Scaaaaary Music

For decades there's been no shortage of metal meatheads, gothic chumps, gangsta wannabes and disgruntled boy bands tripping over themselves to appear as dark and twisted as possible, but genuinely unsettling music of the jump-out-of your-seat, look-over-your-shoulder, or at least refrain-from-giggling variety is often hard to come by. Just being a quality musician that deals with "dark" themes isn't enough to qualify. Slayer, for instance, may kick ass and utilize plenty of disturbing imagery but I don't find them "scary," and ookie-spookie types like Nick Cave and Tom Waits are too theatrically removed from their material (call me when you've actually moved into one of those decrepit barns you're always going on about, Waits). So here's a list of stuff that I find/have found personally unnerving to varying degrees, and that may get you blacklisted by the rest of the neighborhood should you choose to play them at this year's Halloween party. Obviously, this is far from definitive, as vaguely defined lists on some random dude's blog are wont to be, so any other recommendations are welcome (hint hint):

Suicide, "Frankie Teardrop" - This is still the only piece of music I've heard that I never listen to alone late at night; a completely bent 10-minute masterpiece about a disturbed factory worker who earns eternal damnation by blowing away his infant son, wife and himself. Alan Vega unleashes some of the most horrifying primal screams ever recorded over the ominously chugging synth bass and drum machine. A direct inspiration for admitted fan Bruce Springsteen's menacing "State Trooper" from the Nebraska album.

Kronos Quartet, Black Angels - The shrieking violins that kick off George Crumb's Vietnam-inspired title piece set the visceral tone for this anti-war lament of an album, but do not encompass its entire style. There’s also a performance of Shostakovich’s bleak "String Quartet No. 8," a crying Romanian woman (man?) throughout Istvan Marta’s "Doom. A Sigh," and an ironically placed recording of an old Charles Ives war tune reminiscent of Kubrick’s use of "Midnight, the Stars and You" at the end of The Shining. "Black Angels" is the most effective piece on the record though; its dissonant bursts of sound conjuring striking images of violence.

Before I go further, I should state the obvious and mention that I’m a classical music layman, and did indeed become aware of most of the composers below through Stanley Kubrick movies.

Krzysztof Penderecki, Matrix 5 – Before Crumb’s “Black Angels” there was Penderecki’s harrowing “Threnody for the Victims of Hiroshima,” searingly performed here by the Polish Radio Nationaly Symphony Orchestra (of which my uncle was… not a member). Despite it’s clearly defined structure, “Threnody” is like the classical equivalent of Peter Brotzmann’s free-jazz onslaught “Machine Gun.” The entire album is amazing though, and in its way pure horrorshow.

György Ligeti, The Ligeti Project II – Second part of a five disc series on the composer’s works, recorded between 2001-2004. Kubrick used a few Ligeti pieces for the soundtrack of 2001: A Space Odyssey. Two of them here, the shimmering “Lontano” and the static, eerie “Atmospheres,” remain the perfect music for interstellar traumas that leave you an ashen-faced old man inexplicably living out your days in a room full of antiques.

Bartók, “Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta” – More Kubrick madness; this was also used in The Shining, although it was nearly replaced after “Reunited” by Peaches and Herb tested better with audiences.

Scott Walker, “The Cockfighter” – Assuming your inner Beavis can resist snickering at the titular “sport,” and that you have a taste for Walker’s outrageous, faux-operatic voice, this tune from his 1995 album Tilt can serve as prime car-crashing material. After a minute or so of low murmuring, buried instruments and weird digging sounds that prompt you to turn up the volume, the track explodes into a techno/industrial dirge with Walker warbling about God knows what on top. This all had to have come as a surprise to any Walker fan at the time, and leads the listener to assume he was probably listening to a lot of Nine Inch Nails at that point (he was).

Finally we come to what surely must be the most terrifying album on the list, however the cover is so intense I still can’t work up the nerve to listen to it.



Clearly this nubile young woman has been traumatized by some kind of protracted mental and physical abuse, perhaps, judging by the location and the song title “Dirty White Boy,” incorporating scatological elements. I’m not familiar with the works of this “Foreigner,” but I would guess they resemble a cross between a harsher Diamanda Galas and John Cale circa the “Sabotage” tour, when he was ripping chickens’ heads off onstage.

Pleasant dreams!

"Freelove Autobahn" just isn't as funny.

Surely all of you are aware of the great BBC sitcom The Office, and even more of you are probably aware of the American remake (still largely unseen by me) on NBC. But did you know there are French and German versions of the show now as well? This Slate article has the details. I can't wait for the Islamic fundamentalist version where the boss makes inappropriate jokes about suicide bombers and Tim stones Dawn to death for her "shameful flirtatious glances."

(Above: One of David Brent's pranks goes horribly awry)

"I still wake up white on a blog that ain't." - Carcetti (paraphrased)

More Wire geekiness:
- Here's an in-depth new blog hopelessly devoted to every nuance of the show. David Simon posted a couple of comments, justifiably irritated by a post suggesting the show maybe is soft-peddling the junkie aspect. He pointed out that he wrote a six-hour miniseries focused on just addicts that was so grim even I couldn't get through it.
- Slate posted another "best show in the history of television" article shortly after the critical round-up in my previous post. They're also running one of their "TV club" features for season 4 where every week Steve James, the director of Hoop Dreams and other documentaries, and author Alex Kotlowitz discuss the show.
- Here's a fairly recent, extensive Q&A with David Simon that I see was just updated a few days ago. Man, this guy doesn't toss off anything he writes, not even his interview responses.

My Mondays are going to be rougher for the next couple of months as new Wire episodes are popping up a week in advance right at midnight on HBO On Demand. Man, that scene next week where Bubbles is killed by a stingray at the Baltimore aquarium was eerily prescient!*

*yes, potentially irate googler, that's a phony spoiler.

