More monkey shines from the publishers, editors, and authors of That Long Newspaper Spoon, Hubris, GmbH, Even Paranoiacs Can Have Enemies, and The (NIU) Public Address System.
You may think you speak "Standard English straight out of the dictionary" but when you step away from the Great Lakes you get asked annoying questions like "Are you from Wisconsin?" or "Are you from Chicago?" Chances are you call carbonated drinks "pop."
Yes, I come from the portion of the country where they pronounce things correctly. Well ... except that many of us say "ruff" for "roof," which kind of bugs me for some reason. And I absolutely refuse to pronounce "Chicago" as "ShuhCAWgo" -- because there simply is no fucking way you can get that vowel sound out of a mere "a," and I don't give a shit who disagrees.
Also -- hey, quiz-making asshole or assholes, I gotta quesshun fer you (or youse). Why the fuck would I be annoyed to be asked whether I come from Wisconsin or Chicago? You gotta prahblim wit eeder a doze fine playsiz? Whyncha come over by here and say dat?
I AM from Chicago, ya knockwad! And I grew up 5 miles from da Wiscahhhnsin border! Ya jerk.
There, I feel better. A little unwarranted hostility is pleasant during periods of writer's blecch (see immediately previous post).
I would do a post about having writer's block, because I currently have a pretty severe case of it, but I think that's kind of technically impossible.
Plus, one is wrapped up in "building" a new "product" for one's real job, and that's consuming most of one's word-manipulation capacities at this time.
In the meanwhile, Chicago sports fans, enjoy a new-ish web comic strip by the creator of "Palehose Six," Carl Skanberg:
Your dad made reservations for Julmiddag, and I sent the money today. Don't forget -- Dec. 10 - 3 p.m. at Chevy Chase. (o: Probably won't have any lutefisk, though. A lot of the old Swedes were complaining about that last year. Also -- gasp! -- no glogg! Speaking of which, your dad says there's a whole bottle in the gun safe. Between that and the pear wine, we can get snockered tomorrow!
After nearly ten years of promising that the album "Chinese Democracy" is just about to be released, Axl Rose has become the preeminent master of making a career out of not getting stuff done. And after the recent cancellation of a Guns 'N' Roses show due to safety officials' concern about the proximity of stage pyrotechnics to the band's firewater, Axl has begun plowing new fertile ground in the rich earth of celebrity inactivity.
Now, hot on the heels of much media hype for O.J. Simpson's new book, "If I Did It, Here's How I Did It (Psst, I Totally Did It)," offered here as a CBRAT exclusive are some excerpts from the ultimate "Where's Chinese Democracy?" story, "If I Didn't Do It (And I Didn't) Here's How I Didn't Do It," by Axl Rose as not told to Stronger Than Dirt Pete Moss, soon not to be published by anyone.
Chapter One
The fire marshals have taken away my booze. This interview is over.
Chapter Two through Chapter Seventeen
Ibid.
Chapter Eighteen
Another day in the studio. Be a good man and pass the heroin.
Chapter Nineteen
Duhhh.
Chapter Twenty
Wore out my tenth vinyl copy of Ethel Merman's Greatest Hits looking for vocal inspiration.
Chapter Twenty-One
The dry cleaners lost my favorite bandana. Chinese Dumbasscracy.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Totally stuck. Should there be three "whoa whoa whoa"'s or four in the chorus?
Chapter Twenty-Three
Passed a KFC on the way to the studio. Reminded me of Buckethead. Called off the session.
Chapter Twenty-Four
"Do you know where the fuck you are?!" Long story short, I didn't.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Mind totally blown by realization that my name is an anagram of "Oral Sex."
Chapter Twenty-Six through Chapter Thirty-Three
Ibid.
Chapter Thirty-Four
Slash came over to tell me Billie Joe Armstrong still wets the bed.
Chapter Thirty-Five
Spent the day in the batting cage with Mike Piazza. Failed to learn to lay off the high heat.
Chapter Thirty-Six
"Whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa." No, that's too many. Back to the drawing board.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
The fire marshals have taken away my drawing board. Fuck it. I give up.
Accomplished mail and stamp artist, painter, zine publisher, and friend of mine for over 16 years, John Rininger, died a few days ago at the age of 45.
