Back in the attic..

For the sake of keeping everyone updated, I'm just posting a quick note about last night's In The Attic's triumphant return to Joe's Pub in NYC. It was a truly marvelous show, with the lineup including:

• Rachel Fuller
• Pete Townshend
• Martha Wainwright
• Sean Lennon
• Mikey Cuthbert
• Ryan Adams

..and a nice co-hosting job by Jimmy Fallon.

It was definitely a Who's Who in the crowd (pun intended). David Bowie was sitting a few tables away from us, and we actually had the good fortune of sitting right next to Yuka Honda (see the Cibo Matto post below). Yuka is one of the friendliest people I've ever met and she wanted us to definitely say hi to her after her performance on the 9th.

Due to the shitty lighting this time around, I have a lot of work to do in terms of finding acceptable pictures from the ones I took and process them through a noise filter. Once that's done, I'll post them on my pic site for all to enjoy. Until then, it's off to Mohegan Sun tomorrow to see the 'orrible 'oo once again.

UPDATE: The initial run of photos are up at the photo site, so take a gander.

[+] Click to expand and read full post [-] Click to collapse post

As we prepare for giving thanks..

Let's face it - there is a lot of bad shit going on these days. However, we did get to experience a moment of fleeting happiness earlier this month when those election results came flying in. Sure, the pundits have their theories on why things turned out the way they did, and everyone has opinions as to why they switched from one camp to another.

The bottom line is this:

The Flying Spaghetti Monster is always way ahead of us. One of the advantages of its being invisible is that the blessed noodly appendages can work their away all around us without our even knowing what's going on. The appendages themselves are sized perfectly for travelling either through our ear canals or up through the sinus cavity. Once inside, all it takes is a simple tap on the frontal lobe and greater understanding seeps in. The FSM clearly knew that I was not in need of this enlightenment at this time, but a lot of other people were. Hence, the FSM zipped from person to person and lobe to lobe and help them with some realizations to get things going in a different direction.

And for this, I humbly give thanks to our FSM for enlightening masses with some badly needed insight. I can rest assured knowing that the FSM is looking out for us, and may even reveal its presence for comfort's sake.. Like, in Germany for example.

[+] Click to expand and read full post [-] Click to collapse post

You got to know your chicken

Here's an idea: Let's convince all nations in the world to have one internationally recognized holiday to honor Tim Berners-Lee. Without Tim, I wouldn't have been able to follow a trail of bread crumbs on this lovely thing called the Web, leading to a concert that I'm really psyched to see.

OK, I'll get to the story at hand, so quit yer moanin'. Later this month, we'll be attending the In The Attic jam at Joe's Pub on the 29th. One of the artists in the evening's lineup will be Sean Lennon, whom we'll be seeing at his own performance a few days later. Sean used to be involved with Yuka Honda, from Cibo Matto (pic above). I wondered whether or not Yuka might actually be hanging out at Joe's for that performance.

Still with me?

Good.

So, I went on a Yuka-search to see what she was up to. Sure enough, she's part of Sean's band and will be accompanying him on his tour. Good news. But wait.. she is also scheduled to appear at a special show on 12/9 at Japan Society. Looks cool... OK, so I'll pick up that bread crumb and link over to Japan Society to see what's going down. Well I'll be... Miho Hatori, Yuka's partner in Cibo-crime, will be performing the exact same night to show off her own material as well! Do they have in their hearts to do a joint encore and maybe serve some Sugar Water? Obviously, no one knows, but one can still dream. Regardless, it will still be great to see them perform.

And if it hadn't been for Tim Berners-Lee, the bread crumb trail wouldn't have been so readily available at those fingertips.

The last thing we need is to get all this linking together and see if we can establish all of the characters in this post as being six degrees from Kevin Bacon. Any takers?

(Interestingly enough, the University of Virginia has a program that does this calculation. Turns out that Sean Lennon is 2 degrees from Kevin Bacon, via Joe Pesci.)

