After attending my first NASCAR race this spring, I was overwhelmed with the desire to learn more about the economics of it. Despite quite a few years of watching the races on TV, I was unprepared for the sheer scale of it. So many truckloads of merchandise. Each team has several truckloads, and all are busy. The race gets pretty relentless in the middle, and everyone wanders around and goes shopping. Oh, and did I mention that you can bring in your own beer? Coolers that could fit small toddlers are wheeled into the stadium with just a cursory inspection. After getting searched to get into football games, this was a real culture shock to me, but an altogether pleasant experience. So when I stumbled upon the book Sunday Money I thought that with a title like that it would surely shed some light on the inner workins of the sport and the tour.
Sadly this is The. Worst. Book. Ever. The premise is, Macgregor and his wife buy a motor home and do the entire 2002 NASCAR season. I sensed I was in trouble when the entire first chapter was about the buying of the motor home. (Who cares?) Essentially, Macgregor doesn't like NASCAR, he has preconceived notions of what is going to happen (the fans will be rednecks) and so he reports when fans act like rednecks, and when he goes to California, and they aren't as rednecky, he mocks them for being "Califorian." He shares no knowledge about what team members do, about what drivers do, though he does digress tell us what people in the pressbox do. Again, I say, Who Cares? He mocks Darrell Waltrip's Beloved catchphrase, "Boogity Boogity Boogity."He claims that the people who attend NASCAR events spend "money they don't have on things they don't need", as if he took time to talk to any of them about how much money they made, or it is any of his business how people spend their own money. Jeff Macgregor is an elitist asshole, who has written a book about NASCAR for NPR listeners who don't like the sport and have no intention of becoming fans. Fuck him.
Several years ago, when Hugh Grant got caught boffing the hooker while dating the gorgeous Elizabeth Hurley, the world was aghast.
This summer, however, there seems to be an epidemic of British cads doing it with frighteningly beneath their station women.
I will admit that Jude Law, while gorgeous and quite a good actor, especially in A.I., had never seemed like that much of a sex symbol to me - he was just a bit too pretty. So the fact that he shagged the Nanny, as well as many others in the past suddenly made him get that "bad boy" appeal.
But this Steve Coogan and Courtney Love thing has really got me off my nut. I still found him appealing, even after the coke-fueled lap-dance-binge that triggered his divorce. But Courtney Love? I suppose if you are a drug addict and a sex fiend, Courtney Love is the holy grail of gets.
Steve Coogan was the one of these 3 I liked the most. Hugh Grant is cute, but he has those little boy nipples that trouble me. See above for Jude Law. But Steve Coogan seemed smart and funny and a good time. Now I might be a little afraid of him.
Somewhere, Pat O'Brien is saying "Even I never impregnated Courtney Love!"
In praise of Gyros
This year I made a shortened trip to the Ohio State Fair and ate one of my favorite fair foods. Was it the corn dog? The elephant ear? The fried cheese? NO! It was the gyro.
Let's go back to the early 80's, when I was a young girl growing up in rural Ohio. Where a big fancy meal was at the Ponderosa, and ethnic food was a Jeno's pizza. I go to the Ohio State fair and see this thing called a "gyro." It smells delicious. It IS delicious. I eat about 6 of them, alternated with that other exotic food, the taco. (Later, a Taco Bell opened in Zanesville and my boyfriend at the time lived right behind it. Almost every day we went there, and I got a combo burrito, which they don't have anymore, but was just like the burrito supreme only with refried beans in it. YUM! Frankly, I could still eat at Taco Bell every day! Supersize this!)
But back to the humble gyro. When I went to THE Ohio State University, the gyro was the food of the late night drunk. Two places sold the $1 gyro and were open 24 hours - Apollo's, and the Honey Bee. I was an Apollo's fan, since it was also the punk rock club. But Apollos/Honey bee could start arguments just like Genos/Pats or Acme/whatever that other oyster house is in New Orleans that I never go to.
The late night gyro,, after a night of drinking, always left a taste in your mouth like gyro poop the next day. But it was all worth it.
The gyro. Lamby meat on a spit. Creamy white sauce. That soft but toasty pita bread. Juicy tomatoes. Sheer perfection.
My first day in Baltimore, we went to the diner in Canton Square. I was so pleased to see the gyro spits turning. Welcome to Baltimore, which even has it's own Greektown! Yes, I'll have a gyro please.
