fuck this

After all this fucking time (I've been trying to post for weeks), blogger decided to fix their issue with vdeck ftp servers and I can finally post again. Unfortunately, I already started a new blog using wordpress instead of holding out for the new blogger to come through for me. So you (if you so desire) get to update your blogroll to point to my new location:

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The good news is now I don't have to figure out how to mess with my rss feed so all of you get this. Fuck man, I'm getting too old for this shit Riggs.

It's official

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wrap it up b

It's the end of the year, a lot of shit has happened and I don't get to talk to everyone nearly enough. So it's time for me to start making some best and worst of lists. We'll start with the worst (of course).

Worst shows I went to in 2006 (in no particular order)

• 120 Days - @ Sin-E, CMJ 11/2/06 - (ref) - These guys force the ultimate question: can you still like a band when you think the members are a bunch of douches? No matter what the answer to that question is, there is no doubt that their show totally blew, but I have a thing for bands that rip of the Revenge of the Nerds Lamda Lamda Lamda carnival performance song. No one rocks it like goose.


• TV on the Radio - ACL, 9/16/06 - I'm not sure what happened to my ACL post, but fuck did these guys suck. Easily the most disappointing show I saw this year, simply because I was so excited about seeing them. Their album is fantastic, but jesus they sounded horrible live at ACL.


• Ween - ACL, 9/17/06 - I didn't have high hopes for Ween, but they still managed to disappoint.


• The Shins - Stubb's, 9/15/06 - I should probably cut the Shins a break because I was absolutely exhausted by the time I got to their night show. Something about drinking in the hot sun all day that will take the life out of you. Who knew?


• Siren Music Festival - Village Voice event at Coney Island - some music blogger stated that people should prepare themselves for the torture that is Siren Music Festival and damn if he wasn't right. The festival was terrible. The setup was bad, the sound was horrible, the weather didn't cooperate. The good part is that the lineup is awesome and it's free. I think that's how so many people get suckered into going every year. I don't plan on making that mistake again. And I'm a sucker for free. It was that bad.

Now someone will likely remind me that I blabbered on about a show (not on this list) that totally sucked. Don't get me wrong, I hate most everything, but these are the standouts. Exceptionally bad. Yeah.

Edit: I completely forgot to mention another CMJ show that totally blew:

• Gang Gang Dance - @ Webster Hall, CMJ 11/2/2006 - My head is starting to hurt just thinking about that girl and the fucking delay on her vocals. Painful. Like the background music in a B horror movie. Played backwards. Sung by Wing. Ouch.

The most wonderful time of the year

I just read this article over at CNN. For those of you that are too lazy to follow the link, here's the highlights:

• Many radio stations go all-Christmas music after Thanksgiving


• Ratings go up, choice is welcomed by listeners

If there's one thing I hate about Christmas, it's the music. Seriously, I would rather spend a month in awkward family situations than listen to Christmas music. And it makes me sick to my stomach that ratings actually go up when radio stations change to an all-Christmas music format. Are you fucking kidding me?

This has to be a goddamn joke. People really want to hear Christmas music? I just assumed that the department stores here used it to keep homeless people away. Apparently it has two benefits. The editor of some radio trade publication (owned by Clear Channel, of course) said, "Christmas music, for most people, puts a smile on your face. Even if you resist for a while, you can't hold out forever." I think it's more likely that people just give in. Even Manuel Noriega could only take so much Def Leppard before he started growing out his hair.

But you already knew all of this. The real disturbing news was this: "...the earliest station made the switch in October before trick or treaters made the rounds." This is completely out of control. We can't let Christmas invade the best holiday of the year. So do your part. Stop shopping at stores with Christmas music. Smack your parents around until they understand how stupid Christmas music is. And if you have to, kill some people to make your point. I'll do my part by forgoing Christmas altogether.

In non-Christmas music related news, check out Kat's post on the Blip Music Festival that I mentioned before. She pretty much said everything that I thought about the show, with the exception of mentioning that we got kick-ass buttons from The Onion columnists including, Jim Anchower, Smoove B, and Jean Teasdale. I'm a sucker for free stuff.

CMJ - never again

Tuesday:

I decided to work all day rather than taking vacation because I wanted to save some vacation days for Xmas. Kat and I decided to get our badges and such during lunch to avoid any lines (which was probably a good idea because the process wasn't exactly fast, even with no line). Our first event was the Borat movie, which we waited in line for nearly two hours (well, really Kat waited in line for two hours and I showed up after I got out of work) only to find that the place was totally booked and we weren't getting in. Not a good start to the festival.

