today

[ ring ring ]

hi tony, are you still mad at me?

yes.

im glad at least that youre talking to me.

im not talking to you, its just hard to have a bloggy dialogue with just one person talking.

im sure you could figure it out. i always thought you were an amazing writer.

flattery, anna, in this case, wont get you anywhere.

well this is a first.

insulting me isnt going to get you anywhere either.

tony, please. lets be adults about this. im in love. you always told me you wanted me to be in love. even if it wasnt with you.

yes but i didnt Mean it.

i asked you to be my boyfriend a million times but you said it wouldnt work out.

i said it wouldnt work out until after you retired from tennis! i didnt say it wouldnt ever work out. and i certainly didnt expect you to go get married just because i wasnt going to be your boyfriend for a few years. now youre probably just going to retire, spread your legs for enrique and crank out a couple hundred cuban kids.

ok, number one, fuck you tony. number two im in love. number three youre disgusting and he isnt even cuban. number four im not retiring any time soon nor am i having any children any time soon.

shove your nors and your mexican has-been right where the sun doesnt shine. which will be difficult with you, anna, cuz ive seen you sunbathe and the sun shines everywhere.

i dont know why you have to be so mean about this. i dont remember you being mean to your other ex girlfriends. infact all you ever do is talk about how much you love them and how great they are and how much you all get along.

they never ran off with some limp wristed busboy with a zit on his cheek.

omg! you dont even know enrique. how can you say these things?

i could ask you the same question.

what question?

i could ask you how you could frigging MARRY someone who you dont even know.

i know him, tony. quit being jealous. and i love him. and what i do in my life is no longer any of your bees wax.

i give it four months.

dont be so cruel! why would you say that? enrique and i will last forever.

no, i give your tennis career four months, then you will retire. i give your fake marriage three months. then you will get pregnant then he will divorce you because he’s gay and knows that he didnt do that to you, and then you will come running to me to be your babys daddy, but im not going to do it.

i hate you tony.

and i hate you anna. youve broken my heart. ive given you all the freedom in the world and you just spit in my face.

listen to you “i let you…”

i Did let you. every other motherfucker would have blown a gasket with you galavanting around. dating this guy, being in that guy’s video. i was never jealous i never talked shit, in fact all i ever did was support you, especially when you were down (which has been most of your career) and especially during your latest injuries and most especially during that penthouse thing.

i knew you would use all that against me.

no one is using anything against you. i was there for you and what did you do to reward me, you got married to a one hit wonder. to some dudes son. why didnt you just marry george bush.

george bush is married, tony.

so youre saying you… forget it. its over. dont ever call me again. dont talk to me. dont email. dont write. keep the carrier pigeons, keep the cds, keep everything.

i see you have taken me off your blog thing.

and i have rubbed you from my heart.

i dont care what you say, i will continue to be your friend no matter what. even though youre being so mean to me. i love you and i always will, tony.

i hope he comes out on your honeymoon.

hello, this is our honeymoon and he has come, but not out. thank you.

only cuz hes thinking of rupaul.

[click]

scienceblog + treacher + koganuts + cruft

The Wedgewood Rooms, Portsmouth, England
6/7/2005

Andrew in England wrote a great review of the Tsar show on Tuesday and thanks to the miracle of the Internet he wrote a review, emailed me some pics and we shared a pleasant conversation.

Here is a snippet from his review:

Backed by a red board with their name spelled out in light bulbs flashing each letter in turn, T-S-A-R launched into Straight. Whether they were pushed for time, don’t like applause, or always do it like that, they proceeded to run the next 3-4 songs back to back, stopping only to tend to Jeff’s malfunctioning guitar pedal. Was it fixed? Who knows! Jeff slinked back towards the mike announcing “We’re experiencing technical difficulties”, stamped on the pedal a few times, turned to shrug at Daniel, and burst back to life for another 8 minute medley to round things off. Aside from the previews available via their MySpace page, I was unable to make out (either from the songs themselves or the introductory statements preceding them) anything familiar. That they didn’t play anything off the first record is a shame, hearing Teen Wizards live would’ve had me bouncing off the walls. Still, a thunderous recital of Love Explosion almost made up for it.

