Legends of the Superheroes

People scoff when critics say we are living in another "golden age" of television. I don't know if that's entirely true, but there's really nothing on anymore like the absolute crap we had to watch as kids.
Thanks, Onion AV.

Round on the ends and high in the middle

Man, I am getting seriously out-blogged by Mr. Best. Reason being, I'll be on vacation next week and the folks at work really wanted their money's worth out of me before I left.

As Chrissy would say, I'm going back to Ohio. Not exactly what I think of as a vacation, but it'll be nice to see my family, the in-laws, and hopefully some old friends.

There will definitely be some golf, an amusement park or two, and copious amounts of beer.

Maybe you'll hear from me. Maybe not.

Thanks to Natalie Dee for the kick-ass image.

Lips tix

Very excited - just picked up tickets for the Flaming Lips September 19th show in Portland. This will be at the Roseland, a (somewhat shitty) mid-size venue - so it should be an awesome and somewhat intimate show. Will there be room for Wayne to walk around on the crowd is his giant plastic ball? Dear God, I hope so....

Here's the trailer for their upcoming concert film, UFO's at the Zoo:

Stars or Scrubs?

Just found this video to one of my favorite songs of last year, "Your Ex-Lover is Dead" by Stars . It's such a perfect first song. The video is very cool and somehow Canadian, which is fitting since these cats are from Toronto. Just one question - where is the drummer's head??



OK, one more thought. How can a relatively new band have such an obvious word as their band name? With the thousands and thousands of band in the last 40 years, nobody thought of calling themselves "the Stars" before?? That is hard to believe. It's weird to me.

For example, I came up with the greatest obscure band name of all time (I thought) and was trying to convince my current band to use it: "The Wormwood Scrubs".

What the fuck is that, you may ask? Well, it's the name of an old and horrible prison in London. It's namechecked in the best Jam song of all time ("Down in the Tube Station at Midnight"). "Wormwood" happens to be the main ingredient of the banned liquor, or spirit, Absinthe.

"Scrubs" works well, too - a sort of self-effacing reference to a group of people that maybe aren't up to snuff. (NOT a reference to the really awful TV show, though if someone on that show were to make a movie with the line of dialogue "The Scrubs will change your life" - that could be okay.).

And then your fans could refer to you with a cheeky nickname, much like we call The Replacements, "The 'Mats" (it's short for placemats, which isn't the same as replacements, but oh well). "Hey, are you going to see the Scrubs?" "Yeah, I love the Scrubbies". Ok, obviously I have a very rich inner fantasy life, but this seemed like a valid plan.

So, I did a last-minute Google on the name, expecting absolutely nothing to come up - and I find that there's a fucking band with that name already!! What the fuck, how can this be?? That's MY name! Man, I hate these guys (even though they are probably fine and nice and obviously share my sensibilities.)

Hair gods of the '80s

Hey, I've committed my 80's crimes. Oh yeah, no doubt about it. There were a few Miami Vice style linen jackets (cuffs rolled up, of course). Some camo pants. I unapologetically blasted "Beat It" at top volume in my dorm room ("Dude, that's Eddie Van Halen playing the solo!"). A few too many new wave shirts purchased at Chess KIng*. A bit of a mullet, ok fine. Then there were the pink Converse that led to a good old fashioned throat-socking, as Mr. Janes can attest. I admit all that stuff.

So, I can proudly hold my head high when I say there were things I did not do. No parachute pants for Mr. Best. Nope. Never bought a Madonna record. And, more importantly, I never liked metal. Ever. And I particularly hated the hair metal guys. Thanks, Kurt for killing metal. You're my hero.

So I particurlarly enjoyed this article about the biggest Hair Metal bozos. Thanks, Pop Candy.


* What is Chess KIng you ask?

"The store was a specialty clothing outlet that sold men's and women's lines of "faux-upscale" 80's designer wear. More specifically, the cheesiest, sleaziest, ugliest and most eye-searing 80's clothes you could possibly find. Velcro closures? Check. Mesh designs? Check. Excessive use of leather? Check. Odd-colored thick v-neck sweater vests? Check. Just think of any tacky 80's trend, and then spin it as "upscale." That's Chess King."

I never noticed the "upscale" part. Maybe that didn't translate to the Dayon, Ohio franchise....

I've found my birthday present, if anyone cares...

Ok, it's few months early, but I gotta have one of these. The dude abides....

Chicken Shack

Lisa & Her Kin, one of the best (and most fun) bands I've played with, have just released a new album. Check out a new interview here.

I'm not on it, but got to play on some of these songs when they were hot off the griddle. Some great tunes here. This is real country music, not the mutated Bon Jovi hard rock country that's been on the radio for years, and not the affected college-boy alt country that's about as authentic as a "valueless diamelle"*.

