From the world's most reliable newspaper, The London Sun, comes this story about a guy who apparently gets it up whenever his neighbors' come home.
I could come up with some pithy way to explain this better, but really nothing does it better than the article itself:
A MAN who had a willy implant to cure impotence is rising to the occasion — whenever his neighbour opens his garage doors.
The remote control is on the same frequency as the electronic device in his groin.
The sufferer told a BBC Radio Merseyside phone-in it was causing endless embarrassment — but doctors cannot stop it because the implant op was done in Turkey.
He said: “Every time my neighbours park their 4x4 I get an erection. It’s embarrassing.”
When DJ Roger Phillips asked if he had seen a doctor he replied: “I had it done in Turkey, using equipment not known in this country.
“Every time his car pulls in, I can’t leave the house. It’s not funny.”
It's not? Oh, my bad. Yes, of course, a man whose penis rises with a garage door opener because he had the operation done in Turkey is not funny at all.
Are you the kind of person who tries to outwit the pay-per-view box in your hotel room so you can get a fleeting glance at the porn channels, yet you still scored high on the math section of your SAT's?
According to the artist, "the images in this room are created entirely from mathematical algorithms. If you find them offensive in any way, all I can say is that beauty (or obscenity) is in this case most certainly in the eye of the beholder."
In other words, it's only porn if people can understand it. Otherwise, it's art.
OK. It's taking all my energy in the world not to talk about this Mel Gibson thing, but it's really best if I don't, for a number of reasons.
So! Let's go another way but in the same theme: namely, Hollywood is screwy.
It's hard to believe that I've now been out here for over four years, (although technically, I've actually been in town about 25 minutes). Still, if there's one thing that I never get tired of, it's crazy stories of people trying (and failing) to get a movie made.
Some of the most incredible things that I have ever heard have come from these stories, and honestly, once you start collecting these kinds of stories, you have to wonder how any movie ever gets made.
Here's a solidly funny (yet not exceptional) story from Kevin Smith about his version of the Superman movie, and whatever happened to it. Enjoy.
All right, so I have a secret that I've been holding on to for years. It's not that I'm ashamed, it's just that people might get the wrong idea. But now I feel it's time to unmask myself.
Are you ready? Have a seat.
My secret is:
I am one of about five straight guys on the earth who likes Bjork.
I know, it's horrible, isn't it? Well, I feel as though a huge burden has been lifted. But I do like her. I think her records are brilliant, both for her singing as well as the sound design on them. Very impressive stuff.
Now, why am I telling you this?
Because! A guy who can get excited about Bjork can get very excited about Bjorkestra, the jazz big band dedicated to the music of Bjork!
That's right, it's an 18 piece big band dedicated entirely to the music of Bjork. And this is not a gimmick band, people! They're really kinda going for it in the jazz improv sense. In fact, if I didn't tell you it was Bjork, there is a pretty good chance you wouldn't know it's her songs.
Their press kit says "Blending Bjork’s visionary techno pop with the harmonic and improvisational elements of modern jazz, Travis Sullivan’s Bjorkestra has performed to packed venues across the Northeast and received extraordinary praise from both fans and the press alike. Comprised of New York City’s finest jazz musicians, this eighteen-piece ensemble features full horn and rhythm sections as well as vocalist Becca Stevens performing Sullivan’s arrangements that span Bjork’s entire catalogue. Individual members of the Bjorkestra have performed/toured with the likes of Charlie Hunter, Dr. Dre, Ray Charles, Clark Terry, Jessica Simpson, The Spam Allstars, and the Saturday Night Live Band."
Not bad, right? Good news is that they're about to go on tour!
Tour dates are:
8.3.06 Harlow's | Sacramento, CA 8.4.06 Great American Music Hall | San Francisco, CA 8.5.06 The Attic | Santa Cruz, CA 8.9.06 Belly Up Tavern | Solana Beach, CA 8.11.06 The Knitting Factory | Los Angeles, CA 8.18.06 Tonic | New York, NY
Someone in a Hollywood casting office is finally using their head.
According to Billboard magazine, Hugh Grant's singing coach for his upcoming movie where he plays a retired pop star is none other than Martin Fry of ABC!
