Bitter Old Punk

2009-07-20T08:54:00.001-05:00

Awesome dream. I'm catering a party for a rich lawyer who lives in a shabby mansion atop Red Mt. I'm there setting the bar up, and I overhear a conversation that convinces me that the guests are all mobsters. But now they're suspicious, and they try to kill me by trussing me up and hurling me off the back porch. I struggle free, manage to take one of their guns, and shoot one of them. All hell breaks loose. Pursued by angry mobsters, I flee, wrecking a house and stealing a car in the process. I make it downtown where I and my friend (who of course is Samuel L Jackson) fortify our catering company offices, hold off the attacking mobsters, and save the day, I'm rarely the hero in my dreams; I'm usually the quarry, it was nice to be on the side of the ass-kickers for a change.

2009-06-27T11:29:00.001-05:00

Afghanistan has a "Counternarcotics Ministry"? In other news, foxes to offer lessons in poultry security management.

2009-06-27T02:30:00.001-05:00

So now I can post to my lame-ass blog from my iPhone. The world trembles in anticipation.

2009-06-27T02:20:00.001-05:00

This is a test post.

In Which I Purchase Modern Technology And Am Duly Impressed

2009-06-21T13:01:00.004-05:00

You may have noticed that I just got an iPhone. No? Well, now you have, because I'm blogging about it. After having tweeted, texted, emailed, voice-messaged, and talked about it.

I bought the 3G S to replace my old cellie, which was so old that the camera used iodine-sensitive silvered plates and mercury vapor. And man, is my sexy new iPhone awesome. But the feature that has absolutely sold me on it was the one I least expected: using the thing as an e-book reader.

It never occurred to me that I might like e-books. I mean, I have shelves and shelves of real books. I have stacks of books by the bed, by the couch, in boxes in the garage. I like the physicality of books, the smell and the feel of them. I don't like reading on my computer: I'm constantly fiddling with the text size or shifting about to rest a tense neck. So I had no interest in an e-book reader.

Until I accidentally got one.

The first thing I did when I got my new phone all charged and activated and set up was what every new iPhone buyer does: head to the App Store. Scanning the the free stuff, I see the Kindle for iPhone app. What the hey, right? A few moments later I'm browsing the Kindle store, looking at the freebies. Fusty public domain stuff mostly. A fantasy novel about dragons fighting in the Napoleonic Wars. Pass. The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin. Meh, though I feel vaguely guilty for not being more interested in reading it. Then: Conrad. Wodehouse. Chesterton. Well, well. I never did get around to reading Nostromo, it'd be nice to have some Jeeves stories for amusement while stranded in waiting rooms and such, and I lost my copy of The Man Who Was Thursday....

Zoop.

(That's the sound data makes as it flies around, in case you were wondering.)

Neat. That was quick.

I continue futzing around in the App Store: Sudoku! New York Times crossword puzzles! After evaluating the use of the device as a mobile gaming platform (ie, crashing on the couch and doing sudoku and crossword puzzles all afternoon) I remember the Kindle thingie.

About forty-five minutes later I look up from "Jeeves and the Hard-Boiled Egg". It had taken me less than a minute to configure the thing: white text on a black background; large, easily readable type; landscape mode. It weighs less than a paperback: this is what got me. One-handed reading! Go ahead, snicker, and no, I haven't yet downloaded The Story of O. But It's really COMFORTABLE. I never expected that. Reading in bed without a book-light is a life-changing experience.

But more importantly it addresses an issue I have always struggled with: I scan. I read fast and spottily, and though I grasp essentials I am rarely fully engaged with the text in the way a responsible reader should be. The brevity of each screen of text on the iPhone encourages me to read more closely.

Now, we'll see how well that theory works when I read something a tad more challenging than the tales of the cheerfully hapless Bertie Wooster. I just got Bertrand Russell's The Problems of Philosophy, so that'll be the test case. I hear the Kindle isn't necessarily the best e-book reader for the iPhone. So we'll see where this goes. I'm hesitant to actually PAY for e-books, though. I'd like to see publishers develop a model where the e-book version comes automatically with the paper version. That's a publishing model I could get behind: that way I've got the "back-up" for the shelf and the convenience of the e-text. But it seems like there's a wealth of free stuff out there to read in the Kindle format. And that scratches that Pokemon-like itch, too: it's a thrill to zoop a buncha free classics, knowing that they're there in your pocket all the time. Gotta zoop 'em all...

