From SCR Writer Scott Whitt: In a recent blog, our erstwhile leader showed extreme displeasure with the ticket prices for the Rock The Bayou fest (August 29th-September 1st). Jeremy stated that even though he was once a longhair ne'er-do-well, the price tag out weighs the chance to relive his youth. I want to show that even at $125, it's still a worthwhile deal. If you look at the amount of bands that are playing, it's mind-boggling. Every day there are 4 stages with someone on them. While some of them are local or regional favorites (Mighty Orq and Victim, just to name a few), the main stage is packed with bands that haven't played here for years.

Y&T -- c'mon, who doesn't love "Summertime Girls"? -- have reunited and will be making their only Houston appearance. Queensryche headlines on Friday, and if you see them at the Verizon you have to fork over at least $40 for them and maybe one other band.

Moving on to Saturday and the second stages, there is one of the best band names out there, Wolfeblitzer, and Vain. Vain is one of those bands that got lost in the shuffle when Seattle happened, and then the only way to get their stuff was to buy imports at Soundwaves.

On the main stage there's Dokken, whose latest album, Lightning Strikes Again, shows that they still have it after all these years. Plus, you may get to see the incredible weave that is Don Dokken's hair. Also, there's Lita Ford, who has not been seen in the States in a decade and still looks like she could kick your ass. For all those people that insist on listening to those crappy-sounding chick bands -- Le Tigre fans, I'm looking at you -- why not go see an artist that can actually play her instrument? The night is headlined by the Red Rocker himself, Sammy Hagar, another act that would cost you $40 to see him at the V.

Sunday is no day of rest, as legendary Houston metalers Helstar headline the Bud Light Lime stage. Most do not know of the legacy this band has left except for those of us that frequented Cardi's and Backstage. Of course, if you spent too much time at those places, you might not remember much yourself. Keeping it somewhat local, on the main stage there's Louisiana's Lillian Axe, back from an extended absence. After them is Austin's Dangerous Toys. I know what all you hipsters are thinking: yes, there is a metal band that dared to show it head in the land of pompous poseurs and burnt orange. Later there's Scandinavian fretboard wizard Yngwie J. Malmsteen. The "J" is to differentiate him from all the other Yngwie Malmsteens. Alone he would cost you $25 at The Meridian or Warehouse Live, not to mention that this way you can sing "I Am A Viking" in unison with 30k others. That night's headlined by Alice Cooper, but his last album sucked, and he's become a parody of what he once was.

Monday, the grand finale features Ultra Siberian Pant Factory. I have no idea what that is, but for coming up with a name like that, you should pay $125. The main stage features the chainsaw-wielding Jackyl. Where else can you see a band that uses power tools as an instrument and is actually white-trashier than their audience? The whole shindig gets wrapped up with rock frontman turned reality star Bret Michaels. Now, this could be a bad thing if some of those skanks turned "stars" show up. Of course, there will be plenty of female entertainers at the show, so at least there will be plenty of eye candy. Even if you hate his music with every fiber of your being, who doesn't like watching scantily-clad women dancing provocatively? By watching these ladies dance for free, you can save the money that you would normally spend at the Crystal Pistol or Pink Pussycat or whichever establishment you frequent.

Rock The Bayou was birthed out of the success of Rocklahoma, a similar festival in Pryor, Oklahoma. This year, its second event drew over 100k people. Think how many more people would come if was held here and not in Pryor, Oklahoma. If it wasn't for the concert, no one would have ever heard of Pryor, Oklahoma. People that live in Oklahoma don't want to live in Oklahoma.

Lastly, when was the last time you felt like you were 19 again? Several months ago friends and I went to see Iron Maiden. For two and a half hours, I felt like the denim jacket-wearing youth I once was. For the time of the show, you forgot how old you were, the car payments, mortgage, gas prices, bad jobs, fat wives, whiny kids, and all the realities of life. The $35 I spent on the ticket plus the $14 I spent on overpriced beer and another $10 I spent on gas to get to that venue that is seemingly just south of Dallas was worth it. Just think of the savings you get when seeing all those bands over four days at Rock The Bayou.

Labels: Entertainobabble, Musical Crap, Public Service Announcements, Things To Do

gaijin || Link || E-mail || 0 comments

Nope, it's not here in H-town, but it's still damn ridiculous. I've been a fan of Austin rockers The Boxing Lesson for a few years now, since their 2005 EP, so the news out of Austin about the band left me stunned.

