There's also this one that I didn't bring up before: reading a bit of the sports blog from Tony's paper, I found out that the teams from the 'boro regularly play a team from Rockbridge County School. Funny that a frequent opponent of the teams from the 'ville is Rock Bridge High School in Columbia.
Unfortunately, Rock Bridge is good at basketball but doesn't have as good of a nickname as its crosstown rival, Hickman: the Kewpies.
I was going to have a post about other funny nicknames and sporting things I've come across in Missouri, but it wasn't ready. You'll have to wait.
Until then, another strange similarity of the 'ville and the 'boro (kinda). Tony already talked about going "over the mountain" to go to work. Here's a view from my side of the world: the Ozarks on U.S. Highway 63. Unedited (no Photoshop on the laptop), probabaly a lot shittier, but I get a similar vibe. A preview of what Chase might see on his road trip, even:
The call came over the police scanner: cat struck by car at 11th and P-----. That's my territory. I was out of the office and to the scene in a minute, but the teens gathered at the corner had not seen a cat.
Around another block and another street over, I hadn't found an endangered cat. Then I saw Dirt Cat. Unscathed. Or perhaps struck by a car and unfazed. Dirt Cat lives. Here is a few months ago:
Whenever I see Dirt Cat he is walking cautiously in the wide open. And he never sees me until I'm approaching at a sprint.
He looks like a bobcat in the face, a mangy dog otherwise, but ultimately he's a stray cat and perhaps a little slow. He lives in the basement of our house with Basement Cat, Weiner Cat* and Real Cat (otherwise known as Dust Cat, because he's gray, but he's also the least stray-like, and hence, real).
The first time I saw Dirt Cat he was creeping along the neighbor's fence. I chased him for fun and he led me right to his home: our basement. The next time he was creeping into a pipe: I surprised him at the other end. I also chased him with Chase, leading to the first-ever photo seen above.
The best chase happened about a week ago, when I started chasing him around the house. He way ahead and I think he slowed down, expecting me to be coming back the other way around, so when I caught up from behind he was peeking around the corner and had to bust tail all over again.
Finally, I chased Dirt Cat yesterday afternoon. Having just finished a juggling session I turned to walk home from across the street when, sure enough, here comes Dirt Cat, padding onto the lawn but unaware of me. See him bookin' it at the end of the video below:
Just something I had to get off my chest. Today I left my apartment for work and, in the entrance to my building, was greeted by the smell of breakfast food and b.o. It was the smell of the Pink Panther, or the Palace, fried eggs and hashbrowns, with a little sausage blended into the aroma, and a thick undercurrent of man sweat. And there was a complete, fully burned cigarette in the grass outside- a perfect, king-sized tube of ashes.
"Among other things, Mr. Gewirtz has learned that Kerouac played an early version of the baseball game in his backyard in Lowell, Mass., hitting a marble with a nail, or possibly a toothpick, and noting where it landed."
From a wild story about Kerouac in the New York Times.
People seem to say goodbye in one of three ways. If they meet a person with whom they have almost no connection, they might wave only. If they meet an acquaintance, they'll shake hands. But if they say goodbye to someone meaningful, they generally hug.
Of the three, I like the hand shake least.
The longest (and best) goodbye I ever received from a friend was in the form of a hug. It lasted maybe 37 seconds (though I wasn't counting at the time), and it meant a lot.
I'm finished now with my four years of undergraduate work. My family came to graduation. A friend drove up from the south. I said my fair share of goodbyes...and I gave one distinguishable hug to a friend I've grown up with for the past 10 years.
Now I have a lot of time on my hands. I couldn't be more pleased.
Here's what I'm up to:
- Listening to a lot of Daniel Johnston. So much that everything I notice has lyrics (Tony mentioned this in his last post). - The Meat Puppets new album, Sewn Together. - My brother learning guitar rifts (Modest Mouse, Cake, "Thunderstruck," etc.) - The new Yeah Yeah Yeahs album, still. - Google Reader. - Reading Palm Sunday by Kurt Vonnegut. - Picking up Roberto Bolano's2666 soon, a Silliman suggestion. - Mapping my move to Arizona - Finishing a playlist for the drive west...another flung-together list. - Going to juggling club in Louisville. - Getting MLB audio. - Unpacking and re-packing to figure out what I really want to keep.
So on May 31 I'll start my drive to the Southwest United States. Here is the basic map of the journey.
DAY 1: Leave home. Arrive at Jack's apartment. Chill. Sleep. DAY 2: Leave Jack's apartment. Drive. Arrive in Amarillo. DAY 3: Chill in Amarillo with my friend, Brad. DAY 4: Leave Amarillo for Phoenix. Drive. Drive. Drive. Arrive.
Three days later I start working.
The best thing I hear about Arizona, are the wild pigs that run around willy nilly in the streets. I bet someone could make a cool song about them.
Is everyone listening to Daniel Johnston without me?
Last night I watched The Devil and Daniel Johnston, a 2006 documentary on this extraordinary singer/songwriter. It taught me a lot about songs I already love, because so many artists have covered Johnston and so many others want to sing like him.
