I had a buddy in high school that was really into them but I never got there. May have to check this out though….?

The Residents thrive on odd mix of fame and obscurity

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Cream vocalist and bassist Jack Bruce dies at 71

Sad – my favorite member of Cream has passed away. I generally respect Clapton but excepting Cream and a bit of his early solo stuff, can’t generally stand his career since. Ginger Baker has already been discussed in these pages – apparently he has a new solo record out too – but what a freak.

But Jack Bruce, arguably the brains and certainly the key songwriter in Cream, has sadly passed. My favorite quote from him was when he said “People ask me – do you care that Eric Clapton gets all the fame from Cream? I say no, because I get all the money!” 🙂

R.I.P……May you have reached your White Room in harmony and rest…..

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So some of my zany friends from college days pinged me last night around 930pm on their way to a Mike Watt (originally of Minutemen and fIREHOSE fame) show at The Tractor with tickets – I was lucky enough to be able to go – very cool!

He’s touring with a pair of Italian guys in a band called il sogno del marinaio (it was part of this 2014 tour). The opener was a Japanese band called Lite who were also very good.

The show was interesting – The Tractor of course is such a great venue, being small and not overwhelming with NOISE like some can be (e.g. The Showbox when it’s cranked up a wee bit too loud). While Lite was fairly straight-ahead ‘math rock’ (not sure what that means) the il sogno del marinaio set was much more experimental. Then they all joined on stage at the end for an extended jam, which was pretty cool, if a bit crowded up there.

We then slid down the street to The People’s Pub for a couple more beers before running out of steam around 1250am – man, we are getting old.

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I honestly don’t remember the original of this song, but heard the cover on KEXP this am while driving to work – very cool! The band is Tame Impala, but this cover isn’t on any of their current records, apparently, it’s more recent.

here’s the original (from 1996, which is probably why I never heard it the first time, wasn’t paying any attention) – actually pretty good…even if he’s doing his best Diana Ross look in this video:

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although it is now a month old (doh!) this has to be Anna Minard’s funniest column yet – well DONE, sir!

Never Heard of ‘Em (by Anna Minard) – Nico

including classic words like “I used to hear 30 seconds of a punk song and feel like my ears were going to throw up.” and “This is just all bells and talk-singing and waggling noises and some lady who sounds like she lives in a tree.”

too funny.

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At one point or another, we’ve all seen these on various family members, friends and celebrities. I myself have had the Reverse Mullet as well as an attempt at the Hair Metal (I however never, ever used petroleum products in my hair, I just never brushed it :))

The 13 Ugliest Hairstyles of Our Time

Notable missing participants, by hairdo style:

1) The Flock of Seagulls – this is now called ‘Japanese Anime Hair‘ and if you go to any Comic-Con or watch a Justin Bieber video, you’ll see it in abundance;

2) The Beehive – What, no B-52’s?

3) The Side Ponytail – You can’t leave out Tina Majorino’s ‘do in Napoleon Dynamite! Plus if you double up, you end up with Witch Hunter Robin…

4) The Jheri Curl – Ah, the days when Lionel Richie ruled the planet. But Keenan did the best turn in Hollywood Shuffle….

5) The Crimp – The two words that remain, forever, infamous: Gene. Simmons. And in a side note – kerewin and I have seen this ‘do in person at Whistler, complete with guard-Guidos to protect it.

6) The Big Bang – I’m not going to comment on certain sisters who have sported this ‘do – you know who you are 🙂 – but to this day, an entire western half of the Salt Lake City valley still keeps these ‘stylists’ in business….there, however, it is known as ‘The Hair Claw’.

7) The Phil Spector – I always wondered what happened to Bernie from Room 222….Or did he just reach the Tipping Point?

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Saw the ‘rockumentary’ Beware of Mr. Baker last night. It tracks the story of Ginger Baker (most famous for being in Cream) from early music days through Cream, Blind Faith and beyond until the present day. Some reactions:

1) I had only really heard his playing in the context of Cream, which ultimately limited my impressions. While I don’t completely agree with either his (stated at least a couple times rather egotistically by him in the movie) or his bands perspective that they were the ‘cream’ of the rock talent at the time (So the Beatles and others like Jimmy Page and John Entwistle weren’t? There were others too) Cream were obviously in the top tier to be sure.

