Musings on the byways of popular culture
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What do you have planned that your government won’t fine you for?
One of the reliefs of living Out Here is not having to deal with Christmas, neither having to opt out nor opt in. It’s a horrible, venal, stressful “festival” that should die anyway – will covid help to kill it off?
(Two arguments that are way past their sell-by date; People who don’t like Christmas are bah-humbug Scrooges who seek to abolish a wonderful heart-warming time of the year, and “it’s for the kids”).
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D’you know, readers, as I was shaving this morning with my GILLETTE© MACH III™ razor, it occurred to me that a thread featuring favourite Name Brands might prove not unpopular! Yes, as the triple blades of the GILLETTE© MACH III™ sliced easily through my stubble, even after five weeks of daily use – I ruminated pleasurably – you can do that in the shower (@Moose) – on the sheer performance of the GILLETTE© MACH III™ razor! They promise a week’s worth of shaving with every blade, but I get up to a couple of months out of every GILLETTE© MACH III™ blade cartridge! I have what I imagine is a “reasonably sized” (@MC Escher) beard growth, and find that the GILLETTE© MACH III™ razor is not only a pleasure to use, with its sleek lines and weighted and balanced handle, but also surprisingly economical! I bought a starter pack GILLETTE© MACH III™ razor + cartridge at half price, but even at full price the GILLETTE© MACH III™ will prove at least as economical as those flesh-slicing disposable razors! Yes, readers, as I rinsed off the precision blades of the GILLETTE© MACH III™ after yet another successful facial grooming exercise, I » Continue Reading.
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The weird thing is, after being totally enraptured by this for oh-so-many reasons – wait – let’s have that list in full –
– No “hi guys! wasup?” YewChewb commentary – No generic music soundtrack – Sounds flat-out hilarious even when not on drugs – Deeply satisfying skills/toolage – Impeccable filming/editing – Gives flattering impression you could do actually this, with her skills. And tools. And wood. – Adorable text interjections – “Actually I screwed up here” – Rocks out to earbuds at one point – How Bellows sees the world
– the weird thing is, even after all this, I still don’t want the stoopid guitar, beautiful tho’ it be.
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The man has the warm charm of polar bear shit. If you can bear it without wrenching up hot yellow bile from the pit of your stomach, watch the latest self-adoring, utterly sterile, laughably up-itself promo “event” that somehow manages to be hopelessly out of date and out of touch already. Watch professional young actors pretend to be edgy, creative and diverse Mac users (in grungy black n’white, natch). See boring guys in monochrome casual clothing read from autocues and move their hands “expressively” as they speak in a weirdly empty and airless corporate environment that would give me a headache to walk through. “How cool is that?” It’s cool as a corpse. Comments are turned off, mirroring Apple’s on-line help stance, but if you feel up to it, you can leave one here.
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Steeleye Dan
Buffalo Springsteen
Velvet Undertones
The Bandles
Steely Can
The Isley Mothers
The Four ZZ Tops
The Richard Thompson Twins
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My first box set was Soft Machine’s Triple Echo, which may be the first, historically, with rare studio and live tracks rounding out a career overview to that point (already long in ’77!), together with a nice book. It set the form and the standard for all subsequent box sets, of which I bought quite a few. The advent of the CD made the concept more attractive, less cumbersome, and a regular feature of most acts’ back catalogue. Demos were expected, maybe interviews, anything that could be marketed as new, with the added value of remasters. And the bloat factor came in like gangbusters. Six discs, eight … there seems to be no limit.
But all of these lavish and satisfying collections stayed on the shelf. The act of owning them became enough in itself. What was the point of going to all the trouble of opening the box, choosing which disc you wanted to hear, and ejecting it after thirty minutes or so? When the alternative was simply to play an album, it all seemed too much hassle.
These days, I have no physical recordings at all, so the idea of a box set is redundant (as it is » Continue Reading.
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When I shake my mouse (@moose) in the morning, I hit the same half-dozen or so pages to see what’s happened since I fell into bed. These are they:
– Fastmail email account. I’ve had Fastmail for a long time. Bulletproof, plain and simple. Last year they lowered my already low sub because I’ve been with them so long.
