Riot In Thunder Alley

My Best Friends as Classic Soul Singers

2010-08-18T14:24:00.000-07:00

Have you ever wondered what you would have done with your life had you been born in the 1930’s/40’s with a certain amount of melanin in your skin? Why, I think about it every day, and I’ve realized that me and each of my friends would doubtlessly have become legendary soul singers, given the right circumstances. To give you some idea of what we would have sounded like, here’s a stupid list!

What famous soul singer might you have been?

1. Jon Havenhill = Jerry Butler

Allmusic.com says: "stylish, refined, reserved"

2. Chris Remijan = Curtis Mayfield

Allmusic.com says: "earnest, literate, poignant"

3. Erik Greene = Solomon Burke

Allmusic.com says: "amiable, confident, hungry"

4. Chelsea Champlin = Laura Lee

Allmusic.com says: "acerbic, provocative, passionate"

5. Corey Stawicki = Rufus Thomas

Allmusic.com says: "good-natured, boisterous, exuberant"

6. Leslie Sullivan = Roberta Flack

Allmusic.com says: "sophisticated, sentimental, literate"

7. Courtney Fredrickson = Betty Davis

Allmusic.com says: "outrageous, freewheeling, intense"

8. Richard Iseppi = George Clinton

Allmusic.com says: "exuberant, humorous, whimsical"

And finally...

9. Ryan Iseppi = Swamp Dogg

Allmusic.com says: "eccentric, idiosyncratic, entertaining"

Maybe I'm blowing my own horn, but seriously, who else could I be but Swamp Dogg?

Free Your Mind & Your Ass Will Follow

2009-08-28T16:26:00.000-07:00

If you've ever felt the need to get up and dance, this is for you.

Over four hours of impassioned soul and funk of every color and shade, spanning three playlists:

1. "Expressway To Your Soul"

The stankiest, sweatiest, most explosive soul of the 60's and 70's. The grit and groove of 50's R&B gives way to an intense fever pitch of monster dancers and floor-fillers. Tight and outta sight, Al Green, Isaac Hayes, Sam Cooke, The Temptations, Wilson Pickett, Otis Redding, and seventeen others represent the crème de la crème of male soul vocalists.

Dig it.

2. "Pluckin' At Yo' Heartstrings"

While the brothers kept their eyes fixed on the dance floor, the sisters stole America's heart and have yet to give it back. Raw emotion and the defiant voice of feminism set to an unstoppable groove, Aretha Franklin, The Supremes, Ann Peebles, Etta James, Carla Thomas, and twenty others testify on this collection of female soul luminaries.

Testify.

3. "Dance Just As Good As You Want"

The core of soul is the rhythm - the almighty groove. While R&B vocalists aimed at the charts, instrumental combos turned the soul sound inside out, making the rhythm the main attraction. Euphoric jazz and greasy funk collide in this compilation of Booker T & The MG's, David Axelrod, Parliament, The J.B.'s, Jimmy Smith, and sixteen other instrumental rhythm conductors.

Get down.

Enjoy!

Mein Rave Ist Dein Rave

2009-08-24T14:05:00.000-07:00

"There are two kinds of music; German music and bad music."

-Henry Louis Mencken

No one makes techno quite like the Teutons. Those wily Germans have been there from the beginning; from the mercurial musings of Kraftwerk to the catatonic cold-wave trance of Sven Väth to the more recent cathartic thrills of Köln's Kompakt label and its all-star roster of IDM producers, Deutschland has consistently led Europe in its search for the perfect beat.

It goes without saying that Berlin would call itself "Mutter" to any number of innovative and slyly anarchic beat architects. Berlin is, after all, the city of Alfred Döblin's Berlin Alexanderplatz, die Mauer, and David Bowie's most alienating albums.

So who do we find leading the cultural capitol of central Europe in its digital renaissance? Ellen Allien and her Bpitch Control record label, home to such visionary knob-twiddlers as Modeselektor, Apparat, and Ms. Allien herself. Each of BPitch Control's numerous compilation releases can claim for itself a warmth and openness that techno (particularly techno of the minimalist variety) so often lacks.

It's all quite footloose, and who would've expected it? The Germans are notorious for taking everything rather seriously, and maybe BPitch Control is no exception. Here's the label's description of IDM producer Sascha Funke:

"A kind of techno that sways between the polarity of emotional overload and concrete rationale - hence immediacy, which is what Sascha Funke is all about."

Hören Sie die Musik hier.

Sickening

2009-08-01T12:36:00.000-07:00

Some inexcusable filth from the mouth of Pat Buchanan:

"Barack says we need to have a conversation about race in America . Fair enough. But this time, it has to be a two-way conversation. White America needs to be heard from, not just lectured to. This time, the Silent Majority needs to have its convictions, grievances and demands heard. And among them are these:

First, America has been the best country on earth for black folks. It was here that 600,000 black people, brought from Africa in slave ships, grew into a community of 40 million, were introduced to Christian salvation, and reached the greatest levels of freedom and prosperity blacks have ever known. Wright ought to go down on his knees and thank God he is an American.

Second, no people anywhere has done more to lift up blacks than white Americans. Untold trillions have been spent since the ' 60s on welfare, food stamps, rent supplements, Section 8 housing, Pell grants, student loans, legal services, Medicaid, Earned Income Tax Credits and poverty programs designed to bring the African-American community into the mainstream. Governments, businesses and colleges have engaged in discrimination against white folks -- with affirmative action, contract set-asides and quotas -- to advance black applicants over white applicants. Churches, foundations, civic groups, schools and individuals all over America have donated their time and money to support soup kitchens, adult education, day care, retirement and nursing homes for blacks.

We hear the grievances. Where is the gratitude?

Barack talks about new 'ladders of opportunity' for blacks. Let him go to Altoona and Johnstown, and ask the white kids in Catholic schools how many were visited lately by Ivy League recruiters handing out scholarships for 'deserving' white kids. Is white America really responsible for the fact that the crime and incarceration rates for African-Americans are seven times those of white America? Is it really white America's fault that illegitimacy in the African-American community has hit 70 percent and the black dropout rate from high schools in some cities has reached 50 percent?

Is that the fault of white America or, first and foremost, a failure of the black community itself?

As for racism, its ugliest manifestation is in interracial crime, and especially interracial crimes of violence. Is Barack Obama aware that while white criminals choose black victims 3 percent of the time, black criminals choose white victims 45 percent of the time?

Is Barack aware that black-on-white rapes are 100 times more common than the reverse, that black-on-white robberies were 139 times as common in the first three years of this decade as the reverse?

We have all heard ad nauseam from the Rev. Al about Tawana Brawley, the Duke rape case and Jena. And all turned out to be hoaxes. But about the epidemic of black assaults on whites that are real, we hear nothing.

Sorry, Barack, some of us have heard it all before, about 40 years and 40 trillion tax dollars ago.
We are a Judeo-Christian Nation even if Mr. Obama says we are not."

I could write a fucking Talmud-sized tome about how shockingly wrong this piece is, but I'll leave that task to those with more dignity and self-restraint than myself.

This is sickening.

And even worse: thousands of Americans believe and applaud this shit! Thousands of Americans such as my own grandparents, who emailed me this nonsense, presumably as yet another way to illustrate how "Ann Arbor hippie values" such as mine are destroying the foundations of American freedom.

I am consistently horrified by how ignorant and hateful some people can be.

Wilde Thing

2009-07-29T15:08:00.000-07:00

"After playing Chopin, I feel as if I had been weeping over sins

that I had never committed, and mourning over tragedies that were
not my own. Music always seems to me to produce that effect. It
creates for one a past of which one has been ignorant, and fills
one with a sense of sorrows that have been hidden from one's tears.
I can fancy a man who had led a perfectly commonplace life, hearing
by chance some curious piece of music, and suddenly discovering
that his soul, without his being conscious of it, had passed
through terrible experiences, and known fearful joys, or wild
romantic loves, or great renunciations."

"The Critic As Artist"
Oscar Wilde, 1891

This is one of my favorite literary passages - it truly sums up the wonder of music. And while I appreciate Wilde's celebration of Chopin (one of my favorite classical composers), I feel that the text could just as easily apply to Grieg, Rachmaninoff, Elgar, The White Stripes, or even Wu-Tang Clan.
Read the entire text here. I promise you won't regret it.

