The Riff: January 2007 Archives

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January 31, 2007

Music Recommendations (For People Who Still Buy CDs)

I’m not sure how much relevance actual release dates have any more (in this era of internet leaks) but if you’re the type who likes their CDs and mp3s legit, the next few months promise some breathless Monday nights. I thought I'd sneak on here while all the Mother Jones employees are nursing their hangovers and tell you about some upcoming albums I can't wait for, along with a brief explanation, similar artists, and a link to a preview (if available) or some recent material.

02/06/07: Bloc Party - Weekend in the City (Vice/Atlantic)
The UK quartet follow up their acclaimed debut with a more mature (and apparently more openly queer-ish) album
For fans of: The Cure, Franz Ferdinand, being wistful
Stream the whole album already on their Myspace page

03/06/07: Arcade Fire - Neon Bible (Merge)
Adored Montreal band face dreaded sophomore slump
For fans of: Talking Heads, Neutral Milk Hotel, going to funerals
Download the first single, “Interventions,” here

03/06/07: Air - Pocket Symphony (Astralwerks)
French band swings back to the more “difficult” sound of 10,000 Hz Legend
For fans of: Burt Bacharach, Zero 7, spacing out
Buy the first single, “Once Upon a Time” at iTunes

03/13/07: Ken Andrews - Secret of the Lost Satellite (Dinosaur Flight)
Producer-geek former member of Failure uses own name for once
For fans of: Autolux, Nine Inch Nails, wearing headphones
Hear a loop from Track 8 off the new album at his website

03/20/07: Chamillionaire - The Ultimate Victory (Universal)
Southern rap superstar returns with more smooth guest-star-laden hip-hop
For fans of: Paul Wall, Weird Al, ridin’ dirty
Download a recent mixtape here

03/20/07: LCD Soundsystem - Sound of Silver (DFA)
NY dance-rock dude & friends bring back the funk
For fans of: New Order, The Rapture, ironic disco dancing
Hear earlier versions of some of the new songs in the Nike mix 45:33 available on iTunes

January 30, 2007

The Sex Workers' Art Show: Making Sex Arty

The other night, I sat on the cold floor of the San Francisco arts organization CellSpace listening to a woman with red, neon hair announce the first act of the evening to a packed house. She introduced herself as Annie Oakley, curator of The Sex Workers’ Art Show, an event that originated in Olympia, Washington, in 1998. The cabaret-style show, comprised of everything from spoken word to burlesque and multi-media performance art, is made by people who work in many areas of the sex industry. It tours the country every year busting stereotypes about sex work and sex workers (and by extension, about what constitutes art) town-by-town and college-by-college. The show’s aim is “to dispel the myth that [sex workers] are anything short of artists, innovators, and geniuses!”

The artists and innovators who I witnessed perform at the San Francisco show didn’t try to make art sexy, but rather they made sex arty. Some of the performances, namely the burlesque acts, were presented with a quantity of glamour, while others exposed the realities of sex work in a more sobering manner. An eloquently rendered story entitled “Melho’s Place,” by writer and performance artist Amber Dawn started the evening off by shedding light on the humanity of sex work. Burlesque performer Miss Dirty Martini wowed the audience with her stylized fan dance. The art in the show really came to light when the fleet-footed performer hailing from Japan who calls herself Cono Snatch Zubobinskaya danced her way onto the stage with a humorous drag king number. San Francisco author Kirk Read delivered a raunchy yet tender spoken word piece about the closing night of the Circle J sex club in San Francisco’s Tenderloin neighborhood. He presented this little piece of history to the audience like a gift, revealing aspects of a community those who are not gay men in San Francisco will never have occasion to be a part of.

If the goal of the show is to illuminate the intricacies of sex work while revealing sex workers as artists, the group of individuals touring with this year’s show certainly have accomplished a few things. The performances are varied and nuanced, portraying sex work in a way that transcends either positive or negative representation. At times the show was steamy and funny, and at others it was serious or sad. Like most things in life, sex work contains a complicated set of experiences that this set of performers articulated through story, movement, and song.

