He's baaaack....

Yup, I've gone and done it again. After two years of focusing on other endeavors I've decided to dust off the old keyboard, don the ol' rock crit specs again, crack the knuckles dramatically and write for a nationally followed music web-site. I'll let the site's overlord do the speaking for me on this one:

Tomorrow I'll be launching a new column on donewaiting.com, but before then I thought I'd get all you lovable newsletter readers a sneak preview.

NAME OF COLUMN: Lost in Guyville
LOCATION OF COLUMN: Chicago, IL
WRITER OF COLUMN: Tankboy

So Tankboy e-mails me one day and says "Hey, you've got all these new columns in different cities, why aren't you showing Chicago any love?" And before you could say "Deep Dish," we had our lawyers sign the contracts and ta-da! He's writing for the site.

Tankboy comes with a lot of knowledge of the Chicago scene, so it's going to be great to have him onboard with us. We're really excited about this column.

CLICK HERE TO TAKE A LOOK

How was New York, you ask?

Lovely. The show went well (Daddy were sweethearts, Rudy kicked out a great acoustic set and Combo No. 3 literally shook the walls), Combo No. 3 got written up in the Village Voice, Rudy and I had a blast even though Rudy got a little lost Friday night and had to stay at an over-priced hotel on the Upper East Side, I decided the smoking ban in NYC can bite my ass, we saw little girls going crazy over some dude neither Rudy nor I recognized in Times Square outside the TRL studios, We attended a poetry party that could have been really pretentious but ended up being really cool (even if white guys should just stop trying to play reggae), I spent waaaay too much money overall and my first night there I ran into David Cross and managed to be both fawning and a complete asshole in the space of 20 minutes. Oh well, he was really high -- I think it was his birthday or something -- so I don't think he really cared.

Fun!

Now it's time to lay off the booze for a while though...

This is all good.

Speaking of New york...the show I set up is tonight and Rudy is now going to do a short acoustic set between Combo No 3 and Daddy. Details?

Thursday April 3
Combo No 3
Rudy of Woolworthy
Daddy
at
The Bowery Poetry Club
308 Bowery St., New York, NY 10012
212.614.0505

Show starts at 10:30pm

Come by and buy us broke out-of-towners a beer!

FOX News is evil.

I'm out in the suburbs dropping Betty the Beagle off with my family before Rudy and I head out of town to New York and am -- as usually happens when I get within ten feet of a cable box -- consuming the continuos feed on the war. However no matter how much you pay me I will never watch the cable FOX news channel. Pure propoganda.

Liberating Chickens!

While the overtones are serious just try reading this story without laughing out loud.

How does one "wave a chicken?"

It's Phair to say I'm a little disappointed...but I can see the silver lining.

I love Liz Phair. I still feel like an ass for the time I hit on her -- years and years ago -- and got shot down without even realizing it was her. Then I had to deal with the bartender laughing at me. Then my friends. Then everyone who I’ve told the stiry to since then (and no I’m not going into it here.) It especially stung since when I first heard Exile In Guyville I, along with 99% of the male indie population, pretty much pictured Ms. Phair as the perfect woman for me...one who could challenge me and be a general bad-ass yet was down with all the bedroom freakiness that runs through an early twenty-something's head. I loved Whip-Smart because I dug the poppier direction she was taking while still kicking it with the great lyrical twists. 

Whitechocolatespaceegg is where doubt began to settle in. First Ms. Phair went and got married and settled into the family life (though I always felt bad for her step-son...imagine being a teenager and having Liz-Fucking-Phair as your mom. You'd never sleep!) Then came the endless delays as the release date for the disc moved further and further back. And then came the disc itself. To be fair I still dig the album and actually felt like it was part of the logical progression of Ms. Phair's growing up. But the warning signs were there.

Then she sang back-up vocals on -- admittedly a pretty nice little tune but nevertheless -- a Sheryl Crow song. Then word filtered out that she was working with The Matrix production team a.k.a. the geniuses behind Avril Lavigne's current "world domination."

Now I've finally heard the album and can attest with all honesty that Liz has finally jumped the shark.

