One More Reason...

... to love Rhino Records:

The Office Ghetto Run-Through!

2004: A Space Ought-To-See?

It's not a large, opaque monolith, but it's an arresting headline nonetheless.

Opportunity explores mysterious spheres in Martian trench.

p.s. Cow! Kubrick! Cowoobrick!

Traffic Was Crazy!

Some interesting results from my Sitemeter weekly report:

4 weeks ago:
Average per Day .................. 5
Average Visit Length .......... 0:06
This Week ....................... 38

3 weeks ago:
Average per Day .................. 6
Average Visit Length .......... 0:09
This Week ....................... 41

2 week ago:
Average per Day .................. 7
Average Visit Length .......... 2:13
This Week ....................... 47

Last week:
Average per Day ................ 116
Average Visit Length .......... 0:24
This Week ...................... 812

[screeeeech]

812!
Eight-hundred and frickin' twelve!

So much for my small but dedicated cult following.

Hmmm. An average of 116 visits per day. Average visit length of only 24 seconds. I'm wondering if it was the Jessica Simpson thing?

Checking the more detailed stats, it looks like a lot of people found their way here entering search terms for spongemonkeys, but traffic also peaked on Wednesday, when I posted about that "Jessica" song. [shrug]

Classified Ad Of The Week

This ad for THE WORLD'S UGLIEST COUCH definitely puts the 'class' in classifieds.

Courtesy of Craigslist.

Song Of The Week

This week's Song Of The Week goes to...

Adam Green for "Jessica".
(Quicktime required to view video)

This clip also wins the award for Best Use Of Ping-Pong In A Music Video.

Spongemonkey Sandwich

Our pal Vern brings this rather interesting development to our attention. Seems the people at the Quiznos sandwich chain have recruited our much beloved spongemonkeys for a web promotion.

We're not sure how to feel about this. It's often disturbing to see a favoured expression of wacked creativity from the margins get appropriated by large-scale commercial interests. On the other hand, begrudging kudos must go to Quiznos' marketing/ad people for daring to use the spongemonkeys, and for generally having the, uh, "quiznos", for such a strategy. There aren't many marketing strategies out there that are willing to recognize the role of web culture in the popular consciousness.

Either way, we here at jimbuck2 heartily applaud any punnerific use of the word 'buck', especially as used in the 'buck off' header on the promotion's web page.

It's also worth a trip over to rathergood.com to check out some of the new installments. We especially liked "When Biscuits Go Wrong" and The Zoology Dragon.

"COW! CUBE! COWUUUBE!"

Steely Definitions

I've been re-listening to Steely Dan lately. Quite an amazing band, of course. Lots of musical currents flowing in there. Jazz, pop, R&B, rock, funk. Great songwriters. "Peg", "Reeling In The Years", "Do It Again", "Dirty Work" (which I hadn't even realized was their song--sung by the guy who left after their first album), "Babylon Sisters", "Hey Nineteen", "FM". Albums populated with fine musicians. Only in the '70s would such a band as Steely Dan find success on mainstream radio. One more reason why I prefer the '7Os to this retched '80s nostalgia kick we're now suffering through. Ugh.

Kind of makes me wonder what kind of musical beast would have resulted had the Steely Dan bus collided with The Band's bus on some supernatural bayou highway in 1974, and when they emerged from the mystic bog, the two groups had been transmorgrified into one entity distilling the essence of each. A melting pot of Becker and Danko and Helm, with an easily imagined amalgam of Fagen/Manuel singing at the piano. And into that broth, throw in Garth Hudson! Oy!

What a cauldron of music! Imagine! The mind reels [in the years, Jim?]!

So Anyway.

I think partly I was inspired to re-dig the Dan by listening to Wilco's cover version of "Any Major Dude Will Tell You". A fine song and a fine cover version (perhaps a pale hint of what the abovementioned transmorgrified beast from the mystical bog might possibly sound like?). But this line in that song always intrigued me:

Have you ever seen a squonk's tears?
Well look at mine

Which obviously led me to ask "What the hell is a squonk?"