But the thing I liked about the movie was that you see a LOT more of his playing in far, far different contexts, and I definitely have a new view of his abilities as a result. I had not realized he was really a jazz drummer, he considered himself a jazz drummer, and ultimately at one or two points in the movie, he attains that lofty status amongst other top-tier jazz drummers – very impressive and he definitely more than holds his own – I have a much stronger respect for him now just seeing this footage alone. While I have to say that I’ve always preferred Keith Moon‘s drumming, and will still maintain that KM may be my preferred choice for a *rock* drummer – I now think GB is definitely a far more versatile and skilled drummer who obviously crosses many more types of music having seen this film.

2) Like other famous people (and arguably worse in many ways) – he was a disaster as a father, fairly loathsome as a family man and at many times, as even a human being. It’s one thing to be devoted to drums and music above all else – fine. But why have a family and treat them so horribly? Why not just stick with groupies and be done with it? Use a condom? The mind boggles – there’s simply no excuse. We’re all human, yes – but acting this way is simply beyond the pale.

3) He reminds me in many ways of Keith Richards from the ‘too onery to die’ standpoint – but I find it hard to believe that Keith Richards was near as irascible as GB was (and still is). The movie begins with GB literally wacking the poor filmmaker hard in the face with his cane because he was mad about the film having anyone else from his life in it! While to a certain degree (they include outtakes also as the credits roll at the end) this is funny and serves to make him even more of a curmudgeon – the word ‘beware’ is certainly applicable time and again as his story unfolds.

This is definitely a movie worth watching – may be a bit too ‘music nerd’ if you aren’t into drummers, rock stars acting like the immature freaks they often are, or musicians from the 60s – but definitely worth seeing all the same.

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A very interesting look at the music industry and artist success/failure in decades past vs. now. Here’s the article that spawned this graphic, and the article on BoingBoing where I saw this debate in the first place….

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So in continuing to regularly patronize ‘mecca’ (Scarecrow Video) here in Seattle, one of the coolest things about this place is that they have some of the rarest movies out there you can find. Meaning if you still have a VCR laying around, you’re in biz – that’s me.

Back in the formative years (los ochentas) I liked some punk bands like X, but never got the chance to see the defining punk ‘documentary’ – The Decline of Western Civilization. This is a hard movie to find, and has yet to make it to DVD – but Scarecrow has a well-used copy.

I mainly wanted to see it for the bands X and Fear, but the Black Flag, Germs and Circle Jerks segments were interesting too. The other bands in it – meh, I ff’d past much of them. Between the various stage performances, they talked to most of the bands in person, or at their apartment, or what they called living space (Black Flag was living in a burned-out Baptist church, which also doubled for practice space – the singer said his closet (literally) was $16 a month).

It’s weird to see X so young – we saw them a year or two ago at The Showbox and with the exception of Fishbone shows in the past – I have never seen a tighter band. They pretty much play everything exactly like when I saw them about 25 years ago at Portland’s Starry Night.

Fear’s set (they don’t talk to them directly) begins with Lee Ving taunting the crowd quite intensely – kind of weird given that most punk bands *play* out of control, but didn’t seem to put on the a-hole act like Fear does here. Most of the crowd is either yelling expletives at them or spitting on them – pretty wild. And one woman practially gets beat up as they provoke her so much it takes about 5-6 bouncers to keep her off the stage and from attacking Lee Ving, the main instigator. But then they rip out several signature songs, and the movie’s over.

There are other random short interviews at the start and near the end with random punks (boys and girls – these aren’t men and women yet) whose outlook seems pretty bleak, although self-confident. But that’s the Reagan years in L.A. for you – every man for himself.

I guess this movie isn’t so much a documentary as it is a series of shows and interviews – more a sampling of the L.A. punk scene at the very start of the 80s (because punk, and many of these bands, got going in the late 70s, it had already been around a while by the time of this movie). I liked the show, and the wild abandon of the shows – I remember a few of those mosh pits, although I tried to stay out of them, that’s for sure! And this movie is WAY, way better than the steaming piece of crap known as ‘1991:The Year Punk Broke’ THAT movie is about the steaming piece of crap (band) known as Sonic Youth, even though the poster billed the movie as about Nirvana when I saw it – that’s 2 hours of my life i’ll never get back….blecch!

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