Shiny happy choruses abound and the lyrics are less than inspiring. She goes for an old "see I'm still shocking" joke with "Pure White Cum" The truth of the matter is that "joke" is probably the best song on the disc. That and a song about her underwear (extra props for using underwear as a metaphor for a lover...I actually thought that was pretty witty.

So critically the album's a stinker.

But I still like it. Why?

Well, for one Ms. Phair has made no pretense of not "going for broke" with this one. She's aiming for a super-duper Platinum selling type thing. Hell people, she's getting on in years and bills ain't gonna pay themselves! So the songs themselves are really catchy in that lowest common denominator way that usually leads to boffo album sales and usually these reasons wouldn't be enough for me but picture this: Ms. Phair's new album becomes the hit of the Junior High set and blasts from every teenager's convertible this summer. Then these kids, at least a few of them, go out and buy her previous albums and get turned on to her really good stuff. Sure, first they'll be confused wondering why this "Blowjob Queen" shares the same name as their current hero but then you just know they're going to get into it and actually discover something that speaks beyond a catchy hook and a super multi-tracked chorus, right?

Freedom of the Press?

Well, it's already happening as we see more and more of the press silenced through either direct government intervention or via the misguided activities of the general citizenry. The worst victim so far has to be Al-Jazeera, the Arabic version of CNN that's been virtually banned from Wall Street and who's English language version of its site didn't even last a day before being hacked into submission. (You can actually see what the site looked like right here courtesy of The Memory Hole.)

This is unfortunate on a number of levels the primary one of course being that you don't gain the trust of the Arab world by shutting their primary news source out! The government was livid that they broadcast images of US dead and PoWs but I think it can be argued that they themselves weren't violating the Genva Conventions...especially since the media is not beholden to the conventions! How many Western media images do we see of Iraqi soldiers tied up and sitting in rows on top of the desert sand or mangled Iraqi corpses twisted into that exact same sand? Clearly Al-Jazeera is the subject of a terrible double standard here that's primarily driven by their audacity in questioning the American motives in the Iraq conflict. Jeez...half the periodicals in both the US and England are questioning the exact same things! Some are paying (sorry about that Peter Arnett) but most get away with it as the White House grows more and more frustrated by public reaction to the whole situation.

Personally I'm of the opinion that since now we're there we shouldn't really leave until we finish the job...if for no other reason that if we leave the Iraqi people out to hang again it's just going to damage the West's image even more. I just don't think that the best way of improving upon that image in the current situation is by shutting out dissenting Arabic media views. We're supposedly going in to sow the seeds of democracy but our loutish behavior thus far isn't really helping our case, now is it?

More on that leaky Net.

Well, I've given the new Radiohead a few spins and can only conslusively come up with two immediate observations.

Observation #1: This sounds much more like the disc everyone thought would follow OK Computer. Lots of guitars and pleanty of Thom Yorke's trademark wails remind the masses of what they fell in love with in the first place.

Observation #2: There however is a basic danger in finally hearing what the people have been pining for. From what I can tell this is a much less exciting disc and a bit of the danger and adventure that permeated both Kid A and Amnesiac is missing.

A much longer review should come in a day or two when I've had more time to digest this thing.

Leaky Net

Can't wait until June? Well here's the new Radiohead album Hail To The Thief and here's a few songs in case that other link goes dead. In related news, if you're into peer to peer networks...the whole fucking cat is out of the bag and you can find the rest of the disc just about anywhere. By my estimate it must have been leaked in the last 24 hours and it's spreading like a virus.

The funniest thing is that everyone -- including me -- is still going to go out and buy the damn thing when it's "officially" released in June. That's what happens when bands actually put out good music.

The Rock Show Attendee’s Creed

Something to get your weekend off on the right foot. The rest of this most excellent and illuminating piece can be found here. Go and read it. Then go here and here to further learn the rules by which we rock

I believe in Iggy, Jimi, Chryssie, and Joe Strummer, the Parents Almighty, Creator of heaven on earth; I believe in Malcolm McClaren and Sid Vicious, His only Son. I believe in punk, lo-fi and gangsta, indie, post-punk, indie-pop, rock, singer-songwriter, and insurgent country, conceived by Uncle Tupelo, born of Jeff Tweedy who suffers, as does Lou Barlow. I believe in Squirrelbait and Johnny Cash. I believe in the Motor City. I will respectfully love and fear Tad. I believe in Superchunk and PJ Harvey. I believe in new bands and will never pretend to know music I have never heard, so my mind may stay open and I will sitteth at the right hand of Mission of Burma so I may one day ascend to heaven, where I will be greeted by Sonic Youth, Eazy-E, and Mike Watt. I will not listen to rock critics, but trust my own ears. I believe in DIY, zines, Yo La Tengo, the communion of Saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of Cobain, and rock everlasting. Amen.

