I’ve Made Up My Heathen Mind

Here’s what I’m going to do.

I’m going to go to schools, round up kids and pay for them to go and see The Golden Compass. Then I’m going to buy them the book that the movie is based on and all of the subsequent books in the series to make sure they get the “atheist” point and when they have read those books, I’m going to organize them into a protesting mob and we’ll picket outside of theatres that are showing the second Chronicles of Narnia film when it comes out this summer because it will clearly have dangerous pro-Christian themes (I think, because I won’t bother to see it first so I can have an informed opinion) because I don’t want children exposed to those myths that will turn them into God-fearing mush-brains.

Or,

I’ll go see it if I want, take my child if I want, act in a way that is consistent with my moral beliefs in regard to my family and LEAVE EVERYONE ELSE THE F#&K ALONE!!!!

Morons.

I’m Back and Here’s What’s In My Ears!

Wow. Its been over a month? Really? I have no excuse, so I offer none.

On to more important things: Television.

No, not that. These guys:

For those that may not know, Television was a NYC 70’s punk band and were the first in that movement to play at CBGB’s.  More akin to Talking Heads than The Ramones, Television was still a powerful band live as the CD The Blow Out demonstrates. Tom Verlaine and Richard’s Lloyd’s twin guitars are fierce yet artistic and the rhythm section of Fred Smith on bass and Billy Ficca on drums lay down a solid foundation for the vocal antics of Verlaine.

Not very well known at the time (or now, for that matter) Television have been an influence for countless artists from Matthew Sweet to R.E.M. to U2 and although the band only released two albums in their 70’s heyday, Marquee Moon and Adventure, both are essential listening and very clearly a foundation for the next 30 years of indie rock.

(An eponymous reunion album released in 1992 is also worth a listen, as well as the three official live releases, the aforementioned The Blow Out, Live at the Old Waldorf, 1978 and Live at The Academy NYC, 1992.)

 What else is being overplayed on my iPod? Well, it’s all been effected by my recent re-reading of the book, Please Kill Me: The Uncensored Oral History of Punk, an excellent book about the NYC Punk scene in the 70’s that has the good sense to start with Andy Warhol and The Velvet Underground, Iggy and the Stooges and the MC5 to give the proper historical background. (Check it out. It’s a good, quick read.)

So my personal playlist reads like a cast of characters from the book, with a bit of the next generation thrown in:

Richard Hell and the Voidoids, Talking Heads, Velvet Underground, The Damned, Matthew Sweet, Joy Division, The Buzzcocks, The Dead Boys, Patti Smith, The Clash and, completely off the mark, The Shins.

And you? What’s going into your ears these days? 

The Jesus Shield

This is absolutely brilliant!!!

I don’t know what I could possibly say, except I’m very glad I don’t live in this town.

Watch and laugh. And then cry.

More and More Everyday

Here’s an article from TIME about selective prosecution in a corruption case in Alabama. The Justice Dept. chose to prosecute or not based on party affiliation. Guess which party got off the hook?

TPMmuckraker brings it back to the White House for us. Anybody surprised?

Justice? Not Even Close!

The most unpopular president in years wins again.

This is just one more example of the devastation that the Supreme Court is going to wreak on the Constitution and basic human rights for many years to come thanks to Bush, a rubber-stamp Republican Congress and spineless Congressional Democrats.

Imagine if this had been done to one of our own and the offending government threw out the claims. I think our current adminsitration might just start a war over something like that.

But we do it to others and the Supreme Court says that’s just fine.

Is this what American justice is today?

Like We Needed Another Reason……

The hits just keep on coming, folks. There is no defense for these people anymore. They are destroying the country and need to be removed. Call your Reps and Senators. Put impeachment on the table. Enough, already.

I’ve Just About Had It

So this whole damned Iraq thing could have been avoided, except that wouldn’t have been cowboy enough.  Now people are dead so our Chimp-in-Chief can look tough.

Why is this little f*#ker and his evil puppet master still in office? Why haven’t  we the people forced our reps in congress to use the one tool the Constitution gave us for getting rid of bad Executives?

Oh, I forgot. The Constitution isn’t for governing. It’s for misinterpreting to make a spurious claim to ingratiate yourself with a bunch of morons that think America should be run according to the whims of some invisible magician in the sky who’s really concerned with what we do in our bedrooms and who we do it with.

It’s time to take our country back. And it’s time to take our history back. Our founding fathers where too smart to be Christian lemmings and anyone who has ever read the writings of Jefferson, Adams, Madison and even the sainted Washington know this.

