Feeding Milk to Chickens

The State of Skub Address

2011-05-18T14:55:00.005-05:00

For those of you unfamiliar with skub, it was first brought to light as an issue by Perry Bible Fellowship. Since then, pro-skub and anti-skub factions (and even anti-pro-skub factions) have divided this country. I am a vehement anti-skubber. In the past few years, skub usage has gone up, but the issue has been moved into the background of American politics as the economy, terrorism, and unemployment have been more visible. However, what people do not realize is that skub is interlinked with and the cause of many of the problems that plague the United States today. I prepared a State of Skub Address today, in hopes that I may rally the public to the cause. It follows:

Ladies, gentlemen, skub-hating Americans. In the past half decade, the crusade against skub has waned. I know it is easy to be disillusioned seeing how skub usage has spread across this great land, but we must prevail. Osama Bin Ladin, the world's leading producer of skub, has now been eliminated; but it doesn't end here. Being anti-skub is a full-time job. Skub has destroyed the rainforest, leaving orangutans, three-toed sloths, and the screeching rihanna with nowhere to go. Skub is being used at an earlier age than ever, causing elementary schoolers to be kicked out of their homes and become skub-pushers. Skub has allowed Justin Bieber to become famous and influence other children to use skub. Skub has promised to marry various girls, only to get them in the sack,impregnate them with little skubs, and run off with their sisters to Havana. Skub has let loose angry trolls in hospitals. Perhaps worst of all, skub has shortened the rotation of the earth by six milliseconds in the last year, causing global warming and mild constipation.

Now, more than ever, is the time to address skub. For every one person who joins the cause, ten dolphins are saved, 50 pounds of CO2 is eliminated from the atmosphere, a baby kisses a kitten, a double rainbow appears, three people decide not to get a Bieber-cut,traffic on I-94 clears up, Radiohead writes a new song, and someone gets a rock out of their shoe.It is not the time to stop anti-skub protests. I propose a million anti-skubber march in the near future. Jon Stewart, Dan Akroyd, and Ernest Borgnine (whose pet rock was eaten by skub) should be keynote speakers. If we don't use our voices, skub wins. I dread the day that skub destroys my America; on that day I will go down guns blazing. An America ruled by skub is no America at all. So join me in a pledge to fight skub as vigorously as if it were a pack of rabid iguanas (which, coincidentally, skub is building an army of). Rid America of skub today, experience peace and freedom tomorrow.

Thank you all, and God bless America.

Please join me in the fight against skub. We cannot afford to sweep the issue under the rug any longer. If you would like to join the fight, please visit the Anti-skub Facebook page.

Anybody else...

2011-04-22T13:44:00.003-05:00

Think it's odd/funny/sad/worrying/sympathy-inducing to see U.S. Presidents gray, wither, and wrinkle before our eyes? Just do an Inauguration-Day-to-Farewell-Speech comparison, and it's a change that you wouldn't think four-to-eight years (or even as little as one or two) should make. Obama already looks a good ten years older to me. It's one of the most coveted positions, but I often don't envy Presidents. You deal with millions of lives, and sometimes you decide who dies and who lives. I think I'd crack. I wouldn't be able to sleep. How Dubyah supposedly slept ten hours a night... you know I was going to say "is beyond me", but when all I want to do is escape from the world, I sleep. Other times, I can't. I'm no President, but I could see it would work much in the same way except more violent. Plus, being on such a tight schedule, I'm sure it takes a toll on the body.

I'm no scientist, but I feel that looking at Presidents offers the answer to the disputed question of whether stress causes premature graying. I did some investigation, and it turned up that this link has never been proven, but it's suspected by many scientists. The debates seems to revolve around melanin, an a pigment polymer in our body that determines the color of hair, among other things. I won't talk too much about it, as I'm unsure even of that last statement, so I'll direct you to some links that discuss different sides of the issue.

The bottom line is that Presidents seem to age much faster than us commoners. Maybe it's because of the stress. Maybe it's just because we look much more at pictures of Presidents than ourselves or the people we know. Or maybe it's because the U.S. government has mastered time travel and Presidents spend years in the future finding out what issues they have to change to resolve the problems in future America. Which is your money on?

If I had the power...

2011-04-08T12:28:00.002-05:00

So it's been a long time (This is becoming the standard start of my blogs). Sorry.

This is also going to be pretty random. Today, despite having an exam, all I could think about on the way to class was tours that I would put together if I had the power. Not only that, but what they would be called. I put these bands together because A) I like them or did at one time, B) Some are influenced by the others, C)I think they have styles that would compliment each other and attract many of the same fans.

Here's a few:

-WHY? / P.O.S. = The Indie R.A.P.? Tour

-The Dismemberment Plan/Local Natives/ The Velvet Teen = The Adjective Noun Tour (Although, is Dismemberment a gerund in this case? I might have to rethink it. Besides, misnomers are hip)

-The Thermals / Matt and Kim / Headlights = The Feel Good Fun Time Tour (Matt and Kim and The Thermals are in fact touring together)

-Broken Social Scene / DFA 1979/ Chad VanGaalen = It's a Tour, Eh?

-Weezer / Smashing Pumpkins = The We Promise to Play the Stuff from Before Our Lead Singer's Went Crazy Tour

-Janelle Monae / Mugison = The Don't Put Me in a Box Tour

-St. Sat B / Nick Miller and the Neighbors / The Static Sea = The Futures Tour

-Grizzly Bear /Local Natives / Bowerbirds / Colour Revolt = The Sweet Harmony Tour (Obviously it'd have to be when LN wasn't on tour withe The Adjective Noun Tour) (Additionally some would add Beirut or Yeasayer, which I would allow, but I have never really listened to their stuff. It's not that I'm against it, it's just I'm poor and have to prioritize purchases sometimes)

-Radiohead / almost any indie band formed after the millennium = The Opening Bands Grew Up Wanting to Be Us (and That's A Good Thing) Tour

-Menomena (original lineup) / Lackthereof / Ramona Falls = The Solo Projects are as Genius as the Band Tour

-DFA1979 / The Black Keys / Local H = The Dinner for Two Tour

-The Strokes / M.I.A. / Liam Finn = The Nepotism Tour (This is in jest, as all the people whose parents were famous in these bands are very talented at would have likely made it on their own)

- Nirvana / Jeff Buckley = The Live from the Next Life Tour (I wish this was possible)

- Mugison /Chad VanGaalen / Liam Finn / tUnE-yArDs = The Kali Tour (A reference to their mult-instrumental, DIY nature. Kali has many arms, and if these artists did, they could do many things. Liam Finn and Mugison especially got their start as multi-tasking solo performers. I'm not sure about CVG's live show, but I know he records all his stuff in a home studio and mostly by himself. tUnE-yArDs, Mugison, and LF all have touring bands now I believe, although again, I'm not sure about CVG)

-Of Montreal / CSS / Bat for Lashes = The Face Paint Tour

-Arctic Monkeys / The Fratellis / The Kooks = The Fight in a Pub Tour

-Phoenix /Department of Eagles /The Dodos / Bowerbirds = The Flock Together Tour

-Modest Mouse / Avi Buffalo / Minus the Bear = The Indigenous Species' of the West Tour

Ok, I think I'm out of them. At the beginning I tried to choose bands that I'd always thought would compliment each others' sounds well, but at the end I think I was just trying to think of plays on names, although I did only put bands that I thought would go well together. There were some that fit the tour name, but I didn't include them.

Some of these bands aren't necessarily the same style, but again, I think the same people would like them. M.I.A. and the Strokes may seem different on paper, but most everyone I know that likes one is a fan of the other. When I saw Dismemberment Plan in Chicago, they played with a 60's-ish soul act complete with horns. People loved it! Sometimes acts you think have nothing in common are perfect compliments.

Most of the tour names should be pretty straight-forward. If you don't get it, it's probably because it's a horrible, tacky joke.

I also acknowledge that some of the opening bands could easily pull off headlining shows. But this is MY fantasy, and if you have a problem with it, imagine them as co-headliners or at a festival or something. Bug off.

Anywho, I know I'm a nerd and I spend a lot of time dreaming about stuff that is probably not productive at all. I acknowledge that. Wow, I feel like I'm getting super-defensive here and justifying myself to a computer screen that seems to be unmoved by my words and just continues staring blankly at me. Good times.

Guest List

2010-10-15T16:02:00.003-05:00

Hey all, I did a music guest list for the Scott Collection. Head over there to check it out.

Update: I also did an article on tUnE-yArDs. We haven't decided on whether this is going to be a regular thing or not yet. I'll keep you posted.

Janelle Monae: The Rebirth of the Cool

2010-08-17T15:35:00.007-05:00

The title pretty much sums it up. I want to write about this girl for hours. I want to talk about how she will not be restrained to one genre (a clue could come from her collaborators on Archandroid. She works with Big Boi, Of Montreal, and another ambassador of cool, Saul Williams). I want to discuss the amazing plotline of her music and how each track flows seamlessly into the other. I want to speak of how amazing her stage presence and choreography is. I want to speak of her eloquence and articulacy in the face of critics who stereotype the R & B community as unintelligent and shallow. I want to declare her the Miles Davis of this day and age because she breathes awesomeness. But I won't do any of these things. I will post some videos, and let you become so enamored that you want to research these things and come to these conclusions yourself.

"Sincerely, Jane" Live (Original track from Metopolis)- Janelle Monae

"Wondaland" off Archandroid - Janelle Monae

"Make the Bus" ft. Of Montreal off Archandroid- Janelle Monae

"Cold War" music video (Original track on Archandroid)- Janelle Monae

"Metal" and "Taylor Swift" Used in the Same Sentence

2010-06-04T13:47:00.004-05:00

Check out the YouTube station AndyRehfeldt. This guy is insanely musicly gifted to begin with, but he takes it to a whole new level, taking the vocal tracks from pop songs and recording metal tracks behind them. He's not a one-trick pony either, he also has crafted metal tracks into Radio Disney songs. The one that caught my eye was his polka-metal version of Ke$ha's Tik Tok. There's never been a bigger contrast of talent within the same song (And his fart sound effects during the polka parts seems to acknowledge it). Below is his metal version of Taylor Swift's "You Belong with Me".

Taylor Swift - You Belong with Me (Andy Rehfeldt remix)
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Tool Rools

2010-02-21T16:15:00.006-06:00

So, as anyone who reads this blog will know (all two or three of you), I'm a fan of the Format / Fun.'s front man Nate Ruess. This weekend my girlfriend, her roommate, and I went to Minneapolis to see Fun. in concert. I enjoyed their segment. Unfortunately, they were opening for Jack's Mannequin. Now, there was a time in high school that I liked this band. It was during my emo days. I saw them in concert at Summerfest (I think in '06?). It occurred to me after watching Andrew McMahon that he is a giant tool. This weekend, older and wiser as I am, my beliefs were only affirmed.

Now, if any of you want to learn how to be a tool on stage too, I'll educate you in a segment I will call "Tool Rools". Mr. McMahon followed all of these.

#1 First thing you do when you get out on stage is yell "How the f*** you feeling tonight (insert name of city here)?!?!?! This question follows or is similar to other tool rools to follow, but it deserves it's own rule because it's so cliche and one that tool rockers will always follow. Naturally, Mr. McMahon was not an exception.

#2 Have two mics, a foot apart, with absolutely no difference in effect/volume, that you switch between constantly so you can make spastic dramatic movements.

#3 Spastic dramatic movements. Now, there is a right way and wrong way to do it. But McMahon makes ridiculous faces when he plays that in no way are necessary and are clearly meant to be emotive but just come off as douchey. Dude looked like he was having sex with his piano. He clearly was thinking, Yeah, I look awesome because it totally looks like I'm rocking out hard when I'm playing chords on a piano.

#4 Insert the name of the town you're playing in into the song. This is what you do if you're a cheer whore. And yes, it happened.

#5 Stand on the speakers and sing. Unless you take a dive into the crowd (which is only okay if your music is dive-worthy and not sappy ballads disguised as rock), you are a tool.

#6 Swear as much as you can when you talk. Especially if you're not angry about anything. Like, fine, if there's power behind your statements, by all means, exercise your Constitutional right. But come on, if you're saying "I'm quitting music to become an f***ing ice dancer" (actual wording from the concert), then save it.

#7 Have other tools in the audience. So many stories. The girl behind us that was singing at the top of her lungs horribly, the guy in front that would be like "DID YOU HEAR THAT SOLO? IT WAS SO F***ING AWESOME. HE'S THE BEST MUSICIAN EVER! READ MY SHIRT, IT SAYS JACK'S MANNEQUIN! I GIVE HIGH FIVES IF YOU LIKE JACK'S MANNEQUIN!" (Again, actually overheard from the concert. Another unrelated thing I heard was a guy say "I just did something with a man that I never want to do again...").

#8 Jump on your instrument. I'm amazed he didn't destroy his piano. There was really no need for it. I really hate being at concerts when people destroy their instruments. It's like, "Yeah, it's a crappy economy, and you paid $25 dollars to my show, and I really could have charged you $3 less if I didn't have to replace this instrument, but bah, it's so worth it right?" No. It's cliche and it was originally done by people way more talented and rebellious than you. Your music is about wishing someone knew how you felt about them and crying in your pillow, not a corrupt government.

#9 After each song make it look like you just ran a marathon.

#10 Announce to everyone that you're drinking alcohol on stage. Especially when it's a martini.

Basically, I've seen a lot of bad concerts (mostly in my high school days), but if I were the Pitchfork of concert reviewers I'd give a Jack's concert a 0.0 or probably even this.

Politics on the Pot?

2010-01-28T15:42:00.003-06:00

So I'm sitting on the toilet and I read "Don't forget to spay and neuter your liberals". Liberals had been crossed out and replaced with 'conservative bigots'... Next to it said "Bush Cheney Oil". The stall was full of commentary about politics. I thought to myself, You know, it seems like about 75% of stall comments are about politics. Maybe it's because I'm on a campus. But I feel I've seen it just about everywhere I've gone. Do people instinctively think about politics on the pot, or is it just the idea that bathroom commentary has to be bold and powerful? What do these people mean to accomplish by doing this? Are undecided votes won on the toilet? Do people think their deepest when they're squeezing one out? Maybe it's because they're alone with no distractions. Or maybe they're reading the paper and are enraged by something they've read. This phenomenon just fascinated me. I leave it up to you.

The Year in TJ

2010-01-02T15:49:00.006-06:00

No, that's not the title of my new porn flick. I've already gone over the year in music, and since this blog is basically centered on music and myself, I thought I'd go over my own year. I don't blame you if you skip over this post, but it'll be nice to look back at in a couple of years. Some of these things I've already written about, others I haven't.

Basically my year started in April, when I started to hit a string of good luck. Katie and I had been hanging out a lot, and on the 24th we went to Milwaukee to see Company of Thieves. Two days later we were dating. There's no way to describe how happy she's made me since then. Well, I probably could, but it'd be agonizingly long and sappy, and believe me, I have been known to be sappy.

About two weeks later I went in to see my advisor. The previous year I had been denied enrollment in Education. I wasn't feeling too confident because I had basically done nothing worthwhile in the last year to make myself more appealing. I went in to the meeting asking what I could do to make it the next year. The advisor looked at me and said, "Um, I can't really tell you anything flat out, but I wouldn't be so pessimistic about this year". I walked out of that meeting feeling more angry than anything, because I was convinced that she didn't actually know if I made it. However, when I got home I looked in the mail and I had already gotten my acceptance letter. I was completely unprepared and it was like my whole future had changed drastically in one day. Really, it had changed a lot in the last two weeks. I am very naturally pessimistic and the way things tended to be going right past my expectations was mind-boggling.

In addition, for the last couple months, there was a growing number of people that had been asking me to move up a level in coaching the women's club hockey team. In this, I mean that I was the C team coach, and the B players were asking me to come up. I was quite flattered, as I didn't see it coming. I had coached the C team for three years, but this year I had substituted for the B coaches at a couple tournaments. When a position opened up, they asked me to fill it for this school year. Though I had a great time with the C team, I obliged because I felt I could be of more help at a higher level of play. The C team had a new batch of beginners every year, and as i've been playing hockey since I was in third grade, I had trouble remembering how I learned the basics. Coaching the B team's been a lot of fun, and I think things really have begun to click.

The summer was quite bittersweet. I worked grounds at the golf course for the fourth year. The golf course is a great deal, as I get paid well and get about 45 hours a week. Every once in a while a meal gets thrown in there. I worked from 5:30 am to 1:30 pm on weekdays and went in on weekends worked about two to two-and-a-half hours. The hours were nice in the sense that it left nights open to do things. However, this was probably my least favorite year at the club. First off, I was 6 hours away from Katie. This led to seeing her twice over the summer. Both of the visits were amazing and I wouldn't trade them for the world, but it was hard being so far away. Lack of sleep made me more prone to being sad and moody. The politics were really getting to me, as there were numerous tensions between people. Some weren't doing their jobs because they thought other people were getting unfair treatment. I think I worked harder this summer as a result of picking up other peoples' slack. I was so ready to go back to school once it came around.

The psychological effects of this summer probably made the transition back pretty difficult. I had some major social anxiety over the summer, and when you start a program right after that where you have all your classes with the same thirty people in the midst of that problem it makes things quite difficult. Luckily I began to relax after a while and ended up making some good friends within the program.

Practicum was another story. I was placed in a classroom on Mondays and Wednesdays for four ninth grade US History classes. I'm an interesting case because I want to be a teacher, but I'm a nervous public speaker. I've noticed there are others like me within the program, however. My cooperating teacher was great in the sense that he would bluntly tell me my flaws and my strengths. When I'd teach lessons, he'd give me specific things to focus on. He didn't hold my hand, and he put me in some really difficult situations. He had to leave often because one of his children would get sick, and he'd leave me in charge. These were scary times, but I became a lot better of a teacher because of them. I developed a voice at some point within it, and I finally began to relax in front of the kids as I got to know them. I still doubt myself every once in a while, but I think it's normal of people in my position.

I've still been playing as much hockey as I can, but it's been limited due to my schedule being out of my hands and the lack of funds I experienced in the last couple months. I owed my parents some money (a large sum) and paid it to them in October. It resulted in me being left with little of my summer earnings. Constant illness kept me from working much (see Pneumon-YEAH!). I was left with enough to live on for a few weeks when I paid my parents and the instruction that I should take out some money from some investments. In order to due this, I had to take over managing my own accounts, as my family had been doing it since I had never taken any money out. I legitimately thought I'd have my money in a matter of weeks. I got it on Christmas Eve. A month or so of owing people money and having literally no money to spend on food or bills except maybe the $50 I might manage to make over the course of two weeks really put things in perspective. It's been a big relief having that problem solved in the last two weeks, and now I'm able to set straight some debts I owe.

As for 2010, I'm really excited for it. I'll be teaching in a middle school next semester, I'm planning on staying in Madison this summer, and Katie and I have some awesome stuff planned. Hanging out with Katie's awesome all the time, but it's going to be cool going to the Fun. concert in Minneapolis and hanging out in her hometown, going to the Badger hockey team's outdoor games, going to the Lion King play while it's in Madison, and watching the Olympics together.
It's gonna be a good year.

Top Ten Albums of '09.

2009-11-28T16:43:00.015-06:00

So it's been a while since I've written (how many posts have I written this year starting off with this sentence?). Education has me constantly working and I think my lack of writing is a good sign. Right now, howeverm I'm practically the only person in Madison since most people will be coming back from Thanksgiving break tomorrow. Things will be busy for me again soon, so I figured I'd get a post in while I have time. So here's my Top 10 albums of 2009, a few honorable mentions, and some albums that were intentionally left off the list. Hit it.

1. Veckatimest - Grizzly Bear
This is probably going to be the number one on a lot of lists, and deep inside I don't want to make it #1 just for that reason, but it's too good to not (I can feel better because #2 probably won't be on many people's lists). "While You Wait for the Others" is probably the song of the year as well (the original version, not the one where Michael McDonald sings). It's hard to believe they could top Yellow House, but they certainly did. Daniel Rossen's voice is amazing, the harmonies are great, and even though Ed Droste's "Two Weeks" received considerable airplay, it never gets old. And come on, people, if Jay-z thinks they're cool...

"While You Wait for the Others" at YouTube

2. Intuit - Ramona Falls
Who? I'll tell you, calm down. Seriously, take a step back. I can smell your breath, and it's not charming. Ramona Falls is the side/solo project debut from Brent Knopf of Menomena. Yes, another Menomena band, but until they make a bad album you have no reason to complain. This is Knopf's first, and it's amazing. His angelic voice can get wicked at times. He can serenade you or rip your face off with words. He's always right, but willing to admit he's wrong sometimes (don't worry about the logistics of that sentence). There's not a single weak track on the album. It has not only held me over until the upcoming release of a new Menomena album (date still tentative...), it has furthered my confidence in each member's genius. PS the music video below is probably the coolest of the year in my book.

"I Say Fever" at YouTube.

3. Two Suns - Bat for Lashes
Natasha Khan knows she's good. She knew it before anyone else did. Pitchfork thought her first album was good, but nothing special. She likes glitter and sings about having split personalities. She's weird. It's amazing. Both everything that's good about a female vocalist and a bit of every good female vocalist is in Natasha Khan. You can hear Bjork, Tori Amos, Fiona Apple, and PJ Harvey in her music. She's by no means a ripoff, she's a unique bird/flower/butterfly/anything that's beautiful (and maybe a little bit scary and unstable).

