Category: Post

     Hey, how ya been? Remember when I used to actually write stuff here? Man, those were the days, huh? Well hey, I actually put some new stuff up here. Crazy, I know. At one point in time, I had planned to go through all this crap and sort of divide it up into categories, but the list of links and stupid anecdotes just kept growing until I gave up on ever imposing any sort of order on the whole mess. As it stands, the whole thing kind of reads as a stream of conciousness recounting of all the stuff I’ve been looking at online and / or doing for the past month or so.

     The video for The White Stripes “Fell in Love With a Girl” is done in dumbed-down lego mosaics. It would’ve been cooler if they had gone through and done each frame of the footage as a mosaic. If anyone wants to pay me to devote my life to making such a video, get in touch.

     In other Detroit rock news, The Sights appeared live in the FOX2 news studio a week or so ago, and you can download a massive video file of their appearance here. Looks like Nate of Judah Johnson and Buddyhead fame is playing keys for them these days.

     The purpose of their appearance on FOX2 was to promote the Hamtramck Blowout, which happened last weekend. If I was on top of things, I would have posted an update here urging you to go see both of the bands I am currently a member of in their respective time slots, but I didn’t because I am a giant slacker. The Recital also ended up making an appearance on FOX2 news, primarily because we were one of the first bands to play. You can download a digital recording of our fleeting fifteen minutes here. Those of you who are upset about having missed yet another chance to witness my musical prowess can console yourselves by attending one of the following all-ages shows:

• On Saturday, March 16th, at Mr. Muggs in Ypsilanti, I’ll be playing drums with the Pop Project. Also appearing will be a whole damn handful of bands, as it appears to be an all day ordeal. I’m not sure what time this shindig kicks off, but it looks like we’ll be playing sometime around 9PM.

• On Monday, March 18th, at Stormy Records in Dearborn, I’ll be playing bass with The Recital. Also performing will be Lisboa. All the proceeds from this show go to WHFR 89.3 FM, so you should go. Show starts at 8PM (Sharp!)

     While I’m already boring you with band-related crap, two more quick things:

     The Recital played in Ohio awhile back at the venue where Harlow played back when Bands on the Run originally came through town. All the disclaimer signs and what have you from the taping were still proudly displayed. Not surprisingly, the club had an extremely sleazy “Makeout room” in the back, and I had the following conversation with a rather colorful ‘Local:’

Me: (Watching RSB play)
Her: Ahhhhhhhhhh! (Turns to me) Nothing like a good OVULATION!
Me: (Leaving)

     We’ve also been recording on a super nice 2″ analog 24 track with Norm Druce in Owosso, Michigan. His studio is in an old machine shop, so the natural reverb is pretty great. To see a panoramic photo thingy I put together by standing in the center of the room and taking pictures as I turned in a circle, click here.

     …and now it’s time for a little section I like to call “PROTRACTED DISCUSSION OF WRITERS WHO FAVOR FOOTNOTING AND ALSO SOME WHO DON’T” or “HOT NERDY BOOK ACTION.”

     I’m in the middle of my third attempt at conquering David Foster Wallace’s mammoth ‘Infinite Jest.’ It’s going slightly better than my first and second attempts which both ended in the first 100 pages. For those of you who appreciate the nuance of the footnote but don’t have the time to wade through 1200 or so pages, I would reccommend ‘The Mezzanine‘ by Nicholson Baker. The book is under 200 pages in length and takes place over the course of one man’s ride up an escalator – but you learn all about him through the footnotes that drive the story. So yes: highest kempa.com recommendation. [Actually I just heard back from one person who I recommended it to who hated it and I guess I should amend my recommendation: if you consider being called ‘meticulous’ to be a compliment (ie you are mildly OCD and / or at least partially insane and /or an engineering student), you will really, really like this book. If you thought ‘Bridget Jones’ Diary’ ROCKED then you might not. But hey, if ‘The Mezzanine’ isn’t for you and you were into Bridget Jones, then you should read ‘MISadventures‘ which is a pretty good chick-ish book I read on my break one day because I couldn’t find anything else to read.]

     Hey, did you know that the new issue of Dave Eggers’ quarterly literary journal McSweeney’s is out? This one is of the same format as issue #4: a bunch of stories individually bound and then rubberbanded together. So far I’m not very impressed with this issue – it seems that a lot of the irreverence and humor is missing this time around. The cover touts a contribution from Chris Ware – but don’t get too excited, because he only supplied the cover to the Michael Chabon story.

     Those of you looking for some new Chris Ware material should check out the latest issue of Nest magazine, as the first installment of a regular ‘Strip’ appears. Also newly available is the Chris Ware lunchbox, which is really quite great. Just look at the main panel illustration, and check out the typically Ware-ian description:

“Remember gym class, being called names, and getting spit on? Well, here’s the “Rusty Brown” lunchpail — the perfect companion for children who are used to dining alone. Decorated with popular images from the new serial beginning in “The ACME Novelty Library” series of picture books and pamphlets, this one is sure to be just the thing to display for a short time, put in a closet, and then eventually throw away. Four color, embossed, and solid metal — so that it really hurts when somebody bigger than you smacks you on the side of the head with it.”

     Anyway, remember three paragraphs back when I mentioned Dave Eggers? Well, I was going to segue into further Eggers-centric discussion, but then I started talking about Chris Ware for too long for the segue to make any sense, so now I’m using this coincidentally very Eggers-esque device to bring our little discussion back to Dave Eggers. Got that? Okay, good, here we go:

     Speaking of Dave Eggers, there’s been some speculation in the press that his sister Beth has committed suicide. This speculation appears to be at least partially based on the fact that Ms. Eggers, a lawyer, did not pay her California Bar dues for 2002. Her reaction to HBWOSG, which she felt presented her inaccurately, veered from somewhat hostile to a grim acceptance pretty quickly after the books release [The second link was at onetime Beth Eggers’ ‘retraction’ of some of her earlier comments. It appears to have been removed from the McSweeney’s site]. The Eggers-penned forward to the paperback edition (Which dealt in part with the book’s reception) is conspicuously absent from the current paperback edition, as is all the paperback-only footnoting. If this is at all interesting to you, then (1.) you are a giant dork, and (2.) you should know that all sorts of obsessive Eggers-watching goes on here.

     If you’re a fan of Tom Perrotta, you can hear him reading a chapter from ‘Joe College’ in MP3 format right here. Unfortunately it’s not one of the better passages in the book. If you’re not familiar with Tom Perrotta, he wrote ‘Election,’ and also the superior short story collection ‘Bad Haircut.’

     I went solo to see Michael Moore on his book tour as it rolled into Ann Arbor This past Tuesday, and boy, was I glad I did, as Mr. Moore showed the audience an epic rough cut of his forthcoming documentary “Bowling for Columbine.” The film deals with the issue of gun violence in America, but not from the usual “Get rid of all guns” perspective, as Moore is a card carrying member of the NRA. Two of the most intelligent interviews in the film are with Marilyn Manson, who seemed surprisingly (to me at least) insightful, and South Park Creator Matt Stone, who is obviously a very smart guy. You may remember his straight-faced article on the beauty of math from a few years back. Well I went hunting for it online again but couldn’t find it. It looks like the site that originally hosted it has been deleted. All I was able to find was this quotation from it:

     “I became aware of an underlying superstructure that tied all my math knowledge together. Although I had no idea how to define that superstructure, just being aware of it was a big step… When the rays of mathematical structure do puncture the clouds of one’s monkey brain, one sees, or rather feels, the interconnectedness of totality. All these different formulas and graphs and infinite series that you have learned and mastered your whole life all actually describe different parts of the same thing.”

     At any rate, Moore also scored an interview with NRA head honcho Charleton Heston, who manages to come off as a supreme racist during his brief interview. Also of interest to fans of Michael Moore is this transcript of an interview with Bill O’Reilly. The result: a festival of smugness. O’Reilly attacks with his unique brand of “I’m all politics-core smart” smugness, and Moore counters with his “I’m all politics-core and I didn’t sell out” sort of smugness. A smugness standoff is achieved.

     Those of you into hearing a good interview with the late Charles Schutz, you can download some really good interview MP3’s here. [Ah crap – I’ve been sitting on this update so long they’ve changed the interview subject to Robert Crumb. Bah.] Incidentally, shortly before his death, Schultz was interviewed on 60 minutes. It was an insanely depressing interview, completely in contrast to the interview linked above (In which he is almost self-congratulatory). If anyone ever stumbles across a transcript and or recording of this interview online, remember that I really, really want it. Thanks.

     …and now a pile of music-related links:

     Holy Crap! Did you see Thom Yorke on the grammys?! If not, click here, now! He looks like a YETI these days! While Thom was running around all Yeti-like, he also stopped in on an acoustic Beck show where they performed a cover of the velvet Undergrounds “I’m Set Free,” a pretty nice-sounding MP3 of which can be downloaded here. This MP3 is hosted by Injektilo-ftp.com, where you can find all sorts of live Radiohead and Sigur Ros goodness (Another good Radiohead download site is here). Hop on that shit. By the way, if you’re all about Radiohead, you should know that they added a bunch of new merch to Waste.com. Highlights include cups, and a book by resident artists Stanley Donwood.