Vote for the guy that doesn't flail his arms like an idiot

So I've been seeing the ads for All the King's Men, which opens today. Is Sean Penn playing another retarded character? That's the only explanation for whatever it looks like he's going for. Looks like he accelerated from "charismatic" to "lunatic" at about 90 mph and the director failed to hit the brakes. I've never gotten the "greatest actor of his generation" hype around this guy. Yeah, Dead Man Walking, but his only really iconic film role in 25 years was a high school surfer dude. Another reason why Jackass still has a clear path to my $9.50 this weekend: those guys are authentic cinematic cretins!

On another random note, if your company lost 1,137 laptops in five years, wouldn't you suspect something fishy is going on? I don't think a seminar about minding your valuables at Starbucks is the answer in this case.

Sven Nykvist RIP

I don't usually post these, but I wanted to note that Ingmar Bergman's longtime cinematographer on films such as Winter Light, Persona, Through a Glass Darkly, et al. has died. I was surprised to find out he won very deserved Oscars for possibly my two favorite Bergmans, Cries and Whispers and Fanny and Alexander, neither of which are to be missed nor forgotten (although one's tolerance for Cries may vary). The Criterion box set for F&A is particularly exemplary even by their standards.

NY Times takes "Oh, that wacky Hugo" stance.

Insert "Hugo Chavez comedy hour" jokes here.

From the article:

But compared with Mr. Ahmadinejad, Mr. Chávez was just more colorful. He brandished a copy of Noam Chomsky’s “Hegemony or Survival: America’s Quest for Global Dominance” and recommended it to members of the General Assembly to read. Later, he told a news conference that one of his greatest regrets was not getting to meet Mr. Chomsky before he died. (Mr. Chomsky, 77, is still alive.)

It's funny he thought Chomsky was dead, but on the other hand I know how he must have felt. I've always regretted not getting to meet Howard Zinn before he was mauled by that cougar.

However, this particular article doesn't mention Chavez' further literary criticism later in the same speech:

Mr. Chávez drew further applause from the assembly when he admitted to being one of millions of readers who felt "betrayed" by James Frey, author of A Million Little Pieces, calling Frey "a bearded Mephisto who should be exiled into space." Mr. Chávez also speculated that Running With Scissors author Augusten Burroughs "totally made all that shit up" in his own best-selling memoir, and called author William T. Vollman a "pussy" for "only writing seven volumes" of his treatise on violence, Rising Up and Rising Down. Mr. Chávez later clarified that remark by claiming that a guy he knows has written at least ten unpublished volumes on the same subject and that Mr. Vollman had essentially "short-changed the reader" with his comparitively paltry effort.

No word yet on whether or not Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has mentioned Reading Lolita in Tehran during any of his remarks yet, but I'll keep you posted. In the meantime, I suggest you read this.

Jetty Images

Chris Marker's famous, haunting 28-minute short film La Jetée(1962), which I caught for the first time on Turner Classic Movies' short film festival the other day, remains a must-see for fans of film and photography. The subject of a post-World War III time travel experiment is repeatedly sent back to meet the woman whose face became fixated in his memory as a child, after they both witnessed a man's death at an airport. If that sounds familiar, yes, this film was the inspiration for Terry Gilliam's 12 Monkeys. La Jetée is shot entirely as a series of still photographs, with the exception of a motion shot of the woman's eyes opening which unfortunately is pretty hard to make out in this Google video (it's around the 18:55 mark). Except for one out-of-print short film collection, I don't believe the film is currently available on dvd in America.

Unfortunately, I wasn't able to find a version in the original French w/ English subtitles to post. So this is the dubbed version (created by Marker, as he apparently is not a fan of subtitles). But the recording of the narration has a hissy quality that makes it sound oddly, convincingly more like a document of the experiment in the film (in my opinion, anyway).

Hell M to the O to the T to the H to the E to the R to the F to the U to the C to the K to the I to the N to the Apostrophe Yeah!

HBO has renewed The Wire for it's fifth and final season! You see what kind of influence this blog has?!? Now maybe I can get takers for that dramedy I've been pitching about Mark E. Smith from the Fall coaching a high school basketball team. It'll be like White Shadow, except surlier and with less teeth.

On a semi-HBO-related note: Nice one, McSweeney's.

If you're here 'cause you want to be entertained (by me, not The Wire), just go away.

Yes, this blog is going to be devoted to shameless, rapturous praise for my favorite tv show (often alternating with Deadwood for that title). The best drama series in the history of television, The Wire, returns tonight on HBO and this year it's especially important that every man, woman, child and pet duck that can watch it do so. It's been two years since season 3 and the perpetually low-rated show was only belatedly renewed for a fourth after it started doing well on dvd. Word of mouth has steadily been buzzing ever since and there should be a definite ratings spike this year, but HBO has come out and said the hopes for a fifth and final season rest on the audience response. As the sorry fates of Deadwood and Carnivale attest, HBO - despite their "It's not tv..." motto - is no different from any other network when it comes to watching the bottom line and has no problem leaving fans hanging and storylines unresolved if a show's not making them enough money. So if you've never seen it, now's the time to rent seasons 1-3 on dvd. The Wire has a rep for being slow-going and inaccessible but once you get into it you'll wish you could watch the entire thing in one sitting. More than once. The show's complex, multi-layered storylines never insult the audience, and it's closer overall to a living, "page-turning" novel than any show I've ever seen. Anyone who loves that feeling they get when they're reading a book and some seemingly disparate elements are tied together, or characters who you thought you'd figured out reveal some unexpected depth or take surprising action will love the payoff they get from the Wire's storylines.

