Sorry, the station is down temporarily. But I left up the animated gif thingy because it looks neat.



|Mister Glue (now defunct)|
|The State (Jeff & Mike's)|
|Trumbull Scene|
|UnReal|
|Brian Zbriger|
|http://www.30242.net/|
|Movingimage Wire|
|Some Band|
|Ween Radio|
|Tom The Dancing Bug|
|Slow Wave|
|BBC Radio One|
|Howard Stern|
|SickAnimation|
|AllMusic.Com|
|ClearChannelSucks.Org|
|Beyond McDonalds|



Ween.Com

StellaComedy.Com


Visitors since November 23, 1998

Update your bookmarks: WWW.TASTEMYKIDS.COM

HEADLINE NEWS

January 11, 2009

List-O-Mania 2008
Lots of people said that 2008 really sucked. They were right.

2008 Trends (Most of which were annoying)
25 Recognizing youtube stars as legitimate celebrities
24 High top sneakers
23 Exclusively selling your new album at one store (AC/DC, GNR, etc)
22 Bands named after animals
21 Black clothing with hot pink or neon green or bright blue designs (at a Zumiez near you)
20 Indie-metal VS real-metal.. or something
19 Intensely following frustratingly tedious cable-TV election coverage
18 Green-screen/chroma-key montage (Most often used in commercials for really bad reality shows, and also often used ironically in comedy shows such as Tim & Eric and Flight Of The Concords)
17 Dog movies (Beverly Hills Chihuahua, A Dog Year, The Dog Problem, Marley and Me, Hotel For Dogs, Bolt, etc)
16 Indie-rock tight sweater with beard and glasses
15 “Crystal” bands (the new “wolf” bands) (Crystal Castles, Crystal Stills, Crystal Antlers, etc)
14 Huffing 3M dust remover
13 Twittering to your friends about how you totally just took out the garbage LOL
12 Moms on Facebook
11 High School Musical / Flamboyant children
10 Middle-aged Sarah Palin wannabes
09 Lil Wayne
08 Rick Astley’s “Never Gonna Give You Up” (U.S. #1 in 1988, and also Dennis sings it in that one It's Always Sunny episode)
07 “Fuck” bands (the new “The” bands)
06 Autotune vocals
05 Poorly attempting to unawkwardly insert the uber-annoying catch phrases from Juno into casual conversation (honest to blog!?)
04 Orange-tan guidos
03 The crumbling of the U.S. dollar
02 Vampires (Twilight, True Blood, teens with fake fangs when it’s not even fucking Halloween, etc)
01 Emo haircuts on dudes trying to look like Fall Out Boy

Roffles & Waffles 2008 haaaaaaa
Note: IMHO, roffles in comedy movies were hard to come by this year. Many would argue that there were much rofflage to be found in Forgetting Sarah Marshall or Tropic Thunder, specifically Jason Segel’s opera about vampires, or Robert Downey Jr’s surprisingly decent white-guy-playing-a-black-guy thing. I would certainly call these instances inspired, but I don’t think either of them are particularly roffles. And then there’s Pineapple Express, which is a case of a really great comedy movie with lots of fun shock-value first-time laughs that didn’t work the second time nearly as well as Superbad did. Yeah anyway...

totally subjective.. may change at a moment’s notice..

10 Dr. Steve Brule’s wine report (sketch from Tim & Eric’s Awesome Show Great Job)
09 Ronnie (the black kid) calling out Danny (Paul Rudd) for resembling Ben Affleck because he’s white (from Role Models)
08 When Randy Marsh hears there may still be some Internet out in California, he packs up his family and heads west. (from South Park’s “Over Logging” episode) | watch south park |
07 Mack And Charlie fake their own deaths, Dennis discovers a glory hole in the men’s room stall (from It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia’s episode “Mack And Charlie Die”)
06 John C Reilly’s “Crotch Party” song (from Step Brothers) | youtube |
05 Scenes from "Spagett And The Quest For The Golden Treasure" (sketch from Tim And Eric Awesome Show Great Job)
04 Birthday (sketch from Stella) | youtube |
03 Colin’s Bear Animation | youtube |
02 Indiana Jones is bent over a pinball machine and raped by George Lucas and Steven Spielberg (from South Park’s “The China Problem” episode) | watch south park |
01 Will Arnett Sex Tape “All this talk about abortions is making me super wet...”(sketch from MTV’s The Human Giant) | funnyordie.com clip |

Most Inspired Satire Of 2008
Jim & Derrick.

| Part One |
| Part Two |

Runner-up for “Most Inspired Satire” goes to the first five minutes of Tropic Thunder with the fake movie trailers featuring the fake actors that appear later in the movie. The rest of Tropic Thunder is not funny.

2008 Song & Video Of The Year
Ruth Carr “Come Over”



A Few Noteworthy TV Moments
Drama TV can be fun, but it’s gotten to the point where very little of it matches up with the intensity and realness that can be found in 2 places: Live TV, and Reality TV.

A lot of people immediately cringe upon hearing the phrase “reality TV,” including myself. But you must realize, I’m not referring to any shows with judges. Any Reality show that includes judges or people being “voted off” for whatever reason are all bullshit, and do not include anything remotely “real,” despite their tag claiming that these shows somehow do reflect reality. There is nothing remotely realistic about these people. Anyone with half a brain should be able to figure out when realness is in front of them.

The best Live TV moment this year was probably in September 2008, when John McCain decided it would be a good idea to blow off an interview on Late Night With David Letterman. Of course, this turned out to be an incredibly bad idea, because Letterman decided instead to use the interview segment to bitch out McCain for about 5 minutes straight, which was a decently badass TV moment.



The best Reality TV of 2008 involved people getting strung out. Gary Busey’s tenure on VH1’s Celebrity Rehab was mostly compelling because Busey seemed unaware that he was supposed to be on the show as a patient and not as an aid to help people, and obviously because his personality is so fucked up. The A&E series Intervention normally also includes brilliance of this type, particularly the one with the singer from Days Of The New fighting his crack addiction. However, Intervention’s finest moment so far has to be the New England chick who became addicted to compressed-air aerosol cans, which her family referred to as “computer cleaner.” Not only an addict but also a cutter and a sex-for-money slut, the girl from this particular episode was considered good enough to make the subject into an internet phenomenon.



2008 Movies
There was a certain liveliness and innocence captured within 2008 movies which was strangely reminiscent of that found within the spirit of the 80’s, not only in indie films but from Hollywood as well. Hollywood benefitted greatly from this, as they apparently experienced a record-breaking year for earnings. It was difficult to say “Hollywood sucks” this year, since it actually didn’t for the first time since... well, probably since sometime in the 80’s. Hopefully, the future of Hollywood will take a lesson from 2008, such as “release movies that are actually good, and you will make mo’ money.” It’s possible that this innocence may have been inserted purposely (just as it was purposely inserted many times in the 80’s), but it just seems strange that so many filmmakers would choose to include this theme all within one year. This was notable in the upsurge of surprisingly good coming-of-age stories and buddy pictures. It was also not typical to experience the two most over-hyped movies of this year (Dark Knight and Wall-E) as actually being among the very best, which was also far more common in the 80’s.

This is based on a ranking of somewhere between 40 and 50 movies.

10 Synecdoche, New York (Charlie Kaufman)


09 Paranoid Park (Gus Van Sant)


08 Kabluey (Scott Prendergast)


07 Mister Lonely (Harmony Korine)


06 Step Brothers (Adam McKay)


05 The Fall (Tarsem Singh)


04 Son Of Rambow (Garth Jennings)


03 In Bruges (Martin McDonagh)


02 The Dark Knight (Christopher Nolan)


01 Wall-E (Andrew Stanton)


...Bubbling Under...
Be Kind Rewind (Michel Gondry)
Choke (Clark Gregg)
Pineapple Express (David Gordon Green)
Role Models (David Wain)
The Wackness (Jonathan Levine)

Guilty Pleasure Singles Of 2008
The amount of terrible radio singles seems to multiply with every passing year, so it's nearly impossible for anyone to not have at least a handful of guilty pleasure singles. Also, this is 100% based on personal opinion, so I don't expect anyone to agree. All songs have also been rated on a 1 to 10 scale with 10 being the best.

10 Metro Station “Shake It” (3.8)
Technically not a guilty pleasure since I don’t enjoy it at all, “Shake It” remains a fairly perplexing addition to the Top 40 canon of 2008, partially due to it becoming one of those rare singles which went platinum while only barely reaching the top 10 (meaning that it remained in light to medium rotation on a shitload of U.S. radio playlists for the majority of this year), but even more so because it’s a single that defies genre. Normally this would be considered a good thing, such as the case with that weird “Hey Ya”/”Feel Good Inc”/”Crazy”/”Paper Planes” subgenre; however, it sounds to me like “Shake It” is a case of an average rock band who got extremely lucky by recording a song with a chorus that some label executive decided to identify as catchy, which then was handed over to a pair of high profile producers who chose to overproduce this song to the point where it could hardly be labeled as rock. If you’d prefer to label “Shake It” as rock single based on the way the group dresses (and btw, they’re one of the worst-groomed and worst-dressed bands I’ve ever seen), then go right ahead, but rock equals freedom and rebellion, and there’s nothing freeing or rebellious to be found here.

09 Panic At The Disco “That Green Gentleman (Things Have Changed)” (8.5)
For album #2, Panic decided to drop their punctuation, change their image, and change their sound. But they still can only record 3 good songs per album, so I guess despite the song’s title, things haven’t changed all that much. (Before closing this topic, I may as well reiterate what I was told by friends who were able to attend the hotly anticipated Honda Civic Tour.. or was it the Rock Band 2 Tour.. I always get those mixed up: For whatever reason, all of PATD’s songs from their first album are now performed live with completely different arrangements in order to more closely fit with the new sound of their second album. So this means that if you’re a big fan of the first album and you go to see them live, you’re shit out of luck, because they won’t be accommodating. It’s their way or the hair way.)

I almost forgot to mention that “That Green Gentleman” is by far the best song this band has ever recorded, and because of this song and “Behind The Sea,” I’m surprisingly interested in where they’re headed musically.

08 Ne-Yo “Closer” (6.0) / Chris Brown “Forever” (5.2)
“Closer” sounds like what that Tai Bo guy probably pumps while he’s doing Tai Bo. And “Forever” is literally a commercial for Doublemint gum. The appeal comes from pretty much the exact same place in both cases.. The question is, where is this magical place? I’m lost for an answer. Help.

07 Lil Wayne “Lollipop” (6.9) / Lil Wayne “Mrs Officer” (6.5)
Lil Wayne’s nickname is Weezy. This nickname is gay, so I’m never going to call him that. Apparently he had an eventful year, but I don’t care. I also read somewhere that Lil Wayne released 13 albums in 2008, which I guess is supposed impress me, but it doesn’t at all. Only one of these was an official release, which would be Tha Carter 3. The rest of these were what the hiphop world refers to as mixtapes. When rock bands record their equivalent to mixtapes, they’re called demos. Take the band Weezer for example. I’m not sure if they still do this, but back in 2002 when they were putting together ideas for Maladroit, they had new songs available for downloading at their website on a daily basis. If they really wanted to, they probably also could have released an album a month that year. But rappers consider their demo recordings to be more legit, because for some reason hiphop fans value quantity over quality. Instead of trying to put together solid albums, they put extra effort into 4 or 5 potential singles and then fill up the rest of the album with bullshit and skits. This emphasis on singles and selling product is a huge part of why hiphop sucks in ’08. (It’s the money... If you’re a singles-oriented artist, why waste time on album tracks that no one will ever hear?)

Tha Carter 3 is inconsistent, but it’s not bad. It saddens me that it actually is the best hiphop record I heard this year. There are 2 standout tracks: The one where Lil Wayne plays a 2-note guitar solo (“Shoot Me Down”), and the one with the really fun jazzy-drum loop (“Dr. Carter”). None of the singles released from this record are as good as these 2 songs, and especially not “Lollipop.” However, “Lollipop” was far more accessible, and it did go to #1, so clearly someone made a smart decision with submitting this song for radio airplay. The “shorty wanna hug” part is what sticks in my head, which is why it’s a guilty pleasure. (I’m not sure if that’s what he’s singing, but it sounds like “shorty wanna hug.” I don’t care enough to google the lyrics and verify.) “Mrs. Officer” is also guilt-love worthy because of the part that goes “wee-o-wee-o-wee” which I think is supposed to sound like a police siren. Get it? Because the song’s about how Lil Wayne wants to make sexy-time with girl cops. Oh that Wayne... always the jokester...

06 Weezer “Troublemaker” (4.6)
I can’t help but get my hopes up whenever I see an article somewhere that Weezer is planning a new release. I guess this is what’s most frustrating about this band. Matt Sharp won’t be returning. The Moog synths are long gone. They’re now a completely different band than the one who tore shit up on David Letterman, or who rocked the fuck out of the song “Lullabye For Wayne” on the Video Capture Device DVD, a clip I saw for the first time early in 2008, which surprisingly rekindled my interest in 90’s Weezer. This video clip helped me to realise that the Weezer that existed between 1993 and 1998 was probably one of the 50 greatest rock bands in the history of music. Seriously, they’re up there with Queen in the late 70’s, The Who in the late 60’s, and Nirvana in the early 90’s. They fucked shit up for real, and at the time, they remained very strange and mysterious. These days, they seem a lot more human.

During that time, Rivers Cuomo recorded a lot of unreleased demos that only became available this year, when Alone and Alone 2 were finally released. These 2 collections contained so much raw brilliance that it fooled many old school Weezer fans into believing that he may have been able to tap back into his old methods of quirky songcraft for The Red Album. But unfortunately, Weezer’s latest disaster turned out to be probably their worst collection yet, which is saying a lot after 2005’s Make Believe. Here’s what I will never understand about Weezer: The Kitchen Tapes, Songs From The Black Hole, the 2 Alone LP’s, and the summer 2000 demos include more than enough brilliant songs to fill at least 3 new Weezer albums, and yet Rivers still insists on writing all new terrible music instead of trying to perfect a few of the older songs. Radiohead’s latest album contains the track “Nude” which they were working on since 1997, so it’s not like this is an unheard practice.

So anyway, before things run too off-track, we’re supposed to be talking about the song “Troublemaker,” which is not a very good song, but is still the standout track from The Red Album, as nearly every other song on this record is unlistenable. (The only other exception would be “Pork And Beans,” which was ok upon the first listen, and got worse every time after, and whose inner-shittiness became truly amplified when its abysmal video started streaming online and quickly became one of the most overrated music videos of 2008, a video which no one will give a fuck about a year from now.) “Troublemaker” slightly benefits from yet another weak attempt at sounding like classic Weezer. The arrangement and the music itself are actually almost good. But the vocal melody, a key element which Rivers used to be able to effortlessly master, is now mostly monotone. The lyrics, another element Rivers used to be able to nail, carries the song from “frustrating” into “WTF” territory, highlighted by the passage “Marryin’ a beeyotch/Havin’ seven ki-yods...” Seriously, what are you thinking, dude? Perhaps the old school hangers-on should start reserving themselves to the hard truth that Weezer has lost it, and they’re not coming back, EVER. On the bright side, we can still look forward to Alone 3 (hopefully).

05 Webbie “Independent” (6.4)
Yes, he definitely spells out the word “independent” as the chorus for this song. It’s all true.

04 T.I. “Whatever You Like” (6.5)
”You can have whatever you like...” This is a nice message for the kids. Also the video makes me kinda sad because the girl working at the fried chicken joint is stuck with the scumbag boyfriend at the end of the video... But then you remember that T.I. did give the girl his number at the beginning of the video, so possibly there was an eventual happy ending to be found. But see, that’s what makes this video so great. It’s up to the viewer to make their own ending to the story. Does she stay with the scummy boyfriend? Or does she end up in a limo somewhere with T.I. getting sprayed with champagne?

03 Jordin Sparks & Chris Brown “No Air” (7.4)
2008 had no shortage of horribly overproduced radio singles. The extent of this became so overwhemling that it started to become much more obvious when about once-per-month this year, approximately one new song would debut which actually benefits from meticulous production values. “No Air” turned out to be one of the first of these early this year. Despite this, however, its brilliance wasn’t taken quite as serioiusly by radio listeners, for 2 key reasons: #1 Because Jordin Sparks apparently used to be a contestant on American Idol (as if true music fans still consider this show remotely relevant), and #2, more importantly, because she’s not Rihanna. Had this song been a Rihanna & Chris Brown duet instead, it most certainly would have topped the singles charts for at least as long as the inferior “Take A Bow” did.