After giving up on Borat, we decided to head down to the Knitting Factory to catch the Trucks. Tuesday was a light day and the Trucks was the only show I was really interested in seeing. For those of you unfamiliar with the Knitting Factory, it is pretty much in the middle of fucking nowhere and a pain in the ass to get to because there are no subways that go directly there from the East Village/Lower East Side. To its credit though, there are three stages at the Knitting Factory so it was easy to make the decision to stay down there since there were no other shows that looked good and Voyager One was going to be playing later in the night. I had never heard of Voyager One before, but earlier in the day, they played an instudio on KEXP which was fantastic. We lounged around the Knitting Factory Old Office, waiting for the Trucks to play and after Voyager One ended called it a night, since I planned on working halfdays on Wednesday and Thursday to save another precious day of vacation.

Tuesday Scoreboard

• Borat Movie - I still haven't seen it, and most everyone I would see it with already has. I'm going to be that loser that never sees the movie that everyone references. Awesome.


• The Boy Bathing - First off, this is a terrible band name. Telling someone you're going to watch "The Boy Bathing" is like asking Benson and Stabler to show up to your office and arrest you in front of all of your co-workers. On top of that, they are a little too Bright Eyes for my taste.
  Rating: I'd skip them if they were opening for a band I really wanted to see.


• The Trucks - First off, I love this band name. They're billed as "Electro-pop" but I'd throw some of the riot grrl genre in there too. Their show was great - funny, danceable, entertaining. The only issue I had was that they tried to make the sound as bad as possible by requesting more volume from the sound engineer when they didn't need it. This would be a continuing trend at the festival. It seems that the sound engineers working these things will just do whatever the bands ask for, whether or not it makes for the best sound. Apparently bands generally do not make good sound engineers.
  Rating: I'd buy tickets to see them again.


• The Sad Little Stars - We only caught about half of their set because I wanted to go upstairs and catch part of the Voyager One set. I can't remember that much about them, but I remember thinking they were pretty good and it took a little doing for me to make the call that I should get up and go watch Voyager One.
  Rating: I'd show up early if they were opening for a band I wanted to see, or I might go see them if it was a slow night and I really wanted to go see some music.


• Voyager One - I liked the songs of theirs I heard as I expected. Unfortunately we missed half of their set because we were comfortable in our seats watching The Sad Little Stars.
  Rating: I'd buy tickets to see them again.

Wednesday:

Wednesday was a bit more complicated because I worked a half day, but I wanted to see the Vice Guide to Travel at noon, so I had to split up my day and work two hours in the morning and two hours in the afternoon. That will always make your day feel strange. After getting out of the Vice movie, we stopped by the expo floor booths to pick up some free swag. We met the guys from Reverb Nation who were nice and I'm anxious to see if their website takes off. It's like a combination of a bunch of other music/networking sites (think last.fm, myspace.com, etc) but is supposed to be much more useful to the bands. The interface looks pretty slick and they gave us free t-shirts, so I have nothing but good things to say about them. We also ran into one of the guys from Pandora which was awesome because I've been a fan of Pandora for some time even if all of my stations seem to recommend Enuff's Z'Nuff. I was giving the guy working the booth a hard time about it for a while before I thought to ask him if he was one of the developers, which he was. He knows I caught on to his plans for world domination which somehow include making me listen to Enuff's Z'Nuff. After getting all the free stuff I headed back to work for the rest of the afternoon before going to the night showcases. But tonight was really just about seeing The Knife. They were playing at 11:30, which meant there was a little time to kill, but I really needed to get there early because there was no way I was going to miss their set. This was their first time to ever play in America and in a number of people's eyes, probably their last. I wasn't going to miss it, which meant I blew off most of the night to stand in line for this show. After the show we tried to get into an afterparty to see 120 Days, but it (of course) was invite only and we were screwed. Instead we went to Happy Ending for an industrial night afterparty, which turned out to be pretty fun. We met some nice people there that we will hopefully be seeing an industrial show with in the near future.

Wednesday Scoreboard

• Vice Guide To Travel - Unlike the Borat movie, there was absolutely no line for this. We still showed up half an hour early to find that we could just walk into the theater and pick whatever seats we wanted. I think there were only 50 people in the 250 seat theater. The movie itself was entertaining, though I think the billing in the trailer is misleading because the "big names" that are referenced in this movie don't actually go to the exotic locations, they just talk about it with the Vice reporters that do. I didn't really need them in it anyway.
  Rating: I would have paid to see it.


