'Best of TBH Politoons'
Baron Dave Romm
Dude From Mars
By Baron Dave Romm
Shockwave Radio Theater
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For a while I was caught up listening to new (to me) CDs and wrote on other topics. Naturally, I'm now way behind. Here are a few quick reviews that have been on the front burner for too long.
Dude From Mars
Let me get the bad stuff out of the way first: Songs From Mars has a single theme: overproduced Martian surf music by someone sounding a bit like an alien channeling Weird Al.
With that out of the way, I must point out that the songs are fun and some of them are lots of fun. The lyrics are from the point of view of the Dude From Mars. Message From Mars is the intended Hit Single. It's the most overproduced and repeated as an instrumental on the last track. It's bouncy fun, pandering to the base urges of mankind. The message: Send girls. I liked the techno Mars Robotica and even In Memory of Mars Rover
Songs From Mars was a clever idea nicely done but could have been better. Recommended to fill out a dementia playlist and for collectors of songs about other planets (such as myself). A nice novelty gift for the right teen.
Django Twango
Surf music, bouncy rock dance tunes with a drum beat and lead electric guitar, are often instrumental covers. Django Twango harkens back to the early 60s, those simpler times before Vietnam sent surfers to war, AIDS took away some of the innocent fun and pollution fouled the beaches. None of the songs on their epynomous first album are great, but all of them are solid instrumental dance tunes.
007/Goldfinger is a nice James Bond set. Hawaii Five O is a slow cover of the tv theme song at first, then rocks up for the second half of the song. Pink Panther is an okay cover. Night In Tunesia sounds more like The Munsters than Dizzy Gillespie. And so on. Django Twango is probably the most iPod Worthy of the three albums reviewed here. Good stuff in your ears while waiting for a bus.
Art Paul Schlosser: The Tribute
I've talked about Art Paul Schlosser's Vote For Me and as an acquired taste I haven't acquired yet. Still basically true; I can't listen to more than a few cuts in a row and have yet to hear many of them at all. Makes reviewing harder. Still, one can't help but admire his persistence. Having a friend like the great Luke Ski is a major plus, since I admire Luke. When word came, via Luke, of a "Tribute Album" I was very amused. Many of Art's tracks are basically spoken bits of routines and rants. I can do that. What the heck.
Art Paul Schlosser: The Tribute CD is barely available through Art. I'm not going to go so far as recommend it, but I will say that many of the artists who contribute take him seriously. My contribution, Just A Noise is a commentary on fear-mongering in the broadcast industry; 26 seconds that will make you think (perhaps).
Whimsical Will, of the Dr. Demento Show, contributes his 2001 Halloween spoken set of clips that features Have a Peanut Butter Sandwich to frighten you. Joe Bainbridge dresses up the songs with blues riffs. Several nice entries. Luke Ski and Art challenge each other. Aaron Ackerson's version of They Thought He Was A Wiseman is odd, in an electronic Christmassy way. Carrie Dahlby, Luke Ski's female counterpart for Vader Boy and others, does really nice multitrack harmonies to D.
Okay, I had to stop. Even covered by talented weird people, Art Paul Schlosser's music is best taken in small doses. The Tribute is an album I'm glad I own, but more than that I will not say.
Baron Dave Romm is a conceptual artist and a noble of Ladonia who produces Shockwave Radio Theater, writes in a Live Journal demi-blog, plays with a very weird CD collection and an ever growing list of political links. Dave Romm reviews things at random for obscure web sites. You can read all his music recommendations from Bartcop-E. Podcasts of Shockwave Radio Theater. Permanent archive. More radio programs, interviews and science fiction humor plays can be accessed on the Shockwave Radio audio page.
Thanks to everyone who has sent me music to play on the air.