02 Flobots “Handlebars” (5.1)
Once upon a time in 1998, I’m almost positive that I turned on K-Rock and heard this very song, a full nine years before its initial release date. Except now that I’m thinking about it, I’m wrong.. What I actually heard was “Never There” by Cake segueing into “Riot Nrrrd” by 2 Skinnee J’s. My mistake. Now that I’m remembering correctly, the first time I heard “Handlebars” was on the “new” Radio104 in April 2008. I was not impressed, and understandably since it’s a preachy whiteboy rap-rock Cake ripoff with an irritatingly repetitive refrain... “I can ride my bike with no handlebars, no handlebars, no handlebars...” Wow, did you think that up all by yourself? Grammy Awards, here we come. A few months later it actually started receiving light airplay on Top 40 stations, which is kind of bizarre considering how dated and underproduced it sounds. There was one point over the summer when it was listed in the Hot 100 somewhere in the mid-30’s right next to “Paper Planes,” which gave a hint of hope that possibly both songs may continue gaining momentum and become crossover smashes. Ultimately, “Paper Planes” rose to #4, and “Handlebars” disappeared into the abyss never to be heard from again. I suppose it was this distinction as a “charting” song from 2008 that made me appreciate it better. The highlight of “Handlebars” is during its second half when it starts to rock-out a bit; however, those wretched lyrics remain frustrating to sit through. Somehow this idea arrived over the past 8 years where songs are automatically compelling if they might possibly be subtly commenting on the Bush administration. (One notable example was Incubus’s “Meglomaniac” in 2004.) As far as I can tell, in 8 years, not a single one of these songs was ever all that interesting.

01 Katy Perry “I Kissed A Girl” (5.5)
Had it not been for the abundance of vocal-melody hooks contained within, Katy Perry’s crash-landing onto the US singles charts would probably have been considered a massive embarrassment. But as it stands, I personally cannot locate another single positive aspect of “I Kissed A Girl.”

The absurdity of its production, with overdriven compression nearly comparable to that of Daft Punk, is so unnecessarily overkill that it subconsciously makes the listener feel claustrophobic. This makes sense seeing as how Katy Perry longs to be so in-your-face and exhibitionist that we become practically forced into dealing with her, whether we like it or not. The vocal performance appears passable, but not anything especially noteworthy, despite that recordings of live performances have helped to established that she is, in fact, a competant vocalist (and certainly more so than someone like Britney Spears).

However, another common (and irritating) aspect of many of today’s radio hits can once again be attributed to overproduction: Vocalists who have actual singing chops, like Katy Perry, are still having their voices manipulated by computers to make it sound like they’re singing through an autotune device. And it’s not because the producers think it benefits the song. It’s because the producers know what the record labels are looking for, because they know labels are following trends closely and need them to sell their product.

And then, of course, there’s the lyrics... The cringeworthiness of the line “Hope my boyfriend don’t mind it” was probably one of the coldest chills recieved during an especially chilly summer. Unfortunately, it seems as though subtlty may not be in style right now. Despite what was mentioned earlier, 99% of those who could stomach this song did not enjoy it due to its vocal hooks or production, but rather because they thought the lyrics were shocking. God, that is so fucking lame. The formula unfortnately worked very well, and America has spoken. For those looking to calculate and recapture the same success next summer, remember these 2 key elements: #1 Very catchy vocal hooks, and #2 Absolute and complete soullessness.

The Most Unfortunate Albums From 2008
I can only assume that the albums released this year from Pink, Madonna, Pussycat Dolls, and Kid Rock were all shit sandwiches, but I didn’t hear these albums because I no longer have the time to speed-listen through potentially terrible albums. I used to enjoy doing this, but lately it seems like a waste of time. So here’s a handful of shit sandwiches that I did get to speed-listen through at some point this year, just in case you were curious...

05 Dengue Fever, "Venus On Earth"
04 Britney Spears, "Circus"
03 Tila Tequila, "I Have Tourettes"
02 Katy Perry, "One Of The Boys"
01 Weezer, "Weezer" (aka The Red Album)

Worst Radio Singles Of 2008
One major annoyance for 2008 were singles that have the same drum-beat as Rihanna’s “S.O.S.” Notable annoyances of this nature include “Womanizer,” “I Kissed A Girl,” that Hilary Duff song that sampled “Personal Jesus,” and that recent one by Christina Aguilera. With the exception of over-overproduction, this was the worst radio trend of 2008. All of the “S.O.S.” ripoffs are some major suckness, and 2 of them were bad enough to make the worst of the year...

20 Tantric “Down And Out”
19 Britney Spears “Womanizer”
18 Katy Perry “Ur So Gay”
17 Beyonce “If I Were A Boy”
16 Mariah Carey “Touch My Body”
15 Flo Rida “In The Ayer”
14 Madonna “Give It 2 Me”
13 Pussycat Dolls “I Hate This Part”
12 George Lamond “Don’t Stop Believing”
11 Miley Cyrus “7 Things”
10 Hinder “Use Me”
09 Jonas Brothers “When You Look Me In The Eyes”
08 Kenny Chesney “Shiftwork”
07 Hilary Duff “Reach Out”
06 Colbie Caillat “Bubbly”
05 Gavin Rossdale “Love Remains The Same”
04 Pink “So What”
03 Pussycat Dolls “When I Grow Up”
02 Kevin Rudolf “Let It Rock”
01 Kid Rock “All Summer Long”

Albums From 2008 That Were Nice
20 Liam Finn I’ll Be Lightning
19 Rivers Cuomo Alone 2
18 Vampire Weekend Vampire Weekend
17 TV On The Radio Dear Science
16 Ne-Yo Year Of The Gentleman
15 Lil Wayne Tha Carter III
14 Kings Of Leon Only By The Night
13 Sigur Ros Med Sud I Eyrum Vid Spilum Endalaust
12 Tobacco Fucked Up Friends
11 Deerhoof Offend Maggie

10 Bon Iver For Emma, Forever Ago
09 Hot Chip Made In The Dark
08 The Ravonettes Lust Lust Lust
07 Of Montreal Skeletal Lamping


06 The Sword Gods Of The Earth


05 Jay Reatard Matador Singles ‘08


04 Blitzen Trapper Furr


03 Wolf Parade At Mount Zoomer


02 Cut Copy In Ghost Colours


01 No Age Nouns
2008’s Greatest Hits
Most of the best music from 2008 were found on albums. It was an exceptionally weak year for singles, and digging through albums was necessary to find the best songs. Seeing as how it was a weak year for singles, obviously b-sides suffered. The best b-sides I heard this year (that weren't by Jay Reatard) were 2 covers from Vampire Weekend.. I'm not sure which singles they're from, but they do a really nice version of Fleetwood Mac's "Everywhere" and a strange and creepy version of Radiohead's "Exit Music (From A Film)." For anyone who cares, here's some recommended download searches...

60 Vampire Weekend, "Mansard Roof"
59 Of Montreal, "Id Engager"
58 No Age, "Things I Did When I Was Dead"
57 Wolf Parade, "Language City"
56 Fleet Foxes, "White Winter Hymnal"
55 Black Kids, "Listen To Your Body Tonight"
54 Cut Copy, "Out There On The Ice"
53 The Sword, "To Take The Black"
52 No Age, "Brain Burner"
51 No Age, "Here Should Be My Home"

50 Wolf Parade, "Call It A Ritual"
49 No Age, "Eraser"
48 Beach House, "Gila"
47 MGMT, "Electric Feel"
46 Lil Wayne, "Shoot Me Down"
45 Blitzen Trapper, "Not Your Lover"
44 Cut Copy, "Lights And Music"
43 The Killers, "Spaceman"
42 The Veronicas, "Untouched"
41 The Ravonettes, "You Want The Candy"

40 Jay Reatard, "See Saw"
39 Blitzen Trapper, "Saturday Nite"
38 Bon Iver, "For Emma"
37 Jordin Sparks & Chris Brown, "No Air"
36 Neon Neon, "I Lust U"
35 MGMT, "Kids"
34 Blitzen Trapper, "Furr"
33 Sigur Ros, "Gobbledigook"
32 Blitzen Trapper, "Sleepy Time In The Western World"
31 Cut Copy, "Nobody Lost, Nobody Found"

30 Chris Brown, "With You"
29 Animal Collective, "Water Curses"
28 The Ravonettes, "Aly, Walk With Me"
27 Deerhoof, "Chandelier Searchlight"
26 TV On The Radio, "DLZ"
25 Lil Wayne, "Dr. Carter"
24 Hot Chip, "Wrestlers"
23 Cut Copy, "Far Away"
22 Wolf Parade, "The Grey Estates"
21 Death Cab For Cutie, "Cath..."

20 Blitzen Trapper, "God And Suicide"
19 Kings Of Leon, "Use Somebody"
18 Panic At The Disco, "That Green Gentleman"
17 Alphabeat, "Fascination"
16 The Mars Volta, "Goliath"
15 Blitzen Trapper, "Black River Killer"
14 Cut Copy, "So Haunted"
13 Estelle, "American Boy"
12 No Age, "Ripped Knees"
11 Vampire Weekend, "Oxford Comma"

10 Death Cab For Cutie, "I Will Possess Your Heart"
09 Ne-Yo, "Miss Independent"
08 No Age, "Sleeper Hold"
07 Black Moth Super Rainbow, "Zodiac Girls"
06 Holy Ghost!, "Hold On"
05 Silversun Pickups, "Little Lover’s So Polite"
04 Wolf Parade, "Soldier's Grin"
03 Vampire Weekend, "A-Punk"
02 Hot Chip, "We're Looking For A Lot Of Love"
01 No Age, "Teen Creeps"


...Bubbling Under...
Autolux, "Audience No. 2"
Cut Off Your Hands, "Still Fond"
Dilla Ghost Doom, "Super Elite / Murder Goons"
Gnarls Barkley, "Who's Gonna Save My Soul"
Kanye West, "Flashing Lights"
Liam Finn, "Second Chance"
M83, "Kim & Jessie"
Nick Cave, "Dig Lazarus Dig"
Oasis, "The Shock Of The Lightning"
Om, "Gebel Bareel"
Portishead, "The Rip"
T.I., "No Matter What"
The Cool Kids, "Black Mags"
The Sound Of Animals Fighting, "The Heraldic Beak of the Manufacturer's Medallion"
Tobacco, "Side 8 (Big Gums Version)"

January 7, 2009

2009: Animal Collective

I thoroughly enjoyed Sung Tongs. Feels was okay, and Strawberry Jam was confusingly brilliant. A few months ago, A.C.'s Water Curses E.P. from Summer 2008 impressed me like nothing I ever expected. It might be their best release so far. ... The thing about Animal Collective is that a handful of their songs are instantly brilliant, while the majority of them are slow growers, best appreciated upon their 10th or 11th listen. I believe this was the case with Strawberry Jam, which I didn't immediately appreciate, and now I kind of love.

And now it's January 2009. In 6 days, the new A.C. will be officially unleashed, and all I've been reading about is how stunning this new record is.. which I have yet to hear. Pitchfork has already reviewed it with a higher rating than anything they reviewed during 2008. My radio associates have already been naming this as 2009's "Album Of The Year," which is odd considering the first week of 2009 hasn't finished just yet.

I may be incredibly lame for this, but here are the passages from the Pitchfork review that most grabbed my attention: "Animal Collective's pop album..." "a more classic pop structure, with clear bridges and snappy choruses, greater harmonic development..." "What they've constructed here is a new kind of electronic pop..." The word "pop" appears in the review 6 or 7 times. And since this is in reference to a band as experimental as Animal Collective, I've suddenly become quite pumped for this.

Due to my understanding that the many of the songs on Merriweather Post Pavilion fade into each other between track seperations, I'm considering making this my first real CD purchase in a very long time. (Chinese Democracy was a novelty and does not count.)

2009: MF Doom
I have no huge predictions for this year, but what I would love to hear is brilliant new solo album from MF Doom, the only rapper who has collaborated with both Ghostface Killah and Meatwad. New shit from Doom, or any of his various pseudonyms. This is something the world truly needs right now. He's been quiet for the past few years, but I'd like to think this is because he's been locked in a recording studio somewhere, piecing together a masterpiece that may go down in history as the OK Computer of hiphop. I'm imagining it as sounding progressively complex, and yet surprisingly accessible... a record which may blur the lines between mainstream and underground far beyond anything Kanye West was ever able to accomplish. If anyone can pull this off, it's Doom. I realize that making such enormously huge predictions will likely result in an inevitable let down, but I feel the time is right for something of this magnitude. Hiphop's recent slump needs a decent kick in the ass. MF Doom, where are you? Come back soon.

List-O-Mania 2008
Sometime this week I'll be posting List-O-Mania 2008, which will be the last thing ever posted on this geocities page. Sometime soon after this, the $50 I spent on webspace at GoDaddy will hopefully be utilized to its fullest, and I will no longer have to live with geocities embarrassments.

Filler Fun
I'm writing now to fill in the space so that the MF Doom picture looks a little more normal.

So yeah.. whats goin on? um... Oh yeah, right now I'm sort of mildly obsessed with Colin's Bear Animation, which I will post the link to right now.. www.youtube.com/watch?v=FiARsQSlzDc .. And I can't find the link to it, but the giraffe animation tribute is probably just as good.

January 4, 2009

"Was It A Good Day?" Flow Chart
I wanted to post the whole thing but it's too big.

December 28, 2008

MTV Announces 16 New Reality Shows Will Premiere In 2009
From Rolling Stone:

MTV has heard your calls to put the Music back into Music Television, and it now has your answer: 16 new reality shows that have nothing to do with music. With the death of TRL, FNMTV remains the last vestige of original music programming on the station. The new crop of non-music shows shifts into a category MTV lovingly calls “aspirational, enterprising and empowering.” For instance: a student-shot series filmed at the University of Wisconsin called College Life, a daredevil program called Nitro Circus, the Donald Trump-produced Charm School-esque Girls of Hedsor Hall and a show about the founders of Collegehumor.com, ingeniously titled The College Humor Show... ... Everyone from Justin Timberlake to Kanye West have made public pleas for MTV to return to their music video ways, but the recent schedule announcements show those cries have landed on deaf ears. Should MTV even be allowed to put on the Video Music Awards anymore? It seems kind of superfluous, like if ESPN handed out Academy Awards.More

I have no problem with this as long as MTV changes the name of their channel and some kind of music-video based TV network launches sometime soon.. because this is seriously at the point of surpassing ridiculousness, right up to redonkulous levels of absurdity. In addition, it should be noted that the channels MTV Hits, MTV Jamz, MTV-U and VH1 Classic are NOT satisfactory music entertainment. There has not been one single instance over the past year when I can honestly recall flipping through all the MTV's and VH1's (which I always do when I'm bored and watching TV, out of hopes that possibly something of interest will actually be shown for once) and seeing something music related and awesome that catches my attention. MTV Hits is always showing videos by Jessica Simpson or some chick who might as well be Jessica Simpson. MTV Jamz is always showing slow motion chicks in booty shorts, which is nice, up until about 15 minutes later when the boner goes down. VH1 Classic is always showing AC/DC or Heart concerts.. ones performed over the last 5 years, and not while these bands were at their peak in popularity. MTV-U is always showing the same overproduced music video with CGI effects, and it's usually by the same boring rock bands with the same whiny vocalist emo-screaming over the same four chords over and over again.

MTV2 was supposed to be "24 more hours of music," but now as we all know, it's essentially a clone of MTV, although I think they still show stuff like Subterranean and Headbangers Ball late at night, which is better than nothing. Watching videos via On Demand services and YouTube is also nice, but not everybody prefers this. Sometimes it's nice to just watch TV worry-free. Sometimes you want to switch to a music channel and see something you like and not have to shout out the word "finally!" If record labels want MTV to expose their bands better, why don't they start advertising on MTV?

It just doesn't make sense that fans of something so general.. music, the one universal thing everyone in the world understands.. can't be given a single devoted channel. And meanwhile sports fans get to watch Sports Center every day; Obama fans get to watch CNN everyday; food fans get to watch that bitch Paula every single day; money fans get to watch Kramer everyday; people who are obsessed with their pets get to watch the fucking Dog Whisperer every fucking day; and get this.. people obsessed with landscaping and constantly remodelling their fucking homes have an entire channel just for them. And music fans get bullshit. Because apparently we deserve frustration. Viacom must die.

December 13, 2008

SPIN Year-End Predictions Yet Again Another Massive Failure, I Quit
I'm always upset for one reason or another about SPIN's choices for singles of the year. SPIN was what I read in high school, and I still think one day they may go back to their old ways of ass kicking, but unfortunately what ended up happening was that it kept getting worse and content kept getting smaller, and eventually their entire staff was fired in 2006 and they started putting Beyonce on the cover. (However, their hardon for Courtney Love has not yet gone flacid.) Over the past few years, I decided that their choices for albums and singles of the year are consistantly predictable.

