Eddie Vedder Is Still Better Than Indie Rock

Its easy to forget about the truly great iconic rock stars of the 90's. New music keeps coming. The term "Indie Rock" (which is a terribly annoying little label) has taken the place of "Grunge" and real rock stars have gone the way of the Dirt Shrew. Now bands are bands. Their lead singers are invisible. Quiet chess players at Starbucks.
Don't forget about Eddie. Pearl Jam is still the greatest live band on earth. That band has signified various points in our lives. Whether it was listening to Ten the summer before our freshman year of high school or No Code sending us off to college they have been with us every step of the way.
Into The Wild is a new Film by Sean Penn. Intelligent, introspective youth on a journey of self inspection. I think I might be past the point in my life where the storyline of a 20 year old embarking on an Alaskan journey to find himself is at all appealing. But Sean Penn directed and Eddie Vedder wrote the songs. It can't be that bad...can it?
Eddie Vedder does the entire soundtrack...by himself. If this came out ten years ago I would have asked the simple question..."why does anyone else try to make music?" Today, with all the other music clouding my vision, it took a second to realize how good the cd really is. And its good. Brings back the old days. And the old days, were good days. Its nice to remember them.

Eddie Vedder [mp3] Rise

I Once Picked My Nose Till It Bleeded...

Here are a slew of Ralph Wiggum lines. Ralph Wiggum is funny.

-My knob tastes funny.
-Hi, Principal Skinner! Hi, Super Nintendo Chalmers.
-And I want a bike and a monkey and a friend for the monkey.
-Eww, Daddy, this tastes like Gramma!
-I bent my wookie.
-Lisa's bad dancing makes my feet sad.
-That's where I saw the Leprechaun. He tells me to burn things.
-Daddy, I'm scared. Too scared to wet my pants.
-My cat's name is Mittens.
-This snowflake tastes like fish sticks.
-Slow down, Bart! My legs don't know how to be as long as yours.
-When I grow up I wanna be a Principal or a Caterpillar.
-Principal Skinner, I got carsick in your office.
-Dear Miss Hoover, you have Lyme disease. We miss you. Kevin is biting me. Come back soon. Here's a drawing of a spirokeet. Love Ralph
-My cat's breath smells like cat food.
-He's gonna smell like hot dogs.
-Miss Hoover, I glued my head to my shoulders.
-When I grow up I'm going to Bovine University.
-I ate too much plastic candy.
-I found a moon rock in my nose!
-You have the bestest Dad. He read me a story about Chinese food.
-Miss Hoover, there's a dog in the vent.
-Me fail English? That's unpossible.
-My face is on fire.
-The doctor said I wouldn't have so many nosebleeds if I kept my finger out of there.
-Your hair is tall...and pretty!
-It tastes like ... burning.
-I'm Idaho!
-And when the doctor said I didn't have worms any more, that was the happiest day of my life.
and one I heard tonight..."I flushed a potato down the toilet and now we have to move"
quotes are from comedy2.com

Early In The Morning Everyone's Scared Of Us...

Its a great thing to be able to hear good music...to be able to recognize good music without having a critic tell you why it was great or why it fell short of the random standard he has set. I have huge problems with music reviews...at the same time I cant pick up a Spin Magazine and not flip to the back to see what they had to say. So here is a song. Untouched by the critics. Untouched by hype or preconceived notions...
If a great song is written and is never pumped into the mainstream was it a great song?
The answer is of course...Yes.

Ce N'est Rien [mp3] While We Dress Like Dirt

Three Songs For a Friday

Have a Good Weekend. Here are three songs for the day.
(IF YOU HAVEN'T BEEN ABLE TO PLAY THE SONGS DOWNLOAD QUICKTIME...THE LINK IS UP AND TO YOUR RIGHT)

Extra Glenns [mp3] Somebody Elses Parking Lot
John Darnielle singing.

Clem Snide [mp3] No Ones More Happy Than You
I have a video in my mind for this song. It involves two guys on top of a funeral home, dumping coffins off of the roof. The people bounce out of the coffins with smiles on their face. Sick? Yes. Disturbing? Maybe. Brilliant? No, just mostly disturbing...

Band of Horses [mp3] Is There A Ghost
This album comes out on Tuesday...cant wait!!