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Recommended Reading
from Bruce
Ted Rall: Fighting Back? Don't Count On It
But Republicans who might be feeling guilty about felonious or even treasonous acts needn't worry about getting frog-marched: impeachment investigations are "off the table," assures minority leader and lead sell-out Nancy Pelosi. Republican candidates "are in such desperate shape [in the polls]," said her spokesman, "we don't want to give them anything to grab on to."
Interview by Ellen Leventry: 'It Was Just a Gang for God' (beliefnet.com)
Queen Latifah on accepting the 'divine design' and what she has in common with her character in 'Last Holiday.'
Interview with Amber Tamblyn by Laura Sheahen: Joan of Arcadia: Talking Back to God (beliefnet.com)
Q: If you could ask God--or your concept a higher power--one question, what would it be?
A: To me, if there is a divine being, I don't understand why our country has had to go through everything that it's gone through in the last [few] years. If we're supposedly a free country, why were we given 9/11, and why were we given a president that doesn't seem to respect the rest of the world's wishes? Or doesn't seem to care about anyone but himself and his corporate buddies? That would be my long-winded question, and I'd like to see what God has to say about that.
Anafaith: Review of Pick Up the Mic (afterellen.com)
Before making his documentary Pick Up the Mic, a documentary about queer hip-hop artists, director Alex Hinton wondered, "If you are gay and a fan of hip-hop, why would you even consider staring down the mountain of homophobic lyrics that litter the airwaves and dare to pick up the mic?"
Joe Palmer and Francois Peneaud: Gay Comics 101 (afterelton.com)
Comic books historically have not been particularly friendly to gay characters, especially when considering Marvel and DC, two of the largest and most legendary publishers of superhero comics. With two notable exceptions (a Northstar miniseries over a decade old, which dodged the character's sexuality, and a Rawhide Kid story from early 2003 that was a fun take on an old Western character), both companies have relegated LGBT characters to supporting roles or ensemble cast members.
ROGER EBERT: Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas (3 1/2 stars)
The movies can create entirely new worlds for us, but that is one of their rarest gifts. More often, directors go for realism, for worlds we can recognize. One of the many pleasures of "Tim Burton's the Nightmare Before Christmas" is that there is not a single recognizable landscape within it. Everything looks strange and haunting. Even Santa Claus would be difficult to recognize without his red-and-white uniform.
Jim Emerson: A randy roundelay (Shortbus Review; 3 1/2 stars)
At Toys in Babeland, a sex shop in lower Manhattan, sales increased 30 percent in the wake of 9/11, according to the New York Observer. A year after 9/11, the number of babies born in New York hospitals was up 20 percent.
Beliefnet.com Celebrity Interviews
Amber Tamblyn Homepage (amtam.com)
Attend Edison Community College in Piqua, Ohio? Borrow Bruce's Books.
Search for "Funniest People."
Hubert's Poetry Corner
THE ILLUSIONS OF GEORGE W. BUSH
MAGIC OR FAKERY?
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Sunny and pleasant.
LNG Protest
Malibu
Clean water advocate Pierce Brosnan and other celebrity residents gathered at Surfrider Beach on Sunday to protest a natural gas facility proposed 14 miles off the Malibu coast.
The crowd included Halle Berry, Cindy Crawford, Jane Seymour, Dick Van Dyke and Tea Leoni.
One of the world's largest energy companies, Australian-based BHP Billiton, wants to build the Cabrillo Port Liquefied Natural Gas facility off the coast of Malibu and Oxnard.
Malibu
How Difficult Could It Be To Find A Clip?
Murphy Brown
In an attempt to find out just how easy (or difficult) it is to get access to old television clips, Jeff Ubois started a project: track down clips from the Murphy Brown/Dan Quayle debate in 1992. Though that sounds simple enough, the quest turned out to be surprisingly difficult-sometimes impossible.
Ubois was working as a Staff Research Associate at the University of California, Berkeley when he tried to track down the material, and he wrote a paper (PDF) on the subject in order to illustrate just how difficult it is for researchers to access archival television footage. He quotes from Lawrence Lessig's book Free Culture, in which Lessig asks, "Why is it that the part of our culture that is recorded in the newspapers remains perpetually accessible, while the part that is recorded on videotape is not?" Ubois wanted to see if this was, in fact, true.