Fry was summoned to America earlier this year to coach his fellow Englishman, who plays an '80s pop star opposite Drew Barrymore in the upcoming romantic comedy "Music & Lyrics By." "I was like his stunt double, vocally," jokes Fry. "Warner Bros. figured, 'If Hugh Grant was a pop star, who would he sound like?' And I guess my name came up."
Fry recorded vocals for a couple of songs written by Fountains Of Wayne's Adam Schlesinger that will appear on the soundtrack. "Hugh listened to what I'd done, and then used that as a sort of springboard," Fry says.
In the film, Grant plays Alex Fletcher, an artist attempting a comeback by writing a song for pop star Cora Corman -- a "Britney Spears/Shakira-type character," Fry says. Fletcher, who hasn't written a tune in years, must collaborate with his "plant lady," played by Drew Barrymore. The movie, directed by Marc Lawrence, is set for a holiday 2006 release.
Fry adds that Grant "did well" in his role. "I think his voice sort of sounds like John Cale, actually! I gave him a few moves as well, but he's pretty clued-up," he says. "He knows what he's doing."
Hardball opened last night, and so this morning, on 3 hours of sleep, I grabbed a train out to New Haven to take a quick look at Yale Repertory where I have a show going in a few months. Then, jumped back on the train and got back to NYC, where I then jumped in a cab and just barely made my plane and got back to LA in just enough time to get home and tuck my son in bed. I still have several more hours of work ahead of me tonight, in order to be ready to see my next show's runthru tomorrow in San Diego. But I had to write this first before I sit down to work again.
On the plane, I took a little time out to watch the new documentary DVD on the amazing punk band from Sweden called Refused. The film is called "Refused Are Fucking Dead" and it really profoundly affected me in this weird way. I'm still thinking about this film hours later. But let me start back at the beginning.
Now you may ask: "Exactly how punk rock are you, Lindsay Jones?"
And the answer is: well, not all that much. I got a steady job, a wife, a kid, I live in a decent neighborhood and try to fly business class as much as possible.
Now, was I ever really punk rock? Well. I wish I could say I was. But no. I really admire the music and attitude. But no, I really couldn't do it.
Why? Well, interestingly enough, it's like most things in life. It's all about the maintenance.
See, you gotta hold that attitude 24/7, and after a while, it just gets hard to keep it going. You need a break. No one can be angry all the time. It'll make you crazy.
This is the lesson contained in "Refused Are Fucking Dead".
See, this band Refused made one of the single greatest punk records ever. It was called "The Shape Of Punk To Come" and let me just say, if you like rock music and you have never heard this record, then you have not truly heard rock music. It's the most amazingly intense record that I have ever heard and every single song is a sonic masterpiece. It's not just punk, it incorporates classical, jazz and electronica elements seamlessly into the most ferocious rock that you have ever heard.
So anyway, the band had a plan, which was to make the greatest punk record ever. And they did it. But they used up so much of their energy and goodwill trying to make the record that by the time they were supposed to tour to promote it, they all hated each other. Well, not just each other. They hated everyone. They hated the audience. They hated being a band. They hated music.
But they went on tour anyway, hoping against hope that it would all just blow over.
It didn't.
Four dates into their U.S. tour, they played a show in a suburban basement in a house in Harrisonburg, Virginia. They played two songs, and then the police showed up and pulled the plugs of their amplifiers out of the wall. The band was so happy that the police had stopped the show, they all began crying spontaneously. The band was over. Right then. Forever. Refused are fucking dead.
The film basically dissects each of the band members recollections of what happened and even though they are so happy that the band is gone, the final show haunts all of them. You can see it. These guys are literally living with their own ghosts. It's kind of haunting and awful to watch.
Here's the preview of the film. It really does not do the film justice, it makes it look like it's a concert film, which it is not. But at least you can see glimpses of what I saw.
Now, fortunately, this DVD does also come with some concert footage as a separate feature, albeit of some seriously varying quality. See, the thing is that being a punk band and all, you're not gonna have MTV filming you. Instead, it's like some 16 year old kid with his dad's video camera.
