July 03, 2008
Clean cup club
On Tuesday, I had lunch at Schlafly Bottleworks with my boyfriend and his mom. I wanted to order the sardine sandwich but went with the more plebeian choice of smoked turkey, because I didn't want to stink up our table with a sandwich that smells like locker room grout. We talked about our fourth of July plans and the Georgia teenager who was decapitated by a Six Flags roller coaster.
Later that night, Michelle came over and proposed a trip to Ted Drewes, but at the last minute, we decided to walk to Mr. Wizard instead.
In between spoonfuls of my Black Forest concrete, I borrowed all of Bill Kaysing's most convincing arguments and told Michelle how the 1969 lunar landing was probably faked. And she told me about the time she was in second grade, and Jodie Sweetin, the actress who played middle child Stephanie Tanner on Full House, came to the West County mall to sign autographs. Apparently, Michelle's mom, tired of waiting in a long line of rabid Jodie Sweetin fans, told Michelle she would have to content herself with a photo of the child star. So, while Jodie's head was bowed over the Reebok she was autographing, Michelle snapped a picture. She said the next time she came over she'd bring me a copy of the photo (and an Eartha Kitt album). Since Jodie's 1993 mall appearance, she's developed and kicked an addiction to crystal meth; I've gone to San Francisco and walked in the wrong direction for hours in search of the Full House house; and Michelle has forgotten the name of the Tanner family dog. I had to remind her on the walk back from Mr. Wizard.
June 30, 2008
Dishes stay dirty
Author Abby Banks traveled to 25 cities and photographed more than 50 houses in order to compile Punk House: Interiors in Anarchy, a coffee table-sized book featuring pictures of anarchy warehouses, artists' studios, hobo squats, treehouses, communes and basement bike shops as well as their denizens. During her travels, Banks took over 6,000 photos and winnowed her haul down to the 300 images that appear in Punk House. Walls plastered with fliers, posters, graffiti. Cigarette butts crushed into carpeting. Rooms crammed with half-finished art projects, salvaged furniture, stacks of books and magazines, piles of records and tangles of cords and music equipment. Banks captures every squalid detail. I leafed through Punk House at Subterranean, but put it back on the shelf after noticing its un-punk $30 price tag.
June 28, 2008
A ham hock in your cornflakes
In case you're sitting in a cubicle somewhere performing boring, white-collar chores and collecting paper cuts, here's a link to St. Louisan Joe Stumble's mp3 blog Last Days of Man on Earth. Stumble, who sometimes pops up on KDHX's Scene of the Crime, uses Last Days of Man on Earth to share tracks from his favorite out-of-print punk records. Download a Black Randy and the Metrosquad album, and make filing invoices fun again.
June 27, 2008
Smash your soapbox to splinters
I've always hated college radio; I didn't even want to go to college. My parents and I argued about it constantly. They wanted me to go, and I refused. In the end, they won, and I found myself shopping for extra-long bedsheets at Target. Oh, and the sheets had to be pink, so they'd match the comforter my roommate-to-be had purchased from Pottery Barn Teen. I can only assume Webster shredded the roommate compatibility survey I filled out at registration, because I was paired with a girl who was into musicals and color coordination.
On the first day of orientation, my mom was fitting the cotton candy-colored sheets on my extra-long mattress when one of my suitemates came to the door to introduce herself. She was wearing a Dave Matthews Band t-shirt. After she left, I glared pointedly at my parents. My nonverbal message being, "Could college be even lamer than I originally suspected?" I should say that I'm really not the kind of person who judges others based on their taste in music, and actually became close friends with the suitemate sporting the offending tee.
I was even able to overlook the Coldplay poster that hung on her dorm room wall. Chris Martin (the only member of Coldplay whose name I know) is pictured with the words "Free Trade" written in black marker on his hand, a very Eddie Vedder move! I can't stand it when bands with commercial success try to wax political. "Like, we don't just write benign pop songs. We've got substance." That's what I dislike most about college radio - that and the fact that it's like listening to cardboard.
So, when I was standing in line at 7-11 waiting to buy a 20 oz. Gulp and saw Martin's smarmy mug gracing the cover of this month's Rolling Stone , I was grossed out. It's not that I was disappointed, that I give Rolling Stone any credence. How could I? Last month, they named Kirk Hammett one of the all-time best guitar players. It's just that I figured, in 2008, people were pretty much over Martin and his boring music. Wrong! In the cover story, Rolling Stone writer Brian Hiatt actually compares Martin to Jesus Christ. Jesus multiplied fish and loaves of bread. All Chris Martin has done is clog the airwaves with crap. Not exactly an accurate comparison, if you ask me.
Read Buddyhead's hilarious take on the Chris Martin cover here.