And, of course, to answer such questions, there's only one place to turn:
The Steely Dan Dictionary!

According to the good Dan book, a squonk is: A mythical woodland creature, originating in Pennsylvania. Squonks spend much of their time crying due to their ugliness, and when captured, will dissolve into a puddle of tears. Also the subject of a song on the 1976 Genesis album A Trick of The Tail.

Although I rather prefer the definition I found through a google search (dig the Latin name):

squonk n :
Lacrimacorpus dissolvens. A warty, loose-skinned, butt-ugly (and hence wretchedly shy) creature of the northern Pennsylvania hemlock forests, that when sought plays possum by dissolving in a surfeit of melancholy.

So, mystery solved.

For more on the Squonk, look here.

Spuff

The story of the huge marijuana "factory" found north of here a few weeks ago has spawned this little jewel from spoof-meister Rick Mercer, riffing off an old rah-rah jingle for Ontario from many moons ago.

Not much growing out there tonight in this weather, except snow drifts and winter weariness.

And while I'm drawing on the CBC's info well, I'll give a shout-out to their quite cool web site for CBC Radio 3.

Hey Mac, blow out da candles

Happy 20th birthday to the little mouse that roared!

Hep C-ats Sing For The Big E

This looks like it might be an interesting tribute album. Certainly for a good cause.

And file this under "I Didn't Know That": Sheila E is Alejandro's niece?

Top 10 Or So CDs of 2003

Okay, here's the damn list. As usual, there were many acclaimed CDs this year that I just didn't get around to hearing. Here, in no particular order, are the ones I did hear.

Two-Minute Miracles - Vol III: "The Silence Of Animals"
My Morning Jacket - It Still Moves
Jim Bryson - The North Side Benches
The Weakerthans - Reconstruction Site
Paul Westerberg - Come Feel Me Tremble
Fountains Of Wayne - Welcome Interstate Managers
The Jayhawks - Rainy Day Music
Daniel Lanois - Shine
Lucinda Williams - World Without Tears
Stars - Heart
Buck 65 - Talkin' Honky Blues

Reissues:
Neil Young - American Stars 'n' Bars; On The Beach
The Beatles - Let It Be... Naked

Making Tracks

I don't like to waste money. So since I didn't spend any money on air fare this holiday season, I decided I'd better put the money I saved to good use. That makes sense, doesn't it?

So I went out this past weekend and picked me up a cool new toy.

Been looking to get something like this for a little while now, and I figured now is the time. I'm just starting to work my way through the manual, and it's pretty damn cool. Seems very user-friendly. It's really geared towards guitar players; just plug straight in and play. It's got tons of pre-set amp modeling patches and other cool effects. And of course, you can create your own sound, from choosing the virtual amp (Fender Twin? Matchless? Marshall Stack?) to setting the distance the virtual microphone is from the virtual amp's speaker. Amazing.

There are several bass simulation patches, so you can lay down bass tracks using an electric 6-string. There's also an input for a microphone and a line-in for other devices such as keyboards. And the drum machine sounds quite good, fairly realistic.

I did quite a bit of research on the web before deciding on this particular model. It got very good reviews, and there's even a Yahoo Group dedicated to it (nobody there seemed to be having any major problems with it, and most seemed to like it a lot). It uses a CompactFlash media card, comes with a 128MB card but accepts cards up to 1GB. I like the fact that it has a USB port, so I can dump my finished tracks on my computer, convert them to MP3s and burn them to CD (why pay twice as much for a model with the same features that also has a hard drive and a CD burner on board, when I already have those things on my iMac?). The USB connection also allows you to import sounds for making loops and to import extra rhythm sounds to customize drum sounds, such as a different snare sound, for instance. It really seems to give the most bang for the buck.

Guess what I'll be doing while I'm off work for the next week?