Apparently Boxing Lesson drummer Jake Mitchell got busted for growing pot and has been declared...um, a terrorist? The hell? Regardless of what you think of the farcical "War on Drugs" (hooray for trying to claim victory over a nebulous, unbeatable "enemy"!), it's utterly ridiculous to think that somebody could be branded a "narcoterrorist" and tried under the fucking Patriot Act for growing marijuana.

I mean, c'mon -- if the guy's a pothead, fine. But most of the potheads I've met could barely muster the energy to get off the couch, much less engage in any kind of "terrorist" activity. It's nuts. And, uh, don't first-time offenders generally get probation for shit like this? Or is every two-bit pot-smoker now the moral equivalent of Pablo Escobar?

Here're the details from the Lesson's PR guy, Ryan:

You know The Boxing Lesson aren't ones to keep their mouths shut after several interviews and appearances since the release of their full length LP Wild Streaks & Windy Days. The real truth of the matter is that The Boxing Lesson have kept one of the most important parts of their story a secret. It is with much sadness we make this announcement but its time the public knows what is going on. It is with much sadness we make this announcement but its time the public knows what is going on.

Jake Mitchell, drummer for The Boxing Lesson and most importantly, a dear friend, will be put in Federal jail at the beginning of Sept for some marijuana growing charges. What makes this story unique and what has enraged every single one of our close friends, is that Jake has been branded by our government as a Terrorist under the Patriot Act. In fact, they have thrown the Narco-Terrorist tag on him. What this does legally for a defendant is mind blowing in terms of the new laws waged against them. If you are branded a terrorist, your wife doesn't get spousal protections and will go to jail. If you are branded a terrorist, each party involved in the crime gets full responsibility for the scope of the crime. Then there are strict sentencing minimums. And remember we are talking about Marijuana here.

It is obvious from anyone who has ever met, hung out with and gotten to know Jake Mitchell that he is anything but a terrorist. This incorrect and unfair branding on our own US citizen and friend, Jake Mitchell, is a disgrace and this has caused untypical hardships on his life. He has sold his house, lost his cars, and his freedom. We are asking our friends in the media, in bands, in t-shirt screen shops and really, anyone who can help, to send the message of his story to the public eye. We know there was a crime involved but branding him a terrorist has set unfair sentencing guidelines on a person who is anything but a terrorist.

We are accepting PayPal donations to help Jake's mounting legal bills at : freejakemitchell@gmail.com

Jake Mitchell is available for interviews before jail or in jail and has a lot to say right now about the music biz, The Boxing Lesson, the system, playing drums, recording, Fecal Shock, Austin bands, marijuana laws, and life in general. Final performances from Jake Mitchell until he gets out will be next week in Austin,TX!

August 27, 2008 @ Emo's Lounge 101x Homegrown Live show w/ Frontier Brothers
August 28, 2008 @ Carousel Lounge (Monkey Wrench Benefit)

Come out and celebrate life with Jake before our government intervenes. Fans of The Boxing Lesson have no fear, you can keep hearing your favorite songs live. Keeping the seat warm for Jake Mitchell behind the drums will be Kevin Sparks, a veteran of the Austin music scene who has played with many bands including Bad Motivators, Say Hello to the Angels and Megatron Triggerdick. Until next time, we?ll see you on the Dark Side of the Moog.

Do what you can, folks; this guy and his family need all the help they can get.

Labels: Entertainobabble, Musical Crap, Political Stuff, Public Service Announcements

gaijin || Link || E-mail || 0 comments

Dammit, dammit, dammit. Yes, it makes total fucking horribly perfect sense that once the Powers That Be (in this case, the Copyright Royalty Board, rather than the RIAA, but they're all heads of the same terrible beast) took down Muxtape, they'd go after dear, sweet, kind Pandora. And yes, they are. Crap, crap, crap, with an extra side helping of crap.

Man, this frustrates me. It's starting to smell like there's some kind of Vast Bad-Music Conspiracy dedicated to forcing you, me, my little brother, and all our coworkers from ever listening to anything other than horrible, awful mainstream radio stations ever again. Can somebody please explain to me why, exactly, places like Pandora are forced to pay insanely-expensive per-song fees, when plain-old radio stations (the satellite stations apparently pay fees, too, but they're smaller) have to pay squat?

"Want to hear some new music, based on stuff you already know you like? Whoops! Not any more, sorry...here, listen to some Nickelback -- you'll love it, trust me. You went out and downloaded that obscure-as-hell album by Grammar Debate!, and now you'd like to create a virtual mixtape so you can share it with your friends? Uh, no, that's not actually allowed, either. What was that? You're fed up and want to start your own radio station, so you can let other people listen to the cool music you like? Well, heck -- good luck with that! No law against it, of course, but I hope you've got some friends with deep, deep pockets, 'cause we Americans don't hand over our airwaves to just anybody, y'know..."

