Congratulations PRESIDENT Obama

...now get your ass to work.

Campaign Memories

A. Thank God it's over. Now, let's hope the right guys wins.

B. Please read Matt Taibbi's latest blog, wrapping up the seemingly endless campaign season.

Maybe I've had too much of the Obama Kool Aid, but I truly do think that the media's fully in the tank for him because he has by and large run an excellent campaign and rised above the multiple character assassination attempts made on him first by the Clintons and then recently the Grumpy Old Man/Homecoming Queen ticket.

I do like Obama, but I don't want to. I want to be able to say I'm voting for the lesser of two evils, that they all suck and that we should just burn Washington to the ground like everyone else seems to claim. But the dude sold me on the promises that he'd govern with compassion and intelligence and that we'd actually face the mountain of problems that's crushing this country's collective will instead of trying to ignore them or blame them all on homos who want to get married and irresponsible black people.

Now I'm hoping he has a chance to deliver and then actually follows through.

Wall Street: Less Responsible Than a Coked-Out NFL Running Back

The reason I keep pimping Rolling Stone's Matt Taibbi is because I inevitably go, "Damn, I never thought of it that way" every time I read one of his essays. I probably do that because he's a helluva lot smarter than I am.

Wall Street: Less Responsible Than a Coked-Out NFL Running Back

Damn, I never thought about Great Depression v.2.0 that way.

But I did think of the Republicans' plan to pin their mess on liberals and poor minorities this way, taken from an earlier Taibbi blog:

There aren’t enough low-income minority homeowners in the remaining years of human history to create $62 trillion worth of pressure on the economy. You’ve got not billions but trillions of dollars tied up in the Wall Street equivalent of a craps game – the ruling class of the earth gambling away the whole world’s bank deposits on a dice roll, which is about as irresponsible a use of resources as can be imagined – and guys like York want to blame the blowout on a few black people who tried to do something absolutely and completely sensible with their money, buying houses they intended to live in.

I'd love nothing more than to offer a link to his blog, but I'll also keep pimping him to you all just in case.

Peace Through Rock & Roll

I guess it goes without saying that I pre-ordered Guitar Hero World Tour, but through some scheduling snafus I really didn't get any time with my new game until yesterday when I played the hell outta it.

Cliff Notes Review: Loads of fun; Great additions like drum and vocal tracks, create-a-rocker/guitar, loads of cameos, an Amoeba Records stage and an improved battle system that's more in the spirit of the game. Instead of beating them with tricks like snapped strings or amp overloads, you just gotta keep up with them in an intense jam session without getting booed off stage. This last touch goes with a much-needed step down in difficulty from the insanely hard Guitar Hero 3, which was often too brutal and competitive to be fun.

That said, I do prefer Rock Band, largely because of the setlist. Between the songs I've saved on the hard drive from the first game, the ones I've downloaded and those included in the second edition, it's a badass playlist that has a lot of tunes I absolutely love. There are some nice ones on GH4, but it lacks the "I gotta have that one" factor that the previous music games had. Definitely the weakest rundown to date.

Nonetheless, something very cool happened the other day as I finally got acquainted with both the game and the wonderful world of playing online.


You randomly get placed in a band and have nothing to go on in these anonymous gaming encounters except a screen name and character. Early on during the experience I found myself in a band with Dr Ice Berg and DiabolikLord. I'm not one for chit-chat, so I keep the headset that allows you to talk with your fellow gamers turned off. But upon being placed in this new band I was greeted with a strange "R0CKET King...Allllllooooooo, R0CKET Kiiiing?" coming from my speakers.

My silence was interrupted by the *other* bandmate, who began speaking German of all things. Then the first responded in kind. Soon, I was privy to a conversation that was likely taking place halfway around the world. I couldn't understand much...Actually I couldn't understand a damn thing that was said except when they mentioned a song title.

"Ich bin ein 'Love Removal Machine'"

"Ich möchte spielen 'Hot For Teacher'"

The funniest bit came when one of the dudes said something to the effect of, "Was wenn wir spielten 'The Joker' (Mimicing song's signature guitar effect) Weeeeeeet-wooooooo"

So as we ripped through a few songs, this gave me a vision of a better tomorrow, one in which a generation who have learned understanding and cooperation with people different than they are through years of joining forces via Xbox Live to hammer out Bullet For My Valentine songs stop blowing each other up over their nationalistic, religious or cultural differences.

Peace through rock & roll...Just like Rufus said it would be.

The Death of a Red State

This is another Rolling Stone essay written by the brilliant author of the Sarah Palin essay I pimped here a couple weeks ago.

The Death of a Red State

The author validates a hope I've long held; Racism, if not dead, is at least in critical condition in this country and Obama's color and exotic name really won't be issues for most of the voters 9 days from now. If true, it would explain the GOP's sudden struggles as they no longer have the same tried and true villains to use as a distraction.

The geeks shall inherit the Earth

Woman Arrested After Murdering Online Ex-Husband

I say throw the freakin' book at her. If some psycho chick messes with my musicians on Rock Band she better pray that the authorities get to her before I do.

What you *should* be watching every Wednesday

Yeah, I know what you're thinking: Here goes motorcycle boy telling us to watch a show about guys on bikes. Big f'n surprise, jerky.

The motorcycles in "Sons of Anarchy" are irrelevant, much like they matter little to the real life motorcycle clubs (Don't use the "g" word) the titular crew is based on. It's part of the culture and nothing more. This show just flat-out kicks ass.

"SoA" is the first episodic television show that I've followed since the "The Sopranos" bowed, and comparisons between the two are obvious. It's the tale of a crime family, only the Sons (Or SAMCRO: Sons of Anarchy Motorcycle Club Redwood Originals, in case you heed my advice and then wonder where the name comes from) wears patched leather vests and wallet chains instead of velour track suits and medallions. The most important comparison, though, is that both are amazing series that raise the bar on what we should expect from TV.

