Monday, April 28, 2008

Tim and Eric: Beyond Awesome!!

Wow. Just wow. The DVD of Tim and Eric Awesome Show Great Job! Season One was released this week. I don't know why their random, creepy, inappropriate "comedy" resonates so highly with me, but it does. Many are repulsed by this show, I eat it up with a spoon. The DVD is great, and the commentary (particularly David Liebe Hart's discussion of his alien abduction) is a must for any fan.

Tonite I had the honor of seeing them live for the second time, the first being the oddly spiritual show at South Union Arts a few years ago. Thankfully my pals are geeks and we got to the Empty Bottle early and got a spot right in front of the stage which got us prime territory for Papa John's pizza to be tossed at us, hot dogs hurled by Casey and his brother, and Casey puking! The entire show was incredible, but the medley by Casey and his brother was really the best thing EVER! I never thought I'd hear "Cops and Robbers" live, seeing as Casey died in that explosion, but there they were! The live stuff was fantastic, and the video bits of season three (Dr. Steve Brule in an informercial!) were, well, awesome!

Okay wait. It did get better. Somehow I got called on stage for a dance contest! They invited up people in Rats Off To Ya shirts, but I was wearing the Hats Off To Ya shirt ("That's a rarity!")and got to dance to James Quall's Beach Blast. By popular vote, I won SECOND PLACE~!!! I got a copy of their CD (which I had bought upon getting in there, but hey, great gift!) and recognition from many nice people afterwards. Oh, and DJ Dougg Pound's way too brief opening set was super great as well! (Didn't I used to see that guy at Heaven Gallery or somewhere?)

GREAT JOB!!

PS - Way dorky pictures abound here.

Friday, April 18, 2008

Happy Record Store Day!

This whole Record Store Day thing kinda came out of nowhere, but if you want to give us snacks and drinks then by all means go for it! I will now remember some of my favorite record stores for you:

1.Yesterday and Today, Jacksonville, FL

This guy was strictly used, but I went through all my phases with him, LPs, cassettes, CDs. He'd also just get in super cool random posters, magazines, etc. He was conveniently located next to a grocery store so I could get there with my mom pretty easily. I was very sad the day he closed.

That One Place I Can't Remember the Name Of, that was once in 5 Points and then moved to near UNF, Jacksonville, FL

I loved it so much I cannot remember the name of it. I saw a Reel Big Fish instore there that I remember being super awesome (this was like 11 years ago, come on now!) and I bought that April March sings Serge Gainsborg upon hearing it played in the store. Got my first Stereolab there.

Theory Shop, Five Points and Jacksonville Beach

It was totally the best when you could go dancing at Einstein-A-Go-Go and buy 7"s! The 5 Points location was cool too, I bought Sloan Between the Bridges there.

Manifest, Columbia, SC

Another sad sad RIP. It was big and beautiful.

Radio KAOS, Stevens Point, WI
The $1 vinyl at the sidewalk sale was the place to be! Morrissey! Wilco! Other things nowhere near as cool but it was only $1!

Mad City Music Exchange, Madison, WI
The one off the beaten path and near an Indonesian restaurant was my fave in a city of pretty good record stores.

Laurie's Planet of Sound, Chicago, IL
Hey! That's where I work! Back in the day I was a customer too! If I didn't work there I would surely be in there way too much and drive the super great people who work there crazy. Happy Record Store day, everyone! Thanks for coming to see me at POS and being cool enough to buy records, etc.

Tuesday, April 08, 2008

Tonight's Muxtape



Black Sabbath - Behind The Wall Of Sleep
The Monkees - Circle Sky
Jay Reatard - My Shadow
Kate Bush - Wuthering Heights
Kristin Hersh - Your Ghost
Gary Higgins - I Can't Sleep At Night
Guided By Voices - As We Go Up, We Go Down
Hall and Oates - You Make My Dreams
Hot Butter - Popcorn
Songs:Ohia - The Moon Undoes It All
Pavement - The Killing Moon
R.E.M. - Feeling Gravity's Pull
don't just sit there, click the damn tape!

Lemonheads - It's a Shame About Ray Deluxe Edition

This is probably my most High School album. There's a great story with it too. I made Evan Dando sit through it once, so now you will.

I went to high school in Jakarta, Indonesia. The American/European CDs the one chain of CD stores would stock were pretty erratic; you never knew what you would walk in and find. Imagine my delight when I found It's A Shame About Ray nestled in the racks during a Sunday of leisurely shopping at Pondok Indah mall! I listened to it all day long! I told everyone I knew about it Monday, including this boy I sort of had a crush on, Daniel Eiland (boy, I hope he doesn't Google himself EVER). He then proceeded to get mad at me because he claimed to have "hidden" it in the store so he could go back and buy it, and tomorrow was his birthday!

I felt kind of bad, but didn't really feel that the CD was "hidden". When I got home (this part gets complicated, I lived with a friend and her family, and her mom did commercial baking in the house) "Mom" was excited to show off this giant sheet cake and cupcake display she had made for the Boy Scouts. The cake was pretty big, and she encouraged us to touch it. We did, tentatively, and discovered it was hard as a rock! She had made the icing into a gluey substance that looked just like the real thing and "iced" a box. I immediately had a brilliant idea.

The next day at school I presented Daniel with a beautiful white sheet cake with green icing border and, written in my own unmistakeable handwriting, "Happy Birthday Daniel!" with all sorts of little doodles. He was shocked, to say the least. I also let him have the CD. I ran off before the secret of the phony cake was exposed, but eyewitness reports were pretty detailed. He was impressed by both moves, he later told me, and I found a copy myself at another less popular mall's CD store.

Oh yeah, the deluxe reissue! The music sounds great, the bonus tracks really should have included the actual b-sides, but the demos are interesting. The DVD is where the action is though. That Evan Dando was quite the hottie back in the day, and I swear there are multiple videos here of him sitting on a beach/cliff with the wind blowing his hair around and he just looks all high.

I will now present a video not from Lemonheads, but of Superchunk. I love the slumber party scene which prominently features a picture of Evan looking sexy in his PJs from Spin Magazine which I totally had hanging up.

Saturday, April 05, 2008

The New Jay Reatard Single!!

"There's really nothing nothing to it, and that is all that I know." How does this guy write the catchiest pop songs in this galaxy? This is pure jump around your rumpus room arms flailing having a blast. Seriously, Melissa and I just kept flipping it over. and over. and over. I was planning on skipping Pitchfork until they announced Jay (and the two of a fucking amazing one two punch with King Kahn and his Shrines) on Saturday. You can take your Lollapalooza and chug it with your Miller Lite. I will be on a slightly ramshackle foldy lawn chair with my lukewarm Goose Island being creeped out and crapped in. 7 inch of the year!! Oh wait, he has more. Jerk.