One final interesting wrinkle: it turns out that the Powers That Be don't really like radio all that much, after all. Back in June, the recording industry group musicFIRST laid the smackdown on broadcasters nationwide, claiming that they were themselves pretty much pirates because they didn't pay for the songs they play. Hoo-ah. So, not only do the labels & their cohorts want to kill The Little Guy, but they want to hurt The Big Boys, too. (I wouldn't be fooled by the fact that actual musicians/bands are signed up w/musicFIRST, by the by; when the RIAA is involved in anything these days, that makes me question the group's overall motives.)

Now, the thought of The Buzz & its ilk getting shot down by their pals in the record industry makes me snicker a little, it's true, but I'm totally mystified as to what the hell they think they're really going to accomplish with all this. What's the end goal of this whole mess, anyway? To destroy any outlet for music other than Wal-Mart?

(Thanks to Hear Ya for the link...)

Labels: Entertainobabble, Musical Crap, Public Service Announcements, Random Rambling

gaijin || Link || E-mail || 4 comments

Ah, fuck. I knew it was too good to be true for long... Apparently the joy-sucking, soulless, we-drowned-our-inner-child-in-the-bathtub-for-$5 jerks at the RIAA have taken down the very-popular Muxtape site. Ah, yes -- another well-placed strike on that dastardly segment of the music-listening population that actually likes music they can't hear on the similarly soulless radio and enjoys sharing their tastes in music with others. Who might, in turn, go out and buy said music, using real-live money, or use that money alternatively to experience the makers of said music first-hand in a live setting. Great job.

If we're lucky, Muxtape will survive and emerge from their "problem" with the RIAA -- they've got a message up saying that the site is not closed indefinitely, so that's good to hear. I'm not holding my breath that there aren't some changes in the way the site works, though; guess we'll see how it shakes out. Apparently the Muxtape crew might be able to take a page from YouTube and use the Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998, which makes some sense, as I've never been clear quite how Muxtape expected to make any money from their cool little gadget (if they ever did).

Oh, and I feel like I should note that not only is the main Muxtape site currently down, but all muxtapes hosted on the site are down, as well. Including ours, despite the fact that zero of the people/bands on it are on major labels and/or have anything to do with the RIAA, as far as I know. Double fuck.

(Kudos to Indieblogheaven for the link...)

Labels: Cool Web Junk, Entertainobabble, Musical Crap, Public Service Announcements, Random Rambling

gaijin || Link || E-mail || 0 comments

Some more good news, even if it's a little bit late for the band. Ramon over at the Free Press posted last week that iconic local grindcore act Insect Warfare, who called it a day earlier in the year, was finalizing a deal with grind/power violence heavyweights Earache Recs to reissue the band's World Extermination album. Too fucking cool. Is it too soon for an IW reunion?

Labels: Entertainobabble, H-Town News, Musical Crap, Public Service Announcements

gaijin || Link || E-mail || 0 comments

From ThinkProgress (via life is a thrill; yo, Marshall!), yes, it seems that now pretty much anything can make right-wing nutjob demagogues quiver with outrage, including a movie about a cartoon robot. Who, um, works on cleaning up a polluted planet. And is looking for love. Did I mention this is a cartoon, and not the new Michael Moore movie?

What, did these folks run out of ways to compare the Iowa floods to Katrina and find themselves at a loss for something to freak out about? Yeesh. The next time some right-winger sneers at some liberally-minded person for being "P.C." and being insulted/threatened by everything, I may have to slap 'em across their imbecilic face. If I'm not doubled over laughing, of course.

(In the interests of fairness, I feel compelled to note, that not all Repubs are quite this stupid/nuts. My dad, for one, is a lifelong Republican, and he saw the movie last weekend and liked it. Dad's always been a big outdoors lover, however, and I think he now secretly loathes Bush, so maybe he's the oddball here, not the foaming-at-the-mouth talking heads.)

Labels: Entertainobabble, Political Stuff, Random Rambling

gaijin || Link || E-mail || 2 comments

Ah, the wonderfully pungent smell of victory in the War of Online vs. Offline Reviewing-Type Publication Thingys (thanks to Paper Thin Walls/HypeBot for the link).

