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Up to the minute notes on the current state of free thinking and free living: Kentucky moonshine - original analysis and reporting from MoreThings, and all round pop culture museum of sight and sound - photo galleries, mp3 and video downloads.
Al Barger and MoreThings - getting people's goats since 1998.
Live free or die!
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January 18, 2003
We want our global warming!
When do we want it? NOW!!
Temperature down here on the farm is running around 10 degrees, wind chill around 0. I mean, it's colder than Hillary's breast up in here.
So where is all this global warming these lying environmentalist pukes keep promising? More broken campaign promises from Al Gore.
posted by Al at 1/18/2003 12:32:00 PM
January 16, 2003
Aw come on, it's just one little storage locker
Holy crap! BATF officers have busted a guy in Arizona with a big stash of firepower. The owner's arrest record apparently consists of a previous charge of illegally owning a machine gun and a silencer. Whoop de frickin' doo! Somebody pass me the smelling salts.
Here's the money quote from the CNN story: "The ATF spokesman said there is no indication at this time that the weapons have anything to do with terrorism."
Why would someone even say that? Lots of people have lots of guns. There are millions of guns in this country, only a couple of which have been used in terrorist acts in the US in the last couple of years. One of them for the schmuck at LAX, and the DC snipers. Maybe a couple more incidents might be so classified, none involving large caches of weapons.
Apparently the presumption is that if you have guns or at least if you have more than a couple, then you are BAD, and ready to kill bunches of people. This doesn't particularly have much to do with reality.
Maybe it's not completely unreasonable to have some laws about major explosives, grenade launchers and such, at least to the point of regulating safe storage. The right to keep and bear arms shouldn't be presumed to include stashing dangerous explosives anonymously in a public area storage locker where they could blow up in a random fire or some such. Even I would go that far. I suppose you might confiscate some overly powerful munitions and write the guy a ticket.
However, calling out the press to come take pictures, and sending out spokesmen to tell us how "frightening" these weapons are and talk about terrorism is a bunch of nonsense. It's cheap aggrandizement. The guy didn't have nukes, or chemical weapons, and seemingly no indication of wicked intent. It looks like some guns, maybe a couple of grenade launchers. That certainly doesn't frighten me. If you do find guns "frightening" then perhaps you shouldn't be working for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms; that's what this agency deals with every day.
posted by Al at 1/16/2003 10:46:00 PM
January 15, 2003
Captain Beefheart turns 62
Don Van Vliet, better known to the world as Captain Beefheart, was born January 15, 1941. Happy #62, Cap'n!
He's strictly a painter these days, but he's most known for his music. It is some combination of Delta blues, free jazz, beat poetry, and some essence of pure organic California desert freakiness. He really wasn't trying to be weird. It's just in his blood. Put it this way, Captain Beefheart and Frank Zappa were high school buddies, and Zappa was the one who turned out relatively normal.
Trout Mask Replica -a double album from 1969- usually tops critics lists as the best Beefheart album. It is the piece de resistance of his catalog. The pure existential horror of "Dachau Blues" cuts right through issues of weirdness or novelty. "China Pig" and "Moonlight on Vermont" are catchy and relatively easy to relate to. The novelty paranoid rap of "The Blimp" might be an odd point of entry.
Many people find Captain Beefheart absolutely unlistenable. Occasionally I see lists of albums to put on if you want to clear people out of the room. Trout Mask Replica usually tops the list. Consider that a challenge. Part of that comes from his very unorthodox ideas of rhythm, I suspect, which sometimes comes across to people as having no rhythm. In fact, his music is tightly scripted and carefully thought out. Much of it doesn't have anything that would be mistaken for a good dance beat, but listen closer. There's a lot going on.
I don't know sales figures, but my best guess is that his most popular album would be the 1980 opus Doc at the Radar Station. "Ashtray Heart" stands out as a particularly memorable and bitter diatribe. This was the album he was supporting when he played Saturday Night Live.
Perhaps the best starting place for the uninitiated, however, might be his 1978 album Shiny Beast (Bat Chain Puller). I strongly get the idea that he was TRYING very hard to sell out. Put another way, this seems to be his idea of "pop music." Keep this thought in mind as you listen to "Tropical Hot Dog Night." It has some odd sideways Caribbean rhythms, and his classic invocation to all the ladies: "I'm playing this music so all the young girls will come out to MEET the MONSTER tonight!" You can read this on the page, but you must hear how it sings, and the way he riffs on the lyric over the end of the song. This does in fact qualify as pop music for me, but that's probably more a statement about how twisted I am. Anyway, it's my personal favorite among his work.