The Rise & Fall

2009-07-20T20:38:00.000-07:00

If the rise and fall of the waters heaving against the wharf could be given the opportunity to defend itself, it would surely argue that it merely carried out its duties, the way any milkman or cobbler might. The rise and fall, it could be said, had as much personality as anyone in the coastal village. Each day, it moved as if employed to do so, sometimes lazily, as though recovering from a night of heavy drinking. Other days, the rise and fall of the cold, bitter waters put on a real performance. And the people of the town took note and gave fearful ovations.

The rise and fall was as much a part of the peoples’ lives as their wives, children, mistresses, and closest friends. The rise and fall, in fact, played a vital role in the lives of most inhabitants of the village. It was the rise and fall that determined whether the boatmen went to work on any particular day; the boatmen alternately cursed and gave praise to the rise and fall, depending on how the rise and fall decided to act.

When the fishermen felt the bitter sting of the wind and water, and their delicate vessels were tossed about in the rise and fall’s inconsolable tantrum, the men of the village raised their faces upwards, blinking into salty gray skies, and asking “why?” to the rise and fall.

When the sun broke through the clouds and the fishermen stripped themselves of their heavy leather coats, they puffed contentedly on their pipes and pulled in nets filled with frantic sea life. They smiled and one another and shook their heads at the rise and fall, as if to say “you never can really know what it’s on about.”

Tonight, the rise and fall could be forgiven for its rancor. The winds that whipped against the weathered wooden flanks of the wharf had, like so many times before, given the rise and fall serious cause for complaint. The rise and fall, like any who resents his bland lot in life, did not care to swell and heave; it was the wind that incited it to its fearsome pitch.

The rise and fall churned and coughed, its self-control as tenuous as the postman’s grip on his lager in the pub, only the length of a football pitch from the terrified wharf. Women and children peered through dull-colored blinds into the water’s all-encompassing blackness. Able-bodied men ate their stew and told their wives to calm themselves, while knock-kneed old men rocked back and forth in their chairs and assured anyone who would listen that the rise and fall was only having a bit of fun – after all, it had been years since the rise and fall had seriously threatened the village.

The boats at the wharf rubbed uncomfortably against one another, desperately trying to right themselves against the rise and fall’s considerable strength. Meanwhile, the buildings closest to the rise and fall rattled and clanked, admonishing the wind for inciting the rise and fall to such rage.

With a crash like a last angry word and a rush like a dejected sigh of defeat, the wharf gave way to the rise and fall, disappearing into it as though it had never existed. The rise and fall dragged the splintering planks of the ships and docks into itself with a satisfied roar. For the first time in ages, the rise and fall was enjoying its work.

Next came the buildings along the pier. The pub, the tailor’s storefront, the mercer’s warehouse, and the poet’s small cottage on the waterfront all found themselves swept under the rise and fall’s authoritative swell. Roofs cracked and split, windows shattered, and stone shifted as the water’s infallible rise and fall made itself known like never before to the people of the village.

In no time at all, the rise and fall had claimed the village as its own. It rushed through every street and alley. It swept into every mossy old building. It ran over the graveyard and lapped at the hills on the town’s outskirts. The rise and fall, growing tired at last, settled and breathed an exhausted sigh as it drowned the church. With a final heaving shudder, the rise and fall grew quiet and the sea drew back, leaving the town waterlogged and silent in the calm of death.

The rise and fall moved gently, serenely. It feared no retribution for its actions; after all, it had done nothing more than its duty. No one asked the rise and fall to explain its motives. No one was left to do so. And to be frank, the rise and fall would not have cared to answer.

S'been A While!

2009-07-19T22:39:00.000-07:00

Folks, it's true that I've been absent from this blog for about two months now, but to be entirely honest, my brain is broken.

Broken like a rusty ole tractor that just won't run no more.

Bruised like a sad-eyed ole prize fighter with not a single fight left in him.

Battered like a dirty ole hound dog that don't got no bark left to tell the world his troubles.

But I give you my word - I'll come up with something interesting soon. Suggestions are quite welcome. Until I think of something, you can find me at Don's Guns... ha, ha, ha.

God Bless Wikipedia

2009-06-07T21:58:00.000-07:00

This post is intended to be an ongoing collection of my favorite bizarre quotations from Wikipedia, that bastion of somewhat-credible knowledge and wisdom. Anytime I find a particularly humorous or strange quotation from a Wikipedia article, I will log it on this post. If anyone happens to find any good quotations, please send them to me and I will include them here!

Let's begin:

"The 'Theme from A Summer Place" is a song with lyrics by Mack Discant and music by Max Steiner, written for the 1959 film, A Summer Place, which starred Sandra Dee and Troy Donahue. It was recorded for the film by Hugo Winterhalter. It is one of the most well-known examples of beautiful music." (Taken from the entry "Theme from A Summer Place")

"Cunnilingus is the act of using the mouth, lips, and tongue to stimulate the female genitals. Derived from a vulgar Latin word for the vulva (cunnus, whence the English slang cunt) and the Latin word for tongue (lingua), the term literally means 'cunt-tongue.' A person who performs cunnilingus may be referred to as a 'cunnilinguist'." (Taken from the entry "Cunnilingus")

"Hong Kong Phooey is a 16-episode (31 shorts) Hanna-Barbera animated series that first aired on ABC Saturday morning from September 7, 1974 to September 4, 1976. The star, Hong Kong Phooey, is the secret alter ego of Penrod Pooch, or Penry (sometimes mispronounced "Henry"), a "mild-mannered" police station janitor. Although Penry/Phooey appears to be the only anthropomorphic dog in the entire city where the series is set, no one ever connects his two identities." (Taken from the entry "Hong Kong Phooey")

"Unknown Hinson, dressed in his signature rodeo tailor coat and black ribbon necktie, is a dark parody of the country western stars from the early/mid 20th century. With his glued on sideburns, blacked out front teeth, and dark hair slicked back to reveal a prominent widows peak, he has been referred to as the 'hillbilly vampire'. The self-proclaimed 'king of country-western troubadours' speaks and sings with an authentic southern drawl, commonly mis-pronouncing words like woman 'womern', and window 'winder'." (Taken from the entry "Unknown Hinson")

"Each anime saga and set of video games in the Pokémon franchise has featured a crime syndicate seeking to take over the world. Unlike real-world crime syndicates, these organizations usually forgo the use of firearms or other weapons in favor of battling with their Pokémon, due to the franchise's focus on battling Pokémon to solve conflicts. (Taken from the entry "Pokémon crime syndicates")

"Variations: 'Break the pickle, tickle-tickle' involves a similar makeup as "in the hole, got some soul", in that it has historically involved the rhyming in which children and adolescents participate." (Taken from the entry "High five"... please take a look at this page. Every part of the article is hilarious.)

Anybody Wanna Take Me Up On This?

2009-05-20T18:08:00.000-07:00

Here's my latest wonderful idea: I intend to learn one odd, scarcely-spoken language to be used with each one of my friends. Of course, this won't be easy - each friend will have to learn their respective languages, and I'll have to master each language I intend to speak... not an easily accomplished task. Yet I feel it's worth it for a variety of reasons. I would love to be able to gossip with Jon about Jeremy in Navajo (Diné Bizaad), or gossip with Jeremy about Jon in Dzongkha (རྫོང་ཁ)! And who wouldn't love to freak out the folks at ABC Warehouse by asking for a refrigerator in Basque (Euskara)?

Here's a list of suitably odd languages. Hit me up if you want in on this...

Welsh (Cymraeg)
Georgian (ქართული)
Luxembourgish (Lëtzebuergesch)
Kabyle (Taqbaylit)

Basque (Euskara)
Navajo (Diné Bizaad)
Bishnupriya Manipuri (বিষ্ণুপ্রিযা় মণিপুরী)
Nahuatl (Nāhuatlahtōlli)
Gan (贛語)
Cornish (Kernewek)

Dzongkha (རྫོང་ཁ)
Greenlandic (Kalaallisut)
Cherokee (ᏣᎳᎩ)
Amharic (አማርኛ)

In other news, I've got a big old crush on Kate Nash:

I think the language for us is probably Crimean Tatar (Qırımtatarca), don't you?

