Issue 78

News: For lack of a better news story...
This week has been a slow one for news and school and Newspeak Dictionary have not been providing fodder for my blog as they usually do, so I'll give you some personal news. This Tuesday, for the first time in 2 1/2 years, I got a new guitar: An Art and Lutherie Ami. I first learned about the models from the store where I got my guitar lessons, and I discovered the guitars hanging on the wall. When I played one of several of the models, I was amazed by the quality of the guitars, and especially the tone, which was very reminiscent of that of bluesman/Faust Figure Robert Johnson. I eventually had a black version of the guitar ordered and it was supposed to be in for my birthday a few months ago, but apparently the order to get the guitar got lost, so I had to get a guitar as similar as possible to it from an Okie dealer. Eventually, I finally got it. Better five months late than never, and as I expected, the wait was totally worth it. After the store failed in its attempt to acquire the instrument, I allowed it to install the pickup (an LR Baggs Element Active) and fit it with a new set of Strings (D'Addario EJ26). In addition, in lieu of a Direct Box so I could plug it into a mixer when performing, I got a Danelectro BLT slap echo to aid in a Scotty Moore-type echo tone. No, I'm not being paid by any of these companies to plug their products.

Band Name of the Day: The Lina Lamont effect. My name for a problem that I have heard about with micing acoustic guitars: move out of a certain position and you lose the tone and may risk losing volume. The name comes from Singin In the Rain. Halfway into the movie, as Don Lockwood (Gene Kelly) and Lina Lamont (Jean Hagen) prepare to turn their film into a talkie, Lina forgets the location of her mic, so the soundmen are frustrated with the fact that she misses every other word of her lines.

Reviews of the day: Annie On My Mind. I just finished this controversial novel about two teenage girls in love and would highly reccomend it. Of course, the fact that the religious right-wing Book burners have been targeting this book to the point where it became the 48th most challenged book in the nation may have had something to do with my high opinion of the book.
World According to Garp. I watched the film version of the famous novel for creative writing class recently, and I liked it very much, from the beginning where he is a baby floating around to the tune of The Beatles' "When I'm 64" to the end where Garp becomes a crusader against a militant feminist organization called the Ellen Jamesians, who cut out their own tongues in solidarity with a rape victim, who herself is appalled with them.

Quote of the Day: "Burned! I didn't think people burned books any more. Only Nazis burn books."
_______Nancy Garden

Link of the Day: Strange old Newspaper Ads.

Issue 77

News: Teach what controversy?
The more that one looks at the intelligent design/evolution debate, the more one hears the phrase "teach the controversy." The basic meaning behind this phrase is that the creationists seem to be under the misaprehension that scientific support for evolution is falling and that support for creationism is rising, thus students have a right to know about creationism, because it may become the main belief of the scientific community in a short time. There is only one problem with this idea: It's absolutely bogus. One major reason this is so is because scientists no longer need to debate whether evolution is in fact occurring because by this point in time, scientists already have enough evidence to see that evolution does, in fact, occur. By now, one should know that I believe that the evidence for evolution greatly outweighs that of intelligent design, and certainly outweighs that of Young Earth Creationism. The main supporters of this phrase call themselves the Discovery Institute, who also maintain a list of roughly 300 scientists who apparently doubt evolution, although the language that the signatories had to agree to is vague, stating things like "random changes" are "dangerous", which may or may not be a poorly worded reference to Evolution being a dangerous idea. This petition has been spoofed by the NCSE's Project Steve, whose signed statement is less ambiguous about evolution, and has almost 700 signatories, all of whose first names are a variation of "Stephen". The implication here is that if a poorly worded statement about evolution can only muster 300 signatures, and a more consise statement among people with more or less the same name gets twice as many signatures, there is clearly no controversy to teach, except those of parents who are angry because it doesn't exactly line up with their religious beliefs.

Band Name of the Day: The Righteous Sinners. Oxymoronic phrases always make good band names.

Film Idea of the Day: American Band. In the film, a national battle of the bands takes place on the township, county, state, and national levels. This mostly focuses on the county levels of the American Band battle of the bands, specifically Cook County. The Niles Township representative band the MegaMinis, as a joke, spike the drink of the singer of a rival band with something which makes his voice sound like Tom Waits. After the audience laughs at him, the rival band's manager decides to ensure victory by any means necessary, including by murder. Fortunately, they manage to solve the problem and win the contest.

Film Review of the Day: Aqua Teen Hunger Force Colon Movie Film For Theaters. This movie has a very long and convoluted plot which involves aliens, french fries, Phil Collins' "In the Air Tonight", an Immortal piece of exercise equipment, and lofts on the South Jersey Shore. Despite this complicated plot, this must be one of the best movies I have ever seen in a theatre.

Quote of the Day: "We are drawn to the unescapable conclusion that Mr. Keeler writes his peculiar novels merely to satisfy his own undisciplined urge for creative joy."
_________The New York Times

Link of the Day: The website of a writer who writes the strangest horror fiction imaginable.

New Tract: Free At Last, an all-black version of Jack's recent and surprisingly Becketesque tract Set Free.

Issue 76

News: Six Million is an Understatement II: Electric Boogaloo.
I'm sorry for not writing last week, but I was busy recovering from a big chest cold. Anyway, I am going to write about something which shocked me in the news. I wasn't sure whether it was true or false or not due to its date being so close to April Fool's day, but I read a repost of a story from the online edition of The Daily Mail on the Newspeak Dictionary forums, that, in England, more and more schools are dropping teaching history lessons Holocaust (one of the most crucial events of the last 100 years). Apparently, the reasoning behind this is that England's growing Muslim population is being taught in mosques that it didn't happen (which is complete and utter bull to the point where it makes creationism seem plausible). As some of you readers know, I loathe political correctness, and the fact that it allows the truth to be covered up just to pander to the sensibilities to a few people, viz a case like this. In addition to failing to cover the Holocaust, other events like the Crusades have also not been taught. I must say here that, gortunately, this in no way seems to apply to American schools, and that my history teacher didn't fail to talk about either the Crusades (surprisingly for a Catholic school, not lionizing the crusades) or The Holocaust (his grandfather apparently went undercover in Auschwitz) in great detail.