The Dust Blows Forward-Anthology features a pretty good selection, or you can look for some of these specific tracks:
"Tropical Hot Dog Night"
"Dachau Blues"
"The Dust Blows Forward N the Dust Blows Back"
"Diddy Wah Diddy"
"Ashtray Heart"
"Moonlight on Vermont"
"Floppy Boot Stomp"
"China Pig"
"Run Paint, Run, Run"
"Bat Chain Puller"
posted by Al at 1/15/2003 02:07:00 AM
January 14, 2003
Ain't no fun when the rabbit's got a gun
Charges were dropped against a guy in Baltimore who opened fire on a bunch of cops who burst into his house unannounced on a no-knock warrant, on grounds that the guy legitimately thought he was acting in self-defense.
Police Commissioner John McEntee was displeased with the decision, saying "I would have liked to have seen all available charges prosecuted." Hey, buttmunch, you're just lucky your thugs weren't KILLED.
posted by Al at 1/14/2003 07:53:00 AM
Pride and Prejudice
It seems hard to believe, but as recently as January 14, 1963 (within my lifetime, barely), George Wallace was sworn in as governor of Alabama, promising in the infamous words of his inaugaral address "segregation now; segregation tomorrow; segregation forever!"
As one particularly enjoyable bit of evidence of his failure, exactly nine years later, January 14, 1972 marked the premiere of Sanford and Son on NBC. Already we were past any necessity of self-conscious civil rights posturing; it was just a show about a funny old dude who owned a little junkyard. Oh, and he was black. More significantly he was REDD FOXX- one of the funniest sumbitches to ever get in front of a camera.
These decades later, Redd Foxx is a beloved staple of tv reruns, and Wallace stands as a discredited symbol of petty evil southern segragationist politics- to the extent that he is remembered at all. Well duh. Who would you want to spend YOUR time with?
posted by Al at 1/14/2003 07:18:00 AM
Remember, Union good, Confederates BAD
Just in case you think that Osama Bin Laden invented terrorism, note that on this day in history- January 14, 1864- Union General Sherman began heading his troops south [destroying Columbia, South Carolina], culminating in his infamous march to the sea. They burned Atlanta, and purposely, systematically wrecked and pillaged the countryside. At least the refugees had the warm southern climate to be homeless in.
Sherman officially gave orders to "forage liberally" and "should the inhabitants burn bridges, obstruct roads, or otherwise manifest local hostility, then army commanders should order and enforce a devastation more or less relentless." Naturally commanders were to use their own judgment about stealing Negroes along with other supplies, "Negroes who are able-bodied and can be of service to the several columns may be taken along."
Those are among the official orders that Sherman commited to in writing- much less the evil he was doing in actual practice, or condoning among his subordinates.
posted by Al at 1/14/2003 05:51:00 AM
January 13, 2003
Album of the year: When I Was Cruel by Elvis Costello
Song for song, no other album of 2002 can stand head to head with Elvis Costello. Beyond anything else, Elvis has more outstanding songs than any other artist this year. Most particularly, he has more good MELODIES than any other album for the year. He has it down in terms of catchy core melodic hooks, and then actual melodic development of those hooks. Moreover, those melodies communicate more strong [not necessarily hysterical or loud] and subtle emotions than any other record made last year.
Take for example the sad humor of the title song "When I Was Cruel no. 2." The first low bleating notes of vibraphone(?) promise mocking satire that quickly turns into long, slow trip hopping phrases of sad regret. The lyrical details of a pathetic wedding party among the supposedly beautiful people gives more specificity to the mixed emotions of the melody; an older and wiser Elvis can't quite bring himself to ridicule these schmucks as once he would have. The lines of trebly lead guitar act as the ghost of the old Elvis of the 1970s.
"Alibi" stands out as a particularly kickass song, and representative of the predominant style of the whole album. By the tunefulness of it you might call it a ballad, but it has a strong midtempo groove -an undertow, and a biting emotional tone more associated with "rock." It has a good shot of that old fashioned Elvis cruelty that he eschews in the title track.
