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

my car has been shat upon twice by these varmits and im telling you, as grateful as i am that my buddy ken gave me a sweetheart deal on these wheels this is now the second “morning” that ive had to wake up to move it and some of that is due to the fact that my landlord is fucking me on my parking and partly to the fact that i havent been able to do the things i need to do to get a permit out front but all of that will be taken care of tomorrow.

what i havent been reporting is this week ive been on jury duty and the great thing is that each evening ive been calling in and theyve said you dont have to report tomorrow and i do a little jig in the kitchen and hop back on the cheerleader and consider it some sort of victory.

what the courts dont know is id love to be on a jury right now. i got no job. i got nothing to do. youd think id be working on a nice cover or maybe some bonus material for Stiff or clean my house, but no, i dont do jack all day, so when matt and jennifer called this morning and asked if i was up for a drive in maibu i was all, shit give me time to blog and shower.

i could seriously get used to this lifestyle.

yesterday i admitted how i always wanted to be a private driver for someone. i dont care if the dude is like some old geezer like aaron spelling, or some poor sap in a crazy family like ozzy, or even two socialite nymphs with too many dui’s, just get me a cellphone and a car and i’ll pick your ass up day or night.

i know, its the opposite of freedom, but firefighters do it and who doesnt love firefighters? the only thing i wouldnt be so cool about was if i had to wear a suit. if i had to work in a suit all the time id have to ask for a raise. and some days off. suits are fine for some people but im sorry i dont care if the socialites blow me twice a day im not gonna wear a suit and tie in LA.

outside the standard the other day i saw two dudes in suits supervising the team of valet runners right in front of the main entrance. it was pretty interesting. i wanted to try to figure out if that was what these dudes really do or were they waiting for like the president or something. because i’ll tell you what, if my whole job is watching mexican dudes park cars and super hot models and actresses get in and out of cars all day, i might be able to handle that.

as long as i can carry a gun.

two minutes left so in closing let me tell you a little delemma i ran into last night. on the off chance that i would be seeing matt again today i decided that id put together a little mix cd of music. but because i have a.d.d. and two gigantic hard drives, the mix cd turned into a mix dvd with like 4.3 gigs of tunes for his ipod and or mac. but then when i was done making it i was all, is that cool? do musicians get uptight if theyre given a couple gigs of mp3s, since, well, theyre mp3s and all?

i finished my beer and forgot about it.

i’ll return with the answer tonight.

carrie + jmo + gunge

with a beautiful girl who i couldnt keep my eyes off. i couldnt keep my hands off her either.

at some point i swallowed my beef brocolli and said baby how does it feel to be the hottest chick in this restaurant.

she looked around and nearly spit out her kung pow shrimp from laughter.

today i was at a hotel swimming pool on the sunset strip with matthew good, his wife jennifer good, and a half dozen or more would-be starlets who had been surgically enhanced by artisans, even the waitresses proudly flaunted their young flat bellies.

although my life is pretty amazing, the one minute change in scenery from my new used car interior to the pool of the standard was shocking. even for me. and ive seen it all. and what was really interesting was that matthew good had the hottest babe in the whole place. hands down.

definately one of the top ten most beautiful women ive seen. im serious. as soon as my unemployment check arrives im buying a guitar.

jennifer good is so beautiful that i asked matt permission to compliment him on her hotness.

he obliged. matt good is a supercool dude. its funny, i might be the only person who thinks of both of them foremost as bloggers and two of my favorite bloggers at that, so it was like being at sxsw again and meeting people who ive enjoyed reading.

we sipped margueritas inches away from the pool and i told them that the reason i liked their blogs so much was because they both gave me a very clear idea of what parts of their lives were like. i also told them that they shouldnt get so uptight about dumb commentors who say rude shit, but theyre nice, sensitive, normal people, if someone started talking shit about your wife youd probably get pissed off too.

matt loves music, politics, and technology and at some point we were talking about tech he said oh lets go up to the room and i’ll show you… both jennifer and i put down our margueritas and said are you kidding? it was 80 degrees, the pool was gorgeous, it was a rare smog-free clear day in LA – leave the pool, are you nuts?

but matt’s not a sit at the sunset strip pool guy. his wife could live there, but he’s a normal dude not at all impressed by the glitz. and why should he, hes got the glitz at his elbow.

jennifer has never been to la before so i gladly showed them a few places in hollywood, bel air, and beverly hills, and one day i’ll figure out a good route of some hot spots because people come into town or they’ll email me and i never know where these people should go. and most the time its just nice to drive around and play it by ear.

