Music video for “Guassian Castles” from the album Transmalinnia
There are some stroboscopic effects here, so they asked me to add “WARNING: May cause seizures or momentary loss of consciousness in susceptible viewers.”
I’ve never really cared for the Smashing Pumpkins, but this literal version of “Today” by Dustin McLean is amusing. Dustin’s vocals are spot-on, too.
(via HYST)
YES!!! It really looks like the dingbat MN Congresswoman from what must be the lowest IQ district in all of America—they elected her didn’t they? I rest my case—is going to, or has already, if you’ve been watching her behind the scenes moves, thrown her hat in the ring for the Republican Presidential nomination. CNN reports that she’s planning to form a national exploratory committee in June, if not earlier and she’s already making moves in Iowa (where her office could open as early as this weekend) New Hampshire and South Carolina. Comedians, lefty pundits and every single Democrat in the nation are praying to the gods of schadenfreude that Michele Bachmann makes good on her threat. Hell, the woman might even be able to keep the great Garrison Keillor from retiring!
Me? Lets just say, I think it will be good for democracy…. and leave it at that!
One extremely funny thing to contemplate is “Who would be her running mate?” should she secure the nomination (in some fucked up parallel universe, I mean). Looking at the field of all possible candidates—and American electoral politics being what they are—it would almost assuredly be a male Republican. Which one of them would to craven enough to take a strap-on up the ass and be her bitch boy? Obviously, figuratively speaking, that would be a requirement for the job.
Via our pals at Network Awesome comes this collection of 10 trailers for Elizabeth Taylor vehicles from 1948-1968 including the ultra-freaky Boom.
Another collection of clips after the jump…
An extremely wild Fritz the Cat style PSA about AIDS awareness set to the tune of Joan Jett’s “Bad Reputation.” No animals were harmed while making this… I think.
(via Nerdcore)
Consider this the perfect accompaniment to “Whatever Happened To Alternative Nation?” This excellent article, by writer Wallace Wylie and published on Everett True’s Collapse Board, centers around three bands (The Stone Roses, Primal Scream and Oasis) and the negative impact they had on the British music industry and general media in the 1990s. In contrast to Steven Hyden’s US-focused articles, Wylie sticks striclty to the UK and does a really great job of skewering that shower of shitty hype we had to endure called “Britpop.” This represents my feelings about the period pretty much exactly—yes, there was LOADS of great and interesting music being made at the time, but for the most part it was not being made by white men with guitars.
It should be obvious to almost everyone by now that Oasis really weren’t very good, and this is coming from somebody who bought into the hype early and even attended their monster concert at Knebworth. Definitely Maybe remains their best release, with the album coming across as rather varied (by Oasis standards) and tuneful. This was before Noel settled in to writing all his songs in the same Let It Be-derived tempo. It isn’t really necessary to go into detail as to why Oasis were substandard. This has been done elsewhere and will continue to be done for a good while yet. Their limited talents soon ran dry but not before they had kicked open the door to a million soundalikes who popped up every other week on the front cover of NME.
We were constantly being told by the press that we were living through a musical golden age to rival the Sixties (aaargh! why is always the fucking Sixites?! booo-ooring), and while I do think the 90s was a golden age of sorts, I am glad that hindsight is x-ray and cuts through all the bullshit. There were many, many groundbreaking things going on in the world, yet the British music press seemed content to just curl up into a little ball murmuring “Beatles, Stones, Beatles, Stones” ad nauseam. Remember, this is the era that saw the launch of backwards-obsessed magazines like Mojo and Uncut, and the calcification of rock culture into a rigid set of rules to be adhered to. It sucked. But hey, don’t take my word for it. Read what Wylie has to say…
Something sweet from the Dangerous Minds archives. Originally posted on August 4, 2010.
Elizabeth Taylor and David Bowie at their first meeting in Beverly Hills, 1975. Photographs by Terry O’Neill. Scanned from the book Legends by Terry O’Neill.
Via Glamour-a-go-go
There was a time not that long ago when New York City was overrun with marijuana. In the 1940s and early 50s, pot plants were flourishing in vacant lots throughout the five boroughs. In 1951 over 41,000 pounds of marijuana were uprooted and destroyed by the sanitation department’s weed wacking “White Wing Squad,” so described because of their white uniforms. Queens alone yielded 17,000 pounds for the grim reapers.