So anyway, predictions were made here, once again, a few weeks ago. What I hadn't counted on was the possibility that they would follow in the pattern of BLENDER and ROLLING STONE and change their "singles of the year" into "SONGS of the year" (lame) which made the results, once again, incredibly off.. Here's the full list.

  • #1 M.I.A. "Paper Planes" - #1 was guessed correctly for the first time ever. This should count for something. (P.S. It's still a great song, despite the overkill of airplay it recieved. It will not be appearing on the official Taste My Kids "2008's Greatest Hits" list, since it came in at #24 last year.)
  • #2 MGMT "Kids" - Did not realise they would include 2 songs from this band. My bad, guys.
  • #3 Lil Wayne "A Milli" - Close call.. thought it would be #2. It really would have made my day to have accurately predicted the top 2, but it wasn't meant to be.
  • #4 MGMT "Time To Pretend" - Predicted at #6.
  • #9 Black Kids "I'm Not Gonna Teach Your Boyfriend How To Dance With You" - Predicted at #11. This song is ok, but it will sound incredibly dated in 5 years, since this is how every fashionably ubiquitous college indie scene song from 2008 sounded.
  • #19 Hercules & Love Affair "Blind" - Predicted at #16. Terrible song. No seriously, I fucking hate this song. Shitty faux-Morrissey vocals 4 life.


    • ..a bit shocked at the exclusion of Fleet Foxes "White Winter Hymnal," which seemed like an absolute shoe-in. (Pitchfork's readers chose it as the #1 song of 2008.) Equally shocking was the exclusion of Estelle's "American Boy" (Pop Matters choice for "song of the year") as well as T.I.'s "Whatever You Like," which pretty much everyone loves, despite that it's incredibly lame.

    SPIN decided to put a self-titled song by Titus Andronicus at #20, which I'm assuming is a shitty song since I saw this band open for No Age about a month ago and thought they were incredibly boring. On the other hand, congratulations to showing love for Alphabeat's "Fascination."

    November 25, 2008

    Wow!

    Wow.

    Chinese Democracy
    In case anyone was wondering, today's unveiling of Lil' Wayne's forthcoming mixtape cover-art is FAR more interesting than the fact that Guns N' Roses' first new album in 14 years is being released today. And yes, I will be attempting to purchase this new G'N'F'N'R record at some point in the next 2 hours, assuming that my local Best Buy isn't already sold out of them. And then I'm going to listen to it while drinking beer, laugh, drink more beer, and never listen to it again. It should be a blast.

    November 20, 2008

    blurbs..
    Holy crap, dude... I'm fairly positive that Across The Universe is the key reason why The Beatles refuse to license their songs for films/commercials/videogames/etc. For those who aren't aware, musicals are the fucking worst.. I'll always have soft spots for Billy Joel and ABBA, but musicals are allowed to be made out of their music, because neither of them are The Beatles.. not even close.. Despite their inherent cutesiness, The Beatles were badass.. and they deserved way better than this. Lennon would not have approved.. (or at least he wouldn't have in 1980. Were he around today, there's a damn good chance he would have been a guest-judge on American Idol by now.)

    Speaking of shitty musicals, I know it was supposed to be the whole point of the episode, but Stan, Kyle, Cartman and Kenny have truly let me down as of one week ago.. I was SO happy that they hated High School Musical, and then my spirit was indefinitely crushed upon their giving in to the immense peer pressure.. I was literally yelling at my desktop "Don't do it! Don't give in!" But of course, peer pressure wins again.. which seems to be an underlining theme of the current season. (Yeah, in case you didn't know, South Park is STILL the best and most important show on television. I speak the truth.)

    November 19, 2008

    SPIN Singles Of The Year Predictions
    I can feel it.. this is the year I'm gonna nail it.. without further delay, SPIN's 20 singles of the year will be the following...

    01 M.I.A. "Paper Planes"
    02 Lil Wayne "A Milli"
    03 Vampire Weekend "A-Punk"
    04 Portishead "The Rip"
    05 M83 "Kim & Jessie"
    06 MGMT "Time To Pretend"
    07 T.I. "Whatever You Like"
    08 Cut Copy "Hearts On Fire"
    09 Estelle "American Boy"
    10 Death Cab For Cutie "I Will Possess Your Heart"
    11 Black Kids "I’m Not Going To Teach Your Boyfriend How To Dance With You"
    12 Jay Reatard "See Saw"
    13 Erykah Badu "The Healer"
    14 The Juan Maclean "Happy House"
    15 Fleet Foxes "White Winter Hymnal"
    16 Hercules & The Love Affair "Blind"
    17 Los Campesinos "You! Me! Dancing!"
    18 Lil Wayne "Lollipop"
    19 Oasis "The Shock Of The Lightning"
    20 Katy Perry "I Kissed A Girl"

    (Note 11/25/08: I pretty much can't back down from this, but upon a second glance, there probably should be 1 or 2 more hiphop tracks.. probably something along the lines of "I'm So High" by Grind Mode, a song which was not remotely popular, and isn't even that good, but somehow I could see them throwing this in there.. Also I'm fully aware that "Paper Planes," "Hearts On Fire" and "You! Me! Dancing!" were all technically 2007, but one thing I've noticed SPIN doing for the past few years is including singles that were released late the year before which ended up gaining popularity in the following year. Also the MGMT choice is pretty much a crapshoot, as "Kids" and "Electric Feel" are just as likely to appear as "Time To Pretend," although I have noticed that SPIN has a tendancy to choose debut singles. Lil' Wayne will appear twice as predicted above, although one of the two picks is probably going to be a song he was featured in.. so it's possible that "Can't Believe It," "Swagga Like Us," or "My Life" may end up replacing "Lollipop," so I guess I fucked that one up. Yeah anyway...)

    November 14, 2008

    VH1 Classic Rarely Shows Anything Remotely "Classic"
    If you leave on VH1 Classic for 1 hour, the odds are 2/3 that you will, at some point, see Eric Clapton performing as a sober 58-year-old aging musician. Eric Clapton is probably the single artist that recieves more airtime on this channel than anyone else, and yet they always prefer showing him performing in the 00's instead of in the 60's. In fact, the odds are significantly lower .. probably close to 1 in 40 .. that you will see any footage of Eric Clapton in 1968 as a member of Cream, strung out on heroin with acid-tinged backlighting illiminating the stage and the spirit of "classic" music actually being represented accurately.

    This is the major flaw of VH1 Classic: They never dig for ANYTHING. Somehow they're under the impression that viewers prefer older, sober, aging rockstars, and would rather not see bands when they were in their prime, kicking ass, young, good-looking, drunk, far more energetic and interesting, and more than likely on some form of narcotic.

    Rule #1: "Strung out rock bands are ALWAYS more interesting than sober rock bands." If you must insist on playing hour-long concert specials, at LEAST try and find clips from a concert that actually goes along with the title of your channel...

  • Bruce Springsteen performing "Rosalita" at Rock In Rio 2004 = NOT classic.
  • "White Room" performed by Cream during their 2005 reunion concert in London = NOT classic.
  • Any reunion performance by The Who post-1983 = NOT classic.
  • Sting performing a jazz version of "Roxanne" on VH1 Storytellers in 1999 = Never show this shit on TV again.

    • I have yet to see Queen performing at Wembley on VH1 Classic, or any Queen video for that matter.. And yet I'm sure they would prefer to merely show the Wayne's World version of "Bohemian Rhapsody" if this was somehow requested.. And why do they have to insist on sticking to classic rock anyway? Where's Fugazi playing at the March on Washington in 1988? Where's Public Image Limited performing "Poptones" on American Bandstand? Where's Fear on Saturday Night Live? Where's GG Allin doing ANYTHING? ... I'm not sure where I'm going with this, so this is probably a good time to stop.

    November 9, 2008

    NEW LAME TREND: "Fuck" Bands
    Fuck The Facts, Fuck Buttons, Fucked Up, Holy Fuck, Starfucker... etc etc etc

    I have no idea what any of these bands sounds like* but just let it be known that I am immediately biased against all of them for trying way too hard to live up to some kind of anti-establishment/we'll-never-sell-out type of bullshit, just because they decided to throw the word "fuck" into their band name.. It's not edgy, and it's not dangerous. Quite the opposite, in fact.. and further proof that there's a deficit of originality going on in rock music right now..

    If I'm not mistaken, there's a band on Matador Records who emerged earlier in this decade called Fuck. Once again, I don't recall what they sound like (I'm remembering it as sounding like Pavement), but in terms of band names, this is really the only Fuck-band-name that doesn't make me cringe. They kept it simple, and weren't latching onto a lame fucking trend to try and appear scene-worthy. Fuck the Fuck bands, I say.

    *except for Fuck Buttons which was actually kind of interesting.. and I heard a small bit of Fucked Up a few weeks ago, which sounded like some good awesome hard rockin stuff.. I really just think the band names are horribly lame, and make them seem to be trying way too hard.

    November 6, 2008

    My Favorite Onion Article
    This was on digg a few weeks ago..
    900-Pound Giant Squid Joins Cast Of 'The View'

    November 5, 2008

    Oh, Fun
    Obama.

    "Vomit" Completed
    I quickly went through and completed the "vomit" list from a few weeks ago, in case anyone's interested in some of the more recent vomit.

    October 29, 2008

    MTV Uploads 16,000 Free Music Videos, Competing With YouTube
    Holy christ, it's about fucking time..

    MTV/Viacom went ahead and made their first smart decision since at least 7 years ago, back when this website originally should have been launched. It's still in the early stages.. For example, "From Your Mouth" by God Lives Underwater is nowhere to be found.. but within a few months, they're supposed to host every video that's ever aired on MTV, or at least that's what they're claiming. And it would be great if they would get some "channels" up in this, like what Pandora has, except for videos..

    Also...

    What do you notice about this image?

    October 12, 2008

    Vomit
    Due to circumstances which I cannot thoroughly divulge in this most public of forums, I've recently been handed a decent amount of time to browse rateyourmusic.com, and over the past few weeks I've become bored enough to actually start rating single-releases, which has turned out to be one of the most addicting time-killers I've discovered in the past year or so. (It's not a particularly great source for amateur record reviews.. Amazon.com is actually way better.) This has helped me to learn a lot about myself, particularly something I never truly considered before, which would be radio singles that I consider to be truly vomit... or the absolute worst shit that record companies have ever attempted to pass off as "music."

    A few years ago, Taste My Kids posted a list of the 100 worst radio singles ever, and at this point, I'd like to throw out that list and start over again. So this is the REAL shit here.. This is the vomit. While I have 30 minutes to spend outdoors on a lovely afternoon with nothing to do but browse youtube, I decided instead to let anyone reading this know the truth about vomit.. So here's the worst single radio release from every year since I've been alive, as far as I can currently decipher from memory...

    1980
    The J. Geils Band "Love Stinks"

    1981
    Joey Scarbury "The Greatest American Hero Theme (Believe It or Not)"
    Runner-up: The J. Geils Band "Centerfold"

    1982
    Bertie Higgins "Key Largo"
    Runner-up: The J. Geils Band "Freeze Frame"

    1983
    As far as I can tell, there was no true "vomit" on the radio during 1983, but if someone pointed a gun to my head and forced me to choose, I would say a 3-way tie between Donna Summer's "She Works Hard For The Money," Journey's "Faithfully," and George Thorogood's "I Drink Alone.." although once again, none of those are truly vomit.. they're just really fucking bad.

    1984
    Sammy Hagar "I Can't Drive 55"
    Runner-up: Twisted Sister "I Wanna Rock"

    1985
    David Lee Roth "Just A Gigalo/I Ain't Got Nobody"
    Runner-up: Mick Jagger & David Bowie "Dancing In The Street"
    2nd Runner-up: Miami Sound Machine "Bad Boy"

    1986
    Van Halen "Dreams"
    Runner-up: El Debarge "Who's Johnny"
    2nd Runner-up: Peter Cetera "Glory Of Love"

    1987
    Buster Poindexter "Hot Hot Hot"
    Runners-up: Starship "Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now," Bill Medley & Jennifer Warnes "(I've Had) The Time Of My Life," Michael Bolton "That's What Love Is All About"

    1988
    (tie) Eric Carmen "Make Me Lose Control" & Taylor Dayne "I'll Always Love You"
    Runners-up: Gloria Estefan "1-2-3" & Whitney Houston "Where Do Broken Hearts Go"

    1989
    (4-way tie) Calloway "I Wanna Be Rich," Eric Clapton "Pretending," Rod Stewart "This Old Heart of Mine," Linda Ronstadt & Aaron Neville "Don't Know Much"

    1990
    (3-way tie) Paula Abdul & MC Skat Kat "Opposites Attract," Wilson Phillips "Hold On," Cher "The Shoop Shoop Song (It's in His Kiss)"

    1991
    (3-way tie) Paula Abdul "Vibeology," Joe Walsh "Ordinary Average Guy," M.C. Hammer "Addams Groove"
    Runners-up: Genesis "I Can't Dance" & Rod Stewart "Rhythm of My Heart"

    1992
    Dan Baird "I Love You Period"
    Runner-up: Michael Bolton & Kenny G "Missing You Now"

    1993
    Michael Bolton "Reach Out I'll Be There"
    Runner-up: Salt-n-Pepa "Shoop"
    2nd Runner-up: Meat Loaf "I'd Do Anything for Love (But I Won't Do That)"

    1994 (Probably my favorite music year ever, and coincidentally a remarkable year for vomit)
    (4-way tie) Joshua Kadison "Jessie," Melissa Etheridge "Come to My Window," Bryan Adams, Rod Stewart & Sting "All For Love," 20 Fingers "Short Dick Man"
    Runner-up: The Eagles "Get Over It"

    1995
    Annie Lennox "No More I Love You's
    Runners-up: Backstreet Boys "We've Got It Goin' On"

    1996
    Alanis Morissette "All I Really Want"
    Runners-up: Mr. President "Coco Jamboo" & Deep Blue Something "Breakfast at Tiffany's"
    2nd runner-up: Bryan Adams "The Only Thing That Looks Good on Me is You" & Céline Dion "It's All Coming Back to Me Now"

    1997
    Barbra Streisand & Céline Dion "Tell Him"
    Runner-up: Paula Cole "I Don't Want to Wait"

    1998
    (tie) Shawn Mullins "Lullaby" & Phil Collins "True Colors"
    Runner-up: Céline Dion "My Heart Will Go On"

    1999 (wow.. I don't even feel like sorting this one out..)
    Shania Twain "That Don't Impress Me Much"
    Shania Twain "Man! I Feel Like a Woman!"
    Sheryl Crow "Sweet Child O' Mine"
    Smash Mouth "All Star"
    The Offspring "Why Don't You Get a Job?"
    Lou Bega "Mambo No. 5 (A Little Bit of ...)"
    Phil Collins "You'll Be in My Heart"
    Lenny Kravitz "American Woman"

    2000
    Kid Rock "American Bad Ass"
    Runners-up: 98 Degrees "Give Me Just One Night (Una Noche)" & Madonna "American Pie"

    2001
    Jennifer López "Play"
    Runners-up: Jennifer López "Love Don't Cost a Thing" & Uncle Kracker "Follow Me"

    2002
    Phil Collins "Can't Stop Loving You"
    Runners-up: Uncle Kracker "Drift Away" & Jennifer Lopez "Jenny From The Block"

    2003
    Black Eyed Peas "Shut Up"

    2004
    Britney Spears "My Prerogative" & Korn "Another Brick In The Wall"
    Runners-up: Counting Crows "Accidentally In Love" & Gretchen Wilson "Redneck Woman"

    2005
    Black Eyed Peas "My Humps" & Eminem "Ass Like That"
    Runners-up: James Blunt "You're Beautiful," The Pussycat Dolls "Don't Cha" & Akon "Lonely"

    2006
    Nickelback "Rockstar"
    Runners-up: Hinder "Lips Of An Angel" & Fergie "Fergalicious"

    2007
    Shop Boyz "Party Like A Rock Star"
    Runner-up: Fergie "Glamorous"

    2008
    Kid Rock "All Summer Long" & Kevin Rudolf "Let It Rock"
    Runners-up: Pussycat Dolls "When I Grow Up" & Gavin Rossdale "Love Remains The Same"

    September 29, 2008

    The Real Deal With "Chinese Democracy"
    I'm going to assume that Guns N' Roses is releasing an album of new material sometime during 2008. I'm basing this assumption off of two specific items... #1 There is a new song from Guns N' Roses in Rock Band 2. And #2 There's all these news/digg/pitchfork items talking about how Best Buy is going to be the only store selling this album upon its release date.