     Tiny Telephone has always had a great selection of MP3’s but I hadn’t checked back in awhile. There’s some great stuff there, including a Bright Eyes song that I didn’t know existed, a clinic song I don’t have, a demo version of an Elliott Smith song, and an interesting video by a band called For Stars that shows the studio takes that actually produced the song synced up. Not to mention about 100 other MP3’s you should hear. So yes. Go download some good music. Oh and before I forget, here’s the story on that Bright Eyes song:

“Better Looking Records will be releasing a series of 7″ from the Album Leaf (Jimmy Lavalle from Tristeza’s solo thing) and each release will feature a different accompanying guest artist. The debut release features Conor Oberst and is due for release in the coming few months. According to Paul Fischer of better looking, Jimmy recorded some stuff and sent the material to Conor for him to add to. Conor returned it back to Jimmy for final mixing.”

     Matador records is streaming the Jon Spencer blues explosion video that features both a spastic Winona Ryder and a Drum-set-kicking John C. Reilly. So all you high speed connection folks: stock up on the spastic Winona and crazy C. Reilly.

     So you know that album, ‘Pinkerton,’ by Weezer, right? Well I guess it was originally supposed to be rock opera set in space, and that studio versions of several songs that weren’t released were recorded. You can read up on the history of this weird concept album that never was here, and ferret out many of the songs on audiogalaxy.

     I’m on an unashamedly over-the-top power pop kick these days. I’m relatively new to the Jellyfish, but holy cow, they’re pretty fucking good. Anyone know if this box set ever came out? I’m also listening to a lot from The Flashing Lights (Flawlessly produced Canadian pop) and The Zombies lately (My copy of the box set is missing the 2nd disc – if you have the ‘Zombie Heaven’ boxset and feel like burning me a copy of the 2nd disc, then that would be pretty rad). So yes. In case you were wondering, I mean.

     Since we all knew it wouldn’t be possible to make it through the entire update without some nerdly Arcade-based links, why don’t we just get ’em out of the way now? One of the greatest things I’ve stumbled across in awhile is the web page of a guy who only collects arcade game prototypes (ie games that were never mass produced). His collection can be seen here, and some highlights include Beavis and Butthead and Marble Man machines. The Marble Man page is probably the most interesting, as it chronicles how he obsessively assembled the parts of the machine over a three year period. Crazy.

     Oh, I forgot to tell you I went to an arcade auction. If you ever have the need to see the largest concentration of greasy guys who own roller rinks EVER, go to an arcade auction. I went just to see what it was like, and assumed everything would be top dollar, so I didn’t bother registering to bid. It turns out this was a mistake, as towards the end of the afternoon they were letting perfectly good cabinets with minor electrical problems go for $15. Next year I will begin using my nerdliness for PROFIT! But I digress…

SUMMARY OF THE DORKIEST CONVERSATION I’VE EVER HAD: WITH DIAGRAM

     When naming your band, you must ask yourself several important questions. First and foremost should be: “Will we ever release our music in the 12″ Vinyl format?” If the answer is yes, an appropriate follow-up question would be: “Does the type of music we will be releasing appeal to those who would typically alphabetize 12″ vinyl?” If the answer to both of these questions is ‘Yes,’ then the orientation of the chosen band name within the context of the alphabet as a whole must be given careful consideration.

     Danger zones within the alphabet lie in the ‘A’ and ‘Z’ sections. These zones are dangerous because they are vulnerable to stress and wear imposed by the collector who does not have enough records to properly fill the shelf on which they are stored (See figure 1). If these records are left as such for long periods of time, the album stored on the bottom of the stack (Often an ‘A’ or ‘Z,’ though the proliferation of compilation records containing music by “Various Artists” has made the ‘Z’ section significantly safer.) can eventually be warped by the force imparted by the other records on the shelf.

Fig. 1: The stress imposed on the end records by all the other records (which are inadequate in number to properly fill the shelf) is greatest on artists whose names begin with the letter ‘Z’ (See point ‘A’ in the figure above). Alternately, records by artists whose names begin with the letter ‘A’ would bear the most stress were the records to fall in the other direction. It is in this respect that we see how the force of gravity becomes a variable in the naming of a band and / or musical project.

     The ideal course of action if the chosen name of your musical endeavor begins with the letter ‘A’ is to either make music that will appeal to the financially well-to-do vinyl enthusiast who can be expected to adequately fill his record shelf, or make music that will appeal to those who don’t alphabetize their vinyl records, thereby putting your faith in the odds that your albums will end up not on the ends, but in the center of an accumulation of records.

     This second scenario begs the question of desirability: if your albums are to accumulate in the center of a stack it would follow that they would be less likely to be played by the casual listener. This argument, however, is beyond the scope of this summary of a conversation I had.

     When I saw Amelie AGAIN, I noticed something kind of neat. In the beginning, during the likes/dislikes montage, we learn that Amalie enjoys skipping stones. Before she does each of her three “good deeds,” she finds a flat stone, and puts it in her pocket. Before she finally attempts to do something in her own interest, she goes and skips each of the three stones, and they skip approximately a billion times each. Stupid little details like that make insane people like me smile. These things are in stark contrast to what makes the average moviegoer smile, like FUCKING ROLLERBALL KICKS ASS BRO.

     If you were ever obsessively into Canadian popsters Sloan then you are probably familiar with the names Laura Borealis and Catherine Stockhausen. For those of you who have no idea what I’m talking about, allow me to elaborate:

Laura Borealis:

     Artsy gal who dated Chris Murphy at one time. Is credited in both ‘Smeared’ and ‘Twice Removed.’ She’s got her own website now which is of interest for a number of reasons. First of all, you can check out some of the indie rawk videos she directed in the late 90’s, all of them pretty good. For those of you too lazy to go to her page and see what’s available, here’s the breakdown:

• Superfrindz – ‘10 Lbs.‘ Download Matt Murphy of The Flashing Lights fame’s first music video (And speaking of The Flashing Lights, click here to read their hilarious tour rider), in which he appears to be wearing a children’s size medium t-shirt. The song is great, too.
• Eric’s Trip – ‘ Viewmaster‘ Subpop Canadian Lofi, ho!
• Sebadoh – ‘Ocean‘ The infamous ‘Lou Barlow crying’ video. So great.

     Also available at Laura’s site is information on her upcoming arthouse movie, which stars members of both Sloan and Eric’s Trip. Clicking here gets you a complete cast list, not to mention a picture of Andrew Scott in Leather pants. Bonus.

Catherine Stockhausen:

     Artsy gal who has supplied the photographic skills for just about every East Coast Canadian record released in the last decade. She’s also got a new website, and there are some great candid shots of all sorts of Canrock bands including Sloan, The Superfriendz, The Flashing Lights, Eric’s Trip, The Inbreds, Hardship Post, Plumtree, The Deadly Snakes, The New Pornographers, etc. in her photo gallery here.

     If you’re oblivious to all this canadian rock business, you can listen to Michael Barclay talk about his monstrous new book ‘Have not been the same’ (Hi speed / Low speed) which discusses the last decade in Canadian rock music and deals extensively with some of the bands mentioned abouve. It’s almost worth tracking down just for the chapter on Sloan, which was actually really well done and informative.

     In case you are sitting at work and needing online games to play, here are two that kept me amused all through boring lectures I should have been paying attention to:

• ‘Take it Easy.’ Nerdy puzzlish game using tiles and numbers and math and other things you probably hate. But wait: it’s the FUN kind of math!
• ‘Farkle.’ A crazy dice game that makes no sense at all at first but after you play one round you are totally addicted and that lecture about the anthropology of business is the furthest thing from your mind.

The best 99 cents I’ve spent on a record in quite awhile:

     After listening to the record, I’ve determined that a fitting subtitle would be: “…well I’m here to tell you that you’re fucking NOT. And you’re not HAPPY either.” This is like, the jackpot of samples, I swear.

A heap of completely unrelated links:

• This is something you should definately make an effort to see: a short film exploring the outing of Bert and Ernie of Sesame Street fame: Ernest and Bertram. Worth whatever trouble you go to to see it for the ‘sad’ version of the theme song alone.
• Photos and video clips of Sloan making asses of themselves in animal suits on a Canadian talk show are here.

• An interesting site about ‘Circuit Bending‘ (“An electronic art which implements creative audio short-circuiting”) can be found here. To get a better idea of what this is all about, check out their gallery of ‘altered’ Speak and Spells.

• Chris Hatfield dug up a link that archives what kempa.com looked like back in March 2000, when I first made the move to an actual domain after getting booted from the AOL servers.

• I finally found a site that is hosting some Adventures of Pete and Pete clips (Albeit very short ones). Available are brief clips of Artie, Stu, and… Artie again. If anyone out there would like to assist me in completing my collection of original Pete & Pete episodes, please do. I would forever be in your debt, you see.
• Click here to see pictures of the flexidisc GN’R used to promote Appetite For Destruction. Clicking here allows you to listen to the contents of the flexidisc: Izzy and Slash explaining the significance of ‘Night Train.’ Thank you, internet.

