer I don't know I'll put that into the station generator, and then just sort of repeat that process over and over until I'm completely off the beaten path. The results have been exceptionally cool (although I also suspect I'm just really hungry for new music to listen to so everything unfamiliar tastes yummy right now). I suppose you can do this on Pandora as well, but what I've discovered is that for rock, metal, and really old R&B (imho) Pandora is severely lacking. Last.fm is British, so there's like an overflow of old soul artists on here, and that is just fine by me. I've been discovering groups and singers that frankly I was simply too young to have ever even heard of when they were around, and as such it's almost like discovering an entirely new scene (that you know, happened like 35 years ago). Plus, much like Pandora and Rhapsody, the more you play the more it starts to see what you like -- and I've been treated to some very nice surprises in the past few days, especially in the form of a John Paul Jones solo record I was unaware of, and a project featuring Dennis Chambers, Billy Sheehan and John Novello that absolutley shreds. When I think back to the days where discovering new music meant hit-or-miss methods like waiting desperately for something that didn't sound exactly the same to come on the radio or taking part in blind mixtape exchanges on the Internet (even though those were fun), I feel really lucky to have the chance to use technology like this. It's not a flying car or a jetpack -- but it's pretty damn cool.

Andy Samberg I think there's a part of me that didn't want to like Andy Samberg and the whole Lonely Island gang. Part of me that didn't really want to jump on the trend wagon. I get that way sometimes. Old music is better, old movies are cooler, old comedians are funnier, that sort of thing. Problem is, these guys are funny as hell. Movies like Hot Rod, shows like Eastbound and Down, and this new Seth Rogan Observe and Report thing that is already getting a lot of hate from reviewers and watchdog groups for being too dark -- it's kinda hard to act like something's not funny when you're laughing hysterically at it. It's not perfection, and I can still poinit to examples of older comedians/actors/writers who I feel are more consistent and subversive, but there's no way in hell I can deny the sheer awesomeness of this clip, which I posted up on twitter earlier in the week but just can't stop playing, especially when the nitpickers at work start to get annoying.

Pop
Chips Much like micro-brew beer, when you start taking a stand and declaring your love for a brand of potato chips that you can get at a major grocery store, you immediatley risk connoiseurs like Penn Jillete coming down on you and extolling the superior taste and quality of some tiny snackmaker that only sells 3-ounce bags of their product in a little convienence store somewhere in Delaware. Well that's great and all, but I'm not really supposed to be eating these things in the first place, so if I just happen to stumble across something at Target that blows a bag of Ruffles away it doesn't really mean I'm a luddite. All that being said -- if you like Pringles but (like me) can't stop yourself from eating an entire tube all at once, see if you can find yourself a bag of these instead. I've only found them at one or two places here in Jacksonville, but they are really, really good. I'm always open to new taste suggestions if you have any, but if you're looking for a new chip and can find these -- it's totally worth the effort.

Texas I guess I shouldn't call out the whole state just because of something stupid that one elected official said, but then I remember that everytime some a-hole in Florida does something retarded, the entire country thinks everyone in this state is that stupid. There's no doubt that as States go, Florida has an extra helping of dumbass on it's plate -- but we aren't the only store in the mall, if you know what I'm saying. Essentially the story goes that Republican Representative Betty Brown and the rest of the House Elections Committee heard testimony from Ramey Ko, a representative of the Organization of Chinese Americans regarding difficulties people of Chinese, Japanese and Korean descent often have obtaining voter registrations and other forms of identification, at which point Representative Brown said, "Rather than everyone here having to learn Chinese — I understand it’s a rather difficult language — do you think that it would behoove you and your citizens to adopt names that we could deal with more readily here?" at which point I'm pretty much like, "Check, please?"

On My Planet ..This would happen all the time.

[Listening to: Niacin - "Stone Face" ]

Aincent Chinese Secret

2009-04-09T21:42:00.013-05:00

So last night I finally broke down and gave into the General Tso's Chicken craving that I've been having for like two weeks. I've been trying to eat healthier, so resisting this particular treat was in my best interest -- but even I knew I couldn't hold out forever. So I headed over to the surest bet in my neck of the woods, this tiny little place called "Quick Chinese."

Is it the absolute best take-out Chinese you
can get in this town? Who knows, probably not.

But unlike so many things in the Baymeadows area (where I live these days) it's an institution. Happy Woks and Asia Gardens might come and go, but Quick Chinese is forever. Which is a good thing, because the food friggin' rocks.

Anyways, I call ahead with my order so it will be ready when I get there (they don't deliver). When I get there the scene is the same as it always is. A line of people waiting and Seinfeld on the TV. Tell them your name, wait maybe a minute and then they hand you your stuff.

