Culture Weekend

I have designated the weekend of February 28-March 1 as the first annual Culture Weekend. To be more specific, this is a three day span where I will do nothing but immerse myself in music, movies, and books. I am doing nothing constructive, apart from cooking food and making trips to the toilet. Some people take trips to remote, humanity-free places in nature to clear the head, while I prefer to huddle inside my concrete block-like home and escape into worlds created by others. Here are some highlights of Culture Weekend:

The Psychopath, a/k/a An Eye For An Eye (1975)

One thing that really bothers me is the fact that none of my friends are into really terrible movies. I never liked Mystery Science Theatre 3000, but I was always kinda jealous that I could never establish a witty peanut gallery to watch cinematic atrocities. Instead, I watch terrible movies with terrible guilt, secreted away like a junkie, always ashamed to be discovered howling along to Beyond The Valley Of The Dolls, Xanadu, or Fuego (horrendous '60s South American trash, with 50% more tits!). A real shame. I mean, I like Kubrick, Scorsese, and Tarantino as much as anyone else, but who eats prime rib, foie gras, and haricots vert all the time? You have to eat a hamburger dropped on the kitchen floor every once in awhile. 

This movie has it all: a ridiculous premise, over the top acting, unfortunate clothing choices, and a gutter-level sense of morality. Mr. Rabbey, "Tom" to his producer and keeper, is an awkward man-child hosting a children's TV show that looks exactly like the early-Saturday morning local crap folks my age were subjected to 20+ years ago. More creepy than cute puppets, tin-foil logos, and tinny music-box sounds entertain Mr. Rabbey's Rangers. Yuck. The host has a lacquered bowlcut, mascara, and a faraway look in his eyes. He hangs out in the kids ward of the local hospital, listens and lurks, and finds out one of his "special friends" is missing, the same one who might have been beaten to death in the opening montage. Oh no. A frenzied close-up of Mr. Rabbey's eyes later, and the entire plot of the movie is established.

Soon enough, Mr. Rabbey is murdering abusive parents with abandon. The police force, who bluster like CSI experts but are more like '70s cop show rejects, piece together a case against a killer most of them are silently cheering to victory. Can anyone really hate a killer that rides a basket-equipped bicycle who murders unsuitable parents? After hearing the hospital staff recite child abuse statistics, can you really be offended when the guilty party gets smacked with a Louisville Slugger? Sure, it's a horror movie, and the raving psychopath is the evil monster, but this movie blurs the moral guidelines like it knows better. One scene has Rabbey scanning a garage for something to polish off a nasty mother. He scans past the hacksaw and rubber hose, lingers briefly on some garden shears, and finally decides on running over her head with a lawnmower. The ridiculous spooky music and drama of the scene make it clear that the film makers are in on the joke. This is prime-grade crap that's never been on DVD, so I'm glad I finally tracked down a copy.

October Men by Roger Kahn

Books about baseball trail close behind music books as my favorite form of literature. A good baseball book transfers the excitement of a close game to the page, along with a healthy dose of quotes from mouthy players and coaches. This one, about the tense, ego-laden Yankee teams of the late '70s is a classic. No wonder, considering it was written by Roger Kahn, one of the greatest baseball writers of all time. Yeah, the guy who wrote The Boys Of Summer, which is required reading for anyone calling themself a sports fan. He weaves lines and paragraphs like a poet, with real wit that hundreds of fiction writers would kill to have.

The Yankees of the book are the first teams assembled by noted baseball tyrant George Steinbrenner, whose "best team money can buy" philosophy was still in its infancy. Back then, he cared little for such notions as team unity and chemistry, instead dropping the largest ego in baseball (Reggie Jackson) and a $2 million dollar free agent closer (Goose Gossage) into the clubhouse. Predictably, the free-spirited, gifted Jackson clashed mightily with volcanic, hard-drinking manager Billy Martin, and enraged the rest of the team by mouthing that he was the "straw that stirs the drink" in a magazine interview. Also predictably, the Yankees' former closer Sparky Lyle, who by the way won the Cy Young Award and led the league in saves before Gossage's acquisition, wasn't happy either, considering he was making the least money on the team and was demoted following his best season in the bigs. (Coincidentally, Lyle's book about the 1978 season, The Bronx Zoo, is hysterical and also required reading)

With all the drama, its incredible this team survived without murdering each other, let alone won back-to-back World Series. Along the way, every Martin clubhouse tirade, every Steinbrenner meltdown, every player begging to be traded, is documented in Kahn's meticulous style. So many classic baseball quotes emanated from this team, from a journalist writing "there's not enough mustard in the world to cover that hot dog Reggie Jackson" to Martin comparing Jackson and Steinbrenner by cracking "One's a liar and the other one's convicted." It definitely reminds me that players of today are muzzled by agents and PR men, and aren't allowed to get on the mike post-game and rant unfiltered. They don't all have mustaches and long hair anymore either, and above all, that is what bothers me the most (see JoeSportsFan's Worthless Baseball Card Collection for further evidence).