"Daniel" at Yahoo!

4. Eskimo Snow - Why?
Despite having horrible pains from pneumonia at their show and having to go to the ER before they played, the amazing-ness-ocity of Why? is undeniable. Eskimo Snow is the calmest child in the Why's discography, but it's also the most introspective. Where Alopecia talks about jerking off in an art museum bathroom, E.S. asks its mother if its failing. If you love the mallet percussion, you'll love this album.

"These Hands/ January Twentysomething" at Pitchfork

5. Never Better - P.O.S.
The rap I had in my collection before P.O.S. was limited essentially to Why? and K-Os. Why? is a Jewish guy who sounds like a cross between that dude from the Decemberists and that dude from Interpol, and K-Os raps about going to church. P.O.S. is still far from "gangster", but it was my first delving into an artist that was primarily a rapper and a little bit angry. I admit, I got this album initially just because The Velvet Teen's Judah Nagler guests on its title track. I had seen P.O.S. on tour with TVT and Minus the Bear, so I knew his stuff incorporated live band. P.O.S. is the epitome of indie rap. The music to his songs is amazing, and his rhymes are enormously clever. If you've never seen his cover of Pearl Jam's "Why Go", I feel sorry for you, and this injustice must be corrected quickly by clicking on this link.

"Never Better" at YouTube

6. No One's First and You're Next EP - Modest Mouse

I thank God everyday that He gave Isaac Brock a lisp. The band has had mainstream success, yet Brock's maintained his lunacy. They'll still put out 8 minutes songs even though the radio stations will search their music for a hit to play. This is a B side album, but it plays like a coherent thought (which might be the first time anyone's used the word "coherent" to describe anything Modest Mouse has done).

"King Rat" at Yahoo!

7. Upper Air - Bowerbirds
Like Andrew Bird? Like Bon Iver? I have a friend that described Bowerbirds as the illegitimate child of those two artists. If that doesn't sound like a beautiful kid, I don't know what is.

"Northern Lights" from Pitchfork's Cemetery Gates

8. Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix - Phoenix
I've claimed to know a lot of bands before they made it success in the mainstream. You'll never hear me say this about Phoenix. Well, I shouldn't say that. I bought the album about two weeks before it started getting played on the radio and in commercials. But I can't say I was far ahead of the curve on this one. They're so infectious. And while their earlier albums are better, 1901 is probably the best song they've produced, and this is definitely their most mature album.

"1901" at Yahoo!

9. Wildlife - Headlights
Depressing Headlights songs? Where are the four horsemen, cuz this has to be the Apocalypse. Maturity looks good on Headlights. I've heard comparisons of this album to Broken Social Scene's work, and there are definitely a lot more moving guitar parts. If you want them to be their usually poppy selves, then you might be a bit disappointed, but I now look at Headlights less as a "cute" band and more as a creative band.

"Love Song for Buddy" at YouTube

10. Aim and Ignite - Fun.
When the Format broke up I needed a hug. It was just such happy and creative music. Luckily, Fun. is essentially a continuation of the Format, led by ex-frontman Nate Ruess. I'm going to see them in February in Minneapolis and I couldn't be more excited. Ruess has an amazingly pure and flexible voice. Freddie Mercury would approve, as some of their stuff shows shades of Queen.

"All the Pretty Girls" at YouTube

HONORABLE MENTIONS

Now We Can See - The Thermals
This album didn't make it just because no album can ever measure up to The Body, The Blood, The Machine. That album was the right way to do political, societal, and religious commentary in a rock opera (I'm looking at you Green Day...). Now We Can See is a great album, it just doesn't have the venom and message that TBTBTM had.

"Now We Can See" at Youtube

Mean Everything to Nothing - Manchester Orchestra
I think it's definitely a progression after I'm Like a Virgin Losing a Child. It's not so one-dimensional. ILVLC was just so depressing. It was a good soundtrack to my sophomore year. But MEN had a great flow and explored a wide range of feeling. You could hear the influence the bands M.O. toured with had, as shades of My Morning Jacket, Colour Revolt and Brand New come out in many of their songs.

"Shake It Out" at Yahoo!

Ordinary Riches - Company of Thieves
Gen has wicked pipes. The guitarist showed his skills on Live from Daryl's House, but he could use them in their music a lot more. I could not get enough of "Oscar Wilde".

"Oscar Wilde" at YouTube

NOTABLE OMISSIONS
Time to Die - The Dodos
Just to show you I don't always agree with Pitchfork (although that should be obvious from previous posts), I thought the new Dodos album was horrendous. Meric Long's interesting riffs died somewhere between albums.

"Fables" at YouTube

Daisy - Brand New
Literally, just nothing special. They were going in a great direction with The Devil and God are Raging Inside of Me, but it just seems Jesse Lacey's gotten lazy and gotten mental help, which makes for much less interesting music. TDGRIM was just so genuine. Daisy just seems like an attempt to quiet the people who said TDGRIM was too depressing and not hard enough. I do wish I could see them with Glassjaw, though.

"Vices" at YouTube

There it is.

Pneumon-YEAH!

2009-10-07T13:17:00.004-05:00

So, it's been a while since I've updated, but I'm going to have a bit of time on my hands for the next five days or so. Coincidentally, like my last post, this story has to do with a concert (or maybe not, since concerts are often the most exciting part of my life).

So, on Friday, I had what I thought to be a fever. I didn't have a thermometer, so I had no way of confirming. I quaranteened myself to my room until Sunday, when I had a 5K I had signed up for.

The 5K was the Run/Walk for Literacy, run by the Literacy Network. I've started my practicum at Verona Area High School, and my cooperating teacher set up a team. At the time I was feeling somewhat better. I hadn't run in a week-and-a-half, so I wasn't feeling great about how I'd finish, but I figured I'd go out there and do what i could. I ended up finishing in 25:19 with an 8:09 mile average. I got 50/276 overall, 35/106 men, and 5/13 in my age group of 20 to 29. I was pretty happy considering the circumstances, and had I known what I know now I would have been even happier. Plus, the finish line snuck up on me, otherwise I would have sprinted earlier and maybe grabbed a few more spots lower.

Anyway, back on track. I went to school Monday without a hitch. I had a cough here and there, and at night it hit me a bit harder, but generally I thought I was still getting better. Last night I coached hockey practice, then I went to the free WHY? concert at the Union. As I was meeting the band, I started to feel a pain on my left side in the rib area. I shrugged it off as either nerves or gas and headed back out into the crowd with my t-shirt. During the opening band the pain intensified and I still didn't have to drop a deuce. I was starting to worry. My first thought was a collapsed lung because that can happen without provocation and I was having trouble breathing. I tried to tough it out until WHY? I only made it halfway through the second band, AU, who were actually an amazingly entertaining duo. The drummer was fantastic and had some unique drumming methods. At that point I called my girlfriend and asked her to take me to the hospital. Katie was amazing and stayed with me throughout the long night.

When we walked in they asked me if I'd recently had flu-like symptoms. I said yes, and it was like an alarm went off in the room. Mask on, into the quarantined area. Luckily it was a slow night so I got into a room pretty quick. It turned out I had an 103 fever. It made me wonder if I'd had a fever for five days now. I went through about 4 people over the course of three hours conjecturing that I had swine flu and what I was feeling was "aches". I didn't believe them one bit. Luckily there was a promise of a chest x-ray somewhere down the road, otherwise I'd have insisted on it. Eventually, I was given some vicodin, so things started looking up. Finally I got my x-rays. The first clue that it wasn't swine flu was when the doctor walked back into the room without a mask on. I had pneumonia. Doctor seemed surprised. I wasn't.

So now vicodin and fluids are my best friend. I'm back in my hometown until at least the weekend. Couldn't have happened at a busier time in my life, but my professors and partners have all been very understanding. In the meantime, I hope to get a ton of work done and finish up Crime and Punishment. My vicodin dosage has been cut in half, so I'm not as pain-free as last night, but I'm assuming things will improve in the next couple days.

Hmm, what to give you musically. In preparation for the concert I listened to nothing but WHY? for about four days. But I have been loving Phoenix's sophomore and junior albums, 2004's Alphabetical, and 2006's It's Never Been Like That. I'll give you two songs. One that's a rare "not-upbeat" song by them called "I'm An Actor" off the earlier of the two albums, and one off the latter, which is the more Strokes-like songs we're used to from their most recent, Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix. In the Long-Distance Call video we get a bit of a look into their French-ness.

I'm An Actor by Phoenix at Yahoo! Music

Long-Distance Call by Phoenix at Yahoo! Music

It's Official: I've Played an Instrument On Stage with a Professional Rock Band

2009-08-17T19:30:00.003-05:00

So, it's probably not as impressive as it sounds, but it was one of the most exciting experiences of my summer, so it's still pretty sweet to me.

It was about two weeks ago that I saw that Headlights had posted a concert date in Madison on their Myspace. I investigated and found out it was at the UW Memorial Union Terrace and it was part of the union's free "Hot Summer Nights" series. The Terrace is a sweet place to watch concerts because you can buy pitchers of beer and enjoy the beautiful lake view. Once the band you're there to see plays you'll obviously want to move up, but until then it's nice to kick back and have some nice conversation and maybe get a little alcohol in you. This is what my friend, Jenny, and I did while the opening band, Scotland Yard Gospel Choir, played.

The demographic was clearly mostly there to drink. Much of it was middle-aged and unaware of who Headlights was. Even many of the college students there were just there to get drunk and dance to free music that they'd never heard before. Now, I have to mention Kansas-basketball-jersey-mullet-man. Now, the picture to the right was snapped by a young woman named Kayla Clarke, who also captured the video that will be embedded later. KBJMM as I will refer to him later was the sweetest dude ever. Drunk as a skunk and ready to party, he had a beer in one hand and his other hand in the air all night in various hippy symbols. The band loved him. The people loved him. God loved him.

Now on to my story. By the time Headlights played, I had a bit of liquid encouragement in me. It was my third time seeing them, and I had a short conversation with Erin last time they were in Madison at Forward Music Festival, so naturally in my state, I was determined to impress them. So what did I do? After every song I yelled out what album the song was from. I was standing in front of Erin, and I think she laughed a couple times due to it. After a new song, I yelled out "Wildlife, due October 6th!" Erin went, "Woah, who said that?" I raised my hand, and she said, "Come up and say that into the mic". I went up and repeated myself, and the band and a couple people in the crowd laughed. Feeding off that, I grabbed the mic back and said "AND! If you pre-order now for $20, you get a free T-shirt!" The band found this funny, and Tristan said, "That guy is now on the payroll".

Now, even if this had been the only happening of the night, it probably would have been the best story I'd have to tell from a concert, and I've been to a lot of concerts. But two songs later, it was time for the encore. Now's where the video comes in:

Basically, this is the gist of that video:
Headlights called up some people from SYGC to play percussion. Tristan said "Not to discriminate, because I don't know which of you guys (meaning the crowd) has rythym. I know Scotland Yard Gospel Choir has rythym". However, then Erin decided to ask me if I wanted to play tambourine and I replied "YES!". So I jumped up there. Then for some reason, I felt the need to say something, so I go, "It's in 4-4?" as in the time signature. And replied in the affirmative and clapped on the beat as Tristan played the intro. Then I recognized it as "TV", proceeding to say something stupid, which was "Oh, you know this". This was in response to Tristan earlier saying "Trust me, we don't know how to play it any better than you guys do", but Erin probably had no idea what I was talking about and was thinking Uh, yeah, I recorded the song, but she's really nice and would never say that. Interestingly enough, on their last tour I don't think Headlights played TV, probably because they were sick of it because that was there first "hit".

Anyway, what followed was three minutes of me smashing the crap out of my hand with a tambourine. At the end, I try to high five the lead singer of SYGC, which he meets with a drumstick. Then for some reason I keep my hands raised like a dork. Again, liquid encouragement. After the concert we went over to the merch stand and Jenny bought a shirt. I actually had all the merch they had, so I was unable to purchase anything. I thanked Erin for inviting me up and she and Nick both thanked me for the plug of their album. Afterwards I called my girlfriend, who probably couldn't keep up with my drunken school-girl-esque rambling.

So song of the day = TV by Headlights. I'll include the version without the drunk tambourine so you can decide wihether it sounds better with or without me in it.

TV by Headlights at YouTube

Inter-Web Gems

2009-08-13T15:35:00.006-05:00

I've found a plethora of awesome/hilarious web vids/sites I've discovered lately. Thought I'd share them.

1. First one comes from Myspace. I use my Myspace primarily to keep up to date with music. It's a fake Bill Cosby Myspace I made in high school where I put Bill Cosby's head the body of someone doing a Jello shot and made him say dirty things. Anyway, I saw this on the home page and had to see it. I want to learn more about face pulling and how you train/make your face do such things. Is surgery legal? (Update: Apparently you can at least have your teeth removed)

World Face-Pulling Championship

2. If this doesn't blow (no pun intended) your mind I don't know what will.

See more funny videos and Technology Videos at Today's Big Thing.

3. I'm assuming one of the performers arranged this. The stage direction is hilarious. I've never been a huge video game fan, but that's probably because I never had a chance to be. My first system was an Xbox (if you don't count a Gameboy) in the second half of high school, and that is what I still use to this day, more for DVDs than video games. My parents never let me get games with violence in them, so I was limited to sports games essentially. I was okay for that, because really the only games I played on the computer were EA Sports games. The half-ice flip on NHL 99 anyone (You'd just tap the space bar at center ice and it'd go over the goalie's head and in the net. Worked about 80 percent of the time)? Anyway, I still appreciate the hilarity of this video.

See more funny videos and Music Videos at Today's Big Thing.

4. This is why I want to go to a big festival like Lollapalooza. We have hippies in Madison that are pretty sweet, but these aren't even hippies. I don't even know what to make of these guys. Rasta-ish dancing with Kiss shirts on? I dunno, maybe I've missed the new wave of hippies. In any case, I'd probably be speechless.

See more funny videos and Music Videos at Today's Big Thing.

5. The "WTF" tag on Amazon provides for hours of entertainment. Luckily, I haven't been sucked into buying any of these useless/expensive/enraging products, but I can't say I haven't considered. With that in mind, enter at own risk.

http://www.amazon.com/tag/wtf/products/ref=tag_gam_ptcn_istp

6. Who hasn't gotten a passive-aggressive note, or at least encountered them? An angry roommate who's mad because you forgot to flush the toilet, a parent who's angry you forgot to call your grandma on her birthday, someone whose dog you ran over... (RIP Mr. Waggles) I love this site, the notes are hilarious. Just the creative ways people say "F you".

http://www.passiveaggressivenotes.com/

7. I may have been living in a hole lately, because apparently everyone knew about this one except me. Myxer is a site where you can make a free ringtone out of any mp3 you own. Can't find one of Joe Namath saying "I wanna kiss you... YEAH!!!!" on the internet? No worries! Just record it off of YouTube using your microphone (which my webcam has), and then select the mp3 on Myxer.

http://www.myxer.com/make/

8. Amazing Super Powers. A webcomic I found that's very Perry Bible Fellowship-esque.

http://www.amazingsuperpowers.com/

9. Who doesn't have that really annoying Facebook friend who posts way too personal things? Heck, it may even be you. In either case, you're going to want to check Lamebook, because it highlights all of the lamest decisions people have made on Facebook. And if you find yourself as one of the culprits, don't worry, you can send them a message and they'll take it down.

http://www.lamebook.com/

I've gotten a lot of music lately, but I've been obsessing over three bands/performers as of late, so I'll give you three songs of the day.

The first is from Bat for Lashes. I've been enjoying her sophomore album, Two Suns, immensely lately. In fact, I even listened to it while I ran the other day despite much of it being slow and beautiful/eerie. I think it'd be really funny if someone was in their car going, "I wonder what he's listening to. Probably something that pumps you up like Nirvana or Pearl Jam, or some heavy metal or something." No, it was a female vocalist who's a step away from singing opera.

"Sleep Alone" - Bat for Lashes

Next is Chad VanGaalen. Chad's known for his high, wavering falsetto. Crazy enough there is no YouTube video - not even a fan video - of my favorite song by the Canadian Sub Pop artist, Dead Ends. So I'll choose another song from the same album, Skelliconnection. Note that Chad animates his own videos.

"Hot Red Drops" - Chad VanGaalen

The final video is also from an artist who used to be connected to Sub Pop. I've been listening to Modest Mouse for many years, and despite their mainstream success, they are showing no signs of becoming less weird. Thank God. If Isaac Brock tried his hand at singing like a normal human being, I might cry. Here's a song off their newest EP, No One's First, and You're Next. The video was directed by Heath Ledger shortly before his death, and let me tell you, the guys from Whale Wars would love this video, because it highlights the cruelty of whale killing by making the whales the hunters and people the prey. It's slightly graphic, but it's a cartoon, so I guess just use your discretion.

"King Rat" - Modest Mouse
Modest Mouse - King Rat

When I Die...

2009-08-11T15:24:00.002-05:00

I want to be deep-fried and have an open casket funeral.

Fiona Apple, Planes, and Daydreams

2009-08-01T21:34:00.006-05:00

This one's mostly going to be a stream-of-consciousness post because, well, I'm bored, so I'll talk about everything and anything that's on my mind.

Basically, I've spent an hour or so watching Fiona Apple videos. And this isn't the first time. She just fascinates me for some reason. Well, I know for what reason. Basically, she's known for being a little off her block, but in a sense, I believe she's one of the most sane people in show business. She knows the whole thing is a farce, she knows it's all fake.

Part of the reason she's "crazy" is for her 1997 MTV awards speech. There were a few outlandish comments like "This world is bulls**t", but essentially what she said is for everybody to not pay attention to what stars are telling you is cool and to make your own path. Psycho, right?

One of the most intriguing interviews with her is on the Howard Stern Show in 1997. First off, Stern is a pig, constantly pointing out how "messed up" and "troubled" she is, even asking her what it was like to be raped at 11, but she totally takes it in stride. It's impossible not to be impressed by how mature the 19-year old is. Sometimes people mistake a lack of child-like naivety for being troubled. Apple displays an ability to see the hypocrisies and injustices in everything, and how much of life itself is theatrical. I feel like she and Dostoevsky would be friends. "Everybody's messed up" she says (Part 1, 1:14), and it's true. The problem is that when people are honest about their insecurities and how they see the world, it tends to come off as crazy. Most of Hollywood tries to keep that part private, and understandably so as there's media ready to pounce at any mistake or flaw. But what will strike you about Apple is how she doesn't feign excitement or perkiness in any interview she does. There's nothing fake about her, she's genuine in everything she says.

I won't declare Apple a victim of Hollywood however, but rather her reputation is the victim. She's pointed out herself in an interview with Craig Ferguson in 2006 that the ugliness of the people that are negative towards her gets processed through her and comes out as something beautiful. How strong is that? And how lucky are we to receive the benefits from that?

Unsurprisingly, this ends with me buying her music.

In other news, I went to the EAA Airventure yesterday. First of all, it was great to get a day-off from my soul-sucking job. It seemed like we missed a couple opportunities because we were a step behind, but it was still an awesome time. The biggest attraction was the A380, the largest passenger plane in the world. Unfortunately, we got in line to view the inside just as they closed it, but it was still a sight to see from the outside. Now, the A380 is an Airbus, which is the competitor for Boeing, who employs my uncle. Basically, Airbus has a far worse disaster record than Boeing, as many of their parts are cheaper and made of less strong material (read: plastic). However, this plane is pretty awesome. The pilot was a regular Evil Knievel. During its demonstration, he had the plane climbing and turning at angles that seemed like they should make the plane stall out or flip (Actual video of what I saw). Basically, it looked like it was doing things passenger planes should not do. He also pulled the plane back to low speed, even putting down it's landing gear, and it almost looked like a Harrier, just floating in the air.

The underbelly
Originally uploaded by ntdlosangeles

The other pretty cool attraction was the WhiteKnightTwo. It's a crazy plane, with two cabins, designed to launch Virgin's SpaceShipTwo into space. The SST will take customers into space for the low low price of 100,000 to 200,000 dollars. Anyway, the fly-by was mostly just interesting because you thought to youself, "How does that not snap in half?". You also could barely hear it. But another cool thing to note about the plane was the paint job on the bottom, which showed the evolution of flight on the bottom of the cabins. It showed what I believed were, in order, Icarus, The Wright Flyer, the Spirit of Saint Louis, Chuck Yeager's X-1, the Boeing 747, the Apollo Eagle landing craft, and the SST.

For the last couple years my father and grandfather had tried to get me to go on a 1929 Ford Tri-Motor flight, which you can do for just over $50 at the Airventure. I used to refuse because the thing looks like it's made of cardboard, but over the years I've become less afraid of death. So yesterday I finally accepted the challenge. However, we got to the stand as they were booking the last flight, and I was #11 in line for a flight of nine people. All in all the Airventure was tons of fun, though.

Finally, to totally switch subjects, I've been daydreaming a lot, and here are some of a few of the daydreams I've had lately. First, I imagined myself winning the lottery and starting a record label. I was thinking about the bands I would sign. Three came to mind. Obviously, I'm a huge The Velvet Teen fan. Their record label, Slowdance, recently folded in the middle of them recording a new album. I don't know what they have in the works, but I'm hoping they'll still be able to release their album soon. Secondly, I would sign St. Sat B, who is a band from New Jersey that I communicate with often. It's surprising that somebody hasn't knocked on their door yet, considering how talented of a songwriter Jimmy Francis is and how great their sound is. Finally, I'd sign my friend Nick Miller, who is a talented solo artist with the voice of an angel. Check out all three of them.