Much of the show's uncanny authenticity and integrity stems from the top-notch pedigree of it's writers and producers. The series' creator, David Simon, is an ex-Baltimore Sun journalist who wrote 1992's nonfiction Homicide: A Year on the Killing Streets, which was subsequently adapted into what was formerly my favorite cop show of all time, until this one came along. Writer and co-producer Ed Burns is a retired cop and former teacher whose experiences with Baltimore's broken school system will inform a lot of season 4's classroom scenes. The writing staff includes Richard Price, author of Clockers and Freedomland, as well as DC crime novelist George Pelecanos, among others. Every year the writers seemlessly incorporate upwards of 50 characters into a sweeping narrative with nary a false note to be found. The first season was firmly centered on the street level, as a cast-off police unit - including the show's nominal protagonist, self-destructive, oft-amusing cop Jimmy McNulty (Dominic West, providing a fresh spin on a cliched character type) - attempted to bring down drug kingpins Avon Barksdale (Wood Harris) and Stringer Bell (Idris Elba). Season two threw the audience a curveball by focusing on Polish dockworkers (!) caught up in a deadly smuggling ring and illustrating the problems of the city's working class. Best of all for me, however, was season three, which not only brought the Barksdale storyline to it's wholly satisfying conclusion but featured the unlikely but fascinating character arc of Bunny Colvin, a fed-up retiring police major who decides to secretly "legalize" drugs in his district, setting up a "free zone" it's residents nickname "Hamsterdam" where police push all the district's dealers into one spot. Among other ramifications, the good news is that crime on all the rest of his corners comes to a halt. The bad news is that in Hamsterdam he finds himself, as one character puts it, "the Mayor of Hell." Season 4 - which critics who have seen it are proclaiming maybe the best yet - introduces a group of new, young actors and will focus on public schools. The premiere episode has been on HBO On Demand all week and offers another promising start for this year.

Which begs the question of why if The Wire is so good it's remained under the radar for so long. The most obvious reason is that if you don't really sit down and commit to it or get to know the characters, it's hard to get into on a weekly basis (which makes it ideal for dvd). Then there's the fact that because it's made in Baltimore it's all but ignored by the television industry (the same fate that befell Simon's Homicide). Plus, the truth is, tons of white viewers will settle in every Sunday night for the lurid exploits of Tony Soprano and Al Swearengen but they'll look down on a "black show" featuring drug dealers, no matter how insightful it is (and I've seen comments on the HBO message boards that confirm as much).

But since I'm not the most articulate person to be writing on this show, and am more on the George Michael Bluth side of things in terms of street smarts, here's some more people weighing in:

The Baltimore City Paper previews season 4 and delves into the real-life situations and politics that inform the show.
Edward Copeland on the show's vast array of black characters (warning: Contains major, major seasons 1-3 spoilers)
The SF Chronicle on getting into the Wire (more spoil-happy stuff)
Patton Oswalt begs you to watch it

Here's some more critics' praise I copied from the Television Without Pity message board (TWOP apparently doesn't deem it worthy of recaps and seperate forums):

“Brilliant, scathing, sprawling, The Wire has turned our indifference to urban decay into a TV achievement of the highest order.

The show’s impact doesn’t always register fully in individual episodes, wonderful as most are. But taken as a whole - not just over this premiering fourth season but over the entire run of the series – The Wire triumphs both as art and indictment.”

-ROBERT BIANCO, USA Today


“It is the best drama in HBO history – all due respect to ‘The Sopranos’ and ‘Deadwood,’ ‘The Wire’ is deeper, tighter and more ambitious - and one of the finest works ever produced for American television.”

-ALAN SEPINWALL, New Jersey Star-Ledger


“… ‘The Wire’ is more than just the best show on television. This sprawling, ferocious drama is one of the richest, most compelling pieces of entertainment created by anyone at any time in pop-culture history. And even that over-the-top endorsement feels like it comes up short somehow.”

-KARLA PETERSON, San Diego Union Tribune


“I am so blown away by this show that I will go out on a limb here to declare that these 13 episodes just might comprise the single finest piece of work ever produced for American TV.”
-ADAM BUCKMAN, New York Post

“This is TV as great modern literature, a shattering and heartbreaking urban epic about a city (Baltimore) rotting from within…. ‘The Wire’ reclaims its place in the top tier of American drama.”
-MATT ROUSH, TV Guide

“ ‘The Wire’ keeps getting better, and to my mind it has made the final jump from great TV to classic TV – put it right up there with ‘The Prisoner’ and the first three seasons of ‘The Sopranos’.”
-STEPHEN KING

“Second, the argument over whether ‘The Wire’ is the best show on television needs only two other participants -- also from HBO -- in the form of ‘The Sopranos’ and ‘Deadwood.’ Rather than split hairs, let's just say that the breadth and ambition of ‘The Wire’ are unrivaled and that taken cumulatively over the course of a season -- any season -- it's an astonishing display of writing, acting and storytelling that must be considered alongside the best literature and filmmaking in the modern era.”
-TIM GOODMAN, San Francisco Gate

“The best show on TV…This is muckraking TV, in so many ways more powerful than anything a network news division can produce.”
-J. MAX ROBBINS, Broadcasting and Cable

“ ‘The Wire’ is the best thing ever done on dramatic television. Frankly, it makes ‘The Sopranos’ look like a sitcom. It makes ‘Six Feet Under’ look like a sitcom on the WB.”
-JAMES NOLD JR., Louisville Courier-Journal

“They have done what many well-intentioned socially minded writers have tried and failed at: written a story that is about social systems, in all their complexity, yet made it human, funny and most important of all, rivetingly entertaining.”
-JAMES PONIEWOZIK, Time

“ This season of ‘The Wire’ will knock the breath out of you….‘The Wire’ is a beautiful brave series. This is its best season yet.”
VIRGINIA HEFFERNAN, New York Times

”No television show has provided so much insight on politics and all the foibles, frustrations and sick sense of humor that come with it.”
-NEAL JUSTIN, Minneapolis Star Tribune

“ ‘The Wire’ isn’t just impressive TV, its impressive art, and it shows just how far the medium has come – and where, one hopes, it’s going….the best analogy might be the serialized 19th-century novel, the kind of thing that kept Dickens fans lined up at newsstands in anticipation of the next installment.”
-MARY PARK, Seattle Times

“If there ever was a series that makes HBO a necessity, ‘The Wire’ is it.”
-MELANIE McFARLAND, Seattle Post-Intelligencer

“Season 4 of HBO’s The Wire – the best series on TV, period – is brutal and brilliant.”
-GILLIAN FLYNN, Entertainment Weekly