    So I've decided that I do have a seriously bold prediction about this album... I don't want it to be true, because I enjoy pretty much all of GNR's singles from the late-80's and early-90's, except for the covers.

    My prediction is simply this: Chinese Democracy will be incredibly offensively awful. I think it might be worse than any album Creed or Limp Bizkit has ever released. And I'm being completely serious about this. I don't think it will contain even 1 song that is worthy of receiving a higher score than 3 out of 10. If you took every horrible song from the last four Weezer albums and put them all onto one mix, it will still be preferable than a single listen through the whole of Chinese Democracy.

    Yeah, it's gonna be THAT bad, people. Get ready.

    September 24, 2008

    A Damn Good Review Of "I Kissed A Girl"
    http://thestranger.com/seattle/Content?oid=675052&mode=print

    August 29, 2008

    Hey There
    The plan is that at some point in the future, Taste My Kids will be hosted elsewhere.. somewhere that's not geocities. It won't happen tonight, or probably not over the next month, and probably not before the end of the year.. or maybe it will, who really knows. But the move is part of the plan.. and redesigning is part of the plan. It takes time to even FIND the time to do things like this, since I don't care about this website as much as I used to.. However, I still enjoy wasting 30-45 minutes on writing pointless music lists, which is what I shall do right now.

    And so now, without further delay, my newly updated top 4 albums of every year in backwards order, which I will continue from now until I need to leave or until someone calls me. Let's call this "Speed Lists..."

    Top 4 Of 2008
    04 Lowt Ide "Lowt Ide Does/Did Heroin"
    03 No Age "Nouns"
    02 The Sword "Gods Of The Earth"
    01 Wolf Parade "At Mount Zoomer"

    Top 4 Of 2007
    04 Radiohead "In Rainbows"
    03 Minus The Bear "Planet Of Ice"
    02 Deerhoof "Friend Opportunities"
    01 Beirut "The Flying Club Cup"

    Top 4 Of 2006
    04 Clipse "Hell Hath No Fury"
    03 C.S.S. "Cansai De Ser Sexy"
    02 Silversun Pickups "Carnavas"
    01 TV On The Radio "Return To Cookie Mountain"

    Top 4 Of 2005
    04 Wolf Parade "Apologies To The Queen Mary"
    03 Sufjan Stevens "Illinoise"
    02 Of Montreal "The Sunlandic Twins"
    01 Spoon "Gimme Fiction"

    Top 4 Of 2004
    04 Wilco "A Ghost Is Born"
    03 Pinback "Summer In Abaddon"
    02 Death From Above 1979 "You're A Woman, I'm A Machine"
    01 Madvillian "Madvilliany"

    Top 4 Of 2003
    04 Muse "Absolution"
    03 Ted Leo "Hearts Of Oak"
    02 Outkast "Speakerboxxx/The Love Below"
    01 The Shins "Chutes Too Narrow"

    Top 4 Of 2002
    04 Queens Of The Stone Age "Songs For The Deaf"
    03 Justin Timberlake "Justified"
    02 Interpol "Turn On The Bright Lights"
    01 Wilco "Yankee Hotel Foxtrot"

    Top 4 Of 2001
    04 The Strokes "Is This It"
    03 N*E*R*D "In Search Of..."
    02 The Dismemberment Plan "Change"
    01 Daft Punk "Discovery"

    Top 4 Of 2000 - fuck, this is getting hard
    04 Queens Of The Stone Age "Rated R"
    04 Grandaddy "The Sophtware Slump"
    04 PJ Harvey "Stories From The City, Stories From The Sea"
    03 At.The.Drive.In "Relationship Of Command"
    02 Modest Mouse "The Moon And Antarctica"
    01 Radiohead "Kid A"

    Top 4 Of 1999
    04 The Get Up Kids "Something To Write Home About"
    04 Blur "13"
    03 Fiona Apple "When The Pawn"
    02 Built To Spill "Keep It Like A Secret"
    01 Sigur Ros "�g�tis Byrjun"

    Top 4 Of 1998
    04 Sloan "Navy Blues"
    04 Air "Moon Safari"
    03 Beck "Mutations"
    02 Queens Of The Stone Age "Queens Of The Stone Age"
    01 Neutral Milk Hotel "In The Aeroplane Over The Sea"

    Top 4 Of 1997
    04 Supergrass "In It For The Money"
    04 Modest Mouse "The Lonesome Crowded West"
    04 Belle And Sebastian "If You're Feeling Sinister"
    03 Elliott Smith "Either/Or"
    02 Ween "The Mollusk"
    01 Radiohead "OK Computer"

    July 10, 2008

    In Case You Were Wondering...
    This was the greatest moment in the history of MTV...


    ...although somehow the part got cut out where Thurston Moore hands Beck the phone. Beck picks up the phone and says "Hello?" looking at the phone all confused. He then proceeds to slam the phone onto the ground and the 2 of them start smashing the phone with baseball bats.

    June 27, 2008

    20 Shittiest Singles From 2007
    20 Fergie "Clumsy"
    19 Just Jack "Starz In Their Eyes"
    18 Avril Lavigne "Girlfriend"
    17 Green Day "Working Class Hero"
    16 Fergie "Big Girls Don't Cry"
    15 Gwen Stefani "The Sweet Escape"
    14 Meat Loaf "It's All Coming Back To Me Now"
    13 Sean Kingston "Take You There"
    12 Evanessence "Lithium"
    11 Jordin Sparks "Tattoo"
    10 Plain White T's "Hey There Delilah"
    09 Lady Sovereign "Love Me Or Hate Me"
    08 Lene Alexandre "My Boobs Are OK"
    07 Finger Eleven "Paralyzer"
    06 Wyclef Jean "The Sweetest Girl"
    05 Shop Boyz "Party Like A Rockstar"
    04 Akon "Don't Matter"
    03 Nickelback "Rock Star"
    02 Korn & Evanessence "Freak On A Leash (Unplugged)"
    01 Fergie & Ludacris "Glamorous"

    June 24, 2008

    OMFG
    I was amazed by what I saw at 7-11 earlier today. See for yourself...

    This is probably the most absurd magazine cover in the history of magazine covers. Holy fuck dude.

    June 2, 2008

    ...Bo Diddley RIP...

    May 28, 2008

    Switch
    I went back and made a few small changes to the 2007 lists. I'm not going to say what they were, but they were necessary and due to hastiness.

    May 21, 2008

    2007 List-O-Mania
    I finally own a computer again. Website design will be switched soon.. I figured I should post these lists since it won't make sense to keep them hidden any longer.

    Top 30 Albums Of 2007
    30 Dungen "Ito Bitar"
    29 Kanye West "Graduation"
    28 Blitzen Trapper "Wild Mountain Nation"
    27 !!! "Myth Takes"
    26 Studio "Yearbook 1"
    25 The Tuss "Last Rushup"
    24 The Arcade Fire "Neon Bible"
    23 Panda Bear "Person Pitch"
    22 Modest Mouse "We Were Dead Before The Ship Even Sank"
    21 The Shins "Wincing The Night Away"
    20 Ted Leo And The Pharmacists "Living With The Living"
    19 Pinback "Autumn Of The Seraphs"
    18 Ghostface Killah "The Big Doe Rehab"
    17 Dizzee Rascal "Maths + English"
    16 Peter Bjorn & John "Writer's Block"
    15 The National "Boxer"
    14 Silversun Pickups "Carnavas"
    13 Queens Of The Stone Age "Era Vulgaris"
    12 Rivers Cuomo "Alone"
    11 Radiohead "In Rainbows"
    10 Deerhoof "Friend Opportunity"
    09 Minus The Bear "Planet Of Ice"
    08 Daft Punk "Alive 2007"
    07 Elliott Smith "New Moon"
    06 M.I.A. "Kala"
    05 Dinosaur Jr "Dinosaur Jr"
    04 Kings Of Leon "Because Of The Times"
    03 Spoon "Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga"
    02 Beirut "The Flying Club Cup"
    01 Yo Majesty "Yo! EP"

    Honorable mention: Of Montreal "Hissing Fauna, Are You The Destroyer" (leaked September '06)

    2007 Movies
    12 Rocket Science
    11 The Ten
    10 Grindhouse
    09 The Darjeeling Limited
    08 Eastern Promises
    07 Hot Fuzz
    06 Zodiac
    05 Michael Clayton
    04 No Country For Old Men
    03 Superbad
    02 The King Of Kong
    01 There Will Be Blood

    Also enjoyed..

    Alpha Dog
    Aqua Teen Hunger Force Colon Movie Film For Theaters
    Death Sentence
    Knocked Up
    The Simpsons Movie

    Don't believe the hype...

    American Gangster
    Once
    The Lookout
    Before The Devil Knows You're Dead
    Juno

    The trendiest trends of 2007 (super-annoying version)...
    20 Those girl-shoes that girls wear (those flat heel shoe things)
    19 Daft Punk
    18 Snorting your dad's ashes
    17 Denied U.S. visas (M.I.A., Lily Allen, etc)
    16 Injuring oneself while playing Nintendo Wii
    15 Horror/gore films
    14 Anti-analogue
    13 Pretending to care about the fate of Britney Spears
    12 90's nostalgia (Smokin Aces, GTA: San Andreas, Buzz Ballads, VH1's 100 greatest 90s songs, etc)
    11 iPhones
    10 Rock reunions
    09 Shallow indie-rock-fashion teens
    08 Steroids
    07 Gay children
    06 The crumbling of the U.S. dollar
    05 "Good times!"
    04 [insert artist here] featuring T-Pain
    03 Running for president
    02 Ugs/Boots worn over pants
    01 Public meltdowns

    A few A-Ok trends (for good measure)...

    03 The return of sketch comedy
    02 Indie-rock beards
    01 Free music (yay Radiohead)

    Roffles & Waffles: 2007 Edition
    These are totally subjective and may change at a moment's notice. As far as I can remember, this is when I Roffle'd in 2007...

    10 Hotel sex-binge sequence (from "Walk Hard: The Legend Of Dewey Cox")
    09 Randy Marsh on Wheel Of Fortune (from South Park's Season 12 premiere episode)
    08 Michael Ian Black's "eat shit" bit (from "I Am A Wonderful Man")
    07 Aziz turns spaceman suits into the new big fashion trend (sketch from MTV's "The Human Giant")
    06 "Fuck my life" (from Superbad)
    05 Will Forte falling asleep on a mattress & slipping into nightmares (from Tim & Eric's Awesome Show Great Job)
    04 Office sketch in which Mr Henderson (Tim) sexually harrasses Carol (Eric in drag) (from Tim & Eric's Awesome Show Great Job)
    03 Woodland critters discussing the best way to torture Strawberry Shortcake (from South Park's "Imaginationland" episode part 2, listed on DVD as "Imaginationland Episode 2: The Drying Of The Balls")
    02 Patton Oswalt's KFC Bowls bit (from "Werewolves & Lollipops")
    01 Decapitation sequence (from Hot Fuzz)

    TV Moments Of The Year
    I didn't watch TV in 2007, except for The Human Giant 24-Hour marathon, which was the only thing really worth watching IMO.

    The Guilty Pleasure Singles Of The Year
    I'm kind of ashamed at the amount of dance music that I enjoyed this year, but unfortunately there wasn't a whole lot else to enjoy. For example, disco gems such as Cut Copy's "Hearts On Fire" or Simian Mobile Disco's "I Believe" are now among my favorite dance tracks of the last few years, but I wouldn't be caught dead blasting them out of my car with the same sense of pride that I would with rock songs like "tourette's" or "Gratitude." I just can't pump dance. Not even Aphex Twin. (Honestly, who pumps Aphex Twin? Well, besides Richard D James in the "Windowlicker" video, but that video exists in an alternate reality that we will never know.) I'll stick to pumping Wu-Tang like normal kids, thanks.

    So that's what ended up happening when I couldn't find any cool 2007 rock: Indie-disco-pop briefly took me under its gay wing late this year, and I ended up getting embarrassed in the process. However, little of this subgenre can be found in what I was MOST embarrassed about enjoying this year, most of which can be best described as "ringtone hip-pop"...

    10 Ludacris "Slap" (7.2)
    I personally don't see what's so bad about this song; however, it kind of has that pseudo-wannabe-conscious thing, and it's has bad singing, and it's actually pretty damn stupid overall.. Okay, I guess I do see what's so bad about this song. But I guess what won me over is that it's fun for singing along, and I actually would recommend anyone to try this out for themselves.

    09 The Chemical Brothers f/ Fatlip "The Salmon Dance" (7.1)
    Super stupid fun. Unfortunately, this song is so stupid that some people totally miss out on the fun part and instead decide to focus on the stupid. I did not realise this until enjoying the song in public, when my guilt-factor-censor's alarm went a little haywire. Also, I'm sure this is not what hardcore Chem Bros fans were expecting to hear as Track 7 on their latest LP, so there's a pretty good chance the breakbeat kids were left in the dark with this one as well.

    08 Kanye West "Stronger" (6.8) / Kanye West "The Good Life" (5.7) / Kanye West "Can't Tell Me Nothing" (7.8) / Rhianna "Umbrella" (8.6)
    These were all overhyped by critics.. I enjoy them. Lots of people didn't.

    07 Carrie Underwood "Before He Cheats" (4.5)
    This marks a personal milestone for myself: The last mainstream country song that I can remember not completely hating would probably have been something on Randy Travis's 1986 "Storms Of Life" LP. Every last country song released since then has been worth as much to me as six piles of shit procreating with seven piles of shit and giving birth to little baby shit-piles... including the entire discographies of Shania Twain, Garth Brooks, Leann Rimes, Faith Hill, Big & Rich, Rascal Flatts, Kenny Chesney, Brooks & Dunn, and every other artist who caters toward the proud toothless Klan members of Middle America (and mindless others throughout the rest of the country) who are best exemplified by the "Horse Apples" episode of Wonder Showzen.

    "Before He Cheats" has shit lyrics, but that's no different from everything else on mainstream country radio. What makes this song different probably has something to do with it being super-pop-friendly, along with the vocal performance. Production-wise, it has a lot in common with Avril Lavigne's "Complicated," and for pop listeners, its appeal likely stems from a similar area, even though it's not nearly as great, but it's passable enough to count as a guilty pleasure.

    06 Rhianna & Ne-Yo "Hate That I Love You" (5.2) / Chris Brown "With You" (4.3)
    I give up.

    05 Gym Class Heroes "Cupid's Chokehold" (5.5)
    This placed at #17 in my worst singles of 2006. Somewhere around June of this year, the air was warmer, the leaves were greener, and "Cupid's Chokehold" turned into a summer song. And yes, I became absolutely totally ashamed of myself, and I ended up crying in the shower like that scene from Ace Ventura, only without the burning clothes.

    04 Maroon 5 "Makes Me Wonder" (7.0)
    An unprecidented amount of #1 singles appear in this year's guilty pleasures list. Maroon 5 are noteworthy this year because I assumed their string of radio hits was finished, due to the 3-year period between the final radio smash off their 1st album and the lead single off of their latest record. The listening public tend to forget quickly. However, "Makes Me Wonder" ended up winning back a lot of their audience, because of its catchiness and its energy. They may appeal to the same prep-school audience as U2 or Coldplay or Matchbox 20, but Maroon 5's funk aspects make them more fun and less sleepy.

    03 Fall Out Boy "Thnx Fr Th Mmrs" (7.4) / Fall Out Boy "This Ain't A Scene It's An Arms Race" (6.6)
    Please refer to List-O-Mania 2006 when "Dance Dance" was named guilty pleasure single of the year. There's nothing more I can say about Fall Out Boy that wasn't said there.

    02 Lil' Mama "Lip Gloss" (6.8)
    I give up again.

    01 T-Pain "Buy U A Drank" (6.8) / Soulja Boy "Crank That" (6.1)
    For a 6.8, "Buy U A Drank" is pretty amazing. This record should have recieved some kind of award for outstanding engineering, since the song itself is actually really fucking terrible.. But in the end, it gets pulled out of the ugly quicksand by some seriously shimmering production. Beyond this, I'm lost for a defense. One important thing to note about this song, however, is that the vocal performance is nowhere near its best elements, and so I'm lost as to why T-Pain ended up being feature in 90% of every song on Top 40 radio during the 2nd half of 2007.