-- Rose Miller

Helvetica Turns 50: Cool Modernism Turns Gray

The once ubiquitous typeface, which is still the signifier of accessible modernism (Hello Target! Hello Crate and Barrel, Microsoft, Muji, American Apparel...) turns 50 this year. To mark the anniversary of Helvetica's release, Gary Hustwit has made a documentary that will be doing the film festival rounds this spring. To get a taste, check out the clips here. The Berlin montage is a witty look at Helvetica's takeover of the city but mostly the interviews are for font geeks.

Dispatch from Sundance: And the (Oscar) Winners Are...

Sunday night, during the closing ceremonies in Park City, Utah, the 2007 Sundance Film Festival winners were announced. I wasn't there, four days at Sundance was plenty for me, but the onslaught of emails from the press office were evidence enough. But I wonder, does anyone really care about which film won the Special Jury Prize or the World Cinema Audience Award? It seems all anyone is talking about is how "Little Miss Sunshine," "Iraq in Fragments" (read Mother Jones' review of the film here) and "An Inconvenient Truth" raked in the Oscar nominations last week.

Sundance tends to be repetitious in its subject matter. This year, "No End In Sight" will surely give you your Iraq fill, "Everything's Cool" contains a deluge of information on Global Warming and "Blame It On Fidel," much like "Little Miss Sunshine" tells the story of a young girl shaped by her society. But really, would the festival be complete without a film on Iraq or Global Warming?

"No End In Sight" is the product of over 75 interviews with the war's key players (read my blog post on a panel discussion I attended for the film and stay tuned for a Mother Jones review coming soon). With appearances by General Jay Garner, New Yorker columnist, George Packer and State Department veteran, Barbara Bodine, this politically heavy doc weaves the story, through images and first-hand accounts, of the blatant incompetence on the part of our administration. I think this film will act as a historical archive of the war for decades to come. "Everything's Cool," as the title indicates, documents the administration's denial that climate change exists and their dirty tactics to make sure that scientists weren't able to prove it did. In this very funny film, Daniel Gold and Judith Helfand follow global warming prophets, journalist, Ross Gelbspan, Mother Jones writer, Bill McKibben and the "Bad Boys of Environmentalism" throughout their mission to turn back the clock on the widening gap between the reality of climate change and the public's perception. "No End In Sight" and "Everything's Cool" were definitely the two most prescient films of the year, but make sure to look for the releases of "Manda Bala," a tale of the harsh realities of life in Sao Paulo and "Enemies of Happiness," which follows the campaign of Malalai Joya, a female member of Afghanistan's parliament.

For what it's worth, "Manda Bala" won the Grand Jury Prize and "Enemies of Happiness," the World Cinema Jury Prize. Maybe an Oscar is in these film's futures too.

Clueless White Writer + Hipster = Clipster?

Yesterday's NY Times played the race card with an article on, well... black people who like indie rock. Or make indie rock. Or, um, skateboard. Cause white people totally do that! Idolator already has some choice comments about this strange piece (correctly pointing out that UrbanDictionary.com is a kind of lazy source, even for the Gray Lady), and some bloggers and journos have taken exception to the Times' unironic use of the term "blipster" (as in, "black hipster"). Some other blogs point out that blacks didn't just saunter away from rock music because they felt like rapping (see Colonel K's blog entry here).

Hmmm. I'm sympathetic to any attempt at unraveling the racial basis underpinning so much of how we define and categorize music, and, er, "lifestyle," but this article doesn't even try. Can we have some statistics of black artists on white radio? Racial makeup of hip-hop buyers? History of Billboard charts? Ultimately, if you ask how many black people make rock music, you have to define rock music. Oops. You end up back where you started: it's white people music! Turns out the question reveals more than the answer, with the very terms being discussed laden with decades of racial bias. With racism so entrenched, and so many other factors at play (howabout girls who like boy music! Straight people who dance to Scissor Sisters!) it seems like the subject needs a little more attention and care than this lazy, condescending article gives it.

What's the deal with the Times and cultural, specifically current music, coverage? Despite an occasionally amusing piece that comes out of nowhere, they just don't seem to have any idea what's going on, and so they end up trying to overcompensate, and we get these vague articles about perceived cultural trends that just end up being offensive. Too bad.

January 29, 2007

Party Ben's 2007 Mother Jones Mashup: Faithless vs. George W. Bush's SOTU

Hello internet. I'm Party Ben. You might know me from such films as "That's My Monkey 2: Ookin' it Up," and "Arm & Hammer: a Company With a Future." Not really. Actually, I make those most mockable of musical items: mashups! Plus I also DJ in the Golden State, and do something called "creative direction" for San Francisco radio station LIVE 105. Good times.