When television history is written, little else will rival "The Wire," a series of such extraordinary depth and ambition that it is, perhaps inevitably, savored only by an appreciative few. Layering each season upon the previous ones, creator David Simon conveys the decaying infrastructure of his hometown Baltimore in searing and sobering fashion -- constructing a show that's surely as impenetrable to the uninitiated as it is intoxicating to the faithful. In its fourth year, the program adds the school system to cops, drugs, unions, the ailing middle class, and big-city politics. Prepare to be depressed and dazzled.
-BRIAN LOWRY, Variety

“If you have only one hour a week for television, give it to ‘The Wire.’”
-MAUREEN RYAN, Chicago Tribune

“There is absolutely nothing simple about ‘The Wire,’ and that's what makes it the finest show on the current TV landscape.”
-CHARLES McCOLLUM, Mercury News

“. It's as uncompromising and challenging and troubling -- but ultimately stirring, in its triumph as art -- as anything on TV. “
-DAVE WALKER, New Orleans Times Picayune

Oh, and the show also has this guy; everyone's favorite gay robber of drug dealers ("James Lipton?" "Nooo..."):

Please, PLEASE Stay Tuned for "The Commish"

I've been waiting for episodes of David Lynch and Mark Frost's short-lived 1992 sitcom "On the Air" to show up on YouTube for a while now and some kind soul has finally uploaded a well-worn VHS copy of the premiere episode in four parts. This page on lynchnet.com gives a synopsis of the show's history and what it was about. Basically, Lynch's career was so mega-hot following the initial success of "Twin Peaks" that ABC pretty much gave him carte blanche to do any other kind of show he wanted. But by the time he gave them "On the Air" in 1992, Twin Peaks had been cancelled, Lynch was entering a commercial and critical downturn, and now ABC had this utterly whacked new show on their hands - a screwball sitcom with virtually every alienating trait the average network executive and/or person could imagine.

As anyone who's watched a lot of his work can attest, the only time Lynch is more bizarre than when he's vividly exploring nightmare imagery of the subconscious is when he's trying to be funny. Even in dark works like ERASERHEAD, a stray oddly comic moment ("OK, PAUL!") is often one of the most head-scratching elements of the film. Lynch's sense of humor is completely unfettered in "On the Air" and it runs toward the almost impossibly corny and dated. Picture scenes in "Twin Peaks" like the befuddled old man trudging slowly through the bank in the series finale, or the Deputy Andy/Lucy/Dick Tremaine bits late in the series' run, then ramp up the "zany factor" even further and you've got the tone of "On the Air." While the appeal and marketability of Lynch's usual dark milieu for art film snobs and social misfits alike is understandable, it's hard to imagine under normal circumstances that a sophisticated or not-so-sophisticated viewer would go for stuff in these clips like the unhilarious David "Squiggy" Lander's indecipherable German accent; the stock dimbulb, ditzy starlet character; and the sight gags involving midgets and siamese twins; all of which would have been stale by about 1939. However, Lynch's typically un-self-conscious and surreal presentation of this material makes it, if not traditionally funny, at least a weirdly compelling anomaly. I dimly recall the subsequent episodes as being even more odd so here's hoping they turn up on YouTube (or as I call it, SourceOfShamelesslyEverIncreasingOrgasms.orrrg) as well.

ON THE AIR - episode 1
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4

On a related note, this YouTube user seems to be in the midst of uploading the entire first season of "Twin Peaks," including the essential, brilliant pilot episode which, due to ownership disputes is not available on DVD in the U.S., not even with the first season box set. If you've never seen the show and are unable to rent the pilot on VHS for whatever reason you may as well check it out. I watched TP when I was 11 and it forever changed the way I look at the world. The good news is it broadened my outlook, the bad news is I've attached permanent, creepy associations to ceiling fans.

EDIT: Whoops, that Twin Peaks pilot that guy uploaded is missing the last 10 minutes. I don't know what to tell ya.

Untitled Mike Judge Blog Post

What's the best way to spend your moviegoing dough for the remaining four months of the year - provided you live in L.A., Chicago, Dallas, Houston, Austin, Atlanta, or Toronto, that is (and yes, I realize that pretty much excludes all of my regular readers)? Go see the new Mike Judge comedy, IDIOCRACY. I have no idea if the movie's any good or not but at least by seeing it and possibly spreading word of mouth you'd be sticking it in some small way to 20th Century Fox, which has suspiciously gone out of it's way to completely bury and ruin this satire on the dumbing down of American culture. The film stars Luke Wilson as an "average joe" frozen by the government for research who wakes up 1,000 years later to find a society so moronic he's instantly annoited the smartest man alive.

The studio inteference and outright hostility Judge has experienced with this film sounds like any filmmaker not named Herzog or Gilliam's worst nightmare. IDIOCRACY was completed in 2004 but has sat on the shelf until just this past Friday, when Fox dumped it in and around the cities listed above with zero publicity, refusing to even authorize a trailer or website (as detailed in this Esquire article). Moviefone callers in the L.A. area are even finding the film erroneously listed under UNTITLED MIKE JUDGE PROJECT. I for one had never heard about it until last week. Since Judge is the creator of OFFICE SPACE, one of the all-time best sellers on dvd, as well as "Beavis and Butthead" and "King of the Hill," it stands to reason that good or not, the film deserves at least a FROM JUSTIN TO KELLY-level rollout. The prevailing conspiracy theory is that Fox either feared upsetting the film's corporate targets or were irked by his shots at the lowest common denominator-coddling entertainment industry (the #1 film 1,000 years in the future is a 90-minute posterior shot titled ASS). Early reports from people who have seen the film seem to be positive overall, although many are saying someone other than Judge obviously meddled with the final cut, citing examples such as the dreaded voice-over narration explaining self-evident gags on-screen. However, I'll remain optimistic about the film's quality. As the success of Beavis and Butthead proved and my junior high experience can attest, Judge's brand of satire can usually be embraced equally by those in on the satirical aspect of the joke and those who are simply tickled by the antics of their moronic counterparts on-screen. Also, let's face it: B&B's video commentaries were some of the most valuable music criticism of the past few decades.