Of course, the survey also says that it's the opinions of friends & social-networking contacts that really do the job (response for which: duh), but screw it, I'm not gonna let that rain on my parade. After all, now's when the $$$ starts rollin' in, right? Right? Ah, dammit...

Labels: Entertainobabble, Musical Crap, Random Rambling

gaijin || Link || E-mail || 0 comments

Big, big, big "thank-yous" to my little bro for pointing out this news. Not only will The State, probably the funniest sketch-comedy troupe outside of the original SNL cast (okay, and maybe SCTV), be finally releasing their long-awaited DVD set(?), but they'll be doing a reunion show, to boot. Holy fuck. Once I see that, I'll be able to die happy.

Labels: Entertainobabble, Random Rambling, Things To Get, Things To See

gaijin || Link || E-mail || 0 comments

...this seems awful damn cynical, even to a non-fan like me:

[Kiss manager Doc] McGhee said "I believe that Kiss can go on forever. I believe that there is a way - and we are talking to people and we're pretty close to getting it done - about finding the four new members of Kiss."

Um. Is it just me, or did the man pretty much just admit that the band's a total fabrication, so it doesn't really matter who's behind the makeup? Wow. smack! "Take that, all you Kiss diehards -- we know you're such losers you'll come see the band even if there are no original fucking members in it!" Cue maniacal laughter...

Labels: Entertainobabble, Musical Crap, Random Rambling

gaijin || Link || E-mail || 0 comments

Damn. I am so on the wrong press-release lists, y'all, seeing as I missed out on this one from local hip-hop house Rap-A-Lot Records:

Fresh off the heels of a #1 Rap/R&B album, Bun B and Rap-A-Lot Records are looking for the nation's next rap superstar and have teamed with Microsoft Zune to launch the ultimate contest for aspiring artists to win a chance at stardom. Through July 1, entrants can download an exclusive Bun B instrumental Mp3 track from Zune Marketplace, record their own original rap over the track, and submit their demo to Rap-A-Lot Records. At the completion of the contest one winner will receive an expense paid trip to Houston, TX where they will record the track in a studio with Bun B and have a chance at an exclusive recording contract. The winner's track will also be featured as a free download on Zune Marketplace in September.

Props to HandStamp, who I unfairly left out when listing local e-pubs doing good things (Sara & Joey: y'all always rock, so I couldn't call you out for something in particular, right? That's the story I'm gonna stick with...), for putting this one up, because it's made my day.

I dig Bun B and have a lot of respect for all that Rap-A-Lot's done for H-town rap, but still... Beyond the inherent silliness of an "expense paid trip to Houston, TX" -- Ooh! Can I get some free tix to Poughkeepsie, while you're at it? -- it's hard not to find this funny. The best part, though, is Sara's writeup & vow/threat to submit her own, um, "unique" rap. Which, frighteningly, could actually work.

There you go, indie-hipsters: the gauntlet has been thrown. Spit some verses & show the world what H-town's scenesters are made of!

Labels: Entertainobabble, H-Town News, Musical Crap, Public Service Announcements

gaijin || Link || E-mail || 1 comments

Got this one courtesy of the good people at Nasty Little Man, and I find myself liking the song & wanting to hear it repeatedly, so I figured it was only just to post it to this here site. Sounds to me like "Chemtrails" is Beck finally making the full transformation from alt-rock hero into '60s psych-rock icon -- if this sounds like anything recent, it's Spiritualized, albeit with more jazzy drums. I love the wild, live-wire-sounding guitars after the false fadeout, in particular; they come off like some long-lost gem from the vault of sadly-departed Robert Quine. Stuff like this almost makes me forget Beck's a Scientologist. Enjoy...

Labels: Entertainobabble, Free Stuff, Musical Crap, Things To Download, Things To Hear

gaijin || Link || E-mail || 0 comments

I can't believe this finally happened. I also can't believe anybody still cares, especially enough that they'd do something dumb like this. Of course, "handed over" is not exactly "released" -- who knows what the label'll do with it now -- but still. That's what's known as calling somebody's bluff, y'all. Prepare to pony up, Cadbury Schweppes...

(On a side note, does anybody else out there find it disturbing and strange that a fucking soft drink has its own Myspace page? Who in the hell would want to be add a soda as their friend? Although now that I'm thinking about it, I wonder if Jamesons has a Myspace page...)

Labels: Entertainobabble, Musical Crap, Random Rambling

gaijin || Link || E-mail || 2 comments

Fuck. I've been steaming about this for a couple of weeks now, but I just can't get over it -- I'm still mad as hell that Jericho got cancelled for the second damn time, this time permanently.