For reasons that are not yet clear to me, I've been asked to be a guest blogger on this blog, focusing on musical and cultural items of note. I guess I'll bring a refreshing lack of "writing skills" or "journalistic ethics" that they couldn't find around the Mother Jones offices.

To celebrate my acceptance into the liberal media elite, I've updated one of my more political tracks for exclusive download by readers of this fine blog. It's based on a song by Faithless, "Mass Destruction," a deceptively jaunty anti-war number that appeared on their 2004 album "No Roots." At that time I produced a novelty version featuring some appropriate excerpts of George W. Bush's anti-evildoer speechifying. Despite my version's simplicity (like, wow, echo!) it proved inexplicably popular. As is my usual method, I produced at least six different versions, including a long one that appeared on my website and a shorter one that got some radio play on my own and other stations. This new version uses excerpts of Bush's recent State of the Union speech as well as some of the clips I used in the original mix. Compare and contrast! It's Faithless vs. George W. Bush, "Mass Destruction" (Party Ben's 2007 Mother Jones remix). Enjoy.

TheirTube

Embarrassing gaffs, humiliating moments, there's nothing like amateur video to make laughter heard round the world. Now you can tap in to what makes the Arab world tick in the file-sharing universe with the Arab language site Ikbis.com. Along the YouTube vein you can find all sorts of photos and videos that, well, we don't see on YouTube. Like this still from Iraq, this video of a Palestinian ambulance backing into a victim or "this clip, of a giggling man at a prayer sesion, which has nearly 12,000 hits to date. Humor abounds at the site, launched in November, but politics are also common on Ikbis (tagline, "Capture your Life"), with Bush parodies, the Saddam video (now down) and war footage we just don't see on CNN. Definitely worth clicking through every so often, for the raw footage, and for a new window into funny.

January 26, 2007

Ex-Gay, or Faking It?

If you haven't already seen them, here are the "God Hates a Fag" music video and the list of bands that will make you gay from this week's internet-only Christian rock sensation, Donnie Davies. His ex-gay schtick is bound to offend you or make you laugh out loud -- depending on whether you think it's a hoax.

In the video, Donnie dances around in a pink button-up shirt, delivering classic lines like "the Bible says it plain as day: with a man you shall not lay." But he also tosses off innuendo-drenched head-scratchers like "to enter heaven, there's no back door" and "righteous man, get on your knees." The mixed message has inspired endless speculation on whether Donnie is the real deal. To me, it's pretty clear that this is a farce -- a smart, well-acted farce by someone with a studied appreciation for the genre.

Why has it taken off so quickly in the secular blogosphere? People are quick to forward Donnie's material because it's shocking enough to grab your attention, but has just enough irony to leave you questioning whether it's real. A list of "gay bands" with...uh...Ravi Shankar and our buddy Ted Nugent? An fundamentalist site featuring an Oscar Wilde quote? A ex-gay Christian rock song that says Jesus is "the only man for me?" (Hat tip to South Park's "Christian Rock Hard" episode.) Like with last year's Lonelygirl15 mystery, people are intrigued with figuring out whether it's for real.

Take a peek at Donnie's site while there's still a smidgen of intrigue left. Like Borat, it's good performance art that flirts with politics before eloping with entertainment. And whoever Donnie is, his performance is spot-on. As one poster on Dan Savage's blog says, Donnie nails the "so-gay-he-must-be-straight-and-evangelical-or-he'd-sure-as-hell-be-a-drag-queen thing."

K-Fed an Insult to Fast Food

K-Fed just can't get a break. Fresh off of his split from Britney, the stay-at-home-rapper swung a sweet deal with Nationwide Mutual Insurance Co. (yes, at least someone is "On Your Side," Kev) to star in a Super Bowl commercial where he essentially daydreams of being a star and then wakes up to find himself merely a burger flipper.

Nothing groundbreaking here people. Fast food work is not exactly glory-filled, and pop culture calls attention to that fact quite often. Still, this week the National Restaurant Association asked the insurance company to pull the ad saying that it: "give[s] the impression that working in a restaurant is a demeaning and unpleasant," and stands as a "direct insult to the 12.8 million Americans who work in the restaurant industry."