We collaborated on numerous projects over the years, including the notorious magazine, Even Paranoiacs Can Have Enemies. He taught me most of what I know about zine publishing and introduced me to a lot of interesting people. He also fed me a lot of books that have had a huge impact on me, including the works of Max Stirner, Emil Cioran, and Eric Gill. He could be a very challenging and exasperating guy to deal with, but he was a big part of my life, and I'm going to miss him.
Goodbye, John R.
(The headline of this post is a translation of a Latin palindrome used in one of John's last zines, Catalyst Komics 807, published just a couple months ago.)
Pardon the lack of new material for the last couple of weeks. I'm gonna make up for that soon. But probably not until after this week is over, because I'm still recovering from my vacation and my brain is extremely tired. By the middle of the weekend, I should have the initial installment(s) of a new multi-part post in the classic "We Had Some Ultimately Non-Fatal Misadventures on the Way to Better Understanding of Oneself Blah Blah Blah, and Here's a Humorous Telling of the Tale" genre. Subject: Super Karaoke Fun Time Band road trip from Jersey City to Philadelphia, Saturday, November 11, 2006.
But that won't be until Friday afternoon, at the earliest. For now, here's a brand spanking new video for the song "Fire Needs Oxygen," co-starring members of the Jersey City Bridge and Pummel women's roller derby league and One O. Ball and a new set of Chains. It's kind of a preview of the upcoming motion picture of the same name, in a not all that really sort of way.
Otis Ball and the New Chains - Fire Needs Oxygen
POSTSCRIPT: Heh heh. I said spanking. Google perverts, strap it on and cinch it up, here! We need to macaca the Sitemeter stats on this thing.
Just got home from Jersey, after sitting thru a four-hour delay at the Newark Airport for a mystery reason. United Airlines, consider yourself disliked by one very powerful blogger.
Just a semi-random sprinkling of itemery here, to get some blogging in before I leave on the Great November Jersey City Road Trip, '06 version, this weekend.
• Dick Biondi jobful again.Robert Feder of "The Bright One" reports that oldies station doubleyou whatever it is (94.7 FM) has rescued legendary deejay Dick Biondi from Dante's first circle of aging radio talent Gehenna (aka, unemployment) to host a nightime show. Along with their recent hire of John Records "Yeah, I've made a career for 40 years based on pointing out that my real middle name is in fact 'Records'" Landecker, that makes three actual local human beings on that station. The third? Oh come on, it's Scott McKay. You didn't know that? I have more things to say about Scott McKay than Dick Biondi (whose appeal, frankly, I still don't get), so this bullet point is now about him. McKay kind of lost me when he admitted on-air during one of his first shifts for the station that he didn't really know much about, you know, rock music made between roughly 1954 and 1976 ... as in, "oldies" music ... but gee whiz, he was sure game for a college try! It also galled me when he'd say idiotic stuff like, in reference to the Kinks' "Victoria," for example, he said, "Wow, that came out in 1969? I always thought that was much more recent, like 1980 or something." But I guess he's OK. He plays what Scott "I'm the industry genius in New York who tapes and syndicates all the rest of the shifts" Shannon tells him to. At least they have a relatively large playlist, perhaps in an attempt to answer the plea of Carl from The Simpsons: "How 'bout some new oldies, geniuses?"
• KISS-tastrophe. I dropped a deuce when I heard this one. Our correspondent in New Jersey reports that his local Best Buy has sold out of the new KISS "Kissology - Volume 1 (1974-1977)" DVD box set, which was released on (skeddy, keeds!) Halloween. Allegedly, they sold 160 copies in two days.
• Maybe this one will be on volume two. In this YouTube embedded veddeo from 1979, enjoy Peter Criss and his buddy Johnny Walker Black having some trouble with the words (and, apparently, general theme, tenor, mood, and implications thereof, from, and within) to token chick ballad, "Beth."
• Paging Dr. Frood. I dreamed last night that I was at a big party in some kind of barn on a sprawling estate someplace, and I had an embarrassing moment with Keith Richards. Yes, Keith was at the party, and so was Mick. Jagger. There was a pizza on a table, and Keith and I both kept trying to grab the same slice. I'd go for one, and he'd reach at the same time, and then we'd mumble "sorry" and move to another one and the same thing would happen. It was like the pizza equivalent of the awkward hallway dance when you're trying to pass somebody coming from the other direction.
