Hepatitis: Not referenced nearly enough in Zagat's Restaurant Guide

I've never really been the type of person that needs business cards (at least, beyond the fabled "Stunt Cock" business cards that nearly got me thrown out of "Buzzcut" Stipek's[1] Desktop Publishing class). It's entirely possible that one day, though, I could wake up as that sort of an asshole. If so, serious consideration would be given to billing my profession as "Amateur Sociologist". Bad information from worse people can prove an invaluable resource, oftentimes more so than that of an allegedly reputable one. For example, nothing proves that the Stones are better than the Beatles with such succinct effortlessness as the negative Amazon reviews for "Exile on Main Street".

As for those who say Exile isn't an album but a place, I'm not sure I'm into the mystical stuff, but I left that place about 1975 and I don't care to go back there again. I guarantee you nobody has bothered to clean up the half-empty beer bottles, the bloody needles and the discarded condoms.-Some Jerkoff

That comment makes a pretty convincing argument. At least, the argument that his wife presumably began cuckolding him before the ink could even dry on their sham of a marriage. Now, with his better half galavanting around town with a bottomless glass of White Zinfandel, the man devotes nearly all of his free-time to tireless labor in his garden. In no way is it hyperbole to marvel aloud at his horticultural feats. Selflessly, though, he deflects all compliments given to him, and his finely manicured lawn. The real hero? The garden claw. Cultivating, weeding: important steps, no doubt. But the AERATING. Loosening the soil, letting oxygen penetrate the roots. The implement, friends, deserves the credit. He is merely a humble steward over a small patch of earth.

The reason I lead with this anecdote of questionable relevancy is that it helps to illustrate the core values that define my love for New York City's very own, Patriot Saloon. A cursory peak at it's rating on metropolitan booze bible Yelp suggests mediocrity. Look closer, though.

One reviewer spends over four-hundred words, begging and pleading for you to turn tail and run from this terrible, terrible place. They find it's mere existence an affront to decency. Akin to The Animals' definitive performance of "House of the Rising Sun", they caution you to avoid ensnarement in it's tentacles of moral decay. These people obviously reek of fucking cowardice.

Ignore such clowns. Their limp pulses and bourgeois sympathies comprise a cage far more inescapable than the steel bars Michael Bolton sang of. In fact, run contrary to the wishes of these callow, fragile naysayers. Rather, welcome the evil. Roll around in it. Marinate. Let it seep in, mingle with your blood. Make friends with the great Satan. You no longer even control your will. You are a mere vessel for terrible things. Democracy and reason left when you entered. Abandon all faith, forsake hope. You are Krang, and loathsome intent is that creepy brain thing in it's belly. Needless to say, it's intoxicating.[2] Don't listen to me, though. Listen to these excerpts from reviews lambasting the establishment:

I walked by today and the chalkboard outside said, "Wanted: Shameless Slut Bartenders"

I don't care what their reasoning is, that's offensive.

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And I always do throw up from the Patriot. On the street. In the cab. In the apartment lobby.

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I have to admit I have never bought a drink here. But my sister worked her for a short period of her lifetime and the stories she told me were both priceless and very very scary.

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Seriously, are leather bustiers really acceptable to wear before 9:00 PM?

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Do not go upstairs at the Patriot Saloon, especially not at 7 pm on a Tuesday night when folks up there have been drinking since noon!

I am a huge dive bar fan and the cheap prices are oh-so-tempting (so is the fun Hank and Cash music) but ladies stay downstairs! The second me and a co-worker hit the 2nd level a dude fell out of his bar stool..this then lead to ice throwing and drink splashing. If it was a Saturday-more power to em' but a Tuesday night at 7? Lay off the lunch hour shots!

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cheap beer is always nice, but a dive bar that needs its bartenders in pasties to establish atmosphere is too seedy for me.

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This place is trashy and demoralizing. Will make you feel dirty and smell like piss.

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Saturday was probably my least eventful trip to the Patriot ever. Yet, I still managed to wake up at 86th street, traveling on a Bronx-bound C train, at 4:30 in the morning. I live in Queens. For those unfamiliar with NYC geography, it's comparable to going out for drinks in Haiti, and coming out of a blackout in the Dominican Republic. Getting home isn't an impossibility, but you certainly complicated things for no good Goddamn reason[3].

After drunkenly pissing in a corner of the train station (my coronation as an official New Yorker, as far as I know), I apologized to a bum, dozing on a bench, for my uncouth behavior. He sagely nodded with understanding. In my shape, I needed to purge my system of toxins far more than he didn't need to see my limp dick, mere minutes before sunrise. That man was a saint, and I commend him both for the depths of his empathy, and for using the New York Times as a blanket (The Post is unfit even for sheltering vagrants from inclement weather).

I spent most of Sunday uncontrollably convulsing, shades of Michael J. Fox. If an AIDS patient got on the train after me, they would've hurriedly moved to the far end of the car, scared that whatever the fuck I had could overtake their fragile immune system. Still, though; totally worth it. In honor of the mighty Patriot, here's a smattering of the kind of hillbilly shit I play on their jukebox.