Now wait, does an ad expressing disappointment at being a minimum wage, part-time worker with no benefits rather than a millionaire rap mogul really strike you as demeaning? (Even if that worker is Kevin Federline.)

Did they also object to the ending of American Beauty where another Kevin (Spacey) got a job flipping burgers so he wouldn't have to think about anything? Maybe the NRA (could have switched around their name for a more kindly acronym?) should come to the rescue of their "insulted" workers in more substantive ways: let them unionize, increase their wages, and improve working conditions. For starters, just leave Kevin alone.

-- Elizabeth Gettelman

January 23, 2007

Dispatch from Sundance: Bodine and Gen. Garner Weigh In On New Iraq Movie, "No End In Sight"

On Monday, two car bombs in a Baghdad market killed 88 and wounded 160 others. Saturday was the third deadliest day for U.S. troops since the start of the war. Things are dire and only getting worse. Two weeks ago, after watching the President's less than illuminating speech on escalation, I swore off writing about Iraq for awhile. What more was there to write? I found myself flip-flopping between sending 150,000 troops to the country or pulling out completely, a flip-flop many others do. But neither of these seem like such great ideas, so, after listening to Bush's plan to send 20,000 (I definitely don't think this is a good idea), I decided I couldn't add anything more to the debate.

So, where did I find the inspiration today to write about Iraq? The Sundance Film Festival. This morning I attended a live televised panel discussion about the Iraq War and the new movie about it, "No End In Sight," which is a product of over 75 interviews with key players. (Keep an eye out for a doc review from Mother Jones, it's on its way.) The panel included, among others, General Jay Garner, Marine Corps Lt. Seth Moulton and Ambassador Barbara Bodine. The discussion was mediated and many of the same questions we always hear were asked and many of the same answers given. Here's my paraphrase of the discussion:

"We made mistakes, no one had a plan, no one admitted there was an insurgency, the administration did not listen to its military leaders, military leaders didn't stand up to the administration, and disbanding the army as well as not stopping the looting were the gravest errors made over the past four years."

(For more details on the mistakes made before and during the Iraq war, check out the Mother Jones timeline here.)

Yes, hearing all of this still makes my blood boil, but I was left wanting more. For instance, what are we going to do now? What answers do these experts have for us regarding the future? I got the chance after the discussion to sit down with both Moulton and Bodine. Here's what the two had to say (paraphrased).

•We need to define what victory means: staving off regional war, securing the country...?

•It is essential when fighting a counterinsurgency to build the support of the people. It is not just about "killing bad guys."

•We don't have enough troops to effectively fight a counterinsurgency.

•We would need a draft to effectively fight a counterinsurgency, but the country would have to decide if it is ready. (It's not.)

•The war needs to be fought with policy and General Petraeus' counterinsurgency document is full of policy.

•Hiring General Petraeus was the best decision the President has made so far.

•It may be too little too late and the General might not be given enough resources to do what needs to be done.

•The administration may have set Petraeus up to fail.

•Hopefully we are not just postponing the inevitable and in the process losing even more lives.

So, solutions, they were not, but I got to thinking, if these people, who have been wronged by the course of this war more so than any of us, are still engaging in a dialogue, then I think we have to too. Ambassador Bodine said that "we are only down to a few dozen people that aren't listening." They are the same dozen that haven't been listening all along. What has changed, though, is the number of people talking.

-- Leigh Ferrara

January 22, 2007

More Media Whores Claiming Gov't Persecution (Girls Gone Wild Edition)

Today is quite a day for scummy self promoters claiming they've be wronged by government prosecutors, the media, etc.

First there was Richard Hatch. (No, not this one -- aka Apollo. This one.) And now, that purveyor of good taste, "Girls Gone Wild" mogul Joe Francis, is bitching because he got slapped with heavier than expected fines and penalties for making obscene profits by getting drunk underage girls to take their shirts off for a bunch of late-night dorks too cheap to spring for real porn.

His fine is 200 hours of community service, two years probation, and $500,000. That's on top of 32 hours of CS per month for 30 months and $1.6 million in penalties he got in a related Florida case. That's 1,160 hours of community service in all.