BUT! Watch this sequence. This is the band opening a show with "The Shape Of Punk To Come". As you watch them start, keep your eye on the audience. They look confused at first, not knowing how to react, and then within 10 seconds, the entire room is a tornado. This is how good this band was.
The sound quality is not great here. But when this band kicks in, you can see what they were really like. They were so incredibly intense, there was no way it would last. But thank god that they finished the record.
Dear Pigeons Eating Puke on the Sidewalk ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Date: 2006-06-01, 11:31AM EDT
OK, look. Living in NY gives you a pretty thick skin. I've seen some pretty nasty stuff. I'm not a queasy person.
But as I'm strolling to work this morning I accidentally look to my right to see a big puddle of puke and you two bastards hopping around in it like two fatties at an all you can eat buffet.
It took me a moment to register what I was looking at. And I wish, I WISH, I could go back in time and erase the details my brain unfortunately absorbed.
This was nasty, nasty puke. And fresh. Food bits undigested. I noted some peas and carrots in there. But it was not only food. There was an oatmeal like ooze that the bits were floating in. And with this heat, no odor escapes a passerby.
As if the puke weren't enough to turn my stomach, you motherfucking pigeons sealed the deal. In the 4 brief seconds I happened to look at you I witnessed you pick out the pukey food bits and ingest them with imcomparable eagerness.
Then it happened. The horror of what I just saw registered. The smell of it registered. Mouth watered. Ears tingled. Throat clenched.
I fucking puked on the street! In front of people! At 8:30 in the morning. ON myself!
Do you know how humiliating that is???? I'm at work with fucking puke on me because when you suddenly projectile vommit on the street you don't think to aim! I had to lie about taking a taxi and getting motion sickness. And let me tell you pigeons something. YOU are going to pay the dry cleaning bill to get the stomach acid and latte off of my silk blouse!
My internet has been acting very strange in my NYC place lately, what with the weird power flucuations and all. So! I'm in one of my favorite East Village haunts, the only place where you can get a decent pierogi at 3am: Veselka!
All right, I've had some requests lately for me to post more about the kind of music that I do.
It's funny when people ask me about my music and say "What kind of music do you write?" and I say "All kinds."
"ALL kinds?" people ask incredulously. Yes, all kinds.
You see, I do a new play every week, and at least 50% of the time, I'm composing music for it. This play can be set in any place or any time, and I have to come up with its soundtrack. So whether that's Cuba in the 1820's or England in the 1400's and in America right now, I gotta come up with the music that fits it. Usually for very little money.
Here's some recent examples, put on some headphones and let's take a listen:
Becase nothing says "shut up" better than just hanging up the phone.
Hello? Adam?
I've been spending a lot of time lately listening to Ann Coulter. Not cause I want to or anything (god forbid!), but I'm working on this play right now that is loosely based on her, and so I've had to go over the audio that's out there about her.
Anyway, so I ran across this and I have to say that it totally cracked me up.
Ann is supposed to be a call-in guest on Adam Carolla's morning show, and ends up calling an hour and a half later than she said she would. Carolla, who does not suffer fools gladly, gets annoyed quickly and hangs up on her.
ADAM CAROLLA: Ann Coulter, who was suppose to be on the show about an hour and a half ago, is now on the phone, as well. Ann?
ANN COULTER: Hello.
CAROLLA: Hi Ann. You’re late, babydoll.
COULTER: Uh, somebody gave me the wrong number.
CAROLLA: Mmm… how did you get the right number? Just dialed randomly — eventually got to our show? (Laughter in background)
COULTER: Um, no. My publicist e-mailed it to me, I guess, after checking with you.
CAROLLA: Ahh, I see.
COULTER: But I am really tight on time right now because I already had a —
CAROLLA: Alright, well, get lost.
God bless Adam Carolla for doing what we all wanna do: namely, tell these people with their overblown ego-led opinions to hit the road.
If you wanna see the play I'm now working on, it's called Hardball and will be playing this week at The Samuel Beckett Theatre in Theatre Row in NYC. It should be a lot of fun.
Wild nights! Drunkeness! Debauchery! Shameless acts that you're ashamed of now!