Best of all the prices are low, mainly because the place doesn't waste much effort on extras. You get your sauces, but you've got to ask for chopsticks. The other thing that comes from this cost-cutting mentality is that Quick Chinese doesn't make their own fortune cookies. I know a lot of places don't -- but once you find one that does (like they used to at Eddie's in Arlington before it closed), it's hard to go back to the pre-made ones wrapped in plastic.

All that being said, I about fell out of my chair when I opened up my fortune cookie last night.

Seriously, can they really get away with this?

What the hell am I supposed to do with this? Go back to the restaurant and use it like a coupon?

I mean damn, son -- that's just lazy.

The only explanation I can think of is that there's some guy in an office somewhere sitting at a computer who just hates his fortune cookie message-writing job, and every now and then he just boils over and types out something like "Who Cares, You're Not Going to Follow My Advice Anyways," "Stick With Your Wife," or "Joey, do you like movies about gladiators?"

If that's the case, I feel for you man. We all get tired of our gigs sometimes and wish we could be doing something else. Besides, it could be worse -- you could be writing TV commercials:

Either way -- don't take it out on the cookie, man.
That cookie didn't do anything to you.

[Listening to: Lyn Collins - "Rock Me Again & Again & Again & Again & Again & Again" ]

Seven Seven Seven Ninety-Three Eleven

2009-04-08T09:42:00.011-05:00

"Some days I'm Morris Day. Other days I'm just Jerome."

[Listening to: John Paul Jones - "B. Fingers" ]

Actually Spoken During the Course of My Day

2009-04-07T23:39:00.005-05:00

"Now that we understand each other, I think it's imperative that we find a way to mess up Margaret Cho's kitchen."

[Listening to: Pat Travers - "Dedication" ]

That's My Jam: MTV Did Not Help You

2009-04-06T08:57:00.033-05:00

The story goes that the idea for MTV originated with a bunch of New York radio guys looking to expand their market. They had a bunch of songs/videos gathered that they wanted to share with the world -- but the bands they were featuring weren't considered popular enough to play on regular radio.

So with the help of some programming executives looking to find a way to make cable TV a profitable investment they launched what they essentially envisioned as a "radio station on TV" -- where music would constantly play, interrupted only occasionally by "VJ's" who would provide interesting facts about whatever artist's song had just played and help add a "face" to the thing.

As everyone knows -- the first song ever played on the network was "Video Killed the Radio Star" by The Buggles.
But what I find most interesting about the history of the thing was the way "radio mentality" almost killed MTV.

See, the problem with radio guys is that they usually only see what's directly in front of them. They know what they think their audience likes, so they'll just keep doing that one thing over and over until that audience either grows too old for their advertisers to care about or the whole thing just runs out of gas and plummets to the ground like a plane crash. In the mind of most radio station executives -- if you start up a Pop/Rock station, build it into a local favorite, make a bunch of advertising revenue, give away a bunch of bumper stickers and beer coozies, and then either shut it down or sell the whole thing off to Clear Channel at a modest loss once the ratings start falling off, it's considered a "good run."

Early-era MTV was filled with guys like that.

They played the bands they liked and ignored the ones they didn't -- claiming that they didn't fit the "image" the network was trying to project. And much like the classic rock station that played Bob Seger and Beatles tunes in the day to pay the bills and then snuck in entire B-sides of Zeppelin and Metallica late at night, as long as the ads were getting sold and the Arbitron books confirmed that they were hitting their numbers -- they'd just keep running the thing until the spark went out and then move on to the next number on the dial, just like they'd always done before.

The only problem is -- MTV isn't a radio station.

One of my favorite stories from this period in the network's history is when they brought David Bowie in one day to do an interview, and VJ Mark Goodman sat down with him and essentially said, "Thanks for coming in today and answering a few questions for us today, David," at which point a clearly pissed-off David Bowie jammed a finger in Goodman's face and all but shouted back,

"Actually, I've got a question for YOU -- Why don't you
ever feature any videos by black artists on this network?"

Depending on what source you trust, there are many different explanations as to why MTV was essentially lily-white during it's first few years -- the most popular being the "We were just playing the songs we liked, and most of those artists were rock and roll and new wave bands made up of white kids. It wasn't an intentional slight, it was just the way we'd always worked when we were in radio" defense.

None of which explains why at one point executives at CBS Records had to basically threaten to pull all of their videos off the station unless MTV started playing songs by urban artists.

A few months later MTV aired Michael Jackson’s "Billie Jean" -- and we all know what happened after that.

The odd thing about it is that at one point it was run sort of a pirate radio station. Hardly anyone knew who the Buggles were before MTV showed them to us. Sure, it might have all been part of some larger corporate scheme -- but MTV introduced a lot of us to music we might have otherwise never heard. Most frequently in the forms of scene-specific programming blocks like Headbangers Ball, 120 Minutes, and Yo MTV Raps. Places that for many of us opened the doors to genres and artists we then delved deeper into on our own, especially as the network veered more and more openly corporate over the years.