A Cotton Garage

2009-05-15T21:15:00.000-07:00

I was lucky enough to make it to Comerica Park for my first Tigers' game of the year. Curtis Granderson proved once again why he's my Tiger - his at-bat song was "Paid in Full" by Eric B & Rakim (he went only one for four on the day, but watching him step up to the plate to the rhythm of a golden age hip-hop classic made it alright).

The Motor City Kitties fought through a rain delay and took the day 14-1 over the Oakland Athletics, thanks in part to a 1st-inning grand slam from team joke Ryan Raburn (it was entertaining watching his season average jump forty percentage points after one hit).

One of the most entertaining aspects of the day, however, came not from the Tigers, but from my dear old dad, who is now the proud author of this profound quotation:

"Hey Ry, see that fat guy? Look at how big his shirt is! It's like a cotton garage!"

Living The Dream

2009-04-22T16:03:00.000-07:00

Damn Will Hodgkinson, and damn him to hell. He has stolen my dream from me and appears to be enjoying it immensely, the cad. In case you don't know, Hodgkinson is a journalist who works most prominently with The Guardian in London, interviewing just about every interesting musician alive today. He is a regular writer for the fabulous "Soundtrack of my Life" segment, which puts him in touch with just about all of my heroes and idols (although he has yet to interview the fabled Jack White). Just look at this (partial) list of people he's spoken with, for Christ's sake:

Jarvis Cocker (Pulp)
Terry Hall (The Specials)
Duffy
Alex Kapranos (Franz Ferdinand)
Tom Jones
Paul Weller (The Jam)
Al Green
Bobby Gillespie (Primal Scream)
Mark Ronson
Ennio Morricone
Robert Plant (Led Zeppelin)
Timbaland
Johnny Marr (The Smiths)
Bryan Ferry (Roxy Music)
Brett Anderson (Suede)
Neil Tennant (Pet Shop Boys)
Pierre Henry
André 3000 (OutKast)
Wayne Coyne (The Flaming Lips)
Ray Davies (The Kinks)

Not only that, but the man is the proud author of two rather farcical, and quite humorous, books: Song Man and Guitar Man, in which Will attempts to learn to write songs and play guitar, respectively, with the help of a cast of music legends and cult icons. Adding further insult to injury, the guy looks more like a rock star than a writer. He probably has great tastes in suits and has shagged Mandy Moore too, the bastard. Quit wrecking my dreams, Will.

Detroit Findet Sich Selbst Sogar In Deutschen Karikaturen

2009-04-17T17:30:00.000-07:00

"And how much of a scrapping bonus do we receive for the Opel factories?"

I feel an explanation is probably needed:
The German automotive manufacturer Opel, currently owned by General Motors, is undergoing a massive modernization project to attempt to stop the brand's erosion. The German government recently declined Opel's request for a €1 billion credit guarantee to support the company through GM's dark days. Meanwhile, the German government has also instituted a "scrapping bonus" (Abwrackprämie) to support the sale of new cars.
Essentially this cartoon has Detroit's GM executives wondering if they will receive a scrapping bonus for demolishing Opel's factories.

No, it's not a very funny cartoon... I just got excited when I saw the Ren-Cen in the Berliner Zeitung.

A Theological Query

2009-04-11T06:34:00.000-07:00

I don't count myself as a member of any organized religion, nor do I affiliate myself with any particular faith. However, having been raised in the Catholic church, and having seen what the power of prayer can do for many people, I maintain a certain amount of respect for nearly all forms of worship - Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Buddhism, and anything else in between. I even keep a secret ounce of respect for Scientology, as I'm certain that Beck could not continue to produce such stellar albums year after year without a little help from his thetans.

I certainly don't consider myself an atheist, and I find the term "agnostic" somewhat distasteful. However, as a man with faith in both science and a higher power, I find myself in a somewhat unusual position.
Lately, it seems that every website or online article I read organizes itself around some sort of attack on organized religion. The most common criticism seems to be a lack of credibility, although my phrasing seems to give these criticisms a scholarly levelheadedness that is, quite frankly, missing from nearly all of these attacks.
The bulk of the "atheism vs. religion" arguments go something like this:

"Christianity: because believing in the Easter bunny is just silly."

Alternately, many of these oh-so-clever intended insults reproach the average Christian for not having read the Bible.
It's probably true that most Christians have not read the Bible, and I'm not surprised; the Bible is very long and very boring. Reading the Bible is a task in the same way reading Tristram Shandy or watching the Soviet film version of War and Peace is a task. I quite honestly can't really find fault with anyone for not having read the Bible.
Of course, there are those who use Biblical scripture in their arguments without really understanding it - certainly, those people tend to give religion its bad name. However, what most people fail to observe is that the atheists who so smugly denounce religion use arguments that are just as unfounded as those taken from the Bible.
Atheists belittle religion - particularly Christianity - as being absurd, farcical, a fairy tale, all the while pointing to facts that seemingly support their stance: evolution, evidence of the Big Bang theory, etc. I assume it doesn't occur to most people to think about how absurd these phenomena really are - surely no less bizarre than the idea that the first hippie died 2000 years ago to absolve mankind of its sins. Furthermore, the armchair theologists who condemn religion as "silly" or "ridiculous" are simply sycophantically repeating data and statistics taken from scientific studies in the same way the most distasteful brand of Evangelist spouts misinterpreted Bible verses. It's the smugness of so-called intellectuality that, for me, effectively undermines the tenets and beliefs of atheism as thoroughly as it does the doctrines of mass faith.
Here is my question:
Why is the idea that a supreme being exists any more ridiculous than the idea that the entire universe expanded from a single particle of matter? Furthermore, if we hold the Big Bang Theory to be legitimate (and I believe it is), then we must ask "why" it even happened in the first place; who's to say there's not some cosmic bearded patriarch out there, conjuring universes out of his Crazy Bones collection?
No one can say for sure.
Here's the long and short of the religion argument: nobody knows what they're talking about. No one has any idea why the universe is as it is, so what difference does it make if you subscribe to the belief systems of Christ, Allah, Jah, Darwin, Odin, Hubbard, or Mr. T?
If we really take a carefully considered look at both religion and science, we can see that both are absurd and ridiculous and should be used only with extreme caution. I've found that the best one can do in this life is to sit back and appreciate the bizarreness of existence and all it has to offer.
Perhaps if more people would just admit that everything in life - and I do mean everything - is really quite silly, we could stop fighting and writing addle-brained blog posts and just enjoy a cup of tea.

From Where You Are, You Can Hear Their Dreams

2009-04-04T07:59:00.000-07:00

As a lover of all things Welsh and a great fan of Dylan Thomas' surreal 1953 play Under Milk Wood, the news that a Thomas biopic is in the works came as a very pleasant surprise. The film, The Edge of Love, is slated to star Matthew Rhys as Thomas, as well as Cillian Murphy, Keira Knightley, and Sienna Miller (early reports also named Lindsay Lohan, who, thankfully, has been replaced by Miller). The film will focus on the bisexual love triangle between Thomas, his wife, and his childhood friend/lover. It is also rumored to feature a steamy make-out session between Knightley and Miller on the Welsh coast, which should really get you hot and bothered if watching bony over-hyped English wenches playing tonsil hockey is your thing.
At any rate, The Edge of Love should, at the very least, contain plenty of lovely Welsh accents. If the producers can restrain themselves from raping Thomas' corpse for the purposes of a big-budget biopic, it should also cast a light on the life of one the 20th century's most misunderstood aesthetes.

For The Record

2009-03-31T22:52:00.000-07:00

Here's the official playlist from my first solo broadcast on 88.3 WCBN-FM Ann Arbor. I hope everyone who tuned in enjoyed the show.