Who hasn't had this happen?
Well, besides me, I mean. (It's a long story.)
All right, how about this one?
Raise your hands if you've ever had a little too much to drink. Wow, that's pretty much all of you.
OK, so now how many of you were drunk maybe decided to drive home anyway? OK, a few hands go down, but still quite a few of you out there.
All right, so you're driving home in your brand new custom-designed Cadillac Escalade and...
Oh, some of you don't have a Cadillac Escalade? OK, you can put your hands down.
So, ok, the rest of you are driving your Escalade, and you turn on the DVD player located in your dashboard and...
Oh, no DVD player in the dash for some of you? Huh. OK. Well, those people can put your hands down.
Anyway, so while you're driving, you're watching your DVD player, which of course has got a pornographic movie playing, and well, you're starting to get a little turned on, so you start masturbating while you're driving and...
Wait, some of you haven't done this either? Wow. OK, put your hands down.
So, you're driving intoxicated, watching porn and masturbating when you actually slam into the back of a parked car. So you find the guy who owns the car and offer to give him a new car if he won't make a fuss about it. Then, when the police show up, you use your celebrity status to keep from getting arrested, and actually get the police to drive you home without pressing charges.
All right, it seems like almost all of you have put your hands down. In fact, there's only one of you now with your hand up.
Therefore, you must be Eddie Griffin, center for the Minnesota Timberwolves.
OK, so their new album kinda sucks, but trust me, people, Calexico live is SO worth it. This completely unique band with their combination of atmospheric rock, western cowboy music and mariachi horns, is one of my all-time favorites.
I'm totally addicted to this band, having now seen them several times, and god help you if Mariachi De Luna Luz is there with them, because you will be screaming "Ole!" at the top of your lungs within 30 seconds of the music starting.
Prior to the tour they'll be playing SummerStage in NYC with The New Pornographers and then heading to Lollapalooza in Chicago. Performing with kickass lineups at the Touch & Go 25th Anniversary Celebration and Austin City Limits Festival, you should definitely catch Calexico at some point this fall.
08.03.06 - New York, NY (Central Park SummerStage) 08.05.06 - Chicago, IL (Lollapalooza) 09.03.06 - Oakland, CA (Art & Soul Festival/KFOG Stage) 09.14.06 - Austin, TX (Austin City Limits) 09.18.06 - New Orleans, LA (One Eye'd Jacks) 09.19.06 - Athens, GA (40 Watt) 09.20.06 - Carrboro, NC (Cat's Cradle) 09.21.06 - Knoxville, TN (Bijou Theatre) 09.22.06 - Lexington, KY (Headliner's) 09.23.06 - St. Louis, MO (Mississippi Nights) 09.24.06 - Bloomington, IN (Buskirk-Chumley Theatre) 09.25.06 - Cleveland, OH (Beachland Ballroom) 09.27.06 - Milwaukee, WI (Pabst Theatre) 09.28.06 - Minneapolis, MN (Fine Line Theatre) 09.29.06 - Iowa City, IA (Englert Theatre) 09.30.06 - Lawrence, KS (Bottleneck)
As a side note, I'm in Milwaukee today, and have been stopped by like 10 people who read this blog regularly! It's insane! So, anyway, hi to everyone in Milwaukee! Go see Calexico at the Pabst, you'll enjoy it. You heard their music in the production of TRUE WEST a few years ago. Now you remember, right?
All right, so this week it was announced that "Everyone Stares: The Police Inside Out", the documentary of the final tour of The Police, which was shot and directed by Stewart Copeland from his old Super 8 movies at the time, would be released on DVD in September. It got mixed reviews when it played at Sundance back in January, but it sounds like it's worth a look when it finally comes out.
But this got me to thinking: Hey, wait a minute, wasn't there a documentary made of the Police's final tour years ago?
Thank god for You Tube. Here it is: "The Police Around The World" in its full glory.
Now do yourself a favor. Go get a sandwich or something and let this fim load for a while before you watch it. It takes forever. But it is the full film and this is probably the only way you're ever gonna see it!
(Double click on this image as you have to watch this at You Tube, not here.)
