So, the new Hillary Clinton ad is Alarming. And it is meant to be.
Seem familiar? Yeah, it is the same kind of scare tacics LBJ used in the 60s!
And it is just disgusting. I expect such dirty tacticts from republicans, but thus far McCain has actually refrained from it. Leave it to Hillary play this card.
Next thing you know this will be her campaign theme song:
UPDATE: Turns out a McCain Supporter made the same argument for McCain over a month ago. Language is too similar for it to be using a common theme (a scene a faire if you will).
As I left for my radio show this evening, I was in a foul mood. I had a pretty decent weekend, spent a lot of time with friends out at bars, had visitors come in from Portland who took me to The Hard Sell ( a DJ Shadow/Cut Chemist and Kid Koala Show which, by the way, was amazing...all 45s!!), and I even had a nice dinner with a friend this evening. But in the time between coming home from dinner and leaving for my radio show my mood turned sour. I have a feeling it has to do with the looming holiday, but considering I tend to celebrate NOT celebrating the holiday (some of you old timers may recall back in 2005, when I wasn't single mind you, and I cracked open this egg of knowledge...
The Corporatization of Love Can someone explain to me why Valentine's Day might exist other than to get corporations a bunch of money by selling the same old shit at exorbitant prices? For example, tomorrow, a dozen roses will cost $9.99 - $19.99. Yet, TODAY, today they are $79.99 - $129.99 (oh, why not splurge for that 4 dozen roses bouquet for $289.99?). Any love that one has today will likely be the same tomorrow, so what's the difference? Why not wait til tomorrow to "celebrate your love" and spend that extra sixty some-odd dollars on another gift? But, this brings us to an even more pertinent issue. Valentine's Day is bad not just because it lets corporations hold people hostage and thus profit off of something that should be celebrated every day, but also because it makes people feel really shitty. It's like "hey loser! no date? haha, you are gonna die alone! you might as well go slit your throat because you are the ONLY one without a date." I say fuck that.
...on why we should just not care about the holiday).
Regardless, for whatever reason, I was not in a good mood. I had no real interest in going to my radio show and I certainly didn't want to have to pick out a bunch of music to play for the few people I might have listening. However, as I started playing music, my mood started to lighten. Song after song I became happier and more peppy, to the point where my radio show totally made my day. It reminded me, yet again, how important music is to me. Pretty much no matter my mood, there is music that will make me happy.
In this instance, the music that made me happy was listening to stuff that I used to play on my show back in the day on KSCU. Gems that most people in these parts either a)have not ever heard or b) do not necessarily like. I busted out the likes of The Wunder Years (who haven't been around since 2001), Gogol Bordello (who, for whatever reason, I have barely played on my show at all in quite some time), and the ultimate song from the KSCU days (except for maybe Old Skull's version of Homeless): Robyn Hitchcock's Viva! Sea-Tac
After all of that, I was so happy. My mood turned around completely and I had a bounce in my step.
At this point I would like to make a slight interlude and show you the video for Homeless by Old Skull. This has to be one of the funniest/saddest/absolutely most amazing things I have ever seen/heard. Nine Year Olds playing punk! I used to play this vinyl ALL THE TIME on my show. And the part where the kid screams "Ronald Reagan Sucks! I Hate Ronald Reagan!" Classic!
Okay, enough of that, back to the topic at hand (although that kind of proves my whole point, as I am in a REALLY good mood after watching that gem).
What really got me thinking was that some of the music that lightens my mood might, for some others, make their mood worse. For example, if I am going through a rough breakup, or if I have just had my heart broken, it makes me feel better to listen to depressing music because it makes me realize that others out there feel like I do. Then everything is okay. I remember Justin, who at one point went through a breakup at roughly the same time I did, was the opposite and would always try and grab my iPod and change it to some happy sappy bullshit. For my money, when that happens, just throw this track on repeat and nothing in the world can be wrong:
So, trusty reader, this is where you get to be interactive. When you are going through a patch of heartbreak, what's your medicine? Do you reach for the songs of sadness and despair, or do you want lollipops and head bobbing? What's your poison? Tell me!
