Nuclear Rays From My Halogen Haze

music, politics, art, Elvis apologism

Blagojevich defies all reason and logic and appoints Roland Burris to replace Obama for Illinois’s Senate seat December 30, 2008

Filed under: Celebrities,Obama,Politics — orangehairboy @ 10:30 pm
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Arg!  This makes me so mad!  What good does it to do Blagojevich to appoint Roland Burris now, at a time when the corruption charges leveled agaisnt Blagojevich ensures his nomination will never see a seat in the Senate honored?

Former State Attorney General Burris isn’t a terrible choice, and he’s a choice that Governor Blagojevich could have totally fucking made with impunity, if only he’d been content to stay in politics as a man of dignity.  ARRG!  I don’t fucking get it!  Why did he need to be so corrupt, especially now at this historic time of still tentative liberal gains?

It’s greed for greed’s sake, because we know Blagojevich ain’t starvin’.  And once you reach the level of governor, there’s no way you’ll ever be stuck in the poor house again.  After your term as Governor is over, you can join a left-leaning think tank, or get a snazzy job in the private sector heading some bitchin’ company, or run for another elected office, or fuck it, you can go make speeches at colleges, all of which pay more than I’m making, and I didn’t start off already fucking rich!

Instead, Blagojevich has tainted his own name and the names of everyone who’s ever donated money to his campaigns, including the name of Roland Burris.  Maybe Burris should have been chosen–though there are probably fifty veterans of Illinois politics who could say they have more experience–and it’s a choice that Blagojevich should have made honestly when he was still a revered statesman.  He fucked it up, and the Democrats are fucking it up, and this scandal will haunt us for the duration of Obama’s presidency, and we’re all just in a royal clusterfuck that we don’t yet have the political capital to withstand.

In a weird way, a choice like the one made in New York with Caroline Kennedy would actually make better sense in Illinois now.  A system as tainted with scandal as Illinois’ almost would do better to choose an outsider to conventional politics such as Kennedy, if only because we could be relatively sure such a person hadn’t been in cahoots with the Blagojevich political machine.  But because Democrats can’t help but be idiotic douchebags with self-afflicted open sores on their faces, we have Burris as our temporary choice in Illinois and Caroline Kennedy as the choice for Hillary’s replacement in New York.  Both of these controversies make me question the Democrats’s dedication to actual democracy.

 

I want Mike for Christmas! December 27, 2008

Filed under: Bands,Bubblegum,Christmas,Comedy,Personal Shit,Television — orangehairboy @ 9:23 am

Santa brought me the Young Ones on DVD, the OHM electronic music box-set, some cook books including The Veganomicon, and even winter snows!  But perhaps my favorite gift of the modern era is the internet, where I can go back and see strange clips from things I saw on telly when I was ten!

I saw Peter and Davy a couple weeks back at a showing of Head, where Peter said that Mike was always an “againster” during the Monkees heyday.  But it looks like he was a joiner for at least a little bit during this goofy time in eighties history.  Note how thrilled Martha Quinn looks!

 

Slade beats Simon LeBon at Christmas! December 25, 2008

Filed under: Bands,Celebrities,Christmas,Comedy,Glam Rock,Performers,Television — orangehairboy @ 7:50 am

It’s fifteen minutes until Christmas!  Enjoy it the Slade way.  From The Smell of Reeves and Mortimer…

 

California wins lawsuit against Airborne December 16, 2008

Filed under: Art,Comics,LAist,Other Stuff,Politics,Soda Pop — orangehairboy @ 7:29 pm

My buddy Greg has been saying this for years–a medicine “created by a school teacher” is not something to brag about and is no substitution for drugs crafted through the rigorous application of the scientific method. 

And now Airborne just lost their case with the State of California, and is going to have to significantly change their marketing strategy as well as their formula.  That’s a good thing, since not only is it not good for colds, but they know damned well that it’s not, and in fact, its potent dose of vitamins endanger the health of women and children:

Even after studies, Airborne knew that major ingredients in their products–Vitamin C, Vitamin E, Selenium, and Zinc–did not prevent colds. They continued to market their product as a cold remedy, says the Attorney General’s office. Even worse, they say, is that Airborne’s dosage of Vitamin A is 5,000 international units and when taken as recommended, one would consume 15,000. That’s a “potential health risk to vulnerable populations including children and pregnant women.”