Outside the courthouse, Francis said he was relieved the process was over and that he now felt free to say that he had been unfairly persecuted by the Justice Department. "Of course I've been unfairly targeted by the government," Francis said. "What better target than Joe Francis?"

What better indeed. Let's hope they make him clean stadium urinals or something else suitably nasty.

Survivor's Richard Hatch ISO Bob Woodward...

Can't believe I'm taking 5 minutes from closing the latest issue of the magazine on this but, stop the presses, writing from the Federal Correctional Institute in Morgantown, West Virginia, Survivor winner Richard Hatch demands that journalists take up his cause:

"No investigative journalism has yet confronted the blatant abuses of power, bigotry-driven enmity, nor the numerous pitfalls of our current legal system to which I have been subjected."

And not just for his sake:

"I would no more apologize for my winning tactics on "Survivor" than a football player might apologize for his touchdown. Regardless, the issue of innocent people in jail should be addressed more seriously."

Booyah!

January 18, 2007

Ted Nugent's Racist Spectacle at Texas Governor's Inaugural Ball

Is Texas Governor Rick Perry crazy, or is he just a big fan of Cat Scratch Fever? The final act at Perry’s inaugural ball in Austin Tuesday night featured redneck rocker Ted Nugent, who, according to the San Antonio Express News, “appeared onstage wearing a cut-off T-shirt emblazoned with a Confederate flag and shouting unflattering remarks about undocumented immigrants, including kicking them out of the country, according to people who were in attendance. Machine guns, including an AK-47, were his props.”

The funny thing for those who know Nugent is that he was actually being pretty tame. Two years ago, when I saw him speak at a National Rifle Association conference in Houston, he had this to say:

Remember the Alamo! Shoot 'em! To show you how radical I am, I want carjackers dead. I want rapists dead. I want burglars dead. I want child molestors dead. I want the bad guys dead. No court case. No parole. No early release. I want 'em dead. Get a gun, and when they attack you, shoot 'em.

That one was widely reported. But the AP didn’t relate several other Nugent gems from that day. Among them was something he said while recounting a USO tour of Iraq: “I was just hoping somebody would take me hostage,” he said. “Just aim for the laundry.” (Which was even more odd when you consider that Iraqis generally don't wear turbans). Much of this was said while Nugent was holding an assault rifle. He wound up the tirade by concluding that Democrats, guilty of tax-raising and gun muzzling, should be “eliminated.”

There has been a lot of talk in Texas that Gov. Perry could be tapped to run for Vice President. Maybe McCain should just nominate Nugent instead. The bigot vote would be in the bag.

Closest Place With No Clear Channel Ads: Bergen, Norway

A small city in Norway shows us that activism can be effective and that advertising doesn't have to consume our (uh... their) lives. Activists in Bergen, a small university town on the Western coast, took on Clear Channel -- not wanting their beautiful town to be overrun with advertisements -- and succeeded. (Well almost -- more later.) I know! As an American, I can't imagine a life without constant ads that are plastered everywhere -- on every highway billboard and on public transit. And then there is product placement in movies and TV shows, and of course, there's cable and local television's 40:20 rate of show-viewing to ads. It's nauseating, really. Mother Jones reported on this very topic in our current issue. "Ad Nauseum" is chock full of statistics, including that children alone are exposed to 40,000 ads per year.

But in Bergen, Norway, citizens weren't going to let their children, or the adults, face this ominous future. Faced with budget constraints, the City Council began negotiations with Clear Channel and one other company in 2004. The winning company would fund the building of the city's bus shelters and in return, the company would gain ad space in the city (on the bus shelters as well as on some lighted billboards elsewhere). It looked like Clear Channel had sealed the deal, when out of the blue, activists in the community showed up on the scene with its "Keep Clear Channel Out of Bergen" campaign. They started a mailing list and instead of demonizing the corporation they rallied around keeping their aesthetically pleasing city, with its deep roots, just the way it is. In the end, the Bergen City Council nixed the deal. Clear Channel of course sued them for breach of conduct and the outcome is pending, but regardless, it is a pretty cool victory.

So, is it that Norwegians are just way more progressive and efficient than we are? Or is it just easier for small towns and universities to take on a clear and concise enemy? Why can’t big cities do this type of work or the entire nation for that matter? Are the problems just too large? Or are they just too far away for people to feel the impact enough to activate?