The interesting side effect of all this is that there were several bands out there that MTV's original myopic view were clearly intended to be helpful to who not only didn't benefit from the added exposure that the network provided, but in some ways possibly found themselves hurt by the addition of a medium that enabled listeners to see the faces of the people behind the songs.

One of my favorite of these is Aldo Nova -- a Canadian quartet most famous for the song "Fantasy." For those of you who might be too young to remember, this song owned on the radio. People loved the hell out of it. And why not? -- It's got huge guitars, a catchy hook, and a chorus that just begs to be sung out loud over and over with any and everybody at the bar who's listening to it.

In fact, it's a huge mystery to me why this song isn't among the many classic rock anthems that have sort of enjoyed resurgence as a result of the whole Guitar Hero video game craze. Seriously, if there was ever a tune custom-made for that game, this is it -- but as far as I can tell it's not on there.

Who knows, maybe there's a Canadian version of the game you can only get north of the border that features levels where you can only jam along to tracks by Rush, Triumph, Saga, Honeymoon Suite, and April Wine. But short of that, this in particular seems to be a song that is slowly fading into the background,

..And I for one can't help but wonder if the video is one of the reasons why:

OK, let’s forget for a moment the inexplicable opening sequence with the Uzi-toting guards and the nerdy guy "protecting" the guitar. Lets move past the presence of a working helicopter that surely sucked up all the working budget for the video, thereby requiring the less-than-convincing special effects used to represent the LASER BEAM COMING OUT OF THE GUITAR THAT IS USED TO OPEN THE DOOR OF THE WAREHOUSE, and let's just move right to the heart of the problem, shall we?

If you're in a band where one guy wants to wear a leopard-skin spandex
jumpsuit, then either you ALL HAVE TO WEAR THEM or no one can.

Seriously, is there anything that kills the rock and roll authenticity of this whole video more than the fact that the guy with the moon boots and the guitar that shoots frikkin' laser beams is being backed up by what appears to be a bunch of bank tellers?

I can just picture the scene in the dressing room -- everyone standing there with their arms crossed while an angry Aldo Caporuscio demanded to know where everyone else's leopard-skin suits were.

"Well, the guys and I had a meeting -- and we decided that we're not going to wear them anymore."
"But why!? They look great!"
"No man-- They look stupid."
"The songs about living a Rock and Roll fantasy life! How are we supposed to portray that if you're going out there in button-down shirts!?"
"Hey, we're ready to rock the song, but we just don't ..you know, feel good about the spandex anymore."
"Don't you think it's gonna look a little weird if I'm the only one with one on?"
"That's just it, Aldo -- we were all kinda hoping that maybe you'd go without it, too. At least for the video shoot, you know?"
"Go without it!? Are you crazy? I'm Aldo effing Nova -- Where I go, the spandex goes!"
"Well yeah, but.."
"But nothing! I'm WEARING this. You losers do what you want."
"Come on man, don't be that way."
"You'll see. You'll ALL see. When this video shoot is over, people are going to wanna know where all the rock stars are -- and they're not going to mean you guys. They're going to be looking for the leopard man."

You laugh now -- but do you want to know what the scariest part of this whole thing is?

In the very next video the band put out in support of a song called "Monkey on Your Back" –-
..They’re all wearing matching jumpsuits.

[Listening to: Jerry Reed - "Amos Moses" ]

	Somali Pirates	How many movies does Don Cheadle have to make before we realize that this isn't just some quaint little folk hero story that just happened to finally screw up and piss off the US Navy? In my mind, stories like this (especially the sort of "cool" angle the whole thing was largely given before recent events happened) sort of points out just how sort of rudderless the media is right now. Newspapers are sinking, TV news is not only accepting the idea of adding spin into their stories, they're whole-heartedly pushing it. What makes The Daily Show so much fun to watch is the way it calls out news agencies on the way they report the stories we've already read in the morning. The idea being that you have the facts of the story in your head, but then you see the CNN's, MSNBC's, and FOX News Networks of the world report the exact same story and it sounds completely different depending on who you watch. Kinda like these Somali Pirates, who I guess were supposed to be like the new cool kids in school but now are the face of a call to action from these talking heads to ..what, nuke the Indian Ocean? I'm no war hawk, but in this day and age I'm frequently surprised by how much hesitation there seems to be when things like this happen. I'm not saying the old days were better -- but remember how stories like this used to be reported in the news? The anchorman would come on and say "US Military forces blew the shit out of some little boat yesterday. Here's why they did it." And then we'd debate whether that was the right move or not? Now you watch the news and it feels like all this waiting around is the military's way of asking me what should be done. And it's like, "Hey, isn't this sorta what I pay you guys for?" What happened to that Navy Seals commercial they play all night long where the footprints show up in the sand after the wave recedes back into the tide. Where are those guys?