• The Whigs - I don't really have much to say about either of the bands I saw before The Knife. I was really distracted stressing about how early I needed to get in line to make it in to see The Knife.
  Rating: I'm listening to music on their website right now. New York abstains.


• Hello Stranger - Wait, I remember something about this band. Their summary in the book says, "Spanish language threesome combines new wave hooks and dancey beats for a damn good time." They have one song which fits this "Es Tu Vida". You can hear it on their website. The rest of their music is totally bland and not worth putting up with in my opinion.
  Rating: I'd show up for the last song of their set if they opened for a band I liked. Or if you want things to be easy, skip them altogether.


• The Knife - We waited in line for an hour to see them, just to wait in line for an hour inside for them to go on stage. The show was totally sold out. I mean fucking packed as hell. We were five people from the stage. It was absolutely worth it to me. The show was fucking awesome. Lots of visuals, and just the best songs they have. Prior to the show I only had their third album (first in the US) Silent Shout. This album is amazing. I downloaded one of their previous albums which isn't nearly as good.
  Rating: Show up early, get close to the stage and dance your ass off.

Thursday:

I once again worked a half day, which was a little easier this time because there wasn't anything particularly early that I wanted to see. After getting out of work we headed down to the Stereogum - Yep Roc showcase for some free food and free beer. We ate the free food, drank the not so tasty beer, and left before Heavy Trash had finished rockabilly-ing me out of my mind. Thursday was just about seeing Hot Chip so after grabbing some dinner we headed on up to Webster Hall (where we saw The Knife) again to scope out a good spot. After Hot Chip ended, Kat opted to go home and I decided to try to see Forward, Russia!, which was silly because everyone else in the world was already there. The doorman informed me that they weren't letting any more CMJ badges into the show, but they would let me pay $12 to get in. Fuck that. So I went to Sin-E to see 120 Days. Sin-E is another one of those music venues that's kind of out of the way. It's in the Lower East Side, but it's at least a 15 minute walk from the nearest club and is on a desolate street where I think half the NYC crime scenes on TV take place.

Thursday Scoreboard

• Heavy Trash - I'm not sure when it happened, but I am really sick of rockabilly.
  Rating: Let's just go with no.


• Shy Child - Two piece band - drummer and singer/keyboard player. Music was forgettable, on stage presence was lacking. They should really consider getting a couple more members and filling out their sound. And writing better songs. And during the Hot Chip set, the singer was fighting with his girlfriend/wife/spouse/whatever behind us.
  Rating: No thanks.


• Gang Gang Dance - We had met someone on Wednesday that had great things to say about this band. If I read a review of this show in a magazine I would expect it to start with, "Like a child who overeats halloween candy the lead singer from Gang Gang Dance can't get enough of the delay effect on her vocals. And like that child, my stomach hurts." Seriously, get her the fuck away from that delay pedal. It sounds like shit. She's not using it right at all. Musically they were ok, but not tight at all. There were numerous points where it sounded like they got out of sync with the pre-recorded material they were using. And I have no idea how you can have five (or was it six?) members in your band and still have such a need to have the majority of your music be pre-recorded loops. If you're going to use odd time signatures, you better be able to hit those notes in your sleep.
  Rating: You take a guess.


• Hot Chip - Hot Chip was great as I expected them to be. I was a bit worn out from The Knife show the previous night, so Kat and I stayed up on the balcony instead of toughing it out with the capacity crowd on the floor. Their set was really good, but they didn't play "The Warning" which disappointed me. The first two bands should have been taking notes during the Hot Chip set. Hot Chip did everything right that those guys did wrong.
  Rating: Once again, show up early, get close to the stage and dance your ass off.


• Favourite Sons - I'm glad I showed up for the 120 Days set early because it meant I got to see part of this set. Though it drives me crazy when Americans use British spelling, I'll let it go this time because I really liked their set. The music has this kind of doors-y feel to it, but isn't a blatant ripoff attempt. All of their songs were tight, the singer was personable, you really couldn't ask for much more.
  Rating: I'd pay to see them again.


• 120 Days - I have to admit, these guys looked like total douches whenever they started hauling their equipment onto the stage. Everything in the fucking world went wrong while they were setting up too. They didn't have enough space to set up all of their equipment, which mean they only had half of their drumset. Something was going wrong with the drum machine so it kept cutting out. The monitors by the drummer weren't working. The had horrible feedback any time the monitor volumes were adjusted. Fucking horrendous. They started their midnight set 45 minutes late and people were starting to give up on them. They got about halfway through a song before they gave up because it just wasn't working. They only really managed to play two songs, one of which was a Stooges cover (which worked out pretty well). I stuck around for their entire set because I knew I wasn't going to see any other bands that night and for their last song they finally had their equipment working. That song was good, but the rest of the set kind of blew.
  Rating: I'm torn because they really do look like a bunch of douches. I'd likely buy a ticket to see them though because I like their music, but I'd curse their douche-baggery the whole time.