The funny part is watching Stewart Copeland filming like mad during the whole film. He clearly knew that he was gonna wonder one day what the hell actually happened to him. Either that or he wanted to chronicle for posterity the EXACT MOMENT when Sting became a total pussy.
And we're not talking about Rolexes here. For example, a company called Persey Tours can basically fake a whole trip for you to any location in the world.
From the article: " Persey Tours was barely keeping the bill collectors at bay before it started offering fake vacations last year. Now it's selling 15 a month — providing ersatz ticket stubs, hotel receipts, photos with clients' images superimposed on famous landmarks, a few souvenirs for living room shelves.
If the customer is an errant husband who wants his wife to believe he's on a fishing trip, Persey offers not just photos of him on the river, but a cellphone with a distant number, a lodge that if anyone calls will swear the husband is checked in but not available, and a few dead fish on ice."
Think they're kidding? The photo above is an example of their handiwork for a recent customer. The picture is from Rio, but she never went there. Nice, huh?
The article also goes on to talk about a person who sells fake college degrees:
False diplomas and term papers are the busy student's way of getting over that last hurdle at school. Even Putin's doctoral dissertation, researchers from the Brookings Institution revealed earlier this year, contained major sections lifted from a text published by academics from the University of Pittsburgh.
The revelations were barely repeated in the Moscow press, not because they were scandalous, but because they weren't — government officials routinely rely on fake dissertations patched together by underlings.
A woman named "Nadezhda," whose number was distributed in Moscow subway stations offering to provide university diplomas, was asked by a reporter if she could come up with a degree from the Russian State Medical University.
"No problem. It will cost you 15,000 rubles ($555). What year of graduation do you want?" she asked.
"How about somewhere between 1982 and 1984?"
"It is doable."
She told the caller to provide his full name and education specialty, and asked what kind of grades should be listed on his transcripts and whether he wanted to have attended day classes or night school. "By the way, have you studied medicine?" she inquired then, in an apparent attack of conscience.
"Frankly, no."
"Then maybe you don't need to go into it."
"Well, I need it badly."
"Well, I mean, if you have nothing to do with medicine, maybe you should reconsider it and maybe settle for something else."
"No, really, I need a medical degree quite badly. I can't explain it to you over the phone now."
"Well, OK then, let's do it. When will you have the information ready?"
Hey, what's this all about, anyway?
Yuri Lubimov, advisor to the economic development minister on piracy issues, said to understand the Russian public's appetite for fakes, one must understand the importance of appearances.
"It's like the French notion of faire montrer. It's better to look like something than to be something. It's a very Eastern way of thinking," he said. "I know people here who have not very much money at all, but he will buy a very big car so that other people will see that he's rich, he's powerful."
Of course, no one can spot a fake like a Russian — ask any woman who ever looked with disdain at a rabbit fur coat going down Tverskaya Avenue. Or ask Maria Babalova, music critic at the newspaper Izvestia, who raised an eyebrow when she saw billboards pasted all over town for an upcoming performance of "The Rising Stars of La Scala."
Why hadn't anyone ever heard of this tenor and soprano, if they were from La Scala?
Grigory Papish, general producer of the Moscow International Music House, where the performance was scheduled, said he learned too late that the singers were "on their way to having contracts" with La Scala.
"The man, the tenor, he showed some hints of a voice, some signs of the old Italian school of singing," Babalova said in an interview.
"As for the woman, she was a tragicomic sight," she said. "Her dress barely covered her aging knees. One of the straps didn't want to stay on her shoulder, and she was more concerned with fixing it than with her performance. She had no voice to speak of. Instead of singing, she howled, squeaked, slurped."
So there's definitely a downside. But is there anything that people won't try to fake?
Dmitry Popov, founder and chief executive of Persey Tours, certainly hopes not. Last year, he made $2,000 helping a Siberian gas station owner convince his friends that he had rented a ride on the Russian space shuttle to the moon.
"Of course he was smiling when he ordered this," Popov said. "But he paid."
All right, I really have to stop writing about myself.
This is the last one for a while. I swear.