"Lester Left Town" - Art Blakey & The Jazz Messengers

"La Valse à Mille Temps" - Jacques Brel

"She Wants To Move (DFA Remix)" - N*E*R*D

"Where Is My Love" - Cat Power

"Hard Times" - The Greenhornes

"In The Land of Grey & Pink" - Caravan

"Ride That Train" - Oblivians

"Holland 1945" - Neutral Milk Hotel

"Jesus Built My Hotrod (Redline/Whiteline Version)" - Ministry

"Humoresque" - Antonín Dvořák

"Shuckin' The Corn" - Eric Weissberg

"Love Is Psychedelic" - Fantastic Plastic Machine

"Burçak" - Mustafa Ozkent

"Gay Bar" - The Wildbunch

"Shame On A Nigga" - Wu-Tang Clan

"You're Too Fast" - Lightnin' Hopkins

"Só Quero Ver" - Beth Carvalho

"3 Feet Deep (Feat. Abdominal & D-Sisive)" - DJ Format

"Venus" - Shocking Blue

"Le Roi Des Mouches Et La Confiture De Rouse" - Jean Claude Vannier

"Down In Mexico" - The Coasters

"Shangri-La" - The Kinks

"Walk On By" - Isaac Hayes

"Mae Rhywyn Wedi Dwyn Fy Fhrwyn" - Y Tebot Piws

"Wake The Town" - U-Roy

"Meet Me In The City" - Junior Kimbrough

"Hot Fun In The Summertime" - Sly & The Family Stone

"Watermelon Man" - Mongo Santamaria

"Rhinestone Cowboy" - Madvillain

"Strathspeys & Reels" - Angus MacDonald

"Genius From The Waist Down" - The Lovemasters

"Fugue In D Minor" - Egg

"Positive Contact" - Deltron 3030

"Kasvoton Kuolema Ja Sirhan Sirhan" - Suomen Talvisota 1939-40

"My Friend Dario" - Vitalic

"Disney's Dream Debased" - The Fall

"Give Love Another Try" - Claudette McLean

"Een Meisje Van Zestien" - Boudewijn de Groot

"Rated X" - Loretta Lynn

"She Loves Everybody" - Chester French

"Confusion" - New Order

A Few Badass-Looking Classical Composers

2009-03-24T18:37:00.000-07:00

History is filled with men of such irrepressible machismo and unstoppable manly vigor that it transcends their common interactions and manifests in their work.

These men are often called "composers".

Now I know what you're thinking: "Composers? As in, classical composers? Fuck that shit, my favorite song is Big Daddy Kane's 'Pimpin' Ain't Easy'!"

But wait, wait, I implore you! I come here not to dispute the merits of Big Daddy Kane, rather, I wish to elaborate upon the overwhelming masculinity that predates him.

So, without further ado, I am proud to present "A Few Badass-Looking Classical Composers".

Actually, a bit further ado: I'm only judging these fellas on their appearance. It would have taken a very long time to decide who the manliest, most badass classical composers were based upon the content and tone of their music.

Don't complain - I never promised anyone quality when I started this blog.

Richard Wagner

The man:

Bombastic German romantic composer - Der Ring des Nibelungen, Der Meistersänger

The look:

Your grandpa in the early 70's. Wagner preferred Tom Snyder to Johnny Carson, and hurt your feelings a little bit when he said Joe Montana looked like a "fairy". He also thought The Beatles were Communists.

Giacomo Puccini

The man:

Elegaic Italian opera master - La Bohème

The look:

The original "iron chef of pounding vag". Puccini drove a Rolls Royce made of sugar and gold leaf and slept with Raquel Welch before she got famous. His favored tempo in bed was somewhere between largo and larghissimo, but oh so con brio.

Antonín Dvořák

The man:

Nationalistic Czech romantic composer - Slavonic Dances, New World Symphony

The look:

The zany Vietnam vet asking for money on your college campus. Dvořák finished most of his sentences with "like, y'know, maaaan?" and owned only one shirt (a Grateful Dead concert tee). He never actually saw combat in 'Nam; he spent most of his time there smoking reefers and listening to The Fugs.

Sergei Rachmaninoff

The man:

Dynamic Russian piano virtuoso - Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini, The Bells

The look:

A KGB agent masquerading as an Ivy League Slavic languages professor. Rachmaninoff spent his daylight hours teaching impressionable American students the language of Soviet glory, while by night he poisoned high-ranking government officials and garroted nuclear scientists in their homes.

Giuseppe Verdi

The man:

Grandiose Italian opera star - Un Ballo in Maschera, Aida

The look:

I'm not going to point out the obvious (Santa Claus), because Verdi was so much more than that. He adopted orphan children and raised them with the perfect mix of sweetness and sternness. He charmed women with his delightful manner and sublime baking skills, while impressing the guys with his ability to throw a perfect 70-yard spiral. Viva Verdi, indeed.

She Brings The Rain

2009-03-11T13:50:00.001-07:00

I'm still trying to decide if I like this story or not.... Feedback would be greatly appreciated.

The faded aluminum siding of Jimmy Fallen Tree’s dilapidated trailer grew hot in the midday sun. The sun’s rays reflected off the aluminum and shone brightly through the patches of rust that covered most of the trailer, as though threatening to burn any damn fool who would think of touching a big piece of metal on a bright summer day.

Wesley Laughing Eye walked stodgily towards Jimmy’s trailer, thinking that the pathetic dwelling looked far too cheery for the sadness it contained. The trailer itself was old and rundown, but Wynona, Jimmy’s wife, had spent years coming up with new ways to make the 1954 Airstream Caravanner look like a real home. Her impressive garden surrounded the trailer, and blankets and tapestries reflecting Wynona’s favorite Sioux motifs adorned the windows and doorway.

Jimmy’s father had bought the Airstream in 1957. Jimmy could still remember standing next to his dad, a stereotypical strong, silent Indian chief type, as he handed over many years’ worth of income for the shiny, attractive camper. Jimmy remembered the man who owned the trailer dealership, a stout Oklahoman wearing a Stetson and a beige suit with a bolo tie. The man had shown his surprise when Jimmy’s father had paid in cash, even going so far as to say: “Well, this’d be the first time I’ve ever met an Injun had the cash to pay for one of these.” The man had thought that Jimmy’s dad was buying the camper as an extravagance; a place to stay on lighthearted family camping trips. In actuality, the elder Fallen Tree had bought the Airstream as a permanent dwelling, a dwelling in which he had lived out the remainder of his life.

Jimmy had moved into his late father’s camper twenty-three years later, after marrying Wynona Brings The Rain in Rapid City. Now Wynona was dying of cancer and confined to the Airstream trailer, spending her last days in a metal husk designed for rich white folks’ recreation.

Wesley spotted Jimmy standing in the shade behind the camper, chewing a wad of Skoal. He approached him and greeted him with a subtle nod. Jimmy smiled quietly without really looking at Wesley and shifted the wad of tobacco from one cheek to the other. Wesley knocked the dirt off of his boots and squinted into the sunshine.

“Anything happen?”

“Nope. Harry’s been in there for an hour or so.”

“What’s he doin’?”

“Couldn’t tell you.”

Harry Creek was the only licensed doctor on the Pine Ridge Reservation, operating out of a small, understaffed clinic in Pine Ridge. Jimmy and Wesley sometimes played cards with him, although they didn’t fully trust him. Harry was the only man they knew who had gone to college, and one of the few folks on the reservation who denied the value of the wakan medicine conjured by the Oglala medicine men.

Harry had been monitoring Wynona’s condition for the past sixth months as a favor to Jimmy, who could barely afford to keep Wynona and himself fed. Harry had known from the beginning that Wynona had only a few months left to live, and had told the Fallen Trees early on. He had been impressed with their almost instant acceptance of the devastating news; neither Jimmy nor Wynona seemed remarkably fazed by the revelation.

Now Harry was trying to keep Wynona comfortable in her last few hours on earth, and Jimmy was remembering his childhood.

Wesley produced a flask of whiskey from the inside pocket of his Carhartt jacket and offered it to Jimmy. Jimmy took a swig and spat it back out, just as Wesley had expected. Jimmy kept this curious habit as a sort of taunt to himself; he tasted the burn of the alcohol, but never allowed it to enter his system. Jimmy’s father had been a drunken Indian, a broken-down caricature of a 20^th century brave dragging himself resolutely through each week until he could squander most of his paycheck on firewater. Jimmy had gotten drunk only once, on the day of his father’s funeral.

Jimmy, Wynona, Wesley, and the rest of their acquaintances on the reservation were of the Oglala tribe. Most of them recognized this but had never felt it. Jimmy believed in Wakan Tanka, the Great Spirit, and spoke to him now and then, but he participated in little in the way of tribe rituals. Wynona was devoutly spiritual, yet spoke seldom of her relationship with the phenomenal world. Wesley spent many drunken nights in heated debate with his own character, simultaneously exalting and scorning the spirits of his ancestry.