My other daydream was of becoming a author. I'm going to school to become a history teacher, but I'd love to work on a work of fiction on the side. I used to do a lot of creative writing when I was a kid, just for fun. Back then my influence was Matt Christopher, and I wrote stories about hockey. I had a 20-ish page story called "Skating from the Law" published in my middle school's collection of works that followed a promising juniors player whose unknowingly drugged at Prom, resulting in a car crash that leads to his arrest. Anywho, I haven't written creatively since the sequel to that story, and I'd like to try my hand at writing a novel. I've often thought that if I ever become homeless and have nothing left to lose, that would be my backup plan.

Okay, this post is long enough. On to music. Basically, this song has helped to make me happy because you can't listen to it without singing along and wanting to dance. I've been in a nostalgic phase lately, and this song screams nostalgia. Plus some of the lyrics are so witty you don't know what to do with yourself. "If you're bored, then you're boring".

Harvey Danger "Flagpole Sitta"

Flagpole Sitta @ Yahoo! Video

Dostoevsky was the Baddest Existentialest in Russia.

2009-07-26T11:24:00.004-05:00

Dostoevsky
Originally uploaded by holoubek

My girlfriend's got me reading Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky right now, and I'm loving it. My favorite book is another Dostoevsky classic, Notes from Underground, which I'm currently having her read. It's a really short read, so I'd recommend it to light and heavy readers alike. If you like a good rant, both of these books are for you. Notes from Underground is entirely written as stream-of-consciousness (and I use the term "consciousness" lightly here) from an unnamed protagonist commonly referred to by Dostoevsky's readers as "the Underground Man".

The interesting thing about my love for Dostoevsky is how conservative he is. Dostoevsky wrote most of his famous works while Russia was under the rule of Alexander II (r. 1855-1881). Alexander was as reformist a czar as Russia had ever seen to that point, most famous for abolishing serfdom. Alexander's story is fascinating, especially that of his assassination. Alexander was probably one of the rulers that was the most interested in pleasing as many people in his country as he could, but he was also one of the most targeted for assassination. His case supports the theory that if you give the people an inch in an autocratic government, the flood gates open. I wrote a research paper on Alexander II and by the end sympathized with him immensely. But I digress. How does this relate to Dostoevsky?

Dostoevsky interestingly was very liberal previous to being sent into exile to Siberia for four years by the regime of Alexander I, who was notorious for his paranoia of uprising. Although exile often does more to enrage than pacify, Dostoevsky's views seemed to shift to that of a Slavophile, or someone who rejected Western ideals and wanted to return to ideals from Russia's early history. This change of view, however, also came at a time when Russia was moving in a liberal and "progressive" direction under Alexander II. Dostoevsky's writings show a man disillusioned by the fanaticism for change that seemed to be sweeping over the Russian intelligentsia. He does much to point out the flaws in the logic as well as the hypocrisies of these people. He speaks out against trying too hard to explain everything, and how a reliance on science dissolves individualism and often leads to faulty conclusions and pseudo-sciences. Dostoevsky almost pleads for people to see that they are convincing themselves that they are advancing as a society when really many people are worse off and more miserable than ever. The abolition of serfdom essentially put the burden of compensation for the owners of serfs on the serfs themselves, making it impossible for them to pay off their debts and create a meaningful existence.

This all sounds so depressing, but Dostoevsky's books are full of amazing quotes and very humorous moments. Though his main characters are always extremely smart, they are also seemingly mad, which is an amazingly entertaining combination. The opening lines of Notes from Underground are: "I am a sick man... I am a spiteful man. I am an unattractive man. I believe my liver is diseased." How can you not be hooked?! My favorite quote from the book is: "Suppose... that man is not stupid. (Really, it is quite impossible to say he is, for the sole reason that if he is stupid, who then is intelligent?) But even if he isn't stupid, all the same he's monstrously ungrateful!... I even think the best definition of man is: a being that goes on two legs and is ungrateful." What a rant, and what truth to the words! It also makes you want to write entirely in exclamation points if you can't tell...

Anyway, the parents and I are going out to Madison to pick up my things to prepare for moving into my new house, where I will go from living by myself to sharing a place with five other males. It's going to be a shock to the system, but it also has the potential to be super fun. The car ride will be spent with good ole Fyodor and some tunes.

I'm going to make the song of the day another Department of Eagles song, only to display how crazy of a transformation they made between their two albums. Half of their songs are trip-hop tracks on their first record, The Cold Nose, and the other half sound very Radiohead-esque. Daniel Rossen's voice is almost unrecognizable to those who know him only from Grizzly Bear and the second DoE album, In Ear Park. My friend Scott really likes the humorous track, Forty Dollar Rug, which is a good example of how this album really doesn't take itself too seriously. I'll leave you with the only music video of the album, Romo Goth.

Romo Goth - Department of Eagles

I love... lamp.

2009-07-18T13:07:00.005-05:00

My friend Tim has a hat that says "I love being black". For some reason he refuses to let me wear it... Anyway, I told him that it probably wouldn't go over so well if I wore a hat that says "I love being white". But it's funny how I could probably get away with a hat that says "I love being German". Better yet, if it said, "I (beer mug) being German". It's funny how that works. Anyway, I was thinking about that at work today because Allison and I were talking about Festa Italiana(which we decided against going to because it's $12). I'm not complaining about it, I just think it's funny that being more specific about one's ethnicity is more politically correct. To analyse such things would require going deep into the nature of society, which is something that being a history major often requires, but is not something I wish to explore right now.

Why? has a new album, Eskimo Snow, coming out in September. Pitchfork Media recently drew my attention to a song from that album via Stereogum. Yoni had said that this was the "least hip-hop" album he's been a part of, and I'd have to say that "This Blackest Purse" is a good indication of that. However, it still seems to promise good things. The single got me excited and persuaded me to obtain the songs from the EPs that I still didn't have. The song of the day is a song off of the "Rubber Traits" EP, "Dumb Hummer". And yes, it is the official video.

Why? - "Dumb Hummer"

Alaska you a question... was that really the best decision?

2009-07-14T15:40:00.003-05:00

Forgive the corny pun, and forgive the late discussion on this issue. Up until now I've kept politics out of the blog in the sense that I've rarely discussed specific players. But I have to question the strategy of Sarah Palin in stepping down as Alaskan governor. She's obviously getting ready to campaign for President. I think even Jessica Simpson could figure that one out. Now, I would think I'm posing the obvious question that's on everyone's mind, but maybe not since Mrs. Palin failed to consider it: If the biggest concern from the American public in the last election was her lack of experience in governments and a lack of knowledge of its workings and strategy, wouldn't it be detrimental to, oh I don't know, drop out of the government altogether?

I'll leave it at that.

Music of the day: I talked about a song I wanted to throw at you guys last time. The time is here and now, people. Lackthereof is the solo project of Menomena drummer Danny Seim. As in the case of Dan Rossen and Department of Eagles, it's not fair to call it a "side project" because, though less popular, he's been recording albums longer than Menomena's existed. Anyway, his newest album, Your Anchor, is genius, and Menomena fans will enjoy it immensely because it doesn't stray far from the band's signature sound. This video is my favorite song on the album (convenient, right?). Here's Lackthereof with "Ask Permission".

Lackthereof - "Ask Permission"

The Downloading Culture

2009-06-29T22:17:00.003-05:00

So I'm lazy and I'm just going to re-post exactly what I wrote in a Facebook note. Please forgive me.

It's funny. I feel like Ed Droste of the band Grizzly Bear stole these words from me in an interview with Pitchfork. People ask me why I buy all my music legally. I tell them that when you don't buy an album chances are that you are going into it with a detached attitude. If you don't enjoy it from the get-go you dismiss it and dispose of it because you have nothing ride of it. But because of that, the music isn't given a chance. Some of my favorite albums and bands I despised at the start. But because I bought the albums I didn't want to give up on them. After multiple listens, I'd notice new things, pick the music apart a bit, hear genius in the lyrics and/or their delivery, etc. I've listened to certain albums and songs hundreds of times and no two experiences have been alike.

I'm not saying it's wrong to download or obtain music from friends. I get music from friends all the time. If you have never gotten music from friends you either don't like music that much or you are a much, much better and stronger person than me. Getting music from friends, however, one tends to also give the music a chance because they want to be able to relate to the person they obtained it from.

This is also not to say, however, that I force myself to like music just because I've purchased it and want to make my money worthwhile, or because someone's given it to me. I have obtained my fair share of stinkers. I'm just saying we tend to give music a closer look when we aren't able to dispose of it without anything lost. It's kind of like anything in life. If we've invested a lot in something, we'll take a closer look at it. That doesn't necessarily mean we'll like it, but we'll learn from it.

Honestly, if I wasn't so unlucky and convinced that I would get caught, I would probably download albums. But in a way I'm glad I don't have every album at my fingertips because it makes my music experiences that much more enjoyable. The first listen to an album that I've bought is exciting because it's almost like being a general manager of a sports team: You obtain the music based on your general knowledge of the band, but you never know if you're going to get a result that you think is worth your money. There are going to be disappointments and there are going to be albums you wouldn't give up for almost anything. There's a huge satisfaction in finding a gem of an album in a used CD store that I cannot even explain (Although, to the many of you that I've taken to CD Max, especially Jenny, I'm sure some of you can relate). New music just makes my day amazing, and I think it's something I'd begin to take for granted if I could just click and get any album any time I wanted.

I guess I don't know what the point of writing this note was. I tagged mostly people that I know are really into music, and I guess I wondered how you felt on the subject. I think for most people the need for money outweighs their desire to have a truly satisfying music experience, so I'm probably in the minority here, but maybe you still treasure the music you buy more or give it more of a chance. I read this article and was like, "Yeah! Everyone should read this!" This is only like, 10% of the article, but the other 90% is only really relevant to Grizzly Bear fans. If you want to read the rest, here's a link: http://pitchfork.com/features/interviews/7670-grizzly-bear/

ED: Remember that feeling of buying an album? And you didn't have a lot of money so you bought one album and you had that album for like, two months or something until you bought another album? This really cool thing that would happen where you would be forced to only have that album because you couldn't just download a million more, and you may not have liked every song on it, but then as you started listening to it more and more you'd be like, "Oh wait, I do like track nine." You lived with an album, and that doesn't happen as much anymore. I'm sure some people do have that experience still, but it's a little bit harder to get to that place because you can easily just switch gears and go off to something else if it's not tickling your fancy at that moment.

I haven't had that kind of experience with an album for awhile, either. And I sort of miss it-- that feeling of not necessarily settling for an album but just of having an album and having your initial favorites, then listening to it and listening to it and discovering new things and being like, "Whoa, I really like this part now." Just the feeling of "This is what I have for the next six weeks or so until I can buy another album."

Pitchfork: There was time to develop that relationship. Now I feel like it's so hard to develop a relationship with anything because music moves so fast.

ED: There are so many more releases that people have access to. I don't know, maybe there were this many releases when I was growing up and I just didn't know where to look for them. That's probably very much the case. But it just feels like there are a billion [new records] every year. A lot of people are curious and excited about stuff, and one of the great things about the Internet is that people are excited about music and wanna hear a random album from a band somewhere in Romania or something, and to listen to all sorts of stuff from around the world. They have access to new stuff that they would have never had access to [before]. But sometimes I feel like it's a total overload. Where you're like, "I can't even focus anymore." You know?

Pitchfork: Sure. Everything feels disposable.

ED: It is definitely much easier to feel that an album is disposable-- to dismiss an album or delete the tracks you don't like or to just throw it into shuffle or whatever. But that being said, it's a case-by-case situation and that's the way it is and there's nothing we can do about it. People digest and process music differently, and I'm sure that was the case even when I was a kid. I'm not critiquing the general public, I'm speaking from my own experience of being guilty of deleting a track that I didn't like. Then I'm like, "Wait a second, that's not fair. Why am I doing that?"

I initially read this article because I've been obsessing over a Grizzly Bear song, which I'll make the song of the day. It's called "Two Weeks" and the video is insanely creepy but amazing as well. I don't even want to describe it, you just need to watch it.

You know what? Screw it. Two songs of the day. Yeah, I'm doing it. I haven't written in over a month anyway. It's somewhat related to Grizzly Bear anyway. Not even somewhat, it is. Daniel Rossen is one of the four members of Grizzly Bear, and he has another band, Department of Eagles. It's not even fair to call it his side project because it existed before Grizzly Bear. He's having success with both bands at the moment. I can't stop singing this song either. All four members of Grizzly Bear have amazing voices, and their music just gives off an air of superiority that I can only compare to (tourmates) Radiohead. Anyway, the song is No One Does it Like You, and it also has an eerie, amazing video.

Man, I want to do one more song, but I don't want to make your mind explode with amazing music. So I'll save it. Until next time.

Why don't I like spaghetti?

2009-05-24T19:22:00.000-05:00

It's bland.

College Sure Has a Lot of Stupid People

2009-04-23T01:54:00.003-05:00

Make sure, make sure, make sure...

...that if you respond to an e-mail that a Professor sends out to a whole class...

...you don't hit the "reply all" button...

...and e-mail the entire list-serve the most stupid e-mail ever.

Hello Professor L_____,

I am emailing in regards to the final exam. I have a bit of a conflict with the exam time and am wondering if it is possible to take the exam at a different time.

I am the pitcher on a slow pitch softball team, and our first game of the summer is the night of the exam at 6:00. I realize that this reason is not as justified as perhaps a job or an appointment but I felt I needed to ask. I am the only guy on our team that knows how to pitch and if I can't make it, it will really be detrimental for my team. However, regardless of the position I play, I know this still isn't something that you may see worthy of an alternate exam time, and I respect that. I just thought it couldn't hurt to ask.

Thank you very much Professor. Hope you enjoyed the great weather today!

B_____ D______

UPDATE 4/28/09 The professor has informed me that the request has been denied. My request to move mine, however, as I have three exams in 24 hours (which by school policy allows me to move one of them) was granted. Sucker.

I Don't Swear, to Tell You the Truth.

2009-04-17T12:17:00.004-05:00

Anybody that knows me even remotely well knows that I have never sworn or cursed or said certain words. Well, some people claim to have, but that's mostly because for some reason people have a hard time believing I haven't. But I haven't.

But people do have a case in pointing out that there are some contradictions in my method. I have a shirt that says "F*** 'Em Bucky". I say some words that people find offensive like "douche bag". Sometimes I do type "WTF". Some of my favorite music and movies have a filthy word every two or three seconds.

So maybe I should explain myself. I have to a lot, but when put on the spot I tend to not explain it the way I'd like. My reasons for not swearing have changed over the years. As a kid growing up, I was taught that swearing was wrong. When I started playing hockey, I was somewhat uncomfortable because I played with 8-year olds that had the mouths of sailors. I gradually became immune to it but knew it wouldn't be allowed in my house, so I worried about getting to much into the habit if i partook at practice, opening myself up to a slip at home. So I restrained myself.

It almost became a game over the years. It went hand in hand with drinking with me. While I wasn't morally-opposed to swearing, nor people swearing around me, it became something that I wanted to prove to myself that I could go through life without doing. I had come all this way without it, to give up now would be a sign of weakness.

When I hit 21 I drank for the first time. But I haven't sworn. You might ask, well why not? You are exercising a right by drinking at 21, why don't you exercise a Constitutional right in freedom of speech? Good question, hypothetical person. The truth is that in the home I was raised, the only time I heard swearing was in anger. I in no way grew up in a bad home, and I'm sure this is an experience many people have. My parents didn't swear in their jokes. They swore when they were really mad. That's when you knew a situation had escalated to serious proportions.

So part of the reason I've never sworn is because I don't want to say things I won't regret. Swearing is all fun and games when it's part of a joke or for shock value or whatever. But using them as names can serve as daggers in an argument. Some of the most hurtful things you can say are eliminated by not swearing.

Part of what spurred my analysis is the fact that I've been enamored with a certain song this week, and the chorus is so infectious that I want to sing the very harmless, not-even-curse-usage of a word. That song is "Oscar Wilde" by Company of Thieves. Company of Thieves is an up-and-coming band, although I'm going to find it very interesting to see where they go in the coming months. Their style is perplexing to me. I have no idea how to characterize them, except for as good. I mean, I could pick apart their influences, but I don't know who they fit with. Pitchfork probably won't be doing a review on them anytime soon (I'll let you know if I'm wrong) because it's not weird enough to be "indie" (which believe me, isn't an insult to indie, as most of my music falls under the category). However, I also don't see their music receiving much airplay. It's not "alternative" in the punk/emo sense, and it's definitely not poppy. Genevieve has a ridiculously beautiful voice, with shades of Bjork when Bjork's not screeching, Feist, Regina Spektor, and more. Basically, the "problem" (if it is one) lies in the fact that their music is not the same throughout the album. "Oscar Wilde" would give you the impression that the music's going to be very solemn, analytical throughout. But then you hear "In Passing", which is jazzy and soulful. It's all very confusing, but also very easy to enjoy.

While I was researching the band, I found out they had been on Live From Daryl's House. Any Hall and Oates fans? Daryl Hall and his band play songs with a guest artist each show. The dynamic between Gen and Daryl's voice is beautiful. She really displays her pipes in these songs. So, I'm going to post both "Oscar Wilde" and the "Past the Sleep" vid (one of CoT's songs) from Live From Daryl's House that I've been watching over and over for the last week.

Notes to Myself

2009-04-01T16:24:00.009-05:00

These are notes I have written / kept mentally logged in my head today.

1. Visit the Palace of Versailles when I take my dream trip to Europe.

...which will probably never happen. Also, count how many references to the sun I can find in the palace. For any of you that don't know, the Palace of Versailles was built by Louis XIV. He had an ego that makes Lindsay Lohan look like Mother Teresa. He called himself the Sun King (the link is a glorious painting of him as the sun in a ballet as a teenager), a reference to the idea that France should revolve around him. You know Divine Right? God chooses the king, king's the closest thing to God on earth, yadda yadda yadda? Yeah, that's your guy. You can imagine then, that a palace that guy built would be extravagant. You can also believe that the guy basically bankrupted the nation and taxed the peasants to an extreme.

2. Read a book on Peter the Great this summer.

The guy knew how to party. He basically trashed the houses of people he stayed with during his "Grand Embassy" tour, in which he went to Europe to observe the practices of Western culture. He was supposedly incognito, but he was 6'8" and had 250 servants and aides with him, which tends to be a little inconspicuous. He also had this thing called the "All-joking, all-drunken assembly", which was literally where he and a bunch of nobles got together and pretended to be Eastern Orthodox clergy, basically worshipping alcohol instead of God. However, Peter was also insanely cruel. He suspected his son of trying to overthrow him, an accusation that likely lacked legitimacy, having him tortured in prison until he died. Also, during the Grand Embassy, when he wanted to see how the English did executions, he encouraged them to use his own servants when they didn't have anyone on the chopping block that day.

Doesn't dude sound interesting?

3. Get Nutter Butters for the weekend.

I haven't had them in about 5 years. Plus, I gave up chocolate for Lent, so I haven't really had a cookie in about a month.

4. Never sit next to the fat kid again.

I don't mean to be mean. But first off, the guy didn't even give me a chance to get up before he climbed over me to get to his seat. Then, he totally took up about half of my space. Finally, he wheezed and made weird groans all period.

5. Twilight is the female's Star Wars.

By this I mean a couple things. First off, I have a feeling that 20 years from now women are going to remember where they were when they saw Twilight for the first time, and they're going to remember the exact number of times they saw it in theaters. Secondly, it's pretty dorky. Third, there's a ridiculous amount of Twilight memorabilia out there. I'm sure Twilight conventions are right around the corner. No surprise here either: There's a sequel in the works. So now we have the spots filled up for most demographics. Star Wars for men, Twilight for women, and Harry Potter for kids. We're just waiting on the senior citizen cult classic...

I can't believe I haven't made a song by these guys song of the day yet in the past, but yesterday a guitar solo by the Whigs turned my day around, so I kind of owe it to them. Here's the Whigs with "Like a Vibration"

People Like This Make it Hard to Write Off Humanity

2009-03-25T00:46:00.008-05:00

Basically, I often get to points where I'm convinced that there's no one in the world that wants to make it better for everyone before they make it better for themselves. Until I come across someone like this . Her name is Katie Sokoler and she's an amazing photographer. Her work is everything that's cute and innocent in the world. Here are some of the highlights.

She took a picture of 100 (101?) strangers. In three hours no less. Genius! How awesome would that be? How much would it brighten your day to have someone come up to you and ask if they could take a picture of you smiling in front of a colorful backdrop. Some people would find it creepy or a waste of time, but those aren't the people you'd want to meet. Thus, it would seem you would find 100 genial people. This picture is one of the most beautiful I've ever seen just because of what it represents.

She put pushpin ladybugs outdoors purely because she believes that seeing a ladybug brightens people's day. Along the same line, she wrote messages like "You are loved" and spread them around an airport so people who were stressed would have their day brightened. And this was after she missed her own flight! Most people would sulk. I would sulk.

She spent an entire summer recording street performers because they represented something beautiful and familiar. Watch this video and try not to feel warm and fuzzy inside.

I was talking with my friend Katie about how beautiful the world would be if it were made up of people like this woman. Everyone would hug every stranger they passed, dance parties would break out spontaneously, teddy bears would be free. How awesome would that be?