Emo kids on treadmills are about the best you can hope for, Lou

Almost every year I subject myself to at least some portion of MTV's Awards of Music Video, perhaps in order to gauge just how low America's high school tastemakers have sunk that year. I've pretty much given up hope of witnessing any sort of notable spontaneity or epic stupidity - beyond stray expletives - that the show was formerly famous for. And no, I'm not talking about that boring, desperate Britney-Madonna kiss, which the media inevitably runs a photo of alongside any preview coverage of this EVENT. The show and network were firmly in the pits by that point as well. This year's highlights can be summarized thusly:

1) There was a brief, two-or-three second shot of Al Gore talking to Steve-O from Jackass backstage, presumably about whether or not polar bears staple their own ass cheeks together for amusement. Maybe Gore's handlers can line up a photo op with Gary Glitter next just to really torpedo the former VP's credibility for good.
2) There was a gag about Justin Timberlake installing shelves in Jack Black's dressing room that was kind of amusing (to ME anyway. I'm normally more a fan of shoe rack humour).
3) Uhhhh... geez. That's it!

A recurring yearly pattern for this show is to bring on a bonafide legend or, failing that, at least a famous person over 50, for the faintest possible stab at credibility. This year it was Lou Reed, who ran through a barely-minute-long version of "White Light/White Heat" w/ The Raconteurs (a.k.a. Jack White's Half-Hearted Power Pop Explosion). Later, they had him introduce Best Rock Video with Pink, whose schtick these days appears to be goofing on vapid, manufactured pop stars; despite the fact that, last I checked (which was tonight), she's a vapid, manufactured pop star herself, except drunker. Anyway, Lou made an offhand comment about hoping MTV plays more rock videos, which was immediately rendered hilarious by the parade of eyeliner-loving emo kids in the nominee clips that followed. Much like someone who only knew rap music from the bling-heavy, Diddy Puff/P. Diddle/Puffy Longstocking era might possibly be forgiven for having a skewed perspective of the genre, anyone whose knowledge of contemporary rock stops at MTV2 might plausibly believe the music is now exclusively comprised of whiny, cotton candy-bottomed drama club kids -- along with the occasional, generically tattooed-and-beefy nu-metal band. Indeed, every white performer on this show except Timberlake and the increasingly sordid Jackass crew seemed to be auditioning for a pilot called Tim Burton Babies. There was even a preponderance of actual themed costumes among the emo kids (who I learned tonight suddenly include an embarassing Jared Leto among their ranks), as if to erase any doubt that they had finally inherited the mantle of ultimate ridiculousness from hair metal. The closest thing to a victory over these dweebs on this night was when Fall Out Boy wandered up in their Victorian-era Sherlock Holmes get-ups to collect an award and Wee Man from Jackass plunged the statuette straight into one of the guys' nuts. I'll take what I can get at this point, people.

Speaking of Jackass, I loved it as much as anyone and will be there to see the upcoming movie sequel (if nothing else, to see how completely they erase alleged kiddie-fiddler Don Vito from the Margera landscape). Yet I find it hard to believe after so many years that their laughing fits are still genuine when one of them gets hit in the balls. Could it be they're just coasting until the inevitable crippling injuries and testicular cancer sets in? If today's kids can't look to the likes of Steve-O and Ryan Dunn for sincerity and inspiration, where else can they turn? Candidates for local office? I think not.

Really, I don't see what the point is of having a music video awards show in 2006 anyway. Everyone was reminded that the form reached it's peak in the early 80's when the following clip was rediscovered online a few months ago (I think it only won Most Implausible Attempt at Heterosexuality):

Next, get ready for reggaeton with the Ramada Sisters

There's a little-used "interactive" feature of this blog called "Blogging on Demand," wherein you simply send me a word or one-sentence phrase, and then sit back while I regale you with a magnificent* post based on that very topic. While the 592 search results I get for the phrase "Blogging on Demand" indicate this is not a novel concept on my part, I am arguably it's definitive practicioner, similar to how Jason Bonham is considered the ultimate hard rock drummer in his family.

Recently I received the following "B.O.G." (as the kids are calling it) request: "Paris Hilton as a 'singer.'" With the forthcoming glut of new fall releases - Outkast, Billy Joel, Arsenio Hall's zydeco tribute to Too $hort - I was going to painfully forgo listening to this obscure hotel heiress' debut album, Paris. But for the sake of research I mosied over to her MySpace page to check out the four album tracks currently posted. Before a single note hit my ears, I predicted the following would be true of at least one of each track:

1) Paris would speak/sing in that ubiquitious Britney Spears "baby" voice that would be easy to multi-track and digitally manipulate in the studio.
2) The lyrics would include lots of blatant come-ons too obvious to even qualify as single-entendres.
3) There would be some kind of reference to her "that's hot" catchphrase
4) She would team up with King Uszniewicz for a rockin' duet of Simon & Garfunkel's "Keep the Customer Satisfied."

As you can imagine, all but one of the above was true (no fair spoiling the answer). These songs were neither shriekingly terrible enough to turn off, nor interesting enough to keep listening for any reason. They were almost perfectly bland and generic club songs, professionally made in the way a Bring It On sequel is professionally made. If I may damn these tracks with the faintest praise ever typed, each one manages to be better than the Lindsay Lohan song that I heard a year or so ago from her vanity album, Firecrotch. It just goes to show that with today's technology you can just get some competent producers to slap a passable beat together and tweak anyone's voice enough to make them pass for a singer -- which, by the way, Anthony Keidis has also been proving for nearly two decades.

Incidentally, did you know that classy George Bush supporter Vincent Gallo wrote a song for Paris Hilton back in 2001 called "I Wrote This Song For the Girl Paris Hilton?" Yup, you can find it on his album When. Not to be outdone by that skeevy egomaniac, I'm going to be exhibiting my tribute to Paris' former best friend this fall, titled "I Made This Piss Sculpture For the Girl Nicole Richie." Some people thought I was taking the term "piss artist" too literally when I told them about this idea, but I've got to see my vision through to the end. Besides, I've already rented the space and collected 70 jars of my own urine, 84 magazine cutouts of Ms. Richie, and a stack of "Bible Man" VHS tapes for this thing. No turning back now. I'll also be playing the song heard at the beginning of this WFMU archive on a loop (Real Audio required). Nicole, I'm telepathically inviting you to the grand opening as we speak! I know you can feel me in your brain! Your lawyers can't issue their impudent court orders against me there. Oh, and eat something, if you happen to think of it.