• Have you ever been sitting down, trying to solve a rubiks cube (NOT standing up, trying to solve a rubiks cube), and thought: “You know, this would be a lot easier if I just built a machine out of legos that can solve a Rubik’s cube by itself.” Because this guy did.

• A really cool animated web-clock thing.

     This update was brought to by the Financial columnist in my local paper, who apparently insists on being called ‘Timbo.’ Way to go there, guy. Because we’ll all trust our money with someone called ‘Timbo.’

     This semester I have two teachers on opposite sides of the ‘bad’ spectrum.

     One is the sort of teacher who you can tell has no idea what he is talking about, but he’s trying really hard. It’s fairly obvious that he skimmed the chapter the night before and is trying to look like he knows this material like the back of his hand, but he keeps confusing terms and using words that aren’t actually words. Two other things he does:

• He teaches anthropology, and he goes out of his way to VERY LOOSELY relate EVERYTHING to september eleventh.
• Answers student’s questions by inexplicably, and exhaustively answering completely unrelated and easier questions.

     The second teacher is the sort of guy who knows his stuff, but delights in taking every opportunity to point out that you don’t, EVEN THOUGH HIS JOB IS TO MAKE SURE YOU DO.

     Sir, thank you for pointing out that I do not know how a diode works. One thing you may have overlooked is that if I did know, chances are I wouldn’t have enrolled in a class that focuses one third of a semester on diodes. Assbag.

     Actual photgraph of a sign in front of an auto dealership by my house:

     No word on whether or not Jesus will be making other stops or if this is a one-off appearance.

     I was at work the other day and noticed that HBO Family has released a wave of “Harold and the Purple Crayon” books to tie in with their childrens series based on the original “Harold” book of the same name. The really annoying thing about these new books is that nowhwere, inside or out, does Crockett Johnson’s name appear. This wouldn’t matter if, say, he wasn’t the person who CREATED THE CHARACTER. HBO hired some hacks to write new stories and emulate Johnson’s illustration style, and natuarally, these folks are given credit right on the front cover. Way to go HBO.

     Have you seen this director’s bureau site? Due to their web designer thinking ALL people are stupid (Instead of just MOST people), you can work around their links and download some artsy fartsy music videos in the realvideo format. Highlights include (Right click and “Save As” to download):

Air’s ‘Playground Love’
Air’s ‘All I Need’
Air’s ‘Kelly Watch the Stars’
Air’s ‘Sexy Boy’

JSBX’s ‘2 Kindsa Love’

Pulp’s ‘Party Hard’

Liz Phair’s ‘Down’

The Rentals’ ‘I’m Waiting’
The Strokes’ ‘Last Nite’
Ween’s ‘Voodoo Woman’
The Avalanches’ ‘Frontier Psychiatrist’

     If you live in Michigan and / or Windsor and / or somewhere near there, you should get all drunk (ie “crocked”) and add yourself to boysplusgirls.com.

     A super Good / Long / Candid interview with Chris Murphy of Sloan fame can be found here. If you’re a Sloan / East Coast Canadian music fan, this is an indispensible interview. If you’re not a fan I’ll save you some work and post the best parts.

On the English Music Press:

So they like having first run at bands.

Yeah. Basically, there’s a guy named Jerry Thackerty (sp?) who goes by the name Everett True, do you know that guy?

[shrugs]

He sorta discovered Seattle and grunge and all this shit. He was basically paid by SubPop to discover Seattle and that’s how it got big. It got big through England. But he was saying, he told me, he went to Halifax and he saw us, Eric’s Trip and Jale play a show. He said, well here’s what I’m gonna do, I’m gonna say I love Jale, because they’re unsigned, I’m gonna say Eric’s Trip are ok, because they’re an indie and I’m gonna say you guys aren’t that hot, because you’re signed. Because, you’re of no use to me, because you’re discovered. So he basically told me how it works. I don’t hold it against him, I actually like him, I still talk to him from time to time.

On being humble:

You really don’t see yourself ranking up there? It is hard to think of maybe because it’s you?

I guess so, we’re my own favourite band. I’m a fan-I love-I’m proud of what we’ve done and everything. I mean, ask me about other bands, I hate them all. I think we’re the biggest band worth a shit in this country. There’s a lot of awesome bands, but they’re all tiny. They don’t have a story, or they didn’t luck out with the timing the way we did. Do I collect Sloan shit for the fuckin museum and coffee table book? Yes. Am I deranged? Maybe.

On tactfully answering questions:

Do you ever look at the websites or things like that? I saw one today, and the girl who had done it had one of those counters on the bottom of the page, and she’d written ‘I have had [counter] many dreams about Chris Murphy’ around it. Does that ever bug you that you have the 14 year old girls after you? You love it!

I’m not gonna do-I’m not gonna fuck them or anything. They don’t have to worry. There’s nothing weird about it, it’s just kids.

READER MAIL!

…regarding the PEZ popcorn from the last update:

     “Hey man, i’ve been a reader of your site for about 2-3 years now. Anyway, about that PEZ Popcorn business… i work for a company, we are the ‘licensing agent’ for PEZ candy. i’m only an assitant there to pay for bills, but anyway. these things are made by a company in Canada called
Krack-O-Pop. i have tasted all these. i have seen the approval process of these since day one. it’s sick, but
the people at PEZ love them. i have loads of them at work. you would be AMAZED at how well they sell. i was amazed, and yes, they are mostly disgusting. but if you ever see something PEZ (besides candy) that interests you, let me know and i’ll try to get you a sample…
later,
Max

p.s. try to find the PEZ Candy ice pops. warning: they aren’t much better.”

…regarding my luck:

Subject: You lucky bastard

“I guess you beat me to the domain name.

My name is Paul Kempa. I was looking to get a simple web domain. Oh well.

I find it unusual to see many Kempa names around the country, do you?

Have fun with your site and good luck with school.

Also, I’ve recieved two emails that agree that the keychain I had previously asked about says “Auto Paddock.” In case you were wondering, I mean.

     So I finally saw all of Wet Hot American Summer on DVD, after having seen bits of a ‘camera in the audience’ style bootleg on someone’s computer. In case you did not know this, it stars members of MTV’s The State. Their usual brand of absurd humor is present, and the DVD extras are actually pretty hilarious. If you, like me, continue to mourn the loss of The State, you can download all three MTV seasons here. If you actually do this, I would love you forever if you would burn me copies, as I’m still on dialup and it would take me approximately three lifetimes to download even one of the seasons. [Looks like it’s down now. They just posted season three, so they may have gone over their bandwidth limit for January. Try again in February.]

     If you’re bored on Friday, February 1st come to the Halfway Inn in Ann Arbor and watch me play drums for the Pop Project. It’ll be fun, I swear.

     Okay, so two weeks or so ago, I was informed that the olympic torch would be passing within a few blocks of my home. At 6:40 AM. Naturally, I decided I had to see this, so I set my alarm for that ungodly hour. Now, before I describe the atrocity that was the olympic torch experience, I should explain that, in hindsight, I was very naive about the whole thing.

     Have you ever seen those commercials on TV around olympics time where they show just one random solitary dude running along a deserted road holding the torch? Because that’s totally what I was expecting. What I was not expecting was to drag my nowhere-near-awake-yet ass out of bed at 6:30, drive up to the street where the torch was supposed to pass and find MOBS and MOBS of people. At 6:30 AM.

     I don’t even know why I wanted to go see the torch. I think mainly because it was kind of a ridiculous proposition or something. I had NO IDEA that lots of normal people (By normal people, I mean people who are not insane, like I am) would actually want to do this. So I sat at the intersection because it was super fucking cold out and I didn’t want to have to get out of my car to see this crap.

     Then the PARADE started. There were these two GIANT Coca-cola trucks driving down the road, staffed by about five people each who were grabbing 20 oz Cokes out of the truck and chucking them at frozen people on the sides of the roads. On top of one of the trucks was a dude with a megaphone who said this, I swear to god:

“It’s cold out! It’s early! But you CAME! and that… THAT’S AMERICA!”

     Moving on. How many police escorts would you think a guy carrying a torch would need? One? Two? Three? No. NO. Six. Six police escorts for a guy running with a torch. Also they sent along an ambulance and a firetruck, presumably in case he dropped the torch, caught on fire, and needed to be put out and rushed to the hospital. So ridiculous.

     Also there were three news helicopters circling my neighborhood to cover this so I just got really disillusioned with the whole thing and went home.

     In the “nobody really gives a flying fuck at a rolling donut” department, I redisigned the Recital website. It’s got an extremely brief version of the “tour” diary I never got around to writing last summer. Also, on the off chance that I don’t update again before February 15th, anyone in the Metro Detroit area should check out RSB, The Recital, The Pop Project, and The Rants at CPOP Gallery on Friday, February 15th. All ages, five bucks, doors at eight PM. Hot damn!

A review of the first episode of The Real World: Chicago that I wrote in an email to a friend:

What’s with Ms. Aggressively naked?
She’s all serving up the naked whether you want it or not.
Always with the naked.