No word on how Lloyd Dangle, the artist behind those scary germs on the Airborne packaging, is taking this.  I wonder if all the knock-offs of Airborne he so humorously dug into a couple years back will be getting similar legal treatment.

 

The Haunted House of Horror December 15, 2008

Filed under: Albums,Bands,Celebrities,David Bowie,Ghosts,Movies — orangehairboy @ 9:46 am

This is one of those films that you know kind of sucks but you still have to see.  I usually hate spoilers, but I just have to say it: Frankie Avalon gets stabbed through his dick in this movie!  There is a crotch stabbing, and the Big Kahuna gets it!  And you also get to hear him talk about doing drugs with Mark Wynter of “Venus in Blue Jeans” fame, and get to see Carnaby Street in the late sixties, and get to see more go-go boots and false eyelashes than you’ve probably ever seen in a horror film!

The Pretty Things contributed at least one song to this soundtrack, “She Says Good Morning” from S.F. Sorrow no less, and it sounds to my ears like a differently mixed version than the one on the album.  There’s also enough great incidental music by god-knows-who to groove on and make a whole soundtrack disc of.  And while we’re talking about the great rock tie-ins that were, let’s not forget the tie-ins that could have been: both a young David Bowie, as well as Scott Walker, had been cast at one time or another for this feature, as well as Boris Karloff, who got too sick to play the detective (maybe it was the convoluted script).

Anyway, it was a great distraction to watch this and not think about the misery that is another work day tomorrow morning.

 

Beverly Garland RIP December 12, 2008

Filed under: Los Angeles,Movies,Mystery Science Theater 3000,Obituaries,Television — prodigalsonnybono @ 12:29 am

Beverly Garland died this week.  The press remembers her mostly for her television work, and as a Roger Corman B-movie actress.

I remember her as both!  Who can forget Swamp Diamonds on Mystery Science Theater 3000?

And let’s not be hasty and forget Gunslinger!

 

Milk and Sylvester and Neil Young! December 8, 2008

Filed under: Bands,Celebrities,Electronic Music,Gay and Lesbian stuff,Movies,Performers,Personal Shit,Politics,Songwriters,Soul Music — orangehairboy @ 7:38 pm

I just saw Gus Van Sant’s Milk last night.  Of course it was great and moving and sad and informative.  And of course Sean Penn wowed us with his performance, even though we already knew it was going to be good.

But amidst all the drama and sadness and history, I got a little nugget of sweetness when they had a scene recreating a Harvey Milk birthday party, including Sylvester singing him ”You Make Me Feel!”  God, I love that song, and I thought the drag performer Flava (er, real name is apparently Mark Martinez) carried the outlandish role of Sylvester pretty well. 

One purchase I really want to get in the near future is Sylvester’s first album, Sylvester and the Hot Band.  After his stint with the Cockettes, he initially moved in kind of a funk-rock direction, including a cover of Neil Young’s “Southern Man” that I still have not heard, though the reviews are incredible!  Here’s one of the few tastes of this album I’ve gotten, and it’s a goodie:

 

I don’t believe a Zappa on a Sunday! December 7, 2008

Filed under: Albums,Alice Cooper,Bands,Celebrities,Comedy,Other Stuff,Performers,Personal Shit — orangehairboy @ 10:35 pm

I want to stress that I have had some friends who were uanbashed Zappa dorks.  Like, people who would claim his version of “Ring of Fire” was better than the Johnny Cash version.  Or who would sit around watching Zappa dick around on stage in 1983 with a bunch of drums and chimes.  I am not one of those.

However, We’re Only in It for the Money is a pretty amazing album, and this is a pretty amazing outtake.  You gotta love this era of Zappa.  Everything he touched turned out pretty good in those days, from the Monkees and Alice Cooper to the GTO’s and Cynthia Plaster Caster, and I love this chipmunk-ey version of “Let’s Make the Water Turn Black.”