Harry, on the other hand, rejected his Oglala heritage outright. He felt a deep and burning shame for the way in which his ancestors had allowed themselves to be trampled upon, and manifested this shame through his practice of white medicine. Whenever he left the reservation, Harry told others that he was Mexican to avoid entering a discussion of his Sioux lineage.

Harry stepped out of the dark trailer into the blazing South Dakota sunlight. It was now two o’clock in the afternoon, and the sun had reached its most exalted point in the heavens.

Jimmy and Wesley looked over at Harry as he slowly made his way into the shade. Neither Jimmy nor Wesley spoke, but Harry heard the question on their minds.

“She’s asleep. She’s as comfortable as I have the power to make her. I reckon she’s got until tonight, maybe until tomorrow morning.”

Jimmy nodded quietly. He appreciated Harry’s efforts, fruitless though they were. He knew that Wynona had four hours left on earth. She had told him the night before, after a vision of her own death.

“Wiyukca Nagi,” she had called, using Jimmy’s birth name, which meant “Thoughtful Shadow”. “Wiyukca Nagi, I have one day left among men.” Wynona had spoken in a quiet, reverent voice quite unlike her ordinary, friendly manner. “I will die tomorrow at six o’clock, when the sun begins to move west. My dreams have shown me.” Jimmy had merely nodded and held her close to him. Jimmy was a man of few words, and was accustomed to letting Wynona do most of his talking. He wondered vaguely what he would have to talk about without her.

Wynona had drifted back into sleep once more, sweating and coughing as her mind raced through streams of visions and fields of revelations. Presently she had returned to consciousness, her chest heaving, and pulled Jimmy close to her. “Wiyukca Nagi, Jimmy, thank the Great Spirit with me for giving us this life together.” Jimmy had wept openly, for the first time in many years, as he and Wynona thanked Wakan Tanka for their time on this beautiful earth.

Wynona’s condition had worsened rapidly through the night, and she was now in the midst of an uncomfortable battle with her own body. Jimmy longed to go inside once again and speak with her, but Wynona seemed to be lost in a swarm of hallucinations and faulty judgments. To try and fail to bring her to consciousness would only serve to increase Jimmy’s grief.

Instead, he squinted towards the hills on the horizon, thinking bitterly on he and Wynona’s life. Last night he had been happy to pray to the Great Spirit, thanking Wakan Tanka for the revelry of life. Thinking on that same life now, he felt only resentment.

Jimmy had lived his entire life in the poorest place in the United States of America. He lived in Allen, South Dakota, where ninety-six percent of the families lived below the poverty line. Jimmy didn’t know this; he had never heard any of the lamentable statistics that characterized his town and the reservation in which it was located, yet his own experience had shown him what a miserable place it had been his and Wynona’s lot in life to inhabit.

Jimmy’s memories of the Pine Ridge Reservation spanned the course of his fifty-six years; he had only left the reservation four times in his entire life, and never for more than a week. His memories of Pine Ridge life were dotted with rundown shanties, third-world accommodations in the richest country on earth, built quickly and sloppily for the Americans forgotten by America itself. Most of the excitement in Jimmy’s life had come from misfortune – pulling his friends out of drunken brawls, trying to put a fire in a neighbor’s house, and, naturally, following the progress of the 1973 protest in Wounded Knee, forty miles from Jimmy’s house.

Jimmy had spent most of his life sitting down, surviving on welfare money while waiting for a job opportunity to come his way. Jimmy still longed for work; especially so now that Wynona was on her way into the next world. But nothing had ever come his way, and it wasn’t likely to. Jimmy had already accepted his future: sitting with Wesley outside of the grocery store, watching tourists on route to the site of the Wounded Knee massacre, and chewing enough Skoal to satisfy an entire tribe.

Harry suddenly sighed and shook his head. He looked sideways at Jimmy and Wesley and tilted his head towards the hills in front of them.

“Sam’s on his way.”

Harry was the only person Jimmy knew who called Wapataka by his government name. Sam River Henderson was known by a variety of names – Wapataka and its English equivalent, Blackbird, as well as a number of respectful epitaphs – but Harry was the only one who insisted on calling the reservation’s most respected wicasa wakan by such a weak name as Sam.

“Reckon he was up in the hills?” asked Wesley.

“S’pose he must’ve been,” murmured Jimmy drily.

All three men knew what Wapataka had been doing in the hills – he had been speaking to the spirits, asking them to look favorably upon Wynona’s dwindling life force. Now Wapataka was descending from his favorite place to communicate with Wakan Tanka, prepared to administer to Wynona in her final hours.

As Wapataka drew nearer to the lone camper and the men outside it, Jimmy could make out the lines of paint on his wide, smiling face. Even a strict man of science such as Harry could not deny the power of Wapataka’s image; the man was a relic from a bygone era, a man perfectly attuned to his own will and the will of others.

Wapataka was small and wizened, standing about five-foot-four even with the aid of his tall-heeled snakeskin boots. He was seventy-seven years old, yet his thick braided hair remained black as pitch. He hadn’t worn any ceremonial Sioux garments in years, but he still exuded the feeling of quiet humility and infinite wisdom that most white folks seem to connect with all Indians. His voice was quiet and discreet, but with a word he could inspire fear in the most uncouth of men. He did not, however, use his powers of influence to this end; he lived solely to improve the lives of those around him. Today he had come to work his charm over one of those people in their last few hours of life.

Wapataka came at last to where Jimmy, Wesley, and Harry stood waiting. He smiled comfortingly and hooked his thumbs in his belt loops. Except for his painted face, Wapataka looked like any other Indian on the reservation in his denim shirt and chinos. Yet Jimmy had always harbored the notion that even a stranger would know Wapataka to be a medicine man purely from his manner.

Wapataka didn’t ask any questions, or offer anything more condoling than his quiet smile. He went directly into the house and shut the door behind him, effectively excluding the other three men from Wynona’s last spiritual rites.

As soon as Wapataka had left the three men, the sky began to darken. Heavy gray clouds, the likes of which are rarely seen over Allen, South Dakota, filled the sky, obscuring the burning mid-afternoon sun. Jimmy spat a stream of tobacco juice and stepped away from the camper.

Wesley brought his flask back out of his pocket and took a mighty swig. He offered it to Harry, who at first declined, and then changed his mind. Harry knew that Wynona was beyond his skill as a doctor, and a little bit of whiskey wasn’t going to make any difference. He and Wesley passed the flask back and forth as they watched Jimmy walk towards the hills from which Wapataka had just come. Neither of them called out to him or asked him where he was going, they just watched him go.

As Jimmy crossed the wide valley between the aluminum trailer and the dark hills, he thought about his life with Wynona. It had been a quiet life – the two of them had never seriously quarreled, nor had they experienced any euphoric highs in their twenty-eight years of marriage. They had not had any children, nor had they ever even entertained the idea. Wynona had never expressed any interest in motherhood, and Jimmy found the idea of bringing a child into the dismal clime of a reservation quite distasteful.

He recalled Wynona’s mother and the rest of the Brings The Rain family. Wynona had been the youngest of eleven children, all of her siblings being fighters and loud talkers. She had been the meek center of calm in a continually raging storm of violent brawls and drunken chaos. Jimmy had been drawn to her sense of tranquility in the face of such hardship, and he was still impressed with her courage and peace in the knowledge of her own imminent death. Wynona refused to let anything shake her, be it ten troublesome siblings or a terminal case of cancer.

Jimmy began his ascent into the treeless hills as the storm clouds above him continued to darken and become heavier. He reached the summit of one of the smaller foothills and sat down, looking back at his home. It looked lonesome in the vast expanse of nothing that surrounded it, but he could see Wynona’s spirited ornamentations even from the hilltop.

Jimmy’s cheap wristwatch read 5:30 – thirty minutes until Wynona’s vision would prove true or false. Jimmy felt completely helpless alone on the hill, waiting for his wife to pass on. It was a similar sort of helplessness to what he had felt years ago, in the very same hills, when his father had taken him to the highest summit on the reservation and told him about the Great Spirit.