On the BBC
When I got the news earlier this summer that BBC Radio 1 was getting added to Sirius satellite radio, I went right out and bought one. Even though I already had XM in the car.
I hadn't been sold on XM - it was fun for a few weeks, but their playlists seemed kind of narrow. Plus, Sirius has football and basketball and hockey. XM has baseball.
At first Sirius seemed only marginally better - the playlists were somewhat less narrow, and more edgy, and it has more personality. But mostly I just sat around and waited for the BBC.
And it's here! It showed up on Friday. I haven't changed the Sirius station since. (But I still listen to Howard Stern or Tony Kornheiser in the morning, and Big O and Dukes in the afternoon, especially since Ed Norris is back.
That doesn't mean I'm entirely sold. The drive time BBC djs are just like American drive time djs with funny accents.
In America: Are those things real?
On the BBC: Are those the ones God gave you then?
You know the drill: prank phone calls, double entendre, etc. But you do get the sport reports, complete with cricket, and lots of football gossip.
And the weekends, especially this past when all were in Ibiza, were great. Viva, BBC.
Last summer I saw Patton Oswalt at the Atomic Books anniversary party
and he killed, with his jokes about steakhouses and comic nerds. Two
summers ago, I saw Brian Posehn in New York at one of David Cross and
Todd Barry's "Tinkle" shows, and he killed, with his jokes about heavy
metal and comic nerds. However, the Comedians of Comedy tour was a
soul-sucking experience even by the normally low standards I hold the
soul-sucking Recher to.The most disappointing part was that both
Oswalt and Posehn did THE SAME JOKES they did the last time I saw
them. It's been 26 months since I last saw Brian Posehn and he can't
write a new set of jokes?? I saw David Cross 3 times in about a year,
and bought a live cd of another show I didn't see and though some of
the jokes were the same, the entire experience was very different (and
I got turned on to this site. at
the Tinkle show, now THIS is funny.)But even so, I'd chalked it up to just not being in the mood
to be there, until I read a story in Time Out New York that talked
about how Oswalt had organized the tour to counteract the hacks that
you see in comedy clubs who talk about "airplane food" and "where the
missing socks go."Well, jokes about Reality TV are the new jokes about
airplane food, and every guy on the bill shot the fish in the reality
show barrel. I guess they were just trying to do the "tried and true"
stuff since it's going for a DVD and special, but the next time
someone wants me to be an extra on their DVD, I hope they pay ME the
$20.
The Fabulous Sylvester was a celebratory biography of disco star Sylvester, but also a time and place, namely San Francisco in the 70's and 80's, the heyday of disco, especially gay disco. Earlier this summer, I saw The Nomi Song, a celebratory biopic of new wave star Klaus Nomi, but also a time and place, namely New York in the 70's and 80's, the heyday of the downtown art scene.
Both Sylvester and Klaus Nomi were born in the 40's. Both later moved to cities at the perfect time to be part of a movement. Both sang in nearly soprano falsettos. Both were flamboyant dressers, in their own way. Both had strong female sidekicks - Sylvester had Martha Wash and Izora Rhodes, Nomi had Ann Magnuson. Sadly, both were early casualties of AIDS - Nomi when it was still practically unknown, Sylvester not until a few years later, but still before their were effective cures.
Both biographies give some insight into their somewhat distant subjects, and the ends of each, while being personally sad, also stress how much of an end this wasn't just to individual lives, but to an entire lifestyle. Still, though you'll feel sad at America's lack of concern of the "gay cancer" you'll feel uplifted in both that these men got to make their art known, for even a short time.
4 Shows in 4 Weeks and lots of 90s Nostalgia
At the TLA in Philly I saw French-Algerian punk rocker Rachid Taha, someone who I completely discovered through WFMU.org playing the song from the Black Hawk Down soundtrack. He played for 2 hours, lengthy dancy jams that moved the smallish crowd (probably 150-200 people tops).If the scale of crazy performers starts with Van Morrison (chaotic but in total control) and moves to Shane McGowan (chaotic with no idea what's going on) I'd say this was solidly in the middle. It was, most of the time, complete controlled chaos - nearly every young N. African guy there went on stage and posed for a picture with Rachid, shouting things in Arabic to the delight of their friends, women got up and belly danced, the Algerian flag was thrown, Rachid hit himself in the head with the microphone, he signed autographs from the stage, all the way just kicking out the jams. And finally, he is SEXY SEXY SEXY AS HELL. Really, I was just blatantly melting right there in front of The Husband. We both came to the same conclusion - he's like the Algerian Greg Dulli -not the best looking guy in the room, but his cocky confidence makes him so - and for me, who thinks the Afghan Whigs are the greatest live band that ever came out of Ohio, to say the least, that's about the biggest compliment I can give/
XOXOXOXO Rachid Taha. Oh, and he speaks barely any English, so most of the time, my pedestrian ears had no idea what was going on. And it totally didn't matter.