UPDATE:  Just heard word from Dominic Priore (of Riot On Sunset Strip fame) that his buddy Joey Altruda and he put together a great podcast of early Zappa stuff, much of it before the Mothers of Invention.  I’m going to listen to it tonight as soon as I get home!

 

Tycho Brahe is not a train set! December 4, 2008

Filed under: Celebrities,Musicals,Politics,Religion — orangehairboy @ 11:53 pm
my brotha, the Brahe!
my brotha, the Brahe!

Today’s re-discovery of the space-light phantasma-echo of Tycho Brahe’s supernova (originally discovered in 1572) has sent me into a whirlwind of post-mortem mania over Tycho’s total awesomeness!  This is the Renaissance man for me! 

Not only did he use meticulous observation (without a telescope) to determine that the stars were not fixed to celestial spheres and that the planets (aside from noble Earth, which he and the church never relinquished) seemed to revolve around the Sun, but he also hired a clairvoyant dwarf named “Jepp” to hang out under his table at parties, and had a tame elk as a pet (who died of a drink-related accident!).  He also lost his nose in a drunken duel (his exumed body had green stains around the nose, suggesting he wore a copper replacement), and may even have been killed by Johannes Kepler, because his measurements of the stars were that fucking accurate.

 

And I haven’t even gotten to the Bob Dylan part yet!  “Tycho’s Supernova” directly inspired the Edgar Allen Poe poem “Al Aaraaf,” which inspired Dylan’s 1966 poem-novel “Tarantula.”  This same Supernova also likely inspired Shakespeare’s Hamlet (though hopefully had no impact on the band Oasis).
More importantly, the insight Tycho gleaned from his supernova informed all of modern astronomy, from Galileo’s elimination of the celestial spheres in the heliocentric model (though Tycho’s was geo-heliocentric, he was the first to give up the spheres!) to the Chinese calendar–it was the church-sanctioned Tychonic view of the heavens that Jesuits took to China in time for the Ming dynasty to enjoy it before they croaked.  And of course, whether or not there was a murder, Tycho’s measurements inspired his sucessor Kepler to complete his work on the movements of celestial bodies.
Perhaps what I find most interesting though, aside perhaps from the drunken elk, is that when I was learning this stuff in school, they made it seem like there was a logical evolution from Ptolemy all the way to Galileo, and that Galileo’s theory of a heliocentric universe with no celestial spheres was the final vision in the evolution of astronomical thought until like Newton.  Turns out that actually, Tycho’s vision had pretty long legs–the Tychonic vision of the universe was probably the preeminent one until it was finally disproved in 1729:
The tenacious longevity of the Tychonic model into the late 17th century and even the early 18th century was attested by Ignace Pardies who declared in 1691 that it was still the commonly accepted system and by Francesco Blanchinus who said it was still such in 1728.
Pretty nifty, I think, for a dude whose home life sounds a bit like Einstein-meets-Caligula, with a touch of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang!
 

Bob Dole needs positive reinforcement December 3, 2008

Filed under: Other Stuff,Politics — prodigalsonnybono @ 12:00 am

Isn’t Bob Dole just a lovable old coot? This touching tidbit from the Nixon archives released today shows that this former leader of the Party of Lincoln also had a frailty, a need to be commended by virtuous men such as Nixon.  It really gets me misty-eyed reading this:

The material also shows a sensitive side to Kansas Sen. Bob Dole, who apparently needed affirmation in his job as chairman of the Republican National Committee in 1972.

“The key to Bob Dole’s effectiveness is his morale and his attitude,” Colson told Nixon in a February 1972 memo. “A pat on the back from you tonight when you see him would go a long way toward keeping his spirits up. He is very sensitive to this kind of thing and often asks whether you know what he does. The slightest mention would have a very healthy impact.” 

I can just see Nixon now, talking to Bob Dole like he was Checkers the puppy dog.  “Hey There, Bo-Doo!  You’ve been such a good boy!  Where’s that waggly tail?”

 

 
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