matt and jennifer together are classic. matt is heavy into politics and knows about history and has some pretty interesting thoughts about music. jennifer is a total girlie girl but no ditz. theyve been together for five years and have obviously learned to deal with their differences and even when they disagree about certain serious issues like whose gonna sit up front with me, they get worked out without much fanfare or pouting.

they’re both very good about answering any question without making you feel like youre either dumb, or prying, or not a close reader of their blog, which is tricky when you meet bloggers, especially when they say, duh i wrote about this just yesterday. neither of them said that to me. so anyway together theyre awesome, so much so that i was all, dude you two should be on canadian mtv doing like a Meet The Barkers or an Osbournes thing. because they are funny and ive gotta tell you ive seen every episode of Meet The Barkers and im sorry to say but i liked travis before that show and i dont any more. but the goods would be great because these are really nice interesting people who are living pretty different lives than you and i.

at least today they did.

matt said the only way hed do it is if he could spew out a lot of enviornmental causes in there and so on and i was all if i was an mtv producer id say sure sure you can talk about that stuff, knowing all along it would be the first to get edited out.

we drove around first listening to 95.5, the classic rock station that did us right with some zeppelin, and then we flipped over to 103.1 who helped us out with some new white stripes and an acoustic version of that yeah yeah yeahs tune.

jennifer said she loved la. matt said it was ok. i had a great time.

far from relevant + bicycle mark + annika + danielle

which is the daily feature where tony wakes up at noon one-thirty, clicks around the web for twenty minutes and then blogs for twenty minutes as he gets ready to meet the canadian rock star and her husband mr matt good or something.

at the tone the time will be two twenty four. bleep.

because the blogosphere is a totally bizzare happenstance for some reason matthew good has my home phone number. and for some reason every now and then he calls it.

last night he called me from his convertible with las vegas in his rearview and his fashion model wife at his side.

hey tony this is my cell phone number call me in the morning and we’ll have breakfast.

i was all matt am i more rockstar than you? its gonna take a troop of cheerleaders to get my ass out of bed before noon.

he laughed and said that i should call him when i woke and we’ll hang out at the standard’s glittering pool. the standard of course being the sunset strip’s coolest hotel and one of paris hiltons favorite hangouts. for some reason i expected the goods to be either more the chateu marmont or the riot hyatt crowd, but there are so many great and historic places to crash when youre here on the label’s dime that i guess i would bop from hotel to hotel too.

and because im a weirdo i keep thinking these two things as i charge my cameras batteries and prepare for my shower. i keep thinking, when are you ever going to do your laundry, what happens if they want to come over to your train wreck of an apartment, and i wonder when you’ll ever make it to the dmv to get a parking permit to park on your street?

its so funny, my whole summer vacation that was to include equal parts getting shit done and doing absolutely nothing is being fucked with by traveling rockstars, suddenly horny virgins, cubs homestands, job opportunities, and one book that i was so intent on coming out with that now im getting second thoughts about.

so i ask you, busblog readers, for your input.

i have a collection of short stories that i am super proud of. together the stories comprise a 100 page novella.

they are my stories of dying and meeting kurt kobain on the way to hell.

not only are they the best 100 pages that ive ever written, but i wrote them all during my 15-minute government mandated breaks at work at E! when i had just been transfered to the busiest department in the company at that time.

i was terrified of transferring from the tranquil ease of Closed Captioning and i really thought that being moved to Scheduling would not only allow me zero time to update the busblog, but i was sure that i wouldnt be able to keep up with the super fast paced super attention to detail job of what used to be scheduling.

so on my first day in the new department, a place of really hard working super cynical seen-it-all young people, i worked a few hours and took my first break. opened up blogger, and died and met kurt kobain.

my hero.

every day i wrote nothing other than stories about being dead and the preparation for Judgement Day and what happened to my soul after i was pronounced fuct.

at the time most of the people loved it although a few complained that they wanted the old busblog back. but when it was over it was over and the story segued perfectly back to the busblog and a few people said omg that was awesome.

now that i am no longer employed at e! and the time in “hell” spun into a suprise ending, and cafepress.com is still in the business of publishing books on demand, i thought, i know what i’ll do this summer, i will put all those stories in a book and sell them as something a little different than my previous blooks because this one will actual be one full story. a long story. but a short book. a novella if ever there was one.

and because i really loved these stories, which is rare because i hardly ever can go back on the things that i write and read more than a few sentences of them without being embarrassed, i wanted to re-edit them, re-write parts, and change a few things so that they would be as perfect as i could make them.

