Ugly Tour Bus Photoblogging Featuring Cars

Click any for bigger.

Junk Drawer: 4 Random 8-Track Tapes

Ugly Tour Bus Photoblogging: All Mod Cons

Click either for bigger.

Here Are Your Condi/Aretha Pics

Former U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, left at piano, and Aretha Franklin perform at The Mann Center for the Performing Arts in Philadelphia, Tuesday, July 27, 2010. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

So there you go: it really happened! The Washington Post was on the scene:

Putting Aretha Franklin and Rice together on the stage had a kind of goofy brilliance. It was evidently Franklin who decided that the two should perform together; she may have sensed, with the same stage-animal instinct she demonstrated throughout the evening, that Rice would provide curiosity value to augment, or even showcase, Franklin's entertainment value.

[...]

There was a single duet with Rice, who emerged from the wings like a vision from a far more formal world, sat down at the piano and began "I Say a Little Prayer."

"You didn't think she could play it, right?" Franklin teased the audience.

But for all that Franklin had supposedly initiated this project, the on-stage interaction between the two women seemed distant; and this music certainly isn't Rice's home turf. In a nod to Rice's political roots, Franklin brought her back out to close with a song that she called "our national anthem" and turned out to be "My Country 'Tis of Thee" -- a mixed political message right in keeping with the general goofiness of the evening.

Here's a photo of the odd couple (not the oddest Condi's been part of) with their bouquets:

Condi's dress looks good! Well, let me backtrack. Condi's dress looked good while standing front and center, but it did her no favors while she performed:

And that, Pony Pals™, is pretty much all we're going to get out of Condi this year.

UPDATE – Actual video also courtesy the Associated Press.

Asking The Important Questions

Via Talking Points Memo comes this totally faboo question from an utterly serious poll about the important things in politics:

Do you have a higher opinion of Barbara Boxer's hair or Carly Fiorina's hair?

Barbara Boxer's hair....................................... 19%
Carly Fiorina's hair.......................................... 14%
Not sure.......................................................... 67%

Not sure? Not sure?!?

Democracy is dead.

Ugly Tour Bus Photoblogging: Zero Pastel

Click either for bigger.

If Only

Sometimes somebody reads something wrong and creates something wonderful:

Aretha Franklin and Condoleezza Rice both would be coming behind the mike for a fund-raising event. Well, this news is absolutely true. The queen of soul would be teaming up with the former queen of the US state department at a concert in Philadelphia.

Aretha Franklin’s due [sic] with the former US secretary of state Condoleezza is what all and sundry are waiting sitting on the edge of the seat. This duet would be mesmerizing and will surely grab every eye and ear. Both are scheduled to perform songs like Natural Woman and Say a Little Prayer.

Well, ha ha, yes, that would be mesmerizing indeed. Unfortunately, while it is thrillingly true that Condi 'n' Aretha will be performing a duet tomorrow in Philadelphia, sadly, Condi won't be singing; she'll be tickling the ivories while Aretha handles the vocal duties.

But can you imagine? Try to imagine the Disneytronic Condibot belting out "Natural Woman" with Aretha.

The mind reels.

Photoblogging: Ultra Boom!

Click for bigger.

Ugly Tour Bus Photoblogging: Yellow & Violent

Click for bigger!

Random Nancy Panel

Ah, c'mon, Nancy! Pull up to the bumper!

Compare/Contrast

Words invented by William Shakespeare (partial):

• Apostrophe
• Assassination
• Bloody
• Castigate
• Countless
• Exposure
• Generous
• Laughable
• Majestic
• Monumental
• Obscene
• Premeditated
• Sanctimonious

Words invented by Sarah Palin (complete?)

• Lamestream
• Refudiate

They Reproduce By Mitosis

OK, this has been posted many other places, and I'm not generally a big fan of including the Youtubes on this blog... but OMGLOL.

Audioblogging: PSP Teen Beat!

Here's the long story (sorry!) and the unnecessarily complete recordings of my first band!

It was 1983 in Tucson, and my best friends were Jeff Farr, Lenny Friedman, and Laurie Steelink. Jeff was the singer and erstwhile guitarist of the legendary Les Seldoms, and Laurie was the singer and saxophonist/flautist with Clean Dog (fliers here). I felt a little left out, never having been in a band.