God R Us

Hello and happy holidays! It's been way too long between blog posts. Sorry for the delay. Just been busy with all the seasonal stuff. I hope you're all enjoying this most wonderful time of the year.*

I usually go home for the holidays, but this year I didn't have enough vacation days coming to me to warrant a trip out east, so I stayed around Toronto. Had a nice time getting together with friends and making music. Also took in the Kensington Market Festival of Lights procession, which has become something of a holiday tradition for me. This was my third.

It's a procession that takes place on the solstice to celebrate the return of light to the Earth (i.e., the days get longer after the solstice). People join in the procession--some carrying home-made lamps, candles and other forms of light, some dressed up in elaborate costumes--as it winds its way through the streets of Kensington Market. Along the way we are treated to fire-breathers, costumed characters on stilts, and various kinds of tableaux (some up on the rooftops and balconies), depicting a variety of things, from Asian tales to Aboriginal myths to some that are just plain... interesting. It all ends in a small city park where a huge papier machÈ icon of some sort (last year it was a phoenix; this year it was the sun) is burned in a bonfire, while the various costumed and stilt-wearing characters dance and a rag-tag band of Salvation Army deserters plays joyfully.

Here are some photos from previous years.

Christmas eve, I went to a church service/caroling night at Roy Thompson Hall. This was held by the Metropolitan Community Church Of Toronto, primarily known as a gay-positive church, so there was a nice feeling of inclusiveness in the air. My friend Sue and her family have been going to this Christmas eve service for a few years, and she graciously invited me to join them. The service featured a 50-person choir, a band with a small string section and a few horns, drums, bass, piano, organ. It was quite kick-ass. Lots of singing. Joy To The World, O Come All Ye Faithful, etc.

Now, it's been years since I stopped attending church. Recovering Catholic, don't you know. But I've always considered myself spiritual to some degree, more so in recent years. What do I believe? Well, although it's likely that my spiritual views will keep evolving throughout my life, at present they go something like this: There is no God, in the sense of a bearded man sitting on a throne in the clouds, directing things, handing out punishments and rewards. But "God" as the eternal, the divine? Maybe. Probably. If so, if there is "something out there", some energy or power, I believe it resides not "out there" at all, but in all of us, not as something external to us, which we then assign as the source of good (God) or evil (The Devil). The spiritual buck stops here. It is what we do in the world that causes good or evil.

And maybe not only does it (give "it" the name "God" if you want, or any of the many other names) reside in each of us, but in all living things. Maybe "it", "god" the "universal energy", whatever, is the sum total of all souls that have existed or will exist, or something, is some dimension of collective spiritual existence that we in this dimension can't begin to understand. Maybe. I haven't quite figured out this "unknowable" bit yet. I'm working on it.

It's closer to a neo-Pagan idea, I suppose. (see Festival Of Lights, above.) And I like that. Thinking that there is something beyond (further along, as the song says), that we rejoin after we leave this mortal plane. But not something foreign. A one-ness. Unity. Eternal. Not blessed or damned, divine or evil, just...everything. Peace. Eternal Composure.

The sea refuses no river.

Anyway, I say all that because the sermon at this service, delivered by the church's pastor, Reverend Brent Hawkes, marked the first time that a preacher actually made the Christmas message sound like something real and meaningful to me. He said he wanted to stress a different aspect of the Christmas message; that Jesus in the manger represents God becoming human, yes, but put another way, God in human form. God as us. God in us. And he ended by saying, imagine when the God in me encounters the God in you... imagine what we could accomplish.

Here was a minister from one of the world's major religions--the very ones that I'd largely written off years ago--presenting the concept of the Christmas story to me in a way that fit quite nicely into my current relatively alternative spirtual beliefs.

Another Christmas miracle!

After years of Catholic sermons that seemed lost in their own dogmatism and stale rhetoric, smothered in a fog of incense and ceremony, this was like a breath of fresh air. I never truly felt anything about the Christmas story held any relevance in my own life. I suppose since I never quite accepted the idea that we are all branded as "sinners" from birth, the idea that Jesus was sent to save us...well, as a message, it always struck me about as relevent as the pitch from those people who phone me up to sell me carpet cleaners for my hardwood floors. Yes, I'm sure it's a fine product, but y'see...

