Hurricane Watch

Just an update everyone- I got a little wet walking to the bodega next door today but I THINK IT WILL ALL BE OK. Or at least that's what Miley has taught me.

Pop Quiz, Hotshots

WHO ARE YOU?

A.
My soul is a sore foot!
My body's just a new sock!

B.
Ricky Pukulski

C.
A point of consciousness
6 feet above the ground

D.
Not a fucking poet, that's for sure

RESULTS (POLLS ARE CLOSED):

A = 30 %
B = nobody %
C = 20 %
D = 50 %

unDEAD unDEAD unDEAD.... undead.

When Senator McCain or Governor Palin talk on the TV, I turn the volume way low and just play Bauhaus over them.

THE BATS HAVE LEFT THE BELL TOWER

THE VICTIMS HAVE BEEN BLED
RED VELVET LINES THE BLACK BOX
BELA LUGOSI'S DEAD
UNDEAD UNDEAD UNDEAD

McCain Speech

I don't feel qualified to offer political analysis, but I must say it is exciting to be able to choose between two excellent presidential candidates. In 2004, I chose the least worst.

Pull out all the stops in combating the energy crisis? Increase the child tax credit to help families? Build education options to hold failing schools accountable and ultimately increase their effectiveness? Use decades of experience with war and foreign policy to work toward an enduring and stable peace? Put aside differences and build consensus to move the country forward? Pretty difficult ideals to ignore!

I certainly agree with any candidate who promotes an enabling government rather than a dictating government. There is no substitute for hard work and responsible living. Dare I say these ideals are incompatible with whining and complaining? I never though I would consider John McCain endearing. I don't mean to say that my vote is decided, but tonight McCain made a very strong case for himself.

"Foundational" Discovery!

Rated: G

According to a nytimes.com article reporting on an article to be published in Science, scientists from the United States and Israel have pinpointed individual brain cells in the act of remembering! AND the cells firing during the act of recall were the same ones that were most active while the memory was encoded! These brainiacs were even able to identify the memories to be recalled one to two seconds in advance. My mind is absolutely blowwwwn mannn. Far. Out.

The New York Times article

BREAKING NEWS

For a long time I had the habit of replacing the common saying, "when pigs fly" with, "when an elephant goes cold turkey." THANKS THE BBC FOR RUINING THAT FOR ME.



Next in the News:
Elephant gives Pete Doherty tips on how to be a functional human being

Live blog

Wow, I haven't watched the news on TV in so long. It turns out that v-roll of police cars is still something novel. The newscasters have also called into question the intelligence of the candidates "are they smarter than a sixth grader?" The good news: blogs must be how most people get their news because even the talking heads are blogging when they're off camera.

Multi-tasking, I found these naked pictures of Sarah Palin (supposedly) on a French blog:


10:30 Palin: Thank you, Audience: Woooooooooooooooo! I'm adopting this as my new form of "you're welcome" not to be confused with "Woooo," which means "I'm good. How are you?"
10:31 I spy the Liberty Bell. Isn't that cracked? Also, she just said "you're welcome" before anyone said "thank you."
10:33 The new slide shows a... phallus
10:33 S? what's the S stand for?
10:34 He's got GUTS. The voters knew better: they saw him scale that Aggro Crag! He also didn't change his uniform for 22 years.
10:35 She wants her son to be the president. USA USA USA. MOMS! UNITE! September 11. Deploy troops. Oh shit, we're going to hell.
10:36 Phallus, USA, My children: Two boys and 3 strong and kind-hearted daughters. Can we get a fact-checker here? Also, can we really trust a woman who names her kids Track and Trig?
10:39 My husband rides big gas-guzzling machines, and he has quite a package. How about that? Now don't you get in my way or my husband will kick your ass!
10:40 My whole family is here, so don't embarrass me!
10:41 Cut to commercial. The drinking work would be America, but let's change it up and just drink whenever we remember that her accent makes her more lovable and down to earth.
10:44 does the convention stop for commercials? Does it stop for the weather? I was told this was going to be live...
10:46 The right reason to go into politics is to challenge the status quo? Is that a Republican sentiment? And what's this about governing with integrity from the woman who fired public officials because of personal problems?
10:47 Oh... it's about spirit. Note that the good old boys have their heads on a mountain.
10:48 And another break. She was still talking when we went to commercials. I would think this was Fox censoring the candidate, but in this case that wouldn't make much sense.
10:52 Americans, join me in producing more gas! We have lots of it. I live in Wasilla, so clearly I know all about oil. I've been to Wasilla; there's no oil there!
10:54 It's not worth listening to this clown. Let's do some voice-over.

