Why You're Here:

You've said to yourself, "beauty walks a razor's edge, someday I'll make it mine."

You've often thought about what it would have been like to drop acid with Groucho Marx.

You know that until you measure it, an electron is everywhere, and your mind reels at the implications.

You'd like to get drunk on the wine from my sweet, sweet mind grapes.

Wednesday, March 31, 2010

I Kinda Like The Way You Dot Your J's...

Sometimes you need to hear a pop hook so strong it simultaneously punches you in the face and puts a smile on it:



Or, if you prefer a video:



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Monday, March 29, 2010

The Forgotten Word In a Famous Phrase

The Famous Phrase: "military-industrial complex", from President Dwight Eisenhower's 1961 farewell address.

It's too bad Eisenhower dropped "congressional" from the draft of his farewell address. You can poke around the web for more specifics on why he did that, but it's easy to imagine that a desire to go out on a high note and not toss a grenade at another branch likely prompted such a choice.

In any case, today my man Glenn Greenwald chronicles a textbook case which illustrates what Eisenhower warned about.*

It didn't have to be this way.

It doesn't have to stay this way.

*Unlike many (most?) of my posts on politics, this one isn't partisan at all: there are guilty motherfuckers on both sides of the aisle.

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Thursday, March 25, 2010

The Litany

This post is making the rounds today on the googlewebs, as is evident by the fact there is so much traffic I can only link to the blog and not to that specific post. You're looking for "An open letter to conservatives".

I link to this not because the guy says or thinks anything new, but because he does an absolutely herculean job of cataloging all of the right wing hot-air/hypocrisy/exaggeration/outright lies that have been repeated ad nauseum over the past few years. The bullshit that floods the airwaves, dominates the conversation, and becomes part of what some people believe. The bullshit that those who know better almost never disavow and are quick to rely on to chase their constituents to the polls when they've got nothing else to offer.

That shit might win some elections, and keep some people in power, and make some other execrable fucks a whole lot of scratch, but it is bad for the soul, corrosive, and ultimately a dead-end. Prominent conservative thinkers knew this 50 years ago. William F. Buckley and his cohorts had no problem pushing the John Birch Society nuts and the Communist-in-every-corner paranoiacs into the fringes where they belonged. This, in part, allowed the modern conservative movement to grow, thrive, and, for lack of a better word, be respectable.

It would be nice to tangle with some respectable thinkers. It would make Democrats and others on the political left think harder and work harder and, most important, produce smarter, better considered decisions to benefit all of us.

Obviously this dude is preaching to the choir, but maybe, just maybe, like former Bush speech writer David Frum did a few days ago, other conservatives will sack up and speak up.

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Wednesday, March 24, 2010

Newsflash: You Suck

That's right. You do. Some of you know it without me telling you why or how, but that's a topic for another day.

Today, you suck for a specific reason: You Don't Listen to Gil Scott-Heron.

I'm going to go against my better instincts and allow you to remedy this by picking up his greatest hits--The Revolution Will Not Be Televised. Some things are so important I'll act against said better instincts, dig? Oh, you say you've heard of that song, have you? Good for you, you saw that mid-'90s Nike commercial. You still suck, perhaps even moreso.

And when I suggest you "pick up" his music, let me be clear: purchase that shit. Do. Not. Steal. I only reserve this highest of accolades for artists who haven't been properly recognized. Sure, most of the money goes to a dying record company infrastructure, but when Mr. Scott-Heron has to grovel for his next record deal, he can point to sales one record higher than before. Trust me, you owe him that.

Because this world is cruel and unfair, this greatest hits remains un-remastered and kinda sounds crummy. But don't let that stop you, Norberto. Consider subjecting your ears to this sub-par sonic presentation as a form of penance for your acute failure-to-recognize. Perhaps there are other, better-sounding compilations? Perhaps, but then you'll miss out on the cover art, which should bother you even if you can't recognize that Mr. Scott-Heron, as depicted, looks like a douchebag roommate I had in my senior year of college. On behalf of that lanky fuck I apologize to you, Mr. Scott-Heron.

But I really haven't told you anything about him, have I? Ah, better he remain a mystery. Or better you read his All Music Guide biography because I am lazy. Either one works, really.

Should you remain unconvinced:



Should you still remain unconvinced, have someone call the coroner because you are dead to me.

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You're Welcome

Maybe this is old news; stuff one finds on the internet often is. But I've been scrolling through this site for over an hour and laughing my balls off. A perfect storm of internet comedy. People with no clue catalogued by someone who is mean and funny--the classic internet comedy recipe.

And then there's this, which I can't believe I hadn't heard before. I'm speechless.