The program is intelligently written, shockingly dark without being overindulgant, and brilliantly acted; Patricularly Katey Sagal who is so amazing as the ruthless, calculating matriarch of the club that after a handful of eps that it's getting harder to remember that she played Peg Bundy for what seemed like half of my life.

As I said earlier, "SoA" will immediately remind you of "The Sopranos," but it would actually be more apt to compare "Sons" to Hamlet. Wouldn't you agree that a show with a pedigree that includes Tony Soprano and Bill Shakespeare may be worth your space on the DVR and hour every week?

I'm in love...

It's called the Suzuki Gladius (Which, I believe, is Latin for sword), and unlike that badass Honda I drooled over awhile back, this bad boy will be available stateside very, very soon.

On top of being minimalist without being boring, it's based on the SV650 motor Suzuki has been building since Jesus was a child, so you know it's bombproof. I imagine it'll be even hotter with a proper set of bar-end mirrors replacing those bug-eyed deals the factory installs and a fender eliminator on for a cleaner profile on the backside.

With a $6,000-ish pricetag, I think you might see one beneath my ass moving very, very quickly up the 101 very, very soon.

Remember that Axl Rose guy?

Well apparently it really is go time for Chinese Democracy for reals as Axl and company continue to try to pull a massive viral tease by blitzing the 'net with a ton of promo videos only to pull them all just as quickly. This is following a couple years worth of "unauthorized leaks" of both songs and press releases that would promise drop dates which never materialized.

Why does it feel any different this time? Well, they rolled out an exclusive deal with Best Buy and iTunes. Axl may have been stringing what few fans he has left and his label along for 14 years now, but I don't believe for a second that he can get over on a pair of retail giants. If they're offering presales, then I'm a believer.

Now, if only I could be bothered to care. Sorry, but Axl has long chewed through every ounce of good will I ever had for him despite the fact that he's responsible for both my all-time favorite album and song.

I don't hold many grudges, so I'll swoop on a copy if I like what I hear. But Axl's gotta earn his way back into my good graces, much like Metallica did recently after they too spent a decade and a half killing their legacy.

Dubb-ya

After literally spending all-night at the New Bev watching a slew of, uh, let's be diplomatic and call them "interesting" horror films (Stay tuned for that story), I did the only rational thing a human being would do on Sunday and (Following a power nap) saw another scary movie, W.

Very interesting film, this one, focusing much more on the man himself and everything that shaped him than most of the events that will define his presidency. Oddly enough, though, the man is largely defined by the influence that several people in the background wield over him.

The first act deals with his younger years that are defined by alcoholism, several failed careers and the constant disappointment of his family, who very clearly favor Jeb Bush. The second is his redemption as he marries Laura Bush, gets sober, finds Christ, becomes governor of Texas much against his family's wishes and without their support and, ultimately, ascends to the presidency in what he believes is his divine calling. This leads to a third act that isn't his presidency but merely the Iraqi invasion, and I was really surprised at how sympathetic Oliver Stone seems to be toward Bush. Stone very clearly places the blame for the fiascos the world has suffered the last eight years largely on the same three shoulders most of us do:

Donald Rumsfeld: A loose cannon who seizes control of the Iraqi invasion in its infancy.

Dick Chaney: The quiet manipulator who understands how to finesse the headstrong, stubborn president as well as take advantage of his inattention to detail.

Karl Rove: Always lurking in the shadows. You can't always see him but you know he's there. He's a puppeteer who settles for pulling Bush's strings from behind the curtain because he doesn't have what it takes to stand behind the podium himself.

Ultimately, though, the film places a lot of blame on George senior, who is cold, distant and seemingly offers his son nothing but constant reminders of what a disappointment he is as the younger George blunders his way through the first half of his life. The film subltly argues that George Jr's heart is in the right place, but the misguidance of the Rumsfeld/Chaney/Rove triumverate as well as his burning desire to separate himself from his father and clearly define his own presidency leads to the foolish desicion to invade Baghdad.

So much has been written over the last few years about Bush's presidency that the film confidently chronicles the Iraqi blunders without any undue malice. Most of my disappointment over the past few years has fallen on Colin Powell, and this movie cements it. The film doesn't presuppose Chaney and Rumsfeld's motivation, but it doesn't take much conspiracy theory to assume why men who made fortunes in the war and oil businesses would want to go to war over oil. Powell was the one guy in the room who knew better; The voice of reason who tried to cut through the cabinet's hubris by telling them in no uncertain terms that not only is the invasion wrong it isn't going to be nearly as easy as they think it will be. I cringed and shuffled in my seat as I watched his futile battle with the Chaney/Rumsfeld two-headed beast for the president's influence, and my heart breaks as the film later shows Powell stand before the United Nations and effectively sell an invasion that he doesn't believe in.

The other very interesting figures are his enablers: Laura Bush and Condeleeza Rice. The first-lady crosses him once and learns never to do it again. Though he isn't abusive, she learns his fiery temper is just best to be avoided. Rice never offers anything but affirmation to the president. She doesn't cross Chaney or Rumsfeld, she doesn't back Powell and she never expresses even a hint of disatisfaction or anything resembling an opposing viewpoint. What other type of wife/secretary of state could've survived with such a bullish figure? Maybe we should ask the one who resigned shortly after his appearance before the U.N.

I've spoken a lot about the film's message and very little about its nuts and bolts. W. is very effective, and the peformances are strong. (Particularly Josh Brolin as W. and a frighteningly balls-on portrayal of Cheney by Richard Dreyfuss.) But the film geek in me couldn't help but take a back seat to the pissed-off American who's disgusted at the mess his country has created.