But now, here was a way for me to conceive of the Christmas message as a metaphor (as all good religious messages should be taken) that I could finally internalize: God is us.

Not that I have any plans to start attending church services again, but at least in years to come, whenever I see a nativity scene or a silver star atop a tree, I'll see not a stale icon I've long disconnected from, but rather a representation of the light that shines within us and amongst us.

That's a good message.

Peace, out.



* level of wonderfulness experienced may vary.

Time Is A Jet Plane

Oh, what's this? A free moment to update my blog!

...oops, there it goes...

[sigh]

That Fine Line Between Reality And Satire Runs Straight Through Moncton

Like most liberal-minded people, I'm all in favour of the concept of unions. But this story (from my former stomping grounds), is certainly a case of a principle taken to absurd lengths.

That's why I find this story fascinating. You can easily imagine it as a piece of social satire, stretching an idea into the realm of the absurd to make a point. It would be a textbook example of satirical commentaryóif it weren't ruined by being true-to-life.

I love the quote from the city spokesman. Gotta love understatement.

I would also like to nominate the title of this blog entry as my favourite so far, as well as being the title of my upcoming novel (to be completed sometime this century, I promise).

Consumption Junction

Interesting idea posted on the GTABloggers site for observing Buy Nothing Day tomorrow.

I like it! Good thing it's happening now though, as opposed to a few weeks from now when the xmas shopping frenzy will be at its height. Because then the zombies would simply blend in.

ah-choo

I god a code.
*sniff*

Weirder & Weirder

Okay, this horoscope thing is starting to freak me out. Today's was another strange one. Here's the background:

I'm currently working on a story for the SOCAN web page. It's a story I pitched to them about musicians who are earning some SOCAN money for their music, but who need to keep a day job to pay the bills. Since there's no database of musicians with day jobs out there--at least none that I know of--I pretty much had to go with musicians I knew who fell into that category. That's where my experience writing the Showcase page in Canadian Musician came in handy.

So I interviewed Linda M (works as a "background person" in film and TV) and Colleen Power in Newfoundland (works at a savoury farm, packaging) and Jay Clark Reid of Jay Clark And The Jones (works as wait staff at local eatery/bar/music spot C'est What). I had hoped to talk to Jim Bryson, because he had worked at Songbird music store in Ottawa, but his people never got back to me. So, that's when I got hold of Jay, as kind of a last-minute replacement. (No offence, Jay, if you're reading this. You were on my list, but I was trying to get a geographically diverse trio and I already had local Linda. Don't want to seem Toronto-centric. But when I didn't hear from Bryson, you got the call. Plus, waiting tables is the traditional musician's/actor's day job, so it was nice to get that angle in there.)

So, given that scenario, here's the last sentence (it's always the last sentence!) in my horoscope from this morning...

"Last-ditch effort resumes to find a replacement."

!!!!!!

[cue Twilight Zone theme music]

Zodiac My Back!

Okay, first a bit of background: About two years ago, I started getting these nagging pains from inside my left shoulder blade, running down the back of my left arm. Tingling in the fingers. I went to the doctor, and he determined it was nerve-related, and sent me for some physiotherapy. First they hooked my arm up to a TENS machine (electrodes placed on the arm, which sends little electric pulses through the nerves), then they put me in traction for a series of half-hour sessions. That helped somewhat, but I was still in some discomfort. X-rays proved inconclusive, so they scheduled me for an MRI. They put me on the "express" schedule, which meant that if I sheduled it for a 3 a.m. session, I only had to wait three months to get in.

By that time, the pain had mostly subsided, but the MRI did reveal that I had a compressed disc just below my neck. The disc was bulging slightly into the spinal column, causing the pain. The specialist at Sunnybrook told me that surgery was an option, but that if it's not hindering my life--and at that point it wasn't--then I may as well just leave it alone. Fine by me. Back surgey not something I'm excited about venturing into unless absolutely necessary.