– palmerreport.com. Bill Palmer is a rabid anti-Trumper who consistently devalues language (Trump is always “destroyed” by a mild critical tweet) and rarely carries any original news pieces, but for a headline-only update fo what’s happening (you really don’t need to need the short pieces attached, although T.R. Kenneth is a thoughtful contributor), the site works well as an instant catch-up. Use adblock.
– The Daily Beast, rawstory, and huffpost. If I venture “below the fold” on any of these sites I start to get irritated, but for headlines and short news pieces while you’re having a coffee they’re ideal.
– newzit.com. You can focus on UK or US news, seeing all the front web pages of a large number of news sites which you can click to bigly. The Drudge Report is arms-length fascinating – once tin-foil pro-Trump, it’s now » Continue Reading.
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YES, OCTOBER 22 IS INTERNATIONAL CAPS LOCK DAY! (LOOK IT UP)
WHAT WILL YOU BE DOING TO CELEBRATE THE INTERNATIONAL HOLIDAY THAT SO FEW SEEM TO KNOW ABOUT?
I’LL BE DOING MY BIT BY RESPONDING TO COMMENTS WITH MY CAPS LOCK BUTTON TAPED DOWN!
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Not a facetious post. Not fun at all. One of my dogs, a black stray now seven years old, has developed Degenerative Myelopathy. She’s maybe a couple of months into it, and can barely walk. Limbs withered. Doubly incontinent (all over the place).
I’ve done the usual internet research and basically, there’s no cure or treatment for this. It’s recommended to “put her to sleep” when her front legs give way and she can no longer get to her feet. Well, okay, I’ve had dogs “put to sleep” in my arms before. But this time it’s different – the one remaining vet in town will not do it, because Buddhist. This is where Buddhism and I part company, but that’s okay, he doesn’t want to take the life of a living creature. And I don’t want her to become something we push food into at one end and clean up the other. That will be a terrible life, no life at all, with all the ensuing problems of being basically paralysed until, presumably, she gives up the ghost. So I’ll have to do it myself. The vet (rather hypocritically, but we’ll let that pass) will sell me the hypo and » Continue Reading.
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First impressions: that production! It’s perfect. I wish he’d re-record Magic like this. It’s live-sounding, organic, deep, and even in its noisier moments weirdly intimate.
No epic stand-out solos. I would have liked one or two, but okay, we’ve moved on. An ensemble piece, with every musician locking into his part. Bittan’s playing defines The E Street Band – restrained, emotive, powerful, beautiful.
Compositionally, it’s a new hand from an old, old deck, so no points for spotting similar phrases or chords from his own huge catalogue or rock music in general. It sounds like what it is – a Springsteen/E St. album. Not self-referential, not going through the motions, not a cookie-cutter exercise. The real deal. What we were hoping for.
The three old songs are going to take a while for me. I’m familiar with them from bootlegs. Their tone is very much the New Dylan wordsmith he was back then, and although musically they fit better than might be expected – why? and why these? It’ll not be noticeable, perhaps, if you don’t know the original versions. Like all Springsteen albums since ’74, it’ll take a while to settle with me.
The reviews seem to be overwhelmingly » Continue Reading.
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The Mods (GAWD BLESS ‘EM!!!!) recently reminded us of a little-known and less-observed set of guidelines, to whit and thus:
“Be thoughtful. Go placidly midst the noise and haste.Try not to post in a throwaway, unsustainable fashion. Try to have a point – especially you, Bellows.
Posts that are written largely in jibberish [do you mean gibberish? searching for: largely in gibberish] or have no point will be deleted. Avoid in-jokes as posts. Yeah, ri-ight. As if. Pardon our mirth.
Please be frugal [nothing to do with the frug, apparently] with your blog entries. Unless you have something really important to say, in which case why are you here? Multiple posts from a single author over a short space of time are not welcome THIS MEANS YOU, BELLOWS.”
So it occurred to me that we might at least try once in the life of the blog to have a blog piece followed by comments that adhered to this fine document, rivaling as it does the Bill Of Rights and the nutritional information printed on a box of cornflakes for historical value.