Wisdom from the mouth of Savage Steve Holland

As Election Day draws nearer and I get more and more concerned about who this dumbass country of our might elect (Sorry, I just don't trust polls), things are indeed gonna get a little political on my little corner of the blogosphere, so deal.

As McCain gets increasingly desperate, he's shfting the talk away from trivial things like facts and the issues and his new gameplan is to convince us all that we shouldn't like a terrorist lover like Obama, who no doubt seeks the White House so he can destroy this country he hates so much from the inside.

I find it very funny that he sends his attack bunny Palin to do the serious smear work, which I suppose is the role of a VP candidate. But hearing this hateful, cheap rhetoric come from a brainless bit of crumpet like her reminds me of one of my favorite childhood films, ONE CRAZY SUMMER.

The animated segements that served as a Greek chorus for the wackiness featured a gang of "cute and fuzzy bunnies" who terrorized our hero's animated counterpart. Their sweet outward appearance disguised their evil, hateful nature.



Seem familiar?

GET'IM A BODY BAAAAG!

A few facts you may not know about the driving force behind the single greatest cinematic montage...EVER!

Mad Dog Palin

Alright, I'm gonna ring the second recess bell here and call everyone into class for a moment.

I make it a point to only talk matters of frivality here, first and foremost because I'm a guy who is absolutely, passionately, madly in love with his frivilous pursuits. But also because I do have a pretty serious job in which calls on me to frequently watch people die. I like to think I handle it pretty well by never, ever bringing it home with me and by being as much of a child as I possibly can be when I'm not at work.

That said, I'm not a total jackass. I do keep an eye on current events, and like to think I'm way more up on global affairs than the average American, which I know ain't saying much. Our country's current direction nearly brings me to tears. I spent the first four years of the Bush regime hating our president, but I've spent the past four hating my countrymen for giving this guy another term. He is who he is, but we should know better.

Which leads me to this:

Mad Dog Palin

This is the most brilliant opinion piece I've ever read, and I implore you all to read it. It's not so much an attack on one of the VP candidates as it is a biting and balls-on condemnation of America.

If you don't feel like slogging through this, I'll give you the one 'graph that succinctly sums up my feelings heading into this election and why I'm voting the way I am:

So, sure, Barack Obama might be every bit as much a slick piece of imageering as Sarah Palin. The difference is in what the image represents. The Obama image represents tolerance, intelligence, education, patience with the notion of compromise and negotiation, and a willingness to stare ugly facts right in the face, all qualities we're actually going to need in government if we're going to get out of this huge mess we're in.

Amen.

I'm on a mission from God...

Been awhile, I know, but I've been easily distracted (i.e. Trying to complete Rock Band 2) lately, so I haven't downloaded the seemingly endless backlog of photos off of my camera let alone sat down to pontificate about said photos.

But, I have a rare quiet moment here at work right now, so I'm abusing my access to the Internet to relay a couple antecdotes, the first being a story born from my last rare quiet moment at work.

Free time is a dangerous things in the hands of my coworkers and I. Mayhem always ensues if we don't have deathly ill or broken patients to tend to. People get taped to their seats, gurneys or swivel chairs are raced down the hallways, Wile-E.-Coyote-esque weaponry is built out of medical supplies or, in the most innocuous cases, strange, strange conversations are held.

The most recent had to do with "it"s. "It Girls" and "It Guys"; Whatever you may be into. People shared their all-times, with varying degrees of weirdness. I don't have many celebrity crushes. Most actresses don't do it for me, and even fewer models do. There are a few hot musicians, but if she sucks then that pretty much kills my buzz. And considering that the vast majority of new music sucks, well, you can figure it out.

It came to be my turn, and though I hadn't thought about it in awhile, there really is one clear-cut all-time "It Girl": Miki Berenyi.



Only hardcore Doom-Generation music geeks remember Miki or Lush, the band she fronted in those heady Bill Clinton days. They didn't get as much pub as fellow Britpoppers Blur or especially Oasis, the latter of which was pretty much the biggest band in the world for awhile. However, Lush had a phenomenal sound, in large part thanks to Miki's vocals.


The Britpop label doesn't do Lush justice. Their sound was more dream pop: The hazy, etherial alternative stuff that served as the forerunner to trip hop. The Smashing Pumpkins often veered into dream pop territory. ("Today"; "Tonight, Tonight" or "1979", for example.) The Sundays and Mazzy Star were also very similar, with sounds built on jangly guitars and etherial female vocals.

But Lush did dream pop better than anyone; Even the insanely brilliant Billy Corgan. Their sound was more aggressive without getting heavy. The guitars were fuzzy, but they churned out beautiful, sunny melodies that framed Miki's dreamy, shimmering voice.

I imagine that it also didn't hurt that Miki was hotter than doughnut grease.

I first discovered Lush the same place I discovered most new music in the '90s: MTV's 120 Minutes. I know I'm dating myself by mentioning a time when MTV actually featured music.



The flaming Ferrari-red hair, the British accent, the ambiguously ethnic features: Every alterna-geek was immediately in love with Miki, Especially in Europe where Lush made more of a splash. Sadly, they only lasted a few years and a couple albums before internal tension and a band member's suicide derailed the group. But Lush's music still holds up a decade later ("De-Luxe" is a track on Rock Band 2...Just sayin') and Miki has never relented her position as my all-time "It Girl."

Naturally, no one involved in the conversation that prompted the wave of Miki nostalgia had ever even heard of Miki or Lush. Everyone just kinda looked vacant and quickly moved to the next person.

On an unrelated note, I recently was given the role of determining the Greatest Song Ever. Don't argue, because this thing has come down from up on high. It'd be blasphemous to say God spoke to me, but I just kinda know this is what he wants me to do.

