That Movie With Kevin Costner and Dennis Hopper Was Not This Cool

Okay, that clinches it: I'm buying a Hummer and I'm going to hook it up to a gas pump and I'm just going to let it idle all day long every day and then I'm going to buy a buttload of flamethrowers and devote my life to melting some mamma-jammin' ice caps, just so I can live in one of these things sweet babies:

Who's with me? Let's do this thing.

*******

Via the Veer: Ideas blog which is via something else, etc., etc. You know how the internet works.

Poll Position

I added a poll in the sidebar for the next mix votey thingy. I also consolidated some of the titles, whittling the running down from 5 to 7. If you've already voted via the comments section, or if you're getting this via reader, please pop over and cast your vote. Polls close next Friday. I pity the fool who doesn't let their voice be heard.

Peace.

Haiku Friday's Here/This Week's Haiku Comes From Ben/He's My Cousin, Dude

Good morning and happy Haiku Friday (which I almost spelled "Firday", which is either the Norse god of horticulture or a holiday devoted to everybody's favorite conifer). Today's haiku is courtesy of my cousin, Ben, and helps to illustrate why his blog is so infrequently updated (Has it really been since March? Wow.):

Physics test today.
Work, school, work, school, back to work.
My head is asplode.

*******

Beautiful. Get yours in for next week and vote for the the title/theme of July's BRR Monthly Mix. DO IT!

Mixtape = Love

Hi. So I haven't started on July's mix yet. But I'm going to. For reals. For really reals. But I need a starting point. Here's where you come in. I'm gonna give you some titles with a loose musical sketch. Which one would you like to hear?

* It Came From ... the Garage! - Soundtrack for a bar fight at a Stooges show in downtown Detroit, circa 1969.

* Fake Mustaches - No idea. I just like the title.

* Travelogue - World music-y eclectica. Lots of songs in not- or not-quite- English.

* Heliopolis - Songs for the sun.

* Giant Robot vs. Angry Dinosaur - I just like the title on this one, too.

* Like A Knife Through the Night - Late-night driving soundtrack.

* High Fives! - Poppy, energetic stuff, like chasing pop rocks with an ice cold Coke.

Lemme know in the comments section which one you're rooting for. Come on, America needs you to vote! Do it!

*******

Also, if you haven't checked it out recently, we have all the mixes for the year posted over at Mixtapery - the blog for our mixtape club - including Rose's masterpiece, Highly Personal Statement, available for download. That was a big, sloppy sentence. I apologize to every English teacher I have ever had for that one. May you all rest in peace. Or whatever. We're gearing up for the next season with even more slots available for mixtapers (we'd like to post 26 mixes this next cycle - one every two weeks), so if you're interested, lemme know. It's fun.

And as usual, you can download all the BRR Monthly Mixes in my sidebar. See them right there? Yeah. That's them. Go nuts. Let me know what you downloaded and what you liked, mmmkay?

Thanx.

The Beach Boys' Friends Is A Very Good Album

Chris Haley, of the reputable and recommended internet destinations Hip Today! and Destination: Blog! (and who apparently really likes exclamation marks in the titles of his blogs) has started a new blog for his new comic Let's Be Friends Again, written by the esteemed Curt Franklin with art by the aforementioned Mr. Haley.

You can check out their blog here. I designed the header. Start checking it out now so that you can look cooler than everybody else when it's made into a soulless blockbuster with dodgy special effects, a tacked-on love interest and a totally different origin story.

Have You Been Injured In A Car Wreck? You Need A Check.

"The [Review-Journal] thinks I’m a huckster. They’ll take any shots they can at me. I think I’ve done something that no other attorney has done: I’ve transcended being an attorney and am some quasi-celebrity, and that’s made me a target. When you’re part of Vegas culture and I am … Look, in all humility, I’m not even looked at as an attorney anymore. I’m like the white tiger that bit Roy to some people."

Glen Lerner, AKA "The Heavy Hitter", who will be familiar with anyone who has ever watched any sort of television in the daytime in Vegas. The quote is taken from an interview with the Las Vegas Weekly wherein he talks about his recent scandals (like failing to show up to defend his former pool guy for murder. Oops!) and his conversion to Christianity. (Check out his humongous cross - his Jewish mom has got to love that thing - and sweet blue blazer over on his site. He looks like some deranged Christian stand-up comic circa 1987. Or a Las Vegas personal injury lawyer circa 2008. Either way.)