So, a while ago, I was asked to score this movie "A Note Of Triumph: The Golden Age Of Norman Corwin", directed by my friend Eric Simonson and produced by my good friend Corinne Marrinan for HBO Films. It's a documentary movie about this forgotten radio pioneer Norman Corwin (that's him above), who influenced a generation of listeners with his beautiful poems on his broadcasts during World War II. He is now 95, and the film finds him reflecting back on his life and career.
It's a fantastic movie. It's so fantastic that it actually won this years Academy Award for Best Short Documentary. Nice, huh? I've now scored an Oscar winning film!
So, last night, it was the big Hollywood premiere of the film at the Museum of Radio And Television in Beverly Hills, and it was super cool. Big fancy party and a terrific screening room.
The best part is that, before the movie, I got to sit down with Norman for a few minutes, and we talked about music the whole time. It turns out that when he was working in radio, Bernard Herrmann was responsible for his music! Bernard Herrmann is the composer responsible for Alfred Hitchcock's greatest scores, including Psycho, Rear Window, North by Northwest and Marnie. And he's a musical hero of mine. Needless to say, we had a lot to talk about. Norman was a true gentleman, very funny and sweet, and genuinely interested in knowing more about me. It was a real pleasure to finally meet him, after just watching footage of him all this time.
So anyway, we screen the film and Norman makes a speech afterwards. He singles me out in his speech and asks me to stand for a round of applause. It was really wonderful, and an extremely generous thing for him to do.
Afterwards, people are thrusting their business cards at me and being very complimentary. It was really great. I'm so used to being under the radar in what I do, that it is then nothing short of shocking when people make a big deal over me. Definitely a nice night and I owe it all to Norman, as well as Eric and Corinne.
"A Note Of Triumph: The Golden Age Of Norman Corwin" premieres on Cinemax on July 27 at 7pm and 10pm. The film runs 40 minutes.
Well, as first reported here eons ago, CBGB is definitely moving to Vegas. But I hear what you're saying. Moving? That shithole? It's all nailed down and covered in grafitti. What's to move?
"We want to take a lot of this stuff with us, and I think we're going to move to Las Vegas," owner Hilly Kristal said, adding that he'll start disassembling parts of the club as early as September. "I have some developers who have some really great space in the downtown area. So, I'd say sometime in spring we'll be in Las Vegas. It's a big undertaking, and these developers are putting the money into it, and I want to make sure that, for my benefit and theirs, we make this work."
Of course, Kristal, who wouldn't name the developers he's working with, knows it won't be the same in Vegas. "I don't have any choice," he explained. "I have been looking for space in New York and the rent's $125,000 a month on Broadway." He said he came close to securing a space downtown on Essex Street, but the deal didn't make it past the negotiations phase. So, it's "Viva Las Vegas" for one of New York's most revered rock and roll attractions.
"[The Vegas CBGB] won't be the same size or the same shape, but I am going to have all the things that matter there," Kristal said. "I am taking the bars with me, I am taking the stage — I'm taking the urinal that Joey [Ramone] pissed in with me. I'm going to take a lot of things — anything that makes this place CBGB.
"I'll make it CBGB, and even more so," he continued. "I think we can do better, starting in a new place, where the city's for it. It's more important to try to keep things going and moving up."
Kristal's highly publicized battle with his landlord, a nonprofit called the Bowery Residents' Committee that funds programs for New York's homeless, ended in December with an agreement that stated CBGB could continue to operate in the same space it has occupied since its 1973 inception until October 31. Kristal agreed to pay near-market rent of $35,000 per month, an increase of $16,000 over the amount he was paying before the lease ran out nearly a year ago.
Kristal said he's working with a couple of bookers to give CBGB a fitting send-off and added that several of the artists who helped make the club famous, as well as a number of on-the-brink bands, have been contacted about performing as part of the two-month finale. A schedule will be announced in the coming weeks.
WASHINGTON, July 9 - President Bush appears to be losing support among a key group of voters who had hitherto stood firmly with the president even as his poll numbers among other groups fell dramatically.
A new Gallup poll shows that, for the first time, Bush's approval rating has fallen below 50% among total fucking morons, and now stands at 44%. This represents a dramatic drop compared to a poll taken just last December, when 62% of total fucking morons expressed support for the president and his policies.