One night we were at a great, fun party at our friend Jeff Davis' house. Before the party, Jeff had found a big box full of those little Bibles religious groups liked to distribute as freebies, and he "decorated" his place by ripping them all up and scattering the pages everywhere. He made the environment even more surreal by lighting it with only black lights and passed out fluorescent markers for everybody to draw all over each other. Jeff, Laurie and I were all leaving Tucson at the end of the Summer, and at the party we talked about how fun it would be to form a short-lived band before we all dispersed.

We were obsessed, at the time, with the concept of "trashiness," and called ourselves and our friends the Trash Bag Gang. We fantasized about our band making the garbagiest, dumbest music possible, inspired by groups like Redd Kross and the Urinals. "Trashiness" meant Linda Blair, ET dolls, Cabbage Patch Kids, other dumb pop trends, bad movies, cheap beer, and bad taste in general.

Somehow word got out about our non-existent band, and the rumor spread to this idiot named Jon Rosen, a DJ and music rag publisher who fancied himself to be the king of Tucson's music scene (sadly, he was right). Jon started bugging us and our friends about this fake band, which we dubbed Bible Party after Jeff Davis' great soiree, and we (and our friends) exaggerated our accomplishments. Soon, people started actually believing we were this great secret band, even though we had never played, never practiced, and had absolutely no songs or, really, any willingness to write any.

Finally, Jon Rosen told us that he was making a compilation tape of local bands, and he wanted us to be on it. This was hilarious to us, but we realized that we had to shit or get off the pot, as the saying goes. We decided that Jeff would play guitar, Laurie would play bass, I would be the lead singer, and Lenny would be our "spiritual advisor." I wrote the lyrics to two songs, Lenny Lenny and Bulimia Rhapsody, and Jeff enlisted the Seldoms' drummer, the fantastic Cheryl Graham (read her reminiscences of Leif Garrett showing up unexpectedly to her birthday party here), with the promise that it wouldn't be a continuing enterprise. We hurriedly composed the music, but made a point not to practice too much for maximum awfulness. Our friend Lance Kaufman recorded the two songs on his four-track cassette deck, and suddenly we were a "real" band! Sort of!

A real band has to perform live, though, so we arranged to play our two songs in between sets of a terrible new wave group at the horrible Nino's Steak House. We were just terrible (success!), but the audience was enthusiastic. Here's a flier for the show:

Click for bigger!

Shortly, Jon Rosen's dumb cassette compilation of local bands came out. Info about this release, now of interest only to Giant Sand completists, can be found here. To give you an idea of what a raging egomaniac Jon was, he put a picture of himself on the cover, and the first sounds on the tape were of him talking (and taking a hit off a joint). Imagine our surprise when our song, Bulimia Rhapsody, was actually put into light rotation on his radio station, the godawful 96 Rock. I heard it being played in Zip's Records!

And that was that. Or so we thought! The following year, 1984, my friend Al Perry invited Bible Party to perform a "reunion" gig (LOL) with his fabulous band, Cattle, at the venerable Temple of Music and Art the day after Christmas. Cheryl, thank goodness, was game (Such a good drummer! We didn't deserve it), and all of us were home for the holidays. This time, two songs weren't going to cut it, so we enlisted our buddy Steve, a fabulous guitarist with whom I had been making music, to assist us. We had one practice session, and sort-of learned a few covers and songs Steve and I had written, and even wrote a new song. I remember after practicing the Urinals I'm a Bug and Jimi Hendrix's Foxy Lady, I said, "Gosh, I've got to get the lyrics and learn them," and everybody screamed "NO! Don't you dare!" simultaneously. So I promised I wouldn't. Here's the flier for that event:

The night arrived, and we prepared ourselves chemically for the big event. To say that our performance that night achieved "trashiness" is a gross understatement. OMG, this time we were way, way beyond trashy, although there were moments of extreme musical weirdness which somehow transcended awfulness and approached some kind of horrible genius, if I don't say so myself. "I remember being really stoned," recalled Jeff later, "and giving birth to an ET doll on the stage of the Temple of Music and Art with a strobe light going. And it felt goooooooooooooooooooooooooooooood." To make matters worse, or better, the sound man totally sabotaged us, adding effects without our permission and, thus, clinching our reputation without even realizing it.

And that, finally, really, was that.