----------------------------


Jerry Lee Lewis - "What's Made Milwaukee Famous (Has Made a Loser Out of Me)"


David Allan Coe - "You Never Even Called Me By My Name"


Tanya Tucker - "Delta Dawn"


Roger Miller - "Chug-a-Lug"


Willie Nelson and Merle Haggard - "Pancho and Lefty"

For those who don't approve of the latent white-trash streak running through me, I present to you an offering of Mystikal. If you somehow don't like David Allan Coe or Mystikal, then you probably blow. Hard.


Mac & Mystikal - "Murda Murda, Kill Kill"

By my math, he gets out of prison in January 2010. Needless to say, that will be absolute crack rock. Sadly, Mac will be locked up for much longer. In either case, both men have deep catalogs that more than justify "putting the tank on your casket". No Limit ain't never left, yadadamean?
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[1]Though it's tough not to be secretly enamored with any female whose celebrity doppelganger is Sergeant Schultz from Hogan's Heroes.

[2]Pun not intended. Trust me. We're all better than that.

[3]An artists conception of my retardation

I Really Should Know Better

It's rainy, the playoffs are on, and the Mets and Yankees are only identifiable by their dental records. After spending an afternoon watching the Brewers completely take a shit on me [right down to the pseudo-rally cocktease (exacerbated, of course, by Brad Lidge's annual post-season meltdown raising my hopes)], the Cubs jump into a 2-0 lead in the second game, and I head to the train for a night of work.

Since the bar is dead, the crowd consists entirely of bro's, and the weather is fucking abysmal, I slap on my crutch playlist of arbitrarily-arranged classic rock obscurities to keep me entertained during my six hour marathon of self-indulgence and free Sam Adams.

Top 5th, no outs, bases are empty.


The Rolling Stones - "Happy"

Top 5th, 1 out, no men on.

Rafael Furcal walks.
Top 5th, 1 out, one man on.


"James Gang - Funk #49"

Russell Martin flies out.
Top 5th, 2 outs, one man on.

Manny Ramirez walks.
Andre Ethier walks.
Top 5th, 2 outs, bases fucking loaded.

Ryan "Cum" Dempster gives up a grand slam.
4-2 Dodgers.

The place erupts with cheers and high-fives from NY baseball fans, and the only voice of dissent is the word "Fuck", screamed out of the DJ booth, followed by the sound of me punching something hard enough that typing this is difficult.

As Furcal crosses home plate, the James Gang ends.

Up next:


ZZ Top - "Jesus Just left Chicago"

If I, in any way, jinxed them, I should be subject to African tribal genital mutilation. God Fucking Damn It.

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I realize that I'm long fucking overdue for an update. Furthermore, it is in no way an update to anyone that a) the Cubs do this to me every year, and b) I have anger issues. I assure you I will finish a real post in the near future, and that it will give you all the joy of an Anne Geddes photo[1], but with far less latent-pedophilia. To tide you over in the meantime, enjoy Elephant Man[2] acting like a complete maniac over a sample of the Benny Hill theme song.





Elephant Man - "No Tikkle"


-----------------------------------------
[1]Just so we're on the same page, that is supposed to be a vagina, right?

[2] Note: Do not engorge yourself on salami, and then google "Elephant Man". You may think you're gonna get this, but you're way more likely to get this. Or this. Lesson fucking learned.

Mr. Bad Example

When I was in 8th grade, shortly after moving to Wisconsin, I was taken under the wing of my aunt's chain-smoking, whiskey-drinking boyfriend Jeff. Assessing my juvenile sense of humor, emotional retardation, and memorization of the Led Zeppelin catalog as the marks of a kindred spirit, Jeff launched a platform to be implemented across various taverns and living rooms around Northeastern Wisconsin: to get fall down the stairs shit-faced and talk endlessly about music[1]. The first time I met him, he took my cousin Kali and I out in his Thunderbird, driving 90 mph down rural Illinois roads and shouting about how much he liked Cracker[2], and how the original T-Bird's featured a radio that got louder as you accelerated. This initial exchange set the template for most of our future interactions, and likely most of my fondest college memories. In hindsight, of course, the fact that I could barely get into a PG-13 movie at the time is mildly troubling. God willing, my reckless streak lasts long enough that I can one day afford my children such a divine opportunity.

Once our meetings started occurring at regular intervals, Jeff's schizophrenic record collection gave me an opening to plunge into Primus[3], Patsy Cline, and all points in between. To this day, I consider myself lucky that I had someone to introduce me the Dead Kennedys and the Circle Jerks, particularly at an age where I staunchly supported the artistic merits of Bush[4]. Shit, he even took me to see the Statler Brothers in Milwaukee, only to get hammered and spend the entire time shouting about how Harold should go solo[5].

It was truly a golden era. Yet, times passed and things changed, as times and things are prone to do, and Jeff dropped off the face of the earth. Even in his absence, though, the music lingered. None more so than his favorite artist, Warren Zevon. Zevon, known to most for the 70's radio staple "Werewolves of London", spent the better part of thirty years writing dark, complicated, and often hilarious songs about sex and death. A true pioneer, he explored the core motivational aspects of our mosts carnal behaviors, while most of his Southern California contemporaries were too busy writing vapid odes to geography, and banging underage prostitutes[6]. While an asshole like Don Henley will be haunting my children's children from the factory-radios of their flying cars, Warren is unfairly relegated to a historical footnote, like he's fucking Mungo Jerry or something[7]. As my record collection grew to greater and more ridiculous bounds during my high school years, I tried to fill in all of the bizarre corners of the music world I had obsessed over when I lacked any sort of income. However, Zevon's relative obscurity (and a lack of follow-through that lingers to this day) truncated all attempts to move beyond my initial dubbed cassettes rather quickly. At that point, it was easier to enjoy my weather-beaten copy of "Excitable Boy", and just plunge instead into the noisy indie rock that seems to find all shaggy-haired, ego-maniacal high school boys.