Johnston, who is still making music, writes musically sparse narrative ditties about silly things and love. He reminds me a lot of the Beach Boys, Mountain Goats, Bright Eyes, Casiotone for the Painfully Alone, and early Of Montreal. I know Wilco and Tom Waits and Yo La Tengo have recovered covers and tributes. I recommend "I Had Lost My Mind," as an introduction, unless of course you are already listening to him and never clued me in.
When I think of the artists who have most formed my ear, and the timing of when I discovered each of them, I'm able to piece together pleasant narratives and an acceptable interval between discoveries. I have few ... regrets -- was not often blindsided.
Then I watched this Daniel Johnston doc and was sort of angry and definitely filled with a pleasant wonderment about everything yet to be learned.
I ordered two Johnston tapes, as that was his preferred dubbing medium, and one compilation CD. I've been using YouTube playlists on 'play all' mode in the meantime.
And I'm thinking a lot about the old 'toy' organ that a friend gave me and which I have upstairs, because I'm pretty sure it's the same kind Johnston used.
UPDATE Johnston's music has so consumed me that I spent the day singing about everything: my abandoned baked potato, my moat and my boat, and my grass (the tallest in town).
He is also triggering connections to music including:
* "If You Can't Give Me Everything," Reigning Sound * "I Felt Like Smashing ...," cover by Of Montreal * "Sympathy For the Devil," The Rolling Stones * "Cheating On You," Franz Ferdinand * Bright Eyes
Lyric samples:
Tuna Ketchup I saw her in the street She was with her family She didn't say anything She just stopped and stared And I like her
In the summer I worked with her In an oil refinery She wore a yellow suit in the rain And I like her
I drew her some pictures I made her po-oh-sters I let her walk all over me And insult me too Cause I like her
She has red hair And blue eye-ey-ey-eyes I was looking for love But all I got was a bite And I like her And I like her And I like her
Lazy Well I made some mistakes but I ain't learned a lesson that I don't wanna hear about responsibilities I got less important things to do
An Idiot's End She looks at me like a gun cocked And I'm afraid to turn my back For fear of being loved She leans forward for me to see
The lights of her majesty She's tempting me with a razor blade But time is money at a penny arcade And there's monkeys in the shadows
And virgins afraid of being laid The court jester holds up a light bulb and says "All that is made is made to decay"
To know her is to love her And I love her, but I don't know her
Not to usurp any posts (seems like a lot from Tony and I this past week), but something I need some input on. Are these not the most glorious facial hairs you've ever seen?:
If I didn't know any better I'd think these beards were fake. But they're real, and they're spectacular. Glorious.
After about four unanswered calls to the local radio station and two hours of frustration Saturday morning, I finally put the band name with the song. "Permanent Scar," by a band named O + S, has been in my head for at least a week and you can hear it above. Their Myspace.
I've also been enjoying YouTube playlists lately. They can be used like a mix CD, so I've been working on a personal one of songs I've been listening to lately: take a listen.
Bought a jug of juice, drove toward West Virginia. Stirred a turkey into flight. Saw a cow lick its back hoof. Glimpsed a turtle walking along the highway, south of Chillicothe, Ohio.
I saw steep valleys; a big boat on a trailer. Opened my window in Van Wert just as the town dump came into sight. Found Ohio farms smellier than Virginia's.
Looks like I'm one of the few stragglers who can't make it for graduation. Which sort of makes me feel even more isolated out here in Mizzou-rah. Hell, Tim even flew out. From Washington. That's some commitment to see a tall bastard graduate (his words there).
Anyhow, since I couldn't physically be there I tried hard to rack my brains about an appropriate musical tribute to my soon-to-be fellow alumni. It's harder than it looks. My options were that Vitamin C song or this Drive-By Truckers song.
Obviously neither really fits the mood.
Instead I think I have another song that I'd like to send out to all of those future Hillsdale College grads out there. (Like this: "You speak of helpless voids/ Discovering where strangers stay/ Here we are at the end of all things/ And its not so bad")
This post is long (unintentionally, but long nonetheless), so buckle up:
The new Art Brut album has three major things going for it: 1) The title. 2) The lyrics. 3) Frank Black's production.
About the latter: it almost sounds like a Pixies record.
Not that Art Brut sound anything like Black Francis' old band, but he handled the production as if he were producing the Pixies. Guitars, bass, vocals sound squeaky clean and distinct in the mix. Maybe the only thing that sounds un-Pixie-ish (how's that for a word) are the drums, which are sloppy and sort of muddled. But that might be intentional, because the rest of the album sparkles.
Take this song from an older album and compare to this song, "Alcoholics Unanimous." That bass bounces in and out clearly as if Kim Deal herself were plucking it. On another song on the album I noticed lead guitar lines that reminded me of something like Joey Santiago's solos on "Vamos" or "Bone Machine."
That's not to say the Bruts are musical virtuosos. Far from it, but that's not really the point. They're a fractured, shambolic garage band at their core. Something like a nerdier British Hold Steady or Replacements (to whom they dedicate a song on this album).
