Pruple Reign, Purple Reign

God, Adrian Peterson is amazing. Watching Peterson run is like watching a fighter jet take off, except I've never seen a jet take off in person and I think Peterson may be more powerful. The 70-something yard run AP busted off tonight (first play from scrimmage no less) looked so effortless and powerful that I really have nothing I have seen in sports to compare it to. Maybe, just maybe, it matches MJ gliding to the hoop or Ken Griffey Jr's swing.

Oh, and Favre looked okay. Seeing the Ol' Gunslinger (whom I have wished more than my share of harm on in my day) in Purple is still like seeing your enemy snuggle with the love of your life, but I think I can take that kind of nausea if the Lombardi Trophy is paraded down Hennepin in February.

Ken Griffey's Grotesquely Swollen Jaw

Tonight was the biggest cumulative ass whipping I have ever been a part of in softball. I think the other teams scored a combined 75 runs to our 20 or so. It sucks, I'm sore, kinda heartbroken, and sweaty.

But on my way home I stopped at Holiday and witnessed someone buying only a Hawaiian Punch and a Blunt paying in change being rung up by a cashier with the sides of his head shaved and a gel shell on top, and it made everything all better.

Oh, and R.I.P Teddy Kennedy. I'm not exactly sure what you did (or, for that matter, what ANY of the fucking Kennedy's did beside possibly Eiffel Tower Marylin Monroe) to improve American society. But you did love the broads and you loved scotch and you once DD'ed and killed some party slut, so I guess your more than okay in this guys book...

The Stuff Kids Go For

The last year has been absolutely abominable for music...at least I thought so until recently. Today, both Pearl Jam and Weezer released new singles (Pearl Jam going with "The Fixer" and The Weeze going with the succinctly titled "(If You're Wondering If I Want You To) I Want You To"). Both songs rock my socks, going in a very poppy direction for two bands not known for slinging pop candy. The Weezer song is up on some 70s bubblegum nonsense and was produced by my favorite purveyor of nonsense (Butch Walker) while "The Fixer" sounds like the Pearl Jam that kicked our asses on the last disc, except happy.

The other song/group I am totally gay for recently is Passion Pit, whose "Manners" disc has really not left the iPod/CD player in the last couple of weeks. The key track is "Little Secrets" which is the happiest song ever and makes me want to white boy dance.

Oh, and the new Brendan Benson is grand also...but that was to be expected after "The Alternative To Love." Anything else would have been a letdown.

Clearance Rack Cavalcade 8/22/09

Since I haven't actually updated this thang in two weeks, I'm gonna give you two for one on the CD reviews...

Big Black "Songs About Fucking"
This albums title may mislead those who are looking to spice up the bedroom. When I think of songs that may be about fucking, I think of things like "The Lemon Song" or anything by Prince before he turned Jay-Hov. God only knows what kind of fucking Big Black was going off about, but I assume it involved fishhooking, choking, and in all likelihood, an appearance by TT Boy. Overall though, the CD wasn't a terrible purchase. Their cover of "The Model" sounded like Kraftwerk backed by Nine Inch Nails, and the song "Colombian Necktie" has a pretty kickass drum going for it. I guess a more apt title would have been "Songs to Do Speed To".

PJ Harvey "To Bring You My Love"
I was always a little leery of diving into the PJ Harvey pool, mainly because her videos always scared me when I was a youngun. But then I bought "Stories From The City, Stories From The Sea" on clearance and liked the fuck out of it. So I delved into "To Bring You My Love" head-on. TBYML already had a familiar song in it with "Down By The Water"(which reminds me of middle school and the fact that the local alternative station seemed to have a constant battle between "Down By The Water" and "Lighting Crashes" by Live as to who could have more airplay in the Spring of 1995). The deeper cuts, like "C'mon Billy" and "Send His Love To Me" aren't as "radio friendly" as "Down By The Water" (which, if were released today, would never sniff the top 40 at any format) but are just as effective, and dare I say, sort of sexy in a creepy way. Worth my Jefferson, and then some.

For The Movies...