Friday:

Friday I was most concerned with seeing the Tenacious D movie. I didn't really have any plans beyond that, so once we finished with the movie, before going to the afterparty I sat down at the computer and made some quick picks. We headed down toe Sin-E, where I had just suffered through the 120 Days non-set the previous night and got free drinks, free bags, and a free Tenacious D poster. After getting a few drinks on an empty stomach, we picked up some food before heading to the Mercury to eventually catch Tokyo Police Club. After Tokyo Police Club I decided to start heading home rather than catching the Albert Hammond Jr. (one of the guys from the Strokes) set, I think I made a good decision, it was too fucking packed in there to stay. So I started making the walk home and stopped by Irving Plaza to see Architecture in Helsinki (well, more to see Irving Plaza since I had never been before). Exhausted from the week, I was home and asleep by 12:45.

Friday Scoreboard

• Tenacious D Movie - Hilarious. Go see it.
  Rating: Buy tickets, see the movie.


• Tenacious D afterparty - Apples in Stereo, Cinematics, Miho Hatori, IV Thieves - Apples in Stereo were overrated. Not so good. Cinematics were alright, I expect to see them blowing up MTV soon enough, Miho Hatori was like a new cibbo matto, which was cool and I don't really remember what IV Thieves were like.


• Land of Talk - A lot of people were blown away by Land of Talk. I thought they were just alright. Not spectacular, but not a letdown either.
  Rating: I might see them again.


• Cloud Cult - they had two artists on stage that painted pictures during the set. The pictures were pretty nice and on sale to the highest bidder after the set. I find the concept interesting and and the paintings were pretty good. The show was really great.
  Rating: I would pay to see them again. (though I passed on their Monday post-CMJ show as I was exhausted from the CMJ Marathon)


• Tokyo Police Club - These guys fucking rocked. I swear they must have played 20 songs because almost all of their songs are less than 3 minutes (most I believe are under 2). I would have bought their cd.
  Rating: I'd pay to see them again.


• Architecture in Helsinki - They're like an Australian B-52s. I was tired. I didn't stay.
  Rating: Eh, I wouldn't go out of my way to see them.

Saturday:

Saturday was another light day. There were no bands that I was dying to see with the exception of day shows and those were either totally packed or invite only, which is a big fuck-you to anyone who paid $400 for a fucking badge. We tried to get into the Brooklyn Vegan day party, but it was seriously packed. We went up to a club I had never heard of called Lit Lounge to see a band from Austin I had never heard of (they sucked) and then went to see Pablo, met some people there and ended up at some cheesy bar in the financial district. And that's how we closed out CMJ.

Saturday Scoreboard

• Pablo - I skipped reviews of the other stuff that we slightly saw because it's not even worth mentioning. But Pablo, fuck yeah they're awesome. And they're the super-nicest guys you'd ever meet. I chatted them up a bit while I was buying their cd and Paul (singer) and Brian (drummer) were really friendly and genuinely nice people. I'm glad I got to see them.
  Rating: Buy tickets, go see them.

Wrap up

So why do I say never again? Because the badge doesn't guarantee admittance to anything. You can buy tickets to any of the shows and then not have to suffer the waiting in line and the potential for getting turned away because a show is sold out. And that will cost you much less than the badge.
I will likely go to some of the CMJ shows again, but I'll just buy tickets to the shows that I want to see. The only thing exclusive to the badge is getting to go the panels (which I don't care to go to) and the movies (of which there were only three that I wanted to see). I'd rather just figure out how to get on the list for the free shows, pay for tickets to the bands I want to see at night and save myself $200. Yeah, that sounds way better.

Just the facts

I'm in the middle of writing my big CMJ Music Marathon report, which will explain the good parts, the bad parts, and why I won't ever buy a badge again. (Not that it was terrible, it just wasn't worth the price of the badge).

I just got back from my cousin's wedding reception at Truluck's in Austin. It's fucking good. And McP had a party at his house in our honor on Friday night. I have the best friends in the world. No doubt. Supergood times. Sorry to everyone that I missed. There will be a next time though, don't fret. Whatever that means.

