Old Guy Radio

Although I spent most of my college day listen to the ruckus of Henry Rollins, Fugazi, and, stuff like Helmet as get older I love singer-song writers more and more--maybe it is the sudden drop in testorone in middle-age. I cannot stop listening to Sufjan Steven's album the Avalanche. It is compilation of out takes from the Illinois album. I think the whole thing comes off better than the original album.

Enjoy:

This video is fairly lame but the song is beautiful





This is some high school choir covering the same song. I'd say equally as cool.

Good Stuff: LCD Soundsystem

Everybody needs validation at certain times in their life. Art serves two, primary functions: 1) to challenge 2) to comfort. Last week, I discovered a group of artists that are firmly providing me with heaping tablespoons of comfort.

LCD Soundsystem has just released a fantastic album called Sound of Silver and it rocks. If you haven't heard of LCD Soundsystem, you have to immediately stop what you're doing and go buy a copy of their first, self-titled album.

That's o.k.... I can wait...

Here's a music video of one of the goofier songs to prod you along...


Good stuff. It's always nice to have an indie rock album you can actually listen to on an exercise bike (my current obsession).

Well, now you have to go out and get their newest album that continues the energetic, fun pace but with the addition of two songs- "North American Scum". The second song would be my enablement Manifesto if it had been written two years go- "New York I Love You But You're Bringing Me Down". In true, Indie fashion, the band has produced a music video for "North American Scum" that succeeds in lacking any wit AND permanently scarring the song for all future listenings.

So, close your eyes...


Now, go have some fun...

Top 5 week of 4/22--ahh Omaha

I am going back to Omaha this week. I grew up in the river city. I get all nostalgic about the place. Here are five things I love about Omaha.

1) Goldberg's Bread Pudding-- Breading pudding gets a bad rap because usually somebody's mom made with wonder bread and bunch of raisins = gross. But Goldbergs at 50th & Dodge makes the best darn bread pudding-- try it with ice cream.

2) Fish and Chips at the Dundee Dell-- The old Dell was great. It was right on Dodge Street, Omaha's main street, most of the seats and booths were broke...the bathrooms stunk, at least the men's room did...and it was great place to have a drink. The speciality was and is fish and chips served in a little aluminum sack. The trick is to douse the breaded fried fish and chips with about a quart of malt vinegar so you get this salty-sour-fried-fish stuff that is great after you have drank about 3 pints of Guinness. The Dell has since moved. It is actually in the Dundee neighborhood proper...the fish and chips are still very good.

3) Stoysich-- Omaha's stock yards brought in thousands of immigrants in the early 20th Century, many of them from mainland Europe. Most of them settled in South Omaha like my grandparents. Stoysich in the heart of South Omaha is remnant of the era: a true old world butcher shop with what seems like hundreds of meats, especially sausages. One my favorite things is to go to the back of the place and pick up one the cooked the sausages they sale...you then proceed put the sausage on a hoagie-like-bun and fill it full of sweet peppers. So good.



4) Field Club Neighborhood-- I love old houses. I live in one in my home town. Some of the prettiest and coolest houses reside along Woolworth Street in Omaha. I've spent hours just driving the streets marveling at some the great architecture.

5) Woodman Tower-- This is an icon to me, and I'm sure many other Omahans. It is a big old box of building. But it was a marvel when it was built in 1969. It represented to me the sort of industrial spirit of Omaha, but it is dang ugly that is for sure.

Music Man

So, through the miracle of buying used music from Amazon.com (I'm cheap) I bought a bunch of new (to me) Cd's. I even ventured out a bit and bought some Cd's I didn't know anything about like:
Phantom Planet-a solid sort of O.K. band. Music I would not regularly like that much but, if you listen to it enough (which I did because I paid for the damn thing and I'll get my money out of the sumabith)it is infectious, mostly just that "California" Song. It's a corny song and just O.K. but here is the thing. Listen to that song like ten times, while singing along and by the tenth time you will be pouring your heat and soul into it, taken over completely by the sad sappiness of the song. So, I want everyone to go out, listen to the song and come back and tell me if this is true or not I dare you. This is kind of like a chain letter, by getting others suckered into the song I can be free of it.