Here's Lisa Hannigan with "I Don't Know" as the song of the day to give a warm and fuzzy soundtrack to this warm and fuzzy site.

King James

2009-02-28T10:26:00.008-06:00

I don't like the NBA. Of the four major sports, I think it's the biggest joke. College basketball's great, because everyone's got something to prove, but in the NBA it's all about flash and no defense.

I was watching Sportscenter today and saw Lebron James' tattoo of a crown, and remembered his nickname was "King James". I realized that it's a hilarious nickname, one that isn't exactly flattering. If people took the time to do research on the kings named James, they'd realize that they're not someone you'd want to be associated with.

The Stuarts may have been the worst kings in history, possibly with the exception of Charles II. James I (1603-25) popularized the theory of Divine Right, the thought that kings were chosen by God to rule and should basically have absolute power because of it. Thus, he found ways of taxing without using Parliament, who basically derives all its power through taxation. This led to countless disputes with Parliament, which resulted in James constantly dissolving of them once they tried to assert their rights. He personally racked up a large amount of debt because of his extravagence, attempting to resolve it by selling royal lands. He tried to match his son, Charles I, with a Spanish princess, which greatly steamed the nobles as Spain was one of their two rivals at the time. The failure of the match would lead to disastrous war waged by Charles I upon James' death, and the pompous precedents James passed down to Charles would lead the the English Civil War, where Charles was deposed and beheaded, and the country would be subject to eleven years of military rule by the insolent Oliver Cromwell from 1649 to 1660.

James II (1685-1688) was probably worse than James I, if not the worst king in English history. Charles II had done everything in his power to re-legitimize the throne. However, James II threw it all away, very much his father's son (Charles I). James was a devout Catholic, and tried to push the Anglican Church in a very Catholic direction when Anti-Popery was at its highest. He essentially replaced people in every major position of power with Catholics, suspending laws that limited Catholic rights. The man did not know how to be subtle, ordering Anglican priests to read his pro-Catholic acts in church. After he produced a legitimate male heir, the nobles and priests worried about a pro-Catholic dynasty and requested that William of Orange (who was married to James' daughter, Mary) come to England and overthrow James II. He arrived with 15,000 men, the largest invasion force to ever arrive in England. James did not have the manpower to compete with him, especially when a bunch of nobles and clergy pledged to fight on the side of William. James saw that his number was up, and he fled to France, but not before he made some stupid and cowardly decisions on his way out. He destroyed the writs for calling a new Parliament, ordered his supporting army to be disbanded without pay, and in the biggest act of disrespect towards England by a king ever, threw the seal of England into the ocean. He was captured before he ever made it to France by fishermen. Oh, and he was dressed like a woman. In just three years in office, he had managed to infuriate the country enough to dethrone him in the Glorious Revolution.

So go ahead Lebron, go by King James, but don't be surprised if you lose public support somewhere down the road.

Song of the day: The new song by Manchester Orchestra is genius. They are putting out their new album on April 21 entitled "Mean Everything to Nothing". For more information on M.O., see this post.

Musicians Being Replaced by Computers?

2009-02-08T15:15:00.004-06:00

I just got back from coaching a hockey tournament. Hockey tournaments are quite possibly one of the greatest experiences a person can be a part of, so it would be an understatement to say that it was a fun weekend.

When I got back and checked my e-mail, I had gotten one from Scott which contained three links to YouTube videos where people had inserted the vocals from famous songs into Songsmith. Now, if you're not acquainted with Songsmith, it's a computer program where you sing a song or put in a melody and it will come up with instrumentation for it. It's admittedly pretty funny when you put in vocal tracks from famous songs. But it worries me. Will the creative process be eased to the extent that music becomes impersonal and generic?

Microsoft came up with an unintentionally hilarious tutorial/ad. There's a guy in a band who's had some trouble coming up with instrumentation for his songs lately. He uses Songsmith to make music to this melody he's been sitting on. The chord progressions of Songsmith are very simple and take no chances. The ones that don't come out conventional are awkward (which is evident if you watch some of the "remixes") and those that aren't are repetitive. They often bounce back and forth between two chords. I'm cool with people using Songsmith for a "general direction" or inspiration, but chances are you won't find either in the program that would be an improvement from the worst accompaniment that you could come up with in your head. If these "remixes" were the progressions that the bands used in the originals, I doubt any of them would have ever had their popularity. Lyrics and a melody can only take you so far.

For now I think music's safe. I don't think computers will be coming up with the most pleasing noises to our ears.

FM to C Turns 1.

2009-02-05T19:39:00.003-06:00

The dangerous first year has ended, 63 posts later. I've enjoyed writing the blog, whether anyone's reading or not. It's a fun way to look back, and it can be therapeutic at times. In case you've missed it, here's what the first 63 posts have covered:

1. Introduction
2. A praise and analysis of (Song of the day) Menomena's "Evil Bee"
3. The ways California has ruined my life. Song of the day: Eddie's Gun by the Kooks.
4. Coverage and complaints from the great blizzard of '08.
5. Thoughts on my insomnia (which I definitely no longer suffer from). Song of the day: Fear of Sleep by the Strokes.
6. Confusion on the behavior of shoes.
7. Thoughts on sizes of clothes and people.
8. My top 5 bands with more than one lead singer (which would be different now I'm sure).
9. Jebus loves sluts girl.
10. What happened to people name-dropping Jesus on their shirts?
11. I'm 5'6". Do you expect me to have basketball skills? Song of the day: "Macho" by Tin Circus.
12. Music television is as musical as Taco Bell is Mexican. Song of the day: "TV" by Headlights.
13. How I lost $1.25, and you can too! Song of the day: "Wolves at Night" by Manchester Orchestra.
14. Valentine's Day rebellion.
15. Honoring my own procrastination skills. Song of the day: "Running out of Time" by Hot Hot Heat.
16. Basking in Wisconsin's recognition for the primaries, and (correctly) predicting that the next time we get that much attention would be when Brett Favre retired. Song of the day: Menomena - Weird (Dekoder Remix)
17. Fat guy in flannel = not funny.
18. My magic musical powers. Song of the day: "Just" by Radiohead
19. The most absurd statement in the world.
20. A post about how much I wished the Toadies would reunite (Little did I know they would months later and I would see them twice in the next year). Song(s) of the day: "Possum Kingdom", "Tyler", and "Mister Love" by the Toadies.
21. A celebration of a holiday that only happens every four years (although looking back, I'm pretty sure "quad-annually beans four times a year... I can't be sure, though.)
22. Swing and a miss, Will Ferrell.
23. A great streak ends. Appropriately, the song of the day is "Ice of Boston" by the Dismemberment Plan.
24. A sad day for Packer fans, which would end up being sadder in the following months. Song of the day: "Last Goodbye" by Jeff Buckley
25. A picture update on post #9.
26. The case against St. Patrick's Day. SotD: "Charmer" by the Kings of Leon
27. The night I discovered Liam Finn, who my ears have had a beautiful relationship with ever since. SotD: "Second Chance" by Liam Finn
28. My attempt at being deep?
29. Warm weather bands (I'm hoping for the chance to listen to them soon...)
30. A post about (surprise) the music I'd been listening to lately. SotD: "Need Your Needs" by (now defunct) Georgie James
31. Tips for being green (More exciting than it sounds!) SotD: "Better to Be" by Liam Finn
32. Gushing about the (playoff-bound) Brewers. Update: Grant and I are 11-0 now when in attendance at a Brewers game. Album of the day: Plunder, Beg, and Curse by Colour Revolt.
33. I decide not to identify myself as "straightedge" anymore, and the blog becomes "Feeding Milk to Chickens" from "The Only Straightedge in Madison".
34. Bjork has balls.
35. Dilemma for Christian pot-smokers?
36. Review of the Minus the Bear concert. SotD: "Knights" by Minus the Bear.
37. A rant about how basically anyone can make a crappy college newspaper comic strip. SotD: "Paranoid Android" by Radiohead.
38. Commercial directors need love, too.
39. What college examinations really mean to college students. S(s)otD: "Juneau", "Streetcar", "Great Wide Open" by Funeral for a Friend.
40. Are the Foo Fighters to blame for the death of grunge?
41. What you probably don't know about World War II.
42. Chris Osgood gets shafted (after a performance he hasn't even come close to matching this year). SotD: "Hospital Beds" by Cold War Kids.
43. Why did I bother writing a post about Hillary Duff's sister? Who knows? But there was an awesome song of the day. "Fools" by the Dodos.
44. A story that probably deserves a movie.
45. Live from Hawaii. I'm thinking about going out there and living on the beach with no money, living off of humuhumunukunukuapua'a. SotD: "Sitting, Waiting, Wishing" by Jack Johnson.
46. A justification of how I can just forget about Brett Favre like we didn't have a lifelong relationship. SotD: "Backslider" by the Toadies.
47. 5 complaints. SotD: "We Looked Like Giants" by Death Cab for Cutie.
48. Most unintentionally funny commercial ever. SotD: "List of Demands" by Saul Williams
49. What you're missing. SotD: "Hey Hey Hockeytown"
50. Introduction to my new blog about dreams, which has since received 70 dreams. SotD: "Future Foe Scenarios" by Silversun Pickups.
51. How your actions in an elevator tell people who you are. SotD: "Pull Out" by Death from Above 1979.
52. Don't vote... unless. SotD: Murr Murr by Mugison.
53. The checklist for the Brewers that they clearly didn't consult... S(s)otD: "The Great Unrest" "I Want You" "To the Bone" by Mugison.
54. LHC is to nukes as alien doctrine is to Bush Doctrine? SotD: "Subterranean Homesick Alien" by Radiohead.
55. Nostalgia.
56. The musical stylings of Mark Ronson. SotD: "Stop Me" by Mark Ronson ft. Daniel Merriweather.
57. Will Obama taking over lead to higher gas prices? (Signs point to yes, but it's not his fault.) S(s)otD: "Sore", "Carry Around", "Confessor" by Annuals.
58. Why TA's and the IRS are ruining my life. SotD: "Cooking by the Book" by Lazytown ft. Lil Jon.
59. Songs you should listen to to make her think you're sensitive.
60. Just remember, when Demetri Martin gets big, I knew of him before you.
61. Probably the greatest piece of architecture ever.
62. Thoughts I have while I do my wash. SotD: Song of the "Sad Assassin" by Why?
63. Happy anniversary! Song of the day: "Let's Make Love and Listen to Death from Above" by CSS.

Guess what today's song of the day is! How'd you know? CSS is the Brazilian group, who's (gorgeous) lead is Lovefoxxx. I don't normally like dance music, but it's so care-free that I can't hate it. I've known of them for years but never really got around to getting their albums. Now, it's what I listen to when I go to bed every night. Behold the greatness that is Lovefoxxx.

P.S. I've enabled the "followers" tool. I'd love to see who reads this blog, so be a champ and become a follower.

Thoughts I Have While I Do My Wash

2009-01-30T00:43:00.006-06:00

1) You know you go to Madison when you have two loads of just red clothing.
2) It's a good day when a pen goes through the wash and doesn't destroy any clothes.
3) Did I remember to switch the dryer to "Normal" from "Perm Press"?
4) Oh, crap, the washer's been running for 10 minutes and I forgot to put detergent in.
5) My socks don't look like evidence in a CSI mystery anymore (Blisters from hockey skates = bloody socks).
6) Crap, there's a dryer sheet unaccounted for. I bet it will come out in the middle of that discussion section with that cute girl.
7) I wonder how the people that live next to the laundry room feel about me doing my wash at 2 am on a Thursday night.
8) Why do I smell someone's chicken at 2 am on a Thursday? Probably someone drunk.

Song of the day: The Song of the Sad Assassin - Why?
Why?'s Alopecia is on the best albums of 2008 list for many blogs and indie bands. It's weird because some of their songs are straight-up Decembrists-esque indie. Others are Jewish rap. All are 100% beautifully done. Another highlight is "These Few Presidents", which Colour Revolt did an amazing cover of on Daytrotter (leading me to research Why?).

Anyone Want to Go to Sweden with me in 2010?

2009-01-11T17:12:00.002-06:00

Some people dream of playing Shea Stadium when they make it big. Some people want to play Carnegie Hall or Madison Square Garden. In England, people dream of playing Glastonbury or the giant Wembley Stadium. Me? I want to play a concert in this:

It opens in 2010. I expect to be there for the ribbon-cutting.

Demetri Martin: Making Smart Cool

2009-01-09T23:40:00.007-06:00

I just want it to be known that I have been a Demetri Martin fan for years. Why do I feel the need to let this be known? Because he's getting his own TV show on Comedy Central in February (Important Things) and he's going to be huge. Many of you may not know the name. But he is reinventing comedy. He has made intellegence hilarious. This is quite an achievement in a world of Dane Cooks and Carlos Mencias. He doesn't talk about the differences between men and women, or how certain races are scary, or how blow jobs are fun, or any of the other countless cliches that are common to stand-up comedy. No, here are a few Demetri Martin quotes. After reading them, you will see that he is different from those poop-pee-sex comedians out there.

1. "I've heard of many chocoholics, but I ain't never seen no 'chocohol'. We got an epidemic, people: people who like chocolate but don't understand word endings. They're probably 'over-workaholled'."

2. “I went into a clothes store and a lady came up to me and said “if you need anything, I’m Jill”. I’ve never met anyone with a conditional identity before.”

3.“I like fruit baskets because it gives you the ability to mail someone a piece of fruit without appearing insane. Like, if someone just mailed you an apple you’d be like ‘Huh? What the h**l is this?’, but if it’s in a fruit basket you’re like ‘This is nice!.’”

4.“I like sports; I like professional football. I like to get to the stadium and see the games live, you know. And I paint my chest before I leave the house. But I don’t have many friends, you know, so I usually just do punctuation and tack on a group already in progress. But sometimes it works out kind of weird because we ended up on TV one time and it said ‘JETS?’”

5. " I was in the park and I met this girl, she was cute and she had a dog. And I went up to her, we started talking. She told me her dog’s name. Then Í said, 'Does he bite?'. She said 'No.' And I said, 'Oh yeah? Then how does he eat? … Liar.'"

These are all excerpts from his genius program Person. But I think his most impressive work is the one that pretty much no one in America knows about. It's If I, a program he did for BBC Four after winning an Edinburgh comedy festival. Now, some of the jokes in this program are re-used in Person. However, there, they are basically short jokes, a step away from one-liners, very Steven Wright-esque (who he cites as his main influence). But in If I, which has never been released in DVD form, they are all a part of a story: Demetri's life story.

Demetri was and is basically a genius. He went to law school on a full scholarship and was a year away from graduating. But suddenly, against his family's wishes, he quit and pursued comedy. Thank God he did. In If I, he tells the story of the process of analyzing his life that led him to go from sneaking Mensa puzzles into class to using his intellegence to create the program that we have the pleasure of viewing. It makes you truly appreciate how much of a genius he really is, and how much of a leap of faith he actually had to make.

Click on this to see If I in its entirety, split up between six videos on YouTube. Since music is encorporated into the act, I'll also make it the song of the day.

Songs that Will Make You Need to Call a Waaambulance

2008-12-25T23:39:00.007-06:00

Grant and I roadtripped it the other to the Texas vs. UW basketball game from Milwaukee. It was during a pretty sweet snow storm, so it took us about two hours, which gave us plenty of time to listen to music. I couldn't find my iPod hookup, so I had to rely on old cd's. I was running out the door when we left because we wanted to beat the worst of the storm, so I just grabbed my old cd case from high school. Admittedly, in high school I mostly liked emo music until my senior year or so, so there wasn't a great selection, but I at least had a few decent albums in there. After maxing out Brand New, we listened to the Format, which was the first time for me in about a year or so. The song "On Your Porch" came on, and I remembered that I once dubbed it the "Most Beautiful song of all-time". Grant, an avid reader of this blog, said that I should make a post of the most beautiful songs known to myself, and I agreed. As I'm in Michigan right now visiting family and have nothing else to do as they're all early sleepers, that time is now. I won't rank them, I'll just throw them out there and give you videos/streams.

On Your Porch - The Format

Basically the lines that get me are "My dad was sick/ my mom she cared for him/ her love it nursed him back to life. / But me I ran / I couldn't even look at him / for fear I'd have to say goodbye / And as I start to leave / he grabs me and he tells me / What's left to lose? / You've done enough / and if you fail well then you fail but you gave it a shot / Cuz these last three years / I know they've been hard / but now it's time to get out of the desert and into the sun / even if it's alone.

The Great Unrest - Mugison

This song is a repeat offender on the blog. It gets intense at the end, but the orchestration and buildup throughout the song is the beautiful part. And Mugison just has a raw, emotional voice that represents a broken, weathered man, and it's just beautiful in itself.

Poor Celine - The Velvet Teen

Pretty much any song off of Elysium could be on this list. Judah's voice is at its best in this album, as there's no distortion on it and he's not straining it. Don't mistake that for a lack of emotion, because you will feel a range of them within this album, but the absense of a not-even-a-single guitar on this album makes Judah's voice more prominent, and the orchestration adds a new dimension as well.

Poor Celine at last.fm

It's Okay - Land of Talk

Who here's down with Fleetwood Mac? This song could so be sung by Stevie Nicks, but it's way better because while Liz Powell might have some vocal similarities, her voice is in no way obnoxious like Stevie's can sometimes be. The song is so raw, and the lyric "Maybe when I die / I'll get to be a car / Driving in the night / lighting up the dark" just puts you in the body of someone that is giving up on this life and looking towards the next. I think there's a sort of beauty in that kind of honesty, and even though it's a kind of dark hope, it's still undeniably hope.

It's Okay at imeem.com

Annuals - Sore

Another repeat offender. The video itself is beautiful, but the song just to me seems to be about a need to express love daily. Whether with a significant other or offspring (in the video it seems to be about both), its a beautiful sentiment. The highlight lyrically: If I ever let out of bed / Without a kiss to the center of your head / Then I never deserved you from the start /And you can let loose the wall around my heart.

All Flowers in Time Bend Towards the Sun - Jeff Buckley

There are quite a few Buckley tracks that could make it on this list. The obvious choice would be Hallelujah. The song is not originally Jeff's (it's Leonard Cohen's), but his version is the version that has been played by numerous other artists (Before you ask, the version on Shrek is Rufus Wainwright, who had a huge crush on Jeff Buckley) and trillions of YouTubers. However, being an owner of quite a few Jeff bootlegs and B-sides, the most beautiful JB song is All Flowers in Time Bend Towards the Sun. I have two versions of the song, never released or recorded, one very fuzzy, distantly recorded live solo version, and one where he duets with Elizabeth Fraser of the Cocteau Twins. Both are amazing. The duet gives the song a whole new dynamic and meaning. Here's both versions:

(With Elizabeth)

(Without Elizabeth)

All Flowers in Time at imeem.com

All I Need - Radiohead

This song is hauntingly beautiful. It's obsessive. The song is basically saying that the protagonist's only reason for living is the existence another person. It's beautifully desperate. He sounds desperate to try to put into words just how much this person means to him, but like he can never accomplish that task to the extent he wants to. He feels he can't get through to him/her the way he wants. The lyrics are so simple, but they say more than a whole novel could.

That's all I've got for right now. I'd be interested to know what songs you all think are the most beautiful songs you listen to, but I've never been one to ask for comments. If you feel like it though, go for it. I'm going to make a non-related song of the day just because I've been so obsessed with Land of Talk Lately. Elizabeth Powell is the newest member of Broken Social Scene, and I saw LoT open for them and her sing with BSS, and her cuteness is undeniable, but her voice is what gets me. I like it way better than Amy Millan, and she gives Feist a run for her money in my humble opinion.

Land of Talk - Speak to Me Bones

Epic rant!

2008-12-09T21:26:00.007-06:00

Okay, that title hypes this post up to be really good, but it probably won't be because I don't swear and I don't think rants can truly be epic unless they have swearing. But it's a stressful time of year, and I think complaining to my computer will be therapeutic. So here it goes.

1. HISTORY TA's - This is not directed at one TA in particular, but more so the natural tendencies of history TA's that grade papers and exams. Someone that is a history TA is mostly a graduate student studying the area that the class falls under. So a History 115 TA, a broad Medieval Europe class, is probably studying something like the relationship between serf (although they wouldn't call it a serf for reasons I am to annoyed to explain) and landlord in Medieval England. Anyway, the point is, they are extremely knowledgable in their field. Thus, some TA's uphold an unfair standard when grading papers that anything they can think of that we have left out should have been included in the paper.

More than that, what bothers me is when a TA writes "Good" at the end of an essay, doesn't write that you've forgotten anything, that you've gotten a date wrong, that you've spelled something wrong, that you've used passive voice... hasn't made a single mark on the essay... and then somehow you get an 80%. To me, this is like a cashier handing you a cheeseburger that costs $3, you taking a bite, saying "This is good", then slapping down $2.40 and walking away.

I guess this is the burden of choosing such a subjective major. If I were in math, there one be one correct solution. I also have had some great TA's as well, so I can't complain too much. But this is an epic rant, so I'm ranting.

2. THE IRS - The IRS has added an unneeded stress to this holiday/exam season. So I send in my taxes by mail. Everything's been checked. Everything's right. Records are kept. One of my jobs is tax free (Fun fact, if you work a campus job and are a full-time student, you are exempt from taxes on that job). My summer job is not. I work full-time over the summer, so this actually adds up to quite a bit of money. Well, I end up getting a far larger refund than I should have. I look at my taxes, very confused, and it says I have made a mistake, my summer job IS exempt from taxes. I know this is wrong, but I think What am I supposed to do about this? They made the mistake. They can't fault me for this. So I let it go.