Jesus Don't Want Me For a Sunbeam

And so the story goes...
I have found Christ...I was driving down the highway through Illinois as rain trampled my car, listening to someone singing about perpetuated fear, peeling my eyes to stay awake and then...as Illinois became every farm in Indiana everything stopped. The rain paused and the words blurred and my vision was sharp. Raindrops on my windshield slid together and formed a sentence...when I was 8 or so I used to pretend these drops were little pac mans eating pellets...now those same raindrops form sentences that reveal my black hole fate. The water drops moved like tiny bits of mercury on the counter of a science class and they spelled out a simple sentence. "I am the devil and you are coming with me." After getting past the amazment of what I was witnessing I felt overcome with a panic that only a sentence from satan written in water on the windshield of your speeding car could produce. The sky's clouds parted and I could only think that this was a sign...thunder vacuumed and lightning put to rest...this must mean something...it must mean that my time had come. At this moment, a moment of my finest distress, I thought it was a good time to start looking for God, or Jesus or someone in a beard or a dress or in an androgynous pair of slacks...to my amazement I did not have to look very far...finding God was not as difficult as I had anticipated. I mean I always heard about people finding Jesus...You hear about it every day. It is usually after they get caught cheating on their wife or letting their thousand dollar a day cocaine addiction ruin their relationship with their sons and daughters or getting caught in a restroom stall with another man, but I guess I always assumed that they had been looking all along...that the fact that their back was against the wall was just a coincident. I mean I had words spelled on my windshield and then the clouds parted...I was in the worst kind of trouble and I prepared myself for a long, long search.
So imagine my suprise to find Jesus two minutes after I decided to look. He/She/It was lying peacefully under a tree eating what appeared to be a bagel with cream cheese enjoying what was turning out to be a beautiful sort of day. He looked content, but thoughtful. I was excited and I yelled..."I have found Christ!!!"
and all he/she/it said was "But I wasnt lost."

Two Gallants Two Gallants

The Two Gallants new self titled album is maybe their most well rounded yet. Their first one, The Throes, was great, full of energy, angst...kind of made you want to throw a brick through the other guys window. Their second, What The Toll Tells, fell a little short with me. The album had some standout tracks like Las Cruces Jail and Age of Assassins, but as a whole it just seemed like patchwork. This new record is great. One track doesn't stand out above all the rest. But they are all solid. It sounds to me like they are starting to figure it out. They vary tempos from song to song, just not as abruptly as before. A review explained the Two Gallants' music as if punk rock was invented in Oklahoma. I think that is a good assessment. Go buy their new album....now!

Two Gallants [mp3] Despite What You've Been Told

Red Sox...Round 1

Time to talk some post season baseball and the great early round matchups. As much as I would love to say the Red Sox are the team to beat this year I am going to go with the Indians. They scare me to death. Carmona and Sabathia are filthy and they have an entire team of professional hitters. They have 6 guys that can hit the ball out of the ball park led by Travis Haffner who could hit 5 in a series if he gets hot. Glad the Yankees got that draw.
But lets move on to more important series. I love it when the Sox play the Angels. Dave Henderson off Donnie Moore, 1986. I was 8 and I almost jumped as high as Hendu did after he hit that go ahead bomb. The sweep in 2004. Good memories.

The Matchup--Red Sox vs Angels
The Sox have the superior team on paper. Dangerous hitting up and down the lineup. Beckett, Dice-K, Schilling, Papelbon. An overpriced Right Fielder who can make 38,000 friends if he decides to turn it on in October. Not to mention that Manny is back and David Ortiz is David Ortiz. The bullpen is key...Its nice to be able to throw Beckett 6 strong and then rely on the best bullpen in the game today...Delcarmen, Okajima, and Paps.
The Angels have the wheels and Vlad Guerrero, who is the best hitter in this Series. They have one chance to get a game and that is with Kelvin Escobar going against Dice-K. Escobar has the nastiest stuff on the Angels outside of F-Rod. Dice K might be a little tired because he throws from the time he wakes up until the time he goes to bed and post season baseball here isn't quite like playing against Tom Selleck in Mr. Baseball.
John Lackey is their ace and goes in game one, but he is going against Beckett and we all know how clutch he is in post season (Yankees).
Give me Curt Schilling in the post season until he is 50.
The Outcome--Sox in 4

The cool air of October, a Red Sox lead, Fenway Park...and Neil Diamond.
Neil Diamond [mp3] Sweet Caroline