	Last.fm	I have an iPod Nano with roughly 1500 songs on it. Songs I put on there personally because I like them. But what I'm noticing is that after having gotten all those songs on there and enjoying having them all at my fingertips to listen to and rock out with, that now I'm kind of running out of gas on them. Not that I don't like the songs, but that there's roughly 600-700 of them I either skip constantly or just don't play and then a remaining number that I just play to death. It's hard to believe I could wear out on that many songs at a time, but essentially what I'm craving is something like really, really different than the somewhat limited variety that I've created for myself on the iPod. So lately at work I've been just plugging the headphones into my computer and "getting lost" on Last.fm. I'll put in a general term to start a radio station, like "Funk" or "Reggae" and then see what it gives me. If it plays songs I've heard of I'll listen to them and enjoy, but if it presents me with a band/group/singer I don't know I'll put that into the station generator, and then just sort of repeat that process over and over until I'm completely off the beaten path. The results have been exceptionally cool (although I also suspect I'm just really hungry for new music to listen to so everything unfamiliar tastes yummy right now). I suppose you can do this on Pandora as well, but what I've discovered is that for rock, metal, and really old R&B (imho) Pandora is severely lacking. Last.fm is British, so there's like an overflow of old soul artists on here, and that is just fine by me. I've been discovering groups and singers that frankly I was simply too young to have ever even heard of when they were around, and as such it's almost like discovering an entirely new scene (that you know, happened like 35 years ago). Plus, much like Pandora and Rhapsody, the more you play the more it starts to see what you like -- and I've been treated to some very nice surprises in the past few days, especially in the form of a John Paul Jones solo record I was unaware of, and a project featuring Dennis Chambers, Billy Sheehan and John Novello that absolutley shreds. When I think back to the days where discovering new music meant hit-or-miss methods like waiting desperately for something that didn't sound exactly the same to come on the radio or taking part in blind mixtape exchanges on the Internet (even though those were fun), I feel really lucky to have the chance to use technology like this. It's not a flying car or a jetpack -- but it's pretty damn cool.

	Andy Samberg	I think there's a part of me that didn't want to like Andy Samberg and the whole Lonely Island gang. Part of me that didn't really want to jump on the trend wagon. I get that way sometimes. Old music is better, old movies are cooler, old comedians are funnier, that sort of thing. Problem is, these guys are funny as hell. Movies like Hot Rod, shows like Eastbound and Down, and this new Seth Rogan Observe and Report thing that is already getting a lot of hate from reviewers and watchdog groups for being too dark -- it's kinda hard to act like something's not funny when you're laughing hysterically at it. It's not perfection, and I can still poinit to examples of older comedians/actors/writers who I feel are more consistent and subversive, but there's no way in hell I can deny the sheer awesomeness of this clip, which I posted up on twitter earlier in the week but just can't stop playing, especially when the nitpickers at work start to get annoying.

	Pop Chips	Much like micro-brew beer, when you start taking a stand and declaring your love for a brand of potato chips that you can get at a major grocery store, you immediatley risk connoiseurs like Penn Jillete coming down on you and extolling the superior taste and quality of some tiny snackmaker that only sells 3-ounce bags of their product in a little convienence store somewhere in Delaware. Well that's great and all, but I'm not really supposed to be eating these things in the first place, so if I just happen to stumble across something at Target that blows a bag of Ruffles away it doesn't really mean I'm a luddite. All that being said -- if you like Pringles but (like me) can't stop yourself from eating an entire tube all at once, see if you can find yourself a bag of these instead. I've only found them at one or two places here in Jacksonville, but they are really, really good. I'm always open to new taste suggestions if you have any, but if you're looking for a new chip and can find these -- it's totally worth the effort.

	Texas	I guess I shouldn't call out the whole state just because of something stupid that one elected official said, but then I remember that everytime some a-hole in Florida does something retarded, the entire country thinks everyone in this state is that stupid. There's no doubt that as States go, Florida has an extra helping of dumbass on it's plate -- but we aren't the only store in the mall, if you know what I'm saying. Essentially the story goes that Republican Representative Betty Brown and the rest of the House Elections Committee heard testimony from Ramey Ko, a representative of the Organization of Chinese Americans regarding difficulties people of Chinese, Japanese and Korean descent often have obtaining voter registrations and other forms of identification, at which point Representative Brown said, "Rather than everyone here having to learn Chinese — I understand it’s a rather difficult language — do you think that it would behoove you and your citizens to adopt names that we could deal with more readily here?" at which point I'm pretty much like, "Check, please?"

	On My Planet	..This would happen all the time.