January 11, 2007

Song Suggestions for the Dodd Pod

We mentioned earlier that Connecticut senator and new presidential hopeful Chris Dodd is taking song suggestions for his "Dodd Pod." Wonkette considered "Born to Lose" by The Heartbreakers, which brings to mind "Lost Cause" by Beck and "Running Down a Dream" by Tom Petty. But scratch your head for snarky ideas no longer! The May/June 2006 issue of Mother Jones has a whole list of suggestions we can make in honor of Dodd's colleagues in Washington. A sampling:

"Been Caught Stealing," by Jane's Addiction
Former Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham (R-Calif.)

"Girlfriend in a Coma," by The Smiths
Former Sen. Bill Frist (R-Tenn)

"Road to Nowhere," by Talking Heads
Rep. Don Young (R-Alaska)

"Bridge Over Troubled Water," by Simon & Garfunkel
Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-Mass.)

"Don't Fence Me In," by Cole Porter
Rep. Tom Tancredo (R-Colo.)

"Carolina on My Mind," by James Taylor
Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.)

"Stuck in the Middle With You," by Stealers Wheel
Sen. Joe Lieberman (D-Conn.)

"Kickstart My Heart," by Mötley Crüe
Vice-President Dick Cheney

American News Media Continues Its Decline

Last spring, I wrote about MSNBC hosts Ron Reagan and Monica Crowley's on-air statement about the "triviality" of issues like Supreme Court nominations, and--even worse--MSNBC senior producer Tom Maciulis's written revelation that news about lobbying scandals, the Bolton nomination and court appointments were things he "didn't give a flying fig about." Though it was obvious to me that no one in charge at the network cared too much about news, it was nevertheless shocking to hear both the anchors and the producer come right out and say so.

Worse still, the statements of these "news" network officials caused no stir at all. I don't think anyone else even blogged about them, but they put a chill up my spine that has never gone away. Anyone who attempts to find out what is going on in the world knows that reliance on American mainstream news media will get her nowhere. When George W. Bush ran for the office of president in 2000, author, columnist and Texan Molly Ivins begged her fellow media employees, "Check the record!" They didn't. Everything from Bush's insider trading to his questionable military record to the mess he made of the Texas educational system and the environmental destruction he allowed industry to wreak on his state--all were virtually ignored by mainstream newspapers and television networks.

It should come as no surprise, then, that ABC's Good Morning America has hired Glenn Beck as a regular commentator. In plugging Beck's credentials, the show's senior executive producer announced that Beck "is a leading cultural commentator with a distinct voice."

Sure. His "distinct voice" recently struck Rep. Keith Ellison, our first Muslim Congressperson, with ""I have been nervous about this interview with you, because what I feel like saying is, 'Sir, prove to me that you are not working with our enemies.'"

It was Beck who said to Diane Sawyer, "Christmas is really about...the death of [Jesus], redemption...and having a second bite at the apple. Who's offended by that?" He "celebrated" the death of Abu Musab-Zarqawi with a "Zarqawi bacon cake," predicted that we may have to "nuke" the entire Middle East, made fun of the names of missing Egyptian students, and described New Orleanians who could not or did not leave when Katrina hit as "scumbags." And in a rant against so-called "political correctness," Beck became so upset at the thought of wall signs being done in Braille that he quipped, "I'm going to put in Braille on the coffee pot...'Pot is hot.'"

Hate sells. It's a pity that news doesn't.

January 10, 2007

"No Matter How Much You Hate Bush..." (What's Up With the San Francisco Chronicle?)

Generally, I have a pretty low regard of the San Francisco Chronicle. I want to support my local paper but...I just can't. It's the flabby writing, the columnists who don't pick up the phone, the mindless cheerleading of the wine and food industry, the substitution of PC bell ringing for real reporting on race or poverty, the subordination of the Chronicle's home page to the (also bad, and shamelessly clunky) SFGate entertainment portal...in sum, it tends to reinforce every stereotype of yuppie Bay Area solipsism. All of which I would forgive, really, if it just had some damn edge. Of any kind.

(Following exceptions noted: The Balco stuff, that was good. Ok, and the homeless series ; I'd take issue with pieces of it, even premises of it, but they pulled out some stops.)

But I digress. What the hell does this have to do with Bush?