Well, last month, I get a statement saying that I claimed myself as exempt. No... no I didn't. You guys changed this. I call the IRS very fed up. I get connected to a lady that says she can change this without a problem... I'll have to pay the money back, but she can fix the fact that they entered the information wrong into the system. Fine, I can deal with this. I get put on hold. All of a sudden, the phone hangs up. I have to call back, sit through 30 minutes of Tchaikovsky, and get connected to another, much less helpful lady. She says that I have to refile my taxes. No! No I don't! I was just connected with a lady that said she'd fix it for me! She puts me on hold again. She says she'll send my case to Fresno, CA for review. Today, I got in the mail that I owe $250 with $6 interest, because they assume the money's been sitting in my savings account for six months. I'm glad this is over, but screw you for costing me money for your mistakes, IRS. I hope you don't come after me for writing about my discontent.

Anyway, I'd write a couple more, but I have to get back to writing a 9-page paper that will undoubtedly be thuroughly analyzed for things I missed. Guess I'll just have to take pleasure in people slipping and falling on the crazy ice rink known as "the streets and sidewalks of Wisconsin". Even funnier is the human response to the slip. I've narrowed it down to two circumstancial reactions. 1) If you save yourself, you do six or seven running steps like it was part of the plan, and 2) If you fall, you get up, and you just smile as if to say "If I act like I have a sense of humor about it, you'll all think that I'm not really embarrassed at all".

Song of the day, the hottest indie band out there: Lazytown featuring Lil Jon. Warning: Vulgar language.

See more of the internets best videos at CollegeHumors Web Celeb Hall of Fame.

Low Gas Prices: Enjoy Them While They Last

2008-11-26T16:28:00.002-06:00

Gas prices are the lowest they've been in years. While this is fantastic, you must take this with a grain of salt because it's not a coincidence that it's happening in the months before Barack takes office. It's no secret that a lot of powerful Republicans have links to oil (to use a drastic understatement). My theory is that they are lowering prices before Obama takes office so that when they raise them to record highs during his term he will be blamed and they will regain power in the next. I am by no way extremely left, but it has become evident to me that this is a definate possibility. It's scary to think that about the possibility that the Republicans may cripple the U.S. economy even worse to take power back, and I hope I'm wrong. It would go to show that democracy definitely still has its flaws and power is not necessarily very well checked in America.

Now that I've depressed us all, I'll give you some amazing music to cheer up with. Annuals has toured with a lot of the bands I love, such as Manchester Orchestra and Minus the Bear. Yet I held off on getting their stuff for a while for some reason. But in three days I bought much of their library because every one of their songs enthralled me. They're so unique and have such a big sound when they want to, and no phrase of their music is the same. But they can also turn around and write some amazing slower music, that plays like an epic. I'll give you two examples.

Sore is a slower one that builds beautifully:

Carry Around is a more fun, bizarre song:

Confessor is their newest one. It displays their big sound:

Stop Me If You've Heard This One Before

2008-10-31T00:14:00.006-05:00

No, that's not my emo title so I can write some rant. Although, I am going to fail a test tomorrow. But I just wanted to stop by and throw you a video, because I can't get this song out of my head. I don't like hip-hop. Well, I don't like hip-hop with rapping. For the most part. But Mark Ronson's blending of multiple genres including jazz brass and hip-hop beats makes for some seriously sweet music. It's like, blending a '30's big band with ODB. I have his album Version, which he is clearly seriously protective over because they take down mp3's on blogs in seconds flat (not that I put any up on my blog) and won't even let me emb a video. Anyway, Version is a bunch of his arrangements of other peoples' songs sung by guest vocalists. It's majorly awesome. It's got Lily Allen, Kasabian, Amy Whinehouse (unfortunately) and even ODB (which is weird because I forgot that when I made the previous reference) performing songs by some seriously awesome artists including the Smiths, Radiohead, and... Kasabian. Anyway, the song I can't get out of my head is Stop Me, the song originally by the Smiths, who have influenced some amazing bands like Radiohead and Brand New. It's performed by Daniel Merriweather, who I had never heard of before this song, but has a seriously awesome voice. Seriously. Awesome. I guess those are my words of the day.

Mark Ronson featuring Daniel Merriweather - Stop Me at YouTube

P.S. I'm going to start embing the vids that I use for the song of the day. This one I couldn't but you already know that because you've read this post. Also, sorry for the run-on paragraph, but I didn't plan on writing that much.

Nostalgia

2008-10-28T01:04:00.000-05:00

That was your song of the day.

Crazy thought

2008-10-20T19:59:00.003-05:00

I'm sure many of you are aware of the LHC (Large Hadron Collider), otherwise known as that thing that is colliding particles together at just a smidgen below the speed of light (it's currently broken down and will not be restarted until Spring, 2009). The reason you are all probably aware of this contraption is because of the thought that it could possibly create a black hole. Now, this possibility has been disregarded by many of the smartest minds in the world, but I had a thought today, or maybe more of a crazy daydream.

What if a bunch of George W. Bush-like aliens looked down on Earth and head about this LHC and saw it as a threat to their well-being as it could create a black hole that would annhialate their existance? Would they invade and destroy this thing, as Bush invaded Iraq to prevent their nuclear capabilities? What if there are aliens watching intently from billions of miles away watching closely to see what our next moves are? What if Earthlings are having an impact on beings that are not even in our solar system?

Would I put my money on it? No. First off, if aliens do exist, I doubt they have the power to watch a planet light years away in real time. I know people try to imagine aliens as having crazy powers, but I imagine them being not unlike us. To support life, planets would have to have makeups much like ours, and would thus create beings probably similar to us. But, if they were watching us, they'd probably be intellegent, so they wouldn't follow the Bush Doctrine. Furthermore, I don't think the LHC is really anything to worry about.

Anyway, I thought I'd throw an alien-themed song in here, so here's Subterranean Homesick Alien (live) by Radiohead

Brewers checklist for the offseason

2008-10-05T15:22:00.006-05:00

I have to say, I am really happy with the Brewers season, despite their 3-1 exit in the first round of the playoffs. "Playoffs" is a word that didn't get thrown around a lot when talking about the Brewers in my lifetime. I've been waiting for this since I was three years old, and the fact that we can finally say that we lasted longer than the Cubs is priceless.

Here's what I think the Brewers need to do in the offseason. I'll probably make a post at the beginning of the season to grade their performance.

1. Re-sign CC. His agent says he loves Milwaukee. We'll soon see how much he loves it, whether he's willing to give up $20+ million in New York, Boston, or L.A. for $12-15 million in Milwaukee. But if the Brewers complete step 2 of my plan, we might be able to hike that up a bit.

2. Get rid of Gagne, Suppan, Riske, Weeks, and Hall for a bag of balls. This would free up $25 million dollars (and a bag of balls) for us to go shopping. Obviously, it's going to be tough with Suppan due $27 million over the next two years, a deal no team would be willing to pick up, and Riske making around $3 million a year for the next two years, but getting rid of any of these players, with the exception of Weeks, would at least free up some salary.

3. Let Sheets go. $12 million dollars. Listen, the guy has averaged 23.5 starts in the last four years. While he usually put forward a great start, the reality is that when we really needed him, he has not had a great track record. Besides, even if we wanted Sheets back, I don't think it's going to happen.

4. Shop for a third baseman, starting pitching. Our fielding at third base was beyond horrendous this year, probably costing us a substantial amount of games. I'd even be willing to give up some a hitting spot for a good defensive third baseman, because Lord knows that we had neither a good hitting or fielding third baseman this year.

5. Start calling up a first baseman and third baseman. If the Brewers don't make Fielder happy with a new contract, he's going to be ready to leave at the first chance. He'll probably take us to arbitration court this year anyway, which could put a strain on our budget and may lead to a trade. Brad Nelson looks like he has some power potential, but he needs experience. Mike Lamb has had some decent fielding stats in his career, so who knows.

6. Make Ray Durham a full-time starter. The bottom line is that the man is consistent in everything he does, something that no one in their right mind would say about Rickie Weeks. It's hard to give up on a young player, but Weeks has shown absolutely no maturing whatsoever. I don't even know who would be interested in taking him.

7. Re-sign Kendall. There are some Kendall haters out there, but you can't argue with his defensive stats. He had the best throwout percentage in the majors, and his pitch-calling was exceptional. I feel like the Brewers will have even more success with him with a new manager because you can be darn sure that the next manager will know to take a pitcher out before he's given up seven runs in an inning (see July 7, 2007 , fifth inning, and Yost even had Suppan pitch in the sixth!), so pitchers will still be hitting the spots that Kendall sets up for them. Yes, he's old, but he's cheap and he gets the job done. For a defensive catcher he comes up big offensively when we need him most.

That's all for now. I may add later. Here's the two subjects I'm undecided on: Should the Crew spend a lot of dime on Fielder and make him happy? I don't know. When the man slumps, he slumps. We already have a power-hitter in Braun and we could use more contact hitters. At the same time, he carried us through September. It's tough to say. I think it could be disasterous if we hold on to him for a long extended period but he could also do a ton of damage somewhere else. The second is that I could not tell you who we should sign as manager. Sveum showed that he knows when to take a pitcher out. But his lineups are sometimes cooky, and his demeanor reminds me a lot of Yost. My initial guess, before he was even bench coach, was that the Brewers are planning on making Yount the manager. The thing is, players don't always make the best managers, and Yount has no experience. You could get an Ozzie Guillen, or you could get a Alan Trammell.

I'm not going to throw up too many hyperlinks because you can find these players' stats and stuff pretty much anywhere.

Song of the day will be another Mugison song because I didn't really explain much about him with the first post, and I've been listening to him a lot lately. Mugison is an Icelandic indie artist, who is actually very popular on the island. However, that's not saying much, as you only have to sell 5,000 albums to go gold in Iceland. People compare him to Beck, as his music is very experimental and sometimes trippy. His portfolio is extremely diverse, from highly electronic stuff, to good ole blues, to amazing acoustic songs, to songs with orchestras. I'll give you three songs to display his range.

The Great Unrest (official video) - Mugison - Youtube (Slower orchestral, acousticy song that builds beautifully)

I Want You (semi-official video. Mugi made this for his grandparents' 50th Anniversary) - YouTube. *This isn't the greatest example of his trippy stuff, but it suffices. For better examples, see "Sad Like a Truck", and "The Chicken Song". There just are no videos on YouTube for these. The Chicken Song features an amazing line. "The chicken is one of few birds that never can fly / but even with his head chopped of he'll still give it a h--- of a try / How beautiful is that?"

To the Bone (Track only) - Mugison - Youtube

Don't vote... unless.

2008-10-03T22:47:00.003-05:00

Song of the day: Murr Murr (acoustic) - Mugison at YouTube

Re: Elevator Ediquette

2008-09-23T12:13:00.004-05:00

I've decided you can tell a lot about a person just how by they act on an elevator. The gems are the people who see you walking down the hallway and know you're going to use the elevator, and even though you may not be looking at them, they hold it for you anyway. I've also witnessed the people that press the "door close" button as many times as they can in the same instance. Also, whenever somebody has also pressed "6", and I'm going to floor five, I will take the stairs down to five because I don't want to stop the elevator a floor before a person's destination. This does not take any effort at all because I'm going downstairs, and if I'm going to seven, I will press it because the person has already gotten off the elevator so it's not an issue. Finally, if there are stairs (and there should be, otherwise it's pretty much a fire hazard) and you live in a 12-floor dorm or apartment, if you're going to two or three, take te stairs for God's sake. You're young, you have two legs, unless you have something that weighs more than 30 pounds in your hands you should be able to walk up 15 stairs. Most peoples' houses have two stories, so you should be used to it.

Today's song of the day is Death From Above 1979's "Pull Out". The band was a duo with just a bass and drummer, the drummer also serving as a singer. Every song on the album "You're a Woman, I'm a Machine" is intense (and creepy), great for pre-game music. Unfortunately, they broke up after one album and pretty much hate eachother's guts. This is a classic video, though.

Death From Above 1979 "Pull Out" at YouTube

Nice Dream

2008-09-17T21:38:00.004-05:00

Hey, if you haven't already, check out my new blog called "Dreams of People You Will Never Meet". It's my new experiment of gathering dreams that people send me by e-mail for others to read. They're put up anonymously, and my friend Scott is going to draw illustrations for some of them. It's turned out and should continue to turn out pretty cool. To find out more, click on this link to go to the site, and join this Facebook group while you're at it.

Despite the Radiohead-themed title of this post, I'm going to make the song of the day "Future Foe Scenerios" by Silversun Pickups. Some people think of Silversun Pickups as just a Smashing Pumpkins rip-off, but Brian Aubert isn't as overdramatic as Billy Corgan is (not that I don't enjoy some Pumpkins stuff, but he is over the top sometimes).

"Future Foe Scenarios" at YouTube

Why Watch Hockey?

2008-09-13T23:26:00.002-05:00

In a couple weeks now, the NHL will be back. Now, most of you are probably saying "Why should I care?" Even though the NHL has spiked a few more people's interests with the likes of Sidney Crosby and Alexander Ovechkin, I still often get asked why I love the game of hockey. I thought I'd supply you with a few links that will illustrate why, and I promise you, you will not get bored.

1. Scott Stevens was probably the greatest hitter to ever play the game. When he retired in 2004, Sportscenter put together this compilation as an ode to his knack for causing destruction.
Scott Stevens' Top 10 Hits

2. Pavel Datsyuk can puck-handle in a phone booth. Watch as he dekes the crap out of a goalie in a shootout against Nashville.
Pavel Datsyuk's Sick Deke in a Shootout against Nashville

3. The rivalries in hockey are like no other sport because fighting is allowed. In my case, the Detroit Red Wings and Colorado Avalanche rivalry is the most exciting rivalry. In 1997, 1998, and 2002 the Red Wings won Stanley Cups. It just so happened that in those three years, the Red Wings' starting goalies (Mike Vernon, Chris Osgood, and Dominik Hasek respectively), fought Patrick Roy during the regular season.
Patrick Roy vs. Mike Vernon
In that same fight, Darren McCarty annihilated Claude Lemieux, a fight where Lemeiux was labeled "The Turtle" because of his fetal position.
"The Turtle Fight"
When the teams met the following year, off the opening faceoff the two squared off again. It is a classic moment, as you watch them calmly planning the fight before the faceoff is dropped.
Lemieux and McCarty fight off the faceoff

4. Obligatory "Best Fights" compilation

5. Along with Bobby Orr's famous photograph (above), one of the images in NHL hockey that will probable stick forever is the goal Alexander Ovechkin, who is thought by many as the greatest combination of speed, puckhandling skills, and shooting ability ever to play the game (he's not a bad hitter either, scored against the Phoenix Coyotes in a regular season game in 2006. While Orr's meant a lot more (it was an overtime goal that won the 1970 Stanley Cup, while Ovechkin's scored was to put the Capitals up 6-1 in a regular season game), Ovechkin's goal captures all of his insane skills in one play. I don't want to give anything away for people that have never seen it (or at least known what they were seeing), so just watch it.
Alexander Ovechkin's epic goal

6. There are few things as beautiful as an amazing save... unless you've just been the one stoned. Here are a couple of the greatest saves ever.
"Not Today" (See Crosby's reaction at 0:44)
Martin Brodeur is a legend
The Dominator Tribute Video

7. Sometimes people embarrassed themselves:
There's a reason Gretzky only dropped the gloves once in his career...
Goal from the other red line on Toskala
In the 1998 Stanley Cup, the Red Wings were up on the Washington Capitals one game to none. Esa Tikkanen would have iced game 2 for the Capitals if he had made the following shot. Just know that the Red Wings swept the Capitals, 4 games to none.
Esa Tikkanen misses open net
Patrick Stefan channels Esa Tikkanen
When the Red Wings won the Stanley Cup last year, Marc-Andre Fleury was pretty much the highlight for the Pittsburgh Penguins, partly because of the amazing saves he made, but largely in part because of what happened to him before game 2
Fleury's Bad Omen

Please watch all of those. They are amazing, emotional, and hilarious.

I'll make the song of the day "Hey Hey Hockeytown". I have no idea who wrote or performs it, but it's the Red Wings' theme song.
"Hey Hey Hockeytown" at YouTube

Watch now, die laughing.

2008-09-12T12:28:00.003-05:00

This is the funniest unintentionally funny commercial I have ever seen in my life. I saw it on t.v. today and I immediately ran over here to post a link so you could laugh along with me.

Barilla pasta commercial

Song of the day: If this song does not get you pumped up, I don't know what will.
List of Demands - Saul Williams at Youtube

Forget Sarah Palin For a Second, Let's Talk About Me

2008-09-04T20:49:00.004-05:00

Alright, so school's back in session meaning that I should get some more posts in, especially since I'm living alone this year. So hopefully I've heard the last complaint about how I don't post enough.

Let me tell you my top 5 complaints about this school-year so far.

5. Now that I'm a junior, I'm starting to feel stupid for being in classes with freshmen. I have two 100-level classes because they were the only two that I could find that fulfilled some requirements. The first day I walked into these classes, it was practically silent because they were full of freshmen that knew nobody and were afraid to talk to their neighbor. I've never had the hatred towards freshmen that others have felt, but my being in the same learning space as them is now starting to make me feel like the creepy old guy. All I need is to have my hair start falling out and to be the guy to stare at a female a little too long after she's finished answering a question in discussion.

4. My TA's are starting to look closer to my age. Maybe I'm having a middle-age crisis of the college variety, but jeez, I feel like these people will be applying for AARP cards at the same time as me.

3. I love Asian people. Please don't get me wrong. But basically my entire floor is made up of people who I can't speak with. I don't know what it is about this building, but it's made up mostly of people that are not from the U.S.

2. The person who lived in my apartment last did not cancel their cable and internet. Now, when I called from my hometown, I was told that I would need to bring a lease in to be able to get service. Well, lucky for me, I had to work in my hometown until Labor Day, meaning that the only time I could get in to Charter would be when school started. So when I got here, I hooked up the internet and cable and it was working. Sweet, free internet and cable. But yesterday the cable went out. Well, today I went to the nearest Charter office... 8 miles away... and set up cable. It's only going to be 6 more days before I have cable. Luckily, I have That 70's Show Seasons 2 and 3 to keep me preoccupied.

1. I miss living with people.

Song of the day: We Looked Like Giants by Death Cab for Cutie. I just really like the line "You'd skip your early classes and we'd learn how our bodies worked". Even though Ben Gibbard seems a bit pretentious, a lot of my bands have ties to Death Cab, especially Chris Walla, and their songs are amazing productions. They are so well arranged, and a lot of that has to do with Chris' production skills and Jason McGerr's knack for picking the perfect drum beat for a given song. I have to give Gibbard credit for writing some amazing lyrics too. Going back to the bands with ties to Death Cab, The Dismemberment Plan were amazing friends with Death Cab, which is interesting considering that their music is quite different. Walla has produced albums for many of my favorite bands, including the Velvet Teen (Out of the Fierce Parade), Tegan & Sara (The Con (which McGerr also played drums on)), and Hot Hot Heat (Make Up the Breakdown and Knock Knock Knock).

We Looked Like Giants by Death Cab for Cutie at Youtube

Wanna See Me Do a One-Eighty in Five Months?

2008-08-07T15:14:00.016-05:00

Brett Favre is a douchebag.

Yeah, five months ago I wrote about how the game would never be the same for me without Favre. But at that point I had accepted that this was how it needed to end. Brett could not turn back and decide he wanted to return because his retirement marked a point of no return for the Packers organization. The Packers outright warned him that if he came back, they could not guarantee a spot as the starting quarterback. He retired knowing this full well.

So screw him for expecting the Packers to embrace him with open arms when it turned out he had only cried "Wolf!" like everyone thought he was going to. Rodgers was our starting quarterback from the moment he cried his little eyes out and said it was over. Playbooks were changed, chemistries were explored, plans were made. You don't just turn around and say "Oh, you want back in, poof, it's back to how it was". The Packers drafted two of the top quarterbacks in the draft in Matt Flynn and Bryan Brohm. If Favre were to come back, one of those guys would have been a wasted pick. Anyone who blames Ted Thompson for the fiasco can jump off a cliff.

Brett showed no regard for the Packers organization throughout this whole catastrophe. He represented a distraction as a 5-year old who didn't get his way. He threw a hissy fit because we wouldn't trade him to our competition and he entertained the notion of throwing away 16 years of the Packers catering to his every need in the blink of an eye. His character that was nearly spotless for the entirety of his career is now in shambles. Worse than that, Brett became bigger than the organization itself. Brett's stupid ESPN Bottom Line category to himself just irked the crap out of me. It made it seem as if Brett made the organization. This is why the coverage of our fans annoyed the heck out of me, too. Did anyone notice that they only seemed to pick the mindless, one track-minded people who thought Favre was a god, who seemed to be more interested in Brett's well-being than the club's? I never once saw people with my opinion represented, and I'm sure there are many. They chose the fanatics, the hicks with four teeth in their head and beer bellies painted with "We Want Brett!".

No, maybe Aaron Rodgers won't turn out great. Maybe there will be some years of struggle ahead. But sooner or later, the process has to begin, and the earlier it does, the earlier we get closer to glory. For these reasons, I say "Good Riddance, Brett Farve" as he moves on to the New York Jets and the Green Bay Packers move on without him.

