today’s hank williams’ birthday

rock and roll is the combination of black music and white music.

black music is the combination of delta blues chicago blues southern slave spirituals gospel and soul.

white music is a combination of hank williams and more hank williams.

all great white music comes from hank sr. except for jazz which comes from the blacks.

and dont even start with what about classical because classical is simply the absence of both hank and black music, which is why it works so well in cartoons.

nobody has ever written as simply and as clearly and as heartbreakingly perfectly as hank williams, except for whoever wrote those famous great lines in Genesis (the book, not the band).

hemingway came close but when he realized he had never written anything as concise and as tight as “im so lonesome i could cry” he put a gun in his mouth and squeezed the trigger. rightfully. which is why im secretly an nra member.

bob dylan tried to write like hank but when he saw how hard it was he said fuckit and wrote completely the opposite. it appears to have worked out for him.

if the government wasnt so full of liars buttpirates and visonless fratboys hank williams’ face would have been on the $2 bill a long time ago, but you people keep electing idiots

who you refuse to shoot when the truth is revealed.

your problem is youre soft, something todays birthday boy never was.

constantly in pain, constantly drunk, hunched over and sallow even on a good day he was kurt cobain before seattle was even named.

he hated being on time, he hated his bald head, he hated who he was, and most of all he hated a full glass of booze.

born in alabama on this date in 1923, he hated his given name Hiram so much that he begged to be called Shaquille but settled for Hank.

and just like you’d expect this poor little shoeshine boy didnt learn his trade from school or video tapes, he learned about music from a black man. in hank’s case it was a street bluesman named Rufus Payne, aka “Tee-Tot”. lookit up.

when he was sixteen hank quit school cuz even an ignorant whiteboy knew that you couldnt learn shit from some alabama public school in 1939. a few years later he was packing them into bars and juke joints. by the time he was 21 he was married and the next year he was signed to MGM and the year after that he had recorded his third hit “move it on over”.

oddly by 1948 at the ripe old age of 25 many considered hank washed up even though he was a regular on the popular radio show The Louisiana Hayride, but in early ’49 country music’s greatest songwriter released a cover of rex griffin’s “lovesick blues”, a track hank only recorded twice in the studio (one for backup) and forgot about.

but just like most great rock n roll stories, that little song spent four months at number one. and legend has it that when he performed it at the grand old opry he earned six encores. washed up my ass, hank sneered.

that year hank jr was born whose only real claim to fame is that are you ready for some football song. pffft.

despite hank srs great success and the string of hits that followed lovesick blues – in ’49 alone he had seven hits including wedding bells, mind your own business, and my bucket’s got a hole in it – and despite divorcing his first wife and marrying a very young woman named billie jean at the sold out new orleans municipal auditorium, hank was never able to defeat his demons or cure his pain.

in ’52 as rock was just a glimmer in it’s drunken uncle’s eye hank cheated on billie jean and sired a daughter named jett who would be born january 6, 1953.

however on new years day ’53 in knoxville tennessee hank williams shot up with both b12 and morphine, hopped in a rented cadillac, and sipped whiskey while driving all night to oak hill west virginia where he pulled over at a gas station and fell asleep. he never woke up. he was 29.

legend has it that his funeral in alabama was the largest ever held in that state, even to this day.

hank jr, hank iii, and jett are all playing music today.

but only hank iii is worth a shit.

if you like music or american history you’ll get any of hank’s greatest hits.

if you love music you’ll get polygram’s 3-cd box set but i promise you that if you try to listen to more than one cd at one sitting you will get so depressed that you’ll want to get in a cadillac and drive to west virginia with a bottle of jack too.

consider yourself warned.

“i’m so lonesome i could cry”

Hear that lonesome whippoorwill
He sounds too blue to fly
The midnight train is whining low
I’m so lonesome I could cry

I’ve never seen a night so long
When time goes crawling by
The moon just went behind a cloud
To hide its face and cry

Did you ever see a robin weep
When leaves begin to die?
Like me he’s lost the will to live
I’m so lonesome I could cry

The silence of a falling star
Lights up a purple sky
And as I wonder where you are
I’m so lonesome I could cry

hank in los angeles + jett was screwed + great discography

dont ever feel sorry for me

fyi. i know i whined a little this morning and i might whine a little in the future. and i know that even though i try my best not to totally rip off the fine work and style of mr charles bukowski, if theres one thing that i am 100% concious of is that mr charles bukowski never whined. he wined but didnt whine. and compared to him i have a great life. sure he ended up with a great life, but i have one now.

if youre ever in doubt just go to technorati and put “tony pierce” in there – with the quotes and you’ll see totally mindblowing things like the mighty doc searls put me in incredible company just yesterday