• No sir. One time about 10 years ago I was sitting in a crummy apartment next to the projects in Champaign watching a bunch of black gang bangers play Dungeons and Dragons (I shit you not) while I waited for my "friend" to get back with "some used books" I was buying from him. Somebody asked me what I did for a living and I mentioned something about how I used to be a lawyer but I got fed up with the lying bastards. One guy turned to face me and said, "My lawyer got me off of two counts of Murder One. I don't think he was lying to me." I wasn't sure what that meant, but I shut up real fast.
• Back in the New York groove. Friend of the Blog "Mr. Jacobson" (or is it "-sen"?; I can never remember) relates that his downstairs neighbor where he used to live in Northwest Edgewater or Southwest Rogers Park or wherever the hell it's called there, used to suffer under the delusion that she was the lover and soulmate of Ace Frehley. That's all there is to this story. Anyway, under the makeup, Ace looks like a Ramone in this veddeo.
• They really really hate them. The numero uno Google referral phrase for this blog for the past several weeks has been "I hate meeces to pieces." I wish I had more to say on the subject that I didn't have to look up on Wikipedia to come up with. The subject of Mr. Jinks the cat hating Pixie and Dixie the mice, that is. In their eponymous(e) Hanna-Barbera cartoon, that is. Which was produced from 1958 to 1962 but lived on for decades more in reruns. Featured one of my favorite cartoon voice artists of all time, Daws Butler. (Of course, Mel Blanc was the king, and June Foray and Stan Freberg did great work as well, but I digress. If you don't already know about those people you probably do not care. The Daws Butler wiki-bio is actually worth reading, though. Because I say so.) And then there was also Don Messick, the Baba Looey to Butler's Quick Draw McGraw. And come on, he did Scooby Doo. I mean, not in the Rick Santorum way. OK, maybe I'll just wrap this bullet point up.
• By the way. I hate it when people give me or anyone else shit about split infinitives. Everyone except the nuns that taught English to the baby boom generation -- and the people taught by them -- has joined the consensus that they're "unobjectionable." I like what Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary says: "There has never been a rational basis for objecting to the split infinitive." Which is probably why every person I've heard object to them proclaims that they are objectionable because Sister Inguinal Hernia said so.
Just a few of the celebrated people born on this date --
Larry Flynt Anthony Kiedis Lyle Lovett Kinky Friedman Bo Bice (!) Bobby "The Brain" Heenan (!!!) Marcia "Simpsons; Bob Newhart Show" Wallace Rick "one-armed drummer from Def Leppard" Allen Barbara "Hill Street Blues" Bosson Jenny "naked blonde chick" McCarthy Lynne "CNN Headline News" Russell
and
Stronger Than Dirt Pete Moss.
Yep, we here at CBRAT have begun our 40th year on earth, and you can bet we're really pumped. Great. Yeah. Getting closer to death is great, and the time just keeps moving faster and faster. Fantastic.
Uh, I can never remember. It's fall forward and spring back, right?
It doesn't really matter. I might as well leave the clocks where they are, or just shut them off completely. I have nothing approaching a rigid schedule, anyway. I come and go more or less at will, mostly sitting still in front of a flickering screen of some kind ... oh yeah, I guess there's a reason to change the clocks: So I can know when it's time to watch TV. Maybe I should just finally get that Tivo I've been resolving to get for about three years now. Then time will finally mean nothing.
And time, or at least TV, stands still during the off-season anyway, especially on days after nights in which, to paraphrase Al Pacino in Godfather 2, this old man drank too much wine. Today was the first baseball-less Saturday in over six months, and I spent half the afternoon in a hung-over stupor fruitlessly riding the remote. Which was not pretty, because I just can't get into college football. After resorting to watching an episode on the Create network of Lidia the crazy fat bald Italian chef making gnocchi for about the fourth time, I realized that I was no longer very excited about getting an extra hour this weekend. Then I took another nap.