God, there were a lot of ugly people at Target tonight. And they weren't your standard unattractive types. They were the ones wearing dirty white Looney Tunes T-Shirts and had rolls spilling out of tank tops. Made me almost think twice about buying that sack of Pizza Rolls...

Anyways, I heard that some sexy celeb chick from Gossip Girl had a homemade porn floating around on the internet. So, like any good meaning American citizen, I searched for it. All I got was some stills...a huge disappointment. It was the same bullshit I dealt with trying to get me some naked Erin Andrews.

Amazingly, I think I like looking at naked celebs fucking more than I actually like trying to find willing women for myself. I have no clue why. I mean, I actually watched the Tonya Harding porn just to see what it was all about. I ended up laughing, mainly because her hubby kind of looked like an old supervisor I had named Mike T. But the point is, I still watched. I would probably watch a Kirstie Alley/John Goodman porn if one ever gets leaked. Because they are naked and famous.

Random Discs 8/4/09

So on the way to work today, I had the ol iPod on random. A Manic Street Preachers song called "Ifwhiteamericatoldthetruthforonedayit'sworldwouldfallapart" came on, and I thought to myself, "I am the only fucking person I know who owns this CD." Mind you, that doesn't make the music earth shattering or myself some special music savant, it just means that I enjoy some random shit. So here's a short list of CDs I own that I guarantee none of my inner and outer circles (around 50 people owns):

Manic Street Preachers-The Holy Bible
Kind of a cross between Oasis and a hardcore punk band, they later on became a watered down Oasis/Britpop styled band. But this CD was pure fire.

Suede-Dog Man Star
Another Britpop group, this kind of sounds like slow-Bowie fronted by a tranny who has great shoes.

Robbie Williams-Sing When You're Winning
Too bad this dude got no shine in the U.S. besides a few low charting singles ("Millenium" and "Angels") because this CD rules. Witty, sensitive, glammy and pensive all in one package. Note: I also own the Robbie Williams standards album "SWING When You're Winning" which is absolute shit.

Rockpile-Seconds of Pleasure
On which Nick Lowe and Dave Edmunds team up to sing rockabilly. Incredible power pop.

The Magnetic Fields-69 Love Songs
69 songs about love, being in love, hating love, all sung in different styles, but having a very chamber pop vibe.

XTC-Oranges and Lemons-
Not the best album ever, but it has the two best XTC songs ("King For a Day" and "The Mayor of Simpleton"). As if there is anyone who reads this actively judging XTC songs....

Street Dancing In The Dark

Holy shit, I need to quit drinking...this weekend was even more drunken and strange than the last.

Friday started with a trip to the Southhaven Muni On/Off Sale bar, where Kammies were done and cheap beer drank. DJ Funky Monkey was rockin her set (which consisted of David Allan Coe, Buckcherry and Union Underground) and Heggie's pizza was taken from the Annandale Fire Department's banquet table.

I think the Kamikaze put the crew over the top, because on the way home, the whip was ghost rode down a dirt road to A Tribe Called Quest. Having never ghost rode the whip before, I can say it was quite the thrill.

Saturday started with a trip to the Wright County Swap Meet, where magic always happens. A wedding photo of Sonny and Cher was purchased (not by me), along with a Richard Marx CD (by me). The real fun started when we all started drinking around noon, which led to the longest Polish golf game ever ( I think around two hours) which I lost after leading 20-2.

Then, onto the street dance. The scenery at the street dance wasn't all I hoped for, but there was a woman who had a Diane Lane quality that all the young dudes found endearing. There were also jalapeno poppers and more kammies. After getting really really drunk, we went to an after bar at some dude named Bear's house out in the woods.

Bear's bar was a little overwhelming. It was lit with red light bulbs and had dollar bills, panties, and Bears and Cardinals memorabilia all over the fucking place. It also seemed that Bear didn't want any dudes in his house. When his kid started yelling "I'm in the fucking Navy" drunken me decided it was probably time to go.

Great times though...'cept I might not go back to the Bear Cave next time.

Embarrassing Albums 7/20/09

This blog begins with a disclaimer: I fucking hate Don Henley. He is a curmudgeonly old man who won't let chunky housewives sing his songs at karaoke. The songs he sang with the Eagles pale in comparison to anything Glen Frey or Joe Walsh did. Oh, and there is something vaguely creepy about his political agenda.