It changes frequently, as I just hear something, usually a song that's well travelled, and suddenly have an epiphany that this is the Greatest Song Ever. It's happened a few times over the past few months.

First it was "Don't Stop Believing" by Journey. Then it was Twisted Sister's hair-metal anthem "I Wanna Rock." Things got a little prog the last couple months as "Carry On Wayward Son" had a go, as did Foreplay/Long Time."

But there was another changing of the guard a couple days ago during yet another boredom-fueled conversation...



"Purple Rain" is clearly the Greatest Song Ever.

Rock Band 2 observations

* Big, huge, superepic props to Harmonix for curing my "Brick Wall Syndrome." (BWS)

Lemme explain: Inevitably on one of these games I'll run into a song I simply have absolutely no hope whatsoever of playing. On GUITAR HERO 2, it was "Carry Me Home" by Living End.

GH3 stopped me dead with Slayer's "Raining Blood" (I'd last about 13 seconds) and "One" by Metallica. (The latter really pissed me off b/c it's one of the most brilliant songs ever recorded and I'd always get about 5 minutes into it before the furious change would thwart me. At least Slayer saved me the time by kicking my ass really early.)

The original ROCK BAND had a whoppin' three on the final setlist: "Flirtin' With Disaster" by Molly Hatchet, "Green Grass and High Tides" by The Outlaws and the timeless "Highway Star" by Deep Purple.

All of the aforementioned songs became known as brick walls. My progress was immediately halted and I had no recourse save ramping the difficulty down to Hard and starting the whole freakin' game over again. Along with a bruised ego, it also made for some boring freakin' gameplay as the Hard setting is too easy. On top of having fewer notes to hammer out, they scroll down way more slowly than on the Expert setting; Way too slow, in fact. So slow that I would miss notes by getting impatient and belting them out in anticipation of when they'd finally arrive at the bottom of the screen.

Harmonix came up with the genius solution of allowing you to choose the difficulty of each song you play as you play them instead of picking a setting at the beginning and being locked into it. I'll never be able to play prog-metal icon Dream Theatre's "Panic Attack", which is arguably the hardest freakin' song ever included in one of the games. At least as hard as "Through the Fire and Flames" by Dragonforce on GH3. But no worries, I can take things down to a more manageable Hard, beat the song, then continue doing my thing on Expert without losing my progress. Nice.

They also solved the second problem associated with BWS by adding a Hyperspeed Mode, which, on Hard, makes the notes scroll a little faster than they would on Expert. I love you, Harmonix programmers.

* Five most fun songs to play (In no particular order)
"Everlong" by Foo Fighters

"Anyway You Want It" by Journey (Most of it anyhow. The second solo is insane.)

"Hungry Like The Wolf" by Duran Duran (Yeah, I'm as surprised as you are.)

"Alex Chilton" by The Replacements (Trust me: You know this song even if the title doesn't look familiar.)

"You Oughta Know" by Alanis Morrisette (Would've never thought this would be included in a game like this, and definitely would've never thought it would be so fun to play.)

* Axl Rose has graced us with one of the songs off of the Chinese Democracy album that he's been working on for 10 FREAKIN' YEARS NOW. Think I'm kidding? Everyone in G'N'R quit in 1994, Rose replaced them and began recording this thing in early '98. We're actually going on 11 freakin' years now, and, while we're doing the math, this would be Guns' first original studio album since the Use Your Illusion double albums dropped...In 1991. Yes, "November Rain" is older than some college kids.

ANYWAY, with no actual release date in sight for the album, "Shackler's Revenge" has debuted on the game and if this is what this album is gonna sound like then he can take another 11 freakin' years working on it. Hard to describe, but it sounds like Axl Rose doing his best impersonation of Trent Reznor circa-'94. Starting to think that the sheer, Godly brilliance of Appetite For Destruction was an abberation considering all the vastly inferior music these guys have recorded in various bands during the 20 years since.

* Why are Tenacious D songs so insanely hard to play on these games? It's Jack Black's joke band, for cryin' out loud.

* I really want my $75 figurine.

OK, gotta get back to work. "Carry On Wayward Son" ain't gonna beat itself.

Dreams and Plastic Guitars

Make no mistake about it, Rock Band 2 is the single greatest thing ever, replacing the previous single greatest thing ever: Rock Band 1. The folks at Harmonix deserve a Nobel Prize for this one.

The changes from the already great original installment to the mindblowingly epic sequel would seem pretty minor if you saw them on paper, but it's these tweaks in the gameplay that are responsible for the game's instant legendary status.

The single-player mode is now the same as the multi, which includes a series of challenges instead of just a collection of increasingly difficult setlists. Each city has individual songs that have to be beat as well as setlists you make, mystery setlists and, in a really nice touch for music geeks, city-specific setlists. Los Angeles has a setlist of So.Cal. bands. (Linkin Park, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Silversun Pickups, Offspring and Rage Against the Machine, off the top of my head.) San Fran has a classic-rock setlist in honor of the Haight-Ashbury scene and Montreal has, you guessed it, songs by Canadians.

The game's flaws are only minor. One of the improvements is the ability to design your bandmates, so you aren't stuck with strange-looking computer-generated choices that don't jive with your character or each other. The drawback, however, is that it doesn't automatically change vocalists when you come across a song sung by someone of a different gender than the last. Very, very strange to hear Hayley Williams' voice coming out of a dude.

Some of the 80-odd songs included in the game are questionable choices. "So What'cha Want" by the Beastie Boys and Beck's "E-Pro" are two of the worst possible choices they could've made. Not only does the bassline and guitar track on each of these songs only consist of a strange intermittant riff, but the drum beats are identical. Not similar, identical. Beck heavily sampled "So What'cha Want" for this particular song, including a straight rip of the drum track. One song for the price of two.