...Follow the Live blog in the comments

Invitation

So I am the last remaining member of Thousands who has not secured employment. I guess New York is really the land of opportunity. Fortunately I have a plan. Today I have begun my top-secret plan to subvert the government of the People's Republic of China. Today they received a whole bunch of truth-optional paperwork from me. With the help of a disgruntled Chinese national travel agent I will be able to convince them that I even have a round-trip ticket (and thus plans to leave China instead of a one-way ticket and plans to turn myself into an outsourcing option). More on that later, though.

For the time being, I'm at home on the computer. This is an invitation to join me in live-blogging Sarah "who's your mommy" Palin's speech, which Fox News assures us will be starting any minute now.

Come blog with me!

phantom beats

my ringtone for ages has been "let's make love and listen to death from above" by css. it's got this ghostly sort of feel to it, with a high pitch ephemeral melody that cuts through any conversation. a phone is an odd thing. a phone is basically an object that sits around doing nothing, then starts screaming "ME ME ME HELLO ITS ME AGAIN PICK ME UP PICK UP PICK PICK PICK ME UP" until someone picks the damn thing up. phones are objects of convenient urgency. and choosing the right sound to convey urgency is crucial. i've begun to hear css everywhere.

don't get me wrong - i normally hear songs everywhere (and not just through my beloved ipod). the j-m-z screeches out the first three notes to "over the rainbow" from the wizard of oz whenever it leaves an above-ground station. i hear beats in the clicking sound my air conditioner makes. but at least a few times every day, i think i hear "let's make love and listen to death from above" playing and my hand immediately dives for my right pocket. nope, just ghostly css melodies floating around again. i need a new ringtone.

in the meantime, i'll just overwhelm myself with everything else css has done.

lykke li - little bit (css remix)

the cribs - men's needs (css remix)

kylie minogue - wow (css remix)

also, kylie minogue is fuckin' sexy. she has had such an amazing career. madonna is a b-side kylie. there, i said it.

glamerica

One road trip and 40+ electronic resumes later (tangible evidence=0), I finally got an interview at the end of August. The managing editor couldn't resist when I showed up pertly dressed in business formal...probably immediately smitten with my sharp wit, raven-like eyes, the homemade "CONFIDENCE = COMPETENCE" pin on my lapel, and love of artisanal cheeses and anal-retentive workflows. AHA! And so I was offered a job.

(This isn't what happened at all. In fact, one of her interview questions was this: "As a stagnating bean sprout in the primordial pool of the entry-level, how do you sooth yourself to sleep at night through the shuddering sobs of self-denigration and hopelessness?" and I cried a little bit when I told her about a camp song that I sometimes sing)

I did get the job. I've finally moved into my Bushwick (or, in realtor speak, "East Williamsburg") sublet. I have a new home, and a new job. My new grocery store is the Food Bazaar and I can afford Top Ramen every other week. Could it be the American Dream?

So it's not exactly glamourous. But then again, isn't it? You get swept up in the Machine with your well-painted mask of apathy, but it's one that mercifully cracks from time to time. Holy bodega, look at us go. I can see all of Manhattan out my window, and I don't hate it.

What's up, thousands?

("applying for entry level," www.toothpastefordinner.com)

It really doesn't matter what you majored in

Yaya DaCosta, a former America's Next Top Model contestant and Brown University alum, is currently doing very well for herself onstage. She hasn't made it onto my ILCIWSUW* list quite yet, but she's keeping some good company. Leslie Uggams (who may arguably have a better name than Yaya, I don't know), a braodway diva from way back when I don't even know is sharing the spotlight with Yaya in the Signature Theater Company’s production of “The First Breeze of Summer.”
I care very little about any of this.
I do however, care about the clip below. This is DJ Ugg's rendition of "June is bustin' out all over" which has been stuck in my head all day long. The real lyrics, which are half as good, can be found here.


The hits really do write themselves folks.
(Thanks to Rachel Karpf for the thesbo-tip)


*Ivy league celebrities I would shack up with
Natalie Portman, Ed Norton.
Twice.

A fresh ear of corn.