So, fast forward to about six weeks ago, and I'm starting to get the pain again. Again to the doctor, again with the physiotherapy, again with the scheduled MRI in the fairly distant future. Only this time the physio involves neck/back exercises, ultrasound, TENS and back massage. Had my first massage session on Monday. The therapist is very cool, quite funny and seems to have a very intuitive sense with muscles. Spoke about "listening" to what the muscles had to tell her. Her hands are good ears. But she's kind of whacky, too. Breaks into fake Russian accents now and then. "Ees good, yah?" It was great though. I had no idea my muscles were so tight and knotted.

Add to this, the fact that I also hurt my knee last week while playing ball hockey. Almost hyper-extended it, but not as bad as that. I was turning to run up "ice" (read: floor) and my foot just landed weird, my leg was straight when my weight came on it, and I kind of jammed my knee. Crumpled to the floor in pain, and limped off. Had to sit out a few shifts, but I was able to walk it off and get back in the game. It's still a bit tender, but I can walk on it okay.

So, that leads us to today's horoscope in the Metro transit newspaper. I've written here before about the strange horoscopes this paper offers. Ones that advise me to buy new footwear (I did) and look under the bases of trees for things I've lost (I did. Nothing there).

So, keeping in mind that yesterday was my first back massage therapy session, here's the last sentence from my horoscope today:

"Knees and back must be catered to for pain relief."

I kid you not! Is that freaky, or what?

A Jolly Swag Man

I went to our semi-annual Returned Merchandise Sale at work today, and came away with a very nice box o' swag. This is where Columbia House employees are allowed to comb over thousands of CDs, VHS movies and DVDs that customers have returned for one reason or another. In most cases there's nothing wrong with the product. And the price is certainly right. CDs go for $3 (double CDs count as one); DVDs for $5. Multiple-disc sets are the best bargain. You pay the $3 for the first CD, and then each extra disc is a dollar, so a 4-CD boxed set would cost $6. For a 4-disc DVD set, you pay for the first three only. So that's $15. We're limited to 20 DVDs, and there's an overall limit if $200. We're allowed only one CD boxed set.

This is my fourth or fifth sale, and I still have boxes of CDs from previous years that I haven't listened to more than once (I gave them a spin to make sure there are no defects, but haven't returned to most of them, or even had time to file them in my CD rack). So this time, I was hunting DVDs. But my strategy is to first go for the CD boxed sets, since they tend to get picked over quickly. Fortunately, the tastes of the vast majority of my co-workers run more to the mainstream, so the stuff that I'm interested in usually gets passed over. Heh heh.

So here's the swag list:

CDs:

The Last Waltz Boxed Set (4 CDs) ($6!)
Son Volt - Trace
Pink Floyd - Dark Side Of The Moon (SACD)
Lou Reed - Transformer (Remastered)
Radiohead - Hail To The Thief

DVDs:

Bob Dylan, Don't Look Back
The Beatles, A Hard Day's Night: Deluxe Edition (2 discs)
The Last Waltz: Special Edition
Bruce Springsteen, The Complete Video Anthology
Pink Floyd, The Wall
This Is Spinal Tap (1 hour of extra, never-before-seen footage!)
Almost Famous: The Bootleg Cut (2 discs & Stillwater ep)
American Beauty
Brazil
The Hurricane (just because I have a walk-by scene as an extra)
Blade Runner: The Director's Cut
Apocalypse Now
Reservoir Dogs: 10th Anniversary Special Edition (2 discs)
Pulp Fiction
O Brother, Where Art Thou?
2001: A Space Oyssey
The Lord Of The Rings: The Two Towers
The Lord Of The Rings: Fellowship Of The Ring - Special Extended Edition (4 discs) (beautiful set for $15!)

All of this for a grand total of $108, which just gets taken off my next pay cheque.

Now, I just need to get myself a DVD player.