Sick burn, New Yorker!

Recently, British guerrilla artist Banksy has taken up “residency” in New York, meaning his stencils randomly pop up, only to be immediately tagged over by local graffiti artists. And then there’s been a few performance pieces he pulled, like selling his work to unwitting buyers from a streetside stall for $60 (had serious art buyers been in the know, the pieces would have gone for about $31,000). But you know what’s kind of awesome about New York? We really don’t give a shit. Sure, there’s perpetual 24/7 Banksy media coverage, but the average Joe probably gives a Banksy stencil the same attention as he would a bodega mural mourning the death of a local drug dealer.

I’ll admit, it’s almost always nice to see public art. Whether it’s your taste or not, it’s usually better than an empty lot or a crumbling wall. But it seems like the city’s sentiment was summed up nicely in The New Yorker cartoon. There’s something extra stinging about a flippant dismiss from a New Yorker. It’s like having your white grandma inform you that your twerking is sub-par, or being told by a local beat policeman that your Captain Beefheart collection consists of only his “Tragic Band” material.

Take the latest Banksy performance piece, wherein a meat truck of stuffed animals is animated to, I don’t know, show the horrors of factory farming? There’s a presumptuousness to that piece—“Hey, did you know that factory farming is really inhumane?!?” “Why no I didn’t! At least not until I saw that really earnest and heavy-handed social commentary rolling down 8th Avenue!” Plus, I saw a drag queen do something similar (but better) two years ago.

And that shit had glitter.

When so much of your hype stems from your anonymity,  it makes perfect sense that New Yorkers would be largely unimpressed. It’s a city full of anonymous people, so that whole supposedly edgy anonymity novelty just doesn’t move us. You don’t want to be seen? Awesome, ‘cos we don’t have the time to look. There’s dog shit on the sidewalk and bike messengers and taxis to dodge. There’s so, so, so much going on. Why would we pursue a coy “anonymous celebrity,” when we have tons of artists in the minor leagues, desperate to get their real names out there? It was tourists who bought those Banksy originals in Central Park, and I have to wonder, if Banksy revealed his identity, would his fans (and the media) continue to be so enthusiastic about his work?

Perhaps we Banksy-shruggers just don’t “get it”—I never claimed to be cultured. But I really do think that his brand of “spectacle” simply doesn’t translate very well to our fair city. Below, you can see his venture into short film, wherein Syrian rebels shoot down Dumbo the elephant with a rocket launcher, shrieking “Allahu Akbar!”. It’s ironic, it’s political, it’s vague, it’s Banksy. It’s a another brand in a heavily branded city, and we have shit to do.
 

Bela Lugosi plead…

You probably recall the trouble Bauhaus frontman Peter Murphy got into back in March when he was arrested in Glendale, California for driving under the influence of drugs, hit-and-run and possessing crystal meth. Police reports said he appeared confused and even had difficulty recalling what day it was.

Although the goth legend initially pleaded not guilty to all three charges, he changed his tune when he was sentenced on October 10 in a Los Angeles court. Murphy plead no contest to misdemeanor hit-and-run driving and guilty to the methamphetamine possession charge, as reported by Glendale News.

The singer must also attend 45 days of Narcotics Anonymous meetings, perform ten days of community service and submit to random drug tests.
 

 
Lee Ranaldo, of Sonic Youth and The Dust, will be offering a guitar workshop at New York City’s grooviest record store, Other Music.

It’s one night only, October 28, and it’s free!

The Dan Smith in the poster refers to a guitar teacher whose flyers were ubiquitous on walls throughout Manhattan and light-heartedly parodied by Jon Stewart among others.

Hey Lee, that poster looks like shit and it’s perfect.
 

AVAAZ.org have a petition to stop the sale of living animals as keychain/lucky charm.

The petition calls on the United Nations to:

...demand the Chinese government to ban the manufacture and sale of amulets and jewelry containing live animals.

As the petition explains, this “new fashion” jewelry in China has:

...animals living under plastic containing a liquid nutrient and oxygen that allows them to live up to 2 months.

This is cruel and should be condemned by the international community.

Though it has been claimed that the animals can live up to two months in the “nutrient” environment, this is not true, as the animals die within days through a lack of oxygen.

This story has been featured in the news since 2008, but nothing has been done to stop this horrific trade.

Please sign the petition to help highlight and stop the sale of amulets and jewelry containing live animals. Thank you.
 

 
With thanks to Lindsay Reid.
 

 
I’m rather delighted to hear that Sparks are to release New Music For Amnesiacs, a five-disc “ultimate box set collection” on October 21st.

