Ouch. That’s Hot.

Eventually, I’ll get back to some real writing, but in the meantime here’s an interesting take on old media spooled out into something new.  more here.

Saw this over on the Melvillian blog this morning.  The whole series is here, and well-worth a look if you enjoy visualizing your puns.

Does this man look happy about it?   I’m not seeing it.  However, I would like to point out that he’s ready to pounce on the old school correspondence with a blast from his ready-to-roll dual-pen launch pad.  (I used to have one of those as a kid.  My grandpa always had a closet full of them with little gold plaques that read things like, “Pittsburgh Business Services — Where it’s our business to service your business!”)

Full ash try too.  Ah, the good old days, when every meeting started with a firm shake and the admonition: “The bar’s over there, help yourself!”

That all changed back at the start of the ’80s.  This broadcast blames it all on the MBAs.  It might be on to something; certainly insightful and with cool Australian accents, just like Bon Scott & Hugh Jackman.

Combing two great tastes to taste even greater together, Shawn Feeney has sketched out some visual puns set high upon the stages of rock ‘n roll.  More of his series “Musical Anatomy” perusable here.

Oh, how hip am I!  This album, the self-titled debut by Australia’s Wolfmother, came out a few years ago, but by the time I got around to it the combo had already dis-banded and then re-grouped with a new line up ala Axl’s GnR.  Keepin’ up ain’t in the cards any more kids, but the trees are still falling in the woods even if I’m not there to hear the sound.

Speaking of which, this album dropped just in time to ride the tide of the Guitar-Hero’d fascination with propper (and oft progger) rock from the halcyon days of the hard-livin’ ’70s.  It’s nothing more than a mash-up of the top-rock tropes that once swirled off of the nanny’s hi-fi and slipped into the bassinets and under the bonnets of these wee little lads from way down under.

One need not crate-dig past Blue Cheer to catch every trick that’s been recycled on this disc.  And that’s ok.  It’s just kinda funny.  Especially when they decided it’s time to rock the flute on “Witchcraft.”  Yes, they rock the flute in that same goofy/sputtery/spitty way that a certain band did back in the day.  And that’s after they play the Doors keys and the Deep Purple keys and get all sensitive with the pre-glam Tyrannosaurus Rex freak-folk warble and enlightened us with lyrics like: “She’s a woman, you know what I mean.  You better listen, listen to me.”

Of course, it’s the guitar that really sealed the deal for me.  The fret-born hooks and big and barbed and right as rain on a hot summer’s day.  Original?  Not a bit.  You can can picture these guys in-fighting in the studio:

“No, play the Zeppelin thing and then go straight into the Sabbath riff!”

“No way!  We gotta play the Sabbath riff twice, then I scream like a one-eyed pirate, and then we play the Zeppelin thing like we did last night.”

“You were drunk last night.”

“Wait, did you guys rehearse without me again last night?”

But when the licks are as good as this, everything turns out ok.  At least until the band breaks up.

Indulge me with some lazy blogging, m’kay?  It’s been a busy week,  but here’s a little cut & paste of a creative cut & paste from the crazed uncle of all angelheaded hipsters, Wm. Burroughs.

Credits Due: Cut-Ups from Matti Niinimäki on Vimeo via Boing Boing.

Over at BoingBoing, a few videos have caught my eye. And now I shall stick ‘em in yours:

First up: A tripped-out add for Schaefer, the finest of American pilsners, and which was at “one point the world’s best selling beer. By the 1970s, however, it had ceded the top spot to Budweiser.” Perhaps harnessing the power of the Moog wasn’t the best way to appeal to the base:

Up next, Zappa scores some ‘ludes, uh, scored a Luden’s cough-drop commercial:

And finally, Perry Farrell returns to his roots for the benefit of some sort of telethon for the kids:

Jeepers creeper, I liked feeding these to my peepers. May the same be true for you.

Last night I spent a few pleasant hours rolling about in the late-life alternate reality that Woody’s been creating for himself and kindly sharing with others.  Every time you go it’s a little bit different, but there are a few things that one can count on:  It’s somewhere in Europe.  Americans will show up and feel a little sad about themselves.  And Scarlett Johansson will be there too.

Last night, we went to Barcelona.

In Vicky Cristina Barcelona, Woody lets us travel along with two 20-something American girls who get to taste a few new things before the tarred-and-chipped road of life sets the world in stone.  Although the inner-feared voice interfered with a full embrace of the choices our heroines chanced, there was a serenity at work in Barcelona that gave comfort.  In Barcelona the moment must be embraced, and life must be lived.  And in the end, in Barcelona, family will be loved, commitments will be honored, and conflicts will be forgiven, forgotten, and few.

Woody’s World sounds ok by me, although I’m still scratching my head a little (just a little) over the fascination with Scarlett Johansson.

The Economist recently ran the above photo of Holocauster Adolf Eichmann to accompany a review of a new book about him and his big Argentinian outing by a globe-trotting and chutzpah-raging yet still-green Mossad.  It wasn’t till the second glance at the portrait that I noticed the skull gleaming from just above the brim, set like a bedeviled guru’s third eye, channeling Kali and calamity.

And it reminded me of an old Glenn Beck rant (this being a few years before he started invoking the Mormon eschaton nightly on Cable TV) where he pondered what it must be like to be a Nazi, to get up each day in the officer’s barracks at Belsen, to get dressed up in your spiffy black SS uniform, and to look in the mirror and to never have it cross your mind:  “Hey, maybe I’m the Bad Guy.”

Great interview in the month’s TapeOp with Sufjan Stevens, a man mostly unknown but loved and adored by my former clique in the big ol’ OH-IO.  The article is called “So Wrong, But So Right” and that really sums up everything that is true about this guy and the way in which he goes about making his music.

I listened to Illinoise again yesterday at the gym. (The gym being this place where I like to strap on the headphones and find a world of my own, the anonymity of the group-sweat,  being together alone, all human, inescapably human.  The man beside me in the locker room, falling apart, his 60-some years of burgers and fries falling over his too-tight whites, heavy-breathing and panting while shrugging black socks up his shower-damp feet.  A quick-shave later and he’s risen from the bench, fully robed in pin-point starched oxford and charcoal-wool slacks.  Matched cordovan belt to Johnston & Murphy’s.  Watch, ring, wallet, keys.  A captain of local industry ready to take on the rest of his day, transformed, indestructibly armoured by the Macy’s Men’s Department.)

At the gym yesterday, I listened again to Illinoise.  (The gym being the place where I like to really give things a listen, being a captive in search of an audience to slip into, being able to listen in perfect ear-budded stereo to new and old and try new things knowing that just because my body’s strapped to the machine doesn’t mean that my mind can’t be stretching its wings.)

And so, at the gym yesterday, while listening to Illinoise, and reflecting on the recording as a recording after reading TapeOp’s interview with Sufjan, the following point was made more clear than ever:  It’s not what you’ve got, it’s what you do with it.  It’s not the tools, it’s the hands that weild them.  Within 10 feet I’ve got enough gear to write the next folk anthem and record a MySpace-ready demo capable of blowing up the indie charts.  Within 10 feet I’ve got enough typing-up and editing-down tools to write the greatest and latest novel to burn a hole in your soul.  Within 10 feet I’ve got a broadband connection and quiet room and a space for my head to burst, to bloom.

All of this can be summed up in one quote from Dallas Willard:  Never try to find a place to speak, try to have something to say. Alrighty then, here goes.