and i did that. for the last month ive been combing over every word, looking at things closely for the first time ever and paying attention to the minute details so that when this book comes out people will say damn, i cant believe that was all written as blog posts and i cant believe theyve been around for over two years.

yesterday i got the book back from cafepress and it looks good and everything is fine except it looks like it got stuck in the dryer too long. it looks tiny. it looks like a book you would get in junior high along with the weekly reader.

this is a problem because i wanted to sell a limited run of 500 signed copies for $20 each.

so my question to you dear readers, is would you buy a little book of 100 pages, good pages, and spend $20 plus shipping and be satisfied if you liked the stories?

if i sold all 500 copies the bonus for me would be that i wouldnt have to work all summer and i would be able to blog way more, do photo essays, and basically be free for the last time in my life… that is, as long as i didnt have to deal with traveling celebrities and cheerleaders, etc. so much.

laist + gmask + wunderdog + blogging.la

get behind me satan
V2 Records

the new york times got this cd the same time i did.

somehow theyre declaring this a masterpiece because it has some addt’l instruments on it than just drums and jack white.

not so fast baby.

the white stripes have, what five records now? they better put something more on there than just drums on jack white.

wheres my calculator. im such an old man. i have this great calculator thats big and has big buttons and can take a good punch and has big numbers and is solar powered and i never knew id be calculating so much but i calculate like a bitch.

i also find myself using a flashlight quite a bit.

so ive heard this cd for weeks now, which ive decided is really what i should do before i take a serious stab at reviewing a record because i felt bad the second i posted that weezer review.

the chick asked if i ever felt bad about 2,000 people possibly getting “hurt” that i wrote something and fuck no, how on earth could i even post one word if i was worried about hurting anyone.

but i did feel bad busting on rivers because it is a small world, and he does know some of my friends, and he does use the internet, and he did allegedly did get freaked out about pinkerton, and hes just a fragile little dude who very well could have done a little technorati search on his cd and there i was one of his biggest fans who had made a friggin photo essay for maladroit is now talking shit about make believe.

thats gotta suck.

especially since ive listened to make believe every day for the last two weeks.

on the firt day of having Get Behind Me Satan i loved it. on the second day i thought it was just more of the same old white stripes gimmickrey. on the third day i thought it was totally cool again. on the fourth day it helped me write a dirty letter to anna kournikova.

jack white knows what he wants to do with the white stripes and that is this: not rock the boat. this record is not very different than any of the others, maribas be damned. thats the bad news. the good news is everyones got another white stripes cd to love especially on random with about twenty totally different cds.

the problem that i have with Get Behind Me Satan is that theres not enough Satan. anyone who’s seen the White Stripes live knows that Mr. White made a deal involving his soul at the crossroads, but as is usual Satan usually pays up in spades. (see: Zep, Sabbath, R. Johnson, Abba).

if i could find that blasted calculator i would say that the Deceiver is definately in the house on track one, the single, the power chord havin Blue Orchid which has nothing to do with the rest of the collection, sadly. (video)

Be’el’zebub was present on track three ringing My Doorbell asking me what are you going to do about it?

Forever For Her, track four, is so gorgeous that it hints to the sweet rays of lightness from the angel side of the former number two man in Heaven.

Yes, before he fell, Lucifer was an angel, a high ranking one at that.

This is a song he would have written back in those days.

Ugly As I Seem track five made me pull out led zep’s Going To California to see how close it got (not that close) and one of the few times that we get to actually hear the genius of Mr. White on this record as everything is even more stripped down than normal with just his wife/mom/sister on a bongo while he plays acoustic and sings a song that sounds like something robert plant would have paid millions to have been able to record on one of his solo records. half way through you say hi satan and he winks.

somebody is in there with them in the firey furnace during Instinct Blues and Take Take Take but i think its neil peart, not the Fallen One. those are far too intellectual tunes for the devil. give us fire fuckers. fire.

red rain sounds like a white stripes parody with so many effects that its almost like they know theres not a song in there just a good excuse for jack to run around the stage live. which is fine. but not worthy of hellfire. just regularfire.

Little Ghost track 12 is a visit from Lorretta Lynn who is also an angel and would have been perfect on her solo record that White produced and he was smart to steal it from her and put it here, which is naughty, but not satanic.

