Dock Ellis and the LSD No-No

James Blagden’s hilarious short about Dock Ellis and his legendary no-hitter on June 12, 1970:

“I’m high as a Georgia Pine” is now cemented in my lexicon, even if I’m only baking Toll-House Cookies.

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RiP! A Remix Manifesto: Girl Talk, U2, and Walt Disney as Remixer

Just watched Brett Gaylor’s Rip! A Remix Manifesto on Hulu last night. I’m actually shocked that NBC, Fox and ABC (Disney) would have this online, in this format; despite its lionization of Disney the Man, Disney the Company is really taken to task here. Maybe it’s the “if we join them, they will disappear” belief. Or maybe they (Los Corporations Grandes) figure the animals have already left the zoo, and they can’t stop it, exhibited by their mere acceptance of Hulu as a business model. Don’t know.

What I do know is that the film is pretty damn good. I’ve been loosely paying attention to these issues since the U2 vs. Negativland debacle in the early nineties, which really made U2 look backwards at a time when they were actually creating some pretty forwards-looking music. I think Negativland would have looked a bit more serious if they hadn’t included the cover, which is pretty much a giant “U2” over a much smaller “Negativland.” You can claim “culture jamming” all you want, but when you transparently are looking for huge sales by being cheeky, I understand Island’s concern. Maybe not the legal overreaction, but the concern is valid.

(I also think Greg Ginn’s re-release with Negativ(e)land: Live on Tour album on SST is about as brilliant a response as possible- Negativland may have posed and said, “EXACTLY! That’s what we’re talking about!” but the loss of their “intellectual property” and the realization of Ginn’s masterful chess move must have stung a little.)

Regardless, I think Rip! and Girl Talk (the “band” that Gaylor champions- those quotes are not sarcastic, it’s actually one guy) are completely necessary right now, and Girl Talk to me is more of an idea than an actual band. (Much like The Sex Pistols are a better idea than a band- Never Mind the Bollocks… is a pretty good album, but it’s a better call-to-arms. The Clash were 10 times the band the Pistols were.) I love the idea of “everything is fair game, ’cause we’re all the same person” and I think the spirit of Girl Talk is much more interesting than the actual music- I listen to the songs and think, “That’s interesting,” but there’s an aspect of it (to me) that seems like a novelty. It’s not the music that’s important, it’s the crowd’s reaction to said music- much like the Pistols, it’s the movement that’s the star. And I think Girl Talk completely understands that.

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Holy Sh*t, did Carl call that one or what?

Three shots. 75 feet away. In the dark. Yeah, I’d be grinning, too.

Well done, boys.

UPDATE, 4/23/09: A brutal reconsideration of the crowing American cheers for the snipers by South Park, my own included. Do I think the pirates crossed the line by taking hostages? Absolutely. Is there more to the story than than? Completely. South Park makes the razor sharp point, as always: no one wants to live in life-threatening poverty, and have to take ships by force to survive.

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Bruckheimer to USS Bainbridge: “Make sure this is something I can work with -JB”

picture unrelated

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