“Wakan Tanka is everything,” he had said. “He’s you, me, this hill, our trailer out there in the distance. Wakan Tanka means that everything is connected. When I die, I’ll come back as the grass, or the trees, or the rain. And eventually, through Wakan Tanka, I’ll come back as another human being.”

Jimmy thought about his father’s words as his watch ticked resolutely towards the six o’clock marker and, behind the clouds, the sun slowly crossed the sky, beginning its journey towards the West where it would spend the night.

Wynona had five minutes left when, on a cold and lonely hilltop, her husband sprang to his feet, threw his arms into the air, and addressed the Great Spirit.

“Thank you, Wakan Tanka! Thank you for the years of quiet and comfort! Thank you for the many good days Wynona has seen on your beautiful earth, and thank you for giving us both the wisdom to know that life is about more than material possessions and wealth! We are grateful!”

As if in reply to Jimmy’s joyous outburst, the clouds began to darken and swell over the reservation. Thunder resounded from one side of the sky to the other, and as the sun hid itself from the face of man, the voice of the Great Spirit echoed across the valley, heard and keenly felt by the five people listening for it. Then that five became four, and the rolling sound of thunder ceased over the quiet valley and the hills beside it.

Then came the rain.

Enjoyment

2009-03-06T16:14:00.000-08:00

The top five things I've been enjoying lately:
1. Summer Girls

I flâneur'd my way around Ann Arbor and reminded myself why I love Ann Arbor in summer: pretty girls in stylish summery get-up. Unfortunately, it's still March.

2. Little Big Man

Probably the strangest, most thrilling, funniest, and most historically accurate adventure novel ever set in the wild West, Thomas Berger's novel wraps everything that makes the Western genre exciting up into one convenient 450-page package.

3. Rampage

This shouldn't need any elaboration. This game was killer.

4. Club Monaco

Club Monaco is, in my opinion, the best boutique franchise currently operating. Their items are well-made and appropriately modern, yet don't really conform to any faddish trends. Their shop design is relaxing and classy, and their prices aren't absurdly high.

5. Sriracha sauce

It's delicious.

I've Become Delicate

2009-03-02T12:18:00.000-08:00

I was lucky enough to take in a couple of fantastic concerts last week, yet, as excellent as the music was, something felt wrong.

I've become delicate.

On Friday I saw the Black Lips (with Gentleman Jesse & His Men and Atlas Sound) at the Variety Playhouse in Atlanta, and on Saturday I attended the Scion Rock Fest, featuring a multitude of metal bands (I saw Kylesa, Torche, Baroness, and Boris), at Atlanta's Masquerade.

Throughout both of these wild events, I stood front-center as legions of psychotic fans pummeled me into the stage. Only a year ago, I would have relished the beating, allowing myself to be overcome by the ferocious intensity of the music and the crowd.

However, I spent both concerts hoping for a relatively sedate song to settle the lunatic crowds. I worried constantly about the beer being spilled on my $150 Club Monaco jacket, instead of giving in wholly to the Dionysiac ecstasy of the concert experience, the way I once would have.

Hmmm...

Methinks I need a few days of the Detroit Electronic Music Festival to reawaken my savage musical soul.

A Fine Dinner Ruined

2009-02-16T16:17:00.001-08:00

A story:

There I was, in the dining hall of my dormitory, trying to enjoy a slice of tortilla casserole while attempting to block out the nasal monotone voice of the character sitting in the corner of my field of vision.

She was wearing a pair of decidedly un-stylish glasses and had hair of the type that can't decide between straightness or curliness and opts instead for oven-baked frizziness (typical female nerd hair - in mousy brown). She was flanked by two equally dweebish sycophants, one laughing in a husky, masculine "huh-huh-huh" sort-a-way, the other giggling like a cartoon mouse.

The ringleader, whose voice I have already begun to describe, was relating a stream of unfunny, not-at-all-clever, ever-so-bored-with-life vignettes, most of them involving her Japanese class.

Please allow me to be clear: there's not a thing wrong with the Japanese language. Many fine literary works have come of it, including but not limited to the world's first novel and the electrifying fiction of Yukio Mishima. However, it's a proven fact that most college students who decide to study Japanese do so because they want to be able to watch their favorite anime series the way they were intended to be viewed (This is not actually a proven fact).

So you've got an idea of what was trying to come between me and an enjoyable time spent eating a decent meal. And this girl's voice - have you ever noticed that nerds' voices are all exactly the same, be they male or female? Deadpan, emotionless, as flat as that bottle of Grape Faygo that's probably still festering in a house on Austin Lane in Hartland, Michigan after two-and-a-half years of waiting for someone to just fucking drink it (and subsequently die). And let's not forget - FUCKING LOUD. LOUDER THAN DEEP PURPLE'S MADE IN JAPAN. LOUD ENOUGH TO MAKE SURE EVERYONE KNOWS THAT RUROUNI KENSHIN IS ONLY WORTH WATCHING IN THE ORIGINAL UNCENSORED JAPANESE VERSION. Goddamn it.

Eventually she stopped with the Japanese class stories, opened her laptop, and began showing her drones some Facebook pictures. I stuffed some seasoned potato halves in my ears to try and block out her monologue, but the sound of her voice actually mashed the potatoes, making a terrible mess and causing me great discomfort.

"Oh, yeah, remember this? Heh, you untagged yourself." ("Huh-huh-huh", "hee-hee-hee")

"Oh God, ew, I look so gross in this picture." (I cannot even begin to fathom what a "gross" picture of this girl would look like - probably like a half-eaten chicken pot pie.)

And here's my favorite part:

"Oh, this is my step-sister who hates me because I'm successful in life and she's a colossal fuck-up. A colossal fuck-up. She's my age and she's already dropped out of college, and now she's a waitress in Traverse City! And she lives with her boyfriend in this ramshackle little shack, so she hates me."

I have a feeling I would get along with the step-sister. At least we have something in common (pure abject hatred). But wait, what does our protagonist do to cement her superiority over her "colossal fuck-up" of a step-sister? Does she show her friends pictures of herself sleeping with John Mayer? Nope. Does she bring up the pictures of her cello concerto at Carnegie Hall? No way. Oh wait! Maybe the shots of her being inducted into the French Légion d'honneur? Is that supposed to be some kind of joke? (Yes.)

Pictures of her cat.

She shows her friends somewhere around 400 pictures of her cat.

And explains the cat's feelings in each photograph: "Oh, this was when Murphy (the cat) got his wisdom teeth out, see how puffy his cheeks are? I thought it was so funny, but he was so mad. At least he got some Vicodin out of the deal!"

I walked out of the dining hall, put a grenade in my mouth, and pulled the pin. The end.

*An aside: when I began writing this post, I thought a picture of a gaggle of pizza-faced nerdy teen girls would go well with it. I googled "nerdy girls" and this is what came up: 90% porn and 10% pictures of famous celebrity women wearing glasses. Here's a business tip: if you are female and wear glasses of a style that could tangibly be considered "nerdy", star in a porn and market that shit. Nerd porn is apparently the last industry the recession has yet to effect.

**Aside number two: I didn't include any nerd porn with this blog because I'm not sure about Blogspot's policy on that kind of thing. I put a picture of an alligator because alligators are awesome.

My Life Is Over

2009-02-12T18:29:00.001-08:00

Mandy Moore has gotten tired of waiting for me to get famous, and she's now engaged to the lesser of two Ryans - Ryan Adams.

Come on, Mandy, what the hell? He looks like he just tumbled out of rehab for trashy pseudo-rockers, while you look like you just fell off a cloud in Heaven and landed in a world full of unworthy adorers.

Nothing left for me to do now but drink a fifth of arsenic and wait for sweet Death to extend his ghastly hand.

What The Fuck, Chris Brown?