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Monday, March 22, 2010

The Most Beautiful Girl In The World



The Ferrari 246, aka Dino. Existed from 1968 to 1974. Named after Enzo Ferrari's son. Made from "spare" parts and sporting a V-6 so it could be Ferrari's entry into the lower-priced segment of the exotic car market. You can still spot its DNA in the current mid-engined Ferrari, the F430.

Growing up this was my favorite car. I got to ride in one when I was 7 years old--a father of one of my t-ball teammates had one. This was in Detroit, which made its presence that much cooler than if it had been in Los Angeles because of Detroit's preponderance of American iron and the dearth of flashy douchebags. Even living in Los Angeles it was rare enough that I only saw one on the road a few times per decade.

Once could be had in the early '80s for about $20k. By the end of that decade they went for a cool mil. Nowadays, upwards of $100k.

While my sentimental, play-acting side will sees itself in Magnum, P.I.'s 308, and my practical side knows that a 308 or 328 can be had for a fraction of a Dino's price, I will only ever covet the Dino.

Here's one more for the road:




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Saturday, March 20, 2010

The Elephant In The Room

I saw this over at digby's hullabaloo.



A generation's worth of wealth thrown down a hole to feed the military-industrial-congressional complex, with nothing to show for it. Keeping America safe has absolutely nothing to do with it, and never has.

But god forbid that conversation ever takes place while everybody freaks out about the cost of extending health care to all Americans, er, I mean forcing 30 million more people to pay for wasteful, over-priced private insurance, because we're not Socialists goddammit!

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Saturday, March 6, 2010

Now Watch This

As I sit down to watch Alec Guinness in the 1955 comedy The Ladykillers, I realize I would be remiss if I didn't let you know about the Coen Brothers' 2004 remake starring Tom Hanks, which only I can recommend because I think I'm the only person who's seen it and liked it.

The remake takes a lot of stick for, well, let's be honest, not being in the same league as the rest of brothers' oeuvre. But lotsa people hate on it. Could it be that Tom Hanks isn't cool enough for the Lebowski-ists, who look down their noses at it because the source material isn't theirs and therefore must lack that certain je ne c'est Coen? Ok, I can grant that, too (though that orthodoxy must surely be receding in light of No Country For Old Men and the upcoming True Grit, a remake of a John Wayne western, and The Yiddish Policeman's Union, from a Michael Chabon novel).

Despite all that, it ain't to be avoided like the plague as some would make you think. In fact, it's worth seeking out just for Tom Hanks' performance. It doesn't get any credit, but it blew my mind to a small degree (is that possible?). He knows how to be funny (Big, The Money Pit, Bachelor Party) but after a couple Oscars you have no choice but to turn into a self-serious believer of your own hype, which makes this role even more exceptional. He plays a con man in the guise of a Southern gentleman professor/musician whose seems to think his silver tongue is his gang's greatest asset. Rat-a-tat-tat come the words from his mouth, so many and so fast and so fluid I have a hard time believing his dialogue was delivered word-for-word--it just had to be improvised. Watching this character try and keep a grip on things as their caper starts to unravel is a delight.

So there you go. A silly caper-gone-wrong comedy with an unusually respectable pedigree that boasts a  standout comedic performance from an A-list multiple Oscar winner. I still think it woulda been a hit from anybody other than the Coens--it sure as hell ain't no Intolerable Cruelty, which truly sucked.

And and if that's not enough, it's got J.K. Simmons, too, and he always delivers.

UPDATE: For the record, Tom Hanks blows Alec Guinness away here. Yup. And I enjoyed the remake far more than the original.

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Friday, March 5, 2010

Now Hear This

"I've got reservations/about so many things/but not about you"

In my mind exists an ever-growing list of my all time favorite, play-it-to-death over and over again albums (MATFPITDOAOAA's, for short). Ever-growing in that there's always room for more, but there may be (and often are) several years between additions.

Today I hit play on Wilco's Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, from 2002, which promted this post. It's been 4 years, easy, since I've listened to it. Now, tons of ink's been spilled about this album, both with regard to how awesome it is and about the difficulty in making it and how that affected on the band. What I'd like to talk about here is how the music that reaches the level of MATFPITDOAOAA makes me feel and how it fits into my life.

To start, Yankee Hotel Foxtrot has the requisite "approximately 90% of the songs are fucking equally awesome (even if some are more awesome than others)", which is the first of the increasingly elusive criteria for my list. Of its 11 songs, I'd say 10 are on that level--the 11th was in shouting distance but the dissonant noises that eat up the last minute or two of the song are just too much, harshing the warm-cool breeze, stoned-immaculate, front-porch vibe so much that I have to click next, and I HATE clicking next. I'll sit through a lesser, mediocre song, but not I can't abide a mellow-harshing of this nature. That said, 10 of  11 is 91%, dude.