So after a terrible day "at the office" (I really shouldn't be putting this in quotation marks- I know. But I can't actually write this in a non-satirical manner even though I do, in fact, work in an office.) I came home, only to realize that I had left my phone and keys on my bed that very same morning. I realized this right outside of the door to my apartment building.

It is at times like these that I must think of the happiest most rainbow and sunshine filled places ever before I lose my shit and send a Moltov cocktail firebomb into the police station across the street. Cue the hokey flashback noise, spinning camera blur, and take me back to Sunday afternoon...

Travis and I spent the good majority of our day wandering about Brooklyn, and ended up on an expansive roof in Bushwick. All the hip ass kids hid from the afternoon sun in the shady periphery, sunglasses still on, cigarettes dangling from lips. Burning accessories of cultivated boredom. In the far corner of the roof with a Manhattan skyline backdrop, some band rocked relentlessly even though nobody was really listening. They sucked, but their guitarist was wearing parachute pants, redeeming them in my eyes.

Post opening openers, opening for more openers (who would then watch those whom they opened for while getting good and drunk), Ninjasonik opened for Team Robespierre. Though Team Robespierre really rocked in the purest form of the word, I was still more charmed by the haphazard, half-assed performance of Ninjasonik. The sun was beginning to set, dipping the skyscape in gold, setting the mood for lyrics such as, "I'm a tight pants wearing ass n***a" (hint: not 'ninja'), and "I don't care if she got AIDS!" Ninjasonik lyrics may not be the most impressive examples of word-smithery in the industry, but they are enthusiastic to no end, and painfully hilarious.

Nearing the end of the set, the mosh-happy crowd swarmed around the duo, drunkenly improvising the words to "art school," a little ditty in which Ninjasonik professes their love for arty girls. This is my happy place. The police station across the street still stands.

Thousands: a family run operation

I sold my younger sister to buy the internet and all I got was this shitty blog.
It was totally worth it.

Turntable Tips Ep. 1

Hi there kids!

Get ready for a new feature that will explore both the world of old music and the wonder that is vinyl records. Today's installment is brought to you from Mojo Music Studio in Franconia, NH. The shop has thousands of LP records, and the owners hung out with me for a good part of this morning while I ran around like a kid in a candy shop playing unheard of (and largely unheard) cover tunes, strange electronic music from the '80s, and high-speed folk music (see today's tip). It's a pretty good feeling when you drop the needle in a record shop and everyone is stumped about the track you're playing. It's also a lot of fun to read the notes that radio DJs used to write on the covers of records; today I found, "Don't play track 1! It says fucking." Radio work is not for the faint of heart.

Today's Tip: When you're in the mood for a square dance, or have a hankering for some down-home bluegrass picking but have slim bluegrass pickings in your record collection, what can you do? You could go on-line and download some Earl Scruggs or Doc Watson, but digital music just doesn't have the same warmth as vinyl. Instead, try spinning some of your old Dylan LPs or any other folksy 33 at 45 RPM. Suddenly you've got something you can stomp along with, guitars will magically morph into banjos, and your friends will be feeding you moonshine like you were raised in the Smokies.

Re-Hip: If you're into electronic music, experimental rock, and funky beats, then check out Robert Fripp. He was the guitarist for King Crimson, but he also produced some interesting work in the sudios during the '70s and '80s. He has worked with the likes of Brian Eno and Andy Summers, so expect soundscapes, deep beats, and delay. If you're familiar with Eno but want to here something a bit more raw/funky/cutting edge than U2, give Fripp a twirl on the stacks.

from tokyo to toronto

howe-munny says his favorite band name is the toronto-based girls are short. i like it too, because girls should be short. and they are. and they should all be able to sing. and they can. in my mind, every girl i see on the street can sing beautiful melodies off the top of their heads. don't ruin that for me, hayley.

girls are short are also good friends with another canadian indie-electro-pop outfit, the one-man wonder shaw-han liem, also known as i am robot and proud. do all canadian bands have awesome names ?? seems like they do. i have a monster boner for monster animals, so canadian bands are right up my alley: the unicorns, dragonette, even frog eyes. i mean, come on, wolf parade started the whole "wolf" band name phenomenon. then again, that shit came full circle and brought us AIDS wolf, also from montreal. ugh.

remember the tenori-on post? here's i am robot and proud being introduced for the first time (seriously) to this wonderful machine with his own custom model, from the inventor himself. he takes to it like a fuckin natural:

"the holy slow train" -- b. dylan

Suckers bringing the realness at the RNC in St. Paul:

"If you 'just tripped,' why are you pepper-spraying Jeff?"