As they wandered about the stage collecting their kit (Jeff donning his David Hasselhoff cape) I wondered if they’d had any fun. Jeff maintained his Joker-esque beam throughout, even containing laughter after dodging another disposable cup of beer. The crowd (what there was of it) was entirely apathetic; no doubt they were unknowns to everyone but me (and the long-haired chap against the guard rail who solicited a congratulatory handshake from bassist Derrick Forget). I can’t help thinking that with better promotion and a room of open-minded punters (as opposed to a hundred drunken louts and a handful of ill-tempered, aged punks) a Tsar gig would be a riot (hell, I know it would, I’ve read the reviews). I only knew about it from a cursory scan of Tony Pierce’s busblog, and wasn’t sure until seeing the words ‘supporting Towers of London’ plastered across their (oft-unavailable) website (the Wedge trotting out its customarily vague ‘… plus Special Guests’ catch-all).

you can read the rest of it here.

and here is part of our email exchange:

On 6/9/05, tony wrote:
> Mr. Andrew,
>
> Your review is awesome!

Thanks!

>
> Tsar has played many many gigs and some are exactly like the one you
> attended where nobody knows who they are and its too late in the night
> and people just stand there and stare. And like you said, sometimes
> they play shows where people know whats about to happen and they eat
> it up.

It’s a shame, because they’re one of the few bands that makes everyone
stop talking and listen whenever i stick them on in the car. I thought
that principle might translate to the gig environment too;
unfortunately, on this particular occasion, i was wrong. Just hope it
doesn’t make them think twice about coming back.

>
> I agree with you that they should play some of their old tunes but for
> some reason they only want to play songs from their new record. Maybe
> theyre bored from playing those old tunes for four years? I don’t
> know. I do know that I too miss hearing Teen Wizards, and I Dont Wanna
> Break Up, and Calling All Destroyers.

I’ll admit, the prospect of hearing anything off the old record was
what made me put the money down (that and wanting to push some cash in
their direction). If they’d have played the entire thing all the way
through i would’ve stood in quiet awe before going home sporting the
most enormous grin you can imagine. Obviously that was never going to
happen, but i was holding out for maybe one or two songs.

Still, you’re right. They’ve got something new to promote – and doing
anything for four years solid has got to get a little tiring.

>
> As for the blending of songs together one-after-another. Thats
> something that Tsar likes to do. In the LA club scene people have a
> million things to look at and do, and watching the band is only one
> option. I think Tsar does that to entertain the short attention spans
> of todays hipster while presenting a sliver of faux professionalism.
> Thats a tight band. They can stop on a dime if Jeff wanted them to.

That’s the impression i got too, even with the problems they had
(heck, they even sound good as recorded on the crappy microphone of my
digi camera standing a foot from the speaker tower).

>
> I’m so happy you went to the show and your review answered the
> question that I’ve had for a long time “who the fuck are the Towers of
> London”.

Rest assured, this was a gap in your knowledge barely worth filling.

>
> rock on,

And you,

Andrew 🙂

more photos from the show + hear three tunes from tsar’s new cd + bunny mcintosh + the known universe

in a piece they did about people who were addicted to blogging. all i have to say is it’s 1:55p and if i didnt have a blog i woulda been out of this house two hours ago.

but now i think we’re finally finished responding to emails and reading all the necessary blogs to present to you todays twenty minutes with tony. lets see how many words we can blaze out in twenty minutes totally without selfediting. stream of consciousness but more like a bukkake of blogging. ok go!

im watching a replay of the dodgers game from last night. maybe men will never understand the appeal of a shoe store at a mall but women will probably never fully grasp the beauty of vin scully broadcasting a dodger home game. many many times in my life do i look around and consider myself totally lucky and every single time i hear vin scully tell the ongoing tale of the los angeles dodgers i feel completely blessed.

maybe its because laker fans totally savored the last years of chick hearn, and cub fans did the same with harry carey. all of these great broadcasters worked well past the normal age of retirement and do so with style and personality and professionalism that is sadly quite rare in todays younger sports announcer. but enough baseball lets answer some questions.