Other Cd's
Neko Case "Fox Confessor Brings the Flood" Great music, keen artwork with (surprise) Foxes.

Flaming Lips "At War with the Mystics" Love those lips

Dandy Warhols "thirteen tales from urban Bohemia" Right on Music

Musical Sustenance: Part Deux

Henry's right. We DO need more jazz in our lives... and Euro-dance music!

We should listen to more jazz...dontcha think.

Five things I will Miss When I Leave NYC

1) Doughnut Plant - located a couple blocks south of Delancey Street on the Lower East Side, the Doughnut Plant offers a fantastic and ever-changing selection of flavors. Over the years, I have sampled ginger, Meyer lemon, Pistachio, Coconut creme-filled, Tres Leches, Peanut Butter and Jelly, and Rose petal donuts... and I have yet to come across a flavor I didn't like. Their cinnamon rolls and sticky buns rock, too. The donuts are made primarily for gourmet food stores in the City and whatever they have left over is sold from 6:30 a.m. until they run out.

2) The Metropolitan Museum of Art - For New York City residents, it's pay-what-you-like and that makes it the best deal in the City and, perhaps, the world. Their collection is staggering. Morgan and I have spent many Friday nights here, sketching and taking pictures. You can take it to another level, rent an audio guide and spend endless hours in the many, themed galleries. It's phenomenal.

3) Chinatown - This neighborhood intimidated me the most when I first moved to NYC but it quickly became my favorite. I love the Vietnamese sandwich shops, the vegetarian dim sum, the Chinese bakeries, and a small, Thai supermarket that gets me kaffir limes for my curry pastes. It's one of the few neighborhoods still feels like a neighborhood. As I walk the streets, it feels both alien and comfortable and never disappoints.

4) The Bowery Ballroom - The best music venue in the City. It strikes the perfect balance between size and intimacy- there's not a bad seat in the house. The sound system is spot on and the lineup is a Who's Who of the indie music scene, and it's Clear Channel-free. I've seen everyone from Courtney Love to The Kills to the Notwist to the Wrens and the only reason I don't go every night is I'm an hour subway ride from home at the end of a show.

5) The Zip Code - I'll admit it. It feels cool to say that I live in New York. As a kid, the idea of living in a city of this size and density was terrifying. Despite the gentrification and precipitous drop in crime since the 1970s and 80s, this city is still a tough nut to crack. It's as expensive as hell and harder than ever to make it as an artist. I haven't fulfilled the grandiose plans I carried with me to the city, but simply living here has made me a survivor and proud that I have been able to hold my own in this city for this long.

My Top V for the Week 4/15--the ides of April

1) Mischke-- Mischke brodcasts out of St. Paul, Minnesota out of KSTP 1500 which is a blow torch so I could pick up in Nebraska where I went college. Some of the most brilliant radio you have ever heard--and really there is no one like him. You can now pick up the podcast. http://www.mischkemadness.com/

2) Chickens--Ah chickens. Looks like the wife and I will be inheriting a set of backyard chickens. We are lucky that our town is where all the old farmers retired because livestock is generally permitted. A cow used to live in a yard across from the golf course for years. I've raised chickens twice prior...I've witnessed my dog swallow a chick whole--suffice to say I wasn't as happy about the ordeal as the dog was. I've seen with my very eyes a turkey in full attack mode against one of my little bantams--it was prehistoric. And of course I ate a lot eggs. I firmly believe life is much richer with chickens. http://raising-chickens.com/chicken-coops.html

3) The Elected live show on XM--who are these fellows? Very good show. http://www.myspace.com/theelected

4) Krautburgers-- Yummy cabbage, hamburger, salt and pepper baked in bread.

