Link of the Month: Popped Culture
A delightful blog that specializes in the mashups of various pop-culture icons. For example, the recent Josey Wales & The Pussycats:
Album of the Month: Open Mike Eagle: Rappers Will Die of Natural Causes
Just like I did last year, I’ve named Mike Eagle’s new album as my Album of the Month BEFORE it is released! Don’t worry, you won’t have to wait long; it’s released on Tuesday 6/7. Here’s a video to tide you over:
DVD of the Month: The Middleman: The Complete Series The Middleman was a small show that kinda slipped under everyone’s radar a few years ago. It quietly aired a dozen episodes on ABC Family, then disappeared. It’s a shame; it’s one of the geekiest, most gosh-darn fun shows I’ve seen in a good long while. It’s a TV show for people who love TV shows, Movies, and Comic Books. It was canceled before they got to make the final episode, so after you watch the series you should pick up the comic book they made of the finalé.
Whoops! forgot to do this until today (only 2 days late)
Link of the Month: Dads are the Original Hipsters
Sorry hipsters, your dad was the original hipster and he was killing it back in the day. This site has photographic proof that no matter how cool you think you are, your kids will think you are an absolute dork. And they’ll be right.
Album of the Month: The Asteroids Galaxy Tour: Fruit
This is an incredibly infectious and poppy album that has sweet hints of 60s spy jazz music liberally sprinkled thoughout its happy, bouncy, electro-pop sensibilities. Danish vocalist Mette Lindberg has a thin, girlish voice that I find incredibly appealing in such stand-out tracks as “Around the Bend” (which was featured in an iPhone commercial), “Golden Age,” and “Bad Fever.” Also they seem to have a song about Ghost Rider. Awesome fun.
Book of the Month: Usagi Yojimbo: The Special Edition by Stan Sakai
It is a great shame of mine that I do not own any Usagi Yojimbo comics. You may remember him from some (strange) crossovers with TMNT, but Usagi has a life completely on his own, and is celebrating his 25th anniversary. Usagi Yojimbo is easily in the top five greatest comic book series of all time, and I would love to own every single issue. I’ll begin my collection with this extremely handsome edition that collects the first seven volumes of the series (from Fantagraphics) with many fantastic extras. Hopefully I will be able to continually add volumes to my collection.
Carrie is now an assistant purchaser for LUWA Distributing. And in a massively fantastic turn of events, my new job is across the street from her now job; I will be (when I actually start in May) an e-commerce merchandiser for Quality Sewing & Vacuum.
Carrie & I will get to carpool to and from work every day! And maybe meet up for lunches once in a while.
Busdriver started his set with a very cool visual effect: all the lights were off, but he had a blacklight that also emitted lasers in such a way that they made a starfield on the background. Then he stood in front of the blacklight and starfield wearing all white. He made Tangentbot very happy by rapping over an Aphex Twin song for his encore.
Two of the opening acts were women hip-hop artists, Night Fox and Katie Kate. They were both very good, though I kinda liked Night Fox’s energy a little more. They were unlike many women hip-hop artists that I’m used to, in that they weren’t full of “even tougher than a man” bravado (even though there was a fair share of cussing). Night Fox’s voice periodically had an almost-Billie-Holliday warble in it, and at times sounded like an American Miho Hatori. Plus she was tiny and kinda adorable. Katie Kate was a much more polished performer and technical musician — I learned later that she’s a classically-trained pianist and graduated from Cornish with a music degree! Anyway, the point is they had a really fascinating style of hip-hop. I almost want to call it “Cutesy Hip-Hop” but that sound a little degrading. The point is, it was fun and inviting instead of angry and aggressive.
As for the Chop Suey show the next week, Threeni & T-Bo (as they will now be referred to in the rest of this post because it sounds awful) were the opening act for the Fake Four tour, which is the same tour that Open Mike Eagle opened for last year. Good company! And Carrie actually got to come with me because for once she didn’t have to teach on a night where there was an awesome music show!
They completely killed their set. The highlight of the whole night was when Threeni and T-Bo performed an absolutely epic cover of Jewel’s “Foolish Games.” For realsz! Ch-ch-check it out!
Like what you heard there? About to commit seppuku because you missed it? Stay your blade, I say! For Three Ninjas & Tangentbot will be performing a Mardi Gras party at the Skylark Café on Tuesday the 8th! THAT’S TOMORROW, HOMESLICE!
Carrie & I didn’t stay for the whole show because:
We live in Tacoma
I had to be at work at 8:00 the next morning
We’re old
But another excellent act that we got to see was Abadawn, a rapper with an extremely young countenance (he looked like he was 15) and a fascinating style. He had two vocalizations: a hip-hop voice that had inflections and flow that reminded me somewhat of Eminem, and a full-on death-metal screech/growl voice. He switched freely between them. Also, his songs were short, which I really appreciated (a couple were only like 45 seconds long, I swear). They were like a little nugget burst of energy, like a hip-hop haiku of rage.
Link of the Month: Lackadaisy
A webcomic about prohibition-era St. Louis has much of what you’d expect from such a thing: speakeasies, flappers, pinstripes, tommy-guns, moonshiners, heavies, and dames. But you might not expect that it is one of the most lushly-illustrated webcomics I’ve ever seen. Seriously, it makes other webcomics look like they were drawn by four-year-olds using their non-dominant hand. It’s also meticulously researched and strives to be as historically accurate as possible. And let’s not forget that it’s hilarious and dramatic and thoroughly entertaining. And it’s about anthropomorphic cats.
Album of the Month: JP Inc.: An Album of Distinction
You might know JP by his former musician name of Pleaseeasaur. In his new identity, JP has crafted a concept album: JP Incorporated is a company that crafts “Music Themes for Quality Television Programs.” The album is a parade of howlingly-funny horrible theme songs for horrible-sounding TV shows, such as “Lietenant Custard & His Banger of Time,” “Family Comedy,” “Gymnastics Dad,” and “The Internet” (and those are all just on the first half of the album), interspersed with some commercial work, such as the recurring “Common Scents” and the heavy-metal band Crap Factory. The songs are all purposefully incompetent and sometimes hilariously and aggravatingly accurate, especially to 1980s TV theme songs. Take a listen to some sample tracks here:
The Internet:
Situations:
Jacuzzi Air:
And here’s the video for “Jazzbot Xtreme”
Game of the Month: Kirby’s Epic Yarn
One of the most visually stunning Wii games I’ve ever played, Epic Yarn re-tools the familiar Kirby franchise and spins a new game where everything is composed entirely of yarn and fabric and buttons. But it isn’t just a visual style; the side-scrolling platformer gameplay is based almost entirely on incredibly creative ways to manipulate and interact with the various fabric environments and yarn characters. Kirby’s Epic Yarn is simply a joy to play, and is a surprisingly relaxing and happy experience. It’s low on the challenge level (much like Lego Star Wars, you can’t actually die), but the whole point is to be able to experience the lush fullness of the game, not get frustrated by its challenges. So much fun!
Popped Culture
Open Mike Eagle: Rappers Will Die of Natural Causes
The Middleman: The Complete Series
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Dads are the Original Hipsters
The Asteroids Galaxy Tour: Fruit
Usagi Yojimbo: The Special Edition by Stan Sakai
Lackadaisy
JP Inc.: An Album of Distinction
Kirby’s Epic Yarn
