Tomfoolery unleashed the SNES game version of director Paul Thomas Anderson’s Academy Award-winning film, There Will Be Blood, starring Daniel Day-Lewis and Paul Dano.

“Milkshake!”

Via Kottke

 
How to make an embossed metal box from a soda can.
 

 
Via Atomic Shrimp. With thanks to Maria Guimil.
 

 
For your weekend viewing pleasure: The complete final Sex Pistols show at Bill Graham’s Winterland, in San Francisco, 1978. For years all I’d ever seen was the B&W Target Video-shot version of this show, then this improved color version popped up on a quasi-legit Chinese DVD about ten or so years ago. Everyone always rags on their supposed shitty last performance… au contraire, folks, they’re incendiary here.

After this show, the supernova that was the Pistols was no more. Say what you will about John Lydon’s later career, in his youth, the man changed the face of music twice, first with the Sex Pistols and later with Public Image, Ltd. Who else can something like that be said about? Miles Davis is the only person who comes to mind.
 

 
Tea With Duggie Fields is a beautiful and fascinating short film by Federico Fianchini, in which the Genius of Earls Court talks about his life, his art and his influences.

Fields has painted from the age of 11, when his earliest work, an abstract painting, was entered into a local exhibition amid incredulity that a child could paint so brilliantly. With an interest in structure and design, Fields briefly studied architecture, before he attended the Chelsea School of Art, between 1964 and 1968.

In the late sixties, as he established himself as an artist of note, Fields shared a flat with Pink Floyd’s crazy diamond, Syd Barrett. During the 1970s, he developed his brilliant day-glo style that inspired Marc Bolan, Stanley Kubrick, Derek Jarman and David Bowie, who was snapped with William Burroughs wearing Fields’ portrait of Malcolm McDowall.

Fields’ paintings have been variously described as Pop Art, Post Modernist and Minimalist, but in essence, Fields is very much his own art movement, one he termed MAXIMALism - “Minimalism with a plus plus plus.”

Iconic, unique and startlingly original, his work ranges from portraits of Michael Jackson, The Rolling Stones, Marilyn Monroe, Zandra Rhodes, the artist Andrew Logan, Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, to potent images of sexual intercourse, landscapes and his own distinct interpretations of his favored artistic influences (Jackson Pollock, Piet Mondrian).

Today, the Genius of Earl’s Court continues with his brilliance as painter, digital artist, musician, writer and photographer.
 

 
Bonus clips including Duggie Fields on Syd Barrett plus ‘I Wonder Why’ after the jump…
 

 
Bisade Ologunde isn’t the only masquerading musician out there of course, but the Nigerian sax man and bandleader is definitely one of the most intriguing.

Lagos-born and Manhattan-based musician took the name Lagbaja (meaning “anonymous” or “faceless one” in Yoruba) when he started his career in the early ‘90s. Wearing a variety of masks onstage falls right in line with carnival tradition of his Yoruba tribe, and has enhanced his appeal among Nigerians. Ologunde’s hip-hop-era take on Afrobeat—he’s taken to naming his style “Africano,” after the title of his fourth album—takes in aspects of jazz and modern R&B. And as seen below in this excellently choreographed video, deals with some of the same issues…
 

 
After the jump: a clip from Lagbaja’s intense live show in Ife, near Lagos…
 

 
As a young man I grew up in the South and I hated country music. That changed when I first started hearing songs from The Byrds, Buffalo Springfield, The Flying Burrito Brothers and Gram Parsons solo work, all of which seemed to me to be quite different from the hillbilly shit I’d grown up around. The West Coast country vibe had a wide-openness about it that was more in tune with my Jack Kerouac inspired desire to hit the road…a road that was as much a metaphor for spiritual yearning as a slab of tar and concrete. Gram Parsons’ western music wasn’t solely about blue collar blues, booze and bad women. Parsons was a romantic in the traditional poetic sense, a seeker of beauty in the coarseness of everyday life. Yes, it was honky tonk music, but in Gram’s world the honky tonks weren’t violent dives of retribution, they were a kind of cowboy cafe society that weren’t far removed from the cafes of the French surrealists in Paris of the 1930’s, where absinthe was drunk instead of tequila.

This interview with Michael Bates in 1973 was Gram Parsons’ last recorded conversation. 6 months after the interview Parsons O.D’d on morphine and tequila in a motel on the edge of the Mojave desert.

