PrettyFakes

i’m not a harry potter fan. i just ain’t. read the first book, which was like reading second-rate comic books filtered through third-rate britishized young adult sap. sorry, hogwarts alum: it struggles.

but i love the total lust for the written word that has developed around it. what’s the news of the world right now? alabama, kruschev, trouble in the suez? no! it’s that a box of the new order of the phoenix books were stolen—in a heist fit for a steve mcqueen flick.

that people so covet the written word is a wonderful thing. in much the same way i think that some folks downloading songs aren’t thieves—they just want those little three-meg bits of art that badly.

“If you really want to confuse people, give ‘em a copy of the Patriot Act.”
—U.S. Attorney Dunn Lampton, Jackson, Mississippi, June 13, 2003.

other towns have their carousel ponies, their bulldogs, their cows—we’ve got catfish. check out jackson’s gallery of catfish while i drink my morning choco-soy and try to take a nap under my desk.

here’s my nominations for six of the best rock’n’roll songs for the first six months of the year. just fits on one of those cool little cd’s! want one, leave a comment. four of the below are available for download.

1. wheat “do you really want me”

2. the new pornographers “the laws have changed”

3. gossip “fire/sign”

4. exploding hearts “razorblades and sleeping aides”

5. red hot valentines “all you get”

6. postal service “sleeping in”

full disclosure and errata:
(more…)

My ears were ringing from the band, so I walked up front. The Apes may be Pitchfork’s darling, but midnight on Monday their Black Sabbath-party mix antics don’t set well. The Overnight Lows had already wrung out what little bit of rock was in me.

It was a good show for a Monday night—all the regulars and some folks that were just curious. A couple of weird b-boy types that come around sometimes wearing Jncos and Tool t-shirts, and the random heroin addict types that sit and shake at the bar and sip on water, oblivious to the music. Some guy mock-humping the Saints pinball machine, doing this grotesque grind to the Al Green playing in the front bar, the Apes echoing all over it.
(more…)

in the wake and wash of more press than laci peterson, the times gets it wrong again—but this time, it’s much more like the ol’ lamestain/sub-pop seattle lingo dorkiness. in this article about the field day concert, the author offers weakly (and completely without substantiation) that “[e]xcept for the backup singers for the English band Blur, all the performers were white, a rare thing at a rock festival.”

wha?? pardon moi? have they ever been to a rock festival? maybe they’re thinking of zack de la roche and . . . uh . . . is anybody else black? living colour? maybe one guy out of king’s x?

oh, i forgot. i woke up in parallel world nine this morning . . . gorjus update: i’m working on a feature-length for catoptric entitled “you’re not going to make me smile,” which will address that (supposedly) lost beach boys (non-) classic and why it’s not any good, anyway. until then learn TONS at a wonderful site devoted to the album and its legend—the smile shop.

i’m watching a stream of the postal service playing live on kcrw. singer/death cab for cutie ben gibbard struggles with the strap on his guitar and finally strips the instrument off during “we will become silhouettes” and runs out of the studio.

what the hell? i think. then he settles down behind a drum kit—still singing, not missing a beat—and plays the breakdown. i got rock and roll chills from a three-piece band on blurry video!! go 2003! if you keep watching you get to hear better-than-the-album vocals on “nothing better” by jenny lewis, who here puts much more into her pleas for separation. rock and roll!

despite what i just said down below gene clark’s post, i love the web so much. i’m proud that i can settle trivia demands within seconds. i learn more about music in a day now then i could in a week years ago. and i delight in amazing my bosses at how fast i can turn in their memo requests (much legal work is done sans books now, with the aid of online databases like westlaw). so when my fellow clerk kw called from a supposed “quick trip to deliver some papers” and said he was lost, i went all onstar on that mutha. instant maps, fifteen seconds! “turn left here, kw. you should be there. ah, yes. now bring me some beer since the bosses are out of town . . . thank-you for using gorjus.”
(more…)

ah, the idiocies of the republicans and our homeland security legislation—do they even bother to say “we’re for smaller government” anymore?

the washington post reports that all the new-fangled anti-terrorist rules, meant to protect our citizens from harm, are actually putting a damper on celebrating one of the births of our country: july 4. fireworks can’t be transported very easily, due to the new restrictions on “explosives.” so what few can be transported are moving through the less-safe method of the tractor trailers instead of trains.

so increased regs mean: 1. fireworks companies can’t sell their wares, meaning lost income, lost taxes, and layoffs; and 2. greater danger to the public because of less-safe transportation measures.

if you can’t tell, i’ve got a cold and i’m in a bad monday mood.