5) Yoga-- Okay so they came up with this Yoga-thing in India a trillion years ago and its all new-agey and weird, but really it is like the best thing in the world...especially, if your some thirty-odd-some guy with high cholesterol and demanded by his doctor to relax. I do hatha Yoga with a bunch of old ladies at retirement center-- you take what you get out here in the wild west. It reminds me of kintergarden nap time and p.e. I think at some point we will need to get out a parachute and shake it with foam balls on it circa 1979. http://www.yogajournal.com/

Condiment King

So,I had to go to the grocery store and I was wandering around, as I am want to do in food stores (oohhh so many colors and shapes) then I came across my favorite area. The condiment section, I did not buy anything of course because I am in condiment rehab. I have a sickness that makes my buy way too many sauces and and dressings so my wife has forbade me from buying anymore until we get rid of what we have in about five months if we start using barbecue sauce (my true Achilles heal) on our cereal.

The reason I love condiments so much, well every other food item is pretty much locked up. In the cereals it's all about the major cereals, same with meats, and even frozen foods, soft drinks, and bread. It's all about General mills, Coca Cola, Jimmie Dean, Wonder Bread, blah, blah, blah. Even if you think a new exciting food item is on the market-- trust me it's not, because look a little closer and it is make by some big boring company. BUT not the condiments my friend. The condiment sections is the last frontier for an euntriprnurial young up and comer. I LOVE condiments. You could be in your backyard throwing together a bunch of crap to bbq your beef and and the next day put it in a bottle and take it down to the local HY-VEE store an who knows they might put it on the shelf right next to the big boys of barbecue sauce. It's only in the condiment lane that I realizes there are sauces I can't live without. There is a sauce for wild game, yes if you have shot something yourself and need a sauce for it some redneck had gone into production for YOU. Hell there were at least five such sauces last time I saw, granted I live in Nebraska but still.

There is a jar called "The Gravy Master" no, it's not gravy in a can, it's some sort of gravy concentrate, I don't know, so you can, what, add a little and save the time and money making all that gravy by yourself. I'm not sure, but that is what I love about the condiment section, it's full of mystery, questions about lifestyle, and just strange condiments. Who IS the "Gravy Master" some mad condiment making fool with delusions of grandeur no doubt, but just maybe he is the master of all the gravy he oversees. Who knows but condiments is where the Gravy Master's dreams came true.

I will be back to talk about condiments again my friends don't you worry.

My top 5 week of April 8th

1) Harakiri dir. Kobayashi--Criterion Collection, www.criterionco.com. Movies can be such a wasted medium. When do you get the general public to sit down for two hours and really pay attention to anything. Harakiri is up there with old Shakespeare a meditation on death and culture. I won't ruin it for you but really the best movie I've seen in awhile. Makes you wish the cineplex folks made just a little better movies.

2) Giant Pumpkins, www.giantpumpkins.com/. I am really working hard this year to learn to garden with my wife-- who is like the best gardener in the world. However, I am set on going full bore and growing a giant freakin' pumpkin. At the end of the Summer I want a semi with a crane to come over to my house and move the thing down the County Fair. I'd like to block up traffic for a couple of hours. At the Fair I will proceed to have the crane lower my giant pumpkin down on all its competitors and crush the competition--literally and figuratively, but mostly literally.

3) The Comics Curmudgeon--joshreads.com/

Newspaper comics generally stink...well it's okay to say so.

4) The Thomas Jefferson Hour, www.jeffersonhour.org/ , I am radio junkie. Like-I-bought-a-shortwave-radio-in-the-90's-and-listen-to-it-after-my-wife-goes-to-sleep junkie. So I love this modern world and all those podcasts. The Thomas Jefferson Hour at first blush seems all too very dorky. Premise: Clay Jenkins pretends he is Thomas Jefferson and he talks about stuff. Once you get over the whole historical reenactment thing it is very interesting.

5) The Vaselines. I think bought this album in college because Kurt Cobain really liked them. Anyway I've been listen to it again you should as well.