Beyond the fact that the CBS rocket scientists, in their infinite wisdom, put the show in a weird-ass spot at 9PM on Tuesday nights, when/where nobody could apparently find it (hell, I had a hard time watching it at that time & on that night, for some reason), it just feels like a total shame that such an honestly good show got shafted like this, particularly when total crap like Big Brother, My Dad Is Better Than Your Dad, & Don't Forget the Lyrics! are still on the air. (I can't even remember the name of that god-fucking-awful "spill the beans about all your past infidelities" show, sorry, or that'd be first on the list.)

In fact, I've been thinking about it and thinking about it, and I just can't shake the feeling that it was a truly great show, although arguably still in its early stages. (Warning: for those who have yet to see the show, some spoilers to come...)

It was really that good; I mean that seriously. I'd initally written it off as some kind of right-winger's wet dream of a show -- survivalism after the bomb, every-man-for-himself bullshit -- but it turned out to be something that crossed all lines and hit upon some of the deepest, darkest shit that's roiling under the surface of our wonderful, soul-shattered Modern America. It was all about community, about banding together to help one another rather than just looking out for your own (well, within your own town, anyway), about loss and grief beyond measure, about people not being all bad or all good but just being people, and about being able to pick up the pieces after disaster strikes and making a new life.

Oh, and it was also about some fairly radical ideas, like localism vs. nationalism, the government not always being in the right, screwing up and living with the mess, and unchecked corporate power. Heady stuff for a show about a small town in Kansas that's been all but ignored by the rest of the world (barring the desperate, warlike next town over and some ominous corporate mercenaries, anyway) after somebody decided to nuke most of the population centers in the U.S.

Plus, despite me & the wife making ruthless fun of some of the characters, particularly in the first season -- sorry, Sprague Grayden/Heather Lisinski, but for the bulk of the first season you were pretty much just some kind of combination between a hapless '50s housewife and Velma from Scooby-Doo -- the characters and actors showed some impressive development. Everyman semi-hero Skeet Ulrich/Jake Green was likeable as all hell, as resourceful as MacGyver, and yet still susceptible to things like, well, the urge to run out and blow the head off the guy who got his dad killed. That's what I'd call human, personally.

Not everybody was always right or wrong -- even Michael Gaston/Gray Anderson hit a few things on the nose, despite pulling such legally questionable shit as co-opting deputy Jimmy to interrogate Lennie James/Robert Hawkins when Anderson, um, didn't actually hold any kind of position of authority. Hawkins, for his part, was nicely vulnerable and real when it came to his utter failure as a dad and/or husband, in spite of being a badass at everything else. Which, honestly, makes perfect sense; I'd find a combo SuperDad/Secret Agent Man totally unrealistic, personally.

My favorite character-related bit, though, was the convoluted, Odd Couple-esque, growing-in-spite-of-everything relationship between Brad Beyer/Stanley Richmond & Alicia Coppola/Mimi Clark, which was -- for my money, anyway -- the best, funniest, sweetest, most believable on-screen chemistry I've seen since Rob Morrow & Janine Turner fought nonstop up there in little Cicely, Alaska. I can't honestly remember the last time I actually wanted a relationship to work out between two characters on a TV show as much as these two. It kills me not to be able to see what happens between the two of 'em.

The reason this is all coming to me right now, though, is more about the plot than the characters. While watching Season One on DVD (missed most of the first go-round, myself) and catching up to Season Two pretty much in time for The End, I've also been reading Michael Eric Dyson's excellent Come Hell or High Water, about the Katrina disaster/clusterfuck/tragedy. Dyson dissects the whole thing quite nicely, laying blame on everybody, Democrat & Repub, but primarily smacking down the federal government for utterly dropping the ball, whether due to patrician ignorance of how The Po' Folk live or good ol' cronyist incompetence.

It was the part about all the no-bid contracts that flew into effect quickly (but not quite quickly enough, as it happened) after Katrina that made me see the parallels between Jericho, KS, and post-Katrina New Orleans, LA. Two disasters, two inadequate responses from a fractured, self-interested federal government, and two near-takeovers by corporate power. 'Cause c'mon, that's exactly what's happening in New Orleans since the water came, believe it, starting with all those Big Red H rebuilding contracts.

Seen in that light, Jericho seems downright Mother Jones-ish in its condemnation of BushCo, USA. Hell, even the eventually-revealed blueprint for the attacks -- a contingency plan for a nuclear strike on 25 different American cities, written up by a contractor -- is ripped right out of the shady world of real-life, no-bid government contracting. A plan very much like that really does exist, although it's focused primarily on preparing logistics for the event, things like the number of bodybags to purchase and the distance a wastewater zone needs to be from a tent city. It's real and it's creepy as shit, trust me.