Thanks to Daisy Glaze for pointing this one out to me via e-mail.

Just a thought.

Can we change the rules so you no longer have to be born in the US in order to become president? I mean, after watching the dual press conference with Tony Blair and George Bush yesterday I definitley want Blair in the White House!

Hogs and Honeys

I'll be the first to admit that I run with a group who can be a bit, um, stuck on ourselves and tend to look down our noses at activities that aren't really "cool." Luckily we're a self-aware enough group of folks that we realize that this attitude is pretty butt-ass dumb and we do our best to challenge our preconceptions and remain open to outside possibilities when it comes to activities through which to while away our free time.

Simply, we're looking for fun and we'll get it any way we can.

In that spirit I decided that last night would entail an excursion to a bar that, on the surface, just seemed so vile and disturbing a concept that it just had to be so gaudy as to be fun. Basically Hogs and Honeys is a bar that's aiming full-on for the yuppie Bud Light swilling Hooter's lovin' beach volleyball pick uppin' crowd. You can get $1 22ounce beers, ride a mechanical bull for free and the hot female bartenders jump up on the bar and dance. Then drunk girls jump up on the bar and dance. Then drunk ex-frat guys jump up on the bar and dance. Then adrunk ex-frat guy and a hot female bartrender indulge in a pull-up competition on a rail above the bar-top. The hot female bartender won. On top of it all our friends who are in a live rock and roll karaoke band were performing.

So I think you get the idea. On paper this is just too hilarious to be true and when mined correctly it must be fun, right?

Nope.

It was scary. Really scary. Had I been drunker it might have been slightly fun. For instance one of my friends was sufficiently drunk that he was hitting on the beer-tub girl and actually thought he had a chance. I know this line of thinking since I've stumbled into that terrain in the past. Basically we rocker boys think that when we go to a "mainstream" (read: yuppie/frat) bar we instantly become a "hot commodity" because we're "individuals." The more beer we drink the more we believe it and usually start hitting on the staff because we believe they can "pick up on our vibe" of "individuality." I mean how could they not? They're surrounded by so much cattle that when a prime Angus bull walks in they must appreciate it, right?

Nope again.

Basically the staff is there to make a buck. The easiest way to make a buck off frat boys is to wear tight shirts and flirt a lot. It's almost reflexive. So in the end we fall for the exact same line the frat boys are which, in effect, proves that we ain't that much different from the crowd we're lookin' down our noses at.

Anyway, the band was smokin' and the crowd really seemed into it and this was the portion of the evening I could almost stomach as long as the beer and bourbon kept flowing. However they cut my friends off early so they could start playing "white-boy-friendly" hip-hop (The Beasties, Sir Mix-A-Lot, Will Smith, you know...crap) and get those girls dancing on the bar again. Now this is the point that the crowd really started to get into it and other girls started jumping on the mechanical bull and I was just surrounded by red leering jeering alcohol bloated male faces. It was like the scene where the acid kicks into Hunter S. Thompson in the hotle lobby and the floor runs awash in blood while the clientele turn into large scaly lizards.

Nightmarish really.

So we got the hell out of there.

So to recap: my friends and I tried something new last night, had a bit of fun and then ran like hell when the scene started to get a little weird. The lesson learned? Next time I go to see my friends burn up the live rock and roll karaoke at Hogs and Honeys I've got to a) get pretty plowed before getting there b) get there early and c)start practicing my pull-ups so I can kick that hot female bartender's ass in the pull-up contest.

And now the yucks.

Here is a place that folks are summarizing musicians entire career in the space of a few words. Very funny.

Thanks to The Rub for the tip-off.

This just in!