*"magnificent" is sometimes equated with "barely sufficient"

"It's Nippy on My Tw@t:" The Quotable Deadwood

(Note: The title quote was spoken on the series by Joanie Stubbs, although you are free to imagine Hearst shouting it to Swearengen in the above photo. Or not).

Fully immersed in its most gripping season yet, I've been pracitcally in denial for months now that Deadwood is, in effect, no more. As you may know, HBO - apparently freaked out about the show's $5 million per-episode budget and their inability to find another Sopranos-esque cash cow - has cancelled my favorite show despite massive critical acclaim and solid ratings. Thus, the fourth, concluding season isn't gonna happen, and the first of the promised two, two-hour wrap-up films won't be ready until 2008.

The season/series finale airs this Sunday @9, but before we drag Andy Craned up here to talk about Deadwood's rotting, maggot-ridden corpse for the funeral service, let me celebrate one more time the most amazing aspect of this show: the dialogue. Never again will we see such a dizzying mix of Eliabethean flourishes, frontier plainspokenness and gutter profanity on television. What started out as a well-acted, well-written revisionist western has evolved - especially this year - into a near-masterpiece firing on all cylinders. The cast's enthusiasm as they sank their teeth into this rare material became more palpable with each year. With that in mind, here's a collection of but a few of my favorite quotes, along with some brief context. Some of these can be put to spectacular use in everyday life, whether you're in traffic, having dinner with the family, or feeding dead enemies to a Chinaman's pigs. Fortunately, I was able to refer to Television Without Pity's recaps for exact wording on almost all of these:

1. "I may have fucked my life up flatter'n hammered shit, but I stand here before you today beholden to no human cocksucker." - Ellsworth; season 1, episode 1. This early scene established "cocksucker" as the word du jour among many of the camp's residents. Since then it's every, frequent utterance has been like a miniature Christmas morning in dialogue form.

2. "Fuck us all anyway for the limber-dicked cocksuckers we are." - Ellsworth, toasting his fellow Deadwoodians, ibid. For this one episode at least, Ellsworth was quite the quote machine; until he "lucked out" by marrying Alma Garrett and had to clean up his act.

3. ""Pain, or damage, don't end the world. Or despair. Or fuckin' beatings. The world ends when you're dead. Until then, you've got more punishment in store. Stand it like a man, and give some back." - Al Swearengen; s2, e7. Sometime after his bout with kidney stones in season two, Al completed morphing from brutal, cutthroat boss of the camp to motivational speaker/political bigwig determined not to let the town he built descend into chaos. He imparted this bit of sage wisdom, along with a wake-up slap to the face, to newspaper publisher A.W. Merrick, who was moping about his ransacked offices at the time.

4. "Heng dai." - Wu, various. Wu - the boss of "Chink Alley" and owner of the aforementioned people-eating pigs - has repeatedly swore this Chinese oath to Swearengen (or, as he calls him, "Swedgin"). Translated literally it means "Brother," but also generally connotes loyalty and trust. Never was it more spine-tingling-ling-ly delivered than at the end of last week's penultimate episode. Unfortunately, while this is an awesome quote, in today's world it's hard to think of a situation where you could bust out "heng dai," complete with crossed-fingers salute, and not look bizarre and/or retarded: Alone with your good lady wife, to signify your fidelity? No. Super-secretive National Security briefing? Noooo. Rocking out at a Drive By Truckers show? Hmmmm, maybe. Perhaps I'll start my own one-man campaign to replace the played-out devil's horn salute with good ol' "HENG DAI!"

5. "You have been tested, Al Swearengen. And your deepest purposes proved, there’s gold on the woman’s claim. You might as well have shouted it from the rooftops: 'That’s why I’m jumpin’ through hoops to get it back. Thorough as I fleeced the fool she married, I will fleece his widow, too. Using loyal associates like Eustace Bailey Farnum as my go-betweens and dupes. To explain, why I want her bought out I’ll make a pretext of my fear of the Pinkertons. I’ll throw Farnum a token thief. Why should I reward E.B. with some small fractional participation in the claim? Or let him even lay by a little security and source of continuing income, for his declining years? What’s he ever done for me? Except let me terrify him every goddamned day of his life ‘til the idea of bowel regularity is a full-on fuckin’ hope. Not to mention orderin’ a man killed in one of E.B.’s rooms. So every fuckin’ free moment of his life E.B. has to spend scrubbing the bloodstains off the goddamned floor! To keep from... having to lower his rates.' Goddamn that motherfucker!" - E.B. Farnum; s1, e7. Uber-weasly hotel owner Farnum, played brilliantly by William Sanderson (a.k.a. Larry - of Larry, Daryl and Daryl fame - from Newhart)is one of the show's most Shakespearean characters. This monologue was delivered while scrubbing a particularly tough bloodstain which resulted from a Swearengen-commissioned murder in his hotel. Scrubbing a bloodstain and receiving a blowjob seem to be the activities most likely to prompt long, rambling monologues in Deadwood, just like in real life.

6. "Fuck every last one of you. I wish I was a fuckin' tree." - Trixie; s2, e3. Trixie - a.k.a. the Whoriest Whore Who Ever Whored - has been known to unleash enough streams of profanity to make even the show's other most quotable female (and best town drunk in TV history), Calamity Jane, blush.

7. "My bicycle masters boardwalk and quagmire with aplomb. Those that doubt me, suck cock by choice." - Saloon owner Tom Nuttall, so excited by his fucking bicycle he repeated this declaration later in the same scene; s2, e7.