It's always hard to explain to people who aren't from Vegas why it's such a surreal town. It's seriously like growing up in a fun house mirror version of Disneyland. The incongruous architecture, the minor local celebrities - Lerner, Fred from GMF Motors, Lonnie Hammargren, Ed Bernstein, Count Cool Rider and Fletcher "Adopt A Pet"/Fletcher Jr. (who seemed like a total sleazeball)/future mayor (!) Jan Laverty-Jones - wandering around (I remember I once saw Nate Tannenbaum in Waldenbooks in the Boulevard Mall and I totally flipped out. Ditto for the time I saw Gary Waddell in his sweats in a Wal-Mart. Or crooked-nosed Kevin Jamison at a dry cleaner with his kid. Why was it so weird to see these people who basically read the newspaper to you on television in real life? Can anyone explain this?), the omnipresent aura of sleaze, the bright bright bright sun, the total lack of history or culture. It's like some sort of bad science fiction dystopia. It's glorious and repugnant simultaneously.

Some days I flirt with the idea that I would like to live there again someday, in Vegas. Then I think about being stuck in traffic on I-15, my back all sweaty and sticky and shirt soaked through while the taxicab in front of me with the Crazy Girls advertisement on the top (the one with the bunch of butts on it) leers at me as the guy in the big construction truck cuts me off. Mmmyeah. Maybe not.

Anyway, it's a Glen Lerner interview. And it's fairly intelligible. I know, shocking, right? I'd argue his point about being the only attorney to transcend to semi-celebrity, though. Has he really never seen the Edward M. Bernstein Show on some random Sunday morning/afternoon? And if he hasn't, why hasn't he? That junk is required viewing.

And can somebody tell me why there aren't more Heavy Hitter commercials on YouTube? It's pathetic. I mean, this is what the Internet is for, people?

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.

Death Cab For A Cutie (& Me)

I'm excited. We're going to see Rogue Wave and Death Cab For Cutie tonight. Is there a whiter sentence than that? I guess I could have said "and we're going out for tapas beforehand and then I think we'll go shopping for some new Tevas at that organic cotton outerwear store." Yeah, that's better.

I'm fully expecting to be rocked/bummed out simultaneously by the awesome power of Ben Gibbard & Co.'s sad-sack indie poppery. Which would be a great name if this whole rock thing doesn't pan out and they decide to open up an old timey popcorn stand at some farmer's market in like Portland or something. Portland seems like a popcorn town, doesn't it? Portlanders like popcorn. I read that somewhere. Maybe in the Bible. But only if it's like organic, free-range, cruelty-free popcorn. Portland was founded by Hippies, you know. It's true. Look it up on Wikipedia. Totally true.

Here's a video from Death Cab's last album, Plans. It's sad. Oh so sad. But also pretty (the song and the video, that is):

So yeah, Death Cab tonight. If you haven't, pick up their newest, Narrow Stairs. It's goooood, hence it's two weeks as BRR Album Of the Week. (This/last week's selection, Mates Of State's Rearrange Us, is also pretty awesome. Very recommended.)

Oh, and by the way, what the heck are tapas? I seriously don't get it. It's like you just eat a bunch of appetizers for dinner? Really?

Uh, we already have that here in the USA. It's called Chili's. Freaking tricky Spaniards - you are not fooling me. Not for one second.

An Honest Good Time

Remember that list I posted with the "TOP SECRET" stamp over part of it? Well, here was what was so secret. For some reason, the idea popped into my head and I couldn't still giggling as I sketched it in my notebook.

It's a Do-It-Yourself Abraham Lincoln kit. DIY ABE for short.

Now you can realize your dream of being the President of the United States of America. The 16th President, to be exact. Just download the kit and follow the directions. Once you have transformed yourself into Honest Abe, take a picture and e-mail it to me. The crazier the picture, the better. I'll post it here and, if I get enough of them, I'll start a Flickr set for them.

I promise not to do a DIY John Wilkes Booth, so you won't have to worry about assassination. You can relax and enjoy that play, Our American Cousin, with your mentally unstable wife who sometimes beats you up. Long live the Union!

I Am Not A Numbah!

This could be very promising. One of these days, I'll actually get around to finishing the original series, but it makes my head hurt with its layers of meaning, its refusal to dumb itself down or explain itself plainly and its incredible dream logic. Seriously, I don't think I'm smart enough to watch The Prisoner, but I know it's awesome.

Via the Underwire