    As for Soulja Boy, the intense hatred this song has garnered seems perplexing to me. I don't see what this guy does that's so much worse than Lil Wayne, who was absolutely the most overrated artist of 2007, and probably the most overrated artist overall since 50 Cent. This song is not especially great, but it's not especially bad either... And I defend this song. Yes, you heard it here: Taste My Kids is officially backing up "Crank That (Soulja Boy)" as one of the essential elements of 2007 pop culture, and part of what made this an (albiet blandly) unique year for music.

    My guilty pleasure album of the year is probably M.I.A.'s "Kala," because I don't normally enjoy music like hers, and it makes me a little uncomfortable sometimes.

    April 22, 2008

    Festival Lineup
    I hate festivals. I've been wanting to see many of these bands for so long, and now it seems they're all playing at one festival.. one that costs approx $400 to attend and will only really have very rich people in its attendance.. I'm pretty sure its indoors too, so it's not even a hippie-trash-friendly festival like fucking Bonnaroo. And it's not super trendy, so it's not Paris Hilton-friendly either. So here's the lineup for New York's "All Tomorrow's Parties" festival, of which only about 3000 tickets will be available, apparently..

    My Bloody Valentine, Built to Spill performing Perfect From Now On, Meat Puppets performing Meat Puppets II, Thurston Moore performing Psychic Hearts, Tortoise performing Millions Now Living Will Never Die, Shellac, Mogwai, Polvo, Fuck Buttons, Autolux, The Drones, Low, Wooden Shjips, Edan with Dagha, Thee Silver Mount Zion Orchestra.

    This is absolutely the best festival lineup I've ever seen in my life. And I can't go. I actually don't even want to go because staying indoors with 3000 people for 3 days straight would probably be really strange. Whatever, I only really want to see MBV, Shellac, Mogwai & Autolux, and Built To Spill playing all of Perfect From Now On in its entirely sounds pretty kickass. Meat Puppets would sound great too if they weren't like 60 years old.

    Why is this festival even necessary? I don't get the point of this. Only 3000 tickets? Why can't boring poor me get to see My Bloody Valentine? Blah.

    April 21, 2008

    More B&B
    Funk Dat

    April 14, 2008

    Fer Shizzle, Sketch Comedy Is Not Dead
    A few years ago, it seemed like sketch comedy was dead, or at least dying.. but if 2007 was good for nothing else, it was definitely a progressive year for comedy. Back in December, I wrote up my "10 LOL's of 2007" list that I would have posted if I actually went thru with the entire "best of 2007" feature, which was a bust because I simply ended up not caring about organizing and editing the whole thing, which is really the most frustratingly tedious part of doing the "Best of the year" feature the way I like to do it.

    In David Wain's blog earlier today, he posted a link to nerve.com's new list of the 50 greatest comedy sketches of all time, a highly subjective and debateable list, which I have to say is only truly credible due to their inclusion of several sketches from The State, Chappelle's Show and Upright Citizens Brigade. Had nothing from any of these shows been included, I wouldn't have cared enough to post this link here.

    So here's my beef with SNL, and the sketches which are allegedly their best, according to this list:

  • Celebrity Jeopardy: Everyone, and I mean EVERYONE, has such a immediate reaction to this sketch where they're suddenly like "OMG LOL ANAL BUM COVER SUCK IT TREBEK LOLOLOL." The biggest laugh this sketch gets is always the part where Sean Connery reads "Therapist" incorrectly as "The rapist," which I have never laughed at, because I had heard this joke before SNL stole it from Benny Hill's show from the 1960's, which is why I don't appreciate Celebrity Jeopardy. The manner in which SNL presented it, however, garnered such a huge laugh from people who didn't know any better (which apparently included every living American human being with the exception of myself) that they brought the joke back when the segment recurred, most notably as "an album cover" being misread as "anal bum cover." ... Okay, I'll concede that "suck it Trebek" is actually pretty damn funny.
  • Belushi as the Samaurai Chef guy: Yeah... not a big Belishi fan. I don't get his jokes. And I'm not sure how The Blues Brothers has garnered such a large fanbase.. I honestly can't remember a single funny joke from that movie, or anything Belushi has ever done.
  • Coneheads: This is funny? Seriously? They were smart enough to get Chris Farley for the movie, but besides that, what exactly are the Coneheads?


    • Besides that, I guess I'm cool with most of their SNL choices.. although Will Ferrell's "Crazy Doctor" sketch should have been in the top 10.. And even though they're very recent, the Human Giant sketch with Will Arnett, a few random Stella shorts, and some Jan & Wayne Skylar would have fit in nicely.

    Damn son, almost forgot the link!! : http://www.nerve.com/dispatches/nerveeditors/50greatestcomedysketches/01/

    Also, for those who haven't seen..

  • Human Giant Sex Tape Sketch
  • Stella "Raking Leaves"
  • This is a link to where some Jan & Wayne Skylar used to be found, but it was taken down probably because the Tim & Eric DVD is being released next Tuesday.
  • And here's the script for Will Ferrell's "Crazy Doctor" sketch.

    • April 13, 2008

    Sometimes It Feels Like I'm Beating A Dead Horse
    Chinese Democracy is now officially in the hands of Geffen Records. I still won't believe it till I see it. Also, Wikipedia says that Use Your Illusion was origially planned to be a triple album including at least half of the covers from The Spagetti Incident. At this point, releasing Chinese Democracy as a single-disc release would be ripping off the public.

    Also over at the NME, it states the following: "As previously reported, it is rumoured that a Guns N' Roses reality TV show is set to be broadcast to coincide with the release of the album." Okay, so as of this moment, Guns N' Roses are no longer even sort of cool, but rather they are very gay, or at least as gay as Brett Michaels. And everything GNR has done throughout their career up until about 30 seconds ago was not gay; however, now they are. I no longer care about the new Guns N' Roses album, simply because it will be associated with reality TV. Also, everyone who is reading this right now watches reality shows, except me. This is why everyone except me seriously sucks. However, I also suck because I'm the only loser left posting new content on Geocities. And so in order to avoid future embarrassment, huge changes will be made to this website over the next month. And that is a promise.

    April 1, 2008

    I Have Failed Again
    I was going to try and post the movies, albums, & guilty pleasure singles of the year lists before April 1st, and none of them are close to being ready. Oh well.

    Make A Muxtape Now
    So I just made a muxtape which is this fucking awesome thing where you get to make an online mixtape and share it with people.. However, I failed here also because they give you 12 songs to upload, and I wanted to post all new stuff without repeating artists, and I could only come up with 10 songs, because new music is DEAD. At least I tried.

    Also the default setting for the font size on muxtape is "fucking huge" which makes it even better.

    Mr Jizz
    He somehow gets mentioned here every April 1st. I'm not sure what the deal is with that.

    March 13, 2008

    15 Years Of Buffco & Beaver
    I'm boring, and so I'm going to go on and on about Beavis And Butthead for 8 paragraphs or so. Ignore me. Nothing to see here.

    Over the past few weeks, I ended up viewing all 3 parts of Taint of Greatness: The Journey of Beavis and Butt-Head at least twice. At some point during the 1st part, I noticed March 8th 1993 as the date when MTV premiered the 1st complete episode of Beavis And Butthead. According to Mike Judge, a full season was scheduled to be completed to air by this date, but all they had was this one episode, and so MTV just ended up running the same episode every night at the same time, from Monday until Friday. By the episode's 5th airing on that Friday, the show's ratings had grown to the point where it far surpassed MTV's expectations, and thus began what was perhaps the greatest dumb-comedy TV series that ever happened.

    I believe the 5-year stretch that encapsulated Beavis's heyday to be The Golden Age of MTV. During this time, music videos were getting much better in quality due to the efforts of directors such as Mark Romanek and Spike Jonze, and MTV actually played these videos during prime time. 6-minute commercial breaks were not yet commonplace on any cable channel. There was also an innovative streak of TV series that included B&B along with Liquid Television, The Maxx, Buzzkill, The State, and the first few seasons of The Real World. (To be fair, MTV also aired a decent amount of shit series during this time, but seriously, how else were they going to make money?)

    Due to Mike Judge's perfectionism and Viacom's incessant overprotection of their vaults, we may never see a complete DVD collection of Beavis And Butthead during our lifetime, which is just damn sad. Simply for the sake of historical merit, every episode in its entirety, including music videos, should AT LEAST become available for internet downloads.

    For example, there's the episode that included this disclaimer...

    I recall being amazed watching this as a 13-year-old, as they hung Stewart from the wall by his underwear creating a massive wedgie, before throwing a plugged-in egg beater and a cactus down his shorts, followed by inhaling stove gas in Stewart's kitchen while igniting a lighter, which ended up blowing up Stewart's house. It wasn't until reviewing this episode just recently when I realized how amazing it was that MTV actually had the guts to air this, considering they had been censoring words such as "45" (Santeria) and "suicide" (Last Resort) out of their videos.

    There were 2 instances in which MTV aired a large collection of episodes that were never shown again on TV in any form, and were not included on any DVD collections. The 1st of these was during the fall of 1997 during a celebration of sorts that lasted over a month, in which MTV aired almost every episode of the show in chronological order, leading up to Thanksgiving weekend 1997, in which Beavis And Butthead Are Dead was shown for the 1st and only time. (I have yet to meet anyone who has any idea what kind of commentary they gave to Fiona Apple's "Criminal" video.. again, only aired once.) Then in early 1999, MTV took a week or 2 to air what was dubbed as "Beavis And Butthead's Most Dangerous Episodes," or something along those lines, in which all of the most controversial and censored episodes were shown one last time in their entirety (except for the episodes where cuts were made permanently). At the time, I took the brilliance of MTV for granted, and I didn't bother taping any of these episodes. I think a lot of us felt the same way at the time, and unfortunately, most of these are perhaps lost forever.

    This is currently the only youtube clip that has a full 10-minute episode including videos, the way the show was meant to be seen. It will more than likely get deleted from youtube by Viacom at some point over the next 2 weeks. Seeing a DVD collection that includes episodes with this exact format is really the only way to ever get me excited about Beavis And Butthead on DVD ever again. The Mike Judge Collection isn't bad, but it's just not the same. Maybe at some time in our lives Viacom will stop acting like a bunch of dumbasses and allow us to watch these online in their original format.

    My final point kind of sucks, but I'll throw it out there anyway, just out of boredom. Unless you absolutley have nothing else to do, just stop reading or come back to this later or something. Yeah anyway.. So it's like, I've heard a lot of people say "I've seen every episode of Beavis And Butthead" with confidence, but I believe this to be an impossibility unless they are some kind of hardcore Mike Judge fan who has acquired VHS copies of every episode off of eBay or something. Like I said before, has anyone actually seen B&B watching Fiona Apple's "Criminal" video? Apparently this did get aired at one point, and it's probably the only video from 1997 or later that they commented on. There's also episodes such as "Car Wash" or the one where they try stand-up comedy.. or the one where they drop a bowling ball off a bridge onto the freeway.. which were only aired once in the fall of 1993 and then were quickly pulled from the airwaves forever after some 5-year-old kid allegedly burned down his parents' RV while chanting "Fire, fire.." Or there's also the one where Mr. Van Dreisen gets run over by a monster truck, which was the 1st time I personally ever experienced Beavis and Butthead. I never saw this episode ever again. It's reasons such as these that should make it clear to Mike Judge and Viacom that these are the episodes that the fans want the most... the shitty earlier episodes. Even though Mike Judge thinks they're awful, they do have charm and humor within them. Making a third of the episodes unavailable for consumption forever was poor judgement, and perhaps at some point down the line, Mike and Viacom may reconsider releasing a complete collection. Okay, I'm done.

    March 12, 2008

    2007 LOL
    At the end of the past few years, my "songs of the year" list usually helps me to look back on the year's music with some aura of fondness or nostalgia. But this year, it did not help at all. IMO, there were no huge records, or huge singles. There were some very good album tracks, and kickass singles, but I needed something HUGE, and I never found it. Anyway, this one list is finally sorta "fresh n ready" looking, so here it is. It's not glorious, but it's the best I could do with the limited amount of material I was given.

    2007�s Greatest Hits
    101 Flo Rida �Low�
    100 Ludacris �Slap�
    99 M.I.A. �Mango Pickle Down River�
    98 Pinback �Barnes�
    97 The National �Ada�
    96 The White Stripes �Icky Thump�
    95 Ghostface Killah �Toney Sigel a.k.a. The Barrel Brothers�
    94 The Shins �Phantom Limb�
    93 Rob Crow �I Hate You Rob Crow (single version)�
    92 Two Gallants �Seems Like Home To Me�
    91 Jarvis Cocker �Fat Children�
    90 Malcolm Middleton �We�re All Going To Die�
    89 The White Stripes �Bone Broke�
    88 Queens Of The Stone Age �Misfit Love�
    87 The Shins �Turn On Me�
    86 The Arcade Fire �Keep The Car Running�
    85 Dinosaur Jr �Almost Ready�
    84 !!! �Heart Of Hearts�
    83 Dungen �Mon Amour�
    82 Kanye West �Good Life�
    81 Queens Of The Stone Age �Make It Wit Chu�

    80 Blitzen Trapper �Wild Mountain Nation�
    79 M.I.A. �Jimmy�
    78 Kanye West �Stronger�
    77 Silversun Pickups �Checkered Floor�
    76 Justice �DVNO�
    75 Spoon �Don�t Make Me A Target�
    74 Dinosaur Jr. �It�s Me�
    73 The White Stripes �You Don�t Know What Love Is�
    72 Yeasayer �Sunrise�
    71 Burial �Archangel�
    70 Dinosaur Jr. �Been There All The Time�
    69 Lil Mama �Lip Gloss�
    68 Queens Of The Stone Age �Into The Hollow�
    67 Caribou �Melody Day�
    66 Peter Bjorn & John �Objects Of My Affection�
    65 Rhianna & Ne-Yo �Hate That I Love You�
    64 Deerhoof �+81�
    63 M.I.A. �XR2�
    62 Hot Chip �Shake A Fist�
    61 Minus The Bear �When We Escape�

    60 Blitzen Trapper �Devil�s A Go-Go�
    59 T-Pain �Buy U A Drank�
    58 Yo Majesty �It�s A Warning�
    57 Hot Chip �My Piano�
    56 Spoon �My Little Japanese Cigarette Case�
    55 The Tuss �Last Rushup 10�
    54 Silversun Pickups �Well Thought Out Twinkles�
    53 Dizzee Rascal �Sirens�
    52 The National �Mistaken For Strangers�
    51 Mystery Jets �Scarecrows In The Rain�
    50 Cut Copy �Hearts On Fire�
    49 Amerie �Gotta Work�
    48 Spoon �The Underdog�
    47 Queens Of The Stone Age �I�m Designer�
    46 M.I.A. �$20�
    45 Rob Crow �Taste�
    44 Radiohead �All I Need�
    43 Queens Of The Stone Age �3�s & 7�s�
    42 T.I. �Hurt�
    41 Snoop Dogg �Sexual Eruption�

    40 Spoon �Finer Feelings�
    39 Pinback �Good To Sea�
    38 Kanye West �Flashing Lights�
    37 Ted Leo & The Pharmacists �Army Bound�
    36 Modest Mouse �Missed The Boat�
    35 Spoon �Don�t You Evah�
    34 Minus The Bear �Knights�
    33 Dizzee Rascal �Pussy�Ole�
    32 Rich Boy �Throw Some D�s�
    31 Beirut �Elephant Gun�
    30 Pinback �From Nothing To Nowhere�
    29 The Go! Team �Titanic Vandalism�
    28 Modest Mouse �Dashboard�
    27 DJ Unk & Andre 3000 �Walk It Out (Remix)�
    26 Justin Timberlake �Summer Love�
    25 The Tuss �Skiz Ko E�
    24 M.I.A. �Paper Planes�
    23 Beirut �Nantes�
    22 CRS �Us Placers�
    21 Grinderman �Electric Alice�

    20 Beirut �A Sunday Smile�
    19 UGK & Outkast �International Player�s Anthem�
    18 Radiohead �Bodysnatchers�
    17 Of Montreal �Du Og Meg�
    16 Kings Of Leon �Charmer�
    15 Studio �Origin�
    14 Justin Timberlake �Until The End Of Time (Remix)�
    13 Yo Majesty �Kryptonite Pussy�
    12 Radiohead �15 Step�
    11 Deerhoof �Matchbook Seeks Maniac�
    10 Spoon �You Got Yr Cherry Bomb�
    09 Yo Majesty �Monkey�
    08 Simian Mobile Disco �I Believe�
    07 Radiohead �Jigsaw Falling Into Place�
    06 Of Montreal �Voltaic Crusher/Undrum To Muted Da�
    05 Rhianna �Umbrella�
    04 Justice Vs. Simian �We Are Your Friends�
    03 Kings Of Leon �My Party�
    02 Ne-Yo �Because Of You�
    01 Yo Majesty �Club Action�

    This year's #1 just seems larger and bigger than everything else underneath it. Nothing else from 2007 struck me in such a way. In reality, however, there was no "best" song of the year. At least I didn't think so. I suppose I could have just listed all the songs in alphabetical order, but that's fucking lame. I pretty much forced myself to choose a #1, and at the moment, this seems the most correct.