One of my favorite music sites for info and such is Tiny Mixtapes Gone To Heaven. Why? Read below:

The Strokes Begin Recording New Album with God

According to self-proclaimed wiz kid Ryan, The Strokes began strokin' it up at a recording studio in NY, earlier this week. With continuous comparisons to Radiohead, Beck, and Travis, The Strokes decided to go the Godrich route, which basically means they'll allow producer Nigel Godrich to compress the hell out of their music and force the NY rockers to re-record their parts until the rough edges are polished out; he hates human mistakes. And since The Strokes lack talent, the recording process could go longer than expected.

However, that doesn't mean Godrich is the official producer. If you know anything about the Strokes, you know they get what they want, those hedonistic bastards. So the plan is to record only two songs with Godrich over the next couple weeks. If both parties are satisfied (or, if the Strokes are satisfied), they'll throw another bag of money at Godrich to record the rest of their second album. Despite any potential setbacks, they plan to release the album in late August or early September.

See? Informative and funny! Much like Done Waiting, only waaay snobbier.

Glad to know the indie 'tude can survive even the most confusing of times.

Now...

...I have to start mail bombing my friends to convince them it actually is a good idea to go to Hogs and Honeys tonight to witness the Live Rock and Roll Karaoke. Think of Coyote Ugly ramming headfirst into Reckless Records...terribly tacky, but in these confusing times (there's that phrase again)...genius!

Dixie Yucks

I was e-mailed the below. It is definitely one of the better pieces of satire to emerge from this whole "Dixie Chick Vs. Dubya" fiasco. I wish I knew who actually wrote it becasue I would totally give them credit for this. I'm over-using this word today but...genius!

An apology from Natalie of the Dixie Chicks

"As a concerned American citizen, I apologize to President Bush because my remark was disrespectful. I now realize that whoever holds that office should be treated with the utmost respect.

I hope everyone understands, I'm just a young girl who grew up in Texas. As far back as I can remember, I heard people say they were ashamed of President Clinton. I saw bumper stickers calling him everything from a pothead to a murderer. I heard people on the radio and tv like Rush Limbaugh, Pat Robertson, Newt Gingrich and Trent Lott bad mouthing the President and ridiculing his wife and daughter at every opportunity.

I heard LOTS of people disrespecting the President. So I guess I just assumed it was acceptable behavior.

But now, thanks to the thousands of angry people who want radio stations to boycott our music because criticizing the President is unpatriotic, I realize it's wrong to have a liberal opinion if you're a country music artist. I guess I should have thought about that before deciding to play music that attracts hypocritical red necks.

I also realize now that I'm supposed to just sing and look cute so our fans won't have anything to upset them while they're cheating on their wives or getting in drunken bar fights or driving around in their pickup trucks shooting highway signs and small animals.

And most important of all, I realize that it's wrong for a celebrity to voice a political opinion, unless they're Charlie Daniels, Clint Black, Merle Haggard, Barbara Mandrell, Loretta Lynn, Ricky Skaggs, Travis Tritt, Hank Williams Jr, Amy Grant, Larry Gatlin, Crystal Gayle, Reba McEntire, Lee Greenwood, Lorrie Morgan, Anita Bryant, Mike Oldfield, Ted Nugent, Wayne Newton, Dick Clark, Jay Leno, Drew Carey, Dixie Carter, Victoria Jackson, Charleton Heston, Fred Thompson, Ben Stein, Bruce Willis, Kevin Costner, Arnold Schwartzenegger, Bo Derek, Rick Schroeder, George Will, Pat Buchanan, Bill O'Reilly, Joe Rogan, Delta Burke, Robert Conrad or Jesse Ventura.

God Bless America,
Natalie"

These aren't exactly rose colored glasses but I think they'll make you smile.

See the world through Mr. T's eyes for a while.

Yesh!

FUBAR?

Apparently much of the fate of the US/British invasion of Iraq now hinges of the outcome of the Basra conflict. DEBKAfile reports that forces connected to Saddam's nutjob of a son Uday have approached from the north laden with cash to get Iraqi citizenry to begin a sort of intifada against the invading forces. From the south comes the Shiite militiamen led by Majid al-Khoei -- a US secret weapon that Gen Franks had up his sleeve if you will -- hoping to unite the largely Shiite population into an uprising against Saddam. This is the "Iraqi Uprising" in Basra you've been hearing about.