Fast-forward to my sophomore year of college, the first of multiple attempts for Ryan and I to merge like Voltron. The majority of my waking hours consisted of blasting old rap, playing NBA Jam, and blacking out from malt liquor. Ryan's days were fleshed in by the full time job of bottling his escalating rage over the success of DJ Sammy, and writing an electronic composition that consisted of the word "attention" being modified and distorted endlessly until I began to weep. In summation, we were both terribly lame, and on vastly different pages. It would be completely justified if Ryan and Anthony (present day) were to hop into DeLoreans and beat some fucking sense into our 2002 incarnations. Respective failures aside, though, our team-building exercise ran like a well-oiled machine: tandem viewings of David Letterman. Now granted, between Wop Wednesday (named for the drink, not the Italian racial epithet), night classes, house parties, and various other distractions, we'd only catch it intermittently. But the times we did watch Letterman were always our equivalent of a 1950's nuclear family reconnecting around the dinner table[8].

One night, after a virtually non-existent monologue, Dave sat at his desk and explained that the show's format was undergoing a one-time-only deviation from the norm: it was to be devoted entirely to Warren Zevon. Recently diagnosed with a rare type of lung cancer (mesothelioma), his doctor gave him the ominous prognosis of mere weeks left to live. Being close friends with David on both a personal and professional level, Letterman dedicated an entire show to him, in an effort to draw attention to Zevon's dynamic body of work. For the next hour, Warren, always sort of a dark cat, told a series of dry, hilarious anecdotes, all illuminating the stark, bleak truth[9]. Then, he performed three selections from his epic back catalog, straining to hit each note as his cancerous throat fought back against him. Needless to say, Ryan and I were profoundly affected, and both of us plunged much further into his body of work; devoting radio shows and personal income to his celebration, and pulling a pretty thick John the Baptist routine on anyone we thought we could convert[10].

Since then, Warren has been in and out of our lives. Some friends, such as Simeon and Melissa, have responded well, and connected on the level that we envisioned at the start of the exercise. Others clutch their rosary beads, in desperate hope that my streak of musical necrophilia ends sooner rather than later. One crucial obstacle to our crusade has always been that we lacked a tangible way to communicate just how staggering the Letterman episode truly was. CBS only replayed it once: the day after his death. Furthermore, they attempted to quash any YouTube linking, and assailed tape traders on the internet as well. Years later, though, Warren's wife and children have finally emancipated a load of his non-traditionally released material from draconian copyright law, and it's been well worth the wait.

----------------------------

To begin, here's the second, third, and fourth clips from that night's episode. When combined with the initial clip (posted above) it amounts to about 95% of the total content from that night. Due to either Viacom reappraising the internet's role in entertainment (unlikely), or the cobwebs of disinterest shielding the clip from their view (far more likely), this epic piece of history is at least currently available to spread dude's gospel.


Warren Zevon - Interview Part 2/"Mutineer" (live on Letterman)


Warren Zevon - "Genius" (live on Letterman)


Warren Zevon - "Roland the Headless Thompson Gunner" (live on Letterman)

-----------------------

Secondly, the good people at Archive.org have spent over a decade stockpiling an amalgam of multimedia documents, in the hopes of creating a comprehensive online library. One of the most interesting segments of their collection is the recorded music wing. Since most business-minded people fear what new technology could do to their bottom line, your average musician on archive.org is either someone whose works have been considered public domain for years (old folk/blues recordings), independent musicians (who aren't selling anything anyway), or hippies that think the internet is a magical tapestry of puppy dog tales and ethereal hokum (the Grateful Dead).

However, in an effort to simply expose the world to the genius of his works, Zevon's children and ex-wife have signed documents allowing any live recording which doesn't fall under an existing contract to be shared for free on the site. While wading through the 71 concerts(!!!) currently available may seem initially daunting, I assure you that the gold there (ranked according to rating, set lists, and year of production) makes the exercise well worth your time. Here's a few selections, mostly early stuff. The newer stuff is amazing as well, but some of the production works better after you're acclimated to his work. These cuts hit you from the jump.


Warren Zevon - "Carmelita" (live radio performance w/ Jackson Browne)(12/08/1976)


Warren Zevon - "Desparados Under the Eaves" (live radio performance) (10/13/1976)


Warren Zevon - "Mohammed's Radio" (live radio performance) (10/13/1976)

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Finally, here's a couple more live clips of Zevon, including a few other Letterman appearances. His post-1980 work is very Leonard Cohen-esque, where a lot of the production choices aged terribly on the studio renditions, with an over-reliance on synthesized instruments and clunky arrangements. The songs themselves are still impeccable, though, as evidenced by the lyrics I've also linked below. Not everything reaches this great height, but it's all still pretty phenomenal.