Bate’s connection to Gram is almost accidental. In 1973—while he was the host of a CBC radio show in Ottawa, Ontario—Bate was on a road trip when he happened to spot Parsons’ beaten-up tour bus by the side of the Massachusetts Turnpike, 90 miles from Boston. He stopped and arranged an interview, which he says turned out to be the final recorded conversation with Parsons, who died that September from an overdose of morphine and tequila.

Gram candididly talks about Keith Richards and The Stones, bad dealings with The Byrds, The Flying Burrito Brothers and how Waylon Jennings had to walk around the block to smoke a joint during a recording session with Chet Atkins. In the beginning of the interview Parsons makes mention of being stuck in England and left penniless by The Byrds. Gram was fired by Roger McGuinn and Chris Hillman when he refused to join them on a South Africa tour as he was was opposed to apartheid. Some of his friends at the time thought Gram actually quit The Byrds so he could hang out with The Stones in London.

It’s Gram’s birthday today (Nov. 5).
 

 
Via Exile On Moan Street

 
In 2005, Six Flags amusement park in New Orleans was temporarily closed in advance of hurricane Katrina’s assault on the Gulf Coast. Five years later, it’s still not open for business. The once thriving attraction is now a virtual ghost town. Sad and eerie.

The park is closed not only to the public but to photographers as well. The demise of Six Flags is not a source of pride for the city of New Orleans.

Music by MGMT.
 

 
Bill Barol at Boing Boing just posted a piece on the sad fate of Six Flags New Orleans. But the article’s video link has been removed from Youtube. The video below is the one formerly linked to the Boing Boing post. It was shot by photographer Teddy Smith.

Thanks to BB for bringing this story to my attention.
 

 
The Big Cube, a 1969 LSD exploitation flick starring a washed-up Lana Turner and West Side Story’s George Chakiris, is a miasma of nightmarish psychedelic cliches intended to scare kids away from LSD. This turkey is a blast from beginning to end. Highly recommended. Watch it while you’re high.
 

 
You gotta hand it to him…he doesn’t back down.

An excerpt from the TV program “Durch die Nacht mit… (Into the Night with…) Henry Rollins and Shirin Neshat”. Henry gets mocked by local hipsters at the record store and fights back immediately.

(via TDW)

 
You know, once upon a time, conspiracy theories were fun, they usually had an element of something believable that hinted at a hidden world of secret organizations, forbidden knowledge, and funny handshakes. Nowadays, anyone can watch a TV show and come up with a half-baked theory. This one claims The Simpsons not only knew knew about 9/11 but have now predicted a nuclear attack that will hit mainland U.S.A. on the 6th November 2010.

Is there going to be a false flag nuclear explosion on November 6 2010? It might be predicted by hollywood, in the Simpsons, of all places. Does hollywood have elite insiders with knowledge of what they have planned for the world? If it happens, remember not to believe the lie the news tells you about who did it and why.

Well this time tomorrow night we’ll know, won’t we? No, wait, what’s this?

I am aware that it might be a stretch to say that the clock frame is the number 10. It’s possible that it isn’t, so the date could actually be 6/11 or 11/6 on any of the upcoming years.

O, great, the get-out clause.
 

 
With thanks to Maria Guimil
 

 
Is MSNBC doing the dirty work of its future owner Comcast?

Phil Anschutz,  major shareholder and content partner with Comcast, donated large sums of money to the First Amendment Alliance, one of the largest outside groups targeting Democrats in the 2010 midterm elections. The Anschutz Corporation, wholly owned by Phil Anschutz, gave $50,000 on 9/24/2010 to the First Amendment Alliance. The two candidates targeted by the First Amendment Alliance? Jack Conway and Michael Bennet. Keith Olbermann gave to Jack Conway’s campaign along with Raul Grijalva and Gabrielle Giffords.

Read about the behind-the-scenes dirty dealings at Crooks and Liars.

And more here.

“This is what I love about Republicans. I honestly secretly really admire them because, man they have guts. They come in with both guns blazing. They take no prisoners. What I suggested to you here that played on last night’s show, about how there’s 420 bills that the House has already passed, that the Senate could pass right now because we have enough votes to do that, yet they won’t do it—I know they won’t do it—even simple bills like the Child Nutrition Bill, they won’t do it. But I’ll tell you what, if the shoe was on the other foot, if this was the Republicans in a lame duck session, dammit, they’d be passing as much of that as they could. Because that’s how they are. Because they believe in something. And that’s what Americans love about Republicans. Because they just believe in something.”—Michael Moore on The Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell, Thursday, October 4th, 2010

Director Michael Moore, for most of his life, has supported independent political parties and candidates like Ralph Nader. In 2004, Moore returned to two-party politics after four years of George Bush raised the stakes too high for him not to support John Kerry. In this excellent interview from Lawrence O’Donnell’s show, Moore brilliantly lays into the Democrats and Obama and he’s got a stinging new petition going that you might want to consider signing. I did!

