6.16.2008

My Brain Is Bigger Now Than It Was Then

The following is a list of things I learned this weekend, in no particular order:

1. Death Cab For Cutie frontman Ben Gibbard is a lot skinnier than I thought he was. And poor Chris Walla, dude is the ever-lovin' backbone of that group but nobody knows who he is. And BTW, the Death Cab set freaking rocked! I was seriously expecting a much more mellow affair, but they pretty much tore the roof off the Plain Dealer Pavilion. Candace has a pretty awesome picture here. It was a great night.

2. There are two white tent performing arts amphitheaters in the Flats. One is the Time Warner Amphitheater and it's on the east side of the Cuyahoga River, near Tower City. The other is the Plain Dealer Pavilion and it's on the west side of the river in the Flats proper. If you mix them up, you're screwed and will miss the opening act of the concert (sorry, Rogue Wave) you are attending and you will be more than a little irritated because you thought you knew where you were going but in fact, you did not. Because you are stupid and didn't Google Map it first.

Duh.

3. Barbecue pork sandwiches are delicious.

4. I love being a dad. I love my wife and I love my girls. They're the bestest ever.

5. There's a band that sounds so much like late 60's-early 70's Beach Boys that it is freaking spooky. Their debut album is this week's AOK!: The Explorers Club's Freedom Wind.

I'd love to label them all a bunch of unoriginal hacks, but they're too dang good and obviously reverential to the ghost of Brian Wilson to be dismissed. If you love the Beach Boys like I do (And you really should. Seriously, go find a copy of Wild Honey, Pet Sounds or Smile and prepare for a solid mind-blowing), go check them out. It's eerie. It's like seeing someone who looks like someone you know but you know it's not that person and you keep trying to tell yourself "Well, it can't be that person because the eyes are the wrong color but dang! They look exactly like that other person I know! This is so eerie!"

It's like that.

6. This whole blog phenomenon is really taking off. Seriously, folks, it's going to be HUGE! I predict that in five years, everyone in the whole world will have a blog. Everyone. And not just those Early Adopters John, Ben and Brandt. Ehv. Ree. Wun. Get on this fad now before it's not cool anymore.

7. Also going to be huge: Hypercolor shirts. You heard it here first.

8. And speaking of Early Adopters, I learned how to use the torrents this weekend. I am now the Torrent Master™. The Internets has no idea what is about to hit it.

9. That new Mike Myers movie looks really terrible, doesn't it? Like "I think that trailer gave me eye herpes," terrible.

10. Who watches the Tony awards? Seriously? Anybody wanna cop to it? I promise I won't make too much fun of you. I watched roughly 2.5 seconds of it as I was flipping through and it gave me gas. Me + Musicals = Not A Good Scene.

11. So, how awesome is Burn After Reading looking? Brad Pitt, John Malkovich, George Clooney, that creepy albino lady Tilda Swinton, Frances McDormand (of course), plus the always reliable J.K. Simmons and ... (wait for it) ... the dude who played Sledge Hammer!, quite possibly my favorite show on television, ever. There's a "red band" trailer (with some swearing - you have been warned!) here. Oh man, I so love the Coen brothers.

12. TV sure does suck this summer, doesn't it? Is there anything worth watching that isn't a repeat? And if you say American Gladiators I swear I will punch you in the throat as hard as humanly possible. That's right, I will punch you THROUGH THE INTERNET! It's my mutant power and it's more useful than you'd think.

13. Looks like I won't be bothering with M. Night Shammalammading-dong's The Happening. Poor guy. He's like the cool guy in high school who peaked way too early and you see him like ten years later at the grocery store or something and he's all bald and unkempt and smelly and just generally depressing but totally unaware that he's not cool anymore. Poor guy. I feel for him, really I do.

14. Cleveland had a pretty happening proto-punk scene in the 70's. I actually knew this but had forgotten until I was reading about teh US proto-punk scene in Clinton Heylin's (so far) excellent Babylon's Burning: From Punk To Grunge. I'd recommend his From the Velvets To the Voidoids: The Birth of American Punk Rock and Bootleg: The Secret History of the Other Recording Industry to any aspiring rock and roll history student. Seriously, if I could read about rock and roll for the rest of my life, I'd be happy. Is that weird?

15. Nobody loves Haiku Friday. This makes me sad. Please won't you love it? Please?

16. I love my dad. A lot. He probably can't beat up your dad, but he'd give it his best shot. Because that's how he rolls.

What did you learn this weekend? Please share with the class.

5 comments:

Patti said...

I feel the same way about musicals.

This weekend I learned it takes two baths to get the dirt off your feet from Girls' Camp. I also learned that I should have remembered what I told myself the LAST time I went to camp, which was . . . I am so not a camper.

rose said...

i saw death cab memorial weekend and LOVED them... so much that i've listened to them every single day since. they rock.

rogue wave was good too, but i didn't stay for their whole set. there will be a next time.

this weekend i think i finally figured out how to burn the rest of my mixes. woo-hoo!

John Kendall said...

I saw Death Cab once a couple years ago and they were on fire. It was like they took their fairly mellow album, feed it crack in a northwest basement for a year and then let it loose. In a good way. At one point they were rockin' two drum sets at once.

p.s. thanks for the link!

chrishaley said...

I learned some things this weekend that I have been sworn to secrecy to insure I do not divulge them.

For reals.

chrishaley said...

And not comics related things either.
That was the weekend before last.