Sometimes I love the fact that I have a Tivo. It lets me record television programs without actually having to watch the television. That means I can get my dose of The Daily Show (or, as it is known until the writers strike ends...A Daily Show), and weekly doses of Family Guy, The Simpsons, and maybe a little It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia. if you don't know IASIP, get on the bandwagon people...it is simply amazing. check it:
So, I get a call today that says Hillary Clinton cried again. Yes, really, it worked so well before, that she DID IT AGAIN. However, this time Fox News thought it was sincere. Why? Well maybe it is because Ann Coulter has said she will support Clinton if McCain gets the nomination. Yes, she really said that HILLARY CLINTON IS MORE CONSERVATIVE THAN MCCAIN!
Then, as I sat at home tonight watching the Simpsons on the Tivo, more Clinton talk (about Bill, but Clinton nonetheless). This amazing scene came on. Take note that this is a flashback episode to the 90s, which then uses prescient comments to bash Bush...
It is hard for me to understand why Hillary is the candidate that people believe are electable. I am telling you this now, if Hillary runs against McCain, HILLARY WILL NOT TAKE OFFICE. I initially would have said that she would not win the election, but because she very well could but have it stolen away from her like both Gore and Kerry did, I won't say it. Here's the deal. Hillary Clinton is a lightning rod. People on the right HATE her. People on the left side of the right HATE her. I'm A Kucinich supporter who voted for Gore and Kerry in the last two elections and I HAVE HAD IT. If she is the Democrat nominee, I'm voting Nader:
And this is a a common sentiment. Many people will no vote for her. Many would vote McCain if it is Hillary. She will lose, for real, and we cannot have that. 4-8 more years of Republican rule will destroy this country even more than it has been. SCOTUS, as it stands, has set civil rights back 150 years under GWB, we need to ensure it doesn;'t become even more right wing. Obama is the only way left to do that. But, when it comes down to it, Hillary is simply wrong on the issues and is not a progressive in any way...
You might remember that last month I was a judge at a Beat Battle over in Ballard (Seattle neighborhood, for those of you who aen't familiar). Here's a write up we got!
Seattlest attended the late-night Graffiti Rock beat battle at The Sunset on Saturday night, casually organized by P.U.S.H., primarily so we could remind ourselves what Ballard looks like.
Ballard's doing fine, in case you haven't been there recently either, and djblesOne of Massive Monkees took home the battle's imaginary trophy somewhere around 2am; second place went to Sportn' Life DJ Nphared (interviewed by Seattlest here). Both of the finalists brought beautifully composed, rock-hard, trampoline-tight beats to the event, but in the end, djblesOne's complex compositions won out.
The surprise of the night was when hot producer Brainstorm (pictured above), second-place winner at the Big Tune Championships, lost his first (and therefore his only) round to Rudy (of Rudy & the Rhetoric) in a unanimous but hotly crowd-contested decision from the three judges. Boo! Hiss!
We actually loved Brainstorm's second beat, a jazzy, sexalicious stoner number, but the judges felt it wasn't the best choice for the first round of a battle.
In hiphop, love and war, strategy is right up there with sheer technical skill and musicianship; Rudy not only was on the winning left side of the stage (hooked up to a Mac built to play hard beats) but also brought some of his best drum-crunching, creative beats to a first round battle he didn't think he'd win. We are fond of Rudy, and surprisingly fond of his beats, but it was certainly a shocker to see Brain dismissed so early in the evening.
The other competitor we were particularly feeling that night was MTK, who played some of Seattlest's favorite beats of the night (including a guitar-plucking "Fuck You" refrain against Sabino and a crunchy, driving beat against blesOne). We liked PSmoov's work, but only got to hear two beats from him. GMK and Johnny Magnum pulled off a short but very sweet performance of some of their best tracks before the final round of the beat battle, which was fun. Judging the event: Larry Mizell (Cancer Rising!), Andrew Matson (Seattle Times hiphop journalist), and Cameron Collins (of Saku Collins Entertainment & Media Law Group). Big Rob hosted: "Let's flip a coin. Who's got a coin? ... And it's heads. And that," as he bent down to pick up the coin, "is my ass crack." By the end of the night, the battle had devolved into a series of drunken insider jokes from the judges and long, mildly funny stories from Big Rob; we still enjoyed the showcase of local producers' work. We also enjoyed leaving Capitol Hill on a Saturday night for once.