That being said, I love Don Henley's 1989 album "The End of the Innocence." This is probably the first time I have confessed that little tidbit, but it needs to be said. Not only do I own TEOTI on CD, I also have it on vinyl...and I am damn proud of it.

Enough with the "how?" though. More on the "why?"

Part of my love for this disc may because it was one of only four CDs my parents owned from 1989 to 1992 (along with Vanilla Ice, Wilson Philips and The Best of Kansas). Needless to say, the only CDs that actually got play were Don Henley and the Kansas best of. So familiarity may have bread my love.

Another part of the love may be the world weary view the album takes. Ol' Don just sounds beat down, kinda pissed off about it, but RESIGNED to his failures. Even in a song called "I Will Not Go Quietly" Henley doesn't really sound like he's going to bring the motherfuckin' ruckus. And really, what is better than being resigned that life isn't roses and wine?

The best three songs on TEOTI are the three top 40 hits ("The Heart of the Matter", "The Last Worthless Evening" and the title track). They are also the most earnest. Much of what Henley did with the Eagles seemed plastic and bitter (see "Life In The Fast Lane") and none of the three I listed have that quality. So, in "the long run" that is why "The End of the Innocence" remains an embarrassing album that I hold dear to me.

Plus, W. Axl Rose sings backups on the album. How fucking weird is that?

Lake Michigan 09: Own It!

Holy shit I am drained...long long weekend spent in Wisconsin. Lots of drinking, lots of cheese, lots of strangeness that will probably never be matched in the annals of my bar going (and there has been plenty of that).

Friday night we arrived in Manitowoc after a 5 hour drive and hit up a hotel bar that had karaoke. Many dollar taps were consumed, in a setting that could be described as "biker friendly." There was also a ferry boat enthusiast who dressed like Bernie from "Weekend at Bernies" and a chubby dude named Tommy Lee who sang "Amish Paradise" by Weird Al Yankovic. At bar close, we stumbled home while singing "Kiss From a Rose" and also fighting rocks and flower beds.

Saturday can be summed up by the following sequence: Cheese shop, townie acoustic festival, cheese curds, drunken croquet, homemade gourmet pizza, dive bar. The dive bar was called Kenny B's, and 90% of the crowd were either A)raging lesbians or B)pre-op transsexuals. It was insane to see, especially in a town of only 30,000 people. The karaoke there was also insane, lots of Alice Cooper. The highlight for me was when Nate did "A Lapdance Is So Much Better When The Stripper Is Crying" by the Bloodhound Gang(which will probably never be in a karaoke book again). Anyways, it was an insane weekend, but very fun.

Denver Day 2

Sorry about the lateness of this post, hectic ass beginning of the week with return to work and softball and such...

Denver day two started out with a cheap ass breakfast at a cafe downtown. I had a Chorizo Hash and a Bloody Mary, and my bill ran 10 bucks. After that, I hit up some bowling at Lucky Strike Lanes (an uber trendy 3rd floor bowling alley with loungers and a Bloody Mary Bar). I bowled a 163 the first game, and around an 80 the second game (in which I got absolutely worked by Nikki, who hadn't bowled in like 10 years).

After bowling, it was a walk to Coors Field in the pouring rain. Once in the field though, the rain stopped, and I took in the scenery. Awesome stadium, laid back fans. We stood right on the bullpen rail in center, where we saw D-Backs pitcher Clay Zavada's amazing waxed moustache (aka "Face Salad"). Even though I wasn't too in to the game in the beginning (I HATE NL baseball unless its the Cubs) it got exciting later on when the D-Backs put up 11 runs in three innings.

And, that's about it. The ride home sucked, but it was well worth it, and I will be going going back back to Denver Denver sometime in the future.

FOR TOM KLICK: How much shit should we give Nick tomorrow for Sakic retiring?

Denver Day 1.5

Operation Get In To Denver began at 7 PM Thursday with a planned rendezvous point of Omaha around 1 AM. Driving through Iowa was going to be a bitch, and it was, but for unexpected reasons. The entire state smelled like a cross between youth football equipment and pig shit. Probably the most horrendous smell that one could smell, AND IT LASTED THE LENGTH OF THE STATE!

