waste some time learning a totally impractical skill:
iDaft
One of my top 5 This American Life stories, the life and times of Cuervo Man. From the site:
Writer and contributor John Hodgman first encountered Cuervo Man on a press junket to Cuervo Nation, a small island owned by Jose Cuervo Tequila. Cuervo Man was wearing nothing but a Speedo, wraparound shades, and a red cape. Occasionally he'd stick a toilet plunger on his bald head. John was fascinated and eventually got to know Cuervo Man, whose real name was Ryan. Though the Cuervo act was Ryan's Plan B, it had a special power that John couldn't help but envy.
SUBJECT:
Dcup-Personal Touch (Hot Fiyah Hot Fiyah Hot Fiyah!!!)
BODY:
Brand new and good for you!!! This is the record i was telling you about fellas!!! Disco/boogie joint of the summer right here!!! From Austrailia of all places!!!
http://www.myspace.com/dcupmusic
Btw-When you play it, say it!!! Good music always prevails!!! Jeah!!!
(email originally via nacho veal slice)
IT'S GOIN DOWN IN THIS BITCH TONIGHT!!!
On Saturday Rok One and I put our bitter enmity aside. We are now friends, and celebrate this with our new party SATURDAY LOVE. The inaugural edition of this party features special guest Nick Hook! When he's not playing keyboards kicking ass in his band Cubic Zirconia he's putting out awesome mixes or demanding people buy him shots. He'll be laying down the jams while Rok and I spar with our laptops, most likely playing some old rock jams/the occasional italo track, while Rok snorts at the bitrate of my MP3s (sample criticism: "256 kbs? Oh no no no NO!")
Perhaps these 2 tracks will enlighten you as to what I plan to play:
2 LIVE CREW ~ I CAN'T GO FOR THAT
PAUL SIMON ~ YOU CAN CALL ME AL
TROPHY BAR
351 BROADWAY
b/t RODNEY & KEAP
BK
FREE!
THE SMITHS ~ THE DRAIZE TRAIN
A few interesting things about this record:
1. The producer John Porter, when he heard this, lamented Morrissey not recording vocals over it because he was confident it would have been a hit.
2. He was proved semi-correct when Marr later gave it to Bryan Ferry for The Right Stuff.
3. When compiling the songs that would go on Rank, Morrissey put this on the album for seemingly no reason, which led Simon Goddard to postulate that he did so as an olive branch to Marr, since every song on Rank (with the exception of the little Elvis interlude) was a Marr/Morrissey composition, this one being solely a Marr track would give him slightly more $$$ when the record sold. Rourke and Joyce, of course, continuing to make the pathetic 13% or whatever Morrissey deigned to give them.
4. All this information I'm pretty sure I internalized from Goddard's "Songs That Saved Your Life," which everyone should read.
5. This is the only Smiths instrumental aside from Oscillate Wildly.
After 9/11, Clear Channel issued an internal memorandum that listed songs it strongly advised radio stations against playing. The list is retardo.
Some of these songs I guess you can sort of make an argument for? Like "all songs by RATM" makes sense sure I guess. But then it gets into this weird territory where it's like "you can't play Buddy Holly's That'll Be The Day b/c he says 'when I die' afterwards and death is bad." Or maybe because he died in a plane crash? It sort of morphs around at some point, and after a while I feel like I'm looking at a list of songs to play for Halloween. Why Sugar Ray is on this list and the Monster Mash isn't I'll never know.
*via Hey Mister
Here's some more 10"s that I own. Are these blog-worthy? I SAY YES.
There are some really hardcore Lemonheads fans out there. I don't understand this. They never struck me as a Pavement or Gin Blossoms, you know a really powerful band from the 90s that had their own unmistakable take on pop music. I'm not even sure whether or not that last sentence is a joke. I really like the Gin Blossoms. (full disclosure: I am Jesse Valenzuela)
I can say without equivocation (thank you Will Smith for teaching me this word) that "Souvenir" is my favorite OMD song like EVER. Messages and Enola Gay are both unequivocally awesome, but Souvenir is truly next level. I will also state with no equivocality (OK maybe a little equivocalness) that the synth, while the greatest instrument for jumping up and down like an 80s feral child (see: You Can Call Me Al*, Jump, Separate Ways et al), also is the most haunting sound for utter and annihilating nostalgia/regret (see: Your Silent Face, Say Hello Wave Goodbye, These Dreams, et al). Such is the case with Souvenir.