Most of the songs, however, are brilliant choices; A great mix of genres and eras. One of the things I've discovered from owning a few of these games now is that some of the worst, cheesiest songs make for the best gameplay. I'm violently allergic to most music made in the mid-to-late '80s, but damn if "Livin' on a Prayer" ain't more fun than a room full of monkeys on crank.

In a stroke of genius, Harmonix is looking to further cash in on talentless frustrated never-will-bes like me by offering 6" figures of your custom character via their website in the near future. Having always dreamt of being both a rock star and having my own action figure, you can imagine how hard I geeked when I saw the images down below...



Yeah, there's $75 down the drain.

God Gave Rock & Roll To You

A day without rock and roll is far worse than a day without sunshine. I went to school in San Francisco for two years during which the sun only came out about seven times. Asking me to go an entire day without big, fat beats and fuzzed out guitars, however, is expecting the impossible.

It was a very, very sunny day last weekend when The Echoplex hosted nine stoner-rock bands, including Earthless, that real-live bunch from San Diego that is pretty much the single greatest band on the planet.

My dear friend Daisy (aka Day-Z) was my hook-up for this event, which was an added bonus since we don't get to hang out nearly enough these days. She had something to do that afternoon, so I was flying solo for the first couple bands until she joined me.

Day-Z's tardiness turned out to be a blessing for her. For starters, the doors didn't open until after 4 even though the tix said the event would begin at 3. If you haven't been to Echo Park recently, consider yourself lucky. To call it a crappy neighborhood would be giving the area far too much credit.

Things got started (just before 5) with a band who stumbled through an uninspired but mercifully short set in front of the handful of us who were punctual. It wasn't a bad band, per se, but there was nothing to really distinguish them or motivate me to give any of their music a listen.

Things picked up quickly, though, when Night Horse strafed the place. This five-piece set from Los Angeles was a revelation, featuring a snarling, hyperkenetic front-man; a tight, relentless rhythm section and a riff-tastic sound centered around a pair of lead guitarists that had a very-late '70s Detroit feel to it. (The same kinda stuff that The Racounteurs draw from for inspiration.)

A little post-concert homework revealed their debut EP is going to drop in the coming weeks and they nailed down at least one surefire sale with their scorching set. Now we were in business.

One of Night Horse's guitarists pulled double duty as he stuck around to front the next band on the bill, The Ancestors. This was by far the ticket's heaviest band, with a downtempo sound built on a seriously detuned guitar and a bass amp so loud that you could feel it in your chest cavity.

I'm not much of a doom metal fan, but The Ancestors were joined at the end of their set by a blonde girl who laid down a pretty lyricless vocal that offered a nice counterpoint to the band's sludgy sound. It reminded me of a heavy "Great Gig In The Sky" and was definitely the highlight of the set.

Day-Z arrived in time to see San Francisco's Assemble Head In Sunburst Sound, who had been touring with my beloved Earthless the last couple months, offer one of the bill's most interesting sets. We were intruiged the moment I saw them set up a theremin, which, for the uninitiated, is one of the first electric instruments and is best known for giving the Beach Boys' "Good Vibrations" the eerie haunted-house sound that accompanies the chorus. Sweet!

I really dug Assemble Head's sound, but am having a hard time trying to find ways to describe it. Theirs is a very ecelectic mix that encapsulates the sum of rock from the late-'60s through the mid-'70s: Kinda blusey, kinda spacey with a bit of dirty guitar to give it some teeth. It was such a great set that I immediately hit the merch table to pick up their CD, which I've really dug in the days since.



It's also worth noting that they had a cute hippy chick playing bass and keys, which is always a huge plus for a band. Halfway through the bill and two bands have been CD-purchase-worthy. Business was definitely picking up.

The good times continued with Graveyard, who were just plain brilliant! Incredible musicians and great songwriters who laid down very complex tracks with a lot of tempo changes and titanic drum breaks.

Most of the bill draws heavily from Black Sabbath for inspiration; It's kind of a given that retro-metal bands will look to the guys who invented the sound. But there's a lot more psychadelic blues reminiscent of Cream and Zeppelin in Graveyard than most of the bill.

It was the bill's third CD-purchase worthy offering, and Day-Z was particularly impressed with this Swedish band. And here we thought our friends to the far north were only good for boxy, reliable cars; cheap furniture and, of course ABBA.

I'll consider Graveyard as reparations for all of the above. All is now forgiven, Sweden.



That's bassist Mike Eginton.



Dude on the drum kit is Mario Rubalcaba.



And this is Isaiah Mitchell. Collectively they go by the name Earthless. Immediately contact the police if you see any of them because they killed a few hundred metalheads that night with an incindiary set that left a huge crater where the concert venue previously stood.

Think I'm gushing a little too much over Earthless? Then you've never heard them before. I've never heard a band that was so unrestrained and otherworldly without veering away from rock and roll into experimental noise. Earthless most definitely rocks. Rubalcaba and Eginton are the backbone; a tight unit that effortlessly seques from pushing the riff that forms the loosest of song structure for their jams while occasionally changing things up with a double-or-triple time outburst and some devestating seven-megaton beats.

Mitchell is nothing short of mind blowing, weaving an effects-laden guitar tapestry that melts the face of all who dare not avert their gaze. Like the rythm section, Mitchell switches gears many time during the set. Etherial sitar-like lullabies give way to massive, Earth-shattering riffs that explode into crushing tsunamis of wah-wah and feedback. Mitchell colors in the spaces between the riffs with inspired, seemingly endless, head-popping solos the likes of which I've never heard before.