Warren Zevon - "Renegade" (live in Atlanta, 1993)


Warren Zevon - "Mr. Bad Example" (on Letterman)


Warren Zevon - "Lawyers, Guns, & Money" (on the BBC)


Warren Zevon - "Splendid Isolation" (on Letterman)


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[1]...and hating the Jews, but I mainly just nodded and nervously smiled during that part.
[2]This is actually my favorite Cracker song, but the nuanced tone doesn't lend itself quite as nicely to the finer points of reckless child endangerment.
[3]Though I would like the record to reflect that in many cases, I was already aware of the artist from my television obsessed youth. I mean, no self-respecting child raised by Time Warner Cable in the early 90's could possibly forget "Wynonna's Big Brown Beaver".
[4]Oh Gavin, in retrospect your fame truly is as comical as his presidency. Even if I still embarrassingly hum along with "Swallowed".
[5]Trust me. The elderly, western-clad people seated all around us were not nearly as amused as I was.
[6]Y'all have no idea how close I came to naming my blog "FuckYouDonHenley".
[7]I won't delve too much into Zevon's fascinating back story, because that's what Wikipedia is for, though I will say that the recent book written by his wife is fucking revelatory, even for people that have zero interest in the man, or his works.
[8]"240 women sharing 3 showers? What is this - Vassar?"
[9]When asked if he's learned anything now that he's living on borrowed time, Zevon replied "I guess I've learned to enjoy every sandwich". If I ever say anything even half that clever, put it on my fucking urn.
[10]After deliberating, I decided to link to Ryan's account of this tale, in spite of the fact that it's better written, contains far less superfluous garbage, and was written like two years before I got around to covering it. Hopefully that act of writing karma will deflect any of the heat that I deserve for writing my most masturbatory blog entry yet, employing some pretty abominable syntax in the process.

I am a twelve year old girl

Or maybe she does love me. I don't know. What I do know is that about a year ago, I reached the next destination of my ongoing vision quest. Or at least, it's sort of like a vision quest. But instead of depriving myself of all nutrients and waiting for spirituality to descend via malnutrition hallucinations, I drink copious amounts of shitty domestic beer and look for said spirituality in records that contain some righteous fucking drums. I want to put as much distance as possible between myself and other white people, and rhythm seems like a nice back-up plan, in the event that the winning combination of bad credit and admiration for NBA neck tattoos can't quite seal the deal together[1].

Anyway, as I reconnected to the internet, trying to make up for eighteen months of listening almost exclusively to vinyl, bar jukeboxes, and the music I put on my iPod right after Santa came, I stumbled upon a leak of the latest album by the National. So as not to further bore everyone that's heard me rave about that record endlessly, I'll simply reiterate that I think its the cat's ass[2]. So, being heavily enamored with them at the time, and reacquainting myself with frequent live music treks to Milwaukee, it was only a matter of time before I laid down some newspaper, and popped my National cherry. Unsurprisingly, they were fantastic. The arrangements were peculiar, but interesting. "Mr. November" was a great encore. I'd imagine this could all be read about in greater detail on a blog with actual standards, frequent updates, and an interest in content beyond "I simpwy wuuuuuv <3 UGK !!!!11!ONE!!!!" and "Keith Richards is the greatest guitar player ever"[3].

The National, though, were in no way, shape, or form the pinnacle. You just sort of knew they would be amazing, and thus you took them for granted, like the 23rd beer in the case. I am serious as a fucking AIDS test when I say that the high-water mark was St. Vincent. I had familiarized myself with the record and liked what I heard, but the trickles of insight actually came after reading the interview where she explained the background of her album title, and revealed herself as really funny and neurotic. So, when she took the stage with a single guitar and a sampling pedal, with no band in sight, I slumped into my seat, anticipating a shit sandwich on turd bread.

Then the freshly layered chord progressions started swirling, and it staggered the first thirty rows of people. Thoroughly stunned, I looked at at Ted and Dan [4] to verify it wasn't simply the PBR that was mystifying me. Then I uprighted myself, waiting for the heavy applause to subside. This rather lengthy wait also provided ample opportunity to begin shifting gears into serious artistic evaluation mode, since we undoubtedly spent the car ride over passionately discussing just how funny poop and pee really are. Yet, before I could turn off the juvenile part of my brain to keep up with the gravitas of her performance, a weird thing happened; she started telling jokes. Like, nervous one-liners, shit with punch lines, things that she clearly stammered accidentally in Omaha, but later molded into top-grade stage banter. She was hilarious. And she covered "Dig a Pony". Basically, the whole thing gave me a throbbing, purple, indierection for like 36 hours[5].

So all this time, as I've tried to be a somewhat realistic man in most facets of my life, there has remained my completely unrealistic pipe dream that St. Vincent and I will one day share spiral-shaped Kraft Macaroni & Cheese (one bowl, two spoons) in an oversized papasan chair, while watching a televised baseball game and listening to early Pavement records. That vision of domestic hipster bliss, however, has been shattered, however, as my beating heart has redirected it's focus, leaving sweet Annie Clark in the lurch[6].