I know it'll sound eerily like I'm echoing the show here, but I know because I worked on the damn thing. Not as a writer, mind you, but doing editing and formatting and making it look purty/readable. The plan's part of a set of contingency plans created for a DOD program called LOGCAP, which stands for "Logistics Civil Augmentation," that gets awarded out to one of a handful of super-big contracting companies (including KBR, Fluor, and, I believe, Dresser & Bechtel). The contracted company commits to being able to provide all the services, facilities, manpower, etc., specified in the contingency plans they come up with, should the U.S. government activate one or more plans. Think of the whole thing as government outsourcing for big, bad events.

LOGCAP was how Halliburton got its foot into Iraq. It's also how they started billing the U.S. insane amounts for laundry, non-functioning trucks, and awful food for the troops. Don't get me wrong -- there are a lot of good people who work for Halliburton. It's just that that much $$$ flying around makes it real easy to start overcharging, scamming, and skimming. LOGCAP isn't that bad an idea, really, but when you hand off something like that to people outside the government, it gives those people a whole lot of money -- and power -- whether you're talking about Baghdad, Jericho, or, well, New Orleans.

See, there's also a contingency plan out there for a catastrophic event in the Caribbean or Latin America, with an ensuing mass of refugees in urgent need of shelter, food, water, and medical care either somewhere in the southern U.S. or at Guantanamo Bay. Sound familiar? Weirdly, I didn't see any sign of that particular plan being activated for New Orleans, but other LOGCAP plans were -- supposedly, the Blackwater mercenaries sent into The Big Easy after Katrina were part of a LOGCAP contract.

This is why I like/liked Jericho -- the people writing the show basically went head-on at both KBR/Halliburton (which are now two different companies, I know) and Blackwater, tying them to an ambitious Congressman from Montana who, it turns out, had close ties to KBR analogue Jennings & Rall/J&R. (And just to make the Jericho connection to Blackwater more explicit: "Blackwater" == "Ravenwood." Capisce?) All of which is pretty ballsy for a Big Three primetime TV drama. We're not talking Democracy Now!, here.

Anyway. I'm just wanting to express how impressed I was with the show, not to mention how sad it makes me that it's gone away. I've heard rumors that it might come back on cable, but I'm not real optimistic, as great as that'd be. And yeah, it'd be pretty great. (Watch the Season 1 DVDs and the Season 2 episodes online or on the SciFi Channel, if you don't believe me.) Keeping my fingers crossed that we haven't seen the last of Jake, Hawkins, Stanley, Eric, Mimi, Emily, & the rest.

Labels: Entertainobabble, Political Stuff, Random Rambling, Things To Read, Things To See

gaijin || Link || E-mail || 1 comments

I don't know what's scarier, the fact that this happened, or the fact that I already knew some of the backstory. Sorry, Randy Parton fans and inhabitants of Roanoke Rapids, NC (hi, Brandi & Chris!), but apparently the long-awaited "companion" theme park to Dollywood, "Randyland", ain't gonna happen. (Or, actually, it still will, just without him and under a different name. Way to blow a cushy deal, man...)

Labels: Entertainobabble, Random Rambling

gaijin || Link || E-mail || 2 comments

Y'know, on the one hand the Maxim mess is pathetic and disturbing (and props to Broken Record for talking about it before anybody else I subscribe to did), but I'll be damned if it doesn't strike me as being mostly hysterically funny. I mean, c'mon, how much more "meta" could we possibly get? My favorite Threadless tee, the one which I will one day actually go & buy, proudly declares "I listen to bands that don't even exist yet," but dammit, Maxim had the unmitigated gall to go one better (er, worse) -- they review albums that don't exist yet, at least not in the public realm where one can listen to them. Call it "non-listening," a new form, of sorts, of music criticism.

Yes, that's right -- if you haven't yet heard, Maxim hack David Peisner wrote a review of the to-be-released Black Crowes album, Warpaint, for the latest issue of the mag. He smacked it down fairly solidly, which probably didn't make the band happy, but they were apparently much less happy when they read it again, checked the date, and said, "hey, wait a minute -- how'd he even hear the album?" As detailed in the press release linked above, the new Crowes album isn't just unavailable to Joe Schmoe on the Street, but it's also unavailable to Big Important Music Critic Guy. No, seriously -- the band's label was so worried about leaks of the new tracks that they decided not to send out any press advances.

