Farethee well Michael, you creepy bastard

People who write off the king of pop because of the child abuse allegations have missed the mark. I think most people who ever watch his rare post 90's press appearances can agree MJ was bat shit insane by then. Its sad that after putting in all the work into staging his comeback, he died.

I'm not looking to wax philosophical, or gossip about the bizarre circumstances of Jackson's death, but I do have one thing to share with you all...

A somewhat rare MTV short piece-milled together from footage from a lesser known anime called Mighty Space Miners. This is one of several Cartoon Sushi shorts(I briefly discussed this MTV animated anthology a month or five ago in the entry entitled "Cartoons") that were made this way, collectively known as UltraCity 6060. Clips are cut up, poorly dubbed and displayed out of context to mixed effect. This is one of the better ones. I like to think of it as what would have happened had things not gone south for Michael in 2003.

I present UltraCity 6060: Planet Jackson

What I love most is Quincy Jones in the clip looks like a white Quincy Jones. I read somewhere that computer is supposed to be Donnie Osmond or something.

More new stuff, still no posts

Right now the only thing hindering uploads is the absence of my computer. Since I rip music from it, it is obviously the second most important element of the sharing process.(after the record/cd/tape, of course). But when it comes back, I'll have a lot of stuff for the summer. Lot of CD rips, and some cool vinyl rips, and a sampler from this baby-

Yep, the Dolcim LP, Guillotine Ride finally hit, just in time for tour. I spent a lot of time this weekend hanging out with my friend Jonathan and Sean(Dolcim's bass player), who is a mutual friend through different circles from many moons ago. Dolcim is heading out on their first tour(today, I think) which is also their first European tour. Doing it up Gorilla Biscuits style, I guess. Needless to say, Sean hooked us up with the CD-R of the 12", and two copies of his solo project, Kafka on the Shore, which is pretty much amazing. Its all instrumental, and is available on tape only at the moment. I'll also be posting up a few select tracks for you at a later date as well.

I also got some other cool records, such as the Urusei Yatsura Drama Special 12" from Japan. Urusei Yatsura is a much beloved Japanese anime TV show from the 80's, and if you like Japanese culture, its probably the best series representation out there. Its full of humor that most non Japanese would have no hope of comprehending if not for extensive translation notes, a familiarity with the language, and too much exposure to Japanese pop culture, history, folklore, etc. As a terminal nerdking, I can say I dig this enough to buy a mint condittion copy of the record and pay for the shiping from Hokkaido. Since there are only two tracks of music (the rest being a promotional radio drama for the second season of the show, in which the important parts of season one are recapped) I'll only be putting up those tracks. Also to come are a metric buttload of 7"s and a smattering of 12" records.

Still more exciting for me is that I am going to be doing some music stuff of my own. Jonathan came to me about two weeks ago with a plan to write and record an album of predominantly instrumental bits. I've been roughing out some guitar parts for the last week, and I think we'll have the rest of the first song written out by the weekend. I'm doing all the guitar and bass, While Jonathan will be doing some percussion, keys, and horn. We'll be bringing in some friends to help as some of the ideas are a little out of our reach as musicians. Mostly it will be some more complicated drum parts that I can write, but not perform(I honestly can't play drums at all... not one single rhythm). And since we happen to be good friends with a pretty damn talented session drummer, He'll be assisting us at points.

The project is called Imperialism After Dark, and we plan to incorporate some familiar bits of pop culture into our music as short melodic fills, modified drum beats, or just jumping off points with little to do with the original works, as has become the case of the song I'm currently churning out.

We have no idea as to when or how the release of this stuff will go down, and the planning isn't all there. Its one of those things where if we don't just get up, rush headlong into it, the thing will go on a dusty shelf of aborted projects, along with a ska punk band, a feature film, a Le Mons race team, and a zine. Its a do or die situation.

More to come-- Stay tuned

Cartoons...

. . . have always captivated me. I never grew out of them, and I don't mean "I watch Adult Swim, and think the cartoons are edgy." Don't get me wrong, Adult Swim has done some pretty awesome stuff for cartoons in the eye of the general public, and some of the stuff on the show has really sort of pushed some limits. 12 oz. Mouse comes to mind, ushering in some of the stuff that now comes across as bat-shit insane, such as Superjail, which I love.

Yet so much of these cartoons really are no more weird or bizarre than the cartoons of the late 80's and 90's that were just sort of off the deep end at times. Some older readers may recall that in the 90's and early parts of this decade, MTV seemed to have a deep interest in animation. Many remember the seminal series such as Bevis and Butthead, Daria, Celebrity Deathmatch, and Aeon Flux.

I would say (and I only speculate in the case of the latter most, because I have yet to see it) that these titles live on for good reason, but I daresay many people have long since forgotten shows such as Liquid Television, Oddities, and Cartoon Sushi.These three series were anthologies of typically short cartoons, and often gave rise to other more popular series, such as Bevis et al. and Aeon Flux. But mostly, the segments were one off projects that showcased new faces in animation. Oddities showcased only two cartoons as I recall, both action cartoons, “The Head” and an adaptation of The Maxx comic series. At the time these shows were on the air, my local cable provider either did not offer MTV in expanded basic, or my folks had blocked the station. I eventually caught these shows either as late night reruns several years later or at my grandmother’s house on spring and summer breaks. I have begun looking for videos of these to share for your enjoyment, and expect to see more of those titles filling in the gaps between record uploads on these pages. But what prompted all this?

I decided to diversify the blog for two reasons. First, my record collection is stagnating with my current unemployment. I did luck out and get a bunch off cool CDs when the station had to get rid of everything, and I did get some new records a while back that I am excited about. But ripping takes time I don’t have during the school months and that leads into reason two- I can post more often without compromising my school work or quality of the blog. So I guess we should get started…



I found Rad Boy and Jack Mac on the New Bomb Turks’ myspace. The cartoon is very much a prtoto Bevis and Butthead in some respects, with similar themes such as underage drinking, which kind of makes a proto Superbad, except the cops aren’t cool, and they die. Oh well. The plot revolves around Jack Mac and Rad Boy’s plans to go to a party, but its BYOB. They drive to the store, steal some beer, and begin rocketing down the highway until they collide with a truck hauling nuclear missiles for the government. Along the way, they run over a dog, cause two cops to get hit by a train, a couple car crashes and ultimately the destruction of an entire city.

Animated by Wes Anderson, the cartoon aired in the mid 80’s on USA network’s Night Flight. Anderson was one of the original Simpsons animators for the Tracy Ullman Show and was occasionally a director up to season 7, and went on to work with Fox on King of The Hill as well as some early Futurama. I think more interestingly, is Archer’s new project as supervising director on ABC’c upcoming The Goode Family, a new Mike Judge creation. The new project sees character designs that hearken back to the caricatures of Bevis and Butthead as opposed to the somewhat more realistic King of the Hill. Since the 80’s, Wes Archer has moved into more of the role of crew as opposed to the creative side of things. For The Goode Family, Archer was brought on to direct the pilot and seems to be on board for later episodes. Expect to see the show in the summer season on ABC.