The current poll, conducted by phone with 1,409 total fucking morons between May 4 and May 8, reveals that only 44% of those polled believe the president is doing a good job, while 27% believe he is doing a poor job and 29% don't understand the question.
The December poll, conducted by phone with 1,530 total fucking morons, showed 62% approved of the president, 7% disapproved and 31% didn't understand the question.
Faltering approval ratings for the president among a group once thought to be a reliable source of loyal support gives Republicans one more reason to be nervous about the upcoming mid-term elections.
"If we can't depend on the support of total fucking morons," says Sen. Rick Santorum (R-PA), "then we've got a big problem. They're a key factor in our electoral strategy, and an important part of today's Republican coalition."
"We've taken the total fucking moron vote for granted," says Rep. Tom Feeney (R-FL), "and now we're paying for it. We've let the Democrats control the debate lately, and they've dragged discourse back into the realm of complex, nuanced issues. So your average total fucking moron turns on his TV and sees his Republican Congressman arguing about Constitutional law or the complexities of state formation in the Middle East, and he tunes out. He wants to hear comforting, pandering, flattering bromides and he doesn't want to hear a logical argument more complex than what you'd find on a bumper sticker."
For Feeney, the poll is a dire warning that Republicans can ignore only at their peril. "This should send a signal that we have to regain control of the debate if we want the support of our key constituencies in the coming election and beyond. We need to bring public discourse back into the realm of stupidity and vacuity. We should be talking about homosexual illegal immigrants burning flags. We should be talking about the power of pride. We should be talking about freedom fries. These are the issues that resonate with total fucking morons."
But some total fucking morons say it's too late. Bill Snarpel of Enid, Oklahoma is a total fucking moron who voted for Bush in both 2000 and 2004. But he says he won't be voting for Bush in 2008.
"I don't like it that he was going to sell our ports to the Arabs. If the Arabs own the ports then that means they'll let all the Arabs in and then we'll all be riding camels and wearing towels on our heads. I don't want my children singing the Star Spangled Banner in Muslim."
Total fucking moron Kurt Meyer of Turlock, California also says his once solid support for Bush has collapsed. "He invaded Iraq and all those soldiers died, and for what? We destroyed all their WMDs, but now their new president is making fun of us and saying he's going to build nuclear bombs and that we can't stop him. Well, nuclear bombs are even worse than WMDs, so what did we accomplish?"
Laura McDonald, a total fucking moron from Chandler, Arizona, says she is disappointed that the president hasn't been a more forceful advocate of Christian values. "This country was founded on Christian values," she says, "but you'd never know it looking around and seeing all the Mexicans running around.
“I thought Bush was going to bring Jesus back into the government. Instead, Christians are being persecuted worse than ever before in history, because all these Mexicans come here and tell Christians that we have to respect their religious beliefs. So now it's illegal for children to pray in school. Soon it will be illegal for them to speak English."
Not all total fucking morons have turned their backs on the president. Jeb Larkin of Topeka, Kansas says he still fully supports Bush. "He is doing a great job. He is a great president. He is a great decider. I have a puppy. His tail sticks straight up and you can see his butthole."
And not all Republican lawmakers are concerned about the poll. Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-TN), for one, does not find it a cause for anxiety. While he agrees that his party should not take total fucking morons for granted, they "really don't have anywhere else to go. They're never going to be able to understand someone like Al Gore or John Kerry or anybody intelligent and articulate who wants to talk about substantive issues. Just try having a conversation with one of them about global warming. They'll say, 'Oh, but Rush says volcanoes consume more ozone than humans do.'I mean, they're morons! Total fucking morons!"
"They've got nowhere else to go," Alexander reaffirms with a smile, "and they always vote."
Well, I don't like to talk about myself that often, (which would make one wonder why I have a blog), but anyway, tonight was a special night.
I've been working this week at the Royal Shakespeare Company in Stratford-Upon-Avon, England, which you may recall was the birthplace of William Shakespeare. The RSC has generously invited companies from around the world to present plays by William Shakespeare, and I've come along with the production of HENRY IV parts I and II, that was originally produced by Chicago Shakespeare. I wrote the music for the show with Alaric Jans, and also did the sound design.