Last weekend, as Ryan, Miles, and I journeyed to the center of our minds/pelvises/all points in between, events crescendoed until we arrived at some sort of an art mall, waiting to see Dan Deacon play at an avante-garde music festival at 4am. Irritatingly, the draconian alcohol policy required me to bribe a Starbucks employee for a sleeve of cups. Said cups proved worth their weight in gold, though, as they allowed us to take overpriced beers from the mall bar, and stroll around with them towards the stage area proper. As our grift sharpened, our consciousness expanded, and our hubris grew, we abandoned our brief stint behaving civilly in public, and returned to drunken cavorting at peak volume. In the midst of intoxicated Ryan and Anthony argument #2,739,202, I discussed the line-up of the event we were at, and cavalierly referred to guitar player Marnie Stern as "dope". That, friends, is where my path diverged into the yellow wood.

During the tirade, captured for posterity on Ryan's James Bond camera, a tiny voice peeps up in the background. "Really? You think I'm dope??" At this point, we are introduced to the genuine fucking article herself. I then proceed to mislead myself into thinking I was charming Marnie Stern, guitar virtuoso and foxy foxy lady, in an exchange thankfully recorded for the initial 90 seconds alone. The next twenty minutes can only be remembered in my head, where I was unbelievably debonair, and both artist and her flamboyant manager alike were knocked on their asses by my penetrating wit and insight. While this segment failed to make the now battery deprived camera, it's probably for the best, as legend has undoubtedly eclipsed stark, brutal reality.

The night went on, Dan Deacon rocked our faces off, and we left to drink past sunrise, listen to Juvenile, and track down Milos. But nothing lingers in my subconscious the way that Marnie Stern has[7].













*sigh*

St. Vincent, we'll always have Milwaukee. But the world is too cold for a delicate flower like you. All celebrity crushes from this point forward will all be gauged by their finger-tapping guitar solo ability, followed immediately by how adorable their voice is. I think its an air-tight plan.

Get familiar, dear readers. Get familiar.

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For a more nuanced take on the actual event we attended, direct your sweet ass to NameDropAcid. It's a trade-off, though, since he makes way less weiner jokes than I do. But, there's actual video of the performances, and various other bullshit I'm way to solipsistic to concern myself with. I know you all care far more about which brilliant musicians I've reduced to masturbation fuel. And I love you all for it. Hugs and Kisses, blog land!

EDIT: Also, I would be remiss if I didn't mention Marnie Stern and her manager's hilarious reaction to Ryan's business card. The business card is such a blend of genius and retarded that only Pootie Tang, and golden-era DipSet exist on the same ethereal plane. While they didn't seem to think anything was bizarre about a drunken sweaty guy with a bad beard fawning over her MySpace page, they asked about five questions in an attempt to clarify just what the fuck Ryan hoped to accomplish with his business cards. That, I would imagine, is the point of having such a brilliant fucking business card. Kudos.

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[1] The concept of a tandem that's worth far less than the sum of it's parts will forever be known as "The Mega-Maniacs Phenomenon", since it's rather astounding just how inferior they were as a tag team to my beloved "Money Inc".

[2] And as the king of the jungle reminds us, few things are as intoxicating as a cat's ass

[3] As many of you know, I know consider his bandmate Mick Taylor a better guitar player, but you know this because I'm long winded and redundant, which was the point of that aside.

[4] From this point forward, all supporting characters in boring stories I tell will be represented by the first result from a google image search of their name. Feel free to start an internet petition that I never meet anyone named Lance.

[5] Or 253 days. A horse a piece.

[6] Initially, I abbreviated that as "A.C.", until fear struck that lackadaisical readers may think I have dreams of entering an unholy sexual union with the members of Anal Cunt.

[7] Well, maybe the Patriot. But, that's only because I need to keep the legend in the pipeline until I can rally the troops for an epic trip to their almighty jukebox. "Jolene" doesn't play itself, mu'fucka.

Shout It Out Loud

So about thirty-five years ago, when the whims of fat white women dominated the billboard charts[1], there was a product called "Elvis Having Fun On Stage". Essentially, it was the culminating act in Colonel Tom Parker's lifelong platform to suck every fucking last marketable molecule out of Elvis Aaron Presley's bloated pre-corpse[2]. Without underselling the vast, complicated tapestry of awful that acted as marrow in the sonic abortion, it's basic format was Elvis doing stand-up comedy. At least, Elvis doing stand-up comedy, but with the role of "humor" being played by "epic fucking tragedy". Forty minutes of on-stage banter. Hiccups. Humming. Awkward half-jokes. Edited together by some Nazi after their cash cow, the aforementioned EAP, was deemed disappointingly unproductive.

In short, it's one of the reasons why people like myself are fiddling as the record industry burns towards a fucking self-created, fourth-circle-of-hell degree of flaming fucked. So legendary was this relic of Elvis' pill-hound decay that, long out of print, it became mythologized the way shitty things often are. Inevitably, the indie-rock crowd needed to pay homage, because as we all know, ironic comedy was the Lord's seventh day masterwork [3]. The second act was cast, with the lead role played by Robert Pollard of Guided By Voices. GBV (one of the few indie rock bands wise enough to realize that it's members are interchangeable components merely designed to approximate the best of Pere Ubu) was led by Robert Pollard; an alcoholic elementary school teacher with a loose tongue.