I have an official olive vendor. Check them out: Pickles, Olives, Etc. I'm more interested in the olives than the "etc". But motherfucking olives stuff with garlic?!?! Hell yes. And have you ever wondered how many garlic stuffed olives it takes to constitute a meal? 18. At least that's how many it takes for me to be full.

In other olive news, I went to a restaurant that served olive-stuffed olives. Wrap your minds around that one.

It takes 26 minutes to take a leisurely walk home from work at night. In the afternoon it can take 40 minutes.

It takes 15 minutes to take the subway to work in the morning (8:00-8:30).

It is exactly 2.5 blocks (1.5 street and 1 avenue) to the nearest establishment with "Texas" in the name. "Texas Smokehouse". I haven't trie it yet, but with reviews like: "How can this place call itself a smokehouse when not one single thing that I've tried has been smoked?" I have to give it a try.

The season finale of Weeds was really good. I'm liking that show more all the time.

Everyone should listen to Pablo.

AND - Fuck yes I'm going to the Blip Music Festival Nov. 30th-Dec. 3rd. You would (and should) too.

Have you ever heard of ninjitsu?

I just watched American Ninja for the first time in years. Spectacular. What makes this movie so great? I'll start with some sample dialog:

Army Colonel: Jackson! Have you had a chance to check the wounds?
Stereotypical Black Army Guy: Yes sir, I have.
AC: Well, what is it?
SBAG: Have you ever heard of ninjitsu, sir?
AC: What's that?
SBAG: The secret art of asassination.
AC: Yeah, of course I have!
SBAG: Well according to witness testimony and evidence, this massacre was the work of ninjas.
AC: ninjas? hm.

If that doesn't convince you, my timely review of the movie will:

"An American Ninja? What are you talking about? There is no such thing!"

Implausible as it may sound, this movie revolves entirely around the life of an American Ninja. Can you believe it? Everyone knows it is punishable by death for a ninja to teach his secrets to Westerners. But, Sam Firstenberg, director of "Breakin' 2: Electric Boogaloo", crafts a convincing backstory to explain how this American Ninja came to be.

American Ninja centers around Joe (Michael Dudikoff), a man with no past who was discovered with complete amnesia as a child on an island in the Pacific by a construction crew. Before being found on the island and returned to America, Joe was befriended by a stranded Japanese soldier (played by John Fujioka, who would later show of his ninja skills once again in Mortal Kombat) who taught him the ways of the ninja. But this isn't just a simple action movie about ninjas. Set in the Philippines, the action and social commentary quickly get underway when rebels attack Joe's U.S. Army convoy. Rebel attacks in the Philippines are still a problem today (see Cavite). You quickly learn that the rebels are being led by a mysterious businessman who also has a team of ninjas working for him!

I don't want to give away the whole story, but in less than two hours this movie comments on the rampant problems that U.S. soldiers have with ninjas, corruption within the U.S. Army, the disproportionately large number of southerners in high-ranking military positions, the ineffectiveness of machine guns, Hispanic people buying WMDs on the black market, and most importantly - the need for a black supporting actor to balance out a movie.

Fresh off of his rousing performance as a hospital intern in Mask, Steve James paves the for black buddy actors Louis Gossett Jr. and Danny Glover as Joe's rival-turned-buddy after he challenges Joe to a fight and gets his ass kicked in front of everyone. Even the action sequences have an underlying message. Rather than spend money on expensive fight choreographers, Firstenberg opts to use the same play-fight choreography you used as a kid when you pretended to be a ninja, driving home the point that you look like an idiot when you pretend to be a ninja and you should stop trying. Judie Aronson is somewhat forgettable as Patricia, the unnecessary love interest who also happens to be the Colonel's daughter. Patricia's awkward delivery meshes well with her unnecessary lines and inappropriate screams. She does, however, manage to keep her clothes on for the entire movie at a time when all action movies required T&A or at least a little T.

Overall, the movie manages to cover too much ground in a very short time by cutting dialog down to a minimum and using abrupt scene changes to rush you through the loose plot without having to sit there forever. All of this is accomplished AND there are still points that are so slow that your mind wanders, giving you time to reflect on your day rather than being constantly bombarded by a movie. It's no surprise that story writer Gideon Amir turned down all other writing offers for the rest of his career to focus on American Ninja 2 & 3. Though unfortunate that Amir was too exhausted by American Ninja 3 to participate in parts 4 and 5, he gave us the epic American Ninja Trilogy, and we should be thankful for that.

Rating: 3.5 stars out of 5
(Watch the trailer)

Oh yeah and Austin peoples: study up on this. I'm going to be making references to this movie for weeks, which includes the Nov. 10th-12th weekend when I will be in Austin once again.