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Lost John Lennon interview surfaces: “You smash it and I’ll build around it.”
12.17.2009
10:54 pm
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An open letter in the underground press that accused the Beatles of going soft and selling out to the establishment, comparing John Lennon’s call for pacifism in “Revolution” to a BBC radio soap opera, and conferring superior revolutionary credentials on the Rolling Stones, so incensed the Beatle that he spent six hours 40 years ago giving an interview to a couple of college students offering a rebuttal that was finally published today in the pages of the New Statesman magazine.

In 1968, Maurice Hindle and a friend hitch-hiked to Surrey to meet Lennon, who picked them up personally at the train station in his Mini Cooper. Yoko Ono fed them homemade macrobiotic bread and jam. Lennon spoke nearly continuously for six hours.

He says “Revolution” was no more revolutionary than Mrs Dale’s Diary. So it mightn’t have been. But the point is to change your head - it’s no good knocking down a few old bloody Tories! What does he think he’s gonna change? The system’s what he says it is: a load of crap. But just smashing it up isn’t gonna do it.

Hindle writes “Lennon demanded Black Dwarf publish his response, which took [writer John] Hoyland to task for his “patronizing” tone, and ended with the defiant challenge: “You smash it—and I’ll build around it.”
 

 
The full interview is only available in the print edition of New Statesman magazine.

Posted by Richard Metzger
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12.17.2009
10:54 pm
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Yes, we have no tomatoes: Salad staple banned during Sarah Palin’s Costco visit
12.16.2009
06:42 pm
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According to the Salt Lake Tribune, a Costco in Salt Lake City took tomatoes off its shelves last week in preparation for Sarah Palin’s “Going Rogue” book-signing appearance at the store. A man was arrested on Dec. 7 at a Palin event at the Mall of America in Bloomington, Minn., for allegedly throwing a tomato at the former Alaska governor, and Costco management was “determined” to avoid a repeat. Helen Rappaport, a Democrat, was happy to browse the nearly empty aisles of the big-box giant while other shoppers clustered around the Palin event area, but she was puzzled as to why she couldn’t seem to find any tomatoes:

No tomatoes? At Costco?

As she was leaving, she noticed a man with a store manager’s name tag and asked him why they had no tomatoes. He informed her the store did have tomatoes, but they were taken off the shelves for a few hours.

It turns out that Palin had been pelted with a tomato at an earlier stop on her book tour and the management at the Costco was determined it wouldn’t happen here.

No word on whether eggs, watermelons, apples or other potentially useful foodstuff projectiles were available during the Palin event.

Cross posting this from Brand X

Posted by Richard Metzger
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12.16.2009
06:42 pm
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Looking Major Tom In The Molars: An Analysis Of Bowie’s Teeth
12.16.2009
02:32 pm
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Could the artistry of David Bowie be tied somehow to the appearance of his teeth?  That appears to be the subtext of the following video.  Ziggy Stardust-era Bowie?  As “Surgeon To The Stars” Alex Kardis points out, “his teeth don’t look particularly great.”  By the time he got around, though, to recording Let’s Dance, Bowie’s choppers look brighter and tighter.

I find it interesting that Rolling Stone’s Alan Light feels that after Bowie cranked out not only Ziggy Stardust, but Hunky Dory, Low, Station to Station, etc., the one thing “holding him back” was a self-consciousness about his teeth.  Hmm, by that logic…did cosmetic surgery beget Tin Machine?!

Posted by Bradley Novicoff
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12.16.2009
02:32 pm
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To Permit Mouth To Be Able To Rejoice
12.16.2009
02:10 pm
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What’s wrong with “bite the wax tadpole” as a slogan for Coca-Cola ?
 
via Coca-Cola Conversations :

When Coca-Cola was first sold in China in 1927, it was obvious to the Coke employees in China that the Coca-Cola trademark must be transliterated into Chinese characters. To find the nearest phonetic equivalent to ?

Posted by Brad Laner
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12.16.2009
02:10 pm
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The Beatles as seen from the distant future
12.14.2009
09:23 pm
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I find this totally plausible.
 
(via Scott Gairdner)

Posted by Brad Laner
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12.14.2009
09:23 pm
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Yimmys Yayo’s Visual Crack for the Ocular Fiend
12.14.2009
11:55 am
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Yimmys Yayo is a colorful photoblog descirbed as “visual crack for the ocular fiend.” It is “purely to share amazing visuals found with as many people as possible.” Enjoy!
 