Let’s see how far we can take this, guys! LET’S DO THIS, PEOPLE!
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Basically, Dem complacency could ensure a Trump win, in spite of how good they feel about the polls.
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In this thread, I’d like to discuss the issues raised by interpretative dance, especially those explored in the melancholic Café Müller (1985), in which dancers stumble around the stage crashing into tables and chairs.
Or, you know, list your favorite lockdown wear. Do you stumble around the house crashing into tables and chairs in your shreddies? Or suit up?
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Final court ruling today against Mick Skidmore’s attempt to claim Stairway To Heaven was copied from Randy California’s Spirit instrumental Taurus. This has been going on for years. California didn’t want to go to court over it. It wasn’t an issue for him. But after he died Skidmore has been trying to make a buck out of it “for the estate”. Yeah, ri-ight. The legal costs must be e-NOR-mous.
There are wider ramifications, of course. Musicians won’t be so keen to try to sue for copyright over chord sequences or melodies they claim to have created.
George Harrison should never have been sued for My Sweet Lord. Traditional folk music copied and appropriated melodies, classical composers used themes from folk music and each others work. Jazz musicians quote tunes in improvisation. Claiming a few notes as legally your personal property is crazy, a process invented to give work to lawyers, who have done very nicely out of the Skidmore/Stairway business.
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Trump is incapable of debating. He’s incapable of human interaction. This is horrible. He’s bullying, interrupting, and lying. Biden knows debate, but he can’t deal with this.
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To disambiguate: “Top” doesn’t mean “best”, apparently, it means albums you enjoy listening to better than others. Even though you might think certain albums are “better” than the ones you choose, these are the ones you like the best. Placing them in order from 1-5 should not be taken as an indication of relative artistic quality, but personal preference in terms of listening enjoyability. If you have Bobby Snodgrass’ “Live At Wallingford Corn Exchange” at number three, and The Poplins’ “It’s Tupperware Time!” at number five, this means the enjoyment value (the musical “tog rating”, if you will) of the Snodgrass album is palpably greater than The Poplins album, but in a critical sense you feel that the artistic value of each cannot be quantified in the way that enjoyment can. Apparently.
Your Top Five Albums must not appear in the Rolling Stone List Of Top 500 Albums List, even though you might feel your list is compromised by their exclusion. For instance, if you are completely off your fucking head and keen to showcase your Serious Rock n’ Pop Credibility to a peer group that apparently gives a shit about these things and rate Marvin Gaye’s “What’s Goin’ On?” » Continue Reading.
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1) Farewell, Farewell 2) … er …
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I cannot for the life of me understand why he does not feature more strongly here. For those Afterworders brave enough to venture outside their “comfort zone” he will prove to be a veritable godsend of song. Give him a try!
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Give it up for Nandi Bushell, laze-jem.
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Cars may not be re-bagsied.
NB Model variations of already bagsied cars are not available to be bagsied.
I bagsy the E-Type JAAAAAG
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See, the point of this is to STOP AT TWO. This means you, duco01 and tiggerlion. No “honorable mentions” running into the hundreds. Just TWO. Two songs by the Beatles. Not cover versions. Performed and recorded by the Beatles. Not MORE nor indeed FEWER. Two. 2. Deux. Dos.
Let’s do this, people! To get the show on the road, I’ll list my Top Two Beatles Songs in the comments!
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Had this in the mail from Archie Valparaiso this morning. Thought of you.
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Gee, is it ever delicious! Whatever the occasion, CORSAIR TINNED CHICKEN is the centre of attention! Yes, for housewives on the go, CORSAIR TINNED CHICKEN is the perfect solution for family meals, cocktail parties, or when unexpected guests drop by! And remember, ladies – when hubby is hungry, nothing makes him happier than forking the moist meat of CORSAIR TINNED CHICKEN straight from the can! BUY IN A FEW TINS TODAY!
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Fast-forward to the forty-two minutes mark to enjoy Leon Balasco and Chico Marx ripping it up. Balasco is worth a Google, should you be tempted.
(This clip is available as an excerpt elsewhere on YouTube, but not at this quality).