[+] Click to expand and read full post [-] Click to collapse post

Easy nostalgia

Thought I'd give Google's gadgets a try and present an oldie-but-goodie as far as time wasting video games go. Enjoy!

[+] Click to expand and read full post [-] Click to collapse post

This is REALLY fucked up

If you haven't already seen this video on just about every other blog or website, then you better sit down before you watch this.



All we know about this so far is from this article from the student newspaper at UCLA. At this point, I think we're waiting for some more facts to come in, especially since the video did not capture the beginning moments of what led up to the confrontation. One thing is certainly clear: the fact that at least 3 strong (and armed) men had to rely on taser guns instead of their own strength to deal with (whom they thought was) a suspicious individual shows how pathetic they really are.

I just hope we aren't heading towards one of these again:

[+] Click to expand and read full post [-] Click to collapse post

Revenge of the Nerd

C&L has a post about the FBI arresting the asshat who sent out fake anthrax letters to Keith Olbermann, Jon Stewart, David Letterman, Chuck Schumer, and Nancy Pelosi:

Investigators identified Chad Castagana, 39, of Woodland Hills, California, as the person suspected of sending more than a dozen threatening letters to media outlets and the homes of public figures in various cities, the FBI said in a statement on Sunday evening.

I wondered if our friend, Google, could provide any further insight into Chaaaaad (don't forget to have your mouth closed while pronouncing). It looks like Chad was quite the angry techno-geek, posting tidbits on sci-fi, computer, b-movie, electronics, and anti-left sites among others. I guess one could understand his anger, given that he was even laughed out of his own sci-fi corner.

Well, I guess good ol' Chad will have plenty of time for b-movies and short wave radio construction while blaming the liberals for his incarceration. Have fun in the big house, Chaaaaaad.

[+] Click to expand and read full post [-] Click to collapse post

Historic day

In addition to having effectively bitch-slapped the GOP into well-deserved submission, Genesis has announced plans for a reunion tour in 2007. I have mixed feelings about this because right now the plans do not include Steve Hackett or Peter Gabriel. If those guys were on board, count me in. While the first couple of albums after Peter's departure were really quite good from a prog-rock perspective, the later stuff was a little too poppy for my tastes. We'll have to see what develops as more dates are announced.

You can find out more about the reunion on the Genesis News site.

[+] Click to expand and read full post [-] Click to collapse post

A little levity to help things along

Apparently, Tom Delay was in Long Island the other day expounding on the various forms of torture he knows about. Since, that's scary in of itself and we're just coming out of Halloween mode, I thought that a nice little clip about a haunted toaster from Amityville was appropriate:



You can catch more of Foamy at Ill Will Press.

[+] Click to expand and read full post [-] Click to collapse post

Can't make this stuff up

From today's article in the New York Times:

Last March, the federal government set up a Web site to make public a vast archive of Iraqi documents captured during the war. The Bush administration did so under pressure from Congressional Republicans who had said they hoped to “leverage the Internet” to find new evidence of the prewar dangers posed by Saddam Hussein.

But in recent weeks, the site has posted some documents that weapons experts say are a danger themselves: detailed accounts of Iraq’s secret nuclear research before the 1991 Persian Gulf war. The documents, the experts say, constitute a basic guide to building an atom bomb.

I just want to get this straight.. It's bad for the NY Times to publish info on illegal surveillance programs that are currently in use because that helps the terrorists. But, it's ok for the government to publish documentation on how to build an atom bomb because that ... doesn't help the .. well, you know it's all part of the war on... err.. umm... we need more duct tape, clearly more duct tape... (tap tap.. is this thing on?)

I guess that's ok. But if those terrorists infiltrate the TV stations and find a way to cancel the current batch of reality and celebrity competition shows, a ton of people here are gonna be pissed off something fierce and call for immediate revenge against Guam.

[+] Click to expand and read full post [-] Click to collapse post