*"Valueless Diamelle" is an actual quote from one of those late night cheap jewelry commercials that used to be on years ago. I love that "valueless" was a synonym for "invaluable". And, hell, who wouldn't want a diamelle? It goes great with your Chevelle.

Record Industry once again proves that they're assholes

Gee, sorry if Prince wanted to give his fans a good deal, you fucking greedy bastards. Get over it, you're finished.

Millennium falls short by 970 years

This is somewhat sad news. One of Portland's greatest records stores is closing one of their locations after 30 years. I worked for Music Millennium for several years in the mid-90's, and while it was an absolutely freaking great record store with lots of cool in-store performances (Ben Kweller pictured above), the upper management were really horrible to their employees.

They paid for shit, knowing that there would be a steady stream of applicants wanting those coveted positions at a cool record store, so didn't care when employees quit after a few months when they got sick of their measly paychecks. I never made more than 12k a year there, and I was a "supervisor". The clerks made even less.Then when we tried to unionize, the management came down hard and used some classic union-busting tactics on us. Pretty shameful.

On the other hand, great store. And I met 2 of my closest friends when I worked there. That was actually my first job in Portland. So, it sucks that a cool store is closing, but they did not deal well with the ever-changing market place. As the Sizzler says, they spent way too much time and effort kissing the uber-evil RIAA's ass. But between skyrocketing rents in the super-trendy NW 23rd area and the public's general lack of interest in paying for music anymore (after being massively ripped off by the record industry for years), they were doomed.

Client note of the day

"Erecting? Client isn’t crazy about this word. They suggested 'constructing' or something of that nature."

I love this business.

iPhone stress test

I knew it couldn't hold up to everyday wear and tear.



Thanks, Why Advertising Sucks

A shirt that screams Pete

Better buy 'em quick. They're moving fast.

Thanks, Dooce

Future Hall of Famer to stay in Seattle

Looks like the Mariners finally got their act together. Even though I'm a Tribe fan, this is great news for Seattle. This dude is amazing to watch and one of the best players I've ever seen. Would have been a shame to see him go.

Mitt-talkin'

I've never thought of Time as a particularly funny magazine, but they've posted a couple humorous items about Republican Presidential candidate Mitt Romney. First, there's this story about him strapping a pet carrier to the top of his car on a family vacation. Time does a split graphic of Romney, juxtaposed with the Griswald family from Vacation. Obviously referring to the method in which Granny's corpse is transported in the movie, yet Time makes no reference to this in the story. I guess 95% of Americans have seen the movie by now, so the subtext is clear.

Secondly, they have a list of some of his verbal gaffes. Besides admitting that he enjoyed L. Ron Hubbard's trashy Battlefield Earth sci-fi novel, he makes this unique statement about French marriage:

"In France, for instance, I'm told that marriage is now frequently contracted in seven-year terms where either party may move on when their term is up. How shallow and how different from the Europe of the past."

Turns out that he got that from another sci-fi book, this one by a Mormon author. I'm kinda sensing a pattern here...

Lovely ad

Really great stuff, including casting and costuming.



Thanks, Brand Flakes for Breakfast

Nice Outdoor

I am always impressed by ads that take advantage of location to get their message across. This billboard and its subtle, low-tech approach does the trick for me.



Thanks, American Copywriter

Labontes Law Online

A little self-promotion for my place of work. Labonte's Law is now online, sporting the Bobby's Pitstop Challenge game, downloads, Fan Road Trip stories, news & info and all sorts of stuff.

And yeah, that's Bobby Labonte talking on the site. He was a super nice guy and a pleasure to work with.

CNN gets a spanking

Way to go, Michael Moore. As bombastic and self-promoting as you can be, we need more people like you around.

Huge Judicial mistake

Racist, homophobic juror actually removed from jury, instead of being made foreman*.

"I'm frequently found to be a liar, too. I can't really help it," Ellis added.

"I'm sorry?" Nickerson said.

"I said I'm frequently found to be a liar," Ellis replied.

"So, are you lying to me now?" Nickerson asked.

"Well, I don't know. I might be," was the response.

Careful, Sir - this is how many futuristic computers were made to self-destruct on Star Trek.

* Yes, I'm being sarcastic.

Are you happy now, America?

Remember how you were all up in arms about the tainted imports from China last month? And how you wished that those dang Chinese would be held accountable for their mistakes, like we do it here in the good ole USA? Well, it looks like China's Supreme People's Court heard your yammering.

Now, if we could only apply this same punishment to our faulty bureaucrats. I say, start with Michael D. Brown. "Brownie, you're having a heck of an execution...."


Can I just re-use this fake quote gag from below?

"When I was holding her butocks like this, I decided to just fuck the shit out of New Orleans"