Get Behind Me Satan ends in the bluesy piano of I’m Lonely (But I’m Not That Lonely Yet) which hints if not comes straight out by saying that he has the hots for his sister, since after all he’s lonely, but alas not that lonely yet. It’s an odd song because you want to feel sorry for him because he obviously wants to get it on with her but, dude, it’s your sister!

which would have been way creepier of a song if Meg White wasnt outted earlier this year as having been Jack’s wife, and not his sister. regardless Satan is all up in this song. which might not be good for your soul, but is great for rock music.

i still havent found my calculator so lets say Satan is on half of this cd, angels are on two tracks, and the rest of it is plain old white stripes. therefore six thumbs up, but no masterpiece.

the boston globe says it’s just ok + boston herald liked it + canada.com reports that jack calls is a truth record + philly.com calls it brilliant, gives it 3.5 stars and says it has lots of guitar which it doesnt + detroit news calls it “possibly their best“, its good but its not even their second best + the new yorker wished that jack wrote a chorus for blue orchid and duetted with xtina + newsweek has an incredibly sober feature on them aka dull as hell + fake dyi has the best review though

regarding “hurting” people through my blog.

here is part of the comment,

tony, i feel very strongly that if in the process of being comedic, and or angry, other people stand to get hurt, and you are aware of that possibilty beforehand, your right to do so should lose some rights to their right to be safe.

however, with that said, if before you wrote a funny, you could see the future, and in it you saw someone else being hurt because of your words, even indirectly, would you still say them? publicy, in front of 2000 people?

first of all the things that i write actually get read by about 5,000 people, if not more. yes i average about 2,000 hits a day but people skip days or more and then catch up when they come back.

but no im not afraid of “hurting” people because quite frankly i dont think i could hurt anyone through this blog, and if their feelings were hurt in some way thats their problem and i bet theyre letting sillier things than blogs “hurt” them too.

let me tell you a few things about being 111 years old. you get perspective when youre this old and right now we are experiencing a pussyfaction of america like ive never seen.

speech needs to be politically correct, laws have to restrict our freedoms so we dont fuck with the minds of the children whose minds get fucked with daily in other ways, if you call the president a liar normally-rational people will start questioning your patriotism

and people are running around pretending to have their feelings hurt by the names of sports teams, by the pledge of allegiance, by statues of the ten commandments, and by nipples at the super bowl.

sign me up for secretary of shut the fuck up and i swear i will use my bullhorn retlentlessly.

should you piss on korans? should you rape little kids? of course not. on the verge of a real holy war you dont fuck with korans you fucking morons, you dont hump kids, and you dont talk about peoples mommas. obey the rules and we know the rules.

when youre talking about comedy you have to know that langauge and oppressed classes are the easiest subjects, and some of the best.

comedy, in my opinion, as well as writing, as well as sex, as well as conversation, as well as rock music, as well as threesomes, as well as burritos, as well as art, as well as film, is best when its edgy.

sixteen candles is one of my all time favorite films, but today’s pussyfication of PC overprotectness would have sacrificed us the fine character Long Duck Dong who was a buffoon and a walking ethnic slur. and yet all his lines were classic. you think that even john hughes could convince a studio to allow a character like him in a film nowadays?

how would you like to be the dude pitching “48 Hrs” in 2005. “ok we have this young black guy in jail…” he’d be cut off immediately, and chris rock would say, “why’s it always gotta be a brotha in jail!”

writers should always be branching out and trying new things and pushing the envelope. and bloggers shouldnt even think twice about it since blogging happens on the internet and the internet as raymi perfectly put it is for losers.

i hurt far more people by holding back than i do by being funny. regular readers of this blog know that i love people, and when you love them you can make fun of them you can criticize them and when you do that you can then get to higher levels.

we are all in agreement that the g/l/t community is a vibrant and amazing part of this great country. i lived in the city of san francisco for four years and the city of hollywood for four years, and the one thing that i have learned is that all people want to be treated as equals and be given a fair shake.

fine.

then everyone gets to be made fun of, in a friendly manner, with love.

one reason i love howard stern is because he understands this form of equality perfectly. he will crack a joke on you whether you’re retarded or handicapped or old or homeless or racist or yes even gay. he makes it work not because his comedy is so golden – it’s not – its because you can see that he’s coming from the point of view of “we’re all freaks, me especially, and im just as retarded as these retards. so lets just have a big retarded freakshow every morning.”

could howard get on the mic and shout vitrol and hate on the mic every morning? of course. could i type my little ass off saying whitey did this to me, the president did that to me? of course. and it would be boring and a waste of time and youd never come here again. the test is to find that edge and skateboard on it.