Or in Haiku form:

Ms. Aggro Naked
all serving up the naked
always the naked

     For probably the first time since I first offered the service, I’m all caught up on 1″ button orders. If you still haven’t gotten around to ordering buttons, now’s the time.

     Suppose it is your job to take two foods and put them together into one product. Would it ever occur to you that LEMON AND/OR ORANGE PEZ and POPCORN would go together well? No. No, it wouldn’t. But that didn’t stop someone from manufacturing the product below. The only MILDLY excusable explanation that has been pointed out to me is that the resulting products sort of look like buttered and cheesy popcorn(s).

     I mean, come on. Pez-coated popcorn? You’ll be pleased to know that I sampled a bit of each and they are both disgustacular. If anyone I know wants two full bags of ass-tasting Pez popcorn, let me know.

     A really good anti-tour diary tour diary by Travis Morrison of the Dismemberment Plan can be found here. He was in Europe immediately following the September 11th attacks and does a nice job of writing around that subject.

One minute reviews of movies I’ve seen in the last two weeks:

Royal Tanenbaums:

     Everyone in the world should see this movie, ESPECIALLY if they are in any way involved in the process of making movies. This would be a good law to have because then they would see jokes don’t have to necessarily be “JOKES!” to be funny. Does that make sense? No, of course it doesn’t. Allow me to clarify. An example of a JOKE! in a present day hollywood movie:

Chris Klein: Hey man be careful! You might FALL DOWN!

A Wayans Brother: I never FALL DOWN! (Falls down)

Audience Member: BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! I should buy those shoes he’s wearing.

…whereas the royal tanenbaums is littered with jokes that are purely observational and are almost never explicitly referenced or even explained. So good.

Orange County:

     All the funny parts from the trailers? NOT IN THE MOVIE. That Keith Moon part? NOT IN THE MOVIE. What the fuck is that? Someone will pay for tricking me into seeing this thinly disguised coming-of-Hanks crap. Here are the only two funny parts, so you don’t have to see it:

Jack Black (To his brother): Broseph!

Jack Black (On why he is standing in front of a burning building not wearing pants): “I was running from the fire and I tripped and then I took off my pants to run faster.”

Amelie: (again)

     So good. All the time I tell my friends and acquaintances to go see this movie, and they look at me in that sort of sad, patronizing way as if to say “No Adam, I will not see that movie because there are movies with Chris Klien in them coming out.” but what they really say is “Yeah I should see that…(trails off and backs away slowly)” while in their brain they are thinking “WHEN WILL HE FUCKING SHUT UP ABOUT THIS GAY FRENCH MOVIE!?” But yes, I saw it again, and I am right.

     Were you just thinking: “I wonder how perfectly Destiny’s Child’s “Bootylicious” and Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit” would fit together if someone were to try that sort of thing?” Well then you’re in luck! Here’s an MP3! Also: Christina Aguilera grafted onto the Strokes (MP3)! All from this crazy site.

     Hello. I took December off. Didja miss me?

     I’d like to start out what promises to be a mammoth entry by ranting and raving about school for a bit. Somehow I managed to grab defeat from the jaws of victory in the last few weeks of the semester. Now, a less informed person might blame this feat on the fact that I was ridiulously busy this semester, but that had nothing to do with my current scholastic problems.

     First, to give you an idea of what sort of problems I’m talking about I’ll bore the fuck out of you by explaining the classes I took this past semester. Then to make things interesting (Actually no, it probably still won’t be interesting), I’ll list the grade I would deserve if any of these professors actually stuck to their own grading scales, then predict the grade I’ll actually get. You see, engineering professors (At WSU at least) are notorious for instituting absolutely ridiculous curves after giving you mind-bendingly impossible exams. This practice, augmented by WSU’s policy of not mailing grades for the Fall semester until the Winter semester has already begun makes for a very high engineering-student-to-ulcer ratio.

Technichal Writing 2 (ENG 3060)

     My professor for this class was an older man who spoke in that salty sea captain voice that many older men develop. He would best be described as “eccentric.” To give you a rough idea of what I’m talking about, here is a list of things he actually said in class, transcribed verbatim from my notes (Remember to imagine these things in the salty sea captain voice. It’s funnier):

“I am the father of countless children, none of whom I’ll ever see.”

“Hairpins fucking Work.”

“I don’t have any of those upscale japanese erasers.”

“We played a game called ‘Who has the oldest money?'”

“When I was in the Seminary we used to have flatulance contests.”

“Have you ever worked with such an asshole as me?”

“I’m not gonna do anything shitty.”

“I live out here in the hood, so I hate cops.”

“I often wonder, when I go to hell, will they crisp me from toe up or top down?”

“Who laughed?! We don’t do that in America. We save ourselves for the big battles. You can’t grin in the infantry.”

“When you’ve had all this shit come down the pipe you’re gonna respond the same as any other shiteater.”

“Slap the hell out of them, then thank them for bleeding in a way that doesn’t get it on the carpet.”

“Food should be consumed in a private room by yourself. Then food would be better than sex, because you need someone else for sex. At least if you’re going to heaven you do.”

“Professional and to the point?! It SUCKS!”

“Ceaser is bisexual, as every good general should be. That’s how you control the troops.”

“I was an attendant at a hospital. I was good at it so i was a medic in the army. So I wiped some MORE asses.”

“You understand that I’m not in DIRECT contact with the archangel Gabriel.”

     Ok. That said, he knew what he was doing, and he was more than fair to everyone. No complaints here.

Estimated deserved grade: B+
Estimated actual grade: B+/A-

Linear Signals

     This guy was an asshole. The book he likes to teach from went out of print a few years back so he recommended that the university require us to buy a $100+ book. We never used the book we bought, despite the fact that he had instructed us that it was required. He taught from the old book, in which the chapters, order, methods and examples were all just different enough to make our book useless. Also: He refused to make copies of the relevant chapters from the old book for us. We ended up spending more time waiting for the one copy of the old book in our library to become available than learning.

     His greatest joy in life seemed to come from introducing new material ON EXAMS. To top everything off, his final exam consisted of four questions. Two of these questions (ie 50% of the final exam) were based on a “Special Case” type of problem that he did ONE example of in lecture. This sort of problem was never mentioned again on any homework assignment, exam, or review sheet. If I saw you at that Detroit Contemporary RSB show a few Tuesdays ago and I looked like someone had just punched me in the face a few hundred times, it was because I had literally *just* finished this exam.

Estimated deserved grade: D
Estimated actual grade: C+/B-

Ethics in the Workplace

     No complaints here… this guy was pretty..well, ethical.

Estimated deserved grade: A-
Estimated actual grade: A-/A

Computational Methods in Engineering

     This class is every bit as dull as it sounds. Imagine if you will, a very repetitive and pointless task. Now take that task, and enlarge it to the largest possible magnitude. The resulting monstrosity would be any given assignment in this class. The focus is on ridiculously overcomplicated ways of solving things that your calculator can already do for you. The professor lets you use A LAPTOP WITH EXCEL on exams so you can show how you got your answer, but just trusting your calculator: no good. Additionally, his lectures use Powerpoint exclusively (If you are a teacher, please for the love of god NEVER use powerpoint. It’s a CRUTCH, and people don’t learn from it, ESPECIALLY if you use it for math).

      I took the class last fall, but took an incomplete because I was a bit overwhelmed when returning for finals after my brother’s accident. This was the last semester I could still make up the incomplete work and still get credit for the class, so I sat in on the professor’s lectures all semester. I made up the one quiz and homework assignment I missed, and asked when he wanted me to take the final. He asked if I could make it to the final with his current class and i agreed to be there.

     Thing is: I overslept. The final began at 10:40 AM and I woke up at 10:50 AM. So I sped down to Detroit and ran all the way across campus and entered the room halfway through the exam. I explained to the professor that I was the student who had been making up the incomplete, and asked if I could have some extra time and / or take a different exam. Naturally he wasn’t having any of that, so I set to work attempting to solve A RIDICULOUSLY HARD two hour exam in one hour, the catch being that this professor stipulates that students have to get 50% on the final or else they don’t pass, no matter how good their grade is. After he calls time, a girl a few rows in front of me starts CRYING. So depending on whether I achieved 50% in that hour or not, I either passed the class with a B or failed outright, all because I overslept one freaking day. The prospect of sitting through this guy’s powerpoint lectures a third time is not a pleasant one.

Estimated deserved grade: B- or E
Estimated actual grade: B-

     In conclusion, I’d just like to say that I’ve adopted a new philosophy on college. This new philosphy comes from comedic genius Jack Black, via a commercial for the forthcoming “Orange County.” You can download an audio clip of this philosophy (In MP3 format) here.