And I find it pleasing to put the highest-tech device I've ever owned to such a low-tech use.

Here's a brief summary of what I DON'T like about the iPhone: surfing the Internet, that fiddly virtual keyboard, the fact that with 3G enabled you can actually SEE the battery charge indicator dropping in real time. Pretty much the same complaints everyone else has.

On the whole, though, it's a happy-making wonder of a device.

UPDATE: OK, I totally snagged the book about the dragons who fight Napoleon.

Run Out And Buy This Immediately

2009-04-21T15:19:00.003-05:00

Be the first kid on your block to own Booker T.'s new record "Potato Hole", featuring Neil Young and backed by the ever-lovin' never-better Drive-By Truckers.

Well, you'd be the SECOND kid to own it if you lived on my block. Because I already own it, and am thus cooler than you could ever hope to be. At least for the next few minutes.

I would remind you that it is best if you were to simply follow my directives blindly and unquestioningly. Go buy this album. It's the soundtrack of your summer, you just don't know it yet.

You Know Who Rocks? Vulture Whale, That's Who

2009-03-30T18:40:00.002-05:00

I don't go out of my way to promote local music, because 90% of it sucks.

Vulture Whale does not suck.

Their new record is out on Skybucket Records.

Bitch, Bitch, Bitch

2009-03-12T16:09:00.002-05:00

I guess I bought tickets online and somehow the local concert promoters harvested my email address so now I get the intermittent update on what Big Shows are soon to be in my area. Today's list was a perfect storm of Don't Give A Fuck:

Nickelback
Coldplay
Kenney Chesney
The Allman Brothers
Def Leppard

Wow. If I sat and thought all day long I couldn't have come up with a list of shows that left me more indifferent.

The Intellectual Leader of Today's GOP

2009-03-11T02:51:00.001-05:00

Watch Some Old Punks Tear It The Fuck Up

2009-03-07T13:37:00.003-06:00

<a href="http://www.fabchannel.com/buzzcocks_concert/2009-02-06">Live Concert Video - Buzzcocks</a>

I'd point out a particularly good song, but the truth is the whole show is great. Pete Shelley now looks like the typical punter down the pub, but that snotty adenoidal screech is still in place, the rhythm section is still amazing, the songs still make me wanna pogo. Oh punk rock. When did you become nostalgia?

Whatever. The Buzzcocks rock.

UPDATE: The site hosting this video closes down on March 13. Watch it now while you still can.

In Lieu Of Content: Some Lists!

2009-02-26T18:35:00.006-06:00

Because I am deeply lazy and all I've done in recent days is read comic books and allow my girlfriend to prepare me delicious meals, I have nothing of value to blog about. So I'll fake it like the rest of 'em and throw up some completely random and subjective lists of stuff!

Recent Things I Didn't Think I'd Like But Liked Anyway:

Brussel sprouts
There Will Be Blood
David Bowie, Heathen

Recent Things I Knew I Was Gonna Like, But Ended Up Liking Even More Than I Thought I Would:

No Country For Old Men
Iron Man
Agents of Atlas #1
David Byrne & Brian Eno, Everything That Happens Will Happen Today

Recent Things I Thought I Would Like But Ended Up Not Liking At All:

The Dark Knight
Brunch at Cafe de Paris
Getting prescription sunglasses

Recent Things I Really, Really Liked:

WALL-E
Incognito
Atomic Robo
We Jam Econo: The Story of the Minutemen
Eating a reuben at The Diplomat Deli
Don Chambers & Goat, Zebulon

Man, this blogging stuff is EASY!

Normally I Wouldn't Link To Pitchfork, But...

2009-02-21T09:27:00.003-06:00

When they put up a stream of Booker T. & the Drive-By Truckers with Neil Young, I make an exception.

I Tried To Like It

2009-01-30T13:49:00.003-06:00

... but The Darjeeling Limited has to have been one of the worst films I've ever seen. It was so bad it pissed me off. And I LIKE Wes Anderson movies. Really! I even liked The Life Aquatic.

I could list everything that's wrong with the The Darjeeling Limited, but I won't. You don't have all day. Let's just say that just about every directorial decision Anderson made in that film I took issue with. "Let's have them all stand around looking blank for an hour and a half!" "This film needs a moment of drama! Let's randomly kill off a poor brown child!" "See, they drop THEIR FATHER'S BAGGAGE, get it?"