As he toured the country endlessly, drunkenly disparaging every other musician alive or dead during his epic stage banter, he assembled an aggregate of raw material that even an Jimmy Buffet fan could compile into a relatively charming slab of high-octane drunk shouting. The magnificent bearded bastard eventually took these soundboard mixes, and edited them together into a drunken sound collage of genius/retardation called "Relaxation of the Asshole". There's a fucking rant entitled "My Brother's a Better Guitar Player Than Joan Jett" for Christ Sakes. It's comedy gold; and like all all divine humor, rooted in the truth.

Anyway, tangents, excessive context, and three Natty Ice cans later, it's rather evident that there's a larger point here, and said point is this:

Kicking Elvis when he was down was rather shitty, but at the very least, it gave us a lens through which we could hilariously illuminate the minor flaws of a canonical indie rock artist. Said lens, though, lends itself far more fascinatingly to a more nuanced examination of these people/car crashes than either of the instances above. Nuances of editing, let me clarify; not people of nuance.

Paul Stanley, the mouthpiece of the KISS army, could never be considered a man of subtle tones[4]. Since even the extreme loyalists would grow nauseous listening to Brother Chaim's lengthy treatises on poonannie ad infinitum, Paul holds the reins during the set, in order to keep people that purchased $700 concert tickets from throwing up on adjacent members of the New York Jets Set[5]. Inasmuch as they tour with the zest of Shawn Kemp avoiding welfare police, though, the guy sort of has to make up the banter as he goes along. God knows the ocean of d-bags that would see Gene and the boys in Giants Stadium would know if the banter was pre-written. This ongoing exercise in improv is obviously complicated by the brain damage that comes from thirty years of aqua net skull absorbtion, and having intercourse with Cher[6]. In short, there's a perfect storm of idiocy, ripe to be ripped from it's already fragile context and reappropriated for evil and mischief. Thankfully, one magnificent bastard did just that, splicing and editing years of it together, creating the Mona Lisa of arena rock banter.

"All right Richmond, Virginia: Is this, or is this not, THE ROCK AND ROLL CAPITOL OF VIRGINIA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

I couldn't have said it better myself, Paul.

*begins slow clap*

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Pull up a chair, pour a nice tall glass of glogg[7], and put on your headphones. Without further ado, the funniest thing I've listened to in almost a year:

Paul Stanley - People Let Me Speak From My Chest

(via the21gunsalute)

[1]unlike today, obviously

[2] I consider ejaculate-worthy material such as "Suspicious Minds" to be flukes, albeit goddamn phenomenal ones

[3] At least, that's how Genesis reads in that Old Testament bible I found in the Lorimer train station in Williamsburg.

[4] The joke at the 4:51 mark supports my thesis

[5] And in spite of all of this, terrifyingly, I'm warming up to KISS, even as a jaded mu'fucka in my mid-20's. I'm wearing a garlic cod-piece out of fear that the specter of Eagles appreciation cannot be too far behind.

[6] Technically, this may have actually been Eric Carr, or Gene Simmons. However, I reserve the right to lump every one of these assholes together into an monolithic amalgam, until six months from now when I rip off Chuck Klosterman and claim that Stanley is actually a sensitive genius, unfairly miscast as a misogynistic, phallocentric musician/super-hero

[7] Obviously Paul Stanley's Swedish Christmas beverage of choice, referenced on track 36, during one of many introductions for "Cold Gin". It's a nice way to kick off the portion of the album recorded in Sweden, where Paul attempts to win over the tow-headed masses with mispronounced cheeky Scandinavian phrases. Really people, it doesn't get any better than this.

Midwesteren Alcoholism Part Two: Electric Boogaloo

Yesterday was pretty much the walking sequel to to the documented day prior, but everything was more stark, bleak, and drunken. And I had to sit in a 4x4 DJ booth, staring at plywood/computer monitors for eight hours, drinking Guinness[1]. Thus, all of the same faux-analyses apply, except instead of the glass being "half-full", the glass was "half-empty". And there were thirteen "completely empties" sitting around me. And an aging graffiti writer gave me directions to a local metal bar on the back of a receipt for an order of chicken wings. And I had crumbs from my turkey sandwich all over my Fred Sanford T-Shirt. Thus, my emotionally crippled doppleganger was Paul Westerberg, not John Fogerty. Viva la Replacements!![2]

-----------------------------



The Replacements - "Bastards of Young" [3]




The Replacements - "Answering Machine"



The Replacements - "The Ledge"



The Replacements - "Achin' to Be"



The Replacements - "Goddamn Job"/"Junior's Got a Gun" (Live in '81, at the 7th Street Entry)

--------------------------------------------

[1] Actually, it was Bare Knuckle Stout, and they gave it to me when I ordered Guinness on my first night. I didn't quibble, because I figured my constantly crashing computer and my tendency to get drunk and play Social Distortion repeatedly would alienate my coworkers soon enough anyway; I didn't need to accelerate it by starting a fit over being served an Anheuser-Busch knock-off at 6:45 in the evening. Shit, what's 63 RateBeer points between friends??

[2] And I swear, in spite of the fact that I could probably fill a page-a-day calendar with drunken white man music, this will be my last "James Joyce, document my day through shit/shower/shave to slumber" entry for awhile. Godspeed, blogosphere.

[3] Yes, that's the real, MTV-aired video. These guys are that fucking awesome.

Been a long time, shouldn't have left you without a post to reflect to...