Yimmys Yayo

Posted by Tara McGinley
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12.14.2009
11:55 am
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The Peggy Lipton Affair Brings Down Another Mogul
12.12.2009
10:20 pm
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It’s a story that is getting surprisingly little national attention: former Mod Squad actress Peggy Lipton has inadvertently found herself at the center of New York’s pension fund scandal. Lipton was the object of the affections of a political operative named Jack Chartier who abused taxpayer supported town cars and other perks of his job in an effort to woo the actress. Chartier has been described in rather unflattering terms in the majority of the articles I’ve read on the matter. (The back story is told here in great detail). But now the scandal is getting deeper.

Tom Robbins write in the Village Voice:

The only victims in the Tiger Woods episode, for instance, are an SUV and the golf star himself, possibly due to a few swings on a nine-iron by his gorgeous wife. Compare that paltry disabled list to the lethal fallout produced after a schlubby late-middle-aged political hack from Queens fell hard for Lipton, the aging but still charming TV starlet. Lovestruck Jack Chartier was chief of staff to the New York state comptroller with influence over billions in state pension funds. The result has been financial scandal history.

Since Chartier, 64, started confessing to Attorney General Andrew Cuomo’s investigators about how he abused his office in order to better impress Lipton, at least five powerful figures have been forced to plead guilty to crimes involving the pension fund. Those admitting felonies so far include the former leader of the state’s Liberal Party, a Texas hedge-fund manager, a hugely successful investment adviser, and a pension fund broker.

The latest victim is the biggest catch yet: Elliott Broidy, 52, is the former national finance committee chairman of the Republican National Committee and a personal friend of George W. Bush. Broidy was such a generous and prolific giver that he qualified as a “Super Ranger” on Bush’s fundraising team, a designation for those ponying up $300,000-plus. One glittering evening in 2006, Broidy and his wife had Dubya as the guest of honor at their Bel Air mansion where more than $1 million was raised for the Republican cause. Broidy’s wallet was so wide open that Bush named him to the board of the Kennedy Center, placed him on the Homeland Security Advisory Council, and had him to dinner at the White House with another famously randy figure, Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi.

None of those powerful connections, however, were any help once Chartier started singing after having been being nailed on his own transgressions.

The Peggy Lipton Affair Brings Down Another Mogul (Village Voice)

Posted by Richard Metzger
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12.12.2009
10:20 pm
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Sarah Palin Parking Lot, Part 2
12.11.2009
12:00 am
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This time around: what does Sarah Palin mean for womankind?

Posted by Richard Metzger
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12.11.2009
12:00 am
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The Fabulous South Korean Chanteuse: Kim Jung Mi
12.10.2009
10:20 pm
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Why hello there everyone. First of all much thanks to Brad, Richard, Tara and Jason for having me here. I shall do my best to keep pace (a little) with your collective geniuses.
 
I thought I might begin by offering a sampling of the mysterious South Korean chanteuse Kim Jung Mi. I’ve been bewitched by her stylings and especially the raw production and playing on her early 70’s records ever since being introduced to her by the amazing vinyl archivists over at Mutant Sounds (about whom much more in future posts). I’ve found virtually nothing on her in English so I certainly welcome information from any Korean pop aficionados out there. So far the best bit I could glean was from YouTube user “ProudKoreanGuy” who claims : “Her songs kept getting censored so much by the South Korean government at that?ج

Posted by Brad Laner
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12.10.2009
10:20 pm
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Jukebox Hero: Jonesy’s Jukebox returns online
12.10.2009
10:14 pm
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When I moved to Los Angeles from New York in 1991, one of the first things I noticed right off the bat (besides the 99 Cents Only stores, the vast number of strip malls and the LA Weekly ads for butt cheek implants) was how great L.A. radio was. Notice I wrote was... as in past tense.

Cut to 2009 and the radio landscape in the City of Angels is getting kinda lame. If you’re not into the far right talk of Dr. Laura, the all reggaeton, all the time stations or Britney Spears, you’re pretty much out of luck these days. When Indie 103.1 morphed into the Latin format of El Gato earlier this year, it really felt like the final nail in the coffin for L.A. rock radio. High-profile rock DJs like Henry Rollins and Sex Pistol Steve Jones were cut adrift from their loyal listening audiences and there was sadness in the streets.

But now rock fans, rejoice, for Jonesy is back! Jonesy’s Jukebox is operational again, but this time on the Internet, streaming live for one hour a day on the www.iamrogue.com website run by producer Ryan Kavanaugh.

Now L.A.‘s finest DJ can spin for the rest of the world. I, for one, certainly will be listening.

Below: Young Mr. Jones and some of his mates swearing on live television in 1976:

Posted by Richard Metzger
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12.10.2009
10:14 pm
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