Short little thing. This weekend Sabine and I found this at a flea market. We still need to frame it but it looks pretty sharp. People have said it looks like Peter Max, but who knows... Actually yeah, who knows. Anyone know who the artist is on this? We wonder if its worth anything so we can not sell it, but take pride in knowing that we paid less than we should have for it. Like how I found RJD2's "Deadringer" and "Since We Last Spoke" on vinyl at a thrift store for 99c each... kick ass.
My oh my, I've heard of some horrible ad campaings, but DR Martens seems fit to take any credibility they had by throwing musical icons under the double decker bus. please take a gander... Fred Astaire dancing with a vacuum cleaner, and remixing singing in the rain (still awesome) are one thing, but to take "Punk" figureheads, a movement based around eschewing commercialism and capitalist ideas of money over art (while still conforming to a rigid, almost fascist, sense of fashion and musical taste), and turning their unfortunate young demise into a billboard for the official shoe of the subculture is more or less a lesson in how to lose a demographic. I will say though that I have a feeling that the Hot Topic crowd who weren't old enough to pay attention and mourn for these people will probably be scouring stores for these posters to put on their dorm room wall in a year or two. This lack of respect for what made artists who they are is how you end up with Bob Marley's only fans being frat-boys and The Clash being covered on American Idol. Which brings me to what really pisses me off about this campaign.
JOE STRUMMER?!! The rest are good, classics, but way overrated icons who were in the right place at the right time, and lets face it, would probably have sold out like this had they lived.
Joey Ramone... I think Ramones shirts are 2nd only to CBGB shirts in the "Purchases that the Purchasee had no idea what was on their shirt".
Sid Vicious was a lucky hack druggie in a boy band that only gained street cred through his death and the fear of middle aged brits. Their music is so flimsy that while we can look back on the Clash and still see great albums we look back at their one album (yeah they only had one) and say... It's cool, they're like the Monkees of punk. They sure could curse on live TV well, but all their songs sound kind of similar.
Kurt Cobain was married to Courtney Love and wrote her only marginally good album. Hmmm guy gets rich and sucker marries the first dumb slutty blonde that comes along and then gives her his soul. That is so not a sellout move that hasn't been done by every rockstar/actor/director/sports figure in history who made a little money. Then he kills himself, biggest sellout move of all.
So all those guys clearly had a moment in the sun, Cobain probably being the most talented, but all of them wishy washy pop subculture figures. But Joe Strummer was a musical genius. This last albums were as good as his work with The Clash, and his death was truly a tragedy. He was a musician and a song writer, not a fashion accessory for disaffected youth. I don't know who sold out his estate like this but unless it was to pay off any outstanding debts he may have left behind you should be ashamed. And whoever the graphic designer was who did these posters... Fuck you Too, you could've at least not made them look like giant floating gays. Let's say Sid did make it to heaven (doubtful but for the sake of argument), wouldn't it be a better pic to have him bloody and punching Jesus?! Seems like a more appropriate image from the man in the band who's most famous lyric is "I am the anti-christ".
Jack Valenti was rated R for Really Dead today. The hairy Mr. Burns up there is the reason most of the movies you see aren't nearly as good as they could be. Check this to see why.
Son of a bitch.... I had a post all ready to review my favorite new show "Drive" on Fox. It is fun, a mix of Lost and Cannonball Run, and reminiscent of the old family action shows of the early 80's like Dukes of Hazzard and Knight Rider.
Well after 3 nights (4 episodes) Fox Yanked it. So much for the old college try. Who to blame? The American public for not watching? The inabilty of the Nielsens to account for tivo, ipod, and well... viewers? The fact that the producers tried to pass off a mile long stretch of Southern California highway as the east coast? (Florida looks nothing like Georgia, and they all have a little something called trees) Noooo I'm going to blame Nathan Fillion. And I am going to dub him the Ted McGinley of the 00's. As you may know Mr. McGinley is considered something of a curse on the entertainment landscape. The personification of Jumping The Shark, when he arrived on a show, it pretty much signaled that program's doom. Well as much as I love Nathan Fillion, he's good lookin, talented, has "it", he can't carry a program or a movie to and sort of decent success. Firefly, Slither, Serenity, Drive, all should've been moderate hits.... Hell he even popped up on Lost right before that began to take a little nose dive (great episode last night though). I don't know what advice I can give to someone who is seemingly cursed, other than maybe you should dig your feet into the warm sand that is Basic Cable, let someone on Spike, SciFi or FX give you your own show because for gods sake, STAY OFF ENSEMBLES.