Why is Basra now so damned important? Again, according to DEBKAfile:

DEBKAfile’s military sources reveal that allied generals are banking heavily on a successful Shiite uprising against the Saddam regime in Basra under Majid Khoei’s leadership spreading to the Shiite holy cities of Najef and Karbala on the route to Baghdad and also infecting the Shiite troops serving with the Special Republican Divisions defending the capital. Especially targeted are the Shiites of the Iraqi Army’s 2nd Army which is posted in Baghdad.

However, if Uday beats General Franks to the draw and is able to incite the Shiites to rise up in support of the Iraqi army, thereby retaining hold of Basra – even for a brief period - the Shiite community of at least 12 million will not dare to line up behind Majid Khoei. There will be nothing then to stop the Iraqi guerrilla war against allied supply lines growing into a wholesale paramilitary campaign against the American and British military presence in Iraq.

Much for the forthcoming contest in Baghdad is therefore riding on the outcome of the fight for Basra, in which British troops and Shiite militiamen, under cover of American fighter planes and helicopters, are pitted against the paramilitary forces of Uday Hussein, supported by elements of the Iraqi 11th, 51s and 6th Divisions, as well as Saddam’s Fedayeen and the local Baath militia.

Personally I've been hoping this whole thing would have gone along with Donald Rumsfeld's plans of a lighter invasion force that gets in and out with a minimum of casualties but it's beginning to seem like that will only work in situations where the opponent is willing to play by the rules. Now the US is facing a man who keeps all of his power -- even over his most trusted aides -- through a fog of intimidation and terror and is willing to break every rule in the book to insure his survival.

I'm worried and I hope all this naysaying is completely off the mark and the folks that are over in Iraq -- on both sides of the conflict -- come out okay in the end.

But I'm still worried.

First Salam Pax and now...

Blogs are everywhere and in some ways giving the most unique insights into this particular war. First I came across the Dear Raed blog ostensibly coming from an Iraqi citizen in Bagdhad and now we've got the US's own Lt. Smash (funny, they just re-ran that Simpsons episode the day before yesterday) posting from "The Sandbox." It's a bit light and reads more like propopganda than anything else. A nice epicenter of war related blogs would be at Blogs Of War. Links galore to all kinds of other sites and minute by minute updates. Not bad for a US-centric site.

404 File Not Found?

Fu-hu-hu-nny!

Thanks to Zannah for the point in the right direction. Rad.

Thanking my lucky stars.

So I've been complaining about being kept up by my local PBS station running the CNN feed in the overnight slot...but after spending the day at my parents doing my taxes I am so glad I only have access to CNN in that time slot.

Why?

Wolf Blitzer is an annoying little pud, that's why. What a dork. A la Kramer in Seinfeld I fear if I hear his voice any more I'll go into some sort of epileptic fit...

TONIGHT

Need comforting in these trying times?
Tankboy
and
Rudy of Woolworthy
are ready to comfort you lots.

Old school rock and/or roll attitude
mixed with only the finest selections
from yesterday, today and tomorrow.

TONIGHT, Tuesday March 25, 2002
Free PBR from 9-10pm
Free CDs and DVDs courtesy Capitol/EMI all night long

Brand new and unreleased stuff from
Grandaddy, The Assassins, The Yeah Yeah Yeahs,
Blur, The Wrens, Crooked Fingers, Cursive,
The D4, The Bad Plus, Longwave, Damone, The Libertines,
Ryan Adams and the Pink Hearts, The Cells,
Holopaw, Echoboy, Mellowdrone, Idlewild
and all the usual older harder rockin' stuff...

Smoooove

Every Tuesday.
Only at Ten56.

Ten56
1056 N Damen
Chicago, IL
773.227.4906

Now this is interesting.

This was reported by DEBKAfile today:

Away from the main arena, a small yet illuminating scene played out just across the Iraqi border Monday morning. Syria complained that a stray American missile had struck a bus killing five civilians and injuring ten.