Speaking of baseball, I finally decided to take the plunge into obsessive nerd-dom and joined a fantasy baseball league. I tried football last fall, and lost one game in an indifferent league before getting knocked out of the playoffs in the first round. Baseball seems to be much more labor-intensive, but I think I'm ready. The Reds crushed the Yankees in spring training today, complete with Marty Brennaman's classic take on Jim Bowden's resignation ("I'd be less than honest if I didn't say this is a joyous day for me. I will have a smile on my face til I put my head on my pillow tonight.") Warm weather is around the corner, and God help me, I really like the Reds new "Paint The Town Red" theme song. 

I'd like to introduce YOUR 2009 Queen City Stranglers:

C: AJ Pierzynski

1B: Derrek Lee

2B: Dan Uggla

3B: Ty Wigginton

SS: Jhonny Peralta

LF: Ryan Ludwick

CF: Ichiro Suzuki

RF: Xavier Nady

SP: Jake Peavy, Roy Oswalt, Justin Verlander

RP: Huston Street, Grant Balfour, Kevin Gregg

BN: Brian Giles, Jeff Francoeur, Scott Rolen, and a few other sundry malcontents. 

I missed you baseball, welcome back.

Neon Beanbags for Reverend Green

So, the first decade of the new milennium is almost over, statistically speaking. Things are in a holding pattern, with most folks waiting for that nightmarish hangover to wear off before the boss comes in brandishing reports and screaming in an over-stimulated frenzy about the doom and gloom to come. Monday isn't here yet folks, so relax. Chill the fuck out, and let me tell you about the best song to have been written in this confusing, uncomfortable decade.

That would be "For Reverend Green" by Animal Collective, and of this I am sure. The current hype is about their newest album, which left me cold and confused. All it has to offer to these ears are too many whispered platitudes and too much stickiness. It sounds like a screensaver, for fuck's sake. Smooth, manicured hypnotic repetition aimed for the pleasure center of the brain, done up in the dress of today, is what makes Merriweather Post Pavillion forgettable and dull, much like the concrete tomb of its namesake.

I'm not afraid to admit I'm late to the Animal Collective party. It all seemed too showy and cutesy. I'm a believer now, and I blame my classic-rock nerdom. Those tombstones of the '60s pushed and pulled, creating those textbook classics you are conditioned by birth to love. This is why "For Reverend Green" is jaw-droppingly brilliant. You're either an Avey Tare, screaming like a madman after he saw Reverend Green testify for the first time, or you're a Panda Bear passively soaking up the atmosphere and taking notes for a future exam. Pushing or pulling, screaming or sighing.

I heard "Silver Sands" from the latest Stereolab album on the Muzak at the grocery store this evening. Think about that one. I'm still trying to figure it out.

The Cat That Hated People

Here's more of the unhinged genius of Tex Avery. People still think of cartoons as mindless entertainment for children, and that's just silly. Think of all the lessons you could learn from this one.

Random Old Records (version)

After my room mate gave me the tip, and improbably, I saw the author on Carson Daly the other night, I picked up the book 1000 Recordings To Hear Before You Die. Like every list, there's some glaring errors. Too often, author Tom Moon errs on the NPR side of caution, praising Ryan Adams, The Band, Jeff Buckley, and a ton of classical recordings which I doubt he even listened to, but it's still a gigantic book about music, of which I'll always be a sucker. Still, listing only two Rolling Stones albums (one a box set, admittedly) versus multiple Beatles albums shows where his head truly resides. No Bon Scott-era AC/DC, a mediocre Frank Zappa live album from the '80s instead of his '60s classics, etcetera. It reminded me of my original focus for this blog, which involved rambling at length about (um) random old records pulled from my collection. So, as ridiculous as it may sound for a blog barely a month old, its time to get BACK TO THE BASICS!

Ivy - Apartment Life

I wondered for a few minutes why this album didn't get the commericial success it deserved, until I remembered that it came out in 1998, the year of Britney and Backstreet. If you care to remember back that far, 1998 was the year that the supposed Alternative Nation fell to prevailing trends, or to be exact, when Generation X was slain by impeccably trained Disney alumni. I'm sure the only reason this album exists is because some hapless coke-addled A&R man made a desperate pitch something like "OK, a guy from Fountains Of Wayne who had a tiny hit for us a few years back made a record that kinda sounds like the Cardigans, remember them? The singer sounds a bit like Stereolab, one of our 'hip' legacy artists! Chick's got a French accent and everything!" If that poor bastard had kept his job long enough, he could point to Ivy as an precursor to Dido and Grey's Anatomy rock.