Damn, but Elvis knows how to make a RECORD out of his songs. Much like the Beatles, he has taken the care to really fully exploit the full potential of his basic songs. "Spooky Girlfriend" for example starts out as a pretty good song with a decent hook, but the arrangement really makes the song jump out. Listen to all the little things going on the mix; the trombone sounding thingy emerging near the end takes the whole song somewhere else. He's become really good at knowing how to add some unique colors to his songs without overloading the underlying composition with gimmicks. This contributes greatly to making each individual song unique, not sounding quite like anything else in his catalog even when he visits somewhat similar stylistic territory.
"Episode of Blonde" merits a special honorable mention. Elvis makes records with so many good songs that usually one or two get largely overlooked even by fans, especially near the end of the album. This one features a strong hook in the chorus, and a unique kind of film noir rap. It doesn't sound much like any other song I've ever heard, which is a significant compliment- there is some significantly innovative aspect to this. Yet there are just the faintest hints of "Watching the Detectives" to give old school Elvis fans some kind of handle.
To be critical, not every song on the record is a classic. I could do without about half a dozen of the fifteen songs. By my estimates, that leaves us with a kick-ass nine song album of about 42 minutes, with some listenable but less than essential bonuses.
An obvious sign that you're dealing with someone who doesn't get it comes when they speak hopefully of Elvis "getting back to his roots." This Year's Model is a great album. If you want to hear it, it is readily available on CD. I listen to it fairly often. Elvis already made that record, so there is no need for him to try to make another one like it. That is exactly NOT what Elvis has ever been about.
Most of even the best musicians of the rock era have a worthy artistic era of five to ten years tops. Yet twenty five years into his career, Elvis has put out if not his best album [tough competition, that] then certainly one worthy of his name. Paul Simon is the only other name that comes to mind as an equal in creative longevity. Like Simon, Elvis has had an exceptionally sharp self-understanding. They both have been well balanced between pushing the envelope for new styles and sounds while keeping at all times in touch with their original passions.
There are many choices for album of the year. Eminem is riding the zeitgeist, and he has several outstanding songs. I fear that ignorant Grammy voters will jump at the tuneless contrived heroics of Springsteen's fecal 9-11 exploitation album.
If, however, you value actual SONGS more than some kind of "social relevance" then Elvis is your man.
posted by Al at 1/13/2003 12:21:00 AM
January 12, 2003
The greatest show in television history
All in the Family made its debut 32 years ago today, January 12, 1971. To a significant extent, the show was designed by it's liberal Jewish creator (Norman Lear) to be a set-up about the working class white Republican bigot. Ol' Archie foolish bigotry was to be the butt of the jokes. Not that Archie was ever evil, but just stupid and uneducated- otherwise, he'd be a good liberal.
However, unlike the wickedly demagogic so-called "People for the American Way" that Lear later founded, he had greater honesty and integrity in the development of this show. Having set up the basic characters and situation, Lear and his co-writers followed the logic of the characters -how real people would react in these circumstances- rather than just delivering cheap political broadsides.
Following this path led them to significantly different effect than they probably originally intended, and indeed than what they may have thought they were creating. For one thing, it rapidly became clear that Archie Bunker was not really a racist or bigot in any meaningful sense. This is not to say that he was always well informed, or that he didn't have a distorted understanding of other ethnic or social groups than his own, but that he was not hateful nor did he assume any air of smug superiority. Most importantly, he would never have acted to oppress anyone. Indeed, he had love and compassion for his fellow man (though he had the graciousness not to carry on about it)- if not always a good understanding.
The aspect of the show that most especially came out different than what the creators probably intended was the substantially negative nature of the Michael Stivic character. For starters, the meathead was very much both a mooch and -much worse- an ingrate. He constantly disrespected and baited Archie, who was putting him through school. High emphasis on totally unwarranted displays of smug superiority to his father in law, very minimal displays of appreciation. His little rote recitations of liberal rhetoric about poverty causing crime and so forth had no better logic or evidence than Archie's rants; they were but the bigotry of his age and social group.
Mostly though, the show worked because, as I implied, it worked on the personal human level. Edith Bunker probably would come out as one of the half dozen most beloved characters in the history of television, and politics was ultimately ALWAYS secondary to family. The girls had the task of civilizing the men and keeping the family whole. They called the show "all in the family" not "all in the congress." They made humor mostly out of family politics, not electoral contests.
Anyway, they created a great television landmark, arguably the greatest and funniest show in the history of the medium. Other than The Simpsons, what shows even come close?
posted by Al at 1/12/2003 04:53:00 PM
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