So! If you have brave ears, you can download the complete surviving recordings and fake "cover art."  It includes our two "studio" recordings, the only recording I have of one of the songs from our first live show, and the complete "reunion" gig (you won't believe it). And there are bonus tracks! Steve and I re-recorded "Bulimia Rhapsody" with Jeff guesting on second guitar as well as a quasi-Country Western ode to William S. Burroughs, "Cut it Up!" which had a Bible Party-esque feel but with superb guitar. Another interesting experiment features BP members Jeff and Laurie on lead vocals: "Conspicuous Consumption," in which the two of them were given the (retarded) lyrics right before recording and taped separately without being able to hear each other with surprisingly good results.

The 78mb mp3 files are zipped up and available for download here.

Ummmm... enjoy? Can you get through the whole thing? I was 17-18; no apologies.

Fashion Victim: Bionic Woman Shirt, Ca. 1976

Click both for bigger.

This is a strange shirt. It's a short-sleeved polo shirt made from what appears to be a thin cotton/poly blend. There is no label, which leads me to believe it's either homemade or maybe was created in-house at Universal. I love the callousness with which the pocket was just carelessly smacked on without a care in the world for matching the pattern.

One peculiar thing about the graphic is that the background pattern features the official art with Lindsey Wagner, but the vignettes don't resemble her even slightly.  This leads me to date the shirt pretty confidently to 1976, possibly before the show aired and definitely before Wagner was more established as the character.

What's really puzzling is this: if this is a homemade shirt, that means somebody actually manufactured and marketed this fabric! It's not bed sheet material, so its purpose is a little baffling. That's what makes me think it may have been made within the studio. It's hard to imagine there being much of a market for this material. Weird!

Here's another view of the pattern:

Side note: obviously I fixed my scanner! I have an old Microtek model, and they totally abandoned Mac support for the last few years, so the software got increasingly buggy with each Mac OS upgrade. Finally, recently, I installed Adobe CS5 and it somehow totally broke what was left of the terrible Microtek software. I thought I was going to have to buy a new scanner, which infuriated me since nothing was wrong with the old one. Luckily a coworker knew the solution: Vuescan to the rescue! I owe you big time, David.

Ugly Tour Bus Photoblogging All Up In This Grill

Click for bigger!

Vaguely Shaky For Two Seconds!

So right, OMG, I felt it! Earthquake in DC!

I'm an early riser, up at 5AM. I had just put the coffee on and sat down to the internets when I felt... well, it felt like a big truck driving by, or the upstairs neighbors moving furniture or something. But I noted that I didn't hear any trucks drive by or any furniture being moved upstairs.

So two possibilities fleetingly crossed my mind: big explosion far away (yikes!)  or earthquake. Because even though it was brief and slight, I used to live in Southern California and I know what an earthquake feels like, and this felt the same. It made me nostalgic. I have to admit I never thought I'd feel one here, so I was indeed surprised when I saw the confirmation that it really was an earthquake. Fun!

To change the subject, sorry about the light posting lately! I'm in one of those "politics are boring me" phases. To make matters worse, my scanner gave up the ghost recently, and I've been relying on it for content to fill in during times when I can't be bothered with Sarah Palin and whatever. I miss posting, for instance, Random Nancy Panels™.  And I'm still getting used to my new camera, so I haven't been posting photos much, either.

So anyway, don't worry, I'll be posting more soon. Just think of it as the Dog Days of Summer blogging or something.

Happy Friday!

Fashion Victim Tutorial: How To Make An Annoying, Painfully Trendy T-Shirt Design

Gather 'round, kiddies, because I'm going to help you strike it rich! I've been meaning to devise this tutorial for well over a year, and I'm distressed that it's still valid.

OK, you want to make an irritating t-shirt? First of all, it has to feature wings (THIS IS NOT OPTIONAL) and really should include a skull. Let's start with a pair of wings; it doesn't matter where you steal get them:

Why are the wings such a requirement? I have no idea. Don't question me! Basically, the overall vibe you want is caduceus meets tattoo design + random crap. Like I said, a skull is optional but why take the chance of not including one? Look, Alexander McQueen died for you, OK? Place your skull:

Next, you need to add some sort of element reminiscent of Rococo tracery or shapes found in fleur de lis motifs (resist the urge to use pseudo-Maori "tribal" elements; the 90s are over). I'm just going to dump in a simple example of the latter:

Now you need some more-or-less random crap in the background. I strongly urge you to use old-fashioned handwriting:

DO NOT pay any attention to what the handwriting says, because madness awaits down that road. OK, it's time for some color. Stick to grayed-down colors, burgundies, mustard yellows, dull greens, burnt oranges, etc:

OPTIONAL: why not use some metallic ink? It'll look like absolute shit after only one washing! OK, now we're ready for the shirt itself. It should be either black, burgundy, or dull army green. Think drab:

Now it's time to place your design. Here is a crucial point: even though you've just made a symmetrical work of "art," DO NOT place it in the center of the shirt. Make it look like the garment was just tossed haphazardly under the screens:

Not shown above, but crucial nonetheless: sandpaper your silkscreens a little to give them a totally phony "distressed" look.