According to DEBKAfile’s military sources, the only true fact in this terse account was that the bus was Syrian. The missile was no stray. It was deliberately fired from an F-15 fighter-bomber at a bus carrying armed Palestinian volunteers to join up with Iraqi forces, in order to make sure this was the last such Palestinian group of volunteers for Iraq. That F-15 made a piece of history; it carried out the first American air attack on a combatant Palestinian group. More will certainly be heard of this episode.

Keep in mind that DEBKAfile itself is a Jewish based web-site so this piece of reporting could be a bit suspect. However if this is fact then that really does open up a whole new can of worms as far as US involvelement in the Palestinian crisis is concerned.

Pomp and Circumstance

I actually slept through the majority of the Oscars last night -- which isn't that unusual since I usually nod off pretty early on Sundays after abusing my body for the last few days -- but I made sure I was awake to see Steve Martin's opening remarks. Some of my favorites as reported by Reuters were:

Martin rounded out his monologue with a faux tribute to movie stars, set to stirring music: "Movie stars are many things, they can be tall, short, thin or skinny. They can be Democrats or ... skinny. ... We worship them, we idolize them, sometimes we're annoyed with them, like when they shoot their wives.

"Movie stars crave publicity but have the decency not to publicize that they have slept with me," he continued, as shots of a number of stars flashed on the screen -- Kidman, Berry, Julianne Moore, Renee Zellweger, Diane Lane, Julie Andrews, Ted Danson, the cartoon character Stitch and Ernest Borgnine."

Wrapping up, Martin said, "there are no losers tonight, but we're about to change all that."

I then made it through Chris Cooper's acceptance speech and promptly nodded off until my cell rang in the wee AM hours. I fumbled around, snagged it, switched it off and couldn't get back to sleep so I was lucky enough to catch most of Saddam's televised speech and man o man was that spooky!

Why oh why does my local PBS station run CNN late at night? Not ponly do I get no sleep that way but when I finally do doze off I'm shocked awake by the resumption of local programming with the Teletubbies at 6am every morning. Now that's a real nightmare!

Geneva Conventioneering

So I'm trying to figure out why exactly the photos the Iraqis have been circulating of American POWs is a breach of the Geneva Conventions but all the photos of Iraqi POWs in the Western media is okay. I don't have any international law background but does the difference lie in who is doing the actual dissemination of the images? For instance, I'm not aware of any "official" US military photos of POWs...it seems as if all the photos in circulation are courtesy of the international press. Conversely the American POW images are coming directly from the Iraqi government so I'm wondering if it's the source of the images that contributes to the behavior being frowned upon.

Just a guess. If anyone can explain it better to me please shoot me an e-mail.

Make love, not war!

However if you can't find anyone to make love to at the moment might I suggest attending a tee-rific show I put together tonight at The Bottom Lounge? Maybe you can find someone to make love to and take your mind off the war? I certainly know I'm gonna try!

Saturday March 22
Sour Deluxe
Light FM
Analog Radio
at The Bottom Lounge (3206 N Wilton)
Doors at 10:00pm
$7 cover

Rock!

Zach de la Rocha and DJ Shadow...Wonder-Twin powers activate!

Bummed out by the lack of good protest songs for this war? Here's one to rile you up.

Finally something to put a smile on this old sourpuss!

Hilary Rosen, the departing head of the Recording Inductry Association of America, made some pretty wild comments at a convention in Florida a few days ago. Billboard reported:

Rosen spoke of addressing customers' demands for music in more formats, a deeper catalog, and even "a way to make compilations without feeling guilty or like criminals." In short, she said, "They want us to find a way to solve our piracy problems without encroaching on -- or even talking about -- their personal-use flexibility."

Fighting piracy, she said, is "a waste of time if the customer is not served in the legitimate marketplace." Referring to the multiple revenue streams of the film business -- theatrical releases, pay per view, TV rights, and DVD sales -- she said sound recordings should also carry a "panoply of rights" that extends beyond the sale of CDs. She applauded record companies for experimenting with pricing and value-added incentives, and heralded the return of the singles format.

Talk about a full 180 from the histrionics she's been spouting off over the last year! It seems as if -- with the benefit of a broader field of vision as she steps down as head of the RIAA -- Ms. Rosen has finally found a clue and realized that the base of the whole file-sharing problem might just rest in the crap product that the major labels see fit to foist upon the public.

Why didn't she realize this sooner?