2009-02-11T09:38:00.000-08:00

By now you've probably already heard about the savage beating Rihanna got from Chris Brown. Everyone's predicting harsh prison sentences for the 19-year-old R&B star, but I'm here to suggest something more severe. My proposition:

Dear Satan,

We've been tight for a while now, ever since I made that comment about my physics teacher's daughter. I feel like we've gotten to be quite close, and I know we'd be there for one another if either of us ever needed a helping hand. Satan, buddy, I've got a favor to ask. You know Rihanna, right? I know you loved "Umbrella" and were really hoping Hell would get her when she kicks the bucket (ain't gonna happen, but a devil can dream, right?). Anyway, her boyfriend, Chris Brown, beat the living shit out of her a few days ago. I wanna see this dick get the best accommodations Hell has to offer - skin-flaying, rolling a burning stone up a hill twelve hours a day, having to watch Roseanne every night - the whole enchilada. I mean, Rihanna is a stone-cold fox, a laudable humanitarian, and you know what? I even like her music. Chris Brown deserves your best, Satan, mein Freund. Give it to him.

Your pal,

Ryan

Get Rid Of It

2009-02-09T18:49:00.000-08:00

"Whatever it is, and it may be a land and water animal, I think it should be destroyed, as I am not sure whether I had been quite so close to it I should have cared to tackle it. It is difficult to give you a better description, as it moved so swiftly, and the whole thing was so sudden. There is no doubt it exists."

This is an excerpt from the testimony of a Mr. Spicer, regarding one of the first Loch Ness Monster sightings of the modern era. I have always been interested Nessie, and long ago decided that I am a believer, in spite of the piles of scientific evidence that seem to prove my pal's nonexistence. At any rate, I take offense at this quotation for two reasons:

1. Why on earth would Mr. Spicer want to destroy cryptozoology's most awesome subject?

2. He actually thinks he could "tackle" the fuckin' Loch Ness Monster?

The reason I selected this quote to open this blog post is because of its aptness in describing the demo tape I have just made for the consideration of 88.3 WCBN Ann Arbor. Here is what I can remember of the tape's contents:

"Can You Get To That?" - Funkadelic (gospel-tinged psychedelic soul)

"So Weit Wie Noch Nie" - Justus Köhncke (euphoric German techno)

"Burçak" - Mustafa Ozkent (funky Turkish easy-listening soul)

"Green-Eyed Lady" - Sugarloaf (AM sugar-pop bliss)

"Love For Sale" - Dexter Gordon (Latin hard bop variation of a Cole Porter tune)

"Playboys" - The Knux (driving hipster-hop with a garage rock edge)

"Down To Love Down" - The Originals (over-the-top disco dynamite)

"So Quéro Ver" - Beth Carvalho (sunny carnaval samba)

"Accordéon" - Juliette Greco (melodramatic interpretation of the Serge Gainsbourg song)

"Humoresque in G-flat Major" - Antonín Dvořák (elegaic strings, reminds me of spring)

"Rudi Wedding" - Laurel Aitken (classic rude boy blue beat)

So that's that.

"Whatever it is... I think it should be destroyed."

Witerature

2009-02-03T16:01:00.000-08:00

"As soon as I stepped out of my mother's womb on to dry land, I realized that I had made a mistake."
- Quentin Crisp

"Life is far too important a thing ever to talk seriously about."
- Oscar Wilde

"My body has wandered a great deal, but I have an uneasy suspicion that my mind has not wandered enough."
- Noel Coward

"I wanna get into it, man, y'know... like a, like a sex machine, man... movin' it, doin' it, y'know?

Get up, get on up!
Get up, get on up!
Stay on the scene, like a sex machine!"

- James Brown

Lightnin' Strikes

2009-01-29T11:19:00.000-08:00

As if this picture and the way Lightnin' Hopkins plays the gee-tar weren't enough to convince you that the man was the ultimate mojo-struttin' badass, dig this:

The Smithsonian Folkways label persuaded Lightnin' to record ten songs for a record with a bottle of gin. He refused to leave his tiny one-room apartment, so he recorded the songs on the spot - just his voice and the sound of his guitar.

You'll Rue The Day You Crossed Me, Trebek!

2009-01-27T18:38:00.000-08:00

Although Sean Connery is not actually responsible for the quote in the title (that would be Darrell Hammond impersonating Connery), it seemed a fitting headline for a selection of choice Connery quotations.

"I admit I'm being well-paid, but it's no more than I deserve. After all, I've been screwed more times than a hooker." (A weeping Sean Connery, revealing the nature of his business with Kenneth Branagh)

"Why don't you stick a broom up my ass? I can sweep the carpet on the way out." (Sean Connery on his role-playing fantasies)

"You can't drown, you fool. You're immortal." (Sean Connery to himself, five minutes before being fished out of the Hartland High School swimming pool by resident lifeguard Jon Havenhill)

"My dear girl, don't flatter yourself. What I did this evening was for king and country. You don't think it gave me any pleasure, do you?" (A drunk Sean Connery to Camilla Parker Bowles, following their notorious night of ribaldry)

"Don't wait for it to happen. Don't even want it to happen. Just watch what does happen." (Sean Connery, pre-fornication, to millions of women worldwide)

"My boy, we're pilgrims in an unholy land." (Sean Connery to Macaulay Culkin, seconds before making a queen of him)

"A martini. Shaken, not stirred." (Sean Connery revealing what's in his ass)

"I don't there is anything particularly wrong in hitting a woman, though I don't recommend you do it in the same way you hit a man." (This one really doesn't even need a caption)

Well, that about wraps it up. That man is a veritable quote machine.

Czechmate!

2009-01-24T19:44:00.000-08:00

Ahhh, the Czech Republic... A wonderful, magical land full of mystery and allure, and one that has produced a number of interesting aesthetes and personalities over the years, including:

Karel Čapek, science-fiction author and robot inventor

Franz Kafka, essential paranoid fiction author

Antonín Dvořák, "Slavonic Dance" composer

Bedřich Smetana, nationalistic symphonic poet

Leoš Janáček, king of Czech opera

Věra Chytilová, art-house "Sedmikrásky" director

Miloš Forman, Oscar-winning crossover directing talent

Jan Švankmajer, innovative stop-motion artist and director

Petra Němcová, foxy supermodel, tsunami survivor

Alfons Mucha, my favorite Art Nouveau artist

Wenceslas I, Christmas carol subject

Gregor Mendel, pea-plant enthusiast

Dominik Hašek, amazing Red Wings goalie

Yes, yes, fascinating personages, all of them. Yet the Czech I wish to rave about today is a sculptor named David Černý. He's been stirring up controversy since 1991, when he was commissioned to create a war memorial in central Prague and simply painted a Soviet tank pink. He's also responsible for the bizarre surrealist babies climbing the Žižkov television tower and the controversial statue of St. Wenceslas riding a dead horse.

His latest work/controversy surrounds "Entropa", a piece commissioned to hang in the Justus Lipsius Building in Brussels to celebrate the Czech Republic's 2009 presidency of the European Union.

"Entropa" depicts the EU as a number of pieces in a plastic model, with each nation displaying some sort of stereotypical aspect of culture. The piece has everyone's unterwäsche in a bundle, and it's not too difficult to see why:

- Sweden is wrapped inside of an Ikea box

- Italy is a soccer pitch covered in masturbating footballers

- Germany is made up of interconnecting Autobahn segments, possibly forming a swastika

- Denmark is made of Lego bricks

- Bulgaria consists of a number of squat toilets of various sizes

- Belgium is a half-eaten box of chocolates

- Romania is depicted as a Dracula-themed amusement park

Černý was also paid €350,000 to commission "up-and-coming" artists from each EU nation to contribute their own nationalistic interpretations of their respective countries to "Entropa". Černý instead fabricated the names of each artist and worked on the piece with two friends. Černý said of the scandal:

"We knew the truth would come out. But before that we wanted to find out if Europe is able to laugh at itself."

That settles it. David Černý is Europe's foremost badass.

Where Did My Spring Go?

2009-01-24T12:28:00.000-08:00

Above: Brazil in January

Below: Ann Arbor in January

Has Mother Earth forsaken the Frozen Mitten (Michigan)? It certainly feels that way. Nothing to do but wrap oneself in blankets, listen to samba and reggae, and seek out a fitting epitaph for one's gravestone.

I'm lucky enough to have found mine:

"My Saturday night is like a microwave burrito. Very tough to ruin something that starts out so bad to begin with."*

Yes, there's my life in a nutshell. Frozen Mexican food and lackluster Saturday nights!

*Taken from Michael Chabon's The Yiddish Policemen's Union

Despair

2009-01-22T20:36:00.000-08:00

Today: A lousy day if there ever was one.