OMD ~ SOUVENIR
OK, apparently I have this:
Does anyone actually like Sonic Oldness? I mean they are the great great grandfathers of shitty go-nowhere noise rock (I'm pretty sure the aggregate age of SY is larger than that of Aerosmith and the Rolling Stones combined), and thus we have to accord them some kind of respect for wearing sunglasses and not caring before their shitty 90s contemporaries did, but trying to listen to any SY album is an epic fail (take THAT, Daydream Nation!). Still I did always like Diamond Sea (? from the Washing Machine album?) and this song:
Wow a song about domestic abuse. Way to bring the room down, Beaty McUnwanted Child. File under: Me And A Gun, Runaway Train, This Night Has Opened My Eyes.
BONUS!
I only know this because of that scene in Fight Club (gay) but DUDE WHAT A SONG. My dream when I started DJing was to one day play this at Lit in the basement, along with Junkyard Band and Rocky Horror Picture Show (check THAT off the Bucket List!). Also one time stupid stupid Brian told me to play "All 4 Love." Which I did. Much to the WTF of party thrower Justine D. Anyways:
Ridiculous and absurdly awesome performance of Goin Out West on the Arsenio Hall show.
*technically these are horns? I always thought they were synth horns
Apparently this was shot in 1 take, with no post production:
LUCAS ~ LUCAS WITH THE LID OFF
BONUSTOWN:
I always really liked this Bjork video that he did too
This entry is all about noted hack German film scorer, Hans Zimmer. You've heard his head-bashingly obvious action scores if you've ever turned on the TV during the weekend to escape reality by watching a big budget blockbuster film. In fact, let's just take a look at the man's resume, shall we?
With this un-fuck-withable list, it's clear why Hans Zimmer is probably the richest man alive. The funny thing is, if you read his wiki entry, what comes across is that Hans takes his scoring VERY FUCKING SERIOUSLY and does Martin Hannett-esque shit of like going out to record the sound of the trees rustling, wind through hair, parking lots at dusk etc. When supplying music for The Thin Red Line, for example, dude recorded 6 hours of nonsense and gave it over to the director. Hans! Boobie! Work ethic much?
The same thing happened with Dark Knight. When watching the special features
MASSIVE ASIDE BEGINS HERE
OK what the hell is the with the complete lack of special features on Dark Knight. Not ONE SINGLE commentary track? But we get a documentary about how they made the bat pod?? Special features include watching the film in French or Spanish??? (actually it's kind of funny watching it in Spanish b/c then you hear some poor schmuck have to do the Joker voice but in Spanish) A fucking photo gallery? All anyone wants to hear is Christopher Nolan saying "OK so basically the Joker character was so fucked up and Heath Ledger had to constantly go to such a dark place to create him that I'm pretty sure it drove him insane and that the only way he could live anything resembling a normal life afterwards was to heavily sedate himself with hardcore barbituates." Is that so much to ask?
ANYWAYS
When watching the special features there's this really lame documentary about how Hans Zimmer "scored the madness of the Joker." And it's basically him in front of his giant computer work station (not unlike Bob Rock in Some Kind of Monster) pressing the space bar over and over again. Then explaining how they wanted to get all "punk" with it and make the music increasingly minimal until the Joker's musical cues could be summoned with just one note (actually kind of interesting). Christopher Nolan was all "impress me, German man, let's hear some sonic representations of madness" and Zimmer recorded this like 90 minute track of screaming cows, stabbing pizzicato, swelling Zimmer-esque waves of strings, etc etc. Basically he recorded Metal Machine Music and gave it to Nolan to listen to on a plane ride.
Whatever the incredibly pretentious process that gave rise to the Dark Knight OST, I really do actually like all the Joker parts. The rest of it's not bad, it's a little heavy handed but that's fine, it's a giant blockbuster and the dude is German. Not exactly renowned for subtlety (actually renowned for gassing Jews and screaming into microphones at a mass of other, perfectly aligned/marching Germans).
So if I'm going to keep this blog going, I need to occasionally put up stuff that literally no one else will want to hear. For that reason (ie- the maintenance of realness), here is the Hans Zimmer score for Dark Knight.
Let's play a game. Write down 5 of your favorite lines from the Dark Knight. Press play on the track below. Recite those lines.
Here's my faves:
I go to Hong Kong. The Chinese will not extradite one of their own.
I'm not wearing hockey pantsssss
Endu-ah, Mahstah Wayne
...the soize of a tangerine
Enough! From the clown!
His name is Schiff, Thomas.
It was Ramirezzzzzzzzzzzzz
RACK EM UPPPP, rackemup rackemup rackemup
NAAAOOOHHH! WHY ME? WHY DID YOU COME FOR ME??!!!
RACHEL!
SAY IT!
What eef Harvey Dent is in fact, the caped crusader?
etc etc
Congratulations! We just made a film trailer!
My Mainest Man Hans Zimmmer ~ Dark Knight Soundtrack
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