The worst part is that, as a fan of Wes Anderson movies, I was really looking forward to watching this. Take it from me, folks: this movie sucks! Don't waste your time nor clog your Netflix queue. It comes across as contrived, too clever by half, heartless, soulless, manipulative, and empty. And if that's his POINT? Well, that's even worse, then.

Avoid this film.

How Did I Miss This? Awesome Performance!

2009-01-19T14:49:00.003-06:00

Bettye LaVette performing The Who's "Love Reign O'er Me" from the 2008 Kennedy Center Honors.

Further Erosion Of The Fourth Amendment

2009-01-16T12:45:00.003-06:00

Remember back when police had to have a reason to hassle folks? Yeah, the good old days of the Fourth Amendment, which protected US citizens from unlawful search and seizure. The "exclusionary rule", under which the fruit of the tainted tree would be thrown out of court -- a way of making sure the cops have all their ducks in a row before breaking down your door.

Those days appear to be gone. Well, going, at least. The US Supreme Court has ruled in Herring vs United States that "evidence obtained from an unlawful arrest based on careless record keeping by the police may be used against a criminal defendant."

Great. That's just what we need: an INCENTIVE for carelessness in law enforcement.

And we can't un-ring this bell. Even with a new administration.

Still, January 20 can't get here soon enough.

WTF, Christian Right?

2009-01-15T15:01:00.002-06:00

OK, this is just kinda creepy.

Man, the God-botherers squick me out sometimes.

I Know This Is Making The Rounds, But...

2009-01-05T22:22:00.002-06:00

Click this link for Internet satori.

It's especially good for just leaving open as a background tab and then when you get to that right part in whatever song it is you're grooving to, drop in a little DLR. Awesome.

Ballsier Than The Last Metallica Record, At Least

2008-12-28T18:50:00.000-06:00

From An Email Sent Earlier Today

2008-12-20T20:49:00.002-06:00

So a friend uploaded the Hüsker Dü record Flip Your Wig for me to snag and now I'm listening to it through cranked headphones. The song "Divide and Conquer" came on and I had on of those involuntary in-chair rock-gasms where something sounds so good and so perfectly essentially irreducibly RIGHT that it made my whole body shake and left a silver snake of adrenaline crackling up and down my spine. And I thought, this album came out in 1985. Almost 24 years ago. When's the last time a new piece of music has grabbed me like that? Or maybe that reaction is only possible with an old record that you've loved and set aside -- it's been YEARS since I've listened to Flip Your Wig. I long ago lost the CD through either pilferage or poor lending practices. I have it on vinyl, but who knows where that is, and me with no record player to boot. It's not even my favorite Hüsker Dü record -- that'd be New Day Rising. But I didn't need to listen to it: I could summon it up any time I wanted. Or maybe I could summon a ghost of a recollection of what I had felt like as I listened to it with new ears. So maybe hearing it blew the cobwebs out of those long-disused channels, amplifying the experience.

And I keep listening. You know, there are some bad songs on that record. And not good bad -- bad bad. Hackneyed melodies one step above a nursery rhyme coupled with trite pity-party lyrics. All awash in shiny, chiming guitar and heroin-soaked drums that lag a half step behind the beat.

But.

Then comes "Keep Hanging On", a song that kept me alive when I wanted to die, and I can excuse all the precious little songs and feel that rope again, not the one around my neck but the one that dangles at the bottom of the well and is strong enough to grip and climb. Sometimes nursery rhymes are all we have. How's that for a pity party?

It gets better. I flip over to amazon.com and there they are. Every fucking Hüsker Dü record you could ask for. I'd never thought to look. iTunes didn't have them, so why would Amazon? They've been in court wrangling for back profits and who owns what for years, right? But there they are: from Metal Circus and New Day Rising to the Eight Miles High/Love Is All Around (Mary Tyler Moore theme) split EP.

I buy them all.