Band NAme of the Day: The MegaMinis: See Film idea below.

Film Idea of the Day: American Band. This film idea is based around the idea of a nationally televised battle of the bands. Most of the film will take place in the Cook County preliminaries for said contest, and will center around the Niles Township representative American Band: The MegaMinis. After a seemingly disastrous performance of the first band, wherein the singer's voice suddenly became Tom Waitsish, its manager goes ballistic and begins to ensure that they win, by ruining the performances of the other bands (lethally and otherwise) , but the MegaMinis uncover the plan and put an end to it.

Film Review of the Day: Catch-22. I saw this film recently and found it very interesting: A darkly comedic examination of a pilot who tries to pass for insane to get out of flying missions, and his fellow soldiers, like Maj. Major M. Major (Yes, all four names are really "Major") . My favorite scene is one between a 107-year old man who owns a brothel and claims that Italy will always be because it always loses wars, and Lt. Nately (played by Art Garfunkel in an early role). A quote from said scene is reproduced below.

Quote of the Day: Nate Nately: "You Talk Like a madman."
Old Man: "But I live like a sane one."
___from Catch-22

Link of the Day: AMV Hell: a collection of short films consisting entirely of short skits and songs mixed with Anime.

Issue 75

News/Film Review of the Day: Did he Do The Right Thing?
I recently saw the movie Do the Right Thing and I must say it was certainly a brilliantly made film. If you have not yet seen the movie, I would either suggest you A: Go to the nearest video store and rent it, or B: Scroll down to the Band Names Section. Anyway: In the movie, A black radical named Buggin Out organises a boycott of a local pizza parlor (Sal's Pizzeria) because its wall of fame only includes Italian-American celebrities, despite the parlor's clientele being almost exclusively Black. The only person to join the radical in his boycott is a young man, Radio Raheem, who got banned from the parlor because he wouldn't turn down his music. Near the end the movie, Buggin Out and Raheem come out threatening to fight with him unless he puts some photos of black celebrities, while Raheem blasts "Fight The Power." After he has enough, Sal smashes the boombox and calls out the police. When the police come, they kill Raheem, thus pushing the character Mookie (played by director Spike Lee) over the edge, throwing a trashcan through the window of the Pizzeria, inciting a riot which destroys it beyond recognition. With this and the two quotes reproduced at the end in mind, the big question which has been in the mind of virtually every person who viewed the film is "Did Mookie do the Right Thing?" Spike Lee noted that he did do the right thing because he acted out of anger over the death of Raheem. First of all, it would seem to me that when Sal got angry, he was doing the right thing because he was basically trying to do his job, but after the police's situation got out of hand, it becomes clear that when chucking the trashcan, another question must be asked "What else could he do?" I believe that violence is only justified in the event of self-defense, as if the defensive party will have h(is/er) life in serious danger unless he does something, and in that case, with the death of a relatively innocent person, there was not much else that could be done. Phew. That was a tough one.

Band Name of the Day: Toxteth O'Grady, USA. From The Young Ones, he once stuck 604 marshmallows up one nostril and had the world's most sticky bogey.

Film Idea: Are You Ready For the Summer? A seventh grader runs from home and meets up with some unsavory characters, including an ex-teacher who became a Hilary Duff Stalker after a minor stroke which only left him with a different accent, the parents of his only female friend, who show him the hard way that his friend is really male, and (more sympathetically) a senile Blues player who inspires him to return home by giving a convoluted speech about trains, other old Bluesmen (real and fictional), and bludgeonings. Huck Finn meets Waking Life.

Quotes: (Both From the Movie mentioned earlier)
"Violence as a way of achieving racial justice is both impractical and immoral. It is impractical because it is a descending spiral ending in destruction for all. The old law of an eye for an eye leaves everybody blind. It is immoral because it seeks to humiliate the opponent rather than win his understanding; it seeks to annihilate rather than to convert. Violence is immoral because it thrives on hatred rather than love. It destroys a community and makes brotherhood impossible. It leaves society in monologue rather than dialogue. Violence ends by defeating itself. It creates bitterness in the survivors and brutality in the destroyers."
_________________Dr King.

"I think there are plenty of good people in America, but there are also plenty of bad people in America and the bad ones are the ones who seem to have all the power and be in these positions to block things that you and I need. Because this is the situation, you and I have to preserve the right to do what is necessary to bring an end to that situation, and it doesn't mean that I advocate violence, but at the same time I am not against using violence in self-defense. I don't even call it violence when it's self-defense, I call it intelligence."
_________Malcolm X

Link of the Day: The Worst album covers of all time.

A special April 1 Massage.

Dear Maggots/My Fellow Lords and Peacocks,
It is my responsibility to tell you that I will no longer be updating the blog which you are reading regularly because I have an obligation to the Campaign of White Satan for Insert Random Elected Office Here. I am amazed that a person of my age has been elected to help a person (?) such as White Satan gain office when I am still to young too vote for him, and I suppose it speaks to my maturity that I of all 17-year olds have been appointed to a campaign. In short, Rapper Truces, Hustler Preachers who have no idea whatsoever as to what in the Flip they are talking about, and in(s)ane publicity stunts will ensue.
Ewige Blumenkraft /Sincurely Yours/ Minimally Turquoise,
Breece D'J Pancake.