Now that I'm older you look back at people you knew in high school and say, "Oh my god, they must have been gay!!! That explains everything!" Or now you meet a guy who may be a friend's boyfriend and he makes no bones about being into musicals, or Grey's Anatomy, or he mentions he really misses Sex And The City, and you roll your eyes and say to yourself, "for his sake and hers I hope he figures it out soon." That being said I want to reinforce that I am 100% pure grade A+ dudeness. I can't really stand most broadway musicals, I am not homophobic (that shows I am not gay right? I mean I have gay friends, but they aren't like super close friends, but you get it.), and I love slaying ladybits. So never mind that I found this bit of news out from Perez Hilton, and that it pretty much negates all the above statements...
THERE IS A BROADWAY XANADU MUSICAL COMING OUT SOON!!!!
Um yeah, totally. Now for the uninformed this seems like pointless jibber jabber, but please understand that in the history of fucked up, crazy ass films that miss the mark so badly that they bullseye another target this one takes the cake. From the Producer who brought you The Matrix and Lethal Weapon, and the Director of Outfoxed comes a musical with songs by ELO. I know... How could it be bad?! In my mind it happened like this... Joel Silver was a producer on The Warriors and asked it's star Michael Beck if he wanted to make another movie. Michael said, "Sure man, The Warriors was a great experience and a badass movie, I'm totally down for another one... what's this one about?" "It's called Xanadu" "Oh cool man, what's it, about ancient warriors, Kubla Kahn, all that stuff?" "Close... It's a musical about a Greek muse who inspires an man who repaints album covers for records stores to open a roller rink. And there's gonna be an animated sequence" "Ummm.." "We'll shoot in in L.A. and be high on blow the whole time" "I'M THERE"
And thus Xanadu is born. I could keep going, but you really should experience it yourself. You probably won't be able to sit through the whole thing in one sitting, but when you do finish it, it will be your favorite movie. So after The Producers, Hairspray, and any other number of great movies that get farted out and gayed up on Broadway there is no way they could ruin this. Who's with me!?
This week Poet/Hip Hopper Saul Williams (who I thought was from DC, but apparently not) wrote an open letter to Oprah after her show on Hip Hop. I didn't see all of it, I don't know everything he's talking about other than it looks like its the same shit that all the other scared confused old people talk about whenever a youth culture movement becomes prevalent whether it is Hip Hop now, or Rock & Roll in the 50's or Jazz in the 30's. This ____ is dangerous to society. Whatever. Ask an Iraqi child walking down the street whether they care if Don Imus or Dr Dre says Ho, Bitch or Nigga(er), but ask them quick before they're kidnapped or killed. My beef is with the main Black Crusader (Tracy Jordan I've got you) herself. I think she can do great work, I think she can inspire people. I also think she's a hippocrite. I say this not blindly, as working on a talk show for several years, every day at 3pm all tv's in the office turned to channel 7 to watch (and ultimately rip off) what she was doing. Sometimes I enjoyed it, but mainly it was so difficult to watch her smugly slither her way through topics, shunning any possible view but her own. At least on The View that nut ball Hassleback gets to speak a little. So here is my very short letter to Oprah
Dear Oprah, How is a young man supposed to distingush between a woman in a video having cash thrown at her ass in a bathing suit, and with Kirstie Alley, a paid spokeswoman for Jenny Craig (are women supposed to lose weight, or be happy with who they are, thats another thing), coming on to your show and prancing around in a bikini? How do you reconcile your supposed charitable nature with the fact that you own 9 homes (At my last count) , one of which you paid 50 million dollars for, 30 million over the appraised price because it just wasn't for sale. How do you tell women and men (James Frey I'm looking at you) to be honest and open with themselves and others while seemingly living a closeted gay lifestyle. How can you say you opened a school in South Africa rather than America because you feel kids in America wouldn't say they wanted an education over an iPod or shoes, implying that American children are overly materialistic, and then do an hour long program devoted to how you couldn't buy several thousand dollar handbags at Hermes after they closed? Please understand that you put forth many confliciting images on your program, which some less kind people may use to call you a hipocrite. No me though. I understand that people who live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones, and that you live in several houses made of diamonds so throw whatever the hell you want. With loving kindess..... Paul Dean Garrison Hogan