Murphy Brown
Gets Boost From Howard Stern
Trent Tomlinson
The number of country artists who have appeared on Howard Stern's radio show is small. Willie Nelson has, and so have the Dixie Chicks. Add rising country star Trent Tomlinson to that short but impressive list.
A native of Kennett, Mo. -- also the hometown of Sheryl Crow -- Tomlinson scored with his first single, "Drunker Than Me," a based-in-fact, humorous ode to a woman who drank more than he did on a date.
While the song peaked at No. 19 on Billboard's Hot Country Songs chart, it received enough airplay to be heard by Andrea Ownbey, a former stripper who holds the dubious distinction of being known as "Miss Howard Stern." Stern and his crew became aware of Tomlinson's single when Ownbey sang it at a karaoke contest.
When Tomlinson heard about Ownbey's performance, he offered to travel to New York to sing a duet with her on Stern's show.
Trent Tomlinson
Screen Actors Guild
Doug Allen
The Screen Actors Guild board of directors voted unanimously Saturday to hire former NFL players union executive Doug Allen as the organization's national executive director and chief negotiator.
The 54-year-old Allen served as assistant executive director of the NFL Players Association in Washington, D.C., for nearly 20 years. He also is credited for establishing Players Inc., the marketing and licensing subsidiary of the NFLPA.
Allen's contract is for three years. He will join the organization in January. He will replace interim director Peter Frank, who was appointed to the position after Greg Hessinger was fired last October in a narrow vote.
Doug Allen
Notebook Stolen
Hank Williams
A music publishing company says a 59-year-old notebook that once belonged to the late country singer Hank Williams and is now in the hands of two collectors had been stolen from its offices.
Sony/ATV Music Publishing officials say they learned it was missing only after a Chicago Sun-Times article detailed how the collectors acquired the notebook, which contains lyrics to several unpublished Williams songs and has a value as high as $250,000.
Stephen Shutts and Robert Reynolds said they acquired the notebook this past summer after being contacted by an older Nashville-area woman last November.
Neither man is suspected of any role in a possible theft, though it's unclear if they might face penalties for possession of stolen property. The notebook remains in their possession.
Hank Williams
Right Wing Propagandist Settles Suit, Clears $200,000
Armstrong Williams
Columnist Armstrong Williams has reached a settlement with prosecutors regarding payments he received by the Education Department to promote resident Bush's agenda.
Lawmakers criticized the contracts as an improper use of taxpayer dollars. Congressional auditors concluded the department engaged in illegal "covert propaganda" by hiring Williams without requiring him to disclose he was paid.
In the settlement, the Justice Department examined whether Williams actually performed the work that was promised in his $240,000 contract signed in late 2003 and cited in his monthly reports to the Education Department.
Ultimately, prosecutors determined he was overpaid $34,000. Their review did not examine whether he improperly promoted the Bush administration's agenda.
Armstrong Williams
And The Shut London Tube Station
Harry Potter
Harry Potter and his sorcerer's ways were to blame for closing a busy London Underground train station.
The schoolboy wizard was responsible for shutting down Westminster station, in the shadow of the iconic Houses of Parliament and close to other major tourist attractions like the London Eye ferris wheel and Westminster Abbey.
The interchange station, which serves three Underground lines, was closed to allow filming for the next instalment in the blockbuster movie series, based on J. K. Rowling's best-selling children's books.
Harry Potter
Sets Halloween "Jack-O'-Lantern" Record
Boston
Bathed in the orange glow of illuminated "Jack-o'-lanterns," Boston smashed a world record on Saturday when thousands of volunteers lit the largest number of Halloween pumpkins ever assembled in one place.