Last step: contact the buyer at Nordstrom Rack.

Obviously, these are all suggestions (BUT NOT THE WINGS! THEY ARE REQUIRED!), and this is a highly-simplified example (not nearly enough random crap) but I'm sure you'll agree that the tutorial above will help you make a t-shirt so trendy, so incoherent and badly-considered, that you will be rolling in money in no time.

You're welcome.

UPDATE: After completing the above from memory, I thought I'd check Urban Outfitters to see if I could find a good example, and was astonished to find this meta-ironic version:

I swear I didn't see that before writing the tutorial. Points off for symmetrical placement, though.

UPDATE: I also didn't previously see this obnoxious Ecko design, which includes every single motif suggested above:

UPDATE: This is the kind of link I love:

Wil jij ook wel eens meedoen met de mode ?
Dan vindt je hier een pracht van een handleiding om je eigen coole trendy T-shirt te maken voor weinig !
Het is eenvoudig en makkelijk als je de stappen volgt. En niet te vergeten : Je bent echt de bom deze zomer in je eigen unieke shirt !
Laat je fantasie eens gaan over een mooi en eigentijds ontwerp !

It's funny because it's Dutch!

Ugly Tour Bus Photoblogging: Famous Canadian Women Bus With Bonus Camera Recommendation

Click for bigger!

OMG, this bus was nightmarish: covered with a couple of dozen floating heads of noteworthy Canadian women, none of which I had ever heard of, naturally (the one shown here is named, amusingly, Abby Hoffman. She is, of course, a hockey player). Where's my Grandma, dammit? Interspersed amongst the terrible oil (?) portraits reproduced on the bus were what appeared to be spray-painted doily stencils. So weird! I mean, if you want to make a feminist statement, I'm thinking you can probably do better than to use doilies (doilies!) as a design motif.

But anyway! This hideous photo marks the debut of my new camera, a fabulous Panasonic Lumix GF1 (no, this isn't a paid product placement). Highly recommended! It's much more powerful than a point 'n' shoot, but less cumbersome than an SLR. Ten years ago I would have laughed at the idea of Panasonic, of all companies, racing to the top of the digital camera field, but their partnership with Leica has served both companies incredibly well, and this is my second camera by them. I am very, very happy! Yay!

Michael Gerson Knows A Thing Or Two About Crazy People

(Gerson [with the weird hairdo] with fun people Dan Bartlett, Condi, and some other guy, 01-20-04, AP Photo)

Michael "Axis of Evil™" Gerson typifies the Bush-era Christian Republican set; that's why he has a column in the Washington Post, after all. To his credit, he's one of the few Bushies to take on the Tea Party types. He knows they make run-of-the-mill hacks like him an endangered species: so insidery, so "establishment," so "Washington" (EW, EW!!). I have to admit I really enjoyed the following paragraph about Sharron Angle from his latest column:

But mainstream conservatives have been strangely disoriented by Tea Party excess, unable to distinguish the injudicious from the outrageous. Some rose to Angle's defense or attacked her critics. Just to be clear: A Republican Senate candidate has identified the United States Congress with tyranny and contemplated the recourse to political violence. This is disqualifying for public office. It lacks, of course, the seriousness of genuine sedition. It is the conservative equivalent of the Che Guevara T-shirt -- a fashion, a gesture, a toying with ideas the wearer only dimly comprehends. The rhetoric of "Second Amendment remedies" is a light-weight Lexington, a cut-rate Concord. It is so far from the moral weightiness of the Founders that it mocks their memory. 

Haw, good stuff! He then goes on to bash Rand Paul, so, you know, give the guy a little credit for taking the Tea Party angerbots head-on. Yes, yes, it's Gerson, an idiot, but you have to admit he nailed it with that "Che Guevara T-shirt" line.

Ugly Tour Bus Photoblogging: In Stitches

Click for bigger!

