Categories: Review Posted on December 15, 2010 By: Roy
This year the opening credits to Saturday Night Live open with Jewish me, Fred Armisen. Quite like me, Fred is seen leafing through a box of vinyl records, presumably in New York City. It is clear that the record store is not very organized because the titles are ordered PEARL JAM, SEX PISTOLS, JOY DIVISION. The closest sensible reason I can think of for that way of alphabetizing is that the second word in the second pair begins with the first letter of the first word in the first pair and the third pair begins with the first letter of the second word in the first pair, but that pattern doesn’t continue unless you replace Joy Division with someone like Joe Satriani, which is obviously stupid because why would Fred Armisen listen to him? Pearl Jam and the Sex Pistols seem like viable options, especially because Fred has been known to guest star in quirky and fun little indie music videos, which I will not link to.
If you stick with me you will be replaying this video a lot. Don’t worry the 2009 version still applies.
Categories: Lists Posted on January 6, 2010 By: DJ
4 Things I Want To Do By 2011
Apparently New Year’s Eve has come and gone. From all accounts I was in New Paltz for two nights celebrating, but there is absolutely no way I could confirm or deny those statements. My calendar, on the other hand, is about as reliable as any other calendar and it tells me we’re now in the year 2010, which is pretty sweet. Only a few more years till hoverboards, Mastodon is probably gearing up to write another album which will leave my brains all over Roy’s walls, and from what I can gather, we still have two whole years before the planet implodes.
So, I felt it was appropriate to wait until about a week in to make my resolutions. I decided to whittle down the thousands and thousands of character flaws and gimmicks which have been holding me back from achieving massive amounts of success, fame and fortune and focus on five key things I want to be able to accomplish by the end of this year. Let’s get started!
1. I want to be able to play the ukulele better then this kid:
I’ve been putting some serious hours in on the ole’ six string recently, but if I’m going to complete resolution 2, I need to sharpen my uke skillz. This kid has the right idea – just sittin’ around laughin’ and bustin’ out some chords and singing whatever he’s singing. If you double click and read the info, apparently he slipped a “Surfin’ USA” in there somewhere. That’s what ukulele is all about.
2. I want to record an album at least as labor intensive as The Wolf by Andrew W.K.
I was just alerted this morning that every track on Andrew W.K.’s incredibly underrated second album, The Wolf, has between 90 and 200 tracks all recorded by Andrew W.K. That is fucking impressive. Can I write the anthems of a generation as poignantly as Mr. W.K.? Probably not. But can I throw a bunch of shit at the wall and see what sticks? Definitely. Then can I take said sticky shit and overwork it like an even more obsessive Axl Rose? Absolutely.
3. I don’t want to look like this at any point in 2010:
Unless Ralph Macchio just thrashed me in a tournament, there is no reason I should be asleep at a party. Especially if I went so far out of my way to dress up and look presentable. If I were smoking bongs at Roy’s place all night, it’s one thing. But to show up to a kegger dressed to the nine’s just to fall asleep – that’s simply unjustifiable.
4. I want to somehow be able to make whoever accidentally lands on this site a) actually want to read some of the bullshit on it and b) get the jokes.
A lot of people visit the site via random Google Image searches. That rocks. The problem is that once they right click and save their image as (I know Mac users, a two buttoned mouse is so 1998, AMIRITE? Trendy douchebags.). Where was I? These parenthetical asides always knock me for a loop – maybe my fifth resolution should be to make them shorter and funnier. Oh right, no one visits the site or seems to get the jokes. Well I honestly don’t see how I can change either of those things, so let me link you to two comments from 2009 that really really missed the boat. Numer 1. Number 2.
Categories: Interviews Posted on September 2, 2009 By: DJ
The self-proclaimed ring leader of Bigelf was kind enough to take some time away from wearing kick ass top hats and channeling the stoned love child of John Lord and Keith Emerson to talk with me at the Philly stop on the Progressive Nation 2009 tour. If you don’t know who Bigelf are, you need to. Right now. Cheat The Gallows made my wacky year end list and will probably make it again, unless Mastodon puts out another album before December. These dudes put on a heavy fucking show for everyone and reminded all the Wold of Warcraft T-shirt wearing Dream Theater fans what progressive meant in 1975. Mike Portnoy probably relayed probably the best description of them in my interview with him: “They’re about 25 years in the past and 5 years in the future.” And they’re really really cool guys.
Below is my 30-something minute chat with Damon, a few pics from the show and by week’s end I’ll have a transcription for those of you who are deaf or who lack the proper equipment/plugins/moral constitution to listen to me act like a fanboy retard for a half hour. Enjoy!
Categories: Interviews Posted on August 25, 2009 By: DJ
I recently had the opportunity to interview Mike Portnoy at the Progressive Nation 2009 tour stop in Philly. I really don’t think I need to say much else. I wanted to come up with some clever drum-related way of calling him a legend, but I don’t think I need to. If they haven’t already hit your town go see this tour. It features Scale the Summit (who I unfortunately missed), Bigelf (who will be featured on the site tomorrow), Zappa Plays Zappa, and of course Dream Theater. I have to say, it was my first DT show and I was really satisfied with the experience.
Below is the audio interview and a few pics from the experience, below THAT will be a transcription when I have a few free hours.
I recently had the opportunity to interview the legendary Mike Portnoy at the Prog Nation 2009 tour stop in Philly. If they haven’t already hit your town go see this tour. It features Scale the Summit (who I unfortunately missed), Bigelf (who will be featured on the site tomorrow), Zappa Plays Zappa, and of course Dream Theater.
Categories: Podcast Posted on August 19, 2009 By: DJ
In this podcast, James and I take it upon ourselves to tear good ole EVH a new one. We also handle the news that Radiohead insisted “another album will kill us.” Yeah. We’re going for another new gimmick beginning this week. Half hour shows! Like TV!!!
At one point in the podcast I reference and we announce a song contributed to a porno by Mr. Brown Sound. We don’t have any sort of way to do this legally, so here’s a YouTube video of it:
Since we’ve been so insanely inconsistent – we’re gonna bang out (hehe BANG) out two new interviews and another podcast before the end of the week.
Categories: The News Posted on April 23, 2009 By: DJ
If you aren’t an alarmist FoxNews viewer, you’re probably not familiar with the term “sexting.” Clearly, I am. Sexting is the awful play on words that describes when one individual, by their own choosing, takes a naked picture of themself and sends it to someone else via SMS (Short Message Service). The solution to this scourge? Giving the sweet naked pics to this guy. What kills me about the following quote is the use of the sentence structure to create a scene which resembles that of a real job and attorney should be doing, like reviewing photos of the scene of a murder, rape, minor traffic violation, etc.:
Photos of their semi-nude or scantily clad teenage daughters were stacked before him. Mr. Skumanick said the images had been discovered on cellphones confiscated at the local high school.
I can’t believe this is really an issue parents (or anyone) is shocked by. It’s 2009 – could you dolts really be so naive to think your kids aren’t using every piece of technology almost exclusively for personal sexual gratification?
Categories: Science Posted on April 21, 2009 By: Roy
Hello everyone. Many people, particularly those who live nearby water, have heard of an animal called the osprey. You may have even been lucky enough to have seen one of these birds of prey in action. Osprey’s are very cool and they are certainly a species that everyone could use more information on. To help inform the masses on these exciting animals I’ve decided to write this post. This is “In The Know” with Roy and this week’s topic is ospreys.