    The "song of the year" title came very close to being given to Ne-Yo's track at #2. The context surrounding this choice has a decent amount to do with how much I miss classic Michael Jackson, and how much larger this song would have seemed if it were in fact MJ's comeback single. And as for Kings Of Leon at #3, I didn't think any other alt-rock from 2007 rocked quite as much. "Bodysnatchers" comes pretty close, although it doesn't seem like quite as complete of a song as "My Party."

    "We Are Your Friends" is a leftover from late-2006. It looked good as SPIN's #3 single of the year, and most of us didn't hear it until 2007 anyway, so really, what's the diff? ... "Umbrella" was the summer song of the year, no doubt. ... "Voltaic Crusher" was another late-2006 single, but it wasn't on any Of Montreal disc until they released their EP at the beginning of this year.

    Also of note is CRS at #22, which samples Thom Yorke's "The Eraser," and is a highly recommended download. (I don't think it's available commercially, so downloading may be the only option for this one.) ... I'm pretty sure The Tuss (#25 & #55) is Richard D James's new moniker. He released 2 EP's in 2007, both easily as good as Drukqs. ... Also noteworthy is Rob Crow's track at #93, because it's one of those rare cases (or possibly the only case) in which the single version is actually longer than the LP version.

    More to come...

    March 3, 2008

    "Taste My Kids" Will Switch It Up Soon
    The "better late than never" best of 2007 lists will be up here within a few days.. Expect more straight-up lists and less commentary, as I didn't like 2007 music all that much.. Had I enjoyed it more, I would have been given more initiative to write.

    After this, I won't be posting here anymore.. until I can find the time to get all this content hosted by someplace other than Geocities.. seriously, this is 2008. I suppose actually owning a computer would have helped this along faster.. but since I don't, I haven't had the time to care about this as much lately.

    What I'm most excited about is that I'm planning on starting some kind of "Taste My Mixes" or something along those lines.. I'm gonna post mp3 mixes, and if the kids want to, they can load them onto their iPods and pump them out of their car stereos. My days of wannabe-music-journalism may be over. But I'm excited about finding a new host. This will probably be a fun thing. Okay.

    January 22, 2008

    Still Angry At VH1
    Earlier I wrote about VH1's "pop culture" oriented "100 Greatest Songs Of The 90's." I'll write one more thing on this before considering the topic completely exhausted..

    According to wikipedia, something called the United World Chart (which sounds like they keep track of the most popular music in terms of worldwide popularity) named Coolio's "Gangsta's Paradise" as the 15th most successful single that's ever been released. It was a #1 song in 13 countries and was voted by The Village Voice as the best song of 1995. And just like "November Rain," it was MTV's #1 video of the year (1995). It may have been the 1st ever universally praised hiphop song in terms of gaining acceptance from the kids, from older listeners, and from critics, all at the same time.

    VH1, however, decided that Nelson, Meredith Brooks, and Barenaked Ladies would make more sense for a "Greatest 90's Songs" list.. most likely because they were able to actually get these people to comment on their show. Wasn't Coolio on The Surreal Life? He can't be THAT hard to find.

    Will all this ranting make any difference? Not at all. Will VH1 make continue to produce more bullshit "Best Of" lists in the future? Absolutely. Why am I here writing this? I have no idea.

    Cloverfield

    January 18, 2008

    Whoopi Goldberg
    I don't know if Whoopi is Jewish; however, her surname suggests Jewish tendancies. I do know that The Moldy Peaches are at least half-Jewish, and word on the street is that Whoopi and The Peaches will be discussing some movie called Jews Know or something on Monday's The Jew.. I mean The View. Special thanks to kids who live in the Mountain Timezone, who are far more aware of these things than I am.

    Mods In Space

    January 14, 2008

    The Big Update: 2008 Edition
    I didn't bother putting much effort into any "best of the year" nonsense, aside from a few various scribblings that will probably get posted here at some point.. 2007 was a pointless waste. I didn't hear a single solid record this entire year. Neon Bible was probably the best this year had to offer, which is kind of sad considering how disappointing it is when compared to Funeral. (Face the facts: Arcade Fire were better when they were more exciting and less depressing. This is a fact, isn't it? Okay, maybe I'm alone.)

    And then there's Kala, Boxer, In Rainbows and Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga. There's great stuff on all these records, but they're hardly as good as the best records from any of the last 20 years. I do have an "albums of the year" list that I started writing up a few weeks back.. If I ever finish it, I'll probably post it here, but it won't happen today. Based on what I've been reading, it was a really good year for metal and dance music. Maybe I was listening to all the wrong stuff in 2007. Or maybe I'm the waste.

    Some quick for-instance: Remember at.the.drive.in's Relationship Of Command? Of course you do. It's just bloody fantastic. However, it was not the best record of 2000. In fact, it just barely would make the top 10 for that year. But had it been released in 2007, it would have been a "no contest" #1. Or how about The Dismemberment Plan's Change? Fucking genius shit right there. I'm guessing it would probably end up somewhere around #7 or #8 in the best records of '01. And yes, it blows Neon Bible out of the waterpark. I'd say "blame downloading" for this sudden drop in quality, but wasn't Napster at its peak in 2000/2001? Pop music ate the dick in '07, but it had nothing to do with technology and mp3 sharing. And it has everything to do with Pitchfork and music critics praising the wrong things. Songcraft and production are now forced to take a backseat to instrumentation and technical proficiancy. I hate music. And it's all your fault.

    VH1 Fucks It All Up Again
    Several years ago, there were a few Taste My Kids posts regarding the media's "revision" of culture in the 1990's. A little while later, in the summer of 2004, VH1's I Love The 90's premiered, complete with the incessant "dancing baby" image. This was essentially used as the recurring mascot image for the I Love The 90's series. Unfortunately for all of us, everyone hated having this image thrown in their face literally every 3 minutes, mostly because the majority of those who grew up during the 90's have no idea what this image was associated with, unless they watched Ally McBeal every week, and 90% of America didn't. Ultimately, the excessive inclusion of the "dancing baby" was widely regarded as a confusingly poor decision.

    However, the greatest injustice is the lack of appreciation the media has for the "Stairway To Heaven" of the 90's, which would be Guns N' Roses "November Rain." There have probably been at least 2 previous posts at this website noting how radio programmers seem to have completely forgotten not only this song, but every other radio single released from the 2 Use Your Illusion's (with the exception of "Knocking On Heaven's Door"). The only time these songs were actually played on the radio in recent memory was during the few months after the G'N'R Greatest Hits CD was released a few years back.

    And of course, leave it to VH1 to once again give the shaft to the most popular rock n' roll band of 1991 and 1992 (with the exception of Nirvana during the last few months of '92) as VH1's 100 Greatest 90's Songs very predictably did NOT include "November Rain." Lest we forget the stats: MTV's #1 video of 1992, the longest song to chart in the top 3 of the Billboard Hot 100, and in the mid-90's when MTV would air their "Top 100 Videos of the 90's So Far" countdowns, #1 was often (more than once) given to "November Rain" (although a few times they gave it to "Jeremy").

    As for the rest of their list, everyone knew they would fuck it up royally, and VH1 is never one to let down the public. And yes, I do understand that this is supposed to be a "pop culture" oriented list, and not actually a list of the best songs.. but seriously, any magazine or TV special that attempts to pull off a 90's music retrospective without including Pavement is not worth anyone's time.

    Surprisingly, about 20 genuinely great songs (almost all hiphop) were included. I'm sure some hiphop fan at VH1 had to fight like hell to get Geto Boys in there. And this was definitely refreshing to see. Unfortunately most of these placed lower than #50, and were all cancelled out by many of the worst songs ever pressed to CD. Rico Suave? Color Me Badd? TWO FUCKING PRINCES???!? PJ HARVEY?!?!?! Oh no wait, she wasn't included. I forgot, that would actually give VH1 a hint of coolness. Most people who gathered around water-coolers every Friday morning to discuss the previous night's episode of Friends more than likely don't know PJ Harvey. My mistake.

    "Baby Got Back" can eat baby shit.

    Eating Shit
    I guess this is worth noting.. I no longer tell people "fuck you" or "fuck yourself" or "I hope you fucking die" when I get angry. My new thing now is "eat shit." Or "I hope you eat shit." Or "eat a plate of my shit." Yeah, ever since hearing that Michael Ian Black bit, it's stuck. It's just so much more fun. EAT SHIT!! YOU EAT SHIT!!!! Love it. I wanna scream it from the highest mountain.

    More Stuff

  • Out of the "random pop music trivia crap no one except me cares about" department: I had no idea that Whitesnake's "Here I Go Again" was originally recorded 5 years before it went to #1. 18 years later, Bowling For Soup will poke fun at the chick-dancing-on-the-car thing for their "1985" video, which was a cover song originally written by SR-71, who ended up giving the song to Bowling For Soup because they are known for their 3rd-grade-humor video clips, which in turn gave the song much more of a shot at recieving MTV2 airplay. However, now the joke's on both bands, because nobody gives a shit about 80's nostalgia anymore. It's 90's time, beeotch.
  • You bought your kid Uggs for Christmas? Wow, you're really stupid.
  • It's been determined that vinyl will outlive CD's, which actually makes sense.. CD's aren't made to last longer than 40 or 50 years, whereas vinyl from 70 or 80 years ago can still be played. Vinyl's more fun anyway.
  • Download every song by The Zombies NOW.
  • You bought your kid High School Musical 2 for Christmas? Wow, I sure hope you're not a right-wing homophobe, because your kids will more than likely turn out very, very flamboyantly gay. (Even if they're actually straight, they'll be acting flamboyantly gay, so you may not be able to tell the difference for a while.)

    • December 25, 2007

    The HPE Myspace Xmas Spectacular
    High-pitch Erik posted an exciting new video over myspace...

    December 24, 2007

    Christmas Eve
    ...Just once, I'd like a regular, normal Christmas. A little eggnog... a fuckin' Christmas tree... a little turkey. But, no. I gotta crawl around in this motherfuckin' tin can...

    I'm trying to fight my scrooged-out/grinched-out demeanor, but I can't help it this year. I feel like Charlie Brown; commercialism killed it for me. And now it's Xmas Eve. Tonight and tomorrow is family time, but the only thing I'm actually anticipating is the lack of oxygen my brain will be recieving due to excessive alcohol consumption. Xmas music and Xmas movies usually help, but the only Xmas movies I can bring myself to watch are ones like Die Hard 2 or Go or Gremlins which are merely set during Christmas but have really no other true holiday themes. And I've overplayed all my favorite Xmas songs over the last few years to the point where they really don't affect me anymore. Maybe shit will pick up.

    December 7, 2007

    90s Show On Hiatus
    There's this show 90s Mixtape and a little while back they played their 50 most overplayed songs and I'm pretty sure nobody heard it, so I'm going to post it here. The show is going on hiatus after this coming Monday, so fuckin listen if you want. The list was taken from here.

    And so here's 90's mixtape's 50 (+3) most overplayed songs..

    53 Your Woman - White Town
    52 Supersonic - Oasis
    51 Dead Horse - Guns N' Roses
    50 What's The Frequency Kenneth - R.E.M.
    49 Sabotage - Beastie Boys
    48 Pretend We're Dead - L7
    47 Electric Relaxation - A Tribe Called Quest
    46 Down Rodeo - Rage Against The Machine
    45 Minus - Beck
    44 Fade Into You - Mazzy Star
    43 Cannonball - The Breeders
    42 Breathe - Prodigy
    41 Verse Chorus Verse - Nirvana
    40 Unsung - Helmet
    39 Gratitude - Beastie Boys
    38 El Scorcho - Weezer
    37 Strobelight Honey - Black Sheep
    36 Coffee + TV - Blur
    35 My Wave - Soundgarden
    34 Only Shallow - My Bloody Valentine
    33 Bring Tha Noise - Public Enemy & Anthrax
    32 So Whatcha Want - Beastie Boys
    31 Love - Smashing Pumpkins
    30 Let Me Drown - Soundgarden
    29 '93 Till Infinity - Souls Of Mischief
    28 Paranoid Andriod - Radiohead
    27 Kung Fu - Ash
    26 Hobo Humpin' Slobo Babe - Whale
    25 Is She Weird - The Pixies
    24 Alright - Supergrass
    23 All Hail Me - Veruca Salt
    22 I Come From The Water - The Toadies
    21 Drawer - Summercamp
    20 Sucked Out - Superdrag
    19 The Choice Is Yours - Black Sheep
    18 Natural One - Folk Implosion
    17 Girl From Mars - Ash
    16 Seether - Veruca Salt
    15 There She Goes - The La's
    14 Bound For The Floor - Local H
    13 C.R.E.A.M. - Wu-Tang Clan
    12 Wax Ecstatic - Sponge
    11 She Don't Use Jelly - The Flaming Lips
    10 Out There - Dinosaur Jr
    09 I'd Like Your Hair Long - Hum
    08 Deeper Well - Nada Surf
    07 Caught By The Fuzz - Supergrass
    06 All The Kids Are Right - Local H
    05 Tyler - The Toadies
    04 Connection - Elastica
    03 Dream All Day - The Posies
    02 Divine Hammer - The Breeders
    01 Setting Sun - Chemical Brothers

    December 1, 2007

    OMFG PUZZLES!!!
    Puzzles are totally fun. The Mars Volta have this new b-side cover thingy they recorded which you can access by solving the puzzle found right over here. The new song is noteworthy for being their shortest song yet, as far as I can recall. (In case you want a guide, the image in the puzzle can be found unscrambled right over here.)

    November 16, 2007

    Whoa

    They better do some shows in Trumbull.

    November 14, 2007

    "Why I Love America"
    I guess Target, Stop & Shop, the mall, TV ads, and like 8 billion other people never got the memo that CHRISTMAS DIDN'T FUCKING START YET!@!!?# OMFG I can't even go to the store to buy bread and peanut butter without having it turn out to be fucking Veteran's Day and 400 kids with ADHD running around spilling cereal all over the floor and then they force me to stand in line for 7 minutes and stare at magazines that talk about people that I don't care about. I suppose if their impulse item mags were ones that had Local H on the cover, it would make me much happier.. But as it turns out, I guess people's impulses are more likely to be drawn to stories of Owen Wilson's fake-suicide recovery and pictures of Britney's chipmunk-looking children. Okay, sorry I'm out of control right now. So just to clarify.. Who wants to see Christmas decorations right now? WRONG!!! The correct answer is NOBODY!! You answered incorrectly because you still think people want Christmas to immediately follow Halloween. It's common knowledge that Christmas does not start until the day after Thanksgiving. EVERYBODY knows this you fucking students shoot me now please.

    October 31, 2007

    Have A Scary Chanukah
    Nothing is scarier than this.. except maybe this..

    October 30, 2007

    Ween Review On Peach-Folk
    Pitchfork calls 12 Golden Country Greats a "dud." That said, their 6.2 rating of Ween's new record should be taken with no less than 12 golden grains of salt.

    Hey, now that I'm thinking about it, what's up with Ween & Radiohead always synching up their releases to happen within a few months of each other? (I've also noticed similar corrolations between Foo Fighters and Queens Of The Stone Age.. however Ween & Radiohead are a bit more personally prominent for me since my screen name for the past 9 years has included the words "Guava" and "Bends.")

    To quickly remind everyone (with bullet points)..

  • The Mollusk and OK Computer were released less than 4 weeks from each other..
  • White Pepper was released exactly 5 months before Kid A..
  • Hail To The Thief and Quebec were seperated by 9 weeks..
  • And now their closest synch-up yet.. In Rainbows and La Cucaracha, only seperated by 2 weeks.

    • The only difference is that 2007 is a bummer of a year for music, while 2003, 2000 and 1997 (the years of the 3 other synchronicities) were all about rockin out with titties and beer.

    October 27, 2007

    Stupid Shit
    This keeps happening.. I had all these ideas I wanted to write about, but now I don't care about any of it.

    Surf's Up

    I discovered this record a few February's ago.. turns out it's actually perfect for mid-October. I was discussing with someone earlier about how I may never be able to decide which are the best among Surf's Up's highlights. I know the following comment may be considered blasphamous in some circles, but I actually prefer the highlights of Surf's Up to the standouts on Pet Sounds, although Pet Sounds wins overall for containing zero duds. Conversely, Surf's Up is frustrating in this respect, as it includes 1 massive dud and a pair of mild duds. Most mid-period Beach Boys records include at least one enormous WTF moment; in this case, it's Mike Love's wince-enducing "Student Demonstration Time."