8. "I am a sinner who does not expect forgiveness. But I am not a government official!" - Francis Wolcott, s2, e10. Strong words indeed coming from an erudite geologist/whore-murdering psychopath. The fact that Farnum is the town's mayor and that the most bizarre character is a county commissioner should tell you all you need to know about David Milch's regard for politicians.

9. "We'll move in your twelve possessions; you'll be free to come and go by your own fuckin' front door. And as you lay in your beddie-bye, I'll pop from the wall like Grandma Groundhog in a storybook and attend to your johnson, as he'd not see you jeopardize your mayor's campaign whore-fuckin' in your place of business. And I'll have installed in room 3-fuckin'-C or the like, of Shaunessey's adjacent shitbox, that he's paid Shaunessey to cut a hole through to ease my fuckin' fuckin' you." - Trixie; s3, e1, berating her Nice Jewish Boyfriend, Sol Starr, as usual.

10. "Could you have been born, Richardson, and not egg-hatched as I've always assumed? Did your mother hover over you, snaggle-toothed and doting, as you now hover over me?" - E.B. Farnum; s3, e2. Spoken to his hapless manservant while he dresses Farnum's wounds following a long-overdue beatdown.
(BONUS QUOTE: "I loved my mother." - Richardson, in response to the previous quote. Richardson is kind of like the Ralph Wiggum of Deadwood: a hopelessly dumb, walking collection of simultaneously sweet and creepy non-sequiters.)

At least I can take comfort in the fact that the Other Greatest Show in the History of Television, THE WIRE, returns to HBO in two weeks. More on that later. If it weren't for the sweet, sweet Wire I might wash my hands of HBO altogether. I'm still kinda mad about "Dream On" and their various Robert Wuhl-related projects, damnit!

I would've pegged Osama as more of a Talk Talk fan.

Here is an excerpt from the forthcoming, entirely classy memoir by the woman who claims to have been Osama bin Laden's ex-lover in 1996. I'd just like to highlight and comment on the following passages:

"He would humiliate me by making me dance naked. It was such a strange thing, because for the most part he believed music was evil. If a guest at the estate played music, he would cover his ears until the “poison” was silenced (To be fair, "Jagged Little Pill" was pretty inescapable for a while there -- C). But other times he would become this devout party boy who wanted to hear Van Halen or some B-52's. To this day I hear the song “Rock Lobster” in my sleep. I would be jerking around like a white girl—“Dance like a Caucasoid girl!” he would say—and his eyes would track me from one side of the terrace to the other (Somewhere John Waters must be kicking himself for not writing this first). “Your ass is too big, show me the front,” he said. Osama, you understand, did not know the difference between being vicious and being tender (so that whole USS Cole thing was what - a Neil LaBute-esque hate fuck?).

"The first night I met him, at a restaurant, I ran out the door, gripped by terror, and drove home. Relieved that his henchmen hadn't followed me, I ran a bath, lounged in the cold bathwater, then changed into a flowing silk robe. There was a bang on the door, and I could hear shouting: “Hey, black girl!” When I opened the door, there was Osama bin Laden and his seven-man posse (Because to paraphrase Dre and Snoop, "Ain't no fun unless the jihadists get some"). A cold bolt of lightning went through me. ('Cold bolt of lightning?' Is this a memoir or a sports drink commercial?)"

In the same excerpt she also mentions some of Osama's favorite TV fare: "The Wonder Years;" "Miami Vice;" "MacGyver." As a result, I think VH1 might start hunting this guy more dilligently than the Bush administration for those "I Love the 80's" shows. Of course, another topic of the book is bin Laden's alleged "obsession" with Whitney Houston. "In his briefcase," she writes, "I would come across photographs of the star, as well as copies of Playboy, but nobody in the West believes me when I tell them this. It's like they have this totally bogus image of Osama bin Laden. " Yeah, it's like everyone got so distracted by that 9/11 thing they totally missed out on the real dish.

Nevertheless, bin Laden isn't the first notorious celebrity sleazeball to develop an unwholesome fascination with Whitney, and I'm not talking about her husband... uhm, what's-his-name -- the crackhead from Bell Biv DeVoe. No, legendary French perv Serge Gainsbourg also made his intentions toward the singer clear when they appeared on a talk show together in 1987. Is it any wonder she went on the pipe?:

Portland Oregon and severed ears. If that ain't love then tell me what... is.

As mentioned previously, I was in Portland this past weekend. Sadly, all I really knew about the city before this hastily-arranged trip was that it's exceedingly liberal and serves as the respective homes of Sleater-Kinney, Powell's Books and a really shoddy basketball team. Oh, and that according to Tom Scharpling, it's overrun by "street trash" (ah, if only some FOT were here to give me the Best Show archive where he talks about this). However, in my brief time there I found it to be a pretty friendly, intriguing place. Plus the weather was perfect compared to the East Coast heatwave the week before. Anytime I briefly transplant myself to such overtly bohemian surroundings it puts in sharp focus what a tedious, overpriced yuppietown Bethesda is and what a rank vibe I get from DC in general. While I'm sure that listening to pot-fueled conspiracy theorists, being perpetually rained on, dodging cyclists, playing games of "Homeless or Hippie?" and searching for non-vegan restaraunts would get tiresome in its own way after a while, it served as a nice break at least for a few days. Of course, this weekend was primarily all about the Sleater-Kinney love, but I did get to visit a few neat-o places while staying with a very gracious friend of a friend.

While walking around in one of the more hipster-y areas of SE Portland we visited a craft store that may have given me a decorating idea (possibly my first ever!) for my next apt that has equal potential for awesomeness or tacky disaster: weird, Mexican Day-of-the-Dead calaveras (skulls) figurines and boxes, like this (although not quite as, uhm... graphic):

This particular store had a bunch of these set in odd, hotel/diner/stage scenes that I felt transcended obvious, Tim Burton-level gothicness to convey a more genuinely (or at least comparitively) odd sensibility. Unfortunately, in one of my occasional, arbitrary acts of huffiness I was put off by the 9/11 conspiracy book they had prominently on display and ended up not buying any. So if any of you know where I can find stuff like this either online or near DC let me know. I promise it won't lead to me putting up cheesy religious and/or Elvis shrines hither and dither.