Anyways, we arrived in Omaha around 12:30 AM. A hotel was booked downtown for 50 bucks, which gives you an idea of how hoppin Omaha is. There was absolutely no one on the streets. It was like St.Paul on a Wednesday, except more boring. Really strange.

After sleeping a few hours and loading up on caffeine, we continued our journey west. I ate lunch at a place called Runza, which is a Nebraska only fast food chain that serves meat pies. It was the most awful food stuff I have ever consumed. Instead of the luscious meat pie I was expecting, I got something the same taste and consistency as a Hot Pockets Sub. Plus, the place smelled like a nursing home and was loaded with a bunch of ugly corn fed Nebraskans. Such a disappointment...

Finally, we arrived in Denver around 5. Denver is much larger and cleaner than I expected. The downtown area has a strip that is what Block Eshould be. Very vibrant, a nice mix of chain stores and local restaurants and bars, and a free bus that runs the length of the mall.

One of the bars had a drink called Rastafarian Punch, which was like a Tied To The Bedpost at Gasthof's, except bigger and cheaper. The bar also had lamb burgers and numerous other cheap drinks. Needless to say, I partook. And I ended up passing out at 11:30 due to the "altitude."

Michael Jackson

This has got to be the strangest celeb death ever...which is fitting, because it happened to the most off the wall celeb of them all.

Michael Jackson dying is like Disneyland or McDonalds dying. This may sound crass, but its not meant to be. Michael Jackson was a cultural institution, for both good and bad reasons. Good because he produced some of the greatest R&B tracks of all time, and bad because he allegedly abused children and could not get his personal house in order (and the news media ate that up). And, truthfully, so did I. One of my favorite memories is getting absolutely hammered in Cody Stevens basement and watching "Living With Michael Jackson" on VHS to see the shit show that his life had become.

I think the real reason people are reacting to this so fervently is because it is a sort of sendoff of childhood for people in my age group. He was THE dominant pop culture force during the 80s and early 90s, a touchstone for my generation. Also, I think the music took a back seat to the creepier aspects of his personality over the last 15 or so years, and people are realizing how innovative some of those songs were. Even the drivel from the early days ("The Girl Is Mine", "Girlfriend", "Dirty Diana") kicks a lot of the other pop music of the times ass.


So in honor of the musical side of the biggest pop star of my lifetime, I'm going to do a rundown of my top 10 MJ songs, both solo and with the Jackson 5 (whom people tend to forget when discussing his career, but were really one of the best bands of the early 70s. Their first three albums...fire):

10."The Way You Make Me Feel"
9."The Love You Save"
8."Girlfriend"
7. "One More Chance"
6."Rock With You"
5."The Girl Is Mine"
4."I Want You Back"
3. "PYT (Pretty Young Thing)"
2."Don't Stop Til You Get Enough"
1."Billie Jean"

And there are so many others from that time period...the original version of "State of Shock" with Freddie Mercury instead of Mick Jagger springs to mind. Too bad his last good music came out in 1991...still, I always felt he had one great song left in him. I guess the world will never know now.

Fox-y Lady? aka A Treatise on Megan Fox

So I got called "a gay" today for not finding Megan Fox attractive. This isn't the first time either.

I don't know what it is, this chick just doesn't do it for me. I think there are a few factors that lead to my un-attraction to what seems to be the Hollywood "I'd fuck that" it girl of the last year and a half. I will detail those factors for you now.

1) Her face - Ol' Foxy Fox's mug just doesn't do it for me. She has a permanent scowl in most pictures I have seen, and there is some weird Joan Crawford shit going on with those eyebrows of hers. And, to top it all off, her eyes are oddly spaced.

2) Her brain - Once, I heard that she likes to fart. Then, I read that her Transformers clothes smelled "like farts". Clearly, something is wrong with this broad. Nothing disgusts me more than women talking about bodily functions. NOTHING! Don't get me wrong, I love a chick who thinks like a man in certain aspects, but not about farting. God, no.