“I’m a fan of very few celebrities. Or writers. Or both. Mostly both, I guess. John McPhee I’ve told you about. George Lakoff too. Hal Crowther. I’m also fond of Stephanie Brush, Fran Liebowitz, William F. Buckley, Cynthia Heimel, Hunter S. Thompson, Mark Twain, Howard Stern, John Updike, Tony Pierce, Chris Locke, David Weinberger and Saul Bellow, even though it’s hard to connect their dots — except that they all make me laugh. (Not always in some cases, but sometimes in all cases.)”

for those of you who actually know who mr searls is thats quite a compliment. so dont ever feel bad for me.

for example, i have a book agent. yes me, dorkwad. and even though i dont have any published books, like officially published books, i have an agent. for some reason shes the only person who believes and understands the disclaimer “nothing in here is true” so she has not only been trying to pimp me out on some secret projects but she doesnt believe that i have a new job.

so today she emailed me to see if i was interested in being a personal assistant for probably the most beautiful porn star in the entire world.

which is pretty tempting, let me tell you.

but i know how this will end up. sure id make a great personal assistant, especially since i have a car now, and a cool cell phone, but porn is a slippery slope, and anyone who knows me knows that i have a million ideas about a million things

but i have a billion ideas for porn.

possibly a kabillion.

my only problem is i want to go to Heaven one day and theres no way i’ll be able to meet St. Peter and say, yes sir i took whatever gifts i was given to revolutionize the porno world, so thanks, now may i meet jimi?

plus its hard to beat my ten minute commute and anyone familiar with LA knows that only an idiot would live in hollywood and quit working in hollywood to fight the traffic of the ventura freeway every morning even if your job would be to hang out with porn stars and do their bidding.

wait, what did i just say.

just a girl + miss iceland + blogfart + that dude mike

matt good called me last night

and even though we started by talking about blogging, which i could talk about all night we ended up talking about Tom Waits.

heres my favorite tom waits story.

when i first came to california i didnt really know much about music other than i loved it. i first worked at mcdonalds cuz nobody would hire me, but then i got a job at a record store, Licorice Pizza. mr. gary calamar who is now the music manager of kcrw and hosts the great show The Open Road, hired me even though my only experience was working for four months at the mickey d’s down the street.

in the interview he asked me to look behind him at all the album covers on the wall. he said, tell me a little something about some of these records.

i said, i love them all.

he said well pick one or two.

and i was all… starting left to right i see judas priest british steel columbia records, i like them but not as much as iron maiden and ac/dc although the new metallica record “…And justice for all” is about to come out which is gonna be top ten i betcha. next to that you have bruce springsteen the river whose hit single Hungry Heart was a last minute addition which is sorta funny since it was a double album but apparently the label didnt think there were any hits which you wouldnt think a guy like Bruuuuuce would need, but it turned out they were right and that was his first top 10 single. next to that you have Pete Townshend’s Empty Glass whose big single is Let My Love Open The Door, however the b-side is super great.

and Gary stopped me in my tracks and said, we’ll call you in a few days. and i was so depressed cuz i thought i had blown it but i hadnt and i got the gig and i learned way more about music than i ever expected. namely about Elvis Costello, the Velvet Underground, Charlie Parker, Thelonious Monk, and the Replacements.

so Elvis Costello had a series of shows in 86 in LA. five nights. every show was going to be different cuz he basically had two records out, king of america, and blood and chocolate. one night was gonna be all king of america, one was gonna be all blood and chocolate, one was gonna be elvis’s greatest hits, one was gonna be all requests, and one was gonna be The Spinning Wheel night where he had a huge wheel of songs and whereever it landed he and the Attractions would play the song.

because im a freak i went to three nights outta the five.

but the best, and probably the best show ive ever been to was the Spinning Wheel show. elvis had invited John Doe from X and the Bangles and Mr. Tom Waits to join him for the show.

and this is how it happened.

the lights dimmed and a weird accordian sound was heard and there he was in his trademark suit and hat: tom waits, whose Rain dogs record was out and kicking ass and tom sang one of those crazy dark weirdo songs and when it was done he bowed, put down his guitar.

Welcome he said in that deep gruff voice

Welcome to hell. welcome to elvis’s nightmare. what you will do is raise your hand. if the spotlight hits you you will be asked to spin the wheel of Death. where it lands nobody knows. then Mr. McManus will lead his band of mercinaries into the song. you will either dance next to that go-go cage with his wife, or you will sit at that bar and watch Lou Reed via satellite. now who wants to come up here and spin for your life?

it was a little theatre, the Wilshire i think. not the Wiltern, somewhere even smaller. who knows, maybe it was the Wiltern… doesnt matter, i had great seats but i didnt dare spin that wheel cuz i was pretty much pissing my pants anyways.

someone got picked, they came on stage, elvis and the attractions took their positions and Tom acted exactly like a cheezy master of ceremonies and said whats your name.