On Sunday my host also showed me the most awesomest video store in the area, Movie Madness. Besides carrying out-of-print stuff like, say, Fassbinder's complete "Berlin Alexanderplatz" and Tom Waits' "Big Time," they're well-stocked in oddities like Christian scare films, 50's exploitation flicks, rock n roll bootlegs and Andy Warhol films. Plus, the horror section has subcategories like "Ferocious fetuses" and "NOT Growing Old Gracefully."

Their other big draw is their collection of movie memorabilia, which ranges from period costumes from films like "All About Eve," "Young Frankenstein" and "West Side Story" (less impressive is the occasional recent entry like Jodie Foster's sweatpants from "Panic Room") to various props, highlights of which (for me) include the broken glasses from Hitchcock's "Strangers on a Train," one of the mugwumps from Cronenberg's "Naked Lunch," and the severed ear Kyle MacLachlan finds in "Blue Velvet." This gives me an idea to set up a travelling, film snob's version of Planet Hollywood. "Schwarzeneger's 'Terminator' jacket? Sorry, we don't have that, my good man, but have a look at one of Harriet Anderson's damp linens from 'Cries and Whispers.' We're also working on getting Gene Hackman's raincoat from 'The Conversation.' Wait, where are you going?"

And then there's Powell's. Ah, Powell's. Nicknamed "city of books." Indeed it is, as it occupies almost an entire city block. I got a whole bunch of stuff there for under $40 and their website linked above will give you an idea of what a great place it is for book lovers. Why I didn't even get past the Michael Crichton and Danielle Steele sections! Just imagine if I had moved up to Stephen King!

So, in conclusion, Portland gets the "Thumbs Up." Yes, that's really my conclusion. Well, I'm sorry you feel that way but I think that adequately conveys my assessment. No, I guess "Thumbs Up" isn't very clever but... hey! I don't even have a sister. Like that was even a clever insult. What? Oooh... now that was a good one. That one hurt actually. Yes, you're right, I should've thought of a better ending for this post. Dianetics? Why no, I haven't read it. It'll help me relieve stress you say? Please, do go on...

The "Weasels Ripped My Flesh" cd must be in the other Prada bag.

Ladies and gentlemen, courtsey of Gawker, here's a photo of Paris Hilton holding a copy of Captain Beefheart's "Trout Mask Replica"



Judging by Paris' usual promotional fees I'm guessing Other Music must be out at least 10 grand right now.

Incidentally, I will most likely be at the following three EVENTS at the Black Cat in DC next month:
Tue, Sept 12 - Comedians of Comedy
Sat, Sept 16 - The Gossip, Erase Errata
Sun, Sept 17 - The New Quasars (supergroup feat. Meredith Brooks, Yngwie Malmsteen, Kira from Black Flag, Ralph Molina from Crazy Horse and Freedom Williams from C + C Music Factory)

Man, that New Quasars show is gonna be hot. Make sure you wear your Bicameral Mind t-shirts to all these events so we can come back to the ol' basement apartment, talk about my blog and take turns playing the demo version of "Bejeweled" on my cell phone 'til dawn.

96 Tears and 96 Eyes

I won't lie, people, the blog's undergoing a bit of a creative dryspell at the moment. Nevertheless, for those of you maybe not feeling the Sleater-Kinney love that's taken hold here lately, here's a roundup of some of the more mindblowing live Cramps stuff I've seen on YouTube:

Human Fly
I Was a Teenage Werewolf
Tear it Up (from the film "URGH! A Music War")
What's Inside a Girl?
The Hot Pearl Snatch
Can Your Pussy Do the Dog?
From the infamous Napa State Mental Hospital gig:
Mystery Plane
The Way I Walk
Human Fly
Garbageman video

The Final Sleater-Kinney Show

Sat, Aug 12, Crystal Ballroom in Portland, OR:
Setlist:
The Fox/The End of You/Wilderness/Jumpers/One Beat/Step Aside/The Hot Rock/Rollercoaster/All Hands On The Bad One/Night Light/What's Mine is Yours/Stay Where You Are/Modern Girl/Let's call It Love/Entertain/Sympathy/Words and Guitar

Encore 1:
Milkshake 'n' Honey/You're No Rock 'n' Roll Fun/Not What You Want/Steep Air/God is a Number/Oh!/Dig Me Out

Encore 2:
Good Things/Turn it On/One More Hour

Remember how I said the DC show was an amazing experience? Forget all that, I doubt that any band will ever top the final two S-K shows Fri & Sat in Portland for me. I walked out of both shows exhausted, drenched in sweat and feeling utterly glad I flew cross country to be there - and superthanks to Nicole G for hooking me up with the tickets. How many people can say they got to see their favorite band go out at the height of their powers with a pre-announced last show (barring the always-possible reunion, that is)? Following a few band I-love-you's, S-K said goodbye with a nearly-choked-up rendition of "One More Hour," a group hug and a bow to the crowd. Much like their NYC performance, both nights were filmed, so hopefully there will be some kind of future dvd release.

Eddie Vedder - not my favorite performer by any means but always seemingly a good guy - was a surprise guest opener on Sat night and, among other nice sentiments, summed up the general vibe when said that while people often wish they could've seen the Sex Pistols, Hendrix, the Who w/ Keith Moon, etc. he felt fortunate to live in a time when he could see Sleater-Kinney. Here's a portion of the ukelele duet he sang with Janet Weiss, the standard "You Belong to Me" (as heard in The Jerk!)




Fortunately, however, Carrie Brownstein seems to already have her next career move lined up, as evidenced by this clip of her interviewing Saddam Hussein - who looks suspiciously like Fred Armisen here, although personally to me it looks more like Colin Ferrell:



OK here's one more YouTube clip I found so far, a bit of "Words & Guitar" from Friday night's show:

Most unlikely use of Eno music in sketch comedy?

Clip from Chris Morris' Jam. Be back next week, hopefully providing my own content.