(c) Timbaland (BT)[1]

So I've been working on a post about Warren Zevon/the long strange trip I've been on (macro and micro, ladies and gentlemen). And it's interesting (at least to me), but at the same time, I'm creeping into that oh so familiar territory where I don't update this for months at a time, and it's for such nonsense as going on a bender, or realizing they play "Martin" episodes at 2:30 AM, or other such bullshit. In the meantime, the reason I started doing this wasn't because the pretentious bullshit that interests ME is of interest to you, it's because the gaps between that bullshit draw you back. Sometimes I lose that, and end up talking about old Dismemberment Plan b-sides. Thus, to give my half dozen[2] readers what they desperately crave, here is what I'd give you if I were next to you, drinking high life and watching the Brewers.

I had this really interesting conversation about the nature of people from rural areas, and the optimism, friendliness, and other Jimmy Stewart [4] traits that they seem to bring with them when they embark on a metropolis. Where our ideological paths diverged, however, was that while the catalyst of said conversation thought that they all sought out kindred spirits, and thus ended up lonely/unfufilled, I thought of myself/Buck Owens/Gomer Pyle/Girl you knew from high school with pigtails that probably lives in the West Village now, as that sort of cleansing, one part-per-million component that leaves a wide trail of reflection in their wake. Now, I'm not meaning to suggest that my time in the city, nor that of any other country-fried jackass, is as some sort of Johnny Applesee-inspired ambassador of traditional values, knock-knock jokes, and other such cinnamon in the applesauce. However, I think that a reminder now and again of why you do what you do is important.

I apologize for the melodramatic explanation, because I assure you, even people on Wall Street trading baby carcasses had a more socially profound day than I had. However, the day was a classic Anthony day, those that typically inspire the sort of "what does it all mean" questions that most people abandon after they leave high school/Fueled By Ramen records. I bookended my day, on the floor, in Queens, with baseball. Tacoby Bellsbury's phenomenal catch, millions of Japanese watching opening day with the fervor of our grandparents, and Bystol making off color comments at ten-year-olds for drafting relievers out of turn. In short, the kind of day where I have an endless half-stock before I even check the updates page on SpankWire. In the middle, I read a little Steinbeck, did some laundry, prepared for my Fantasy Baseball draft, grocery shopped, and played Smash Bros.

Basically, this was exactly the sort of day that is the reason I'm 24 years old, quasi-employed, and sleep on a floor. However, as I set about lofting my ridiculous circumstances towards a profundity I could never reach, but incessantly claim after beer four, I soundtracked it all with Creedence. And all was good.

Nearly everyone I know has heard me extol the virtues of "Lodi", one of the greatest songs of all time. To be brief, since you've all heard the pitch ad infinitum, "Lodi" is "Piano Man" for people that aren't emotionally/intellectually retarded. John Fogerty's yarn is about spending the rest of your life in a town you never planned on being in for more than 24 hours, and the Sisyphean struggle of trying to get the fuck out with some goddamn dignity. From the opening chords to the staggering key change at the end, it's a crash course in empathy, and it belongs on God/Allah/Jah/Jordan's fucking jukebox in spot A Fucking 1.

But, as I lazily drifted through the day, taking a nap, pleading with the Asian Laundromat operators not to fuck up my Blackhawks jersey, delicately testing the freshness of my produce, downloading songs from third grade to play for drunks tomorrow at work, I realized that I needed a bit beyond "Lodi", and simply played through Chronicle[5], about nine times.

From there, I jammed the fuck out of everything: the wise cover of "Proud Mary" took me through the bakery while I bought glazed donuts, "Have You Ever Seen the Rain" was the daily song that the neighbors have to listen to me karoake during my unreasonably-late-in-the-day shower, and "Hey Tonight" guided me through my daily "send out one resume so that way you can sleep without waking up in a sweat about how your sole occupation is playing Bon Jovi for people from Jersey" routine. John Fogerty's vocal rang true on each one, but the big three were "Lodi", "Long as I Can See the Light", and "Someday Never Comes".

As much as the guy has written some of the greatest good time music ever (Shit, fucking Jeff Lebowski references him as such), I think we all forget that barring the aforementioned Van Morrison, John Fogerty may be the greatest white soul singer of rock and roll's formative years. "Looking Out My Back Door" hilariously invokes acid confusion (though only his hairdresser knows for sure), "Down on the Corner" is on every Time Life "Music of the 1960's" box set for the next century, and "Fortunate Son" addresses politicism in a way that truly captures the angst of those affected, not simply limousine liberals who rally against any land-owning white man's cause. However, his true gift is that he managed through every A and B side to lend a gravity to subjects that his contemporaries never could have. As played out as my Billy Joel/"Lodi" comparison is, I fucking dare you to place "Someday Never Comes" against anything ever written by Art Alexakis, and not end up wanting to beat all of Everclear to death with a fucking crowbar. The reason the man is a national treasure is that he's genuine, without being heavy handed. He writes for all of us, though gives us the credit that what we would write would be "Grapes of Wrath", and not the Nickelback song most of my tenth grade shop class probably would have penned. He's probably the only classic rock dinosaur that gets trotted out on every awards show tribute imaginable, yet never comes off as tired, pathetic, or dated. Instead, he gives a context to things that flatters, without ever pandering, nor bludgeoning you with obviousness. Just as it makes my pathetic, post-collegiate road trip come off as a profound journey of ambition and self-discovery, it makes you cooking bagel bites in your sweat pants a brutal reality that can be overcome, pumping gas a look towards a railed future. In short, he takes every act of uselessness that you perform during your (shit, definitely my) menial existence, and elevates it to a plateau where it seems a tragic, yet vital component of a decaying system. There's a humanism (in the delivery, obviously, but also in the narrative arc of each original composition) that not even Springsteen can approach, because it's about the micro, and never the macro. In short, the man gives us far more credit than we goddamn deserve. And it's what makes him a genius.