Lindsay "Warhol Recursion" Lohan still exists. From Wikipedia:

Lohan has yet to comment on the exact nature of their relationship, stating through her publicist that she "wants to keep her private life private." When pressed by a paparazzo to deny the rumors, Ronson responded, "Are you retarded?"

Things that make that much sense:

Paparazzo: "Deny the rumors!"
George Clooney: "Am I hungry?"

Paprazzo: "Deny the rumor!"
Lisa Kudrow: "What is a quark?"

Paprazzo: "Deny a rumor!"
Winston Churchill: "Come here often?"

Two great album titles, one deep-sounding-because-we're-French-and-half-literate song title, and the my favorite band name ever:

Everything That Happens Will Happen Today
Everything All the Time
Everything Is Everything
Girls Are Short

In conclusion, Michael Johnson looks like a haggard Eddie Murphy, Tony Stewart looks like a fat John Cusack, and it is hilarious to spend a year smoking up every day and getting super fat before getting completely over it and regular-size again. That must be the biggest perk of being young and male.

This past week in Screen Shots: YOU'RE a convention.

Looks like CNN hired a wordsmith:


ALERT: AMERICA


Democracy ruins childhoods:


Yo. Let's make a movie about the internet! YO OK!:


Banksy is still awesome; Louisiana still getting rocked by hurricanes with dumb European names


So I think I've seen this one before too:




Um.......Lastly?
I blame Lynne Spears. For everything.
ALSO WHY IS THIS ENCOURAGED. STOP. JUST STOP.




UNTIL NEXT TIME! HAPPY LABOR DAY! MAN I LOVE THAT AMERICA CELEBRATES MOST THINGS WITH HOT DOGS AND NOT WORKING! ALSO: CORN SYRUP!

ARE YOU KIDDING ME?

Fact: Alaska's state motto is "North to the Future." That is the second-best state motto after "Live Free or Die" (Nü Hampshire). The worst is Ohio's---"With God, All Things are Possible" ---because it is not true. ("Cincinnati? Do you mean Cincifratty Brohibro?" "...No."). HILARIOUS.

Mission Impossible Two, oh my God: people take off their faces in that movie like you and I walk down stairs (not that often, but with an air of aggressive 'of course'). The stressed characters (all of them; calm down Tom Cruise!) rub their temples and then, as if an afterthought, un-face. Dept. of Come On: director John Woo also made Face/Off. Some kinda formative childhood trauma he must've had. Then again, MI2 came out in 2000, when websites still asked you if you wanted Frames. The past is a foreign country: they face the future less figuratively there.

The word 'aggressive' is soon to join 'random' and 'awkward' in the graveyard of killing overuse. The millions of guilty will face no jury. 'Absurd' is endangered.

"Not at all" is a bizarre way to say "You're welcome."

"Thank you."
"No! Nooo!"

"Fuck you, fuck your fuckin' pizza, and fuck Frank Sinatra." Casting an Italian guy as a pizza shop owner is like casting a black guy as a criminal or inmate.

"Okay, get in the cell. Nice. Also, there is no movie."

--America

This post being a hodgepodge, I will tell you that Thousands's Ricky sent my family a thank-you sausage after crashing at our house. The packaging says this: "ARE YOU KIDDING ME? That's the best summer sausage I've ever had!"

Ricky, everyone: I am not kidding you.

big in japan

music-wise, japan is both the beginning and the end. styles go there to die, be reincarnated, and relished by millions of people living an incessantly adolescent life. yet still japan produces some of the best new ideas, music, and culture that have so obviously permeated the entire world. this is a country that has produced merzbow, boris, and now, one of the coolest musical toys i've ever seen: the tenori-on.

created a few years ago by a japanese artist, the tenori-on is basically a screen of LED switches that can be activiated in various ways to "create an actively evolving musical soundscape". music, visualized through blinking lights. it is beautiful, it is powerful, and it is just a hint of what technology can offer music to come in the future. holding one of these must be magical. it's versatile enough that it can be used to do most anything, from inspiring electronic and experimental musicians, to bringing old tunes (i use the term liberally, as this song dropped the bomb everywhere only earlier this year), to new life.

i bring you the oh so beautiful and talented little boots, a female singer from england, doing a cover of "ready for the floor" by hot chip. on the tenori-on.



interesting tidbit: little boots's song "stuck on repeat" (which i previously posted a remix of) was produced by joe goddard of hot chip.

mobama, not less

Barack Obama is the idea of artistic ambition followed to its logical conclusion.*

McCain's brilliant/desperate/what? VP choice makes me happy on the level of bastard-comeuppance: the millions of bigoted troglodytes who oppose Obama on (non-) principle will now have to swallow, regardless of outcome, the bitter ascent of the Other.