In happier news, the Toadies are putting out a new album at the end of the month. You may have read my earlier post about how I wish they'd get back together. Well, good news, they did, and I saw them last week. The concert was amazing, and Vaden Todd Lewis' voice (at 42) sounds as good as ever. The dude has a glint in his eye when he sings that makes it clear that he still loves what he does. Thus, I am making the song of the day "Backslider" by the Toadies.

"Backslider" by the Toadies at YouTube

It's my 7th day in Hawaii

2008-07-16T01:09:00.011-05:00

Suckers. Too bad it's my last. But lots has happened.

The night we arrived... we ate McDonald's. $9 for an extra value meal. Insane. But they still have a dollar menu, so if you're sneaky you can get a meal for 4 or 5 bucks. But yeah, that was pretty much all we did the first night except for watch the sunset, which was awesome. The first couple hours you're in Maui you're just in awe of your surroundings if you've never been there. We stayed at the Ka'anapali B each Club all week, where we have a time share (so, ladies, if you're looking to get to Hawaii, all I'm saying is I will be inheriting said time share).

The next day we went snorkelling in a harbor. There were as many 400-pound sea turtles there as there are squirrels in a park. It was awesome, and if you're lucky you can get up to one before it dives to the bottom and holds its breath for an hour. But if you touch one I guess it's a year in jail. At night, we went to Lahaina, which is your stereotypical surf town. In fact, they did the reality surf show from MTV, "Living Lahaina", there. This will come into play later... Anyway, Lahaina is kind of the State Street of Hawaii. It's shopping central. We ate at "Cheeseburger in Paradise", the restaurant Jimmy Buffett owns. It was real tasty stuff.

Our third day, we took a party boat out to different spots in the Pacific to snorkel. It was lots of fun. There was lots of fun stuff to look at (off and on the boat if you know what i mean), but there were no sea turtles, and other than the fact that you can see fifty feet below you, it wasn't much different from the fish we saw in the fifteen feet below us in the harbor. It was a sweet experience nonetheless.

On the fourth day, we took the road to Hana. This is a crazy experience. The road to Hana takes you through 50 miles of rainforest, where you climb more than 1,000 feet on roads that are 1 1/2 car-widths wide with two-way traffic. According to the shirt I have there are 617 curves and 53 one-car bridges. Often, you take a turn and are staring straight at another car. Hence, you have to take the whole trip at 10-15 mph. But it's definitely the most "Hawaiian" place in Hawaii. Along the way, you see many waterfalls. You can swim in the pools that most of them make. Probably the coolest are the "Seven Pools", which are basically just 7 tiers down the side of a mountain. Supposedly if you swim in all seven you make it to heaven. We only made it through three, so I guess I'm out of luck. Also on the road is Charles Lindbergh's grave, who is actually buried in the same graveyard as monkeys (it's a long story). He's also buried sitting up so he can watch the waves of the ocean.

On the fifth night, we went to a Luau. There were many attractive women in grass skirts (see video). It was beautiful. Additionally, I tried poi and Mahi Mahi. Poi is made from the tarot plant. It tastes like the materialization of air AKA nothing. Mahi Mahi is a large fish that, in my opinion, tastes a bit like string cheese.

On day six, my sisters and I took surfing lessons in Lahaina. We took them from an instructor from Outrageous Surf. His name was Kaye or something, I can't remember. He was a real cool dude, and a good teacher. Anyway, I was talking to him about "Living Lahaina", which was about the surf shop "Royal Hawaiian Surf Academy", which is two blocks away from OS. Apparently, MTV made Outrageous Surf look like the bad guys on the show. However, this is not the case, so if you're ever in Maui take classes from them.

Finally, on day seven, we jet skiied. Tons of fun, especially with Maui as your backdrop. In the afternoon, I finally got to rest and work on my tan. Now I'm getting yelled at that I have to go pack.

The only thing you can listen to on the radio in Hawaii is reggae or Jack Johnson, so even though I've moved on from his music since high school, I'll make the song of the day a Jack Johnson song. It really is necessary to listen to his music to get the whole "Chill Hawaii" experience.

"Sitting, Waiting, Wishing"- Jack Johnson official music video at YouTube

"You Wouldn't Happen to Have a Ladder?"

2008-06-29T18:29:00.002-05:00

So, my buddy Mark is in the forces in Qatar, and we still talk over AIM. The other day, we were talking about an incident on Prom night of Junior year. A bunch of us didn't want to go or didn't have dates, so we made a plan to toilet paper 96 houses of people that were at Prom. I mapped it out and divided it into sectors. Well, about six houses in we got caught after someone saw us running away from a house that we saw someone move in. Hilarity ensued. I found the transcript I wrote of the dialogue between us and the cops. Here it is:

"You Wouldn't Happen to Have a Ladder?"

A nine-act play based on a true story
The night of April 14th, 2005
As told by T.J.

ACT 1: AT HOME
TJ: I'm going T.P.ing
Dad: Don't take my car
TJ: OK.

ACT 2: IN TJ'S DAD'S CAR WITH FOUR FRIENDS
Policeman: Get out of the car.
TJ: OK.

ACT 3: ON THE STREET
Policeman: Do you know why I stopped you?
TJ: No.
Policeman: People described five young men getting out of a van fitting the description
of yours, walking up to a house, and running away. Do you know anything about that?
TJ: Haha, yeah. We were scoping it out.
Policeman: Like you were going to burglarize it?
TJ: Haha, no. Like we were going to T.P. it.
Policeman: Alright, is there anything in the car other than TP (He flashes the flashlight into TJ's eyes)
TJ: Like...
Policeman: Drugs or alcohol?
TJ: Ha, no, we were just out to get people while they were at Prom.
Policeman: (Laughing) Are you the guys that couldn't get dates?
TJ: Haha, no, I could have gotten a date. I dunno about the rest.
Policeman: Oh, I gotcha. You didn't want to spend $90 on a girl that wouldn't aprreciate it.
TJ: Exactly.
Policeman: Alright, you can go back to the car.

ACT 4: BACK IN THE CAR
Policeman: Alright, you guys have two choices. 1) I give you all $160 citations. 2) You clean the houses off while we watch.
Matt: Choice 1!!!
TJ: Haha, no. We'll take the other one.

(Policeman starts to walk away)
TJ: Wait! You wouldn't happen to have a ladder, would you?
Policeman: Haha, nope. You're gonna have to use your imagination.

ACT 5: TAKING THE T.P. DOWN OUTSIDE OF JULIA'S HOUSE
(TJ and the police officer watch as Dan Sleider is hoisted into a tree by Matt and Cox. He gets stuck and hangs like a monkey in the tree to get some TP. TJ turns to the officer and says...)
TJ: This is more fun that the actual T.P.ing
Policeman: After we're done, I've got a lawn that needs mowing(Sleider gets down and shows them his wrists, which are all cut up from the branches)

ACT 6: STANDING BY TJ's CAR
Policeman: I still see a strand of TP in the tree.
Sleider: If I try to get it, the branch will break.
Policeman: No license until you get it.
(All the guys go "awwww")
Policeman: I'm just kidding. How many rolls did you guys buy?
Dan Brown: 120.

TJ: Haha, yeah, we had a 96-house plan.
Cox: It's all the cheap kind.
TJ: Yeah, like half-ply.

ACT 7: FLASHBACK TO PICK 'N SAVE
(All five guys walk up to cahier with 120 rolls of T.P.)
Cashier: Going camping?
TJ: Um, no. We're... building a float.
Cashier: You're lying. You're going t.p.ing, aren't you?
TJ: Yeah, but if we get caught, we'll say we got it from Sentry.

ACT 8: STANDING BY TJ'S CAR
TJ: We got it from Sentry. Can we donate the TP to the police station?
Policeman: Ha, no, we're all set. But you guys are free to go.
TJ: So we can go back to T.P.ing now, right?

ACT 9: BACK HOME

Dad: You took my car?! You're grounded for two weeks from car, internet, and cellphone. You're gonna have to gain our trust back... (Fades out)
FIN

Possible Casting
TJ: Jude Law
Matt B.: Jim Carrey
Sleider: Some unknown gymnast that can hang from trees
Dan Brown: Steve Buscemi
Stock: Andy Dick
Cox: Mark Cox

Policeman: Himself. He was like 25 with a fauxhawk. Chicks would go crazy for the guy.

Haylie Duff - Foremost expert in singing and acting

2008-06-16T21:47:00.003-05:00

Okay, I've caught some of the search for the next Elle Woods from Legally Blonde on MTV. Whatever. A lot of annoying voices, etc. But you do have to feel terrible for these girls because it seems like Broadway is the most cutthroat business ever.

But this is what's ridiculous: About every ten minutes or so Haylie Duff says something about how hard it is to be an actress and how good singers do this and that and blah, blah, blah. This is hilarious. There is NOTHING hard about Haylie Duff's life. She rode her younger sister's coattails to... Napolean Dynamite. I want to see her sing one of the songs from Legally Blonde. She would get laughed off the stage.

I dunno, that's my random injustice I thought I'd share with the world today. I haven't had a lot to write about lately because I work and sleep, and that's about it. I have listened to music, though, so I'll make the song of the day "Fools" by the Dodos. The Dodos are a two-piece band with a guitar player / lead singer that plays some crazy, intense, difficult riffs all while he sings some crazy rythyms. Fools is the most intense song with an acoustic guitar you will ever hear.

The Dodos' "Fools" at YouTube

Chris Osgood: Most Valuable... Goalie?

2008-06-05T14:06:00.003-05:00

Messed up. Listen. I'm ecstatic that my favorite hockey team, the Detroit Red Wings, won their fourth Cup in 11 years. Let me just say that I have been a Wings fan since I was in kindergarten, before they had won their first Cup in 42 years, because my whole mother's side of the family lives in Michigan and are Wings fans. But this is my beef: How did Chris Osgood not get the Conn Smythe trophy as MVP of the Stanley Cup Playoffs?

Henrik Zetterberg got it. Zetterberg was tied for first in the playoffs with 27 points, along with "the Next One", Sidney Crosby of the Penguins. He was tied for first in goals with 13, along with Johan Franzen of the Wings. He was third in assists with 14, 7 behind Crosby's 21.

Osgood was passed over in '98 when he was starter for the Wings in favor of Steve Yzerman for Conn Smythe, which was probably the right call. But consider this: Chris Osgood is 35. He got traded away from the Wings to the New York Islanders and St. Louis Blues, teams that clearly had no shot at Stanley Cups. It looked like Osgood was on the downswing. Heck, when he came back to the Wings, and even this year, he was supposed to be Dominik Hasek's backup. But no, he led the regular season in goals against average with a 2.09 goals-against average. When he got to the playoffs he again did not start as the Wings chose to use Hasek. But after game four, with Hasek having lost the last two games as starter, Osgood got the job and never let go. He went 14-4, with 3 shutouts (T-1st), .930 save percentage (3rd), and a 1.55 GAA (1st), .42 ahead of the second place holder. By comparison, in 2006 the Conn Smythe trophy was given to Cam Ward of the Carolina Hurricanes, who had a 2.14 GAA and .920 save percentage.

I have nothing else to say. I think the numbers speak for themselves.

Song of the day: Hospital Beds by Cold War Kids at YouTube

I'm Gonna Be a History Geek for a Second

2008-05-23T19:54:00.004-05:00

Anyone who took a high school history class knows the Soviet Union sustained the worst death toll in World War II (about 23 million total). But can you tell me who sustained the second most?
I bet more than half of the U.S. population didn't even know that China was an Ally. 20 million Chinese died in World War II. Why the heck don't we learn this stuff in high school? The bottom line is that, though we believe we are the land of the free, one of the most accepting and cultured countries in the world, our high school history cirriculums are western-focused. Where are the primary sources from Chinese civilians talking about the death all around them? It just confuses me. Is non-Western history not important? We trace Soviet progression into Communism but not Chinese. It just blows my mind.

Let's face it. White history is still the history of public schools. Sure, we throw in some black history. But so-called "Global Studies" are usually a look at Europe, or the events that effected the United States. We may talk about Japan, but only because they were a major player against us in World War II. We may talk about the Soviet Union, but that's only because they we our opponents in the Cold War. Our education system still looks at the world as it affects us. We disregard Africa because we look at it as a tribal continent that doesn't have a lot of interaction with the United States. We look at the east and see cultures that are far different than ours, and that alarms us. For these reasons, we choose not to explore and discuss them, and that's just sad. 20 million lives is an insane number, whether they are Europeans or not. The value of a life should not change based on the culture from which it came from.

Did the Foo Fighters Kill Grunge?

2008-05-16T15:19:00.005-05:00

This is something that's been bothering me for a long time.

Basically, I've been home since Tuesday because I had early exams. The majority of my friends are still in school so I've been playing a lot of video games and listening to music. Well, I am currently what is known as "broke", or something like it, so I haven't gotten new music for a month or so. Well, except for the new Foo Fighters album that I bummed off someone else because I didn't think it was worth buying, but that doesn't really count because I don't see myself listening to it. The last two albums have had no character whatsoever, with the exception of the song "The Pretender". I can actually tolerate that song, but songs like "Best of You" and "Long Road to Ruin" are death. I will not even honor them with links. The Foo Fighters have been reduced to watered-down "hard rock" that really has no traceable structure and is boring as heck. It kills me because the Foo Fighters were the second band that I was ever obsessed with (after Creed, so really I should say that the Foo Fighters were my first favorite good band). But obtaining the album was enough to thrust me into nostalgic stage of listening to the first four Foo Fighters albums. Even then, though, you can trace a downward spiral of quality.

This spiral has led me to ask myself the same question for years; Did the Foo Fighters, namely Dave Grohl, kill grunge music? I feel terrible thinking that because I like the guy. However, after Kurt Cobain died, and Dave Grohl formed the Foo Fighters, the movement was really placed on Dave's back. As the Foo moved out of their grungy ways from their first album and into the ballads and "hard rock" songs, did the crowd move along with it, or did they become disgusted with the way it was going and move on to other things? OR did Cobain's death signify that the style was dead with him, or leave grunge fans thinking that no one could ever do it better? I was six when the guy died, so I really can't use myself as an example to answer these questions. I knew Wierd Al's "Smells Like Nirvana" before I knew "Smells Like Teen Spirit".

But grunge's legacy lives on in the crappy post-grunge bands like Nickelback, Puddle of Mudd and Seether (again, screw you, no links), who do their best to sound like Kurt Cobain. This is why I fret over the Foo Fighters. They could have taken it in a respectable direction. Instead, one of the most influential bands ever, the "Beatles of the 90's" now lives on in "How You Remind Me" (please do watch that link, because it helps my argument).

I'll make the song of the day a Foo Fighters song, which seems to be inconsistant with my rant, but my qualm is with their new music, not the early stuff. "Everlong" is one of my favorite songs of all-time. So "Everlong" it is.

"Everlong" by the Foo Fighters at YouTube.

What I REALLY Learned from Exams

2008-05-14T08:54:00.005-05:00

Let's be honest. Exams are a time where we do hardcore studying for 48 hours or so, throw it down on paper, and then forget what we learned. At least that's the way it is for a lot of history classes. I'm sure engineers have to remember things as they go along, and blah blah blah, but ask me how much I remember from Chinese History last year. It's hard to remember names with 3 X's and 5 U's in them.

Here is what I really learned over exams:

-I'm going to warn you ahead of time that this is going to be a run-on sentence: When a TA gives you a review with 10 essay questions on it and says five will be on the exam, two of which you have to answer, and then he gives you the five essays that he can "almost guarantee" will be on the test, it is not safe, in fact, to only study three of those essays. This is what I did and only one of my essays made it onto the exam. With it being a cumulative exam, I had absolutely no idea what the answers to the four remaining essays were. I wrote one Bluebook page on the one I finally picked would do the most damage, and then I had nothing left. So this is what I wrote: "I'll be honest, I studied three of the essays you said would probably be on the exam, and that backfired. So I will conclude my essay by saying 'Have a Great Summer', and here's a picture of a missile blowing up my grade." The grade was depicted by a cartoon A with a face screaming "Noooo! But the first essay was so good! How could this happen?!"

-Listen to music you are very familiar with while you study. If you listen to music you've just purchased, you get distracted far too easily, especially if you're like me. I pick apart music and analyze the crap out of every aspect, so my first 20 listens or so I pay attention. Additionally, I do a lot of studying at my computer, and when I start listening to a new band I do more research than the FBI. I need to know how many albums they have, how old are their members, what are their grandma's names, etc. It's even bad if you listen to music that you haven't listen to for a long time, like I did with Funeral for a Friend this weekend. I wanted to know if they were putting out an album soon, and sure enough they are. This led me to studio videos, articles, etc. Don't throw that stuff in front of me or I won't be able to stop. So usually when I study, I go with one of my favorite bands, like Radiohead or the Velvet Teen, or whatever I've been listening to over and over again for the last four weeks.

-E-mail your TA's. A lot. It makes it look like you care a lot. Bonus points if you actually do. It wasn't my intention to, but I also impressed them by handing in take-home exams the day after I got them. This was more convenience than initiative, as I had exams on Sunday and Tuesday, and the take-homes were due Monday and Tuesday.

- Don't moon your roommate as you walk out the door on the way to the library. You might break your fly button and have to use a safety pin to keep your pants together.

I guess I'll leave you with a song by Funeral for a Friend since I mentioned them earlier. FFAF are a bunch of Welsh guys, who have the greatest accents ever in real life. But if you heard them, you'd think they were an American band because they don't have a UK feel. They're one of the few bands from my emo/screamo phase that I still enjoy listening to because Matt Davies has a pure, beautiful voice, which contrasts with the moving, intimidating guitars beautifully. It's not whiny at all like other emo bands, and by their third album they had matured a lot over the years, although they've stated that with the new album they are going to bring it back to more complicated riffs and some harsh vocals, like their earlier albums. Their last album was made entirely without any screaming, which is done by their drummer, Ryan Richards. Apparently, this is not going to be the case for the new album. I had a scare two days ago, though, because Wikipedia suddenly said that Matt Davies had left the band. When I got to their Myspace people were already freaking out all over their wall, as they are a huge band in the UK, somehow with relatively unknown status in the U.S. Well, as Wikipedia is fan-edited, my suspicions that it was contrived were confirmed when Gareth posted that it was something someone made up. It hadn't made sense to me since they had just announced that they were filming the video for the new single on May 17th. Anyway, I'll leave you with two songs, because I want to show you the something from all three of their albums. I feel like Matt's voice really matures between the second and third albums. They're in chronological order.

"Juneau" by FFAF at YouTube
"Streetcar" by FFAF at YouTube
"Great Wide Open" by FFAF

Poor commercial directors

2008-05-05T12:47:00.007-05:00

The most unappreciated job in show business. Do they get a credit at the end of each commercial? I think not. Can you name a single commercial director? No. Who are the genius' behind the Berries 'n Cream Starburst commercial, or the Robert Goulet Emerald Nuts commercial? We may never know. Oh, the lack of fulfillment they must feel. In this coming election, I will pledge my support to whatever candidate takes up this issue and finally frees the commercial director from the chains of despair that they have endured for over 75 years (don't forget about radio commercials).

College Comic Strips: An Opportunity for the Sucky to Be Published

2008-04-29T20:10:00.002-05:00

Listen, I love the Daily Cardinal and the Badger Herald. I even love the comics as I read them everyday. But there's GOT to be some requirement for people to be allowed to make comic strips for these papers. Basically, I'm pretty sure they're so eager to fill a page that they don't care who draws for them.

My first grievance as against the comic strip "The Crackles". There is no originality to this strip. First of all, they are pacman-type characters (and believe me, he tries to milk the jokes out of the resemblance, as if it's coincidental) that just stand around and talk. Fine. Whatever. Kevin Smith makes his living by making movies where people just stand around and talk. It's just got to be funny. But the guy clearly can't draw. So you would think that he would make up for it by being funny. Well, I submit to you this comic. Haha, it's a hippo. Wait what's that, the hippo's hungry? Oh, I get it! Hungry, hungry hippos.

Let's just review. The usual requirements for comic strips: Good drawings, good story-lines, usually funny. Crackles? 0 for 3.

But the crappy comics aren't limited to the Daily Cardinal (see also "Square and Cone". I can't find a good link right now, but I'll find one.) With the Badger Herald, we have Milk. Here is an example. The thing I hate about comic strips is for some reason, about half of them like to talk about World of Warcraft, and other RPG's. This girl is clearly among that demographic. The thing is, most of her comic strips nobody gets unless they play them! There are a couple of other comic strips like this, but the one's like Yourmometer and C'est La Mort are occasionally funny and are not limited to that subject.

So many of you would say, get out there and do it yourself if you could do better. And to be honest, I've thought about it. But then I realized... I AM LAZY. It would be tons of fun, don't get me wrong. But to make them to my standards, it would take a lot of time. I would not be happy putting forth some of the stuff these people are doing.

But I do have to admit there are some very funny comics in the papers. Everyone loves and raves about White Bread and Toast, but I think it's on and off, and it mostly does the one frame with different dialogue thing. The one comic strip I could see getting national syndication is Green Planet. The drawer's talents are not limited at all, and the plot lines are hilarious. And although the subject matter of many comic strips, like Rehablilitating Mr. Wiggles, is funny because it is inappropriate and could never be put in a national paper, Green Planet's is for the most part just clean, witty humor.