Creedence Clearwater Revival - "Someday Never Comes"



Creedence Clearwater Revival - "Long As I Can See the Light"



Creedence Clearwater Revival - "Lodi"

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[1]Before Timberlake
[2]Google analytics [3] has actually proved that whole self-deprecating "nobody reads my shit thing" is wildly incorrect, but I think the Rodney Dangerfield schtick is my bread and butter, so going egomaniacal now would be self-destructive.
[3]Or, at least it will, tomorrow, after I finish my taxes, and triumphantly install it onto my blog.
[4]Since I'll probably never get around to writing about it, I'll simply use this footnote to recommend Mr. Smith Goes to Washington. I'm a sucker for Frank Capra, and I don't think there's nearly enough populist films being made today (Mumford, of course, being a pleasant exception). That movie is the reason why I still follow politics, even though it usually makes me want to punch everyone in the face. It's also a member of the club of "Weird audio/visual material that makes me cry when I drink Malt Liquor", formed by a Van Morrison record I've probably shoved in all of your faces at taverns up and down highway 29.
[5]I'm not putting up mp3's, because I'd imagine everyone has this (let me know if you don't, I'll hit you up with something), but shit, this is like the most competent "Greatest Hits" disc of all time. CCR got it together, mayne.

Two Craptacular Ships, Passing in the Night

When I opened this window, I was really striving to write a thought provoking piece tying together pop culture hyper-saturation, internet celebrity, the age of the non-contextual edit, and metacommentary/postmodernism (I could link to just about any article Brent DiCrescenzo ever wrote for Pitchfork, but I'll go with this). The problem with this, however, is that I was merely attempting to provide intellectual window dressing before justifying spending an afternoon in my underwear drinking dopplebock, watching Jan Terri videos. Such an afternoon would've been "another winner"[1] regardless, but it achieved true transcendence when I stumbled upon the greatest merging of equal billing quasi-celebrities ever[2]: Jan Terri's "Losing You", and Tay Zonday's 2007 ANTHEM, "Chocolate Rain".

Since learning of her via the Found Footage Festival, I have been more than a little smitten with Jan "Voyage to My Labial Taj Majal" Terri. While it definitely helps her cause that she penned two of the greatest holiday songs of all time ("Get Down Goblin" and "Rock and Roll Santa" shit all over "White Christmas". Fuck a Bing Crosby), the ultimate draw is that, being entirely self-produced, the projects carry a humanism that extend the projects to an absurd degree of insularity. She genuinely has a more warped perception of what the public wants than almost any performer of the last two decades. The only difference between "Baby Blues" and "U Saved Me" is that Jan Terri doesn't have to pay her cohorts to pretend it's not bat-shit insane. THERE IS NO ONE ELSE INVOLVED! I mean, there's anonymous actors as window dressing, but it's not like there's a marketing department, the members of whom go home after work to pound bourbon and shake their head at what their Liberal Arts degree is being used for. Jan sings, Jan films, and then Jan distributes these videos to PASSENGERS IN HER LIMO! Fucking awesome.

Zonday, on the other hand, is at least in on the joke. I'll elect not to write a dissertation about "Chocolate Rain", since it's been done to death, often by far funnier people. I will go as far as saying, however, that even a cursory listen to his cover of "Rainbow Connection" verifies that lightning has struck more than once. Spending his days as a PhD student, and his free-time sharpening his peculiar musical gifts, Zonday clearly is cut from the Ollie Creekly cloth.

While there are literally dozens of people omniscient enough to realize the dual genius of these two entities, one magnificent bastard actually had the vision to wind them together into a staggering double helix of profundity. Granted, the precision of the editing could be improved, but the storyboarding is top notch, and it's really hard not to produce something life-altering with such fantastic source material. I'll won't list all of my favorite parts, because part of the fun is seeing them for yourself, but I openly wept joyful tears when the Zonday line "raise your neighborhood insurance rates" accompanies the visual moment in "Losing You" when Jan Terri and her mulletted suitor run a stop sign on their carefree motorcycle ride. For my entertainment dollar, a way better ride than fucking Alvin and the Chipmunks, I do declare.



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[1] I think I'm now going to sprinkle my praise of anything with David Manning quotes. I also consider my balls "this year's hottest new star!!"

[2] I specify "equal billing", because it would be unfair to pit any low-level montage against the juggernaut of pederasts making Alyssa Milano-centric "Who's the Boss"[3] tribute videos.

[3] And while we're on the subject of "Who's the Boss?", what's up with Italian language theme songs to 80's TV shows?? This one is as fucked up as the Fresh Prince joint from a couple weeks back. Bel Aiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiir!!