(Fact: in the day, Palin won a pageant!)

*Because:

He is a serious and seriously accomplished writer.

He embodies a transformational narrative of his own construction. (That sentence scans as bullshit but I stand by, at least, its denotation.)

He made his career not through policy or ideology or (actual) reform but with his own words and the force of his fiercely empathetic personality.

(And when I say artistic ambition, I have extroverted ambition in mind. HayK47 and I disagree on the very terms of artistic creation---we almost came to blows in Durango on this point. Future post!)

that's not my name

i want a tattoo. i told myself, if i was going to get a tattoo, it would have to be something i'd be crazy about, something i would not immediately regret (you know, the same sort of feeling you get right after you masturbate), something that would both be aesthetically pleasing and be mega dopeness.

recently i've developed a major hard-on for airships. everything about airship history is amazingly interesting. topics like mystery airships, count ferdinand von zeppelin, the uss shenandoah, the list goes on. i could probably squeeze out a million blog posts about dirigibles. they've taken my musical inspiration to a whole new level - i want to create m83-esque layers of synth and sound that will evoke images of, say for example, a pack of armored triceratops wielding muskets piloting a zeppelin trying to fend off attacks from a swarm of raptors dropping spiked grenades from smaller, but much faster and agile gliders. meanwhile, far off in the distance, a coat of arms can be seen on an ominous black flag that cuts through a swath of clouds, concealing the legendary and feared airship of the t-rex.

*orgasm* (the good kind)

thus, i want to get a tattoo of an airship. i've spent the past week scouring google and deviantart for sketches of airships, and found a few to my liking. hayley sent me a link to a gawker-featured artist, myke amend. an artist who runs a blog about death and airships, the image seemed perfect.

then i found out he was commissioned to paint this airship for Dread Pirate Roberts, the frontman for the band Abney Park.

"Abney Park comes from an era that never was, but one that we wish had been. An era where airships waged war in the skies, and corsets and cummerbunds were proper adventuring attire. They've picked up their bad musical habits, scoundrelous musicians, and anachrostically hybridized instruments from dozens of locations and eras they have visited in their travels and thrown them into one riotous dervish of a performance. Expect clockwork guitars, belly dancers, flintlock bassists, middleastern percussion, violent violin, and Tesla powered keyboards blazing in a post-apocalyptic, swashbuckling, Steampunk musical mayhem."

scounderlous? middleastern? this sounds like a really good band. excuse me, what did i just say? no, as an honest person, this sounds like a shitty band whose entire fan base is made of single, white, pathetic males who still whack off daily to thoughts of female characters from the final fantasy games. to drive the point home, their songs (with names such as "i am stretched on your grave" and "thornes and brambles") sound like *shudder*... world music. they use stupid tribal beats, bizarre electronic melodies, and have a dude with a creepy voice singing about demons and despair. when's the PUNK part kick in? they even have a christmas album, with steampunk-ified versions of "little drummer boy" and "rudolf the rednosed raindeer".

where are they playing next? dragon con.

oh yea, you can also buy clothes in their store. im pretty sure the girl modeling the "vintage military hat" is the kind to try and choke you during missionary, because "her ex used to love that".

good gawd. i think if i ever saw someone wearing an airship combat kilt, i might vomit blood into their eyes. so now i can't get a tattoo of this really beautiful airship, because i would be forever associated with some steaming pile of shitpunk. always fact check your tats, folks. i could've easily been living the rest of my life being asked by 35 year-old virgins which Abney Park album i liked the best, like "the death of tragedy" or "from dream or angels", and whether i thought kristina or finn von klaret was hotter (two unexplicable female members of the band). at least my idea of putting dinosaurs in zeppelins means i'm not taking this stupid shit seriously. plus, dinosaurs.

closing thoughts? i'll leave that to nathan, the band's guitarist: