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The Beatles + Vincent Price + The Muppets = Awesome
06.01.2010
04:19 am
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Right?

Posted by Elvin Estela
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06.01.2010
04:19 am
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King Crimson: In the Court of the Crimson King
05.31.2010
11:50 pm
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Over the weekend, I picked up a copy of the 5:1 surround mix of King Crimson’s classic 1974 album, Red, but I didn’t have a chance to listen to it properly until this afternoon. And when I say properly, I mean loudly, as Red happens to be one of the heaviest rock albums of all time. Crank it up loud enough—as I did today—and it feels like a jumbo jet is taking off inside your skull. The sonic power of that album can blow you away like a feather in the wind at top volume. Most King Crimson albums I find to be a bit spotty (some of them are really spotty, in fact) but when they lock into a serious groove, like on Red’s title cut, it’s an awe inspiring thing to listen to.

This new surround version, mixed from the original multi-source mixdown tapes by Porcupine Tree’s Steve WIlson (with Robert Fripp’s participation) tends to put the listener in the middle of the mix, that is to say, it sounds like you are standing in the room as they are playing. I find that this approach worked great on Wilson’s redo of In the Court of the Crimson King in 5:1, but with Red, the violent onslaught of Fripp’s buzzsaw guitar riffs sounds emasculated somewhat (when compared to the familiar stereo version) unless the album is played at an almost ear-splitting volume. Me, I’m happy to oblige. Listen to it as loud as fuck and it sounds wonderful. I suppose that was the point. Who’s going slap on Red to listen at a background volume anyway?

There’s not much by way of film footage of pre-80s incarnation of King Crimson. As in nearly none. I did find two amazing clips, though. First an intense run-through of Lark’s Tongue in Aspic on what appears to be Germany’s Beat Club show.
 

 
Below, a 1973 performance in New York’s Central Park of Easy Money:
 

 
(Incidentally, the new leaked Kanye West single, Power, samples King Crimson’s 21st Century Schizoid Man)

Posted by Richard Metzger
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05.31.2010
11:50 pm
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Neil’s diamonds: The wit and wisdom of America’s Funnyman, Neil Hamburger
05.31.2010
10:37 pm
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“Why did God create herpes? So Robin Williams could give something to his female fans that they couldn’t just turn around and sell on eBay.”

Last Friday, Xeni Jardin, Tara and I went to Rich Fulcher’s comedy benefit in Los Angeles for victims of the Tennessee flood and on the (stellar) bill was anti-comic Neil Hamburger. I have a few Neil Hamburger CDs and quite enjoy the warped wit and “anti-comedy” of America’s funnyman, but I had never seen the Neil Hamburger experience live and let me tell you, he’s very, very funny “in concert.” His frequent appearances on the Jimmy Kimmel show are the closet thing we have these days to Brother Theodore or Harvey Pekar turning up on Letterman in the 1980s. The next time Neil turns up in your town—and he will—make sure you go see him.

“Why did God give Smashmouth three top ten singles? Well, it was a clerical error—he meant to give them all AIDS.”

Hungry for some more Hamburger?
 

 
What I did not realize until this weekend is that “Neil” (or rather his alter ego Gregg Turkington) was responsible for one of my all time favorite collections of prank phone calls, the side-splitting, Great Phone Calls. Here’s the classic cut I’m in Your Band:
 

 
And here are a couple of pizza related prank calls:
 

 
Neil Hamburger UNOFFICIAL website

Neil Hamburger on Twitter

Posted by Richard Metzger
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05.31.2010
10:37 pm
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‘The Red Chapel’: Comic documentary about a deliberately bad comedy troupe touring North Korea
05.31.2010
08:37 pm
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The Red Chapel is a new comic documentary that exposes the paranoiac culture of Kim Jong Il’s North Korean dictatorship in the form of a chronicle of a two-week trip made to the country by a deliberately bad comedy act (which includes a straight-talking spastic) purportedly there on a cultural exchange mission. It recently won the top documentary award at the Sundance film festival and the daring humor of the film is said to make Borat look tame in comparison. It’s fascinating to read that all of the footage had to be cleared on a daily basis with North Korean authorities. These guys have balls!

From Cinematical:

Here’s a documentary so astonishing that, for a time, I was convinced that I was being had—that no sane filmmakers would ever attempt, much less pull off, anything this crazy. The Internet assures me that Mads Brügger and Johan Stahl’s The Red Chapel, which won the Documentary Grand Jury Prize at Sundance, is very real indeed: that Brügger and a pair of comedian friends really did sneak into North Korea pretending to be a pro-Socialist vaudeville troupe there to engage in cultural exchange with local schoolchildren, that they really did get most of it on tape, and that they really did escape that fascist hellhole with life and limb intact. In the process, they’ve made a film equal parts horrifying, exhilarating and hilarious—an epic prank on the world’s most sinister dictatorship that makes Sacha Baron Cohen look like a shrinking violet in comparison.

I have an abiding fascination with North Korea, or, as it is more affectionately known, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK). I think it was Christopher Hitchens who once wrote that the reason George Orwell’s writing remains relevant today is that the word “Orwellian” is the only accurate descriptor of the North Korean regime—its complete intolerance of independent thought, the elaborate false reality painstakingly constructed for its citizens, the personality cult of the Dear Leader at its center. Never mind that, as The Red Chapel informs us, the Dear Leader is personally responsible for starving countless of his own people.

The DPRK is, among other things, notoriously secretive, meticulously controlling the image it projects to the rest of the world, and taking pains to hide—with the sort of appalling disingenuousness that is the hallmark of dictatorships—what we know to be the realities of everyday life in the country. The Red Chapel, which takes place almost entirely in the country’s relatively maintained cities, doesn’t try to get at the most shocking of those realities: the incredible poverty, the starvation, the labor camps to which the “untrustworthy” are sent. But it does give us an astonishing glimpse into a world that only seems possible in dystopian fiction; a world of brainwashed sycophants literally worshipping at the altar of the Dear Leader, living out a facially ridiculous fantasy built for them by what may be the most evil government in the history of civilization.

The most fascinating character in the film may be Mrs. Pak, the motherly, slightly creepy government functionary assigned to be the caretaker for Brügger and the two young Danish-Koreans who make up the “comedy troupe” that Brügger “directs.” There is nothing to suggest that she is a bad or malevolent person. Her belief in the fundamental greatness of her country and her government, and in the “values” of unity and togetherness used to keep North Koreans in line, is wholehearted and pure. She can’t talk about the Dear Leader without being emotionally overcome. Aside from the mentally ill, I’ve never seen a human being who exists so completely in an alternate universe. It’s terrifying.

 

 
Thank you Chris Campion!

Posted by Richard Metzger
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05.31.2010
08:37 pm
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Guest Blogger: Julien Nitzberg crashes the Westboro Baptist Church’s Ronnie James Dio protest
05.31.2010
06:40 pm
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The author at right,
 
It seems like everyone is suddenly dying- Dennis Hopper, Gary Coleman and Ronnie James Dio.  As a lover of metal, when I heard that there would be a public memorial for the late great former singer for Elf, Rainbow and Black Sabbath I decided I should go.  Then when I heard that the Westboro Baptist Church would be there protesting I was even more intrigued. In case you don’t know the Westboro Baptist Church are a group led by Reverend Fred Phelps who are famous for protesting at funerals with signs saying “God Hates Fags.”

Why were they there? Their website lists a lot of reasons including that Dio disrespected God by taking the name Dio (meaning God in Italian) and that he did not follow the Biblical precept to love his neighbor, evidenced by his being mean to Ozzy Osbourne.  If there ever was any doubt that the Westboro folks are great performance artists, I think this proves it. It’s hard to believe that it has taken anyone this long to realize that they are the Christian equivalents of Billionaires for Bush or the English Monster Raving Loony Party. They take all the ridiculous ideas and hypocrisies of the Christian right and take them to their logical extremes.  When Pat Robertson says that Katrina was New Orleans punishment for being a gay friendly city, they say that Americans soldiers dying is America’s punishment for being a gay friendly country.  Right wind Christians recoil at them while they are shoving the mirror of their own homophobia and hatred in their faces.  These same people also once claimed that heavy metal would lead the world to hell and so the Westboro folks have to show up at Ronnie James Dio’s funeral to prove this point.

When we got to Forest Lawn Cemetery, there were only three Westboro protesters there but they were surrounded by a larger group of pranksters with their own comical signs riffing on Westboro’s signature themes.  A memorial is naturally a time of sadness but the protesters brought a little bit of fun to the proceedings.  We all stopped to take pictures and pose with our own signs that my good friend Jill McGraw had been kind enough to make.  I was surprised to find the Westboro people to be uniformly friendly and glad to pose for photo after photo with everybody. A few people tried to logically argue with them, which I have to say, sure sounded silly. As you can see from the photos they added to their bag of tricks some new great slogans for which they have websites. The woman was promoting their brilliant new site Jews Killed Jesus, while the men were promoting Priest Rape Boys. They obviously realize that God Hates Fags isn’t as fun as it used to be, so I’m glad they are branching out into new areas of comic extremism.  

After the levity of this time with the wonderful Westboro people and the pranksters they inspired, we trekked up the giant hill to the memorial. So many people showed up that they had to issue admittance wristbands to the first 600 people who showed up. Those folks got to enter the memorial hall where the memorial took place. Most had showed up at 8AM for an event that started at 2. The rest of us got to watch the memorial from outside the hall on jumbotrons. Memorial buttons were issued to everyone as well as a beautiful program with testimonials. Sadly no heavyweights like Tony Iommi or Richie Blackmore made it there. There were musical performances which featured Dio songs played for some odd reason on acoustic guitars and flutes(!!!). Somebody from the awful band Asia sang “Heaven and Hell” which almost seemed more disrespectful than the Westboro people being there. But the testimonials from friends and family were great. I learned that Dio was his high school class president!  There was lots of talk about who Dio was jamming with in Heaven. (I don’t know why but everyone thought he’d be working with Dimebag Darrell from Pantera first!) All in all a sad but inspiring tribute to one of the great rockers of the heavy metal era!

—Julien Nitzberg

Posted by Richard Metzger
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05.31.2010
06:40 pm
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Tiger B. Smith and the Tiger Bunch is WTF personified
05.31.2010
03:49 pm
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70’s German rockers Tiger B. Smith must be seen to be believed.  As you can see up above, they are not messing around with their tiger gimmick.  Lead by Holger B. Schmidt, their music is a sludge of heavy metal, glam and some serious Hendrix-isms.  The group’s patchy trilogy of albums does contain some gems including the one above, which is the title track to their second album.  The song featured below is not as awesome but the clip is just unreal!
 

Posted by Elvin Estela
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05.31.2010
03:49 pm
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‘Satan was in that dude’: Mixed martial arts fighter rips friend’s heart out
05.31.2010
12:38 pm
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A mixed martial arts fighter has been arraigned on charges of ripping his close friends heart out after drinking psychedelic mushroom tea in Northern California. According to the Contra Costa TImes, the victim and the suspect, according to the testimony, became preoccupied with the idea that a tidal wave was coming, that the end of the world was upon them and that a struggle between God and the devil was taking place.