Revisiting New Day Rising is like going back to my childhood home and finding it much smaller than I remembered. What I had thought of as an uncompromising "punk" record, screamy and spiky and loud, seems so much more melodic, somehow innocent now. All that angst, and beneath the bristling skin of Bob Mould's guitar and impassioned yowls beats the heart of a house cat. An angry, spitting, house cat, but a house cat nonetheless. Yet I'm not dismayed. I'm comforted. Even "59 Times the Pain" seems regretful now, not as strident as it seemed to the angry ears who first heard it in 1985. Bob sings, "All I feel is bitter, and it doesn't make it better" and these days that's worth a rueful smile, not white half-moons of fingernails dug into reddened fists. Is that maturity or resignation? Both, perhaps.

I can't separate the music from the memories, you know? It's more than nostalgia, I hope. Maybe not. The music brings back not just memories but memories of memories: a taste of my first serious girlfriend's lips, bitter with beer and cigarettes; the view from my dorm window; the smell of the library, dust and old leather. Central Park in the snow. Standing in Monet's Water Lilies room at the Metropolitan Museum of Art ripped to the tits on acid, feeling submerged in aqueous pastels.

There are surprises. "Powerline" is a really lovely song: a bass line like a bed of smooth stones over which a liquid wash of guitar burbles and chimes. And "Books About UFOs"! What a blast of pure power pop happiness!

Then we hit "Whatcha Drinkin'" and "Plans I Make": it's this perfect hardcore one-two punch. My legs twitch: I know how to dance to this. My body wants to own these songs. The galloping drums struggling to keep up with Bob's chainsaw guitar, Greg Norton's bass set to subsonic stun, the last song's desperate shouted pleading lyrics occluded by the chaos: "Make plans. Make plans. Make plans."

Such good advice, so sorely unheeded. And the last note soaring up into supersonic nothingness. Beautiful.

From there I move on to "Eight Miles High", a cover of the Birds classic, and one of the great cover songs of rock history. Hüsker Dü's manifesto. Melody via screaming. Beauty through feedback. Everything louder than everything else.

But now my ears are getting tired, and it's all beginning to sound over-familiar. Same old stuff. I'm glum: have I really ossified that severely? Am I stuck in 1985? I try not to be.

Drive-By Truckers Get Some Love (Just A Little Bit)

2008-12-18T16:36:00.004-06:00

Robert Christgau, writing in Slate, lists Brighter Than Creation's Dark as his number three record of the year, and "The Righteous Path" as his number nine single. I guess that's a bit of cold comfort, as the record was ignored by everyone else making such lists, including Spin, Rolling Stone, and Blender. He goes on to call DBT's latest "the most underrated album of the year". Christgau's been behind this band since the Adam's Housecat days, and it's good to see that he's still out there trying to get them heard. Especially since I, at least, still consider him the dean of American popular music critics.

link-type thang

It's Funny Cuz It's True

2008-12-09T15:45:00.002-06:00

Hee.

Dammit

2007-06-05T15:09:00.001-05:00

I get everything squared away, all chores done, I sit down, and I'm ready to play LOTRO.

The servers are down.

Dammit.

It's A Miracle!

2008-01-06T21:18:00.000-06:00

Someone should sell this dog's ass on Ebay.

A Theory Of Birmingham Food

2008-12-06T19:01:00.003-06:00

Imagine a compass.

At the cardinal points are, starting at north and proceeding clockwise, Highland's Bar and Grill, Pete's Famous Hot Dogs, The Bright Star, and Milo's. So you have north-south and east-west symmetry between the two major food groups (which are, of course "delicious high-quality fare prepared with pride and precision" and "delicious cheap-ass fare that's probably deadly somehow").

In every other direction?

An untamed ocean of barbecue.

(This theory doesn't account for Nikki's West, and so needs more work...)

Dear Mayor Langford,

2008-12-01T10:42:00.004-06:00

I am sure I am not the first to say BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

Here's the (101-count) indictment (.pdf). Langford's only accused of 60-some-odd of them, the rest fall on Bill Blount and Al LaPierre.

This was NOT, by the way, a particularly clever or elaborate scheme. It looks like, reading the indictment, Blount and LaPierre were MAILING GIFTS TO LANGFORD'S OFFICE.

Jesus Christ, guys. Haven't y'all watched TV in the past, I dunno, twenty fucking years? There's SO MANY better ways to bribe people.

Besides, you didn't have to give the Mayor a Rolex! You know the man would have settled for some crack and a new stem! That would have been so much cheaper, and it would have kept that money in the community, you know?

More later maybe when I can think rationally. Right now I can't stop chuckling.