That sounds like a bunch of lame, jumbled comparisons, none of which would impel the average yokel to check out this album. It reminds me of the first dozen or so times I heard the Pernice Brothers. The songs seem so perfect, so studied that they become aural wallpaper to ears that have been beaten into submission by flashy, overbearing quick-fix hype machines. By the second listen, you're thinking "OK, I've heard this SOMEWHERE before," and it bugs the shit out of you until the fifth listen, when you realize you're becoming obsessed, and you've already internalized every lazy-sounding trumpet riff ("Baker") and nonsense chorus ("Ba Ba Ba"). I'm as guilty as the next person, waiting for bands to come up and punch me in the face. Maybe that's why I place a premium on ones that sneak up from behind and knock me out when I'm not really paying attention.

Since I mastered the horribly-awkward segue a few posts back, here's another one: Speaking of bands that sneak up behind for the knockout blow, I'm a bit surprised to find out that Stereolab might be my favorite band of all time, statistically speaking. My last.fm charts are showing a steady rise in Stereolab stock, now that I've reclaimed my iTunes from past and current room mates. No, they don't inflame my passions like the Manic Street Preachers did in my early 20s, nor do they get me hopped-up and blissfully excitable like classic jams from Black Flag, TSOL, The Damned, and Agent Orange. They just go in there and get shit done. Somehow, the answer to "what the fuck should I listen to?!" usually ends up being Stereolab. Whether I'm cleaning, relaxing, doing my taxes, or working, the default choice ends up being the classic Stereolab mix of oldfangled analog synthesizers with newfangled digital recording techniques. They're like the musical equivalent of a perfect pillow. No matter how much you thrash around at night, in the morning it's still soft and perfectly formed.

Or, if you'd like, Stereolab is the nerd's AC/DC, every song as perfect as the last. Try and fail to explain it. Coca-Cola, Budweiser, Stereolab, and AC/DC. You can't fuck with the classics.

Random Old Records Podcast #5 will be out soon, I swear. I was mixing and sequencing the final version the other night and saved it half-way through to finish later. The file decided to become corrupted, so I had to start from scratch. Oh well. Even though its already been done to death, its going to be a tribute to Lux Interior, filled with classic Cramps tracks, freaky psych, and violent, scary vintage redneck country. Stay tuned.

Rock-A-Bye Bear

I love vintage cartoons. Face it, we were all kids once, and we've seen them all a million times. This is, without competion, the funniest of all time. Rock-A-Bye Bear, directed by the legend Tex Avery, released sometime in the early '50s. Laugh, and laugh loudly.

What's-a-matter, boy, you deef or somethin'?!

Dear Internet

Dear Internet,

Overall, I have been quite pleased with your service over the past fifteen years. Unfortunately, it has recently come to my attention that you have been bombarding the blogs I frequent with an especially obnoxious advertisement. I understand that ads are what keep these blogs in business, and have come to terms with that fact a long time ago. I realize that your advice about meeting cute emo girls for free and obtaining prescription drugs from internet-based pharmacies are all part of the landscape I navigate on a daily basis. Such is life.

However, the advertisement I am writing you about has honestly stepped over the line. I am speaking of the one which is headlined "1 Rule To A Flat Stomach: (obey)." This ad features an exposed female torso (the "before" picture, I'm assuming) on the left, which is hideously bloated and pocked with stretchmarks. While the "after" picture on the right does indeed feature noticeable results, the hideous over-exposure, poor attention to lighting, sloppy pixelization, etcetera, produces an overall condition of nausea and revulsion to all who view it, at least in my case. To be blunt, it makes me sick to my fucking stomach. 

In an age where computers are supposed to provide digitized perfection to everyone, can someone on your end do something about this? It is admirable that a person would seek to improve their physical appearance through dieting and hard work, and I understand that a business model would want to use success stories to promote their product. I am honestly trying to fill downtime at work by watching YouTube videos of skateboarding accidents and the ad in question is screwing it all up. Someone has clearly dropped the ball on your end. Can't you get Al Gore to handle this? I read somewhere that he invented you.

I would post a link to the site in question, but I do not want to provide further publicity to an obviously slipshod organization.

Please advise.