“how do you pick who makes your blog + blog list.”

linking is everything. as ive said before, linking is what seperates bloggers from apes. and its part of the shoutout culture that hiphop never gets credit for. therefore there are several places that i link fellow bloggers. after each post i link 3-4 blogs that i have recently read and enjoyed. either they had recently updated or they mentioned me in a nice way or they said something really good. sometimes i link someone who i, for whatever reason, havent linked them in a while.

if blogrolling could add one feature that id really appreciate it would be a tiny script that rotates through my blogroll that i could add to the bottom of each post. i dont know how many people actually click those links but if anything i know how nice it is to get a link and i figure everyone else feels the same way. and if i can turn someone on to a cool blog then awesome.

i also have a blog roll on the left hand side of my blog. i havent really managed that very well in the last six months but usually if someone gives some shoutouts to the busblog and has a decent blog i will gladly put them on the blogroll.

blogrolls are drama to many, but i do my best to link people who regularily blog and who link me back. maybe blogrolling has this, but it would be nice if blogs that havent updated in two or three months would fade or blink so i would know to delete them. i dont care what anyone says, writing an email to the world once or twice a week is not all that difficult. and thats all that blogging is. not everyone has to blog every day, not everyone has to write as many words as they can in twenty minutes every day, but everyone has a story to tell. everyone is doing something with their day. you might not consider it amazing, but nobody asked you your opinion, just tell the story and hit publish and i will probably link you.

do hot chicks who fawn over me get linked more than others? uh. yes. sometimes. usually. probably. no not at all.

do i deserve even a fraction of the attention that i get. no way. and maybe thats why im making up for it with quantity since quality comes and goes like hitting streak. just keep taking your cuts.

wow time is flying, so here are two questions from our girl in trinidad

1. Have you ever been with a black woman?

2. Have you ever come close to marrying someone?

i have never been with a black woman and during an xbi psychological examination the shrink said something that i found interesting. i found it particularily interesting because i am not a fan of psychiatry or mediums or therapy or meditation or any of that, but this dude said something that i think i agree with.

when i was a boy i lived in an all-white town. my sister and i were the only black kids in school for many years. as time passed sometimes one family or two would move in but theyd move out. then maybe another family would move in, and theyd move out just as quick. so the only black women i ever knew really were my mother and my sister and my relatives. therefore whenever i would see a black woman my brain would try to match her up with a family member, not really what you want to think about if youre on the prowl, lets say. so therefore ive never really been into black girls.

however, there have been exceptions, and i find mariah carey very beautiful, as well as beyonce, lil kim, the two black girls in american idol this year, the black chick in clueless, serena williams, and naomi campbell. actually naomi is my favorite supermodel of all time.

have i ever come close to marrying someone? no. the two girlfriends who i lived with id ask to marry every day that i was with them. i never produced a ring or got on my knee but that was probably because they punched me in the gut anytime i ever mentioned marriage.

if either of them had said yes my life would be worlds different than it is now and i seriously doubt i would be blogging today. i got very lethargic and satisfied when i was in those relationships and i dare say dull. there was a great deal of love there but not much to blog about. besides the wild monkey sex.

but id love to be married one day and id love to create a few dozen offspring and name them all george foreman or prince.

times up so let me say that its nice that scully has gotten to document the rise of eric gagne and the true excitement that happens at home games when they play the opening strains of “welcome to the jungle” and the typically reserved dogdger stadium goes apeshit while taking pictures with their cell phones of the best closer in baseball running out of the bullpen.

long live rock.

splink + sk smith + virginia + bio kinton