Magazines that are actually worth paying for:

• Readymade: The first issue should be in all the larger chain stores now. It’s sort of like an artsy do it yourself magazine for poor twentysomethings. Notable articles in the first issue include pieces by Adrian Tomine (Optic Nerve writer/artist), and Neal Pollack (McSweeney’s Contributor), but the whole thing is good.
• Chunklet #16: Best magazine ever. Includes the hilarious shitlist, in which bands are alphabetically given what-for (Example: “My Bloody Valentine [1991]: Like standing in front of a jet engine. The loudest thing ever. Anybody who says they enjoyed this is lying.”), and the best no-holds barred tour diary ever, chronicling the last days of Don Caballero. A months worth of interesting reading.

     Did you know they made Simpsons breakfast cereals for a little while? I didn’t either until I found some discounted a few weeks back. Check it:

     The very best part about these cereals is the fact that on Homer’s, he is so happy to have donuts that he is crying. So great.

Two-second reviews of completely unrelated things:

• Vanilla Sky: Take the money you were going to spend on seeing this, buy the soundtrack (Which is exemplary as far as hollywood soundtracks go, but they left off some of the best music used in the film) and listen to it in the dark for 3 hours. Twelve times as interesting.
• The Strokes (live): Like listening to the album, only louder and smokier. Roughly the same level of animation from the music source. But check out the B-side “When it Started.” Good.

Four things about ads:

• All the postal trucks in our area have recently been covered in gigantic Microsoft ads on both sides. What the hell is that? Since when does the post office offer advertising?

• You know how sometimes people go door to door hanging ads on your doorknob in little plastic bags? Well that happened to me today, and the bag says “ADS” on it. How stupid is that? Do they really think people are going to see this opaque bag hanging on their doorknob and think “Oh! ADS! Hot Damn!”
• Just a few minutes ago I saw a commercial that had Portishead’s “Roads” playing in the background. It was one of those sports commercials where you can’t even tell what the hell they’re advertising. Again: what the hell is that? The only way this is acceptable is if Portishead took that money and is finishing that new album they’ve supposedly been making (Update: I’m told that the commercial is for Nike and / or Michael Jordan).
• If you happen to be lobbying for funding for time machine research, My collegue Zach Curd and I have come up with a slogan you can use to gain grassroots support, free of charge. Here ’tis: “Time Machines: We Need ‘Em.” You’re welcome. On the off chance that you’re NOT lobbying for funding for time machine research, you can say this whenever you and/or any number of those you count among your “Pals” (also:”Buds”) does something stupid.

     I had the weakest case of the hiccups EVER this past week. It lasted all of two hiccups. One less Hiccup, and I wouldn’t have had the Hiccups, I would have had the Hiccup. Lame.

     Hey you don’t happen to have the ability to read the writing on the keychain pictured below, do you? A friend of mine found it and wants to know what it says. Any takers?

     So one of my coworkers also has a tivo and we typically compare notes on all the crazy upgrades they’ve been throwing around. Recently there was this annoying lexus ad thingy that popped up when you’d turn it on. We had previously discussed this. So one day at work the following exchange takes place:

Him: Hey Adam, that thing went away for me.

Adam: Yeah, me too.

…which would have been fine if there hadn’t been another coworker standing there with us to look at us funny. Har!

Fun with Instant Messenger:

Chris H: did everybody look at their hands?

Adam: ?

Chris H: I was quoting men without hats

Adam: oh

Adam: ha

Chris H: they really need to get back together

Chris H: I think it would really repair the hole left in our hearts from the WTC

Adam: ha I agree.

Chris H: plus if everyone was doing the safety dance the world would be.. well.. safer.

Adam: Your logic is irrefutable.

Chris H: aye

     Black Books is a mediocre british sitcom that is currently airing on Comedy Central in the wee hours. The good thing is it’s set in a bookshop, so it echoes many of my own complaints. Some audio samples for your listening pleasure: Mellow, Morning, and Bastard.

Anonymous mail I recieved:

     “umm you dont know me but my my friend has the same last name as you and i know you will think this is so stupid but i just think some people have the same last name. dont you think that is amazing.”

Yes. Amazing.

My friend Ryan A. saw that new indie rock supergroup Zwan (Corgan / Pajo / Sweeney / Chamberlain) this past month. Here is his review:

     “…also, i saw Zwan tonight (the new billy corgan band) and it was somewhat surprising and almost impressive… they were sort of like a more melodic Will Oldham-ish Americana/Folk thing, with this really strange Negro-hymnish undertone type thing going on… i’m not even joking… the whole set was done acoustic, with Dave Pajo (slint/papa m) primarily playing 12 string guitar, Billy singing and playing an aray of extremley expensive acoustic guitars (with the exception of a Gretch hollow body on one song, the only song he stood up to play), Matt Sweeney (chavez/bonnie prince billy) playing electric guitar (with the tone set perfectly for that warm bluesy sound), and Jimmy Chamberlain playing very minimalistic and wearing a Hawaiian shirt… Billy was actually very funny, saying to a guy who kept yelling out “drum solo!” that, “Jimmy will give you 20 dollars if you shut the fuck up” then “jimmy will let you give him a blow job after the show”… at the end of the set (after they played their most pumpkins-esque song, called “broken heart” i think) billy led the band in an impromptu song called “chicks get in the way”… his best line was something like “hey, i’m not gay, but chicks really get in the way”… it was really fucking strange… billy involved the audience on a few songs, leading some hand claps, and doing a sort of call and response blues thing that was sort of insane, but kind of endearing… besides that craziness (and the Iron Maiden cover that sweeney sang), the songs were really soulful (i know… i know… dumb) and sad, but played in a really honest and jovial way… it was something to see anyway…”

Barnes & Noble stories:

     It’s been a relatively slow holiday for insane people at Barnes & Noble. Nonetheless, there have been a few notable cases.

Scene: Interior, Barnes & Noble Men’s Room.

Adam: (Enters, walks towards “fixtures”)

Old Creepy Guy: Excuse me, but would you mind taking my picture?

Adam: Um… (cautiously) where do you want it taken?

Old Creepy Guy: In here.

Adam: Um, I guess I could.

Old Creepy Guy: (Hands Adam his camera, and backs up against the wall. Also: Smiles.)

Adam: (Takes picture.)

Old Creepy Guy: Retrieves camera and leaves without saying a word.

     Phrase uttered by college student to his friend in reference to O(U?)sama Bin Laden on cover of Newsweek: “Dude, it sucks for that Dude, Dude.”

     So this woman comes through the checkout with one of those cellphones that has a speaker phone option. And it’s stuck on. So as this woman is paying, one of her friends calls her up and doesn’t realize the situation with the cell phone. The conversation turns to some sort of situation involving one of them scrutinizing a photocopy of the other’s ass at work or something. The woman at B&N immediately stops talking hoping her friend will shut the fuck up, but instead the friend seems to misconstrue the silence as a reception problem and loudly repeats herself.

Scene: Calling a customer.

Me: (Waiting for an answer)….

Them: (picks up, then immediately:) GRAMMA!

Me:… Um. This is Barnes & Noble

Them: YOU’RE NOT GRAMMA!

Me: …No. Is your mom there?

Them: NOPE!

Me: Can I leave a message?

Them: NOPE!

Me: Uh.. ok. Bye.

THEM: I LOVE YOU!

(Both hang up)

     While in the middle of a transaction, an elderly man unbuckled his belt, adjusted and yanked up his trousers, and re-buckled his belt while looking directly at me. Creepy.

Scene: Answering the phone.

Me: Hello, Barnes & Noble, this is Adam, can I help you?

Them: Is This Barnes & Noble?

Me: Yes it is…

Them: What’s your phone number?

Me: Excuse me?

Them: Can you give me your phone number there?

Me: (gives number).

Them: Okay, thanks. *click*

     A foreign man and his young son are in line to buy a relatively expensive Thomas the Tank Engine Train set. Figure about fifty bucks. He approaches the counter and produces a gallon-sized ziplock bag filled with change. As the cashier eyes it in an “I don’t want to count that” manner, the man holds it out to him and says very emphatically in a thick european accent: “FROM A PIG!”
     He meant that the change came from his son’s piggy bank. This experience has scarred me and the scar is this: I will never again be able to see any quantity of loose change without thinking “FROM A PIG!” again.

Total number of people who tried to have me redeem a Borders Gift Card on the day after Christmas: 5

Number of these people who not-so-silently conspired with their significant other while remaining oblivious to the fact that I was watching him dismissively whisper “He’ll never notice,” which only made the task of refusing the card slightly more enjoyable (Yes sir, you’re absolutely right. I work at a bookstore, but lack the knowledge to discern the differences between the phrases “Borders” and “Barnes & Noble” in print. Additionally, the fact that they are ELECTRONIC gift cards should not prevent your redeeming the Borders card either, as we all know that all computer systems function identically and are 100% compatible with each other.): 1

Number of times this guy said “C’mon can’t you do something for me?” after I refused his card: 1

Overheard in class:

     (In reference to a particularly strict engineering professor, who marks down if you don’t use the exact same notation as he does, even if the problem is correct.) “It’s his way or the highway. Like Limp Bizkit.”

Things not to do:

1.) Don’t ever obliviously go to Ann Arbor on the day of the U of M / Ohio State game.

2.) Also, don’t try to drive home from Ann Arbor after this game.

3.) Especially if U of M lost.