"We have just busted past 29,000 lit pumpkins, this is so wow," shouted John Jacobs, whose Boston-based T-shirt company Life is good sponsored the extravaganza that turned Boston's historic Common into fields of blazing orange orbs.
Volunteers started lining up the pumpkins donated by local farms on Wednesday. The pumpkins were then carved out and lit from the inside with candles. By Saturday evening, dozens of latecomers were still rushing to let accountants number their gourds and add them to the final tally.
Boston
Thieves Lead to Discovery of Egypt
Tombs
The arrest of tomb robbers led archaeologists to the graves of three royal dentists, protected by a curse and hidden in the desert sands for thousands of years in the shadow of Egypt's most ancient pyramid, officials announced Sunday.
The thieves launched their own dig one summer night two months ago but were apprehended, Zahi Hawass, chief of Egypt's Supreme Council of Antiquities, told reporters.
The tombs date back more than 4,000 years to the 5th Dynasty and were meant to honor a chief dentist and two others who treated the pharaohs and their families, Hawass said.
Tombs
'Exiled' To Canada As Punishment
U.S. Pervert
In an unusual sentence that has immigration lawyers questioning its legality, Malcolm Watson, a U.S. citizen, has agreed to stay out of the United States for the next three years as punishment for having sex with a 15-year-old female student.
The exile starts Monday for the 35-year-old former Buffalo Seminary teacher, who was arrested in April after a mall security guard noticed him and the girl sitting in a parked car for two hours.
Under the sentence for sexual abuse imposed by Cheektowaga Town Court, Watson can enter the United States only to report to his probation officer. Watson already lives across the border in Fort Erie, Ont, with his Canadian wife and three children.
U.S. Pervert
In Memory
Jane Wyatt
Actress Jane Wyatt, the prototypical housewife and mother in the television series "Father Knows Best," has died at age 96.
Before taking her role in the television series, Wyatt had already established herself as a television pioneer, serving as host of "The Bell Telephone Hour."
But it was her co-starring role with Robert Young on "Father Knows Best" that catapulted her to stardom and led her to become the first consecutive winner of the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences' Emmy Award.
In the late 1960s, she appeared in an episode of "Star Trek" as Spock's mother, a role she reprised in 1986 in "The Voyage Home," a Star Trek movie.
Born August 12, 1910, to an investment banker and a drama critic, Wyatt attended Barnard College and made her Broadway debut as an understudy at 19.
In 1934, Universal hired her and moved her to Hollywood. Over the next 30 years, she appeared in 30 films and a number of plays, often in the role of the understanding wife.
She acted in "Great Expectations" (1934); "Lost Horizon" (1937); "None but the Lonely Heart (1944); "Gentleman's Agreement" (1947); and "Task Force".
After World War II, President Roosevelt asked Wyatt to help host a performance of the Bolshoi Ballet in the United States. That led to her being blacklisted by Sen. Joseph McCarthy and the House Un-American Activities Committee in the early 1950s.
In 1935, Wyatt married investor/inventor Edgar Bethune Ward, who died in 2000.
Wyatt is survived by her sons Christopher and Michael Ward, three grandchildren and five great grandchildren.
Jane Wyatt
In Memory
Daryl Duke
Emmy Award-winning Daryl Duke, best known for directing the 1983 television miniseries The Thorn Birds, has died at age 77.
The Vancouver native's career in film and television spanned five decades in Canada and the United States.
Duke won many awards, including an Emmy Award for best director of a dramatic program and a Canadian Film Award -now the Genie Awards - for best director of a feature film.
A member of the Canadian Association of Broadcasters Broadcast Hall of Fame, Duke spent much of his life advocating for and defending free speech and individual rights and freedoms.
Daryl originated the first television shows from the CBC's station in Vancouver, CBUT, which went on the air in December, 1953.
Duke is survived by his wife Anne-Marie Dekker, sons Brian and David, stepson Michael Favelle and nine grandchildren.
Daryl Duke
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