3)Her "talent" - What has she been in? Transformers? Thats it, right? Oh, and Maxim. Seeing as how I never saw the first Transformers(but, admittedly, thought it LOOKED cool) maybe I missed out on the sex appeal. But still, show me something else. Maybe a cute little romantic comedy I watch on the sly without my boys knowing, or a drama where you go to Africa like DSL Angelina Jolie.

Maybe its me, I don't know. I mean, I find certain celebs attractive (I won the "you just don't like her because we all like her" argument at work because I detailed what I would do to Jessica Biel) but just not this little cookie of love.

I'll Be Your Natural Selection

So whilst watching Sports Center tonight (its come down to Sports Center and more Sports Center as the only thing I can watch on TV) I saw a commercial for Natural Light. Ah yes, Natty Light...the beer every poor kid drank in college. Except for my crew, who was more discerning, and drank Old Style, Grain Belt, and Pabst if we wanted to do it on the cheap.

The thing that struck me about seeing a Natural Light ad was that I had never seen one before. Without any advertising, one of the shittiest beers brewed by the shittiest brewery (Anheuser-Busch) is the #6 selling beer in the U.S.A. Natty Light is the equavalent of Nickelback...no one admits to liking it, girls go "whooo" in its presence, and its really popular with frat boys.

Personally, I never have even considered buying that shit...except for the time I saw a 30 banger of it in Chicago for $8.99. That would come out to 30 cents a can! Actually, I think the only time I actively consumed the Natty was when I played flippy cup at a house party in Bloomington where I knew nobody. That one time was enough for me, 30 cents per 12 oz or no 30 cents per 12 oz.

Chicago Day 2

Day two started off with a train ride down to Wrigleyville. We didn't have tickets to the game, so a group decision was made to go bar hopping. The area was PACKED with Twins fans, Saturday being better than Friday by probably about 70/30. Cubs fans weren't as jovial as the previous day, giving us a lot of shit about coming into their territory and giving off a overall kind of defeated vibe (not that the defeated vibe is anything new for a Cubbies fan).

After the Twins sealed the deal, we went to a newish bar that had $2 Old Styles. That's when the fun began. A group of about 15 Minnesotans, mainly dudes,were having a dance off in the corner We stayed there for about 2 hours, and stumbled out into the streets to drunkenly take pictures and rabble rouse with other Twins fans (and strangely enough, one really depressed Washington Nationals fan). Then we hopped a train downtown.

The train was nothing but drunk Twins fans chanting some awesome nonsense. A few chant examples were "Frank The Tank" and "KFC." The dude who was presumably Frank The Tank tried to use my brothers girlfriends rack as a hand rail, and also missed his stop. Yet, no one seemed too annoyed with the Tank's shenanigans.

Drunk as all getup, we ambled about downtown, where a man's car from Ontario had broke down. Instead of thinking that (the logical choice), we all assumed that he was Ghostriding the Whip down State Street. So we chanted "Ghostride the Whip" at him instead of making any effort to help. I stand firm that this was the right decision...

After we sort of kind of sobered up, we had a less than good meal at Rock Bottom Brewery. Then, it was time for home, where some of the party tried to keep the hotel pool open past 10PM, to no avail.

Chicago Day 1

So the day started off at 2am, with the drive down. Fortunately, no one fell asleep at the wheel and we arrived in the Windy City around 10am.

Immediaiately after checking in, we hopped on a train to Wrigley. It was my third time in the Friendly Confines so I kind of knew what to expect...lots of well behaved Cubs fans and a relaxed atmosphere. What I didn't expect was the swarm of Twins fans. I would say probably 60 percent of the crowd was pro-Twin. And when Joe Mauer went yard, the place got loud. Like Dome loud.

After the game, Wrigleyville was so packed with Twins supporters it was hard to move. So we took a train back to the suburbs and went for some Giordanos. As always, the combonation of cheese, tomatos and flaky pie crust put me in heaven.

Because no one had slept in nearly 36 hours, we decided to just go pick up some beer at 7-Eleven and call it a night. Saving all our downtown energies for tonight was the plan

Take A Letter, Maria

Sorry about the lack of posts lately, I just haven't really been in the mood to write. My grandmother passed away last Friday morning and I haven't really been up to the challenge of slinging together a good rant, a music review, or a softball story.