“Though the bust in the above article occurred in Greenwich Village, the leader of this group of “strikingly pretty girls” and musicians copped to finding his marijuana “somewhere in Brooklyn.” As to what they were doing “sitting hobo style around a man preparing marijuana in a frying pan” is, however, anyone’s guess.”
Read about the amazing history of New York City’s marijuana jungles at the Brooklyn Public Library’s website. Lots of jaw-dropping photographs.
In the photo below, 100 pounds of ganja uprooted in Brooklyn is being hauled off for incinerators in Woodside, Queens.
It looks like someone got to the crops before the cops did:
Thanks to Mark Kamins for the turn-on.
Regrettably, I missed Edwyn Collins at SXSW and based on the YouTube videos of his performance at club Nuvola, it would appear that I missed something quite special. With all my pissing and moaning about this year’s SXSW, there were some wonderful moments. Unfortunately, many of them got lost in the shuffle. I’m doing my bit so that this one doesn’t.
John Robb’s piece from blog Louder Than War is so heartfelt and sweet that I’m sharing it in its entirety:
Perhaps the most heart-warming moment of the whole of SXSW was Edwyn Collins set.
Still recovering from 2005’s double brain hemorrhage, Collins had to sit down for the whole set and had a stand for his lyrics.
Despite this, he is in great voice, in fact I can’t remember his voice ever sounding better. It’s slightly deeper and warmer now as he leads his band through a selection of Orange Juice and solo classics. He is also still sharp as fuck. His witty asides between the songs are as funny and astute as ever and if it wasn’t for the fact that the right hand side of his body is still semi paralyzed from his illness he would still be same old Edwyn.
The fact that he is here at all is a miracle and the fact that he can still tour and sing with such passion and beauty is tantamount to an inner toughness and the redemptive power of great music.
There’s only the guitar missing as he sits on stage giving each song the hindered per cent that is so often talked about by glib singers and so little delivered.
Way back in the early eighties I used to go to Orange Juice gigs when they were an emerging cult band on Postcard records. It was a period of fascination with all things Scottish underground from Josef K to the Fire Engines to Orange Juice- bands that took the energy of the Subway Sect end of punk rock and criss crossed it with sixties underground. They were making a brave new pop that made none of them millionaires but whose DNA is all over modern music from Franz Ferdinand to the Artic Monkeys- what was once weird is now mainstream.
Orange Juice’s spindly, kinetic Velvets take on punk rock was simply thrilling honey and we saw them several times in that period that is now called post punk and seems to have a load of rules written into it. The fact was that at the time we were watching all sorts from Discharge to Postcard to Bauhaus to Killing Joke- the music scene was far more eclectic than we are now being told.
The 2011 Edwyn is proof of the redemptive power of rock n roll and its healing nature. He sings the songs beautifully and his superb band including ex Ruts drummer Dave Ruffy and Rockingbirds Andy Haackett is shit tight. They play the songs with a comforting aplomb and that sort of loose swagger that only great musicians can.
They also play with a real joy adding to the genuine warmth of the gig. It’s a genuine, very human warmth that can be so rare in the fast food conveyor belt of modern music. Edwyn Collins is not on that conveyor belt. He is not in a rush. I guess what happened in his life puts everything into perspective. The music means everything but it’s not part of the pointless contest. The songs stand the test of time and infact sound even better twenty, thirty years down the line.
Edwyn sits there and croons in only the way he can and brings a new life to all corners of that wonderful catalogue, ‘A Girl Like You’ is rearranged slightly and sounds even better, the old Orange Juice stuff replaces its nervy, kinetic punk rock haste with the assurance of middle age without becoming flabby. The songs now sound like the classics they are, timeless pieces of great guitar action.It’s also a family affair with Edwyn’s son joining the band for a couple of songs, Edwyn Junior looking the spit of father. It all really should not work atall but this is as rock n roll as it gets, if rock n roll is the purest expression of being human then here it is.”
Here’s Edwyn doing “Rip It Up’ which was a hit for his group Orange Juice in 1983
Edwyn Collins and his band Orange Juice perform “Rip It Up” on Top Of The Pops in 1983 after the jump…
Thanks Elloise.