In case you accidentally do these three things, you should proceed in the following manner:

1.) Make sure you have a cell phone.

2.) Watch as 50 year old men who have more school spirit than you will ever have in your life refuse to let you in for two hours. Note that many of these men probably didn’t even GO to this school.

3.) Play the “Call everyone whose number I have stored in my cellphone’s memory in alphabetical order” game.

4.) For the first few minutes of each call, just make random small talk, as though there is no real point to your call. This really creeps people out.

Two recommendations:

• If you want to hear Sloan circa 1991 mangle some Smiths songs, click here.

• If you like oldies and high pitched pop, you might really like the rants. I do.

     Many MST3K afficionados would agree that “Manos: The Hands of Fate” is one of the best episodes of the series. Here‘s a good interview with someone who was involved in the production of the film. Turns out the actor that played the movie’s monster, “Torgo” took his own life shortly after making his big screen debut.

Some interesting Beatles-related stuff:

• This “I am Sam” movie looks pretty good, and the soundtrack looks even better (Well, some of it). Click here for an interesting (To me, at least) article about the Beatles’ role in the film and the shady nature of soundtrack rights. No wonder Smash Mouth is in every fucking movie ever. They must be GAZILLIONAIRES.

• A good discussion of the folklore that “Beacuse” from Abbey Road is actually just Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata backwards can be found here. An even more involved and infinately dorkier discussion of a decidedly more musical bent can be found here.

     I was recently informed that my friend Dan Clark sings a totally bizzarre second verse to “Happy Birthday,” and has since he was a child. I asked Dan how this second verse went, and he replied:

     “Yeah, seriously, i’d always thought that was the real second verse… turns out the nanny of my two great uncles sam and hal wrote that verse a long time back, and it’s been a family tradition. Here it is:

they say that our (name), he ain’t got no style
got style all the while
got style all the while
they say that our (name), he ain’t got no style
got style all the while, all the while
ain’t he sweet, haha, neat, haha
handsome and fair
he’s a jim-dandy the girls all declare
he’s a high-rolling, rollicking swell
here’s to our (name), now don’t he look well

…and of course pronouns and the word “girls” may be switched for a female’s
birthday.”

     Awesome. If you ever run into Dan Clark, ask him to sing it for you, because Dan Clark loves singing things to people. Also: If you have any other crazy birthday song variants that don’t deal with monkeys, zoos, age inquiries or pinching, I’d like to hear about them.

Bonus Completely unrelated links:

• The Stained Apron is a fun site put together by waitstaff, consisting primarily of stories from their personal experience. Highlights include the all the stories and the celebrity tippers section.
• Did you know there was a sixteenth series of Garbage Pail Kids that never went into production? Me either, but this guy did, and he constructed a fairly comprehensive website regarding these lost treasures. You can also buy original artwork from the GPK series from the artist, John Pound (He also did Wacky Packages); or check out some of the paintings he did that Topps rejected. There’s even some discussion of the reasons Topps finally gave up on GPK in the FAQ.

• This person paints on bowling pins in that “Juxtapoz Magazine” sort of way, and then sells them for lots of money.

     In today’s cutthroat internet climate, I figured this site just couldn’t compete without having a fun quiz that gives results you can plaster all over your livejournals and / or diaries. Here it is (Update: It has come to my attention that lots of people don’t “get” this joke. Go to livejournal.com and visit a few member pages and you should get the idea [2nd update! it’s already causing all sorts of havoc! Hooray!]).

     I never thought a year could seem to go by so quickly, yet seem so long at the same time.

     So apparently someone I know made it backstage at tonights Sloan show in Detroit and had Chris Murphy call my cell phone. He left a voice message. After I listened to it, I promptly pressed 7, as I always do. Unfortunately, 7 means delete. I AM AN IDIOT. If you are the person who got Chris Murphy to call my cell phone, let me know.

Update!

     It was Zach Norton. Thanks, Zach!

     This looks like it’s going to be one of those updates where I post a lot of links to other people’s stuff. This is because I haven’t done that in a long while, and the pile of magazine clippings and feverishly scribbled notes to myself is becoming unmanagable. I’ll get all the usual rambling out of the way first, and then make with the linkage.

     I’m pulling double duty as The Recital and the Pop Project both play this Friday the 16th at The Halfway Inn in Ann Arbor. There is an online flyer here, and approximate directions can be had here. This will be the first time I miss a Sloan show in the Detroit / Windsor area in roughly seven years. Also, if anyone wants to see Sonic Boom playing Spacemen 3 songs at the Magic Stick for free this friday instead of either show mentioned above, get in touch.

     The other night I bowled a 150. This is odd because I suck at bowling and I’ve only bowled one other time in the last 5 years. Even odder is the fact that this game included a turkey (3 strikes in a row). Gobble gobble.

     This weekend I went to a party with the best theme ever: everyone brings a mix tap/cd, and throws it in a container of some sort upon arrival. When leaving, everyone reaches into said container and removes a mix tape / cd. Genius! I got a cd with a good songs by Trembling Blue Stars and Album Leaf on it. But then, I cheated.

     My cd was assembled at the absolute last minute. I listened to it on the way to the party and realized I had put a song that ends in one solid minute of feedback in the middle of the CD. Then, I proceeded to leave the cd in my cd player, and put the empty case in the container o’ mixes. Fortunately (Or unfortunately, considering the content) the person who got my empty case came back for the CD.

     I also managed to spill two containers of liquid on the exact same chunk of carpet. These spills resulted from two separate lapses in coordination, occurring hours apart from each other. Hurrah!

     So there was this woman in Barnes and Noble the other day. She was buying books, but that wasn’t the important part. The important part was that she kept calling her son “Dude.” It was obvious she was his mother because he kept calling her “Mommy,” but she kept saying things like “Hold on a minute, Dude.” and “Hey Dude, there’s your book!” She did it so often and in such an offhanded manner that it didn’t seem to be a joke or anything. She never emphasized the word as someone saying it for comedic effect would, and the son never reacted like this was out of the ordinary. The only satisfactory solution my brain could come to was that she had named her son Dude, which is possibly the greatest thing ever.

     Also: There was a woman in this weekend who bought a Harry Potter movie calender. This woman was of the “Inspect each item on the reciept REALLY DRAMATICALLY after the purchase is complete in order to intimidate cashier” school of shopping. Now, “Harry Potter Movie Calender” doesn’t fit on the reciepts. In fact, it gets abbreviated to: “Harry Potter Movie.”

Her: (Pointing angrily to reciept) What is this? I didn’t want a Harry Potter movie.

Me: No, that’s this (holding up box that obviously contains a calender).

(Pause)

Her: But we thought it was a calender.

Me: It is.

(Pause)

Her: (Pointing at reciept) But it says movie on here.

Me: (Opening box, showing her that it is in fact a calender.) Right, it’s a Harry Potter MOVIE calender. It’s got scenes from the movie.

Her: Ok, that’s a calender, but why did you charge me for the movie?

Me: Ma’am we don’t sell the movie. This item on the reciept is the calender (Shows her that prices correspond.)

Her: But.. why does it say… if.. Hm. I’m not sure if I want this then. I’ll come back. (Walks away scrutinizing reciept.)

I hate people!

     Really dorky thing you should do, even if you’re not really dorky, because then really dorky people will have something to do while you’re off “painting the town” this December:

     Mystery Science Theatre 3000 has been a favorite show of mine for a long time, much to the chagrin of basically everyone I know. They haven’t been making new episodes for quite awhile now, but the Sci-Fi channel has been playing reruns on Saturday mornings. This December, it will be going off the air indefinately. “MSTies,” as fans of the show are called (Stop laughing!) are pushing to get Sci-Fi to run a farewell marathon. Here’s how you can help: On November 24th, send email to program@scifi.com saying you support the idea of a marathon. There is a very poorly designed website providing information on more involved ways of contacting Sci-Fi, if you’re into that. Thank you.

     Bonk Music in the UK stumbled upon some fan mail written to porn stars. Naturally, they decided to record it as spoken word and put the result out on a 7″. Their site offers a sample MP3 here, as well as three sample letters (1, 2, 3). They’ll also sell you a t-shirt with a few of the letters lovingly silscreened across the front. Did I mention the MP3 is read in a stuffy british accent? Because it is. And if it doesn’t make you laugh for roughly an hour, then something is wrong with you.

     Two good sites that deal with unusual instruments:

The first is a site about the late Harry Partch and all the instruments he built. This page has a drop down menu at the bottom that lets you select from a list of his creations. Each instrument has its own page with a photo and text describing it’s construction and function. Examples:

Cloud Chamber Bowls
From 10 to 12 tops and bottoms of 12-gallon Pyrex carboys (the bottoms are inverted). At the University of California Radiation Laboratory, at one time, centers were cut from such carboys for use in “cloud-chamber” experiments. Played on the edges with small soft mallets, also on the flat tops. The bowls give a bell-like tone, and each has at least one inharmonic overtone. When one of them breaks it is virtually impossible to find an exact duplicate.