The Brothers Mael themselves have curated this definitive guide to Sparks’ extraordinary career, which includes a four-CD set, containing 81-songs from 21-albums that “are the most significant in terms of their career (which spans four decades) or that resonate with them on a more personal level.” There is also a 64-page hardbound coffee table book featuring photographs and memorabilia (much of it from the band’s own archives), which in accompaniment with the music tells Sparks story from the late 1960s (when they were first the Urban Renewal Project and then called Halfnelson) to present day.

Think of it as a mixed-media autobiography, as told by Sparks.

The box set also includes some of Ron’s never before seen handwritten lyrics; an oversized envelope stuffed with a proof-sheets of photo outtakes of the Big Beat photo session shot by renowned photographer Richard Avedon; and a second envelope filled with memorabilia that “you can proudly pin on yourself or stick on your wall to flaunt your fandom and totally irritate your still-not-converted friends.” If all this weren’t enough, there is a bonus CD containing new studio tracks commemorating two of Sparks’ unique live events, “Islington N1” from the Sparks Spectacular (21 albums in 21 nights), and Two Hands One Mouth from the tour of the same name.

All this goodness is currently available in the UK at £99.99 (GBP). US release soon.

New Music For Amnesiacs coincides with Sparks tour of America and Europe. And if you haven’t already, I thoroughly recommend you do go and see them—they are truly brilliant. Then maybe you can ask Santa to bring you the box set.
 

 

 

 
More classic Sparks after the jump…

 
Finnish YouTuber “markoboy” enjoys his drink and food. He’s uploaded close to 400 videos of himself imbibing booze and scarfing down gawdawful looking plates of unidentifiable grub. I couldn’t help but watch a few of his weird little displays of gastronomic gluttony wondering all the while if they’re some form of Viennese Actionist-style performance art for the Facebook generation.

I’ve come to the conclusion that they’re not. For some inexplicable reason, “markoboy” has chosen to share his goofy inbred gobble-fests with the rest of the world. The dramatic arc of his videos are pretty flat and I quickly got bored until I came upon the one featuring the cat with radioactive eyes. This one must be seen for its absolute eeriness. It’s also very “Tim and Eric.”
 

 
It’s likely you have listened to William Shatner’s unforgettable rendition of Bob Dylan’s “Mr. Tambourine Man” and thought to yourself, “WHOA—what in tarnation was on Shatner’s mind there???”

We now have something of an answer—the answer is, Not very damn much!

Kevin Pollak recently interviewed Ben Folds on his long-form talk show. Folds has had (among other accomplishments) a fruitful musical collaboration with Shatner, most notably he was the man behind Shatner’s successful 2004 album Has-Been, featuring such actual, talented musicians as Joe Jackson, Aimee Mann, and Adrian Belew.

Folds related a conversation he had with Shatner about his legendary first album The Transformed Man, released in 1968 (edited to eliminate crosstalk and the like).
 

Folds: Well, you know, when I was a kid and I was trying to, you know, I wanted to be a songwriter and Neil Sedaka had done it by the time he was 13 and I didn’t, you know, but I was still goin’ for it. One of the things I did in high school was, I really liked, at an art sale I bought … the William Shatner record The Transformed Man. And that’s the one that has “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds” and “Tambourine Man.”

Pollak: Yeah, “Tambourine Man”…. he just keeps screaming it.

Folds: It’s really good!

Pollak: So you see what I’m saying—there’s no perfection there….

Folds: He didn’t know what he had done, like I asked him about that record and he said, “Well, you know, it was a day and we were shooting Star Trek….” and it was one thing on his list and he did it in real time, it was like a 45-minute thing. He didn’t even know what he had done, it was just like, he just left. And then it became this huge cult classic.

 
So there you have it. Perhaps 45 minutes is a wee bit of an exaggeration, but the point couldn’t be clearer. Shatner went to the studio and just cranked out the vocals for those mothers and then went off and did something else that day. That was it—no big musical idea, no “concept,” just following through on an idea to cash in on a little bit of that Summer of Love zeitgeist and employ his unique actorly skills in a way nobody would ever have thought possible.

There can be no doubt that the track successfully captured that preposterous/genius thing that has always been a trademark of Shatner’s acting.
 
Here’s the Pollak interview; the Shatner section starts around the 28:50 mark:

“Mr. Tambourine Man”

 
“Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds”

Previously on Dangerous Minds:
Microworld: William Shatner’s psychedelic short film about microprocessors and transistors (1976)
Happy Birthday Canada: Here’s William Shatner singing the Canadian National Anthem

This image adorned a special commemorative bag that Mets/Spider-Man fans received on the big day.

Comic book fans will well remember the 1987 storyline in which Peter Parker/Spider-Man married Mary Jane Watson. Pete’s proposal to Mary Jane occurred in The Amazing Spider-Man #290, and the marriage took place in The Amazing Spider-Man Annual #21.