Which I know, by the by, because SCR attempted to get our hands on one, so that writer Damon could get his Black Crowes fix. And rather than receiving zero response from the PR people (which is pretty much what I expect when we're talking about a band like the Black Crowes; I'm still somewhat in awe that PR types respond to my emails at all, actually), we got a note apologizing and saying that no press advances were being released.

Naturally, with no disc/MP3s to listen to, we decided we'd have to hold off 'til the dang thing actually comes out. Which makes our little e-zine, I guess, more ethical than Maxim. Woo-hoo! I'm gonna pin that review up in my cube, right next to the cautionary Amplifier clipping, so it'll make me feel a teeny bit better about my lazy-but-principled pseudo-journalistic ass.

Obviously, the whole debacle raises a host of frightening visions -- if a relatively major mag like Maxim can just go and review an album, sound unheard, where's it stop? I mean, why bother to actually see that new Definitely, Maybe movie if you don't have to, right? Hell, you can find the synopsis on IMDb, and you can probably guess enough of the most-likely-sappy plot to fill out the rest. Poof -- review completed! We could be looking at a whole new world of critical endeavor where there's no, ah, actual criticism involved.

The scariest part, though, to me, is that if it weren't so damn blatant -- i.e., writing about an album the guy couldn't possibly have heard -- who's to say Maxim would've even been caught? Hell, if they'd held off for a couple of weeks and then released it right as the album hit the streets, nobody would've been the wiser. Totally fake journalism, totally undetected.

That's the part that makes me twitch, a bit, and it's partly because, y'know, the thought's occurred to me in the past, too. We're not Maxim, no, but there's still time pressure from time to time, and it'd be all too damn easy to just slap together a couple hundred words on Big-Time Band X's latest release we just got sent so we can put the review up before they play H-town. I mean, I basically did just that for 2-3 of the 4 years I spent in college, and then honed the craft while working book PR; it's easier than you'd think to say a lot of nothing about something.

All of which makes me wonder, how often does this happen? I think it's fairly likely that it happens a lot, honestly, especially when you get up to the Rolling Stone/Pitchfork/SPIN level. Pressure to deliver, tight deadlines, etc., etc. How many other reputable, big-name music crit outlets do shit like this? And that's where I stop chuckling and shaking my head at how stupid Maxim is -- maybe they're stupid, in a sense, not because of what they did but because they got caught doing it. If they were smarter, nobody would even know they'd pulled the review out of their ass. Which is nowhere near funny, if you ask me.

Labels: Entertainobabble, Musical Crap, Random Rambling

gaijin || Link || E-mail || 4 comments

Okay, so I really should be doing, um, actual work, but I stumbled across a couple of things today that are begging me to post about 'em, even if ever so briefly. I'm not particularly up on what movies are coming down the pipe (I tuned out of the whole Cloverfield thing once I realized I couldn't tell the real viral marketing sites from the fake ones), being as I only read AintItCoolNews about once every six months for a half-hour or so, just long enough to get good and mystified as to how those people have the energy to rant about things the way they do. So these two upcoming films came as a total shock to me (despite the fact that the first one won the Prize of the Jury at Cannes; boy, am I out of the loop...):

• Persepolis: I'm totally, utterly over the moon about this one. I really enjoyed Marjane Satrapi's first Persepolis graphic novel (need to get the second) about growing up in Tehran in those days after the Shah & the CIA took out Mossadegh and right when the Iranian Revolution hit; it's a fascinating, soul-baring read, and I love how Satrapi doesn't pull any punches with regard to her childhood viewpoints on things. Now, somehow, the books have been made into an actual movie, and thank whatever deity you look to, it's a cartoon. Not that I didn't like 300 or anything, but that kind of cartoon-looking-but-real filmmaking would've fallen utterly flat here. Instead, it almost reminds me of Madeline in its overtly cartoonish style, or maybe The Triplets of Belleville; check it out:

  
  

• War Inc.: First thought: "holy crap -- they made a sequel to Grosse Pointe Blank!" Second thought: "uh, not quite..." I mean, there's John Cusack as the amoral-but-uncertain hitman who offers pithy observations on life and death and all the rest, there's sister Joan as his(?) assistant, and there's the inevitable black humor you get when an assassination attempt takes a surreal turn. There's no Martin Blank this time, though, but "Brand Hauser," which is one of the dumbest names ever handed to a character, and the film's set in a "fictional" country called Turaqistan that's pretty much totally controlled by a company called Tamerlane. Whose logo, I should add, looks a heck of a lot like a certain bright red corporate logo I used to see a lot of during my day. Anyway, I'm not sure how this'll go -- it could be great or it could really suck. Either way, I think it's worth a look...