At least there's always "Hammerzeit" to put a smile on my face.

There's also Bertrand Burgulat Meets A.S. Dragon, a fantastic album of French space-rock.

And don't forget Cannibal Holocaust, one of the least watchable (and therefore most watchable) movies ever made.

Fred Perry Is Timeless

2009-01-21T15:19:00.000-08:00

Fred Perry has yet to offend me, design-wise (although their current "&Son" collection is pretty iffy). They haven't made any drastic changes to their signature look since they began as a corporation in 1952, yet they've managed to remain stylish and modern over the course of nearly six decades.

Fred Perry is currently featuring collections based on collaborations with Paul Weller (The Jam) and Terry Hall (The Specials). Both are fantastic, although neither can hold a candle to the phenomenal "Laurel Classics" collection.

Yes, I'd say that Fred Perry is timeless - probably the most enduring aspect of 60's skinhead* style.

On the other hand, the component of skinhead culture that should never have endured, yet somehow has, is the Chelsea hairstyle (see below). How the pretty girls of the UK went from structured, chic mod symmetry to this abomination in only a few short years is beyond me.

*When I say skinhead, I am referring to the youth movement that began in the UK in the late '60's. The term "skinhead" is usually used in the United States to refer to neo-Nazis, although this is a entirely separate and thoroughly inane movement.

When The Red Man Can Get Ahead, Man...

2009-01-20T16:51:00.000-08:00

Did anyone else think this guy (Joseph Lowery) was the best part of the Inauguration Ceremony? I know I did.

"...when black will not be told to get back, when brown can stick around, when yellow can be mellow, when the red man can get ahead, man, when white will embrace what's right."

I almost expected him to start puffing on a joint while some jazz flute and wah-wah funk guitar started playing in the background.

In other news:
- Deep Purple's Made In Japan is incredible. It's almost too intense to listen to in one sitting.
- I'm jonesin' for a falafel pita.
- According to Dion Boucicault's 1859 play, The Octoroon, having one-eighth black heritage was enough to be considered a "negro" slave. Wowza.

I Wish I Had Him As A Stylist

2009-01-19T17:51:00.000-08:00

Edward Gorey wrote a whole slew of creepy "kids" books throughout the 50's, 60's, and 70's. Most of them focused primarily on death and similar topics, while many displayed a bizarre sort of non-sequitur-based humor that no child on earth would understand. This was a strange, strange man... yet his illustrations are fantastic, and particularly well-suited to a lover of oddball Victoriana such as myself.

My favorite Gorey limerick:
"There was once a young curate whose brain

Was deranged from the use of cocaine

He lured a small child

To a copse dark and wild

Where he beat it to death with his cane."

What a nut...

N'awlins Never Dies

2009-01-19T11:26:00.000-08:00

"A man who called himself Strangebone talked with New York Times reporter Dan Barry in early September 2005 on Clouet Street. He told Barry that the police had beaten him and taken his gun, and then he added the following comment about the post-Katrina sky.

'You're able to see the stars. It's wonderful.'"

I was touched by this quote when I read it in a collection of short stories and essays titled Do You Know What It Means To Miss New Orleans? It's been over three years since Katrina decimated New Orleans, and from what I hear, the city has done a remarkable job of getting back on its feet.

I'm obsessed with that damn city.

Weirdness

2009-01-19T09:41:00.000-08:00

"Who the man? You the man!"

Today is Martin Luther King Jr. Day, so I started celebrating last night by drinking lots of rum and letting the bizarreness of life take its course.
I won't go into specifics, but it was a memorable evening.

As I sit here in my cold dorm room listening to Waylon Jennings and trying to wash the taste of stale liquor out of my mouth, I'm looking forward to the future (Obama's inauguration tomorrow) and waiting for karma to exert its mighty pull on me. I feel like I've saved up some pretty decent karma; it seems like I'm due for something groovy.

I'd like you to take away one, nay, two important messages from this post. Ponder them. Form an opinion. Debate. Get involved in your local government. Stage a fundraiser for the Humane Society. Adopt a whale. Or better yet, adopt a Bengal tiger. At least adopt Hervé Villachaize; what's he going to do without Ricardo Montalbán?

What? Hervé has been dead for fifteen years?

Well fuck my life.

Anyway, here are the two messages:

1. Show some love to everybody, as MLK would have wanted you to. Truly, other cultures can be great fun, which is why I've listed a few that I particularly endorse:

Sikhs, Maoris, Sami Laplanders, Midwest Jews, Puerto Ricans, Creoles, Brazilians, Appalachian Hillbillies (to whom I'm proud to trace my lineage), Bavarians, and Mexicans (particularly luchadores).

2. Mammas, don't let your babies grow up to be cowboys. Cowboys ain't easy to love, and they're harder to hold.

Waylon and Willie weren't joking around.

Tom Ford Is A God

2009-01-18T17:25:00.000-08:00

And this advertisement for his line of fragrances for men proves it.
I'm tired of reading fashion magazines and being bored by advertisements starring waifish heroin addicts draped in boxy "post-modern" dresses, pouting at the camera as though it's a real task to have to wear the shit that Marc Jacobs dresses them in.

The advertisement above shows real creative genius.

It's no wonder he's designed for Perry Ellis, Gucci, and YSL - the man has a gift.

*This entry is only half tongue-in-cheek.

Crescent City Heartache

2009-01-18T16:54:00.000-08:00

Well, sheeee-it. This is a hot one.

I had never heard of Inell Young until a few days ago when I heard "What Do You See In Her?", and since then, that damn song has been playing on endless repeat in my computer, my iPod, and my head.

I'm not usually one of those record collectors who hears some voodoo rockabilly song recorded by a schizophrenic Haitian with Graves' Disease and wonders why said song didn't make American Bandstand. I feel that, generally, it's pretty obvious why some songs are hits and why others aren't.

But this baffles me.

I know next to nothing about New Orleans soul diva Inell Young, and it's been difficult to find out much. Her last.fm biography was apparently written by someone with only a very basic grasp of the English language, but it seems to imply that Young was a heroin addict who died of an overdose not long after recording this gem with Eddie Bo in the late 60's/early 70's.

Anyway, regarding the song: it's a killer. A fat, slinky bassline over a sugary-smooth electric piano and the type of chang-a-lang-a-lang chicken scratch guitar riff that defined the sound of 70's soul. Inell croons about her love woes with a heart full of hurt while some unknown session drummer sets the track ablaze with authentic Big Easy funk swing. "What Do You See In Her?" is easily one of the best fifty soul tracks I've ever had the pleasure of hearing.

Alright, on to what I can't understand: why wasn't this song a monster hit? Or at least a minor one? Hell, this song is obscure even by crate-digger standards! I've heard dozens of lost soul classics that suffered from poor recording quality or sub-par vocal talent. And while Inell Young is no Aretha Franklin, she's certainly no Screaming Lord Sutch either - her voice sounds about on par with most of the late 60's soul divas.

Sonically, "What Do You See In Her?" is very close to Bobby Hebb's "Sunny" (one of the most-played singles in radio history) or some of Sly & The Family Stone's more pop-oriented classics. Eddie Bo's production soars, the chorus is catchy and buoyant, and the guitar solo ranks right up there with some of Steve Cropper's best work.

Somewhere in the cosmos, something went wrong, and Inell Young never had a hit. I'm sure we'll never know just what conspired to condemn poor Inell to utter commercial failure; all I know is that it's a darned shame.

Ah jus' don' geddit.

Theme From "Riot In Thunder Alley"

2009-01-18T16:24:00.000-08:00

Alright ladies and gentlemen, here's the deal.

Kitsch-Pop Deconstructionism has been discontinued.

Why?

Well, it was getting stale. Writing about shoes and Finnish people doesn't thrill me the way it once did, I suppose, and I've moved on to writing about socks and Danish people. Eventually I'll rid the world of this blog and start a new one devoted to my thoughts on stockings and Lithuanians.

Anyways, I'm sorry to have disappointed the devoted fans of KPD (all zero of them).

With Riot In Thunder Alley, I intend to, uh, write about some, uh... stuff, like, uh... I dunno... What did I write about before?

Nonsense?

Well then, expect pretty much the same.

*About the picture: I like it.