Chromelodeon I
Reeds are inserted for a 43-tone-to-the-octave scale. Thus, an acoustic octave covers that many keys and reeds, successively, and measures some three and a half keyboard octaves. The scale is in just intonation, and each tone is a frequency ratio to a fundamental, shown on the keyboard by colors. With the thirteen sub-bass reeds, and the stops for higher and lower tones in the second cell row, the total range of the instrument is from the lowest piano C to the third C# above middle C, slightly more than five acoustic octaves. All the other instruments are tuned to the Chromelodeon.

     The next site deals with the “first viennese vegetable orchestra.” Basically, it’s a bunch of crazy folks who play music made completely with vegetables. At the end of each performance, they throw their instruments into a stew, and eat them. Genius! Click here to view their site, here to browse some of their instruments, and here to download an MP3 sample of their work.

     I was recently sent a link to this insanely huge collection of archival and public domain footage. If you’re a crazy “DJ” type, this looks to be the one stop shop for loading up on zany “samples” for next time you “spin.” Alternately, it’s a bunch of cheesy old video to watch. File under: Things that may or may not have been projected behind Man… or Astroman during a live performance (Actually, that gives the impression that it’s all space / science related, which it’s not. For example, here are two (1, 2) stop motion animations of dancing cigarrettes, produced by Lucky Strike in the 1940’s. Yes. Yes!)

     If you’re in the mood to hear a few dozen kids belt out slightly “off” arrangements of Beach Boys and Bowie songs, then click here and be dazzled by the 60 piece Langley Schools Music Project. A quote from Hans Fenger, the “Supervisor/Arranger” of the project:

     “I knew virtually nothing about conventional music education, and didn’t know how to teach singing. Above all, I knew nothing of what children’s music was supposed to be. But the kids had a grasp of what they liked: emotion, drama, and making music as a group. Whether the results were good, bad, in tune or out was no big deal — they had elàn. This was not the way music was traditionally taught. But then I never liked conventional ‘children’s music,’ which is condescending and ignores the reality of children’s lives, which can be dark and scary. These children hated ‘cute.’ They cherished songs that evoked loneliness and sadness.”

     If you’re too lazy to click over to the page, here are direct links to MP3’s of their versions of Bowie’s “Space Oddity” and the Beach Boys’ “In My Room.” I stole this link from scrubbles, which has had tons of good audio links lately.

     Fellow Bjork fans who don’t already know about it will probably be pretty excited to find out that Bjork Remix Web exists. It’s a Japanese website that hosts scores of remixes of almost every song Bjork has ever committed to tape. There are even remixes of b-side covers, such as this super-good mix of “I Remember You.” (For those who’ve never heard Bjork’s original mix: it features only her voice and what sounds like an autoharp. This mix has full instrumentation.) If the prospect of sorting through hundreds of remixes to find the diamonds in the rough is unappealing to you, you’ll also be happy to learn that there is an extensive peer review system in place, and most reviewers are painfully honest when a mix isn’t worth the bandwidth. Someone with a fast connection should download all the good ones and send me a cd.

     Maybe you already knew that you can tour the crazy top secret 14 million dollar cold war bunker in West Virginia that was declassified in 1992? I did not know this. This seems interesting to me. Perhaps I am insane.

     This is the “secret” site that was put up to coincide with the release of the latest Spiritualized record. Everything is in realmedia. Bah.

     It looks as though I’ve exhausted my pile o’ links. Just a quick question: does anyone remember that movie about obsessive record collectors that showed at last year’s CMJ? What was it called? And did it ever get released? Thanks!

     The other day my friend Cyndi called me to say that she had just passed a house that was throwing away a full sized arcade game in my neck of the woods. Naturally I dropped everything (Not that there was much to drop, mind) and ran over to said house. There I found a thrashed Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles machine. The cabinet was in such bad shape that it wouldn’t have been worth the work, so I pulled the boards out and plugged ’em into my cabinet at home. Turns out the board is of British origin (Note the “Hero” instead of “Ninja.” The brits did this to all TMNT merchindise.) and it works perfectly. Score!

     I played my first show on Drums with the Pop Project on Saturday night. I hadn’t played my drum set in a live situation since late 1997, so this show opened my eyes to a whole slew of problems I need to fix. If you are a drum-type person perhaps you can help me. I have a Ludwig drum set. I need to replace one of the chrome things that holds the legs on the bass drum, and I also need to replace the chrome mounting bracket thingy that holds the T-bar in place. Since that last sentance made no sense whatsoever, please reference the photos below.

Here are ways you can help.

• You know the correct names for these parts.
• You know what years Ludwig manufactured Bass drums like the one shown above.
• You know where I can get these parts.
• You have these parts for sale.
• You have these parts and want to give them to me.

If any of the above statements are true of you, please get in touch.

Three things to be excited about: DVD, Game, TV.

     One last thing: Awhile ago there was a site that was hosting every episode of Mr. Show. Naturally, I lost the link before I finished downloading everything. If you have this link, please pass it along. Thanks!

     On the local music / self promotion tip, here is a list of shows that bands I am in are playing. Come one, come all.

Saturday, November 3rd
Halfway Inn in Ann Arbor
– The Sights
– The Pop Project
[I’ll be playing drums for the Pop Project. Expect a bunch of new songs and a few from their full length CD.]

Friday November 9th
Magic Stick in Detroit
– Red Shirt Brigade (CD Release show)
– Judah Johnson
– The Recital
– Windy & Carl
[Rob, the drummer in the Recital is currently working 3 jobs, therefore making it difficult for us to perform as frequently as we’d like. Because of this situation, we spent one Friday night a few weeks back setting microphones and cameras up around Rob’s drum set. We then had him play through our set, recording the audio on a digital 8 track and switching between the four cameras. This was all put on a video tape, which is going to be used as the “drummer” for this and our November 16th show. We’ve done one “test-run,” at the Lager house in Detroit which elicited some kind words from the Metro Times. If this crazy experiment sounds at all interesting to you, you should come out to one of these shows and watch us squirm. Chances are this will be the more challenging of the two “video” shows, as we’ll have to run the faux drums through the Magic Stick’s PA, whereas we will have more control over them at the November 16th show. Also, this is the release show for RSB’s full length, “Home of the Cannon Saints,” and Judah Johnson and Windy & Carl are playing. Also: It’s all ages! How can you not go?]

Friday November 17th
Halfway Inn in Ann Arbor
– Hot Paws
– The Pop Project
– The Recital
[Same story as above, except I’ll have my drums there for the Pop Project Set, so The Recital will likely play the two songs I don’t play bass on, with me on drums.]

     Dear religious people who go to the church directly behind B&N every Sunday morning and insist on coming in afterwards to drink coffee and leave gi-nourmous piles of Christian Inspiration books throughout the store: I have a message for you. Christ contacted me earlier in the week and asked that I pass it along. Here is the message:

Hey fuckwads,
     Please shelve your fucking books or I will make sure you rot in hell.
Just because I was a hippie doesn’t mean I was a slob.
yer pal,
JC

Thank you. Peace be with you.

     Some photos I took of Spiritualized @ the Majestic in Detroit, 10/30/01:

     How was it? Very good. For much of the show, there were 12 people playing on stage. Jason will probably fire them all after this tour, though, so don’t get too attached. Also: It’s a safe bet that ‘Attending Spiritualized shows’ is not a popular activity among epileptics.

     I saw Man… or Astroman again this weekend. Rather than write another boring show review that everyone will skip over, I summed up my opinions in the form of a graph. The really sad part is that I am not joking. Click here to see it. Oh wait, one thing I will talk about is how at one point, they refused to go on with their set until everyone in the Magic Stick was kneeling. That was pretty impressive.

     In case you’re keeping tabs on my T.V. watching habits, you’ll be happy to learn that I still watch way too much TV. Shows I am currently watching include
Undeclared (Which is easily my favorite show),
The Real World (Which isn’t so great lately), The Amazing Race (Which is Better than Survivor), Survivor 3 (Which is completely lame so far), The Practice (The reruns on FX have me addicted), and Dismissed (Speaking of Dismissed, has anyone else noticed that the underage contestants often end up drinking alcohol? Apparently laws don’t apply to MTV.)

Movies I really want to see:

• Waking Life – Melding of live action and animation by Richard Linklater. You can download six movie clips form the official site:
  1,
  2,
  3,
  4,
  5,
  6.

• Amelie – From the folks who brought you delicatessan and City of Lost Children.

     An extremely interesting tour of the remains of various Motown related buildings in Detroit is here. This comes from the Fabulous ruins of Detroit site which has been linked here numerous times.

     Brian at Bipolar conducted an interview of sorts with me via email. Click here to find out what I had to say about various things.

     Have you ever been in a situation where your brain and mouth got in a fight and refused to communicate with each other? I don’t mean in the ‘You said something stupid and later regretted it’ sense, but more the ‘You lost physical control of your mouth during speech’ sense. Because that happened to me the other day.

     Some friends and I were in the drive-thru at Burger King, and the drive-thru worker person asked if we wanted any sauces or anything of that nature. One of the passengers in my vehicle wanted ranch dressing. So I turned to the BK person and attempted to communicate this fact. Unfortunately, it was at roughly this juncture that my brain and mouth ceased communicating.

