80′s One Hit Wonders
[ 5 Comments ]Posted on July 23, 2009 by admin in Music
Thursday, July 23rd, 2009Was the music & fashion so bad because we did so many drugs, or did we do so many drugs because the music and fashion was so bad?
At last, the “Official” video for 88 Lines About 44 Women. Rather peculiar, and NGSFW* |
I’d completely forgotten about the 80′s song “88 Lines About 44 Women” by The Nails until the other day when the “Official” video (also at left, NGSFW*) appeared on YouTube. I guess it isn’t so odd I’d forget about it; as much as I loved the song back then, I now remember clearly the drug-addled morning that I first heard it. I had just awakened in the San Francisco apartment of some woman I’d met the night before and she thought it really funny to play it under the circumstances. Honestly, I sometimes wonder if there were so many one-hit wonders in the 80′s simply because people were doing so many drugs that they couldn’t remember the bands’ names from release to release. I know that I, for one, remember very little of lasting value from the years 1983-1990, and given our hairstyles, clothing, and musical preferences, probably prefer it this way! But I thought it would be fun to try to recall – without using the Internet or VH-1 as a memory aid – a list of these tunes. By the way, compiling this list made me realize that there’s a previously un-named micro-genre in here somewhere that’s epitomized by tunes like Trio’s Da Da Da, The Flying Lizards’ Money (That’s What I Want), and The Nails’ song featured above. I hereby christen this genre “Clock Rock”. Remember me if that catches on. The list is below, feel free to share your own in the comments…
Nothing To Worry About
[ Comments Off ]Posted on February 23, 2009 by admin in Music
Monday, February 23rd, 2009Uplifting video for the song “Nothing To Worry About” from Peter Bjorn & John’s upcoming release Living Thing
If you’re having a rough day, play the video at left, and I guarantee you’ll have Nothing To Worry About
Elbow Room Only
[ 2 Comments ]Posted on October 31, 2008 by admin in Music
Friday, October 31st, 2008You’ll need some sharp elbows to queue up in my music collection…
If you care about me, stop introducing me to music I like. I’m rapidly running out of time and hard drive space. The other day, a friend sent me a link to some British band’s web site, asking me what I thought. I think my remark at the time was something like “it’s a good thing their web site’s so pretty, ’cause they’re a fugly bunch of fellows”. After giving their music obsessively repeated listens, I now officially retract anything unkind I’ve ever said about Elbow. Their newest release, The Seldom Seen Kid
More Uncanny Valley: Bobblehead Einstein Robot
[ Comments Off ]Posted on October 16, 2008 by admin in Technology
Thursday, October 16th, 2008Relatively peculiar
One of the newest residents of the Uncanny Valley is the almost-macabre Einstein-headed robot in the video, left. There’s a strange set of ironies going on here: the uncanny realism of the face (it’s made of “Frubber”) ; the eerie motion of the robot body; the weird bobbling of the head…all combined with the idea that one of the greatest minds of the 20th century is reduced to a mumbling marionette pitching a product. The Albert HUBO, as it is called, is a product of the Korea-based Humanoid Robot Research Center, a research group that seems to be playing a little bit of catch-up with Honda’s Asimo. The welcome video on the HuboLab site is unintentionally hilarious; an Einsten-headed robot speaks with a carefully suppressed, but obvious Korean accent.
Why We Link
[ Comments Off ]Posted on September 17, 2008 by admin in Editorial & Opinion
Wednesday, September 17th, 2008The made-for-TV version of Clemens Kogler’s video “Le Grand Content”
A cool video was making the rounds yesterday with the title “Why We Drink”. It’s a sort of hip, 2.0, 3-D video absurdist Powerpoint explanation of life. Made me smile, anyway. The original video is at left, or on the creator Clemens Kogler’s site with the title “Le Grand Content”. I love his summary, in which he explains that it “…examines the omnipresent Powerpoint-culture in search for its philosophical potential. Intersections and diagrams are assembled to form a grand ‘association-chain-massacre’, which challenges itself to answer all questions of the universe and some more. Of course, it totally fails this assignment, but in its failure it still manages to produce some magical nuance and shades between the great topics death, cable tv, emotions and hamsters…” As a courtesy to our American viewers who can’t handle the ponderous, European art-house, four-minute director’s cut, there’s a shorter (two minute) version here, re-titled “Why We Drink”.