Arizona's like, a million miles from Florida

I made a triumphant return to the dollar bin at Half Price Books this afternoon, mostly out of boredom, and partially because I had a coupon. Yeah, that means I'm cheap. Occasionally though, I can find some gems nestled in with the dozens of copies of Laid by James and the Hanson Christmas album, either musically brilliant and obscure or something you can flip on eBay for twice as much. Every single time I visit that store, the same 60-something, morbidly obese creeplord is hanging out: a sweaty, loud-mouthed behemoth, stuffed into too-tight flannel and polyester, who the staff has repeatedly assured me is NOT an employee. Please God, don't let me turn into that man.

Anyway, I've totally flipped for this album by Hey Monday, Hold On Tight, even though it should repulse every last "hipster" bone in my body. They're a band signed to Pete Wentz's label, and all the tracks are produced and written by the same cretins who coughed up Metro Station and Cobra Starship (who? I have the feeling they play the songs I don't recognize when I accidentally flip on the FM radio in my car). The singer is an Auto-Tuned cipher, the drums are Beat-Doctored and beefed up by samples, and the guitars have that same, post-Foo Fighters buzzing roar of every radio rock song from the past 10 years. It's completely mindless, paperthin, and honestly, a blast: ten perfect tracks of aural crack. It's as superficially exciting as a million dollars in counterfeit money, and that's the point. 

Every song has been scientifically engineered for perfection, for turning it up loud and shouting along. It reminds me a lot of another great dumb-fun band, Damone from Boston, mixing loud guitars with cock-rock riffs and female vocals. Squarely aimed at the hearts and minds of the eternal teenager (sometimes too much, as "Candles" is a soppy kiddy power ballad that almost makes me feel like a pedophile just listening to it), just like all great pop music from the Association and the Lovin' Spoonful to Vitamin C or The Coors. I'll take stuff like this over indie rock's recent move towards mushy soft-rock crap like Fleet Foxes anyday. Paying a dollar for this was a steal, and I can't help but laugh about the current state of the music industry, where an album that was released last year is already in the dollar bin.

All the internet hype is talking about how "shockingly relevant" the Grammy's are looking tonight. Sure looks like a lot of the same old dad-rock to me. Radiohead, Coldplay, and U2 all on the same stage? I'll be watching to see if the stage collapses under the weight of self-importance. People talked about how great the Grammy's were gonna be last year, and it turned out of be a pathetic wankfest, topped off by Herbie Hancock's Joni Mitchell tribute album winning Album Of The Year. I bet Robert Plant & Alison Krauss take home the statuette this year, providing more horrifying proof that NPR rules the world.

Random Old Records Podcast #5 will be out next week. #1-4 are still available for a limited time, so check below for the links. #5 is a tribute to the Cramps and all the vintage rock and sleaze they rescued from history's trash heap. It'll be more fun than listening to the Jonas Brothers talk earnestly tonight about donating to the Grammy Museum, that's for sure.

Songs The Lord Taught Us

So, a new term started at my job, and I went from going in at 7 AM for the past six months to starting at 3:30 PM with only two days to prepare. Unsurprisingly, I'm not yet adjusted to the new schedule, which might explain why I'm making white chicken chili at 1:30 in the morning. Not exactly from scratch, but from the mix sent to me in my faraway birthday care package I mentioned below. This, to be exact: White Lightning Chicken Chili. I still consider it "from scratch" since it takes 2 hours to prepare, and I added a bit to the simplistic recipe, including marinating the chicken in broth for a half-hour, and dropping a spoonful of Habanero's face-melting hot sauce into the mix. The back of the package stressed how "mild" the flavor was, so I took that as a personal challenge. It is simmering as I speak.

From food that might cause stomach cramps, I have to make a painfully awkward segue into the news that Cramps frontman Lux Interior has passed away on February 4th, 2009, at the age of 68. I've always heard vague rumours that Lux lied about his age, and given his corpse-like pallour over the last 20 years or so, I wouldn't be surprised if he was really pushing 80. What a sad shame. After 30 years and almost as many guitarists and drummers, the Cramps never put out a bad album, and resurrected loads of classic garage and rock n' roll classics which might have never been heard again via faithful cover versions. Among all the year-zero bullshit that the '77 wave of punk brought, the Cramps were there to remind everyone that real punk rock was fun, and that its roots stretched farther back than anyone else cared to admit.

I had the tracks for my next podcast all picked out when I heard the news, and instead, Random Old Records Podcast #5 will feature a load of Cramps tunes, along with a host of dirtbag classic rock n' roll from the '50s and '60s, in tribute to a man that walked like he talked. Here's a vintage clip of my favorite Cramps song, "Human Fly."

Random Old Records Podcast #4 is still out and about. 61 minutes of classic punk, psych, garage, and funk. Download it here: http://www.mediafire.com/?jonzln5zmwz.

The links for podcasts #1-3 are only going to be valid until the next edition comes out. Get those from the links below before they're gone.