"Alcoholics" kicks off the album, and I was hooked right away. I don't know if it was the music or the lyrics, but they both just work (especially the backing parts: "I've been making mistakes/ Lots of mistakes!/ I'm hiding it well/ Not very well!/ But I don't feel great/ Last night we tried to warn him!").
The second song, my favorite, is called "DC Comics and Chocolate Milkshake." It's an ode to youth. Or arrested development. Or something: "DC comics and chocolate milkshake/ Some things will always be great/ DC comics and chocolate milkshake/ Even though I'm 28/ DC comics and chocolate milkshake/ I guess I'm just developing late/ DC comics and chocolate milkshake/ I never got over that amazing taste."
I always hear the phrase "deceptively simple" bandied about regarding bands like this. But I think it's a BS term that doesn't really mean what people think it does (does it actually mean that it's difficult even though it looks simple, or vice-versa?). So I won't use that to describe them. I think a better term here would be "willfully simple" or even "coyfully simple" (if "coyfully" is even a word).
I remember seeing part of their set at Pitchfork a few years ago and walking away unimpressed. Seemed like bullshit to me, with bandleader Eddie Argos prancing around up there like a jackass and not singing, but kind of talking, over punk music. But I was also dehydrated and on the other side of the park. I'm glad I didn't write them off.
Argos seems to revel in sounding, on the surface, like a jerk who can't sing or can't write more than a few chords, but there's obviously something deeper there.
But so far, the one that intrigued me most was this one called "The Making of the Goon" by Johnette Howard (it's the second piece posted there, I couldn't find a legitimate copy). It's the only hockey piece in there (I think) and it is what it says it is, so I won't explain it any more.
Considering how much of Halberstam's book is about boxing (a whole section devoted to Mohammad Ali), it's kind of disappointing but not surprising that the only hockey story they can muster is about a fighter and, oh, not about superstars like Steve Yzerman or Wayne Gretzky, or about what I think might be the most difficult in the sports world (goaltending).
Finally, I bought the Zach Greinke Sports Illustrated yesterday, just so I could read Joe Posnanski's feature on him (for anyone not in the "know," he's now my new favorite sportswriter...seriously, if I could subscribe to the Kansas City Star I would just to read him, but they don't go this far south).
It's the first time I've purchased one in a long time - maybe three, four years.
The quality of the magazine has gone down, as Tony noticed on this space before. They ran a 10+ page feature on surfer Kelley Slater. Which is fine, except but the cover story on Grienke was two pages. And there's lots of filler (like 20 pages of BS in the front) before the actual articles. They could have done away with all of that crap and made each article longer and more substantive.
Spoon is the most confusing most underwhelming most surprisingly awesome rock band around. I would not call them epic, aggressive, or pretty.
They just write catchy, perfect songs. Memorable and simple songs.
= = THE BEST SHOWS I'VE SEEN = =
Best Value: Spoon, free at City Fest, Detroit
Biggest surprise: Tapes 'n Tapes, Pitchfork 2006, Chicago The Exit, The Empty Bottle, Chicago
Went beyond their recordings: Dungen, Magic Stick, Detroit Andrew Bird, Rock the Garden, Minneapolis
Made me freak out: The Hives, Metro, Chicago Wolf Parade, Magic Stick, Detroit Of Montreal, 40 Watt Club, Athens
Felt important: Circulatory System, Athens Pop Fest
Most entertaining: The Hives, Metro, Chicago
Most perfect sound: Yo La Tengo, Michigan Theater, Ann Arbor
Best crowd/most deserving encore: Dungen, Magic Stick, Detroit
Most connected to crowd: P.U.S.A, Magic Stick, Detroit
Best pre-show venue music: EODM show, Magic Stick, Detroit
Best moments:
:: The Dungen show, which I find it hard to deny as the best concert I've ever seen, concluded with an unbelievably fuzzy blitzkrieg final number and a rather slow exit by the band. The crowd was furiously loud in hopes of an encore, and it came quickly. The band, who I found extremely genuine (they were hanging around before the show, friendly and eating Chinese take out), commented that they rarely play encores. I believe them. Then they blasted my face off again.
:: When Yo La Tengo played the Michigan Theater it was baseball playoff season, and before the first and second encores, Ira admitted he was sneaking looks at the Mets game backstage and apologized for the delay. Then they played "Can't Seem to Make You Mine," a Seeds cover.
:: When, during the first Hillsdale Battle of the Bands, Juny was playing the song about "he must be gay ... pink shirt" and during the rousing conclusion, his strumming and the reintroduction of the drums was slightly off and so believably human as it became sync again.
:: My Dad's good friend Bill caught a White Stripes drum stick amid a melee.
:: Jesse The Devil Hughes caught a bra, hung it on the mic stand.
:: More generally, in terms of energy and intrigue, I really enjoyed Spoon's frontman during "The Beast and Dragon, Adored," and the chorus portions of "Requiem for OMM 2," by Of montreal. I remember the Wolf Parade guitarist completely destroying a hanging chime.
Worst openers: Whirlwind Heat for White Stripes, Aragon, Chicago Early Man for the Black Keys, St. Andrew's Hall, Detroit Lamest crowd: Wolf Parade, First Avenue, Mpls Worst doormen: The Blind Pig, Ann Arbor