I'm going to start fresh this weekend...I'm going to Chi-City for Cubs-Twins at Wrigley and I will be dragging along the Laptop for another running Chicago daily journal. So get prepared for stories involving Old Style, pizza, and brahskis...not in that order hopefully.

Top 6 Cover Songs by Pussy Sounding Bands

Any cock rocking stud with a mullet can rock the house with a cover...but it takes a special breed of emo sounding twerp to make something as good as the following six reworkings. In no particular order, here are the six best cover songs done by bands whose ass you could probably kick.

Want-Lagwagon (originally by Jawbreaker)
The quintessential emo jam, with a chorus of “I want you, I want you” sung ad infinum. The original is a bit garbled due to poor recording and Jawbreaker’s lead singer sounding like he gargled glass. Lagwagon sweetens the deal a bit, and the result is sublime romantic longing.

On With The Show-Get Up Kids (originally by Motley Crue)
A cautionary tale about being bad, never good and getting murdered with a switchblade…but still having to go on with the show. Not only was this covered by the Get Up Kids, it was also covered by the even pussier MXPX on their covers album in the late 1990s. Strangely, Vince Neil’s vocals and the Get Up Kids vocals are almost the same.

Game Of Pricks-Jimmy Eat World(originally by Guided by Voices)
One of the best rock songs of the 1990s gets re-did by Jim Adkins and company. Clocking in at around two minutes, its dark lyrics are lost all in the bounce of the music.

Somebody’s Baby-Phantom Planet (originally by Jackson Browne)
Here’s the deal with covers (at least for me): I like em almost the same as the original (probably one of the reasons I think Cat Power kind of sucks). “Somebody’s Baby” is a stellar chunk of American cheese by a guy who did much better work (see his self titled disc or “Running on Empty”). The chamelions in the Planet don’t try to re-invent the wheel, and that is why this cover clicks.

Boyz In The Hood-Dynamite Hack (originally by Easy-E)
Where the fuck did these guys go? This slice of white boy prep via Compton candy is why we all bought the album. Then, after finding out these guys sounded kind of like Weezer on both downers AND speed at various points, it was love. Then, nothing else. Sure they were a novelty band, but they coulda been contenders

A Little Respect-Wheatus (originally by Erasure)
Either you hate this song or love it (if you have ever even heard it). A man with the whiniest, most nasal voice ever in pop music covers a song by one of the most gay friendly pop groups of the 80s (Erasure released an ABBA EP, for chrissakes). Personally, I love it. And so did the UK (where it hit top 5 in 2000).

Cabin Parade II: Still Cabinin'

Memorial Day 2K9 was quite the festivius. Some of the highlights:

-Playing Scruples with a bunch of 15 year olds
-Buying 9 LPs (including one autographed by Eddie Money!) for 33 cents each at the Wright County Swap Meet
-Going into a townie bar in Kimball with 200 bikers on their way to a memorial ride. THEN being told by our waitress "I'm gonna give you a minute, and hopefully you'll be ready by the time I get back" in a very unfriendly tone
-Playing lawn darts in the dark and somehow hitting a bulls eye
-Getting my head shaved

But now I am snapped back to reality with work and such. And I will probably never find an Eddie Money album for 33 cents (let alone an autographed album) ever again.

Ben Utecht...Really?

So I was browsing what was new on iTunes because I don't want to tempt my bank account with sexy CD shopping at a brick and mortar...and I came across former U of M great Ben Utecht's new self titled CD. This has got to be the most out of left field (or maybe out of left end?) CD released by a pro athlete ever. We are all accustomed to NBA player releasing discs (remember K.O.B.E I L.O.V.E U and Ron "Bitches don't give a shit about my wifey" Artest almost came to blows last night in the playoffs!) but this has got to be the first CD by a tight end ever.

The only other NFL player that pops to mind is Mike Reid, an all pro lineman with the Bengals in the 70s who wrote "I Can't Make You Love Me." And, of course, Samurai Mike, The Punky QB Known as McMahon, and Sweetness...