“We just voted for you, the Democratic members of Congress, in the midterms. But our vote comes with one big condition: If you do not straighten up, get a spine and do what we expect of you, we will find alternate candidates to run against you in 2012. And we mean it.

Consider yourself on notice that you have just two more years to start doing the things we elected you to do. If you move one more inch to the “center” or to the right, you will never get our vote again.”

SIGN THE PETITION: “I’m Voting Democratic But I Will Work to Defeat You Next Time If You Don’t Do Your Job”

 
One of my favorite rock and roll websites Cherry Bombed uploaded this very strange Iggy photo. Where the hell did this take place? It looks like a Republican fundraiser. Nope. It’s the Rock and Roll Hall Of Fame induction ceremony. Gawd, rock IS dead.

Actually, rock still lives, check out the Grinderman video on Cherry Bombed.

 
This is not a confirmation of booking. This form ONLY allows fans to reserve a place in line on a first come first serve basis. This place in line reserves each guest the right to buy any level of cabin prior to general public on sale. Tentative cruise date November 10, 2011.
 
Cabin rates.        

Interior 939.00 899.00 659.00 - 829.00
Ocean View 1139.00 1099.00 1079.00
Balcony 2349.00 2049.00 1909.00
Premium Suite 3349.00      N/A       N/A
Suite 4499.00 4299.00       N/A
 
Shit! The premium suites aren’t available. I’m so not going.
 
Via Cherry Bombed

 
I once saw an interview with The Mighty Boosh, where Noel Fielding described their comedy as being for people who grew up listening to Frank Zappa. Falling as squarely into that quite particular demographic as I do, maybe this is why I resonate so much with their work. Certainly, for me, the inventively choreographed musical production numbers on their three TV series—think bohemian Busby Berkeley—were the highlights of each show. Kinda like The Monkees, in that way. The best Boosh episodes always have great musical payoffs.

When I caught the live Boosh experience at the Roxy last year, a primarily musical event, I must say, in true Paul Crik-parlance, they fucking killed it.

This weekend in London, Fielding and his comedic/musical partner in crime, Julian Barratt, will be co-headlining what looks to be an incredible musical event, celebrating the life and music of Frank Zappa, along with the Dweezil Zappa-led Zappa Plays Zappa band at a festival at the Roundhouse:

The three-day series of events begins tomorrow with a discussion between Frank’s wife Gail Zappa, his musical assistant Ali N Askin (who worked with him on his classical piece ‘The Yellow Shark’), computer synclavier programming expert Todd Yvega, and recording engineer Frank Fillipetti, the first engineer to work with The Zappa Family Trust on reissuing unreleased Zappa material. This precedes a performance of ‘The Yellow Shark’ by the London Contemporary Orchestra – the last album to be released before Zappa’s death in 1993, it features some typically Zappa-esque song titles; ‘G-Spot Tornado’, ‘Dog Breath Variations’, ‘Get Whitey’ and ‘Be-Bop Tango’. This will be followed by ‘Wild Imaginings – The Music That Influenced Zappa’ also performed by the LCO, giving an insight into Frank’s influences that ranged from Stravinsky to 1950s doo-wop, grungy rock ’n’ roll and jazz icon Eric Dolphy. 



Yet it will be the Zappa Plays Zappa band that should provide the highlight of the celebrations on a double bill with cult British comedy duo The Mighty Boosh on Saturday. The ZPZ band have performed in the UK before but this should be particularly special as the band will feature original Zappa sidemen including Mothers of Invention singer / guitarist Jeff Simmons, anarchic bassist Scott Thunes and woodwind / keyboards player Ian Underwood. They’ll play Frank’s best selling album Apostrophe in its entirety as well as other selections from FZ’s vast repertoire. With The Mighty Boosh’s Noel Fielding and Julian Barratt providing their own take on Zappa’s music and a comedy sketch recreating actual dialogue from Zappa’s infamous Old Bailey obscenity trial, plus Frank himself making an appearance to ‘play’ live with son Dweezil, this will be an epic and aptly surreal tribute to this truly unique musical visionary.

Frank Zappa: 70th Birthday Celebration, Roundhouse, London NW1, November 5 to 7, 2010