So that's it. I was just taking a dump and reading the papers and I got frustrated with some of the comics, so I thought I'd rant. And my whole weekend was spent reading a book on the role honor played in the foundation of the U.S. and writing a 10-page paper on the subject, so I needed a stress reliever.

I thought I'd go with an animated music video for the song of the day. So here's my favorite song ever, Paranoid Android by Radiohead.

Paranoid Android at Youtube

Minus the Bear Concert an Intense Ride

2008-04-23T15:36:00.007-05:00

Minus the Bear encountered a bunch of problems at their concert in Madison on Thursday. One band got pushed out of the lineup by the sponsors. Then, Portugal the Man, who actually drew a significant chunk of the crowd, had to pull out because their van broke down in Chicago. Thus, the people that traveled showed up for an 8:00 show that got pushed back to 9:30 due to unforeseen circumstances.

Club 770 is literally a cafeteria by day. It's placed in Union South and has a capacity of like 450. Well, I'm pretty sure they overflowed this place because there was absolutely no room, but due to our early arrival my friend Jenny and I were able to get front row. Worse than that, there were kids that were clearly on acid or something of that nature jumping around and into people, even before Minus the Bear was on and the Big Sleep had the stage. There was a drunk girl that I couldn't shake that kept playing drums on my back and trying to get me to dance crazily (Her name was Regina). Jenny found this hilarious, and due to my extremely muscular back I was able to tolerate it.

Once the Big Sleep was off, everyone tried to rush to the front. It was basically like trying playing Red Rover for an hour-and-a-half. I am a small guy of 5'6" but I was not letting anyone through. Jenny, on the other hand, got pushed out. She was gone before I knew it, something I felt terrible about. She ended up watching the show from the side. The reality was, I could not have gotten out if I tried, so we kept communications by text message. The entire concert was spent with the entire weight of the crowd pushing against the front row, causing them to be constantly bent over onto the stage that was only a foot-and-a-half off the ground. It was also really tiny and I'm amazed they got five members on it. It was like clowns in a clown car.

During the second song, probably over the previously mentioned pushing, a fight broke out about 5 feet to my right. Cory, the bassist, jumped out. He had clearly been uneasy about the pushing right off the bat. It's funny, because last year at the Lussier Teen Center, Cory had to keep kicking kids off that ran onto stage. Anyway, Cory jumped out, then Jake, the lead singer, also jumped out to stop it. There was no security, so I guess they felt it was their job, and I guess no one would have been able to see it from the back, so really they were the only authority figures to do it.

The rest of the concert was amazing. They played The Fix (link to the Youtube video of them playing it at the concert), which is my favorite song of theirs, and they played a bunch of songs off the new album. In fact... you can see the entire setlist because with two songs left I asked Cory for it after the concert. At first I didn't think he heard me, but right as the song was starting he bent over and handed it to me. Before the last song I showed him it in case he forgot what the last song was and he laughed. Encores were "Fulfill the Dream" and "Absinthe Party at the Honey Warehouse".

Overall it was an amazing concert. I hope they still come back considering the problems they've had their last two concerts out here. I wonder how they feel about playing small venues like this when they could easily fill larger ones.

I'll make the song of the day Knights, because it has a sweet music video and is the best song off of Minus the Bear's new album, Planet of Ice.

"Knights" by Minus the Bear at YouTube

Oh, and I made it in a couple of pictures. I can be seen in one on Mixtapes |Heartbreaks (although Cory's blocking out my face), and there's this one that the writer of that blog sent to me. Thanks Stacey!

Also, the top picture looks kind of cruddy because I didn't take any pictures with the flash on. I didn't want to blind them because I was literally that close.

4/20 is on a Sunday this year...

2008-04-20T03:58:00.003-05:00

... This really poses a conundrum for Christian pot-smokers. Do you observe the Sabbath or smoke your brains out?!?!?! Is Communion good munchies-food?

Bjork - Grade A Pimp

2008-04-16T16:13:00.005-05:00

Yeah, I said it. The lady has balls. Declare Independence is a fantastic song, and she's been using it for inspirational purposes. She used it in a couple concerts to praise Kosovo for their new Constitution in Tokyo, a move that kept her from being allowed to play her show in Serbia. But this one takes the cake. In China, during the song she clearly says "Tibet, Tibet" on three different occasions. Just awesome.

YouTube video of Bjork's "Tibet, Tibet" version of "Declare Independence" in China

About the Name Change

2008-04-09T22:09:00.007-05:00

I'm distancing myself from the "straightedge" name. Let me tell you why. For a while I've heard of the militant movement with the straightedge label. Tonight I watched a documentary on National Geographic (narrated by Thurston Moore of Sonic Youth). Apparently this militant movement has grown over the years as a social-cleansing type movement. I'd known about it, but thought it was relatively uncommon. Turns out it's pretty much evolved into gangs all over the country. Basically, I only ever related to the straightedge ideals of abstaining from drugs and alcohol. I never listened to the "straightedge" music or even contacted another "straightedge". There is a sect of the movement called "posi's" (for positive livestyle) that do peacefully pursue a clean life. However, the posi's have been overtaken by the militant movement in the media. I am esentially a pacifist, so I would never condone any of this activity. Thus, I will no longer identify myself as a straightedge.

"Feeding Milk to Chickens" is something I came up with one day in class that has personal meaning to me, but I'll let you interpret however you'd like.

Here's a picture of a smashed guitar I found on my way to class today.

Off the Schneid

2008-04-06T13:14:00.005-05:00

I went to the Brewers game yesterday. Be jealous. There is nothing like a baseball game. I said to Grant as we were walking up to the stadium, "I feel like I'm going to Six Flags." A baseball game IS the grown man's theme park. It has its distinct smell, distinct noises, distinct feeling.

I smelled somebody grilling about 3 weeks back in Madison and i had an urge to run the 70 miles to Milwaukee and pick up a Smoky Joe along the way. When we got into the place, though, we were disappointed to see that hot dogs had risen to $4.50. Insane. Right then, I said "We're coming to dollar hot dog day." Four hours later, we had ordered tickets to one of those games.

We ended up sitting at the end of one of three rows occupied by someone's 30th birthday group. Naturally, the friends of this guy were trashed. Well, one ended up sweating profusely. Not cuz he was fat. No, cuz he was plastered. The guy looked like death, and naturally, his friends found it funny. His girlfriend came down from the two rows above his and tried to help him out. Well, the dead guy suddenly came to life when he grabbed an empty large cup in two milliseconds flat and filled it about halfway with his own personal fluids. Naturally, rather than help him to the bathroom, his friends were merely blurs as they fled their seats for the aisles. They were more worried about their beer than their friend who quite possibly had alcohol poisoning. Basically, the rows around them cleared out too because they were disgusted by the amount of sweat and puke on the floor.

Me and Grant? Not disgusted at all. I labelled the man "Steve Barfman" This was a sign of the baseball season starting. It was highly amusing. This guy was apparently 32 years old and wasted at one o'clock in the afternoon. There's a college saying: "Enjoy it now, because after college it's called alcoholism."

At around the sixth or seventh, two guys jumped onto the field and ran from the third baseline towards the bullpen. I've never seen so many security guards on the field. They were chasing from behind, from the sides, from everywhere. But the ones that caught them came flying out of the bullpen. One guy got the classic spear from the guards, where it looked like Brian Urlacher taking out Mother Theresa. But the second guy didn't get caught from behind. No, he tried to break through a line of the guards that had come from the bullpen. Well, he tried doing this by bowling over one of the guards. This guy would have none of it, and he actually threw a haymaker at the guy before he had the chance. Yes, this guy got punched. Hard. And it was beautiful.

The baseball was beautiful, too. Ryan Braun's my favorite player (I used the second pick in my fantasy draft to get him even though he was ranked about 17 in the league). The guy finally got off the schneid on home runs. It wasn't a ball that barely cleared the fence like Kapler hit later in the day, it was a rocket. Parra had a no-hitter through five. We ended up winning 5-4. Gagne (pictured) was lights out in this save opportunity.

Last year, the Brewers were 8-1 with me in attendence. I was hoping the Crew would give me free tickets as a good luck charm, but this has not been the case. Nevertheless, I couldn't have asked for a better game to start out the season with.

Rather than have a song of the day today, I have to make an album of the day. I have been a fan of Colour Revolt for a couple years now. Up until April fools day, they only had an EP of 6 songs to listen to. Although this EP is one of my most prized posessions, I longed for more. Well, I got it last Monday at 12:01 am, as I downloaded their new CD "Plunder, Beg, and Curse" off of iTunes. In five days I've listened to this album 21 times. These guys are going to make a big name for themselves in the months to come. They are a mix of Modest Mouse, Brand New, Minus the Bear, and an old blues musician. Jesse Coppenbarger has one of the best voices in music. The guy is so young, but he's got such a booming voice for such a scrawny body. They have three guitarists, but as so many reviewers have written before, they are not obnoxious at all and are each necessary to make the music what it is. Check out their myspace and see for yourself.

Colour Revolt's Myspace

By the way, Geoff Jenkins looks weird in red, it's weird that our catcher can run faster than a snail, and it's great that the Cubs are 2-3.

Pictures of the Brewers game will be put up when I get back to Madison.

Actually, it is easy being green

2008-04-01T00:06:00.004-05:00

I missed the chance to say "Happy Opening Day" to you all by 10 minutes. However, the last baseball game isn't finished, so I guess it kind of counts. I've waited for this day for what seems like forever, and it did not disappoint. However, Eric Gagne did.

Anyway, I've dropped by to write something I'm surprised I haven't written about yet. Most anybody that knows me knows that I am very vocal about global warming. Lately, I've been trying to reduce by carbon footprint, and I thought I'd share some ways you can help.

1. Turn off your computers while you're not using them. This is a huge problem with people our age. I admit, that up until a couple weeks ago, I didn't really think about it. It's much more convenient to leave on, but if you think about it, how many hours a day do you spend at a computer? Two? Three? Well, if you turned it off for the time you weren't using it, you'd cut down your computer's carbon emissions by 80-90 %! The away message is a catalyst to this problem. But I have two comments for that: 1) If you are not on at 1:30 at night or so, we will assume you are sleeping. You don't need to leave an away up telling us. 2) Do you really need the away message? Let's be honest, most of us use text messaging. And really, let's try picking up a phone and calling someone. Relationships have gotten so much less intimate because everyone uses a screen to relay their feelings rather than their mouths.

2. I've pounded this one into my friends' skulls. Use CFL bulbs rather than incandescent. CFL stands for carbon-fluorescent lamp. It's a fancy way of saying those spiral light bubs. A CFL bulb uses up to 75% less energy than old fashioned bulbs and can last for ten times as long. This also means saving on your energy bill, so it's as good for your wallet as it is for the environment. There are lots of reasons to not like George W. Bush, but in December 19, 2007 (a day that i celebrated, resulting in people thinking I was a geek) he actually did something right. Starting in 2012, incandescent light bulbs will start to be taken off the shelf. So basically, it makes sense for you to convert to CFL's right now! But here's the one thing about CFL's you must know. They contain mercury, so there are specific places that will dispose of them for you. DO NOT throw them away.

3. There are some very indirect ways you can help, but they have a great impact anyway. GoodSearch is a search engine powered by Yahoo that donates a penny to the organization of your choosing every time you use it. It's my home page, because it's such an easy way to help without really doing anything. Why use Google, who keeps all their profits when you could put the money towards a cause? Another way is to add the "Greenbook" application to Facebook. For every minute you spend on Facebook, CO2 offset is purchased to compensate for the amount of CO2 you've put into the atmosphere while you've been on the computer. Thus, I usually keep my Facebook up on my screen no matter what I'm doing on my computer.

There are so many other ways you can reduce your CO2 output, many of which are really obvious if we stop to think about them. I think you're smart enough to figure them out, so I'll spare you. I'll also spare you from a corny closing statement like "You can make a difference" or something of that nature. Instead, I'll leave you with a link to the new music video for "Better to Be" that Liam Finn released today. Enjoy.

"Better to Be" by Liam Finn at YouTube

I Have Returned... With Music.

2008-03-24T23:25:00.005-05:00

So I'm back in Madison after spending spring break in my hometown. I didn't write over break, not because I don't have a computer, but because A) I was busy, and B) Most people say they read this when they are bored, so I figured that if you were like me you were never bored over break because you were busy catching up with friends that you rarely have a chance to see during the school year.

The consequence of spending so much time with people was that I didn't get any work done, with the exception of getting Allison a summer job and paying $130 to take a stupid ACT-type test called PRAXIS I that I have to take to get into the School of Education. That's like paying $130 to get punched in the face. But getting back on subject, I didn't read the 300 page book I was supposed to read on Louis XIV to write a six-page paper on it by Thursday. My progress tonight? 30 pages because I am easily distracted, especially considering the fact that I gave up video games for Lent and have been itching to get to the March Madness 2004 game that I purchased for $2. Guess what I spent two or three hours doing instead of reading about a dead French guy that no one liked.

On the bright side I have a lot of new music to help me get through the rough times. While in the Milwaukee area I went to CD Max, the used CD store in Brookfield. I picked up Version by Mark Ronson which features sweet brassed-up, funky covers of popular songs in England featuring guest vocalists. Highlights include "Oh My God" (Kaiser Chiefs cover) featuring Lily Allen, "Just" (Radiohead cover) featuring Alex Greenwald of Phantom Planet, and my personal favorite, "Stop Me" (The Smiths (a favorite band of Radiohead from the '80's (You may have heard of the lead singer, Morrissey) )cover) featuring Daniel Merriweather, who has a fantastic voice. Additionally I picked up the Knock Knock Knock EP from Hot Hot Heat, which is pre- Make Up the Breakdown, their first LP (aka it doesn't suck like their newest album).

Additionally, I cashed some checks that I forgot I had this week. Thus, I treated myself to some music from iTunes. I picked up Kings of Leon's newest album, Because of the Times, which features the song "Charmer", which was the song of the day on an earlier post, and "Fans", which there is an amazing live version of on YouTube.

But the album I'm most excited that I purchased is Georgi e James' Places. Though it might be easy to assume Georgie James is a person, it's actually a band, featuring the dual vocals of former Q and not U drummer John Davis and Laura Berhenn. They produce bubbly pop songs that fans of Headlights will enjoy, but which feature more guitar and less keyboards. The song that attracted me to them is called "Need Your Needs", which is the song of the day for today.

Need Your Needs by Georgie James at YouTube.

Warm Weather Bands

2008-03-13T16:33:00.007-05:00

Today, I've been in the best mood. I can't remember the last time I was this happy. After a long period of very little going right, this week nothing can go wrong. The weather was amazing today, and no one can help but be happy. The feeling on the streets is indescribable, everyone's moods have been lifted. In a time like this, your musical choices must go along with your mood to enhance it even more. Today I listened to sunny bands that only made me smile more. There's music that I only whip out during the warm months because they have that warm feeling that you don't want to ruin by bringing out during cold weather. Here are my three choices for music today:

Headlights
The epitome of good-feeling music. For real. You can't help but feel happy when you listen to "TV" or "Cherry Tulips". It's in no way corny either like some poppy, happy-go-lucky music can be. You just want to give people hugs when you listen to it, or dance around in colorful outfits with Leslie Feist.

Kings of Leon
Everything is in a major key and every drum beat and tambourine shake calls for you to run wherever it is you're going. The amped-up bass-lines scream Jet, and the twangy guitars resemble the Strokes. Caleb's 'let-go-of-all-your-
inhibitions-and-yell-out-however-you-want- even-if-it-comes-out-as-something-no-one-can-
understand-just-because-it-makes-you-feel-
good' lyrics make you wish you were in his place. Everyone just sounds like they're having fun.

Minus the Bear
This mostly applies to Menos El Oso. The whole album makes you feel as if you're sitting "on a Beach in the Mediterranean". It's hard not to throw the word "Romanticism" around when considering their lyrics. You can feel exactly what Jake Snider was feeling as he wrote the songs when you hear such lyrics as he says "Is it possible to put this night to tune and move it to you" or "I hope the weather holds / But you don't need the sun to make you shine. / These island towns don't care for city folk / but I think we can starve the city from our minds."

I couldn't hold it in. I felt I needed to share my good mood bands to spread joy.

Will you?

2008-03-12T23:18:00.005-05:00

It's easy to say you would if you could when you can't, but then when it turns out you can, will you say that you will and can, and will you?

Late Night Findings - Liam Finn

2008-03-12T02:22:00.007-05:00

I've been obsessing over Liam Finn's song "Second Chance" since I heard it two weeks ago, and I want to share it with you guys in my new segment. It is a late night finding because I found an amazing live version of the song on David Letterman where Liam concedes the mic to friend EJ Barnes to play drums.

At first listen, Finn may sound like your usual acoustic singer. But the New Zealander has some amazing pipes, as is evident by the end of the studio version of the song. Much of this may be attributed to his musical royalty genes, as his family is one of the most prominant musical families in New Zealand. His father Neil and uncle Tim were both standout musicians in the 70's and 80's and still sell out shows. Neil can count Ed O'Brien and Phil Selway of Radiohead, Johnny Marr of the Smiths, and Eddie Vedder of Pearl Jam among friends and musical collaborators. Oh, and Neil appeared on a little show called "Flight of the Conchords". Liam has also earned the seal of approval from Vedder, touring with him this spring. Liam was thrust into the musical spotlight of New Zealand with the grundgy band Betchadupa in 2000, at the age of only 17.

Liam plays every instrument himself live, with a few minor exceptions when EJ is accompanying him. He does it with the help of a looping system. This causes his songs to have a slightly predictable build sometimes because he is constantly adding parts, but what do you want? He's a one-man band for God's sake. And he's a great musician at everything he does. Here's a better example of his looping. The Letterman video is great purely because the song is amazing.

Liam Finn's "Second Chance" on Letterman on YouTube

The Case Against St. Patrick's Day

2008-03-10T21:02:00.004-05:00

I am part Irish. My grandmother's maiden name was Haggerty. Thus, St. Patrick's Day has some relevance to my life. However, I am actually in opposition to the fight to make St. Patrick's Day a national holiday.

I have been getting Facebook invites to a group that insists on making St. Patrick's day a national holiday. There is a petition that states that if it gets 1,000,000 signatures, St. Patrick's Day will become a national holiday. News stations have also begun to report on the fight for making St. Patrick's Day a national holiday.

St. Patrick's Day is in fact an exclusive holiday, only truly pertaining to the Irish, particularly Catholics, although St. Patrick was made a saint when the Catholic church was the only church around. St. Patrick's Day should not be a national holiday because it has nothing to do with the United States of America. All national holidays are in celebration of American history, not British, Irish, German, Candadian, or Djiboutian. Additionally, this is in no way a major religious holiday, therefore there is no reason to get out of work or school, the true reason people want to make St. Patrick's Day a national holiday.

To make St. Patrick's Day a national holiday would be going against the diversity of America. Every federal holiday has to do with American history with the exceptions of New Year's Day and Christmas. Christmas is the only Christian holiday that is regarded as a federal holiday, and that is due to the tradition of this country based on its founding upon the Christian religion. Its national status has been reduced in years past due to such inventions as the "holiday tree" and the fact that celebrators of other religions must be given off of work and school for their respective religious holidays.

Lastly, I would like to educate you on the color green in regards to St. Patrick's Day. Green represents Catholic Ireland, as it is a Catholic holiday. I actually wear orange every St. Patrick's day because my family is Protestant Irish.

I'm not trying to scream "USA! USA!" while drinking beer with my shirt off perched on top of a camper in the infield of a NASCAR race right now. I am merely stating that if we were to celebrate an Irish national holiday as one of our own, how would the other ethnicities and religions of the U.S. feel? I know you are all looking for a way to get paid or get out of school while getting plastered, but if it's that important to you, can't you take a sick day or something? Just a thought.

Here's the song of the day. I'm going to go to some all-American boys. The Kings of Leon are all either brothers or cousins, with the same grandpa whose name happened to be Leon. Their sound is similar to the Strokes sometimes, but it has a mostly has a more prominant bassline and even less decipherable lyrics. Caleb Hollowill has a delightfully raspy voice, which he has amazing control over. Rolling Stone named them the 16th best live band still existing in July of '07, and from what I've through live videos on YouTube seen they live up to that ranking. Caleb does every high pitched scream and voice inflection just as it sounds on the record, and every guitar solo is tight.

"Charmer" by Kings of Leon at YouTube

Update on 2/10/08 Only in Madison...

2008-03-07T15:50:00.006-06:00

Allison found me this photo of the Jebus Loves Sluts girl. Just remember that there is a windchill of negative 30 degrees. Here's a link to the original article.

Gah!

2008-03-05T15:45:00.004-06:00

...It's all gonna be alright... shh... it's gonna be okay... NO IT'S NOT!

It's so weird that I've mentioned Brett Favre in a couple posts in the last week, about how his streak was going to end someday, and the next time Wisconsin makes it into the news will be when Brett retires. Yet I was totally unprepared for it. Or perhaps in denial. At the end of the season this year, I said to myself that in the last three years, this is the year that would make the least sense for Brett to retire. But that scared me, because he's always done the opposite of what people expected him to do. Sure enough, he goes and does it.