    Carl Wilson's "Feel Flows" is used during the credits of Almost Famous. I thought it was Todd Rundgren. In the DVD commentary, Cameron Crowe made extra sure to throw in yet another story about world famous musicians who he just happens to be good friends with... in this case, it was a story about Brian Wilson telling him upon seeing the credits of the film that it made him miss his brother. As touching as that story is, I really can't stand Camoron Crowe and I hope he stops making movies.

    According to wikipedia, "'Til I Die" was a song Brian wrote while he was at the beach and feeling small, insignificant, and "preoccupied with death." Mike Love complained that the track was too much of a bummer, but Brian recorded it anyway, and it was included because they needed songs to fill up the album. I'm not sure how Mike Love ever had the audacity to question Brian Wilson's genius, as this may be my favorite Beach Boys song ever.

    The album's title track first showed up on some sort of TV special that might have been hosted by Burt Bacharach or someone, which was about the future of pop music (in 1966), and I think this might have been part of the clip, although I'm not sure. This also may have been the same "piano demo" version that appeared in Pitchfork's top 200 songs of the 60's... I'm kind of confused about the history of this song, but regardless, I fucking adore the version on this album.

    October 15, 2007

    Forced Update (At Gunpoint)
    Since this is a forced update, I will write about bullshit.

    This In Rainbows shit is bananas. And I haven't even heard the record yet (except for 1 song about an hour or so ago that I wasn't really paying attention to). However, all the excessive press would have us simple-minder's believing that this is may be the single record that succeeded in severing the ties between consumerism and popular music more than any other in history.. certainly moreso than something like The Gray Album, which seems to be a distant 2nd place. I'd like to hear In Rainbows soon.. Unfortunately, they announced the leak so recently that I didn't have enough time to anticipate. At the moment, the favorite new record is definitely Michael Ian Black's latest opus I Am A Wonderful Man. Keeping up with TV only through youtube is getting difficult. However, the small amounts of TV I'm catching here and there have been grabbing my attention. I just read on Digg that Jon Stewart and Dimitri Martin are collaborating on a sketch show for Comedy Central. I saw a Cadillac commercial that used "Stars" by Hum which made me happy, although not happy enough to buy a new car. There's a new Wes Anderson movie which I know nothing about, including the title. Oh dip, I just thought of something meaningful to write about...

    Those Good-Tasting Twizzlers
    I've written about this before.. Those Twizzlers that they only sell before Halloween that are in the individual little packages.. not the long stringy Twizzlers, but the smaller ones and they're like stuck together in the celophane.. Yeah, those are good.

    October 8, 2007

    Dwayne (And Rick)
    According to the nutjobs who post to wikipedia, Dwayne's appearance is supposed to resemble Slash...

    I always assumed he was supposed to be Joey Ramone.. not just look like him, but actually be a strange alternate bizarro universe version.. or something. That's what happens when you read into things too much.

    In other news, I've found myself time and time again entering this mode where I secretly want to be proud of my guilty pleasure records so that people think I'm the type who is all about expanding my horizons. So yeah anyway..

    Somehow this has become my album of the moment. Yes, I'm serious. It's high energy and pretty much as catchy and vibrant as any of Cheap Trick's first 4 albums, so just relax already. And since no one asked for it, here's some quick commentary.. The kick-off point of Working Class Dog is announced with a triumphant explosion titled "Love Is Alright Tonight," which is perhaps now best known for its brillant usage during a Trainspotting-inspired drug-binge sequence in Wet Hot American Summer (a.k.a. perhaps the funniest movie ever made). Next up is the #1 single "Jessie's Girl," undoubtedly the signature moment from Mr. Springfield's entire career, and yet again, another triumph.. (According to wikipedia "some try to highlight deeper symbolic meanings of the piece..." I'm interested in learning who these people are and exactly what symbolism can actually be found. As far as I can tell, the lyrics are as straightforward as it gets. But perhaps I'm just a shallow/superficial waste of a person who sucks at catching onto symbolism. In fact, it was just last night that I realized there was any symbolism at all within "Strawberry Fields Forever." Moving on..) After this 1-2 punch, side 1 continues with "Hole In My Heart" and "Carry Me Away," both unexpectedly just as catchy as the 1st two tracks. "Carry Me Away" specifically has turned into one of those which ends up getting stuck in my head for 6-hours at a time, conjuring memories of the great "Stacy's Mom" epidemic of 2003 (and not unlike at least half the tracks on the last 3 Of Montreal records). Side 1 comes to a close with another high energy track penned by Sammy Hagar titled "I've Done Everything For You," which apparently was a top 10 hit song at some point in 1981. On a record that exudes so much cornball subject matter, this is probably the one that surpasses the rest, although it's no more annoying than 80's pop-metal, and definitely less pretentious (and if you don't think 80's metal is pretentious, you need to see The Decline Of Western Civilization Part 2 and re-assess your opinion). In a shocking turn of events, side 2 of Working Class Dog is just as catchy and high-energy as side 1.

    This was one of those records that I ended up wearing out before I turned 5. I occasionally came back to it maybe 5 times between then and when I turned 13. Some of the first records I listened to when I was very young are ones I do not enjoy today (such as Journey's live double-album Captured, or anything by the band Survivor). Likewise, I assumed Working Class Dog wouldn't be worth my time, but I was in 80's-mode a week or 2 ago, saw it in my vinyl, threw it on, and it surprised the piss out of me. True story.

    GEICO Commercials
    GEICO is ok cos my insurance is a little lower now. So that's fun. However, their commercials make me want to punch babies. In this respect, GEICO is probably the new Pepsi. If anyone out there actually gets why the cavemen thing is funny, I'd love some kind of explanation. Is there a joke? If so, what is that joke? And why should I care? Why am I even writing about something so insignificant to me? Who fucking cares about GEICO commercials? What is a horse shoe? What does a horse shoe do? Are there any horse socks? Is anybody listening to me?

    October 1, 2007

    YOU KNEW What You Were Doing ... You Wanted Us ALL To Be Abuzz
    This is all the big news I can handle...

    Over the past 24 hours, the world has transformed from calm-and-mild-niceness to crazy-and-chaotic-insanity, and it's all because Radiohead announced last night that they're releasing their next album in 10 days... This announcement excites me and makes my skin and nipples considerably harder than their average consistancy, mainly because for the first time in years, there will be NO internet leak prior to October 10th, the day this album will be available for download.. In essence, Radiohead is announcing the day that their album will be leaked onto the net. From this point, one of three options can be taken... Either 1) download the album for free from a file sharing service, or 2) download the album from Radiohead (which apparently everyone will be able to "name their price" for.. like if you want to buy the entire album for $5, I guess you're allowed to do that), or 3) wait until early 2008 to purchase a hard copy of the album from the retail venue of your choosing. And unless I'm mistaken, I've heard the record is going to be something like 18 tracks. It's ALMOST too much for me to handle, but I'm trying my best with it.

    Belated Smiths Thing
    About a month ago, I was planning on writing up this huge thing about how I was happy to hear that Morrissey turned down something like $40 million to do a Smiths reunion tour, as well as turning down something like $5 million to reunite at Coachella last year.. which made me quite happy since almost every one of the recent "reunion" tours or shows from the past couple years (save for The Pixies and Dinosaur Jr) have been completely lame borefests that seem to be serving nothing other than the almighty cash-flow-generator. I'm not feelin' the reunions. Whenever anyone recently has tried to strike up convo's regarding "reunion tours," my brain returns immediately to 1995 and my least favorite thing about 90's music.. which which be the "Page And Plant" tour, and that horrible Unplugged version of "Hotel California" that they used to play on MTV like 400 times a day. Fuck reunions. Sign better bands. The world needs fresh rock stars. Let's get on this shit.

    And while the topic is pertinent.. I've decided that I now hate Coachella. As of the most recent of these, Coachella has become the biggest bummer out of all the huge desert/farmland festivals. They try and suck you in with the flashy ads with the huge lists of about 6000 bands, screaming statements like "The Jesus And Mary Chain!! Back together after 13 years!!!" but what they fail to mention is that Scarlett Johannson will end up joining JAMC onstage to sing backup vocals on whatever one of their songs was used in Lost In Translation (as if Coachella needs surprise VMA-type moments) while non-music-fan Paris Hilton sits backstage celebrating 4:20 just so she can be seen at the-place-to-be of the moment, and so that people can take pictures of her doing this and post them on their fucking failure blogs.

    A Failure Pile In A Sadness Bowl
    This is what I eat everyday... and yes, it comes with a complimentary copy of This Mortal Coil's It'll End In Tears. It's teh fun.

    (please listen to Patton Oswalt's Werewolves And Lollipops)

    August 6, 2007

    New MIB Alb
    I guess this is coming out in September...

    Mike Showalter's new stand-up album was recorded about 2 weeks ago. No release date announced yet.

    July 22, 2007

    It's About Damn Time
    So right here we have a link to Dr. David Wain's blog with a very special announcement attached to it. (And you know what? I still won't believe it till I see it.)

    July 20, 2007

    The Big Records Of The Moment
    Let's take a look.
    Yay Spoon at #10 wowowowowowowowow. I'm satisfied with how this top 10 looks right now. This is as close to satisfaction as it's going to get anyway.

    By the way, Smashing Pumpkins are totally trying to match the "comeback" that Green Day achieved with American Idiot. The album art for both of these records have similar styles and themes. Both records include vocals from singers which sound watered-down and pussy compared to what they did in the 90's. Both albums mark a sudden lyrically thematic change where the singers suddenly want their music drowning in a sea of politcal overtones. The only difference is that American Idiot had a few catchy songs, and Zeitgeist has ZERO catchy songs (and one very long attempt at an "epic" called "United States" which isn't bad, but is not particularly memorable when up against "Silverfuck" or "XYU" or "Porcelina." Corgan has lost it. He needs to give up and do what I fucking told everyone from the 90's to do a long time ago.. Which is, put together some different younger bands and write songs for them, and watch them blow up. Trent Reznor totally could have been the Maurice Starr of nu-industrial.) Shit I'm late.. bye.

    July 14, 2007

    Happy 7-11
    I hope everyone didn't forget about the 7-11 celebration that's been going down. This year it's an 11-day celebration once again, because the year includes a "7" (2007). So from the 11th of July until the 21st, you have to go to 7-11 everyday because it's the law.

    Also coming home on the train the other day, I was bored and I made a list of my favorite movies from 1999. So here it is...

    Pre-Millennial Tension: Reviewing 1999 In Film
    There was truly something special in the air that year, perhaps something about the impending Y2K catastrophe that was due to set the globe ablaze with chaos and satanism. Whatever it was, this was the year that sparked an awkward transitional period between the "slack" aesthetic of the 90's and the materialistic values of the 00's. Had Y2K somehow actually caused the world to end, reality TV and flipflops would have never gone completely mainstream. Make what you want of this.

    It's simple to sum up this period in retrospect. This culturely awkward time began to take shape late in the year 1998 when Limp Bizkit's "Faith" video began charting on TRL, the most popular MTV show of the day. Some months after this, the official arrival of the period was marked by Eminem and Britney Spears making their first Rolling Stone covers consecutively. Somehow both Britney and Eminem were never able to match the peak of their success outside of this time. The period abruptly concluded when The Strokes and Ozzy's fat children somehow caused planes to fly into the World Trade Center. Certain pop culture icons were ONLY popular during this time, case in point Kid Rock, Tom Green and Rachael Leigh Cook. So let's estimate October 1998 as a starting point, and we'll end it around September 2001. Contained within was a bizarre 3-year-long state of innocence. Nothing was the same outside of this time. By the period's end, the naive and lively spirit of the 90's was crushed dead. However, at its start (a.k.a. the tail-end of the 90's), the world seemed far more alive and hopeful.

    It might have had something to do with the tension of Y2K, but this was a really good time for movies. These days, there's a huge record-breaking Hollywood blockbuster virtually every weekend, which was not at all the case in 1999. In the DVD commentary of Fight Club, Ed Norton specifically mentions 1999 as a time when filmmakers collectively made an effort to "raise the bar." What resulted was probably my favorite movie year ever. Here's a quick refresher for those who already forgot, beginning with my 12 favorite films of 1999...
    #12 AMERICAN MOVIE (d: Chris Smith)
    Inspirational, funny as shit, and often touching, this true story of a low-budget filmmaker's struggles while putting together his own horror movie should have moved more than a few reality TV producers to get director Mark and his buddy Mike (along with their phenomenal hairstyles) their own reality show by now. I recieve genuine chills and moosebumps everytime I hear Uncle Bill's big scene: "It's alright! It's okay! There's something to live for! Jesus told me so!"
  • Mike Schank Clips
  • The Making Of Northwestern
    • #11 THREE KINGS (d: David O. Russell)
    George Clooney, Mark Wahlberg, Ice Cube & Spike Jonze are soldiers in Desert Storm who try to illegally steal Iraqi gold from this weird gold reserve. Mark Wahlberg somehow gets captured and... Okay, I actually don't remember this one all that well. However, the YouTube clips are jogging my memory.
  • "If You Leave Me Now"
  • Marky Mark gets captured
    • #10 THE STRAIGHT STORY (d: David Lynch)
    The Elephant Man is probably the only other David Lynch film that is this straight-forward and contains this much emotion. This was Lynch's G-rated movie that he did for Disney based on the true story of an elderly guy who drives a John Deere tractor halfway across the country so he can visit his sick brother who he hasn't spoken to in over a decade. They used to play this on Bravo occasionally, and I always found myself captivated by its simplicity and usually unable to change the channel.
  • Final scene (with Harry Dean Stanton!)
  • Richard Farnsworth press conference
    • #09 PARADISE LOST 2 (d: Joe Berlinger, Bruce Sinofsky)
    Despite popular belief, this is the essential film between the 2 Paradise Lost documentaries, mostly because the sequel more prominently features its breakout star, suspicious step-parent John Mark Byers, as (possibly) the most disturbing villian in the history of film. His step-son and 2 other young children were murdered and mutilated in 1993, resulting in the arrest of 3 teenagers (now known as the West Memphis Three) who were picked out (and in one case, sentenced to death) due to their preference of wearing Metallica t-shirts.
  • Best of Byers Pt One
  • Best of J.M. Byers Pt Three
    • #08 AMERICAN BEAUTY (d: Sam Mendes)
    So this is the first movie listed so far that isn't based on a true story. Among other brilliant (and beautiful) aspects, this film includes an often underrated sequence featuring Thora Birch's lovely boobies. I find it a bit shocking that they haven't been more exploited since 1999. (Somehow, Thora Birch was yet another icon who was only popular during the awkward transitional period of 10/98 thru 09/01.) So yeah, almost everyone has seen this film, and there's not much I can say about it that hasn't already been said... Touching metaphorical shot of a plastic bag floating around, Kevin Spacey & Chris Cooper shine, etc.
  • Plastic bag scene
  • K.Spacey smitten by M.Suvari
    • #07 ELECTION (d: Alexander Payne)
    Along with Rushmore, Election seemed to be setting a new standard for high school films, a standard which was killed dead 4 months later by the launch of the abysmal American Pie franchise. Both Rushmore and Election were tightly-directed, well-paced movies with quirky humor and political undertones. I'm pretty sure Tracy Flick is a close 2nd place for Reese Witherspoon's 2nd best roll so far (coming in after her red-riding-hood character in Freeway opposite Kief Suth).
  • Last 5 minutes of Election (the only scene I could find)
  • Reese interview
    • #06 MAGNOLIA (d: Paul Thomas Anderson)
    This is among the best films which use the tactic of showing several concurrent mini-stories with their own seperate characters and related scenarios that all somehow intertwine by the film's end. In this case, the stories were brought together by a strange natural phenomenon. I don't know if this had to with my decision to watch this on the evening of September 11, 2001, but perhaps that idea subconcsiously called to me. The only bad thing about this movie is motherfucking Tom "Pound Me In The Ass" Cruise recieving a "Best Supporting Actor" Oscar nom for his lackluster performance in which he yells a lot and cries on command in one scene. ZOMG ZOMG Tom Cruze cries on command?? HOLY SHIT Somebody give that man a fucking medal already ZOMG ZOMG
  • Opening sequence
  • "Wise Up"
    • #05 OFFICE SPACE (d: Mike Judge)
    Speaking of "Pound me in the ass.." How is this not #1? Everyone has their favorite Office Space moment, quote or character, but from the first time I saw this movie, I still prefer David Herman's brilliant portrayal of the unfortunately named Michael Bolton. For my money, I don't know if it gets any better than when he sings "When a Man Loves a Woman" pounding the guts out of a printer with his bare fists to the sound of the Geto Boys. Certainly among the most quotable films of the last 10 years, and not (yet) quite as annoyingly quoteable as, say, Anchorman has become.
  • Abbreviated printer segments
  • Wtf is that
  • Lumbergh & the bobs
    • #04 EYES WIDE SHUT (d: Stanley Kubrick)
    Jesus fucking Christ I hate Tom Cruise. In the documentary that comes with this DVD, everyone pretty much notes that Kubrick was as anal as he's ever been during filming for this, asking actors to go through a scenes 50 times or more before being satisfied with the final product. This precision was likely the reason why watching Tom Cruise is not quite as much of a chore as watching him in a Cameron Crowe film. Yes, it's a very slowly paced film. And yes, it contains excessive nudity. But both of those aspects are essential to the whole point of the film.
  • "Musica Ricercata"
  • Some dude analyzes the movie
    • #03 FIGHT CLUB (d: David Fincher)
    Chuck Palahniuk's novel about the creation of Project Mayhem and being a slave to consumerism guided Brad Pitt and Ed Norton through the best work they've done to date. This is also the singular project that made Meat Loaf a lot more than the big dude who sings annoyingly long faux-broadway tunes with annoyingly-long song titles. Since this movie, he has somehow seemed a lot cooler during TV appearances. Meat also recieved a new hairstyle for his roll in Fight Club as support group member Robert Paulson, a style which he's kept to this day. And I'll tell you why right now. It's because Chuck's character-spirit came to life within Meat Loaf so vividly that he literally BECAME Robert Paulson, which now owns his body for the rest of his life. It's true.
  • Jack's smirking revenge
  • Human sacrifice
    • #02 BEING JOHN MALKOVICH (d: Spike Jonze)
    This movie screamed it: World, meet Charlie Kaufman, the most inventive screenplay writer pretty much ever. In this, the first Kaufman/Jonze collab, Malkovich plays himself, as well as himself with people controlling his mind from inside his consciousness, as well as himself dozens of times over in one of the most insane sequences in film history, in which Malkovich enters his own portal and sees a world that NO MAN should see. Also, most of the characters have outstanding hair.
  • The 7 1/2 floor
  • JM enters his portal
    • #01 SOUTH PARK: BIGGER LONGER & UNCUT (d: Trey Parker)
    There are few movies throughout history that deserve a perfect score of 10 out of 10, and I'm pretty damn sure this is one of them. From the opening scene of Asses Of Fire to Satan's musical ode of wonder about "the world up there" and beyond, its brilliance never quits. And it's DENSE!! Like the most compact Simpsons episodes, there's virtually a joke with every line of dialogue. Take away the jokes, and the story still stands as among the most entertaining and exciting as one can get. As far as "musicals" go, this is probably the only one I can stand more than once all the way through, since it's not campy. My favorite scene is still Satan in bed with hot and bothered Saddam who pulls out his enormous man-prick in order to try and satisfy his manly desires, which then turns out to be merely a fake penis: If that's wrong, I'll never be right.
  • some clip from the south park movie