Labels: Entertainobabble, Moo-vies, Random Rambling, Things To See

gaijin || Link || E-mail || 0 comments

The above title is true on both counts. Not only am I a huge Buffy the Vampire Slayer fan, but I am indeed also a big, big dork. Not that the one follows the other, mind you -- I was a dork long before Buffy ever aired (see: AD&D, comics, Star Wars/Star Trek, fantasy/sci-fi novels, cyberpunk, that lameass picture of me doing the Vulcan hand symbol when I was 14, etc., etc.). But the fact that this makes me really kinda excited pretty much proves that yep, I'm still a big ol' dork.

So, for the others out there like me... At midnight on Fri., 8/31, and Sat., 9/1, the venerable, doomed-to-die Landmark River Oaks Theatre at 2009 West Gray will be hosting a special "sing-along screening" of one of the coolest, most ambitious bits of TV ever to hit the little screen. Yep, it's the musical ep, "Once More, With Feeling", wholly written & composed by Buffy creator Joss Whedon as a kind of insane homage to musicals, where everybody sings, nearly everybody dances, and very few lines of actual dialogue are spoken. And, believe it or not, it works. Honest. I loathe musicals, myself, but there's enough tongue-in-cheek humor tucked away in this episode that it overrides my distaste for the genre every freakin' time. Seriously, if you haven't seen it, it's well worth watching. (Hell, it's probably on YouTube somewhere, but I'm too lazy to go look...)

Anyway, this sounds like it could be ridiculously fun. I've been to the Rocky Horror screenings at the Landmark a few times, and despite me not really being a huge fan of RH, it's always been entertaining; this, to me, promises to be a whole heck of a lot better (it's actually well-written, for one thing -- sorry, RH fans...). You get to sing along with Buffy, Spike, Giles (Anthony Stewart Head can actually sing, by the by), Anya, & all the rest, yell things at the screen, join in what's probably gonna be a panic-inducing version of Buffy karaoke, and show off your BtVS trivia skillz. More info can be found here (if you didn't find the link above, that is).

Hrm. It occurs to me that if I'm gonna go to this thing, I'd better at least listen to the songs again -- 'cause there's nothing worse than a half-assed dork, I have to say...

Labels: Entertainobabble, H-Town News, Moo-vies, Things To Do

gaijin || Link || E-mail || 2 comments

Damn. This is a shame; I know Kurt Vonnegut was getting up there in years, sure, but with him gone I feel like yet another chunk of my heroes of old, people who spent their lives fighting against the outright stupidity we get force-fed every single day, has disappeared. A bit of the smart, sarcastic, weirdly funny edge that makes life interesting is gone from the world.

Labels: Entertainobabble, Random Rambling

gaijin || Link || E-mail || 1 comments

Congrats to the Dixie Chicks for the win. While I tend to think the Grammys generally mean about as much to the real musical world as the Oscars do to the real world of film, Taking the Long Way is a good album, and the Chicks deserve it. Nyah-nyah, Nashville.

Labels: Entertainobabble, Musical Crap

gaijin || Link || E-mail || 0 comments

Back to the Grammys: the Chili Peppers, God love 'em, are on stage playing a song so weak and anemic it makes me wonder if Freaky Styley really only ever happened in my head. Guys, c'mon. You've turned into the Aerosmith of funk rock, releasing what sounds like the same song over and over again (and even swiping the Beantown band's penchant for re-using the same song titles, to boot). I think it's great that you've been clean a while now, but damn.

And how big a mindfuck is it for a child of the '80s like yours truly to see Al Gore, of all people, onstage to present the Grammy to one of the most-censored bands in the history of rock? Answer: a big one. Wow.

Check the moment of stunned recognition between Anthony Kiedis and the ex-Veep: "Um. Dude. Your wife, she..." "Yeah, about that... Different times, y'know?" "Yeah." "Here." [hands over the award] "Thanks!" Four words: "Party On Your Pussy."

Labels: Entertainobabble, Musical Crap

gaijin || Link || E-mail || 0 comments

...from the Grammys. Timberlake, goddammit, just put the fucking guitar down. Please? This show's bad enough without you ruining one of the best Bill Withers songs ever.

Well, at least it didn't last long.

Labels: Entertainobabble, Musical Crap

gaijin || Link || E-mail || 0 comments