Hobbit Hair.

Last night was, and this is an understatement, stupendous. Girls dancing on the bar. Rocker boys shaking their groove thing. Wriggling hips and pouty lips from wall to wall. Rudy and I kicked major ass. Now, as an extension of that evening, I find my ass still a bit numb from last night’s kicking and my brain is a tab cob-webbed but I’ll do my best. I’ve actually found that a slight fuzziness seems to aid my creativity. I think it might be because I have trouble focusing on any one thing so ideas keep whizzing past my head. In one ear and out the other. That sort of thing. It’s not so good at constructing a masterwork per se but it is useful in gathering seeds that will blossom later with a little further attention.

Oh yeah, the title above refers to what the top of my head looks like. Jeez do I have a lot of frickin’ hair up there. Oh great. Now that I typed that I’m sure to start balding. Crap.


Fanatics, lub sweet lub and the space in-between.

So I was thinking about people that are nutty about sports. This was prompted by my bringing in the full newspaper to work, realizing I should probably offer the sports section in it to some of the “sporty-guys” in the office...and then wondering just what would be in there to read. I mean are any sports even in season right now? Football’s done, baseball doesn’t start for a while and beach volleyball season is a loooong way off still. So what do these people read as news in these relatively slow sports news cycles?

Then I thought about people that are really crazy about sports. You know, he types that can’t date outside of their circle. Like a guy that’s a Bears fan that just absolutely could never even consider dating a Packer’s fan. I can sort of see that from a musical perspective with an example being an emo girl that just won’t date a metal dude. Then I thought about myself and how lucky I am to have such a broad taste in music. For instance, when I met Photogal her favorite band was Hootie and the Blowfish. Hootie and the fucking Blowfish! Of course she also dug The Afghan Whigs and Bad Brains but if I was a true musical snob the Hootie thing would have been an insurmountable obstacle. The moral? I don’t care how much you love the home team. If you find a mate that can groove then you should fucking grab ‘em and count yourself lucky.


Thanks and have a nice day…

On my way in I also stopped and picked up some coffee and was annoyed by the sun-shiney folks behind the counter. I mean what losers. They work in retail! How can that be fulfilling?

But then I thought back to my own experiences in retail and I realized that, while the customers generally sucked, the environment was a lot of fun. Lots of witty banter formulated to pass the time and lots of room for actually getting to know your co-workers. As a matter of fact the environment sort of generated a sort of second family feeling in me and my brethren. Come to think of it, as long as you look past the low wages, retail is pretty fucking cool!


Mail order is fun!

So I was turned on to The Moonbabies by Paul’s extremely positive words over at The Rub and 75 Or Less. I secured a burned copy of the disc and fell in love. Then I looked to purchase my very own factory sealed copy. I searched. And searched. And searched and searched and searched and could not find a copy in the Chicago area so I decided to do things old-school stylee and I actually ordered a copy from their American label and had it sent to me through the mail.

Mail order is something that is so easy to do now due to the Internet but I remember back in the day, like 1992, when stores buried in the heart of the bible belt just did not carry cool music and the only way to get most of the albums you wanted was by writing a letter, including a check or some well concealed cash and mailing the whole thing off to the label. Two to three weeks later – presto! – a new album would arrive in the mail. In some ways that made the music more precious since a) you knew you really wanted the disc because you actually put some effort into obtaining it and b) it humanized the whole deal and you felt closer to actually dealing with the band and their cohorts rather than buying from some listless middleman punching in sales at the generic neighborhood “big-box” store.

You know that gets me to thinking about downloading as well. In some ways the current age is terrific for people like me that just can’t get enough music and enjoy listening to as much as possible to contribute to the bedrock of our near maniacal, nigh encyclopedic musical knowledge. On the other hand, sometimes too much is too much. I rarely listen to discs more than a few times now. Sometimes it feels like a job to slog through all the hours and hours of tunes I haven’t listened to yet. Also, and this has been eroding since I started to receive forthcoming albums to review in college, I kind of miss the anticipation that used to precede an album’s release date. A bit of the magic is forever gone.

So sometimes it’s nice to take a step back, write a check and mail off an order form, and wait for that special aural treat to arrive in the mail.


Note to self: If The Moonbabies ever tour the States I must book their Chicago show. I know have a mission in life...


L-to the-FM

For the record, the Light FM album release show rocked my world. I hate to resort to a cliché, but take it leterally and you get an inkling of how good the show was. The album also kills. You need a copy. Now.

Also, the band's drummer is looking to sub-let his apartment as he and his wife move into a home more suited to the impending arrival of their new little baby boy. If you're interested in the pad, and it is a sweet place located on the border of the Wicker Park neighborhood here in Chicago -- right near my favorite Mexican restaurant Tecalitlan -- then just drop me a line and I'll forward it on to him.