It's a challenge stuffing 4 ounces of living into a 10-pound bag.
In case you were wondering, statistically speaking, the 06 St. Louis Cardinals rank among the worst champions of all time. Their numbers are terrible. It's widely believed (including by me) that they got into the playoffs as a fluke and didn't deserve to be there. And then they mowed em down. Buncha fucked up ignint and injured rednecks, with a midget at short, and a pissy midget at that, no sense a humor atall. Wow, I hate them, but I'm glad they won. Oughta piss a lot of sports nerds off.
Everyone on-jumping bandwagon of stupid fake Borats this days. Make example, thinkly veingled secret Naked Raygun show ... so why should this blog except? (Besides sheer stupidly, that is.) Yes!
Onlies, I, Stronger Than Goat Beet Moss-Covered-Roof-House, am ripping off instead original dimwitted eurasian web yokel, Mahir. Straight to bullock's anus, my people alway fable-tell. Watch out, he kiss you. You need get shot of tetanus. Is favorite Kolickybabistanian drinking game.
I like musics. Here is rare nougat from smoked hot Dekalbistan skomorokhs scene, in oval of 1987. Itinerant rascals Otis Ball & The Chains make rehearse of classical Kulak protest song, "My Tiny Little Member Tender, Yes?", using new high-tech windmill stole from Industrial Commisariat for energie juices make go electric balalaika for you enjoy. Is nice. Dos equis your bongo.
It's World Series time, and in the easily misinterpreted words of Randle Patrick McMurphy, "Somebody get me a fucking wiener before I die!"
In honor of the Motor City hosting the Fall Classic for the first time in a little while, here's these. Turn up the speakers.
MC5 - Kick Out The Jams
KISS - Detroit Rock City (Paul Lynde Special)
Iggy & The Stooges - TV Eye/1970 (Cincinnati Pop Festival -- if you watch only one embedded YouTube video on this blog this week, make it "Charles Manson's Birthday," but if you watch two, make this the second one)
Ted Nugent - Wango Tango (also has suburban Chicago ties -- we miss you, Ma Nugent)
Suzi Quatro - 48 Crash
Funkadelic - Cosmic Slop
Special Bonus: Radio Birdman - TV Eye (not from Detroit, but the Australian Detroit Sound kicks ass)
And Because Too Much Is Never Enough: Radio Birdman - New Race (Yeah hup!)
Ah, anniversaries! They're the stuff of remembering things that happened a round-number's-worth of years ago.
Most people like to commemorate the happy anniversaries -- weddings, graduations, formations of businesseseses -- but I like to pause now and then to mark the passage of blocks of time since the occurrence of various hurtful, humiliating, and disastrous things, too. Maybe even moreso. There sure are more of those to remember than the good times.
And here's the story of another one. Maybe it really even happened the way I'm about to tell it. You'll have to take my word for it.
It was Autumn 1986, and my favorite ex-Cub, Bill Buckner, had just blown Game 6 of the World Series for the Red Sox (speaking of bad anniversaries relived over and over for eternity). Anyway, I was spending my evenings hosting a late-night public access talk show on the _______ cable system's STD/TV channel. I think it stood for Standard Television Display Television, but I'm not sure.
The name of my show was STD/PM, and it was pretty popular. Well, my mom said it was good. She also used to say that girls smiled when I walked into a room because they liked me, and not because they were stifling a mocking laugh. I guess that's also why they made those sinus infection noises with their noses and excused themselves right away ... but I'm digressing here.
So one day station management decided -- several years behind the rest of the nation -- that music videos were the new big thing, and it was time for STD/TV to join the videolution. They killed my talk show to make room for the new format, but they were willing to let me stay on as head veejay. I was in no position to refuse.
Now I just had to choose what to use to launch STD/TV's Music Video Cable Access Now With Video Featuring Music. You know, our "Video Killed the Radio Star." But I needed a fresh hook. The premiere was set for November 12, so I headed for the men's room and grabbed an almanac.
What happened on November 12 in history? Let's see. A lot. 1918 -- Austria becomes a republic. 1927 -- Leon Trotsky is expelled from the Soviet Communist Party AND the Holland Tunnel opens. 1969 -- My Lai. Ooh, maybe a bit TOO negative. But what's this? 1934 -- Charles Manson is born.