So this one isn't going to be very exciting. More of a description of the ongoings and some thank yous. The real juicy stuff is to come... but I will put initial observations at the bottom:
So I got there Tuesday night. Just hung out for a few days until Thursday when people started showing up. Already, on that first night, people were super drunk. I was surprised at how hard some people were hittin the bottle considering we had a full weekend plus bowling left. And I'm not even talking about my team. We represented Asian Man Records and were pretty much awesome. The first day we bowled pretty poorly, but bowled just well enough to advance to the B league playoffs. 56th in the B group (which meant 88th overall). The second day, we got 15th in B group (47th overall).
We were rollin strong too...huge crew. So I say thank you to new and old friends who really made the weekend: James, Darin, Rich, Ruben, Jessica, Linney (+2), Jen, Kate, Haley, Jacob, Kevbo, Jamie, John, and my cousin Brian! And I am positive I forgot others, but love me anyway! OH...and a BIG thank you to Mike Park!!!!
Observations: 1) People at Punk Rock Bowling get really really drunk.
2) Fat Mike isn't so fat anymore. Cocaine, anyone? He still writes good music though.
3) Our group of friends definitely had the most attractive girls. Big ups to the ladies for making us look good!
4) Nothington and American Steel, who both performed at the show, fucking rule.
5) The guitar player from American Steel looks like Andrew from Against Me!
6) I bet you the Tell-Tale Heartbreakers are insane live, although I have never seen them. Their lead singer is pretty awesome though.
7) McDonald's is putting some super dirty toys in their Happy Meals, and they should probably be stopped. Go look at it in person and just think of whether the Golden Girls were a porno about rabbits...pretty gross.
8) Even smokers think it is too smokey in Vegas casinos.
9) You can't leave Vegas without gambling...I bet a whole dollar!
10) The best haircuts come in hotel bathrooms from hairdressers on vacation!
So my business partner just got back from Germany and told me about this new female singer that is all the rage. Apparently she is a well known french actress (Stéphanie Sokolinski) who is now playing music. It is straight up indie. Kind of like a french kimya dawson (moldy peaches, juno, anyone?). Kind of like feist. But she is blowing up in Europe. No one here knows her here yet. And you can tell this is going to be something KEXP is going to eat up so hardcore!
Show review from Gigwise UK: "It's difficult to know what to make of our French friend. Playing a solo show with just ukulele and keyboard (She is normally supported by a full band) she comes across as a real life Phoebe Buffet with song titles such as 'I Hate Your Dog', 'Baby Cat' and 'I Think I'm Pregnant'. There's definitely the influence of Daniel Johnson throughout with very little attention paid to the music, all simple beats and strums, and nursery rhyme like storytelling but beneath the simplicity the words cut deep with an emotional wit. Shy and bumbling throughout there is something charming about Soko in her innocent persona that makes her music no matter how absurd beautifully arresting."
So, this is a repost...in light of the Aggrolites (or aggregates as this dumb girl with a tramp stamp called them) playing bumbershoot. ----- First, I know...that line is actually about hip hop. But you know what?! Before hip hop was ever "dead", people were always saying ska was dead. I can't tell you how many times I have heard people say "you still listen to ska? I was way into it in high school, but i don't like it anymore." What I find really funny is most of those people were into ska AFTER the third wave craze...which reached its pinnacle during MY highschool years. And the people that tell me this are generally younger than me! So what exactly is it about ska that drives people away? I mean, for me, ska was a natural progression as I became MORE knowledgeable and intellectual about music. Reggae is something I listened to in middle school; ska was its better (and we won't even get into the debate about how it can be seen as two separate trends that simply have similar roots since they both came from Jamaican Mento, with ska breaking off into rock steady which eventually lead to reggae).