Next come its lyrics. It's here the album never slips up and is just exactly perfect. Hitting the Venn diagram bullseye among literate, abstract, clever, and emotionally revealing, I can't shower enough praise. Such lyrics are key to burrowing into my consciousness, their waves and particles interpenetrating mine, doing so by being memorable without being explicit, like the dreams you have in the morning after you're already sort of awake.

After the lyrics comes musical consistency. I don't know how to write about this, really, other than to say the all the songs sound the same--but in a good way. I guess this is the magic of production. The wistful, slightly detached vocals and the burbling digital noises that simmer just below the surface together make an otherwise (mostly) straightforward roots-rock album sound out of time and timeless. The overall effect this album has on me is intoxicating. No matter what song is playing, the album is playing, dig?

The real kicker, the one that separates great albums from the ones that are actually part of my life, is supremely subjective--what's going on in my life while the album is uploading itself. I listened to this album while Jenn and I moved into the house in Echo Park. Warm mid-summer nights in this strange new ancient house, windows open, all dark wood beams and strange embellishments. Stuff still in boxes but the music moved right in. She and I were riding high--we had walked over to the landlord's house around the corner, prepared to tell him, no, it just wasn't right--we didn't really have the stuff to fill it or suit, we thought. As we walked up his porch steps we looked at each other, thought "Fuck it!" and told that crazy bastard we'll take it.

I'll close with a bit of the ol' chicken-and-egg: did the album become more special because of the circumstances under which I experienced it, or did what I experience become more special because of the music I listened to?

Yes.

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Thursday, March 4, 2010

One Of My Favorite Movie Moments

From M. Night Shymalan's 2002 Signs:

Crops circles pop up all over the world. Then hovering ships appear in the skies. The entire world is glued to their televisions...




A pretty darn good movie; an absolutely perfect movie moment--made even sweeter because I, like M. Night, remember watching the "Bigfoot" segment on Leonard Nimoy's "In Search Of" and being freaked the fuck out:


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Tuesday, March 2, 2010

Can We Get Down To What's Really Wrong?

The only warm and fuzzy part of this post will be the song whose lyric I nicked for the title to this post, Van Morrison's "Caravan".  Might as well let it play while you read the rest of the post...



Here's how I feel about, well, the state of things:

When several things appear to be wrong at the same time, there is really only one thing wrong.

Let me expand a bit. On several fronts, life in these United States is off-kilter and somehow less-than-satisfactory in important ways, and--more important--different groups of people share this feeling but disagree about the reasons. Difficult to explain, perhaps, but not difficult to exploit.

Let me yoke this to some real-world examples. I'll be brief, and use shorthand. Because I'll bet you know I'm talking about:

Symbiotic Wall Street & Congress. Lifeless Corporate Food. Endless War Making.  Skyrocketing Health Care. Automotive Industry Failure. Mountains of Credit & Worthless Mortgages. Metastasizing Chain Stores. Increasingly Ludicrous Warning Labels. Empty Punditry and Celebrity. Environment For Sale. "Green" For Sale. Cheapened Language. Sex-Fueled Imagery. Cheapest Consumer Goods. News For The Stupid and The Scared.

If we lived in huts and relied on the King's largess to sustain the Kingdom in difficult times, such merry-making by the aristocrats would lead to necks in the guillotine and blood in the streets. Instead, enough of us drive gleaming chariots and feast on an endless supply of food, brought from the four corners or created in laboratories, that it would never cross our minds to change The Way Things Are.

Something lurks beneath this. We share it. It is collective even when it appears not to be. And whatever "it" is, it has seeped into every part of our society. We pour it into our institutions and we feed on what these institutions churn out, until nothing we touch is free from it.

Have the past 200+ years been the exception? If so, do we glimpse our true nature in these times? Is it for us, here, now--or others, in another time and place--to deliver the next punch to fate's jaw so that humans might be dragged one more step out of the mire?

I wonder...

Anyway, think about "It" for a while, won't you? I have some ideas, I hope you will, too.

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Monday, March 1, 2010

Sage Advice

The best $20 you can spend right now: some new socks.

Never a high priority, I know, but trust me, it's an underrated, low-cost quality-of-life upgrade. I'm telling you, don't even be like, "Ok, next time I go to Target I'll remember to pick some up". Be like, "I'm gonna go to Target today to pick up some socks".

This is how I roll. Come summer, I do it like this or this, depending on where the shoe hits my Achilles' heel. And they're black because that's how my brother does it, on the rare occasions when he's not wearing these.

In other sock-related ruminations, when I become a man of means, I will wear a pair of socks no more than twice. When I really become a man of means, I won't be wearing any socks at all.


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