OMG Weather

Back to work after a relaxing three-day weekend! Is it really going to get up to 103 today? Yow!

Bruising Sunday For Michael Steele

Oh, oh, already today things are looking grim: John McCain, hawk supreme, was on "This Week" and not only called the erstwhile puppy lover "wildly inaccurate," but did so via satellite from Afghanistan. Ouch. "Chairman Steele sent me an email saying they were misconstrued,” McCain continued, hilariously.

Even better, horrible Joe Lieberman was very humorous, indeed, on Fox News, offering the theory that Michael Steele's gaffe was "unfortunate," but then turning it around to be superfantastic for the Republican Party, because it united them all.  United them all in hatred for Michael Steele. Good point, Joe!

More to come, presumably.

UPDATE: Jim DeMint called for Steele to apologize to the military, but like Lieberman and McCain, didn't call for a resignation.

UPDATE: Kiss of death? Ron Paul issued a statement commending Michael Steele on his (now retracted, sort-of) comments.

Michael Steele Finds The Least Contested, Least Controversial, Least Divisive Republican Sacred Cow, Trips Over It, Falls Flat On His Face, Hilarity Ensues

Of all things! Afghanistan! Questioning the Afghanistan war and calling it "Obama's choosing"! Honestly, I didn't know Michael Steele had it in him to utter a gaffe –a lonnnng gaffe, on video– so completely preposterous, so out of left field, etc., etc., that I am caught totally off guard. It's like he sat down and thought, "Hmmm... what is the one, single thing that each and every Republican on the entire planet agrees upon?"

We've been down this fun, giddy road before, where Michael Steele says something so ridiculous that it's hard to see how he can survive, yet like a Teflon®-coated punching clown, he bounces back up, grin never wavering, eager for more. But ridiculous is one thing, pure heresy is another, and already the hawkiest hawks agree:

• Liz Cheney: "It is time for Chairman Steele to step down."
• Katherine Lopez: Oh, hey, how about Liz Cheney for Chairman?
• Bill Kristol: "You are, I know, a patriot. So I ask you to consider, over this July 4 weekend, doing an act of service for the country you love: Resign as chairman of the Republican party."
• Erick Emerson: "Michael Steele must resign. He has lost all moral authority to lead the GOP."
• Talking Points Memo points out that it might at first seem lucky that Steele made his amusing funny right before a holiday weekend,  but in reality, all these hawks are on the Sunday shows (McCain, Lieberman, etc.) and will be asked to respond, and it won't be pretty.
• Fox News: Michael Steele Must Go.

So what's it going to be for Mikey? Will this one blow over, like all the others? Will Katherine Jean get distracted by something else? Will Bill Kristol bury his head back in Sarah Palin's lap, thus muffling the sounds of his calls for Steele's resignation?

Happy July 4 weekend!

Ugly Tour Bus Photoblogging: Checkmate

Click for bigger.

John Boehner Is Concerned About Tanning Salons, Obviously

FILE - In this June 16, 2010 file photo, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Ky., center, flanked by House Minority Leader John Boehner of Ohio, right, and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nev., is seen on Capitol Hill in Washington. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster, File)

At least somebody knows on which side their bread is (cocoa) buttered! Rich, mahogany colored John Boehner is going to stick up for the hideously beleaguered tanning salon owners of America, otherwise known as "the downtrodden":

ObamaCare’s first tax increase-a 10 percent tax-starts today. This $2.7 billion tax is the first of ObamaCare’s $569 billion tax increase.

The new tax adds 10 percent to the cost of tanning services businesses provide. Some 30 million Americans visit a tanning salon at least once a year and 75 percent of the employees and customers are women, according to industry sources.

Out of the approximately 19,000 professional indoor tanning salons, more than 50 percent are owned by women and employ approximately 160,000 workers.

According to this Wall Street Journal article, ObamaCare’s tanning tax is causing all kinds of problems for business owners who provide tanning services as well as other products or those who include tanning services as part of a gym membership.

This is such an outrage.

If Mr. Boehner wants less expensive tanning, normally I'd recommend a trip to sunny Arizona, but if he goes there, either he'll get racially profiled by an overzealous police officer, or worse (?), he'll get decapitated by swarming Mexicans. Either way, maybe it's time for him to invest in his own private tanning bed?

Happy Canada Thing!

Fun fact: both my parents are Canadian, and my mother is a Green Card carryin' citizen, still, of the quaint northern land.