Jerry.

ok Bob what song would you like for the band to play.

Jerry looked at the wheel and there were some Elvis classics but a bunch of weird rarities and cover songs.

“oh wow Tom I’d really love to hear them play Tom Petty’s American Girl”

ok Fred go ahead and spin for your LIFE!

and when the wheel turned around steve neive tinkled the ivories, the lights flashed and when it slowed down to the slice that showed the song the band immediately went into the number and Tom Waits escorted the spinnee to a seat next to the rickety bar area, rubbed his shoulders and then poured him a drink.

after a few songs Tom and Elvis did a tune or two together that pretty much blew everyones minds.

then the bangles of all people came out for some acoustic numbers dressed in sparkley cocktail dresses.

then john doe in a blue prom tuxedo took over as MC for the second half.

and then an angel from above said tony i hope you know youre the luckiest man of all and i said yes i know and the angel asked to take a sip from my beer and fucking chugged that bitch down burped and laughed before vanishing.

Update: the show was at The Beverly (scroll down just a tad). how on earth can i remember these things but i still havent memorized my own cell phone number?

best week ever + now is the time to buy Siri + moxie

twelve minutes with tony

i hate mornings. i love my job but i hate the mornings because i cant write to you really. ive got 11 minutes and then i must hit the shower, shave the head, brush the teeth, and dig through my tshirt collection.

i do love the job but its amazing how when you love something all these other offers come out from nowhere. but the weird thing theres only a few other jobs that i would accept.

manager of the cubs, of course, because dusty baker might be a brotha, but he’s taken a mountain and turned it into a molehill. there was a time when we had a great pitching staff and now… fuck. i cant even think about the cubs.

i know i sounded happy yesterday but oh what a few hours can do to someone.

tomorrow im getting paid to go to a huge rock concert. i know that some of you will read what i have to say and think geeze tony theres people starving in china and youre about to bitch. and what can i do, ive gotta keep it real.

so yeah, im getting paid tomorrow to go to devore which is french for de-crap to see a rock show. heres the lineup

11:00-11:40 AM Kasabian
11:55-12:35 PM Fishbone
12:50-1:30 PM Bloc Party
1:00-1:40 PM The Bravery
1:40-2:20 PM Cake
2:25-3:05 PM Arcade Fire
3:10-3:55 PM Live
4:00-4:45 PM Garbage
4:50-5:30 PM Jet
5:35-6:20 PM Madness
6:25-7:20 PM 311
7:25-8:20 PM Beck
8:25-9:25 PM Weezer
9:30-10:30 PM Oasis

now devore was created by some asswipe who thought, hmm, i can build an outdoor ampitheatre way outside of LA and i will offer clearchannel or whoever wants to run their shows through there a fraction of what the Staples Center would charge or the Forum or the Hollywood Bowl and guess what, lots of shows end up way out there in buttfuck

ozzfest is always there, ac/dc played there last time they were in town, no doubt with blink was out there. and somehow if you play there they sign you up to a contract that says if you play there you cant play anywhere in regular LA for three months or six or something.

anyways i have great tickets to that show and press passes and i think i even get a beer and head from the laker girls or something.

but the reason that im depressed this morning is cuz last night i got home and i got a phone call from my date who said yeah, nah, i think id rather go to dinner with this one girl and then go to a party with someone else.

and some people take rejection pretty well, and i guess im one of those people. however there are a few people who when they reject me it totally destroys me. and now i dont even want to go to the damn thing because first of all its in buttfuck but secondly because now i have to go with this dudes stripper wife probably cuz she who knows the situation and is just gonna be annoying.

yes thats nothing to be depressed about, but i am.

i know i should be more pissed/bummed/angry about the fact that BushCo are destroying fucktons of 9/11 evidence and establishing Karl Rove to head up the Katrina recovery (because he’s just so damn qualified for patching up natural disasters – just look what he did with W)

but im not.

im a selfish winey dude who just wants a few things to go the way they should.

i want the right people to be nice to me, i want other people to show up places that they say they will, and i want others to just fucking choose me over these random people.

but i guess its friday and i should just be happy that i live in la and have a cool job and im finally able to sock away a few bucks, and i get to go to a concert with a stripper.

but for some reason im not.

i need to make a tshirt that says “id rather be blogging”, as fucked up as that is.

i know things will get better.

just probably not by monday.

google maps plus census + i miss danielle + sk smith + zulieka