I discovered Earthless at The Silent Movie Theatre a couple months back where they performed following a screening of the stoner-rock doc SUCH HAWKS, SUCH HOUNDS. I proceeded to fall in love with their glorious sound from their first note up until the LAPD shut 'em down about 40 heavenly minutes later. I scooped up the two records they've released over the past three years, and they are nothing like anything I've heard before: Old-school psychadelic metal with a jazz sensibility from three insanely brilliant musicians.

Now after seeing them perform a proper set without fear of Johnny Law killing our buzz, love has given way to infatuation. I'm not the only one, either. Seemingly every musician on the undercard lined the sides of the stage to watch them do their thing. Day-Z also developed a bad case of Isaiah Mitchell. I had the pleasure of meeting the master at the merch table after I'd recovered from their set ("Don't look him directly in the eye and be sure to call him 'sir'" I warned Day-Z) where he sold me a shirt ("You should ask him to sleep in it and then give it to me" Day-Z suggested) and gave me a head's up on a live disc recorded during a European festival that's going to drop next month. Nice!

As a postscript, Day-Z was a little bent a few minutes later when she saw the cute hippy chick from Assemble Head cozy up to Mitchell at the merch table. She had some less-than-kind words for hippychick, but I offered that the pairing could have children that would end poverty, cure all disease and benevolently rule the utopia they'd create.

Co-headliner Witch wrapped things up, and they were a great outfit. Unfortunately, for them, it was now midnight and I was getting pretty rocked out and hungry by this point. Also, Graveyard and Earthless are tough, tough acts to follow. But, I dug Witch's heavy, riffy sound enough to buy their CD and give them a listen when they have my undivided attention.

What a beautful, loud day it was, the remnants of which I got to enjoy for the next 36 hours, which is when the
constant ringing in my ears finally abated. Permanent hearing damage has never been so much fun.

Eric Vs. "Big" Jim Martin

Yet another in a series of public cries for help as I cannot for the life of me get five stars on "Epic" by Faith No More in Rock Band. The four-and-three-quarters-star glass ceiling is proving to be unbreakable.

This continues a painful trend when it comes to me and my obsession with music video games: The more I love a song, the worse I play it.

This trend now spans several games. It started with "Sweet Child o'Mine" on Guitar Hero II. The song's signature riff always gave me fits.

It continued with "Knights of Cydonia" on GH III, which I never could get a handle on. My inability to play neither the long strumming sections at the beginning or the sci-fi interlude before the song's furious finish often sent my blood pressure through the roof.

And now "Epic," which would definitely be on a very short list of my all-time favorite songs. I can play most of it pretty well, but I can't handle the solo which ends with an insane series of hammer-ons and pull-offs that my clumsy fingers can't even begin to comprehend.

I take this matter a bit too seriously, as I eventually come to blame the guitarists who originally played these songs for my lack of skill and come to despise them. That said, FNM guitarist Jim Martin is my latest arch-nemesis.

Trust me, you're familiar with the dude even if you aren't the rock-&-roll-aphile that I am. Remember the video for "Epic", with the fish flopping on the ground? Or how about the opening minutes of BILL & TED'S BOGUS JOURNEY that are set in the utopia created by the universal love of Wyld Stallyns? Then I'm sure you remember this guy...



If any of you ever see Martin, tell him I hate him.

Labor Day, You Jive Suckah

I continue to be impressed and enamored with The CineFamily's set-up at the Silent Movie Theatre. As if the lure of seeing long-forgotten and extremely rare gems as well as amazing music documentaries from the comfort of a plush couch wasn't enough, bossman Hadrian is prone to moments of demented genius like the insane Five-Minute Game the theatre hosted on Labor Day.

Get your mind out of the gutter for a moment. The five-minute game isn't what you played in junior high when you were locked in a closet at a party with a member of the opposite sex (hopefully) while someone stood outside the door with a stopwatch. This is something Hadrian said was born during his video store days as a game for geeks by geeks.

Occasionally after the store closed, the employees would scramble to all corners of the building to unearth the most obscure title they could find. The kind of thing that never, ever, ever got rented. Hadrian said it was key to look for layers of dust on top of the video box or seriously faded color on the box art done by years of sun damage.

The geeks would then scramble back to the VCR where everyone would watch exactly five minutes of each title, the rationale being that every movie is good for at least the first five minutes. Everyone would vote on which they wanted to watch in its entirety, and the winning film would roll.

Brilliant, right?

The game was preceded by one of the semi-regular CineFamily cookouts, which is yet another stroke of genius. If you haven't read any of my earlier blogs about the Silent Movie Theatre, they have a swanky back patio with a barbecue which occasionally is opened up for a BYOM throwdown. Pimpadelic Wonderland, the house disc/video jockey and Hadrian's co-conspirator, spins tunes while the geeks try not to burn themselves and chow down on some grub and several cans of Tecate, which always seem to be in abundance at the theatre.

Fellow New Beverly regular Michael and I grilled for a bit before the preceeding, my veggie-dogs sharing real estate on the jam-packed barbecue with his swanky chicken-apple sausages. Chewing became a luxury we couldn't afford as Hadrian summonsed the geeks into the theatre shortly after cooking was completed.

Ballots were waiting on the seats, and though I was sure I'd have heard of at least a couple of the 15 titles, none of them rang even a tiny bell. Hadrian and one of the video-store geeks who helped create the game explained its genesis and the rules before the parade of cinematic abominations began.

And an interesting mix it was, indeed. TOOMORROW (That's not a typo), a lightweight Olivia Newton-John disco sci-fi thing, kicked things off and seriously worried me. I make no secret of my severe hatred of all things disco, especially when disco and cinema are joined in an unholy union. All we needed was a couple people like New Bevver/disco-musical lover Jen in the crowd and I'd spend 90 minutes in Hell.