It was a controversial storyline. David Michelinie, the writer who executed the script based on a story by editor-in-chief at the time, Jim Shooter, in 2007 commented that he disagreed with the move: “I didn’t think they actually should [have gotten] married. ... I had actually planned another version, one that wasn’t used.” In a storyline called “One More Day” published 20 years later, editor-in-chief Joe Quesada contrived to “erase” the marriage, saying, “Peter being single is an intrinsic part of the very foundation of the world of Spider-Man.”

Be that as it may, in 1987 the Spider-Man wedding was such a big deal that … it just could not be contained in the 2-D medium of comic books! Or at least so thought the PR people at Marvel, and probably Stan Lee himself—as we shall see. On Friday, June 5, 1987, Spider-Man and Mary Jane were actually married at Shea Stadium before a sellout contest between the New York Mets and the Pittsburgh Pirates. (Update: This incident is covered in the PBS special Superheroes: A Never-Ending Battle, which aired on October 15.)
 

Fans at the game received this swell heart-shaped Spider-Man pin as well. Or is that a patch or even a… cookie?

The wedding—or, if you like, “stunt”—was a news story of note. Not only did it receive coverage by the likes of AP and Good Morning America and who knows who else, but the lofty New York Times itself actually ran a tongue-in-cheek announcement in its “Weddings and Celebrations” section, in which they printed Mary Jane’s admission that she is a total slut:
 

Spider-Man To Wed Model

by Michael Gross

Friday night at Shea Stadium, Mary Jane Watson—an actress, model, and computer businesswoman—will be married to the Amazing Spider-Man, a superhero also known to comic-book cognoscenti as Peter Parker, a freelance photographer for the mythical Daily Bugle in Manhattan. Stan Lee, publisher of Marvel Comics and creator of Spider-Man, will officiate.

The mock ceremony, to promote a special wedding issue of the Amazing Spider-Man comic book, which goes on sale next Tuesday, will take place at home plate in front of more than 45,000 fans just before the New York Mets play the Pittsburgh Pirates.

All this is something of a fashion event. Ms. Watson’s wedding gown was designed by Willi Smith. The form-fitting white lace, satin and tulle gown was the designer’s last project. Ms. Watson’s wedding ring will feature a black widow spider setting.

Ms. Smith—whose image appears several times in the special comic book—also designed the groom’s black tail coat, which is buttoned with the masks of Comedy and Tragedy. Spider-Man reportedly gained superpowers as the result of a bite by a radioactive spider.

The couple, played by models, will be attended by other models portraying the Incredible Hulk, Captain America, Ice-Man, Fire-Star, Green Goblin and Dr. Doom.

At the final fitting of her gown, Ms. Watson (actually Tara Shannon, a model) said the wedding had to be held in Shea Stadium to accommodate all her previous beaus. This might explain Spider-Man’s recent behavior. ”He’s been pacing the ceiling for weeks,” she said.

 

 
Here were the wedding vows, delivered and presumably written by Stan Lee—you have to hand it to him, they’re pretty good:

“Do you, Spider-Man, being of sound mind and superbody, take Mary Jane to be your lawfully wedded bride, forsaking all other superheroines? Do you promise to never leave footprints on the walls or ceilings, or cobwebs in the corners? And do you agree to pinch-hit for the Mets if they ask you?”

and

“Do you, Mary Jane Watson, being of sound mind and spectacular body, agree to forsake other masked Marvelites, to never, ever swat a spider and to hug, comfort, and kiss away any bruises incurred after a long day of bashing bad guys—and to stay out of the Mets’ locker room?”

Rather than say “I do,” Lee, Spidey, and Mary Jane all intoned the words “I thee web.”

In the AP report on the wedding, Mary Jane, asked about the possibility of having children, is quoted as saying, ‘‘As long as they are healthy, have two arms and eight legs, I’ll be happy.’‘
 

 
Actor Stephen Vrattos, who was the man in the costume for the photo shoot that produced the commemorative poster above featuring Spider-Man and some of his Marvel superhero friends alongside Mets players Roger McDowell, Darryl Strawberry, Wally Backman, and Lee Mazzilli (he was not the man in the Spidey costume for the wedding), reminisced:
 

Trudy, aka Firestar, had her hands full trying to politely shake off the roaming hands of Roger McDowell who followed her like a stray puppy and persistently tried to pick her up. There is a reason why the former pitching ace has the biggest grin in the poster.