The media coverage just depressed me. It felt like Brett had died because there was no press conference, no interview, no nothing. I didn't want to post on it because I didn't know how to. Every blogger in Wisconsin will be attempting and failing to express their feelings on the issue adequately. It comes across as stereotypical Brett-Favre-determines-the-lives-and moods-of-Wisconsinites. People (including myself) have been reacting with hysterical away messages and Facebook statuses and everything. But to an extent, it is true. It's the end of an era, the only one I've ever known.

Let's look outside of the box here. Brett's been the starting quarterback since I was three. Who else in Wisconsin sports has been here since 1991, other than Bob Uecker (who is the man, too. Nick has often said that the only fitting way for Bob Uecker to die will be to get hit by a baseball in the announcing booth, and I wholeheartedly agree. Hopefully that doesn't happen for another 20 years or so). No Brewers. No Bucks. No other Packers. No one from the 1996 Super Bowl team was left. Brett's retirement is sad purely because of his greatness, but also because he's the last staple that has been around since I can remember. Sports are constantly changing, especially in a day of $30 million a year contracts. But Brett Favre was always there, goofing around and smiling. I've not only mourned for the Packers, but realized that my childhood is nearly over.

I don't think Brett's coming back. I don't think this is a publicity stunt. I think he's telling the truth when he says he's tired. I also think he feels the pressure of living up to this season, and a little responsibility for the NFC Championship loss. Who knows what will happen next year, or in the entire future of the Packers' organization for that matter. But it's obvious that no one could ever replace Brett Favre. That's not to say there won't be anyone better, but there's no other figure that I will ever associate with my childhood like I do Brett Favre.

In his honor, I'm making the song of the day "Last Goodbye" by Jeff Buckley. I've listened to Jeff Buckley for a year or two now, but I just recently got reacquainted with his music again since I've become what is known as "broke" and am unable to buy new music. Jeff Buckley was one of the most influencial musicians on today's music scene, including the likes of Radiohead, who have influenced a few bands here and there themselves. Before drowning in a tributary of the Mississippi River in 1997, Buckley made one of the greatest albums ever in Grace in 1994. The album features the famous cover of "Hallelujah" by Leonard Cohen. It's much different from the original, yet the version that multiple artists have covered, including Rufus Wainwright for Shrek and approximately 50 other artists. It is the epitome of beauty. But the album has many powerful songs too, like the title track and my personal favorite, "Eternal Life". Buckley's diverse influences developed his intensely falsetto dominated voice and unique guitar work. This is an understatement, as getting into the details of his influences would take pages.

"Last Goodbye" - Jeff Buckley at YouTube.

Every Great Streak Must End.

2008-03-02T20:58:00.006-06:00

Even Cal Ripkin missed a game eventually. Brett Favre will eventually miss one too, either through retirement or injury. Well, today, a great streak ended for me. Before you get excited, it's not that I drank or anything.

I've been taunting the ice here ever since October. I do not own boots, so I walk around in my usual nike skater/tennis shoe breeds, constantly slipping, but never falling. My quick hand-eye coordination saved me probably 500 times in the 4-month winter we've had thus far. Every time I cheated wet pants, I laughed at the ice and dared it to try it again. I was a naive young man, nowhere near experienced as I am now.

Today, the ice fought back in full force. It gathered up all the times I taunted it, and thrust them back me in a cluster of karma. It was 47 degrees tonight and rainy. This meant that you had to choose between walking on ice or walking in 6 inches of water in some areas. Naturally, I picked ice. I had some close calls and addressed them with my usual arrogance. But a mere block from my apartment disaster struck and I wound up with a drenched side. Dejected and dethroned as the king of balance, I carefully stepped with a new-found respect for frozen water.

Don't cry for me, I learned a valuable lesson.

I will make the song of the day "The Ice of Boston" by the Dismemberment Plan. They were a very influential band on the indie music scene, buddies with Death Cab for Cutie, and a favorite of Pitchfork Media (not that that means anything to me). Hailing from Washington, D.C., they released four albums before disbanding in 2003. They, like the Toadies, often have reunions in their hometown, usually for benefits. The Dismemberment Plan, at least for their first three albums, were a unique blend of spoken word, screaming, and singing, employing dischords and funky basslines similarly to Primus.

The Ice of Boston by the Dismemberment Plan on YouTube.

To be honest...

2008-03-01T02:50:00.002-06:00

Semi-pro doesn't look like a very good movie. Sorry, Will Ferrell.

Happy Leap Year Day!

2008-02-29T23:13:00.002-06:00

It is the rarest holiday of all, because it is only celebrated quad-annually.

Under8ed

2008-02-28T12:36:00.005-06:00

That would be a good name for a Good Charlotte-esque band. Like, I would already hate a band named "Under8ed" purely from their name, so I would hope it would be sucky music to go along with it.

First off, I apologize for saying the Jonas Brothers are better than the Beatles. But I will stick to my guns that Avril Lavigne is the greatest guitar player ever.

Anyway, this post is about the Toadies. Most of you, probably being under the age of 25, will have probably never heard of them. They were a band from the early nineties that toured with the likes of the Red Hot Chili Peppers, White Zombie, Bush, and The Butthole Surfers. Their sound is tough to describe. Grunge with a heavily-Robert Plant influenced voice? I suppose. The "grunge" aspect was probably the cause of their demise. Grunge died with Kurt Cobain (and the help of the gradual mutation of the Foo Fighters from grunge to alternative to a band with ballads and lukewarm "hard rock" songs that are more patterned than Al Boreland's shirt). It also didn't help that it was seven years between the release of the Toadies two albums. By the time the second was out in 2001, Vaden Todd Lewis' voice was pretty much blown out and their music was considered outdated. Years of screaming took their toll, and although he still has some pipes, it was clear that they were not what they used to be.

Rubberneck, released in 1994, should be on every top albums of the 90's list out there in my opinion, unless you're talking in terms of records sold. Perhaps alternative fans will be familiar with the song "Possum Kingdom". I know that once in a blue moon they play it on Rock 102.1 in Milwaukee. It's featured on the Xbox 360 version of Guitar Hero 3, a track that I have yet to play because my roommate has it on PS 2. However, the whole album is solid, and features many songs that I think are better that Possum Kingdom. "I Come From the Water" is just a delightfully intense song about evolution. "Tyler" is slightly ripped off from the Pixies' "Where is My Mind?" (which the Toadies cover on their live album), but it's a creepy story about a man breaking into a woman's house. "I stumble in the hallway, outside the bedroom door. / I hear her call out to me, I hear the fear in her voice. / She pulls the covers tighter, I press against the door/ I will be with her tonight." No doubt these lyrics are a bit creepy, but often great music is just a bit creepy or offensive. Nirvana's "Rape Me" anybody? Possum Kingdom itself is about a vampire trying to persuade a girl to let him bite her so they can live (sort of) forever as a couple. It's often misconstrued because Vaden Todd Lewis repeats over and over again "Do you want to die?", which sounds more like a threat than persuasion. This album is the ultimate pump-up cd.

The Toadies disbanded in 2001, shortly after their second album came out because Lisa Umbarger, the bassist, wanted to quit, and the band felt it wouldn't be the same without her. However, since their break-up, they have gotten together for a few reunion tours, mostly in the Texas area (minus Lisa, however). It seems as if they are discussing larger scale ideas lately as Lewis' current band, the Burden Brothers (who I also enjoy very much), are on hiatus. When speaking of their December reunion tour, drummer Mark Reznicek said, “Expect lots of rock. And maybe even new Toadies releases in the future. Whether that involves putting out some unreleased archival stuff, or even recording new material... who knows?”

So check out the complete collection of Toadies videos:
"Possum Kingdom" at YouTube
"Tyler" at YouTube
"Mister Love" at YouTube (Warning: Tripped-out old man licking frogs in this video)

The Jonas Brothers are Better Than the Beatles Ever Were.

2008-02-25T17:54:00.001-06:00

And Avril Lavigne is probably the most influencial guitar player of all-time.

Apparently I have mind powers

2008-02-22T15:57:00.004-06:00

I have 107 Radiohead songs. I'm not trying to brag, it's just background information.

You see, today I have been in a kind of "woe-is-me" blah mood. Some people would listen to happy music in these circumstances. However, I find that when I'm depressed, depressing music makes me feel better. Don't ask me how it works. So I hit shuffle on my iTunes and type in Radiohead. I was like, I hope one of the most depressing songs of theirs comes in. Enter "Fake Plastic Trees". So I laid down on my bed and was like, you know what, all I'm doing is feeling sorry for myself. All of a sudden "Just" comes on, which features the lyrics "You do it to yourself, you do, and that's why it really hurts".

I know, these aren't that strange, but it seems like there are so many points in your life where music really adds a soundtrack to it. That's cliche, but it's only cliche because it's true.

Sidenote: One time I hit shuffle on some band where I had 50 songs or something, and I promised my iPod a dollar if it played a certain song first. Well, it did, so for the next month I left a dollar where I set my iPod while it recharged.

Holy crap. I just realized that it's my iPod that has the ability to read minds, not my mind that has the ability to send messages.

Anyway, the song of the day today is a no-brainer.

"Just" by Radiohead.

That's enough, Larry the Cable Guy

2008-02-22T01:43:00.001-06:00

No, that's it. I'm just getting sick of him.

Almost Famous: Wisconsin

2008-02-20T00:45:00.008-06:00

It was nice for our state to actually get a little recognition today. I can't remember the last time our state has been acknowledged on a national level. The last time the Packers were at the Super Bowl? It got me to thinking, when will the next time be? What possible event could take place in which Wisconsin will play an extended role in national news. Every possible scenario had one variable in common: Brett Favre.

The obvious possibility would be Brett Favre's retirement. I have long thought about what will happen on this day. Schools would be shut down. The elderly will die from sadness. Men whose blood was pure alcohol and brat grease would no longer be able to thrive off of their adrenaline, which was the only thing keeping them from dying of heart attacks for the last decade or so. It would rain, not a violent storm, but a slow steady downpour with the clouds blocking out the daylight.

After this day, the next time the proverbial sun would come out for Wisconsin in the media would be when Brett Favre chose to run for governer, President, and Pope all in one shot. He would make Friday required-pick up football day, with cheerleaders and everything. There would be no war, and all conflicts would be resolved in sudden-death overtime (not to be taken in the literal sense). It would be the most glorious era in the history of the Dairy state.

So fear not Wisconsinites, despite the fact that rough waters are ahead, they will ultimately lead to a utopia... a glorious beer-battered utopia.

I want to make the song of the day a totally unrelated song. For the past two weeks, I have been bathing in the sounds of the Dekoder remix of Menomena's "Weird". I decided to make it the song of the day today because I heard it featured in a Mountain Dew commercial (ad can currently be seen on the Mountain Dew link in promo section).

Menomena- "Weird" Dekoder remix

I procrastinate like it's my job. A job that I don't remember I have.

2008-02-18T00:29:00.005-06:00

As I don't see me having a lot of time this week, I may not get a post this week. Here's why:
-Finishing R.A. application due Wednesday.
-I have some exam or project due Thursday, I just can't remember what. We'll worry about that Wednesday.
-I have some exam/project due next week, I just can't remember when/what.
-I have to make up for the two days I was absent last week, resulting in me missing my 3 power lectures both times last week. Good times.

You know how it is when you kind of wish one of these times your procrastination will come back to bite you in the butt, but it never has, so you've never learned? No? I do. Is this a valuable life lesson? How to procrastinate effectively? I know not.

Fittingly, I'll make the song of the day "Running out of Time" by Hot Hot Heat, pre-Happiness Ltd. which sucked hardcore. It succeeded in limiting my happiness. I just made the same joke that every single critic from every college newspaper across the country made.

Disclaimer- this is most definitely not the actual music video. There isn't one.

I could do a post about Valentine's Day

2008-02-14T12:58:00.002-06:00

Nah.

Sometimes, it's more than just a dime

2008-02-12T20:03:00.003-06:00

Today I had Cousin's for dinner because I have run out of food in my apartment. Attempting to be efficient with my money, I got the two 7.5 inch subs for $5.50 deal, rather than the 4.25 for one 7.5 inch sub deal. Anyway, I ordered from one guy, who went to make my sub, and the other guy came over and rang me up for him. I was kind of in a daze (not drug-induced, obviously), so I paid and took my change without paying attention. As I waited for my sub, I looked at my receipt and noticed the guy had only charged me for one sub. Quickly I was reminded of a story the pastor of my church told.

Here's how it goes: A pastor got onto a bus one day and paid his fare to the bus driver. When the driver handed back his change, he sat down at the back of the bus. Counting his change to make sure he had been given back enough change, he soon realized that the driver had given him a dime too much. The pastor thought about it for a sec. It's a dime, it doesn't really matter. But after a while, his conscience got the best of him and he took the dime back. The driver said to him, "I was watching you in my mirror the whole time. If you hadn't given that dime back, I would have written off the whole Christian population as a bunch of hypocrites."

I gave the change back. Now, there's no way the cashier could have known that I was a Christian, but I still think this story is very relevant. Christians are constantly being analyzed for their actions. It is a Christian's duty to live a model life. However, I am not saying that they should attempt to sway other people to switch religions, gain religion, or even live their life like a Christian. I have said and will always say that tolerance is necessary between all religions and those who lack religion. I am instead saying that it is necessary so that people don't lose faith in Christians. There are a lot of bad people out there who call themselves Christian that lead very immoral lives, as well as a lot of good people that don't believe in religion. It is up to Christians to show people that we are a good group of people.

That being said, I will leave you with a song by a band who makes it well known that they are Christians. While their music is in no way Christian rock (though there are mentions of God and Jesus in their music, but they are not the focus of the song), Manchester Orchestra has reiterated that they are Christians through various mediums, including their tour vlog. They toured with a band, Brand New, whose lead singer, Jesse Lacey, is also a devout Christian. Andyway, the Manchester Orchestra is an AMAZING live band. Andy Hull is one of the most passionate singers I've ever seen. I'll leave you with Manchester Orchestra's "Wolves at Night"

Wolves at Night by Manchester Orchestra (live) at YouTube

Music Television as Musical as Taco Bell is Mexican

2008-02-12T15:47:00.000-06:00

I am as much a fan of MTV and VH1 as anybody. I am currently fascinated with Celebrity Rehab, and who didn't watch Tila Tequila's Shot of Love. But these shows should not be the death of music television. A more accurate name for MTV and VH1 would be RTV, Reality Television. Let's evaluate the programming schedules of these channels.

Today on VH1, February 12th, 2008 - From 3 am to 11 am was the slot allotted for music videos. Every other time slot (Flavor of Love 3, The Salt 'N Pepa show, My Fair Brady: Maybe Baby?, Free Radio, Scott Baio is 46 and Pregnant, Celebrity Rehab, Rock of Love 2, VH1 presents Britney's secret Childhood (I'm not going to hyperlink all of those because I'm lazy, but they're all on the VH1 website)) is a reality show with the exception of Free Radio (a mockumentary), and the Britney special presentation, which may as well be a reality show. The reality shows aren't even music related! What do a model and Peter Brady have to do with music? (By the way, it's no mistake that VH1 scrapped it's motto, "Music First" in 2003).

But the mother of all "musical networks" is worse. The original. There is less than 5 hours of musical programming on MTV, unless you consider Making the Band and America's Best Dance Crew musical programming. I'm even being generous with that statistic, because I'm considering TRL a music show, even though it shows about a minute of every video they play. Even MTV2, which was originally created for this problem, has shifted to airing the reruns of the shows of MTV as well as original programming.

Although not in my demographic, CMT and BET have also followed suit. However, to be fair, BET doesn't have "Music" in their title.

It's true, I love some of this programming. But shouldn't there have been another channel made for this? Shouldn't music television be left to its own? Aren't the conglomerates that own these channels also the owners of multiple non-music related channels? My love for music outweighs my love for seeing C-list celebs battle their coke addictions. But fear not, there are options music lovers! Unfortunately... most are going to cost you.

There are many music channels on extended digital cable packages. Fuse is very good about playing music in time-slots that normal people are awake. Additionally, they don't limit themselves to mainstream acts. Unfortunately, this often entails a large amount of emo music. Additionally, they have begun to go in the direction of MTV and VH1, with original programming. However, a complete 180 from these channels, they usually air them during weekends and the late night slots. MTV has also thrown us a line with MTV Hits - 24 hours of music videos. This is an attempt to silence the critics, such as myself, but also not readily available. MTVU is also almost solely devoted to music, and this is a personal favorite of mine because it features non-mainstream acts. However, it is mostly limited to college packages and campuses.

Unfortunately for myself, here at my apartment in Madison, we have a digital package that features no musical benefits. The dorms receive MTVU, for which I am extremely jealous. For now, I can only get my music fixes from when I visit home, being awake at unholy hours, and the wonder that is known as the Internet. Oh, well.

To keep with the theme, today's song of the day will be "TV" by Headlights. The line is actually "I cannot stand to watch the TV", so it fits well. For more information on Headlights, see my earlier post on my top five bands with multiple lead singers.

"TV" by Headlights on YouTube.
Headlights on Myspace.

My Everything Hurts

2008-02-11T23:11:00.004-06:00

New Year's resolution accomplished. On New Year's Eve, as the ball was dropping, I said to myself "I'm going to exercise this year. I'm going to lift, and I'm going to run." Well, I've achieved those goals. Yes, for the first time this year, I lifted (for the first time in two years, actually) and I ran (I played basketball). Now I'm done.

I'm kidding, of course. But I'm sore as anything right now. I organized a basketball game between my old dorm floor of last year. Now, in nine months of last year's games, we didn't have a single injury. Tonight we had two. They were serious enough to get the entire front desk of the SHELL to come and make sure nobody passed out because of a concussion. More about that in a second. But let's talk about me.

Now, I hadn't played basketball since last year's adventures, and I wasn't even good then. I mean, over the year I progressed, but come on, I'm used to shooting at a four foot by six foot net, not a 3 inch wide circle. So, let's just say the first game was rough. I think I was 1-for-8 from the floor, which is still higher than Armon Gilliam's career average. This was with a 80-pound girl covering me. Hey, she's good. She was really speedy. That combined with my horrendous ball-handling skills was my downfall.

During the second game is where the fatalities occurred. We had one sprained ankle from my friend Aaron, who once when he was drunk poured my chocolate milk down his pants (just for reference). The other was none other than my assignment, little Ellen. She made the mistake of going for a rebound against my beast of a roommate, who never saw her coming. Needless to say, she hit her head so hard on the ground it wasn't funny. Even when I thought she was dead, she never stopped smiling, one of her more favorable traits. They're both fine from what I know, but you never know with concussions.

On a lighter note, I did a little better throughout the night. My assignment for much of the second game and all of the third game was Corey, who is my height, but a rock. He's immovable. Luckily, I had some mobility against him, so I'd say my shooting average was better.

After the games I was about to head home, but then I decided, hey, why not stay and lift with Stapes, my roommate. There weren't too many people around to point and laugh at me, as it was 10 pm, so I was like what the heck. Now, I am a small guy. 5'6". I also haven't lifted since the end of my hockey season senior year of high school. I was never an amazing lifter, but my summer job at the golf course often requires heavy-lifting, so I guess I developed some abilities, because I could bench as much as I could in high school. That's only 95 pounds, which I'm not proud of, but remember, I'm 5'6" and I've been out of it for two years. I also did three sets of 10 reps.

Right now, however, I can barely move my fingers to type this entry. This is the reason for my dramatic first paragraph. I'm sure I'll lift again to try to beat the century mark (that sounds pretty sad).

In the spirit of this post, I will make the song of the day a song called "Macho" by Tin Circus. Tin Circus is the band that Judah Nagler (The Velvet Teen) led and played bass for in high school. It is amazingly talented California Ska music. There is not a weak point in the band, and Judah is probably a better bass player than a guitar player (which makes it unsurprising that when Josh Staples left the band last year to focus the New Trust, Judah took over bass duties and they hired Polar Bears guitarist Matthew Izen to take his spot on guitar). This is probably the high point of the album, which early Incubus / Primus - like slap bass and psychedelic guitar parts with some brass thrown in for good measure. The whole album is available for free download at www.tincircus.com . If you don't want to download the whole thing, head over to myspace and give it a listen.

Tin Circus - "Macho" at Myspace.com

What ever happened to those "Jesus is my homeboy" shirts?

2008-02-11T18:07:00.002-06:00

For real? Who would have thought they'd go out of style?

Only in Madison...

2008-02-10T23:54:00.002-06:00

I'm starting a segment called "Only in Madison...". It's pretty self-explanatory.

So I'm walking down State Street yesterday. If you don't know about State Street, it's basically the place to go for shopping and food on campus, as well as where the big Halloween festivities take place. Anyway, we come to Park St. and right before the court, we can hear music being played from a boombox. It was Incubus. Can't remember the song. Anyway, we're like, what's going on.

All of a sudden I realize, there is a girl in a bikini holding a sign. Mind you, it is negative 5 degrees outside. I was like, wow, there must be some huge message on the sign for her to be outside in a bikini in negative 5 degree weather with a negative 30 degree wind chill in a bikini. Something she's really passionate about. Something really important that society needs to know...

"Jebus loves sluts".

Yeah. That's what it says. The "b" is not a misspelling either. Now at first I laughed. Really hard. That is the most random thing I've ever seen. Then I stopped and thought about it. Who decides, I'm going to go out today, on the coldest day of the year, one with 40 mph winds, and stand in a bikini with a sign saying "Jebus loves sluts." What exactly was she trying to accomplish? Was it an anti-religion sign? Was it a lost bet? I don't know. I was just confused... but amused. Only in Madison...