I saw Dinosaur Jr. twice in the 80’s, once with My Bloody Valentine, and once with the Pixies and both times all bands were dead boring. Other than thinking “Just Like Heaven” is probably the best cover ever,I don’t think much of them. Plus, after the split, I discovered Sebadoh during a breakup and spent the better part of a summer mooning around to their sad sad songs, so I’ve always felt squarely in the Lou Barlow camp, not the wankery J. Mascis camp. But I enjoyed the reunion show at the 9:30 Club, especially their commitment to only play songs from the early albums. Not as much as the Husband, however, who also went to the Philly show and made friends with some tapers who are supposed to be sending him live bootlegs. Dinosaur Jr. are the New Grateful Dead, and J. Mascis and the Fog are the New Jerry Garcia Band.
The New Peach Pit after Dark is the Ram’s Head Live, actually a pretty cool club which makes you feel as if your in a Hollywood movie version of a rock club, it’s so clean and glamorous looking. If only they booked some better shows. I finally made it there to see Common, John Legend and De La Soul. The show was to start at 9. After being somewhat enterertained by some djs and Rahzel, the Human Beat Box (who quickly disintegrates into that guy from the Police Academy movies.) I looked at my watch to see it was 10:30 and we hadn’t seen anyone yet. Then Common hit the stage – great, lots of energy, but a little more cliché “Wave your hands in the air” “Say Oh-oh” than I might have expected. He plays for an HOUR – a long set for most rappers and a REALLY long set for the first performer on a 3 man bill. Close to midnight, John Legend comes on, with his beautiful voice, and plays another hour of music. FINALLY at well after 1 a.m. we get a shortened De La soul set, only because it was last call. I don’t mind staying out late if I expect it was going to be late but this was a LOOOONG night. Also, putting the slow jam John Legend in the middle really killed the energy. All in all, a great show, marred by Philadelphia Eagle in the Super Bowl poor clock management that kept it from being a winner.
But the real winner was Teenage Fanclub. The most clichéd story about them is that in 1991, Spin magazine declared Bandwagonesque their album of the year over Nevermind, which of course is a cultural phenomenon to this day. Taken on purely musical terms, Bandwagonesque is one of my 5 favorite albums ever, while I haven’t played Nevermind in probably 10 years. So this was the first time I’d seen the Fannies since 1992, when they played with the beloved Afghan Whigs (see above) or as I like to call it the BEST SHOW EVER. 13 years has aged the band, but not their music, it’s as timeless as pop music can be. I saw this show at the North Star in Philly and there were so many cold chill moments, not the least being in a room with a bunch of people who all scream as soon as they heard “She wears denim wherever she goes, says she’s gonna get some records by the Status Quo” and sing every lyric. Especially since I had to go to Philly to see this show instead of DC because I only know one person on the whole east coast besides myself who likes them. Seriously is there a better lyric than “There are things I want to do,but I don’t know if they will be with you?” I think not!
Looking back at my month I realize that with the exception of John Legend, it could have been 1991. This was driven home even harder by the piece in Pitchforkmedia.com about Lollapalooza, talking about how Indie Rock is now a “nostalgia driven installation piece.” http://pitchforkmedia.com/features/weekly/05-08-01-museum-of-alternative-rock.shtml And driven home again when I was drawn to buy the Judgment Night soundtrack (for 98 cents on ebay)to complete my Teenage Fanclub collection, only to be reminded that they sang with De La Soul on it, and Dinosaur Jr. were on it too (Remember before rap rock was sullied by Fred Durst?)
I don’t want to become a museum piece, and I got NOTHING on my calendar for August. Is there anything new that some young whippersnapper can recommend?
