yesterday i was so busy that i couldnt tell you that


2 live crew at sxsw at the levi fader fort

my 2 Live Crew concert review got up on the LAT’s Soundboard, and they were nice enough to accept my headline

Still Horny After All These Years

which strangely enough was not precisely the headline I was mulling over. i was considering “Still So Horny After All These Years” which my editor Margaret, i think, wanted, but she chose the former, which is totally fine with me.

im a weird writer in that once i write it down i couldnt give a fuck what you do with it. you can change the headline, you can rearrange the words, you can change everything. once i make the poop if you wanna sculpt it into a castle or a snowman, its all you. i have thousands of more in me and theyre all gonna get out at some point, so no use fighting over this one or that one cuz like doritos i will make more.

also i trust and respect my editors and copywriters and i value their opinions, no shit. also sometimes i have to make hard decisions and i always appreciate it when my cohorts just let me do what i need to do without a lot of ‘splaining.

another story that got posted yesterday was my Flatstock photo essay.

Flatstock is this huge concert poster convention which is better than a kid in a candy store cuz its art. and everything is pretty much reasonable. and cuz it doesnt turn to poop after you enjoy it.

flatstock 16 at sxsw in austin
flatstock 16 at sxsw in austin
flatstock 16 at sxsw in austin

why are things so poopy in my mind today?

anyways its very nice to be able to bring my love of photo essays to the LA Times.

and its totally awesome that I am the one who gets to do it.

i have some sweet announcements to make

.. ahem

the first is we have have just launched today something im extremely happy about. our friend and yours, Ms Christie St. Martin has been telling us all what is cool and new on the web since her blog All Things Christie. that led to her gig at the Best Week Ever blog, and most recently at Exhausticated.

today we at the LA Times have launched Funny Pages 2.0

we call it that because the Funny Pages of the paper just isnt all that funny any more. what’s funny are the things that you find on YouTube, on the web, and in the blogs. that could be interesting videos, like the one below, wacky pictures, or goofy blogs.

Laziest.Pet.Owner.Ever

Christie will be blogging every day, several times a day on Funny Pages 2.0 which can be conveniently found at latimes.com/lulz

so please bookmark the page, tell yr friends, and leave comments because i heart christie and i want her to feel at home on our blog roll

yay!!

cubs total conditioning coach’s ride

on their 100th anniversary of their last world series win, the cubs seem to be having a bunch of fun this spring.

the chicago tribune baseball blog, hardball, reports that the pitching staff gave strength and conditioning coach, tim buss a heart attack of sorts that he will never forget:

“Hey Bussy, what’s your car doing on the ramp?” [third baseman Aramis] Ramirez asked, pointing to a wrecked ’95 Nissan sitting on a ramp near the Cubs bullpen.

Buss looked over at the wreck and replied: “That’s not my car.”

But then Buss did a double-take.

“Dude,” he said to Ramirez. “That’s my car!”

Buss, who had just driven the car to work, soon discovered that it had been demolished beyond recognition by some unknown perpetrators and brought to the ramp for him to see. He was aware that the pitchers liked to pull pranks, like a couple years ago in Mesa when they stole Will Ohman’s tires and left his car on cinder blocks. But this was no ordinary prank. The car windows had all been smashed in, the front, back and sides were all severely dented, and the smoking guns — a couple baseball bats and balls — were strategically placed in the windshield in case Buss wanted to get some fingerprints for the Mesa Police.

But it didn’t take a CSI team to figure out the perpetrators. Buss figured it was the “usual suspects” all along.

“I figured (Jon) Lieber, (Kerry) Wood immediately, (Ryan) Dempster,” he said. “Then I realized it was every pitcher we have.”

what really frightened Buss was the 13 year old car was his wife’s.

yikes.

“It’s a shame,” Lieber said with a straight face. “What kind of person would do something like that? It really just shocks me. I’m sure she’ll understand.”

After the workout ended, Buss was talking about the incident to reporters in the Cubs clubhouse when Dempster told him to “quit pouting” and come with him to the weight room to “see something.” From there, Buss and several pitchers walked out a back door and found a 2008 Nissan Xterra parked in the walkway.

The prank was complete. Buss was presented with a new SUV valued at around $25,000. While he sat in the driver’s seat in a daze, Carlos Zambrano got in on the passenger’s side and cranked the stereo, bobbing his head to the music.

hardball also says that cub manager lou pinella announced the probable opening day lineup, which looks pretty nice at the top, but peters out fast: Ryan Theriot at short, Aflonso Soriano in left, Derrek Lee at first, Aramis Ramirez at third, Kosuke Fukudome in right, Mark DeRosa at second, Geovany Soto catching and Felix Pie in center.

sure wouldnt hurt to have one more big bat in that lineup.

if a white guy had given this speech they’d have moved up the election so they could vote him in

immediately

yes it was that good.

fucker looked that bull in the eye, took him by the horns

barehanded

didnt blink, and wrestled him down.

some bloggers and naysayers and liars are trying to pretend that this speech wasnt all that. theyre trying to pretend that he missed here or there or whatever,

truth of the matter is the guy they voted for the last two elections could not have pulled this off. the guy they will vote for next time would not have been able to pull this off

and this is exactly the type of stuff that we need from our Presidents: intelligent, insightful, no bullshit messages from a thinking person.

we have had the alternative and unless you own oil companies or euros or haliburton stock, the alternative hasn’t done much for you.

this was exactly the speech that i didnt hear the first two times obama spoke here in LA, and the reason that i wanted to vote for Ron Paul, a man who looked at tough issues in the eye and didnt blink.