    • Honorable mentions:

    THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT
    When I try to think of movies from 1999 that felt more like an event than simply attending a movie, this is probably the 1st one that springs to mind, reason being that few of the people with whom I attended the film were sure whether it was staged or if this video was the real deal. (I recall paying half-way attention to a promotional made-for-TV special which aired on possibly the Bravo channel days before this film's release, confusing me and others into thinking some of this may have actually taken place, or that it was at least based on true events like The Exorcist.) By the end of the film, it was a little more obvious. Everyone's always like "wtf I can't believe people were actually scared of this stupid piece of shit that I could have made with my mom's shitty 80's video cam." Yeah, well I was one of the idiots who was scared out of my brain for at least the one night after I saw this in the theater. I guess I suck.

    THE MATRIX
    "Free your mind." "Whoa." Words to live by. If not taken completely seriously, this is a really fun (and at least mildly thought-provoking) film, in which Keanu actually out-dumbs his portrayal in the Bill & Ted films.

    THE TALENTED MR RIPLEY
    I remember enjoying this one a lot, but it was before I really knew Philip Semen Hoffmore, who for the past 6 years I've praise among my favorite acting talents. I'd like to review this one.

    A few other honorable mentions include SUMMER OF SAM, GO, GIRL INTERUPTED, GHOST DOG, DROP DEAD GORGEOUS and THE SIXTH SENSE. However, let's not forget that it wasn't all smiles and sunshine in 1999. The year was not without its duds, which rank among the most foul turds that have ever excreted from ass. Here are the most mediocre films of 1999...
    THE FACULTY (d: Robert Rodriguez)
    For a very long time, and perhaps even today, I've considered this as the worst movie I've ever seen. The extensive marketing for this movie seems bewildering in retrospect, which included the film's stars posing in denim magazine ads, an MTV video for a cover-version of "Another Brick In The Wall" performed by Layne Staley and Tom Morello, and a SPIN cover titled "Class Of '99." The Faculty is notable for including the following...
    - An enormous and possibly unprecidented string of plotholes and continuity errors
    - Jon Stewart with an amazing goatee (whose character's name was Prof. Edward Furlong??)
    - At several points throughout the film, characters have to sniff coke to prove they're not aliens, and yet rarely appear tweaked
    - Worst ensemble cast ever. With one or two exceptions, The Faculty caused me to become biased against every teen-actor in this film. I'm still convinced Josh Hartnett was the worst thing about both Sin City and The Virgin Suicides. And Shawn Hatosy was clearly the worst thing about Alpha Dog. (I may forgive Elijah Wood someday. Haven't given it much thought.)
    10 THINGS I HATE ABOUT YOU (d: Gil Junger)
    Strangely enough, this was my 2nd worst movie ever for a very long time, coming in right after The Faculty. At the film's start, the story focuses around the kid from 3rd Rock (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) whose character expresses wimpy fake-deep adoration for a super-cute airhead played by Alex Mack (Larisa Olenyik) who I guess was trying to start some kind of movie career with this roll. 3/4's through the movie, the focus switches to one of the secondary stories from earlier in the film, the one about the struggling relationship between Julia Stiles and Heath Ledger's respective characters, which encapsulates the film's final 10 minutes, almost as if the screenwriters gave up on their initial idea halfway through the story. I'm also confused about how this film is supposedly some kind of homage to Shakespeare.
    VARSITY BLUES (d: Brian Robbins)
    I've been wanting to buy this on DVD for years, but haven't been able to find it used. In terms of bad movies, this takes the opposite direction of The Faculty, in that the absurdity of its horridness makes it a surprisingly entertaining experience. Notable items include...
    - Whip-cream bikini (duh)
    - The suggestion of multiple date rapes
    - Awesomely bad southern accents
    - "The Beek" throwing a football at his dad's face, and his iconic "I don't want your life" sequence (I can see Beekman's face light up with joy upon his first read through the script and recieving this line, his personal equivalent of "You can't handle the truth.")
    - And of course this film's centerpiece, a scene completely out a nowhere of the one fat dude named Billy Bob (with the pet pig) drinking straight-up hard liquor and sitting on the back of his pickup truck with a shotgun crying about how his dad doesn't love him enough. (Also notable: One of the TV spots for Varsity Blues shows Fatty driving around in his truck listening to Ween's "I Don't Wanna Leave You On The Farm" from 12 Golden Country Greats.)

    SHE'S ALL THAT (d: Robert Iscove)
    This movie is really weird. Of course it will be remembered as that one where Rachael Leigh Cook was supposed to be ugly in the beginning but was actually hot, but then Anna Paquin makes her over and she goes to the prom with Freddie Prinze Jr, yay happy ending. Originality prevails again. But deep within this film lie some strange elements, mostly due to characters who really add nothing to the story at all, other than awkward weirdness...
    - Matt Lillard plays a dude who was kicked out of The Real World house and returns to his high school expecting fanfare, but then turns off his hometown people by dancing to Rick James.
    - Usher's roll was to be their high school's DJ, and narrating the story through his announcements over the school's intercom system. However, high school's don't have intercom DJ's, so once again, this makes absolutely no sense.
    - Lil Kim plays... some random black chick who does nothing. And her part in the film is NOT as a cameo. She has a genuine part, and has lines in several scenes. However, her purpose doesn't even serve as filling the token-black-chick void, because there's also a (sort of) prominent part played by the chick from the Clueless series. Baffling.
    STAR WARS: THE PHANTOM MENACE (d: George Lucas)
    Wesa goin' home.

    Other mediocre classics from 1999 include DOGMA, AMERICAN PIE, and WILD WILD WEST. I have nothing to say about these movies.

    July 6, 2007

    I Like The Way Snrub Thinks
    And featuring former president Dwight D. Eisenhower! Let's git bizzay!!

    July 4, 2007

    Happy 4th!!
    Today's a good day to enjoy America and pump some acoustic Prince. Also it's supposed to rain today.. Will that rain be purple? Only time will tell.

    America

    July 1, 2007

    Special June-Fest Expantion For 2007!!!
    Since Junefest rocked so hard this year, the powers that be have decided to expand Junefest for four extra days, so the last day of Junefest is now July 4th. I still don't even know what Junefest is.. somehow it has made me nostalgic. I shall now post various nothings regarding the world at large...

    Smashing Weird Pumpkins, Ok
    Billy Corgan has angered Pitchfork and probably other people by releasing four different versions of Zeitgeist with four different tracklistings depending on whether you shopped at Target, Best Buy, iTunes, or other places, which is really not a big deal since you can simply download the exclusive tracks for free from file sharing services. (So the song "Zeitgeist" will only available from Target, which is kind of weird.) I suppose the only truly shitty thing about this lies in other bands following their example in the future, which will ultimately get out of hand and become super annoying. However, in the 60's bands like The Beatles and The Rolling Stones used to issue albums with different titles, different album covers, and completely different tracklistings, depending on whether it was bought in the US or the UK. So yeah, seriously, who cares?

    Cash Money Niggaz Videos
    Blazin' hot new trend: Early 00's nostalgia WTF?!?! Was Missy Elliott's "Work It" an actual song that really existed? Is it just me, or does 2002 seem like exactly the same as now, except a million times less complicated? I shall now post bullet points with videos from the Cash Money Platinum Hits collection.

  • Juvenile "Ha" (1999)
    The joint that started it all, and set the nation laughin it up. There is a timeline in this video. I feel it.
  • Big Tymers "Big Ballin'" (1998)
    This was their clip for the streets. It's like, they got the bling, but they still street.
  • Hot Boys "We On Fire" (1999)
    The hot "super-group" of the Cash Money camp, robbin, gettin chased, ass whuppin.
  • Juvenile "Back That Ass Up" (1999)
    Juv gets the crowd bumpin, dirty south woodstock style. Only better. Coined "drop it like its hot."
  • B.G. f/ Hot Boyz & Big Tymers "Bling Bling" (1999)
    These dudes be rich.
  • Big Tymers "Get Your Roll On" (2000)
    Money, cash, rims, hos, baby birdman. A video with everything all at once.
  • Cash Money Millionaires "Project Bitch" (2001??)
    This one's fo' th' showties.

    • June 24, 2007

    Hot New Trend: Deeming The Overdiscussed As "Overrated"
    I'm sure Jann Wenner has never once considered the damage he has caused in the world of rock music by continually placing at least 4 or 5 classic-rock artists per year on the cover of his magazine, with no other intention than grabbing the attention of classic-rock fans who are stuck in the past and haven't considered exploring any music released in the last 10 years.. who more than likely are also among those who listen to "everything but country and rap."

    In the 60's and 70's, Wenner would have never considered going with Chuck Berry, Miles Davis or Frank Sinatra for a cover.. but into the 80's and beyond, it got to the point where at least one of The Beatles had appeared on the cover at least once a year (and usually as a group.. a blurb on Wikipedia states they've been used for over 30 covers since 1967.) Especially over the last 15 years, it hasn't been uncommon to see bands such as The Rolling Stones, Bob Dylan, Nirvana, Jimi Hendrix, Bob Marley, U2, or similar overdiscussed rock n' roll icons on its cover (or overdiscussed to death on VH1 nostalgia programs). We are now at the point where the overdiscussion of these bands has annoyed those who simply are not into their music, leading those people to consider them as "overrated." I'm not necessarily a huge fan of all of the bands listed here, but these seem to be Wenner's most commonly overused artists for helping to sell his magazine. (And just to help prove my point, this week The Police are on their cover.)

    MSNBC's Dave White is one of these millions who have fallen victim to Jann Wenner's music-killing ignorance. White specifically lists The Beatles and Nirvana as 2 of rock's most overrated bands, which frankly, in my humble opinion, is complete and utter bullshit, as they are far and beyond the 2 most important and best rock bands ever assembled. And every bit of overdiscussion these 2 bands have garnered has absolutely been earned, making them not "overrated," but actually rated accurately. (SPIN's Chuck Klosterman also named The Beatles in his list of the 10 most accurately rated bands, for similar reasons.)

    So now that the internet makes everyone's opinion supposedly matter, people can easily google "nirvana sucks" and find hundreds of other bloggers who have also grown tired of their overdiscussion, proving that Rolling Stone's efforts of reminding people of rock's glory days have completely backlashed. There's a fair chance that NWA (arguably a far more important group than, say, U2 for example) will never appear on their cover. It's actually debatable as to whether or not Jann Wenner is actually a fan of Nirvana or any music released before 1980. On their top 500 songs list, the canonized "Teen Spirit" did make it to #9, but the other 3 Nirvana songs in their list were all ranked below #400. It seems they're only discussed as much as they are in this magazine because of their supposed status as canonized rock icons. This canonization is also a huge part of what is killing music. If older music that was discussed less frequently would appear in Rolling Stone more often, it might entice their readers to explore instead of being stuck in their own nostalgia.

    We're currently living in an age where true music fans no longer use Rolling Stone, SPIN or VH1 as sources for recommendations, and rather they peruse outlets who do not overdiscuss certain artists, and who give every band, from the iconic to the obscure, an equal share. So from this, we can safely assume that most people who firmly believe in the "overrated" qualities of The Beatles and Nirvana - people like Dave White - are either not true music fans, or that they have unfortunately fallen victim to overdiscussion and oversaturation.

    Also, anyone putting Nirvana at fault for Nickleback and Puddle Of Mudd recieving radio airplay need to get their heads examined, as neither of these bands, nor their watered-down cohorts, have yet to record a single track that resembles anything close to the cathardic explosions heard in "Territorial Pissings" or "Endless Nameless." Just deal with the fact that you're wrong and die already.

    June 19, 2007

    Summer Anthems '07
    '07 now has this new weird trend of hit songs that are very catchy, but not necessarily good, resulting in unexpected songs getting stuck in many people's heads. And so partially because of this new trend, summer anthems have been popping up everywhere.

  • "Summer Love" - Obviously. As far as I know, this one has no video, but they decided to make it a radio single just so it could get played out during the summer, which is fine with me. I like this one better than "Love Stoned" anyway, which I think has a video, and should be all over the radio by the fall. The only downside is that J.Timb now has 5 current radio songs, with more to come, and odds are in favor of a given Top 40 station playing at least 3 of his songs within a 2-hour period, which may ultimately result in pending massive overkill.
  • "Umbrella" - The seemingly polarizing huge new Rhianna single.. Very summery. I'm into it.
  • "Girlfriend" - Confusing as shit. So bad it's... either bad or good. I'm still not sure.
  • "Makes Me Wonder" - I guess this one is okay. Despite their nearly equal homo qualities, Maroon 5 is more fun, more funk, and more funny than, say, Matchbox 20, who never had a summer anthem.
  • "Because Of You" - Sadly slipping down the charts as of late, Ne-Yo's summer smash will probs be remembered as a late-spring/early-summer type of jam, anticipating the end of the school year.
  • "Cupid's Chokehold"/"Buy U A Drank"/"Give It To Me" - These songs are old, so they're exempt from summer-ness. However, they're still on the radio like 9 times every hour, and they all follow the "catchy but not necessarily good" trend, and they're decently summery "sounding," so they don't necessarily sound bad on the radio around this time (as opposed to complete bullshit like "Party Like A Rockstar" or "Glamorous" ... or "I Tried," which totally rips off "Return Of The Mack").
  • "Rehab" - This song is also old, and I think it's boring, but lots of girls seem to like it, and it's kind of weird and different, so whatever.. this one can stick around for a while.

    • Abundance of summer anthems makes mouths happy. Let's all smile and get totally douched by the slip n' slide.

    Headline News archives

    1