the president is doing it, howard stern is doing it, and this blog needs to do it more often.

if people become offended by the things that i write or the way i say them or if they want to make giant leaps that the things that i write may convince others to perform hatecrimes on others then they can think those things and fear those things and be hurt, but im not going to concern myself about it until i see more than one or two well-meaning worriers say shit.

my mom who i love more than anyone in the world doesnt like me to swear and i dont even listen to her.

i recommend that all writers and especially bloggers write what is in their heart even if some of whats in there is dark or dirty or politically incorrect

or even gay as fuck

and then hit Publish Post.

bing + golden fiddle + vortexia + a year of lies

this is the part of the blog where i wake up at noon, click around the web for twenty minutes and then blog for twenty minutes straight. at the tone the time will be 12:44pm. beep.

wtf is up with the instapundit. i swear to fucking allah, sure sometimes i take little jabs at him out of professional courtesy and flow him a little traffic and break his balls a little about being a closeted republican, but its all in good fun and he knows i have much respect for him, in fact i often call him my favorite blogger, which used to be the case, but hes really slipping and i cant say that i expect him to even stay in my top ten for much longer because i seriously doubt that he isnt on the take.

the courts have made two decisions over the last few days that have really let the world know what the good professor was all about.

the first was on friday when the court decided that the ACLU could have previously unreleased photos of the prison scandal at abu ghraib including video of our soldiers assraping little iraqi boys.

now the last thing that id ever want to be able to do is find myself in the position where someone could say “busblog soft on kiddie assrape”, but glenn pretty much does just that on how he’s handling this american atrocity.

yesterday the worlds most popular blogger, the instapundit, handled the buttraping story like so:

June 05, 2005
GAIJIN BIKER posts a report on what’s being done in our name that some people should find sobering.

UPDATE: Some important perspective on what’s going on, from The Anchoress.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Harsh words.

posted at 09:50 AM by Glenn Reynolds

his link to the gaijin biker is bascially a post that says blah blah liberal media blah blah abu ghraib is old news blah blah heres some pictures of soldiers being nice.

glenn’s link to the anchoress has a link to gajin biker and includes a passing defense of Lindy England!

and his link to “harsh words” is to the suddenly looney Bill Quick who accuses Newsweek (and the “MSM”) of treason for “waging war” on the president.

is that how glenn reynolds feels about our soldiers sodomizing children?

sheesh.

ok well thats politics. all my readers and friends and everyone have told me for years that glenn is just a republican lap dog and will back the Bush administration on anything that they do, anything that they’re responsible for, and anything that they try to sweep under the carpet.

i defend him and say, nah, it just looks that way. nah, he never said those things, he just links to them.

and besides i say, he’s pro-legalization of weed, he’s not really a conservative. just watch what he’ll do to the supreme court if they overrule medical marijuana.

today the US supreme court overruled the right of americans to use doctor-prescribed marijuana for their suffering and pain as they die.

what does the alleged Libertarian legalize-it college professor have to say about the 6-3 decision? nothing. no commentary. and like the good news source that he proports not to be, he links a variety of blogs, some of whom agree with the finding and some who disagree with it.

damn near fair and balanced.

but wheres the outrage? wheres the vengeful bloggod who when he gets a target in his sights (currently he’s locked on to Linda Foley, Newsweek, and Amnesty Int’l surprise suprise.) wont let go for weeks, if not months?

so amnesty international overexaggerrating the fucked up shit going on in gitmo by calling it a gulag is worse and deserves more energy and angst and is more detrimental to the safety of our soldiers, the safety of americans abroad, and the safety of americans at home than the fact that our people went to iraq and started buttfucking little kids and videotaping it?

youve got to be kidding me.

i can understand a full-on Bush spokesperson tapdancing around this story, but a blogger? a blogger who doesnt even claim that hes a republican? apparently we cant do wrong in iraq. we being any american with a uniform and or any american who calls himself a republican. we can even rape boys on video while their mothers watch.

today ive seen the future of blogging and its disgusting.

nearly as disgusting as watching the supremes piss on states rights, and the voice of the voting public, and judge on an herb that the good professor knows in his heart has no business being taken away from terminally ill human beings.

instead of standing up and saying, instapundit readers, this is bad, he says nothing and links to the dittoheads as if it were a computer program

engineered to appeal to the lowest common red state denominator.

which if that is the case, i take my hat off to you computer programmer, and like the dudes in the guinness ad say to each other

brilliant!

aham + tivo tricks + etienne