McDowell seemed to be the only Met enjoying the situation—albeit for reasons other than comic-book appreciation. Mazzilli, Backman and Strawberry only ceded their looks of scorn to smile when the photos were being taken. And if you look closely at their visages on the poster, you’ll notice those smile are forced. Perhaps they thought we couldn’t hear clearly in the costumes, because their under-the-breath grumblings about having to participate in the shoot were easily audible.

 
Vrattos describes this crazy event in exhaustive detail here. Be sure to click through, because there are tons of amusing pics and anecdotes.

As it happened, Spidey’s wedding also coincided almost perfectly with the Mets’ finally getting their act together in the 1987 season. People forget, but from 1984 to 1988, the Mets were the shit—they, not the Yankees, were the talk of New York City during those years. They were exciting, they were controversial, and they generally kicked ass. The Mets had won the World Series the year before, but in the spring of 1987, their star pitcher Dwight Gooden tested positive for cocaine use and entered rehab, causing him to miss a good chunk of the season. His first start in 1987 was that very same day, June 5. The Mets, who were a foregone conclusion to run away with the National League East, were stumbling along at just 25-25 entering the game. Gooden pitched a solid 6.2 innings to win the game 5-1—Gooden won a fairly astonishing 15 games the rest of the way (in only two-thirds of a season, remember), and the Mets went 67-45 after Gooden’s return, only to finish second behind their hated rivals, the St. Louis Cardinals.

Here’s a Good Morning America report on the wedding with a quick clip of Entertainment Tonight’s John Tesh at the very end:

 
Here’s an old Spider-Man bit from The Electric Company in which Spider-Man takes on “The Wall” while attending a Mets game (since the Mets are in the field during the top of the 6th, the game must perforce be taking place at Shea)—as a special bonus, the umpire is played by none other than Morgan Freeman.
 

 
Thanks to Rachel Jensen!

Previously on Dangerous Minds:
Gay Couple in Ultimate Comics Spider-Man
The best fan-made Spider-Man movie you’re ever going to see, 1969

Meet Tuna.
 
Sacred albino moose killed by hunters - TreeHugger h/t Nicole Panter

Man in the Mirror: The Photographic visions of Graham Nash - MOJO

NSA collects millions of e-mail address books globally - The Washington Post

Males who chose red as their color in a competitive task had higher testosterone levels than other males who chose blue - APS

Motown charm school instructor Maxine Powell dies aged 98 - NME

China confirms new human H7N9 infection - China.org

Nutrient pollution threatens national park ecosystems, study says - LA Times

Stream Donna Summer and Giorgio Moroder’s previously unreleased “La Dolce Vita” - SPIN

Bomb hoax at school, school punishes all male students, even those not involved - reddit

Xeni Jardin: standing up to breast cancer in public and in private - The Guardian

Student-faculty research shows Oreos are just as addictive as drugs in lab rats - Connecticut College News

Our music tastes change as we get older to match the shifting social circumstances of our lives, according to a new study - The Telegraph

Lake Superior is warming faster than any of the other Great Lakes. In fact, it’s warming faster than any lake on the planet - PRI

Sudden disappearance of sardines has serious economic and ecological effects on the B.C. coast - The Vancouver Sun

Majority of U.S. fast-food workers need public assistance - Reuters

Moose die-off alarms scientists - New York Times

Apes comfort each other ‘like humans’ - BBC News

Cyberbullying-suicide suspect: Yes, I bullied girl who killed herself - Orlando Sentinel

Living relatives of iceman mummy found - Discovery

Not Just Foster Farms: Other chicken may also be contaminated with salmonella - LA Weekly

Below, “HELL NO: The Sensible Horror Film”

What’s wrong with this picture besides every damned thing???

Everybody’s talking about “Chinese Food,” the hideous new video from Alison Gold, which is courtesy of the horrible hit-makers of the ARK Music Factory, the talent behind the scenes of Rebecca Black’s ultra shitty “Friday” number. It only came out yesterday and already it’s being called the most annoying song ever.

Forget about “Chinese Food” and instead go for the ARK Music Factory’s hard stuff, the unfairly overlooked video for Tweenchronic’s “Skip Rope,” which was released earlier this year and featured none other than Miss Alison Gold herself.

With Tweenchronic, ARK pulled out all the stops, coming up with an absolute ear-bleeder of a song and pairing it with a truly offensive music video that has little girls lined up to buy Pixie sticks and Butterfingers from a pint-sized “drug dealer” and then rubbing the powdered candy all over their faces like pre-adolescent crack whores. I don’t get why this one wasn’t a huge, huge hit. Clearly ARK’s Patrice Wilson felt the same way going by the subtlety of his guest appearance…

We’ve come a long way from “Strawberry Shortcake,” haven’t we, folks? Apparently the scenes where Tweenchronic were turning tricks for Nerds and doing bong hits of Nutella were cut out of the video…