Well, I'll tell you. I was about to talk up a great piece by the Chron's D.C. Bureau Chief that was funny, to the point, analytical...but in the minutes that it has taken me to write this post, that story has fallen off the SFGate/Chron homepage. I dove into the architecture for more than 10 minutes...but I still can't find it. So piece by DC Bureau Chief, on a decision by our fair leader to send more troops into Iraq, written for a city with strong feelings on the matter...can't find it.

And that, in a nutshell, is the San Francisco Chronicle.

In my search for the missing Bush analysis piece, I did find following story, however: "New Year's nightmare for visiting Yale singers". Which is actually quite juicy, if you're into local politics: Matt Gonzalez meets "Fajitagate" meets PacHeights scion deploying his peeps to beat up Yalies.

Though, on that last point, these paragraphs— "But witnesses said one of the uninvited guests -- who happens to be the son of a prominent Pacific Heights family -- pulled out his cell phone and said, "I'm 20 deep. My boys are coming. According to Rapagnani and others, the Yale kids barely made it around the corner when they were intercepted by a van full of young men."—make me wonder why this "son of prominent Pacific Heights family" was not named.

And also, what's up with Pac Heights boys rolling up on Yalies? They'll all work for McKinsey one day...

January 8, 2007

Paste Magazine: Don't Blame (Or Praise) Canada

Mea Culpa: In a roundup of various books, movies, and magazines that the staff reccomended to readers as holiday gifts, my entry on Paste Magazine reported, in error, that it was a Canadian operation.

Reader Tom Monk, a lawyer out of Atlanta, was quick to point out that: "Au contrare, it is based in Decatur, GA. With our country in the middle of a cycle where many of our jobs and services are being transferred overseas, we should make a point to note something good within our borders, don't you think?"

Fair enough, Tom. I'm not quite sure why I thought Paste was a product of the Great White North. Canada, while a great exporter of comedians, TV anchors, and magazine writers and editors, has (at least since the heydey of Jonnie Mitchell, Neil Young, and The Band) never really been known for producing a lot of great pop/indie music. [Care to argue? For a geographical breakdown of Candian bands, most of whom you've never heard of, go here. I still have a soft spot for Chilliwack.]

Georgia on the other hand, well now. You got R.E.M., of course, and all the Athens spin-offs (Remember Guadalcanal Diary?) And Ray Charles, who's genius should be enough for several states, territories, or provinces.

But maybe, to make up for my error, I should tell you why I not only reccomended Paste to readers, but I bought gift subcriptions for more than a dozen of my friends. Why? For starters, there's the CD that comes with each issue, a 20+ song sampler of bands the editors like. Mostly (but not soley) alt/indie rock tracks with a singer/songwriter slant (but not in a we're-all-vegans-here way). And how much do you love that their FAQ notes "Paste is about the artists, not about the artists' bodies." (Translation: No Britney!) It's a thinking person's (mostly) music and (some other) culture magazine.

Supporting good independent magazines is important. Back of the napkin calculations indicate that if I guaranteed the editors of Paste a dozen subscriptions at $34.95, they need to sign up 42 of their friends for a Mother Jones subscription, which you can get for only $10, in order for us to be even. En garde!

Meanwhile, if you're in the Atlanta area, best get some legal advice from Tom, instead of exporting litigation to say...Florida.

Angelic Jolie on Adoption - Always Low Prices!

Kate Kretz, a heretofore little-known North Carolina artist has a rendition of Angelina Jolie that's causing quite a stir. The acrylic on canvas work entitled Blessed Art Thou, is on display in Miami this week and seems to be the biggest deal in celebrity art since Daniel Edwards' rendition of Pro-Life Britney.

Jolie, who has now adopted two children, one from Cambodia, the other Ethiopia, has been a high profile champion of adoption from third world nations. Apparently she sees herself as celebrity watchdog when it comes to the issue, calling out none other than Madonna, for her legally murky adoption of a baby in Malawi: "Madonna knew the situation in Malawi, where he was born. It's a country where there is no real legal framework for adoption. Personally, I prefer to stay on the right side of the law. I would never take a child away from a place where adoption is illegal." Didn't Spears mess with Madonna too? Not advised.

No word from Anderson Cooper on whether Jolie will shell out the $50,000 (and then donate it) for Kretz' painting.

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