It's been a really terrific experience, the staff has been great, the theatre sounds fantastic and it's just been a great week. Hell, the computer crashed and I lost all my data, and even THAT worked out ok. Thank god.
Now, if you haven't noticed, I'm not a real deep thinker. I don't often take stock of things, I'm usually just really busy, and when I finish something, I always have to move on to the next thing. That's just how it seems to work for me.
However, there are these occasional moments in my life where I've stopped for a moment and thought "HOLY CRAP!"
Anyway, so tonight while I was watching the show, I had two thoughts go through my mind.
The first was just the realization of "HOLY CRAP! I'm working on Shakespeare at The Royal Shakespeare Company!"
The second was, at a certain point today, after asking around, it appears that I am in fact the first American composer EVER at the Royal Shakespeare Company.
HOLY FUCKING CRAP!
If you know otherwise, write me. Otherwise, if you have that other shoe that's gonna drop, then I'll see you in a couple of minutes.
So, ok, if you're a regular here, you're probably wondering why it was my birthday here for nearly a month.
Well, for one thing, it wasn't!
What actually happened was that we moved and that took some time, and then my wife (who's 8 months pregnant) fell and broke her leg (and SHE'S FINE, SHE'S FINE, THE BABY IS FINE, CALM DOWN), and so anyway, she was laid up in a cast and I was running my ass around nonstop trying to help her out, and then I hadda go tech her play in NYC, and that was crazy because I hadda come up with a new score in a day so it could be cut after I left, and then I hadda come tech this 6 hour show in England, which definitely required lotsa fast talking, and so now things have just calmed down.
Finally.
Now, if you are a regular to this blog, you know that when I miss a bunch of days, rather than letting them just go, I actually go back and fill them all in. The reason being that I DO have things to say during the time I'm gone, I just don't have time to write them down. Well, that and I'm a huge geek.
SO! It is now incumbent upon you to scroll down and read all the crap I'm gonna put down there. I don't care if you have something else to do! Don't hand me that! If you had something else to do, you wouldn't be here in the first place!
It's been forever since I posted and man, do I have a lot of explaining to do. I promise I will start tomorrow.
For today, however, I wanna share with you my 4th of July present, as my way of getting back on track.
See, right now, I'm working at the Royal Shakespeare Company in Stratford-Upon-Avon, England with the cast of Chicago Shakespeare's production of "Henry IV Parts I and II". Now, as you can imagine, they don't celebrate the 4th of July here, and we have had a hard (but really great) week here so far. So, today, as we finished the tech of our 6 hour show (you heard me), I put on the following track as our curtain call music for the day.
Do you love it or what?
It's the Holiday City Hot Cha Kitchen Band from their truly magnificent album "Hey Look Us Over".
And here's the liner notes from the back of the album! (Click on it to see it at full size.)
Man, they just don't make albums like this anymore, and I honestly cannot understand why.
BUT! You must go here and download this entire album! I guarantee it will change your life, much like the cast of Henry IV who had it blasted at them at full volume today in the theatre. It was a revelation for us all, especially the British crew who truly had the most confused looks on their faces that I have ever seen.
It was the best way I could think of to celebrate the holiday.
Between the Yeah Yeah Yeahs and the White Stripes and The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion to Keane to Eagles Of Death Metal, there has been a total dearth of bass players lately! You gotta have bass, man!
And I'm not just saying this because I'm a bass player.
Take, for example, The White Stripes. Now, ok, fine, they're good, right? But as much as they rock, you KNOW they would sound so much better if they had a bass player. Admit it! They would!
How do I know?
Enter Steven McDonald of Redd Kross, who you may recall several years ago, did the Redd Blood Cells project. Essentially, he decided to prove that The White Stripes sound better with a bass player than without, and he used the Stripes album "White Blood Cells" as his backing tracks. He even went so far as to put himself on a remade version of the cover. See?
Nice, huh?
Now, you may be thinking "Hey, this is cool and all, but is this legal?". Well, that's a great question.