Bingo.
Now, Charles Manson's 52nd birthday was not exactly a round number, but I had been led to understand that Mr. Manson was very fond of card tricks, and there are 52 cards in a standard deck (sans Jokers), so ...
STD/TV was far from an award-winning public access cable channel, but it had a pretty phenomenal video library. With minutes to airtime, I located the perfect video. At the time, I didn't know much about it, except that it was by an obscure band from Hoboken called Otis Ball & The Chains. And the name of the song was "Charles Manson's Birthday."
The rest is history. Painful, painful history. Long story short, that was my last day in the employ of STD/TV.
I was really disappointed I didn't get to stick around a bit longer to play the follow-up hit, "Carl Mannberg's Bar Mitzvah" ... although that wouldn't really make a lot of sense anyway, because I'm pretty sure "Carl Mannberg" is a Swedish name.
Hey, by the way, what do you call a deaf Swede? Hard of herring!
We would also have accepted, "Vutever y'vunt! He can't hear ya anyvay!"
OK, why is Count Dracula second-guessing my punchlines now? Never mind, just watch this video.
Thanks to the magic of YouTube: Otis Ball & The Chains perform "Charles Manson's Birthday!"
Coming soon: On November 12, 2006 -- STD/TV returns!
Colicky Baby Records and Tapes is proud to announce, now, a special celebration in honor of the 20th anniversary of STD/TV. It was Nov 13, 1986 and STD/TV was on the air! Or ... cable. There must be some air in cables? I think they use satellites. Although there's no air in space. And it was public access cable. I don't think they have satellites. Anyway ... The very first video aired cabled was "Charles Manson's Birthday" by Otis Ball & the Chains.
The response was overwhelming. We were immediately removed from the air. Cable. Public access.
But on Nov 13, 2006, we return! And we're coming back with a world premiere! The debut of Otis Ball & the New Chains with two brand new videos!! (That's one exclamation point per video!)
I don't have a CD player in my car, or even a cassette deck, and I am so far away from having enough energy or patience to set myself up with one of them iPod radio magillicuddies that you wouldn't believe it. Three or four days a week I drive 25 miles to and from work, which takes about an hour each direction.
Therefore, I listen to the radio a lot. Radio today is perhaps the most dreaded mass medium of all. The vast majority of it is horrible, and getting worse every year. Nobody wants to listen to the radio anymore, and I don't blame them.
But, a lot of the time, I enjoy the challenge. I like to confront radio head on. I ain't takin' no guff from no dilapidated mass medium!
There are a couple Chicago rock stations that purport to be special, and occasionally they play something good. There is a decent oldies station with a pretty big playlist. But the preset buttons get a hell of a workout from me on every commute. It's like hunting snipe. And since I only have a few preset buttons in my crappy car, I've learned how many pushes of the tuning button up or down it takes to get to the next station that might, maybe, possibly be playing something I can stand to listen to, or, maybe even like. So when I run out of presets to monitor, I'm flipping two up or eight down to try another one. Still, sometimes I can't even find a single passable commercial radio station that isn't playing ... a commercial.
In Chicago, we are lucky to have several very good noncommercial stations, and I'm lucky enough to be able to tune many of them in -- among them, WNUR, WLUW, WZRD, WDCB -- but their programming is erratic, as it should be, and their geographic coverage areas are mostly pretty limited. Although sometimes I can leave it on one of those stations for the whole trip.
I don't listen to WBEZ.
So, yeah, that's how the commute generally goes. Plus, whenever any Four Tops song comes on the oldies station, no matter which song, I like to yell "BERNADETTE!!!" at the top of my lungs, especially in the summertime when I have the window rolled down.
When they come to take me away, you can say you saw it coming.
By the way, for the less keen-eyed of you, not to mention the less "in the know," if you scroll back down to the Windy City Rollers You Tube vid a couple posts ago, watch closely for a brief cameo by Friend of the Blog, Kirby The Beekeeper, in full regalia.
If you, too, fiddle around with Rupert Murdoch's social networking site, check out Stronger Than Dirt Pete Moss's profile and don't be shy with the add-friend requests.