Not to make light in any way of such a grisly, horrific crime, but it seems to me that his fellow was gripped in equal amounts by paranoiac delusions brought on by psilocybin mushrooms, as he was by religious superstition… and yet religion is still legal:

Under questioning by Del Norte County District Mike Riese, Sgt. Elwood Lee said he was dispatched to Requa on March 21 to meet a man who had reported a stabbing nearby. Lee met the man, later identified as Justin Davis, who took them to the Fizer Road house in question. When Lee entered the house, he noticed what he believed to be dried blood on some cabinets in the entryway, and broken glass on the floor. Drywall had been discovered on a wall, Lee said. He heard someone mumbling in the living room, and saw a foot sticking out from a couch. Lee testified that he saw a man, later identified as Wyatt, standing near a body on a couch, naked and covered from head to toe in what appeared to be dried blood. Wyatt said,”I killed him,” Lee said.

Lee was able to cuff Wyatt without incident, and then he proceeded to look at the body on the couch. The body had had the majority of its face removed, and an 18-inch incision in its chest cavity. Lee said that he did not attempt first aid because he could see the man was dead.
”At one point,” Lee said, “(Wyatt) asked if we were God, or if we were God coming to save him.”

Lee said that Wyatt said he’d cut out Powell’s tongue, and that he’d removed his heart. He also mentioned that there had been a “big fight” in the kitchen. Wyatt told him that when he’d looked at Powell’s face he’d seen the devil, Lee said.

 
Mixed martial arts fighter Wyatt faces murder charge in Northern California (Contra Costa Times)

Thank you Paul Gallagher!

Posted by Richard Metzger
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05.31.2010
12:38 pm
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Looks like he’s made it: Stormfront readers review ‘The Wild and Wonderful Whites of West Virginia’
05.30.2010
09:41 pm
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Dangerous Minds pal, Julien Nitzberg, director of the amazing documentary The Wild and Wonderful Whites of West Virginia, sent the following short note to Boing Boing’s Xeni Jardin and myself:

“I was excited when Dangerous Minds profiled me. I was complimented by Boing Boing writing about me.  But why does this make me the happiest of all: http://www.stormfront.org/forum/t711880/  WOW!”

Nothing says you’ve really hit the big time quite like seeing your nose and ethnicity mocked on a white-supremacist forum like Stormfront, eh? It easily trumps an SNL parody!

A sampling of what the skinhead Roger Eberts at Stormfront think of Jullien’s documentary:

This is the most anti-white, offensive thing I’ve ever seen.—Cougarspeed

Did you see the nose on Nitzberg???? I could park my motorscooter in there.—White Reverence

How do you like that jew who created the film? Seems like jews have a nose for what people will buy. Heh. Jews can smell actual metal gold from fifteen feet away…I swear. They are the perfect “middle man”. And they will do/film ANYTHING for money.—Embattled Warrior

The Wild Whites of West Virginia opens theatrically at the end of June. Available now as a download on Amazon and on POV from many of the large cable operators.


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(Above) Director Julien Nitzberg, with nose, and the film’s executive producer, Johnny Knoxville.
 

Posted by Richard Metzger
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05.30.2010
09:41 pm
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The ‘Best’ party wins in Icelandic election: Comedian now the mayor of Reykjavik
05.30.2010
07:06 pm
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You have to love the fact that a joke political party in Iceland, started six months ago by a comedian, won the most seats during a local election The party, know simply as “the Best” won local elections in the Icelandic capital, Reykjavik, scoring 34.7% of the vote and securing 6 of 15 seats of the city council. The campaign video featured members of the party, including founder Jon Gnarr—now the city’s mayor—singing Tina Turner’s “The Best” (what else?)

From BBC News:

Key pledges included “sustainable transparency”, free towels at all swimming pools and a new polar bear for the city zoo.

The party also called for a Disneyland at the airport and a “drug-free parliament” by 2020.

As well as specific pledges, its video promised change, a “bright future” and suggested that it was time for a “clean out.”

Clearly Icelanders, who have seen their entire economy collapse, get the joke!

Posted by Richard Metzger
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05.30.2010
07:06 pm
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Gibby Haynes on Fox News Channel
05.29.2010
04:19 am
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Ummm… Err….

Posted by Tara McGinley
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05.29.2010
04:19 am
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