My fears were doubled a little later when a disco horror film, NOCTURNA, also reared its ugly head. (Damn thing even had the balls to promise appearances by one-hit wonders Gloria Gaynor and Vicki Sue Robinson in the opening credits.)

Most of the films were terrible, and not in a potentially entertaining way. I gathered few of them had a chance, so I only remained fearful of being stuck with one of the disco films. SECOND SIGHT, an utterly forgettable late-'80s piece of cable fodder comedy with Bronson Pinchot playing a psychic detective and John Larroquette playing...Uh, Hell if I remember...was the only one I had ever seen before let alone heard of, as it turned out.

There were only two I really wanted to see, the first being Z.P.G. (Stands for Zero Population Growth) which looked like a laughable bit of socially conscious '70s sci-fi in which world leaders on a smoggy, insanely overpopulated Earth try to fend off the apocalypse by banning reproduction for a generation. We caught a glimpse of a youngish Oliver Reed during the film's five minutes, and I imagine he kicked the crap out of his agent once filming wrapped.

Z.P.G. had potential, but my clear-cut choice was DEATH PROMISE, which I fell head-over-heels in love with from the moment it opened with an aerial view of a pair of dudes (One of which was a black dude rocking a physics-defying afro) jogging through Central Park in matching banana yellow track suits accompanied by a funky "Death Promise" theme song which sounded like something from the late Isaac Hayes, only much, much worse.

An unintentionally hilarious voiceover explains that landlords will often go to extreme measures to drive tenants out of rent-controlled buildings in order to replace them with residents who will have to pay a higher rate. When this happens, the victims are only left with one choice...

...to FIGHT!

The non-afro sporting jogger then thwarts an attack by a couple of landlord-sponsored goons on an elderly neighboy by using some of the clumsiest martial arts ever captured on celluloid before DEATH PROMISE's five minutes were up.

It was EPIC!

We adjourned to the patio for more grilling while the votes were tallied. DEATH PROMISE was getting a lot of buzz around the barbecue and did receive a rocking ovation, so I liked its chances. Micheal and fellow New Bevver/frequent partner-in-crime Cat also voted for DEATH PROMISE, but a few of Michael's friends weren't loving the kung-fu exploitation, which concerned me. Hadrian called us all back in, and by now I wanted to see DEATH PROMISE so badly that I was gonna be a little more than annoyed if it didn't win.

In third place was SECOND SIGHT. I guess there's something to be said for Gen-X nostalgia and the fact that its five minutes included three recognizable actors. That said, it would've made for an extremely boring and anti-climactic night, so I suppose it recieved a few tallies from the casual films fans milling about but didn't get much of the hardcore geek vote.

Hadrian said Z.P.G. came in second by a mere vote. Again, it looked like a great source of unintentional comedy, but it just didn't grab me the way one of the films did. Things looked really good at this point.

And the winner...



DEATH-freakin'-PROMISE! And it was all I hoped it would be.

The hero (If you can call him that) and his afro-ed partner take a stand against a landlord who has joined in an axis of evil with several others to drive out their tenants so they can raze the buildings and sell to a developer. The axis included a stereotypical late-'70s Italian, a stereotypical late-'70s Jew and a stereotypical late-'70s African-American pimp/pusher. A little something to offend everyone.

The clothing and music were atrocious, the acting and dialogue was even worse, and the martial arts scenes were done s...o s...l...o...w...l...y that you wondered if the cast was trained at the same YMCA in Newark that taught Daniel Larusso. It did, however, have an attempt at a twist ending, so I'll give the writer props for the effort.

Just awesome!

Based on the huge turnout, Hadrian promised to do this kinda thing again. Can't wait, but DEATH PROMISE is going to be a tough, tough act to follow.

Clu Gulager Is My Homeboy

As the New-Bev faithful and I filed out of the theatre following the final night of Clu Gulager's film fest, we all agreed on one thing: Four nights barely scratches the surface of this actor's monumental resume.


The second batch of Clu's films were much more serious and subdued compared to the wacky double shot of horror films that kicked things off. The night began with THE LAST PICTURE SHOW, which, as I learned that night, really needs to be seen at the cinema to fully be appreciated.

It had been many years since I had seen this early-'70s epic, and, like many films I've revisited in recent years, I found a new appreciation for it. I'd chalk to it up to maturity, but we all know that couldn't possibly be the case with me.

Although the films ends with Cloris Leachman's scathing Academy-Award winning monologue, the soul of PICTURE SHOW is found in its quieter moments. The small Texas town that contains the lives of its characters is dying a slow death in 1951. Anarene is expiring with a whimper, not a bang, while the space age is booming elsewhere. The vast plains that surround it on all sides are slowly strangling it, and most everyone who lives there have tacitly accepted it with a shrug and are meandering on.

The big screen underlines the enormity of the emptiness that's suffocating Anarene. It's not quite the end of the world, but you can see it from there. The highways that serve as the only lifeline between civilzation and this small Texas town seem to stretch forever. Drive too far and you'll fall off the edge of the planet into oblivion, as ancient sailors feared.

I was really intruiged by Clu since it was, after all, his night. I'm sure it also had something to do with the fact that he's the only actor in the film that I hang out with.

The man I know now is something of a favorite great uncle. He's your grandparent's sibling who can both spin fascinating stories about his experiences and have you rolling with a well-timed off-color remark, often in the same sentence.

But he had an air of danger and mystery about him four decades ago. In PICTURE SHOW he plays a roughneck named Abilene. (His name or a handle given to him based on his hometown?) He says little and wears a perpetual poker face that leaves you a little uneasy about what could be simmering beneath the surface. We spend two hours watching Cybill Shepherd's Jacy effortlessly bend overmatched boys to her will before she briefly gets mixed up with Abilene and immediately learns that life isn't going to be as easy as she thinks it'll be.