Okay, we'll step back here because knowing some of you, you are like "3rd wave ska? what the fuck is the difference?" Here is a quick synopsis for you. But please note, I am not even going to go into the racial and political movements associated with the genres...that is a whole different story which is a great topic but beyond the scope of this blog.
First Wave Ska: finding it's roots in the Mento music genre of Jamaica, as the American invasion of R&B came in, the two genres fused to form ska. It took the beats and bass of American R&B and mixed it with the guitar strum that emphasizes the up of the second, third and fourth beat of Mento. When you think of the First Wave of Ska, generally you think of such artists as The Skatalites and Bunny and Skitter. Here's a Skatalites video for you to get the idea: Second Wave Ska: ahhh... Two Tone Era. Here is some amazing music! It was the fusion of Jamaican ska rhythms and melodies with the lyrical content and aggressive guitar chords of 70s punk that took place in the UK. They were all about racial unity. Bands like The Specials, The (English) Beat, Bad Manners, The Selecter, so on and so forth...and for those of you who are like "whatever, I listen to other British bands;" many artists who become huge (like the Police) started out as ska bands. And Elvis Costello produced the first Specials record, so he was a major part of the scene! Unfortunately when you mixed the working class skinheads (not what you think of as skinheads here, not racist, but pretty much dressed the same) with the Rude Boys, well, violence would break out in the dancehalls and people stopped booking ska. Sadly, it went away for awhile.
Here are some videos from the Specials, Bad Manners, and, The Selecter: The Specials
Bad Manners
The Selecter
Third Wave Ska: in short, third wave is a fusion of the two tone ska of the second wave with modern punk rock. Its much faster and can oftentimes sounds just like punk rock but with horns. Just like the 2nd wave, it features brass instrumentsand a heavily-accented offbeat. Skankin Pickle, Op Ivy, Mustard Plug, Reel Big Fish, No Doubt (pre-Tragic Kingdom), Mighty Mighty Bosstones, Catch 22/Streetlight Manifesto...and you even has bands like the Slackers, Hepcat, and the Aggrolites that continued to play 60s style ska. This was probably the pinnacle of ska popularity wise, as it became huge in the US between 1995 and 1998. By the early 2000s, a lot of the bands broke up, and there really haven't been too many new ones coming into existence...however some of them are still rocking. You can go see the Aquabats, the Reel Big Fish, Streetlight Manifesto, and a handful of others even to this day. SM even has an album that is about to come out and RBF put out an awesome live record last year... Here are some videos from Streetlight manifesto, Reel Big Fish, Tim Armstrong, Skankin Pickle, and the Slackers so you can see what it is like:
Streetlight Manifesto
Reel Big Fish
Tim Armstrong yeah seattle!
Skankin Pickle oh look how young mike park is!!
The Slackers
And all of that music is amazing...so I do not really understand how someone who listens to crappy, untalented bands can't even see the good qualities in ska, even if they do not like it. I can recognize talent even if I do not like the music. But more importantly, Ska is still here, so keep listening. You can go see Streetlight Manifesto, Reel Big Fish, The Slackers, Monkey, etc... I mean, come on, the Aggrolites are playing Bumbershoot!! And more importantly, even if you are not a ska fan, the shows are FUN! You can dance and skank all day. the Bad Mannner/Monkey show I went to a few weeks back was amazing. I was skankin my ass off....YES ME, THE ONE WHO DOESNT DANCE!! It was awesome times. So broaden your mind...even if you were once a fan and are not anymore, give it another try. You just might like it. And even if you don't, at least you will have one hell of a time!! So get on that internet and start illegally downloading ska song songs...and if you like them go buy them!
All this has made me want to go to a Streetlight Manifesto show.
Attorney with an emphasis in entertainment law. College radio dj. Bassist. Keyboardist. Former college radio music director. Former show promoter. Former college radio general manager.