i still might vote for ron paul as a write in, because i like to vote for whoever the fuck i want, but senator obama just made it a little harder for me not to look at his name a little longer come november.

be your own pet at the mohawk patio

because the LA Times has slightly different rules than the busblog (ok very different rules), there were some shows where i only shot 30-40 seconds of video, because thats all that we can use on our blogs there in regards to live concerts.

i know everyone will say well fuck tony whats the point then?

and i would normally agree, but i would also say that one can write about how a young woman was running around writhing in seeming pain, and you can even have a photo or twelve of her doing it,

but to have even 36 seconds of video sometimes tells the story way better than words or photos or even etch-a-sketchess could provide.

thus here are some words, pics, and a quick video of Be Your Own Pet vs J. Mascis vs Thurston Moore and the New Wave Bandits at the mohawk stage friday at sxsw, a show i was lucky enough to see with whitney of usa today and ken basart of dan grant for congress

today is me and jeanines anniversary

even though we broke up a long time ago, longer than some of you have been alive. jeanine and i still call each other on st paddys day as thats our anniversary for when we first started going out.

we met in the newsroom of the daily nexus. she was so very shy. she had long hair over her eyes like Cousin It. but she wrote so beautifully that i had to meet her. we went on several dates that were horrible because her wall was up so high.

but then she played guitar for me one rainy day and i saw what was behind that wall and it was wonderful.

so i fed her copious amounts of drugs and alcohol which he asked for, no i swear, and when she was in an acid induced tunnel of possibilities mumbling how much she wanted to break out and reach out i said hmmmm that sounds like a girl who wants to get a kiss and she said some gibberish and i kissed her and every since we have been if not bf/gf the best of friends.

jeanine inspired me so much in my life, i wrote my best poetry because of her, i wrote my best college journalism because of her, and in many ways i learned how to be a better boyfriend because of her. not that im a very good one, but i learned what i need to work on.

if only i had used the time that i was with her to learn how to play guitar, as she is a marvel. and i love her and i miss her and i wish her the best in san dieger.

i love you bay bay!

for the next few days i will pretend like im still in austin

k?

but sadly im back in LA, which doesnt suck except i cant seem to find my shwag bag that has some important things in it. but never you mind. heres a pic of nbc austin anchor michelle valles, her lovely producer haley, and some bozo, enjoying the afternoon at the filter party.

if it wasnt for my pal samantha barnes, i would have probably never have truly loved sea wolf, and if it wasnt for sea wolf i would have never been at the filter party, and if not for the filter party i wouldnt had seen kate nash, who invited billy bragg on stage for a few songs, and if not for all of that i wouldnt have met michelle and haley who turned me on to the best female guitarist ive ever seen in my life, carolyn wonderland, who i wrote about on the LAT’s Soundboard.

yes we are having some formatting problems on that blog, but i blame the awesomeness of ms wonderlands’ licks.

anyways heres that story featuring some video that you’ll love.

and heres one more story, after sea wolf kate nash billy bragg, i walked two blocks and saw 2 Live Crew, who were totally filthy disgusting juvenile and obscene, thus rad. id never seen them before and even without Luke Skyywalker they were pretty funny. they invited a bunch of girls on stage and they started booty shaking and grinding and one particular babe got all freaky and got groped and did not care one damn bit.

that sexual energy spread to the crowd. somehow i ended up at first behind two of the biggest douches ever. and of course they were big white dudes who had drunken way more than they should have so they were trying to dance and their arms keep hitting me and every time i thought i could get around them i failed.

one of them had this really cute blonde girlfriend, or so i thought. as i maneuvered around one of them i accidentally rubbed up against her. she rubbed right back. the dope who i thought was her boyfriend just kept doing some weird 80s whiteboy dance and the girl started kinda grinding up against me.

im telling you the sexual energy was immense. girls were grinding each other, people were making out. one couple was basically going at it with the dude reaching down the chick’s pants.

now the 2 live crew are not great rappers, their songs arent much more than “sucky sucky, oooo sucky sucky”, but there is something about the party atmosphere that they produce, and the fact that they are having Fun with sex that makes it ok to just be fucking stoopid in the crowd. so yes i basically got a standing lapdance from this college chick while i was trying to take pics of the show.

definately the polar opposite of the sweet, beautiful, dulcet sounds of sea wolf, billy, kate, et all at filter. and one reason i will love austin forever.

but dont think for a minute that if Ice Cube hadnt been closer, i wouldnt have bailed out and checked out the niggayoulovetahate, as he is my boy.

today at work i will be so so busy. i tried so hard in my hotel to tie up loose ends so that i wouldnt be slammed with backed up work, but to no avail, seemingly nothing wanted to get completed, in fact more shit popped up. so pray for me argentina while i pretend im back on 6th and Red River with my beer, falafel, and you.

the beautiful and talented and gifted and rad aj mulcahey of sony

got me into this perry farrell show the other night right before the playboy party and without her id never had seen this, which was so sweet and beautiful and just the sort of thing i needed at that moment

thanks aj it was so great to finally meet you and i promise that the next time you txt me in LA wanting to rock i will be there for you now that i know youre not some freaky stalker pr wonk who doesnt know her shit. you totally completely full on ragin know yr shit and you have the best accent.

i hope sony keeps their seattle office and doesnt f up and lose you.

and yes busbloggers its dark, it was a totally sexy show where perry brought out some dancers at the end which was too scorching for even my beautiful leica. some things you should just enjoy in your own experience, so yes the mood lighting was in effect for this song but thats probably just as well.