Afterwards, Clu dished about working for the megalomaniacal Peter Bogdanovich, who the actor both praised for his skill and slammed for his overbearing directorial style. Clu said his pool-hall scene with Shepherd, who Bogdanovich had recently begun romancing despite their age gap, caused the director a lot of grief. The scene was cut from the theatrical print, added decades later in an extended cut, and Clu made no effort in hiding his anger over Bogdanovich's mistake.

The festival wrapped with 1964's THE KILLERS, which I had never seen before but was being highly lauded by my fellow New Bevvers. Clu and Lee Marvin play a pair of hit men who have a bit of a "bad cop-worse cop" routine to their partnership. I could clearly see these characters' fingerprints all over the subplot of a film that would be made three decades later.

Marvin's performance is pretty subdued. Clu is a wildman, whose antics elicit the same nervous laughter Joe Pesci gets in GoodFellas. The pair complement each other nicely, and I can easily say this is the best made-for-TV film I've ever seen.


Clu honored several of us on the final night of his festival with thanks and shoutouts. Once again, never would I have imagined during any of my countless THE RETURN OF THE LIVING DEAD viewings that one day Clu Gulager would be thanking me by name for being his chum. It was an honor both because of my admiration of his work as an actor and my affection for him as a person.

Seems like it wouldn't be a night at the New Bev if it didn't end with a wacky photo, and the cake fellow freaks Rob and Jen brought served as the inspiration for this installment. Naturally, Clu was game for this freakshow wedding photo.



Four nights really isn't enough. Let's all keep our fingers crossed that Clu-Fest 2: Clu's Revenge happens soon.

CURRENTLY LISTENING: Silversun Pickups - Carnavas (Yes, still. They're that good and I was a little late in discovering this one.)

Send...more...paramedics

What a long, strange trip it's been -- "Truckin'" The Grateful Dead

Cliche, I know, but that lyric wouldn't stop bouncing around my head last weekend as venerable actor, New Beverly Cinema fixture and, I'm quite proud to say, my friend Clu Gulager hosted four nights of his films at the Beverly. He and I had a lot of history together long before I had the pleasure of actually meeting him, which served as a 25-year set up for his film fest.

I wasn't a huge horror fan growing up, but I had to learn how to become one quickly. The other kids in the neighborhood loved horror films. To have a dissenting opinion as child is to be a social outcast, so I, too, fell in line and learned to at least not hate horror. I've always liked films that were fun or exciting. Horror films were neither.


Standards were obviously a little different in the heady days of the mid-'80s. The films that were considered extreme at the time seem pretty tame after two decades of societal decay, but even then I was put off by most of the slasher films. The only horror films I dug were a little outta left field.

A maniac with a machette didn't do it for me. Freddy Krueger was badass. I could watch stuff about aliens, monsters or alien monsters. (There's an alien monster film that even qualifies as an out-and-out masterpiece.)

But hands down my favorite sub-genre was zombie flicks.



I first saw THE RETURN OF THE LIVING DEAD in junior high and immediately fell in love with its demented genius. (And the west-coast punk soundtrack certainly helped.) The characters were strange and far different than the cookie cutter targets who only existed to meet a gruesome demise in other flicks. The movie's full of brilliant throwaway gags, like the eye chart that reads "Burt is a slavedriver and a cheap sonofabitch..." Freddy's varsity jacket is another favorite of mine. The back reads "F**k You" in the theatrical version. On TV it reads "Television Version." Brilliant.

I saw the film often over the years and it easily became my favorite horror film. But never during any of the viewings did I imagine I'd someday be sitting with the man playing Burt and listening to his war stories about making this celluloid abomination.


But I'm getting ahead of myself. The night began with a viewing and panel for FEAST. Turns out that Clu has an in with the director.

I first saw FEAST a few months ago in a red envelope viewing after a co-worker recommended it to me. I really liked it for a lot of the same reasons I've loved RETURN all these years: It's very smart, funny and self-aware without skimping on the horror. It's obvious neither film had much of a budget, but the directors of both manage to overcome that obvious constraint.

As with most films, FEAST was even better on the big screen. Judging from the big laughs in the appropriate places, many in the audience had never seen it before and, I'd imagine, walked away fans.


Resident genius Marc hosted the panel that followed, which included the Gulagers, actress (and Gulager by marriage) Diane Goldner, actor Duane Whitaker (Who's much, much cooler than the colossal pricks he plays in this film and another film you perhaps have seen) and a few crew members.



The younger Gulager dished about the challenges of making FEAST. Making a low-budget film is hard enough, he said, but making a film with everything being documented for television while two dozen producers are breathing down your neck is especially taxing. All involved described the shoot as exasperating, but added that the reshoots which were done minus the interference from Bravo and the producers, were quite fun.





The night wrapped with a screening of RETURN, which got the full panel treatment the night before but I was absent due to a slight case of work. I had never seen it at the cinema before, and one of the many reasons I love the Bev is that it allows me to see these films that served as the cornerstones of my childhood as intended. Home video is great, but there is simply no substitute for seeing a film on the big screen with an audience, especially one full of geeks who know proper (cult) movie etiquette.

It was nothing short of a thrill watching the film. Seeing it with Clu, who I've gotten to know pretty well after spending many hours standing in line with him over the past year, made it all the sweeter. It was kind of a culminating moment after a quarter-century of geeking over RETURN.

I thought it'd be a good idea to mark the occasion and continue the tradition we kicked off with Diablo Cody during her turn at the theatre's helm.

It goes without saying that Clu was more than happy to pose for a geek team photo.

A long, strange trip indeed.

CURRENTLY LISTENING: Silversun Pickups - Carnavas