     “We’d like some Rahhhhhhhhhh-auuuunch.” is what came out. Which, to the casual Burger King Window Person, sounds like “We’d like some raunch.” Naturally, my friends laughed their asses off, and the window person ended up giving us extra food for free. Why? I don’t know. Perhaps she considers their food raunchy.

     Fair warning for anyone I know who has not seen me in awhile, in the form of an AIM conversation:

Me: also i am pretending i am able to grow a beard so do not be alarmed.

Them: NO

Them: NO NO NO

Me: it is only an experiment to see if i can do it.

Me: ha!

Them: dude no

Them: groooosss

Me: I have to do it so I can do funny facial hair experiments.

Me: it is for the greater good of this earth, trust me

Them: rofl

Them: i just sent that to krysta cause it was too funny

Me: seriously it’s going to ruke.

Me: actually it will rule.

Me: but possibly it will ruke as well

How To Really Fuck Up Your Friday Afternoon

By Adam Kempa

     One way to really fuck up your Friday afternoon would be to be playing drums. In the course of this drum-playing, you should bring your right elbow back at an alarmingly high rate of speed. This elbow should then collide with the corner of the doorway which you stupidly set your drums up in front of. Next, you should hop around, unable to speak, and experience unbelievable pain. During this time you should consider the possibility that you’ve broken your arm. Next, the pain will start to go away. Except for now your entire right HAND will be sort of numb. This should persist for over an hour so you should decide to get doctors involved. Next you should go to the urgent care place. They will give you X-Rays and make jokes about the lead protecting your future children from having three eyes. They will tell you that nothing is broken, but that you’ve bruised a muscle of some sort, and that you have traumatized your ulnar nerve. Now you can go home! Except your hand is still numb and it’s 4 hours later! Mission accomplished!

     About a year and a half ago I did a survey thingy about mixtapes. I’ve been pretty lax about updating it so if you sent me something and it never appeared, I apologize. I just got the following submission (from one Mr. Brent Elliott), and it reminded me that it was kind of a cool idea. So feel free to send a submission (or an update) if you haven’t already.

“I ran across your site quite by accident, and I’m going to suggest some
snotty mix tape rules, if you don’t mind. Here goes:

1) Don’t use a conversation (or a web site) about mix tapes to throw in
comments proving that you know rare tracks from even rarer bands. Nobody
cares. Remember, there will always be people 1000 times cooler than you,
and if you play that game, you’re going to get burned.

2) Don’t put crap on that you don’t really like. This should be a no
brainer, but people have suggested going over your head to look cool and
diverse. That means you’re probably someone who is force feeding yourself
another Will Oldham album, desperately trying to find an angle that you can
like it from. Mix tapes can get you into someone’s pants. Treat the format
with respect.

3) Top tip! If a ends on an A minor chord, try following it with a song that
starts on the same chord. This works particularly well for a song that
fades out, trailing into a song that breaks in quickly. For a song with an
abrupt finish, going into a similarly abrupt starting, try using
complementary chords instead. Use your ears on this one, but one that
usually works is if a song ends on a major chord, have the next one start a
half step down and minor. This is where the mix CD format comes in handy.
You can use iTunes or whatever to arrange a playlist and shuffle tracks
until the CD has got more flow than Jay-Z on his period.

4) Top tip! Mix tapes are better than CDs, because you can set the recording
level from track to track. But if it’s gotta be a CD, make sure that people
don’t turn up their speakers for one track, and then get blown away on the
next track. You’re never going to get laid if you blow someone’s car stereo
speakers, okay?”

Well said.

     Ryan Allen of Red Shirt Brigade fame used AOL Instant Messenger to ambush (AIMbush?) everyone’s favorite Olympian, Calvin Johnson. He posted the resulting conversation as an ‘Interview.’ If you know even a little bit about K records and / or Washington indie rock, you will laugh.

     I drove to Toronto to see Bjork this past Monday. My friend Chris and I were the only ones to make the trek, and those of you who know us know that we are the two worst navigators in the entire world. Amazingly, we made it all the way to Toronto without screwing up the directions once. This is probably not amazing to most people but for us this was amazing. Even more amazing is the fact that once we arrived at the theatre, we were able to orient ourselves within the city (without a map!) and figure out where we wanted to go to kill time. So we walked down to HMV, thinking we’re navigational gods, and they’re closed! And so is Sam the Record Man! It turns out it was Canadian Thanksgiving, and that is a bunch of crap. I don’t understand why they have a different thanksgiving, or why columbus day is their thanksgiving, or why this should keep me from buying records, but you’re more than welcome to try explaining it to me.

     We eventually just wandered back to the theatre and waited for them to open the doors. The venue was the Hummingbird Centre, and it was absolutely ridiculous. Apparently they usually do musicals and that sort of thing there, so it was super classy. The hummingbird has a nice site here, where you can see a little animated pnoramic view of the theatre. They even had programs. The capacity is listed at 3,223 and we had pretty good main floor seats (Thank you, internet).

Some observations:

• They ripped the tickets wrong. You know how there are two perferations on ticketmaster tickets? And one of them is the universal “rip here upon entry” perferation? Well, they ripped the other one at this show. I don’t know if this was a “Just the Hummingbird” thing or a “We’re Canadian and goddamnit we do everything different” thing.
• Chris Murphy of Sloan and his lady were right near us waiting to get into the seating area.

     Matmos opened the show with all sorts of crazy sampling antics. They played music on a mic’d birdcage by plucking and bowing its bars. Their M.O. seems to be as follows: one of the Matmos lads fiddles around with something (ie acoustic guitar, balloon, themselves, etc.) and the other one samples it and chops it up in real time using a laptop. Very entertaining if a bit artsy in that pretentious sort of way.

     After a fifteen minute intermission, Bjork took the stage in her much celebrated swan dress, as the giant music box (as seen on her David Letterman appearance) played ‘Frosti.’ Next the orchestra played the overture from ‘Dancer in the Dark,’ and Bjork finally began the set proper with ‘All is Full of Love’ and ‘Unravel’ from Homogenic. This first set was a fairly low-key collection of songs from Homogenic, Selmasongs and her latest effort, Vespertine. She closed the first set with a contrastingly unreserved version of the older non-album track ‘Play Dead’ before leaving the stage for a brief intermission.

     For the second set, Bjork emerged in a dress made from red microscope slides and ostrich feathers. The microscope slides would clatter together making a sort of tambourine-like sound when she would move. If you’re having trouble visualizing this, it’s probably because I’m not explaining it very well. Some good photographic references are here, here and here; and you can read about the folks who make these crazy dresses here. The second set heavily featured material from Post, broken up by one song each from Vespertine (‘Pagan Poetry’), and Debut (‘Venus as a Boy’); and concluding with ‘Bachlorette’ from Homogenic. The highlight was easily ‘Hyperballad,’ which undoubtedly had much of the crowd cursing the arranged seating. The opening snare bit was provided by one of those crazy Matmos fellers, played on some sort of electronic drum pad while his counterpart pitch-shifted the output.

     Bjork came back for just one encore, which included her first single, ‘Human Behaviour,’ and an unreleased song called ‘In Our Hands.’ ‘In Our Hands’ featured some exemplary real time sampling from Matmos. The song included breaks every so often where everyone on the stage would clap together. While they were doing this, Matmos were recording the claps and speeding them up into beats that would introduce the next part of the song. Very cool.

A whole bunch of reviews of the show can be found here. Some of them are pretty funny. Example:

“Highlights (in order):

1. The large quantity of hot gay guys in attendance (and the abundance of hot people all round!). The hotter and richer, the closer to the stage. Now I know how Cher fans feel!”

     We left for Detroit after the show and at about 2:30 AM I got a speeding ticket. I had been driving for about an HOUR behind a TRUCK on a highway that was closed down to ONE LANE for NO APPARENT REASON, so when the construction ended, I passed the slowest truck ever, and sped up a little. Naturally, there was a cop waiting with all his lights off a half mile away from the end of the construction zone. I’d also like to note that the speed I got a ticket for is legal in the U.S.

     In other “I LOVE POLICE” news, you’ll all be happy to learn that the Livonia Police Department has taken up a new hobby: ticketing ONLY cars that park in front of my house. All those other cars? They’re okay, man. Cars in front of my house? Watch out. The fact that this was a blatantly retaliatory move is not lost on me and that makes me think even less of our law enforcement folk (I didn’t even think it was possible!). If you encounter any Livonia Police officers, feel free to glare at them because they deserve it.

     Two weeks ago I ventured out BY MYSELF (thanks a lot, friends) to see the one and only Tenacious D. I ended up running into a few folks I knew though, so it all worked out. The set included covers of GN’R’s ‘Mr. Brownstone,’ The Who’s “Pinball Wizard,” and the entire Closing medly from “Abbey Road.” Also, it was hilarious. Visit the D at their website, www.greatestbandonearth.com.

     If this web page were an episode of The Daily Show, this would be your moment of zen: Dave Letterman holding a White Stripes CD.