 As for our current leaders, I hope 3800 Americans lives and countless Iraqi lives aren’t too big a price to pay for your egos, you worthless f#*ks.

I Don’t Wanna Go Down To The Basement

NY Punk Godfather and CBGBs owner Hilly Krystal died this week, just a few months after that famed dive closed it’s doors. I guess you could say both the club and the man were victims of the ever changing city.

The Bowery, the neighborhood in which Hilly operated CBGB, was a seedy, dirty, drug addict and wino infested place when the club opened in the ’70’s and when I lived there in the early 90’s, but is now an up and coming area filling up with trendy stores and eateries and high-priced housing, just like every other area of Manhattan.

I went to CBGB’s a few times and saw some good (and really bad) bands there. There was something special about the place and in my opinion it was this: In a city that is notorious for disgusting bathrooms, CBGB’s had the absolute worst. Really. There are no descriptives strong enough to do justice to the putresence of the dank holes I can only loosly describe as restrooms. My one and only exchange with Hilly was about the bathrooms. After holding my breath and running in, doing my business and running out as fast as I could, I informed Hilly that the men’s room had no paper towels. He replied,”Yeah? Well, that’s been the case since about ‘82.” Then he chuckled and walked away.

By the time I had moved to the city, CBGB’s wasn’t the happening spot it once was. There was still live music, of course, and it’s status as the home of New York punk kept it busy on the weekends, but it was more of a nostolgia than anything else. The town has passed Hilly by. Still, it was a warm and friendly kind of shithole.

Anyway, rest in peace, Hilly. Thanks for the place to see music and drink PBR on the cheap.

Gabba Gabba Hey!

Back From Ohio and Still Shaking……

OK. So after a week in the solidly red state of Ohio I have to admit that I had forgotten what the experience is like. Here are some highlights:

• My cousin informs me that his 2 year old son will not be allowed into my other cousin’s house where my daughter and her new found 3rd cousin friend are playing because “my boy ain’t going to be playing with no fucking dolls.”
• That same cousin’s wife tells me, in all seriousness and feeling very open-minded, that she thinks Adam Sandler is funny, “even though he’s a Jew.”
• A stranger that my brother and I played golf with goes on at length about how even though Bush may have made a few “small mistakes with this Iraq thing” it’s excusable since he’s had to spend “so much time cleaning up the mess that Clinton left behind.”
• Any public place with a television that is not showing ESPN is showing Fox News.
• My parents don’t have cable, so they only get 6 channels. Two of them are full time religious networks owned by mega-churches.
• And the countryside is littered with billboards for these mega-churches, crusades, biblical quotes, anti-choice slogans and other nonsense.

On the upside there are a lot of indoor water parks and roller coasters in the part of the state I was in.

My parents are considered very liberal for the area (although I would consider them moderates) and I’m stunned they haven’t been run out of the area by a crowd of pitchfork and torch wielding morons. 

So to recap: I had a great time seeing my parents and family, showing my daughter the places I grew up and going to theme parks.

I had a terrible time being reminded of the reasons I couldn’t wait to leave in the first place. It was an eye-opener. Living safely ensconsed in the liberal stronghold of MA has warped my view of things. If Ohio is any indication, the country is most definatly NOT swinging left. Or maybe Ohio is just a lost cause.

Whatever the case, conservatives in my homestate make the ones we have here look like Kennedys.

Some Random Thoughts While I Have a Minute

The comedy show was a big success and a hell of a lot of fun. I didn’t advertise much this time, but I’m planning more in the fall and I’ll get the word out earlier and farther.

I’m still in the midst of one of the busier summers I’ve had in a while, so the posts will  continue to be sporadic for a while longer.

I’m heading out to Beautiful Ohio next week. (OSU grads stand and sing here). I haven’t been there in years. My parents usually travel here to see us (well, to see the Grandkid. I just happen to be here) so it’s time to go the other way.

I’m having one of those stretches of time where everything seems to break. It’s running the gamut from a leaky faucet I can’t seem to fix to the transmission in our mini-van that costs way more to fix than I care to mention.

I recently had a lovely evening in the back yard of a neighbor drinking and talking with many of the bloggers on my blogroll and some other great folks from the area. Thanks for the hospitality, Greg. And Ross, great to finally meet you. I’m taking you up on that Rotary lunch soon.

My latest musical obsession is King Crimson. Especially the 80’s and 90’s lineup of Robert Fripp, Adrian Belew, Bill Bruford and Tony Levin. This is Prog Rock Magic, folks, with a paranoid edge that makes David Byrne look downright well adjusted.

More later, perhaps from the wilds of the Lake Erie shore.