2005 list!

Hey kids! Here are my picks for the best/worst of 2005! Boy, been quite a year, hasn't it? Tell you the truth, I have trouble remembering when 2004 ended and 2005 began. Oh well. Here we go.

Best shoes of 2005 - My shoes. Yep, I picked up these cool Converse in Eugene. They're cool.










Best movie of 2005 - The best film I saw this year was The Harder They Come with Jimmy Cliff. Yeah, it didn't come out in 2005, but I didn't see it until this past year, so it's new to me. It is the story of Jamaica, shanty towns, music, and one man's quest to become famous, then just saying "fook it, mon," and deciding to become infamous. It is a vibrant, fun, colorful, violent, tragic, and just plain rad movie. And the soundtrack kicks ass.

Worst movie of 2005 - Hmm. I don't remember all the movies that I saw this year, but the worst one I can remember is Two Weeks Notice with Hugh Grant and Sandra Bullock. It was on TV one night. It's not a terrible movie, just a really dumb one. Uh...don't see it.

Best album of 2005 - The best album I heard all year was Neon Blonde's Chandeliers in the Savannah. Neon Blonde is the side project of singer Johnny Whitney and drummer Mark Gajadhar, both from the avant-noise-punk group Blood Brothers. With Neon Blonde, Whitney retains all the theatrical sarcasm and anger he expresses with the Blood Brothers, but he isn't grounded in a thrash-punk base. In fact, Neon Blonde moves so freely between musical elements that they seem to have no base at all. But this isn't simple theme-sampling postmodern pop. Everything is filtered through Whitney's bizarre aesthetic sense to create a completely distinct sound. The songs "Headlines" and "Cherries in Slow Motion" are stand-alone masterpieces. This is some kind of new mutant pop music; challenging, smart, melodic, vicious, yet beautiful. It's kind of like a pretty girl beating you up. With a giant diamond. In a condemned art gallery.

Worst commercial of 2005 - There is a dramatic shot of a rock drummer, sweaty, onstage, counting off on his drumsticks. Then, on the downbeat, we cut to a four-door BMW - a goddamn BMW - driving around some hillsides. Oh, and there is some generic, stupid, car commercial rock music playing to accompany this luxury car rolling through the scenery. When I first saw this it almost made my eyes vomit.

Best quote of 2005 - "What was fresh and new so long ago is now old and dumb." -Alexio Wiseman

Best Western of 2005 - Bayside Inn, 555 West Ash Street, San Diego, CA


Best celebrity moment of 2005 - When Brad and Jen met up with Ben and Hillary in that dark alley and then Leo showed up and ran down Lindsay with his mercedes and then the rest of them butchered each other with flaming broken bottles with poison teeth. In a big toilet.

Worst president of 2005 - I know there were a lot of presidents doing their thing this year, but president Bush just keeps on suckin'.

Best book of 2005 - I'm not sure when it was released, but this year I read and enjoyed A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers. I don't read a lot of books, but that just goes to show how good this one is; it actually held my interest the whole way through. The most refreshing part is how immediate and free the writing is. I just love how Eggers disregards every narrative rule they try to teach you in school. You see, kids? Writing is about telling a story. Not about run-ons and proper form.

Best random pretty girl of 2005 - Rina Uchiyama. C'mon, you know me.


Best game of 2005 - Harvest Moon: Back to Nature on the Playstation. Once again, this didn't come out in 2005. But during this year, this game was my second life. And in this second life, I am successful, and happy, and prosperous, and all the things that I am not in my first life.

Worst hurricane of 2005 - Definitely hurricane Rita. I mean, gosh. All that water was blown around, and....No, wait. Katrina! Yeah, on second thought, Katrina was the worst hurricane. Duh.

Best 2005 list of 2005 - This one, beeyatches.
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Merry Christmas space!











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I heard it on the radiogram!

So I changed the look and the name. 'The Flying Wheel' was intended to be a temporary placeholder anyway. But here is a picture of Mia Matsumiya of Kayo Dot to make the transition more, um, smooth.


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The Taste's Photo Adventure!

If you have been paying attention to me, then you know that my band The Taste has played two shows in the last couple weeks- one at Loveland, then one at the Tonic Lounge this past weekend. In addition to rocking people's heads, much merriment was had at Aaron's house, which has become a veritable cool dude headquarters housing the peerless personalities of Luke, Joel, Alexio, James, and Will (and Aaron, of course). Today upon returning home from Portland I made my camera vomit upon my hardrive all the pictures I took. In addition, our band's self-appointed photographer Rob got a bunch of good shots. Oh, and then yesterday, the morning after our show at Tonic, the heaven's rained snow upon the city of Portland. It could be a Christmas miracle...even though it isn't Christmas, and then we were snowed-in.

pondering with the English boy.



This English boy is pondering "Strip clubs present an interesting paradox; a kind of power stuggle, if you will. On the one hand, it is a man-run institution, and the businesses are usually managed by men. It is the man being catered to and entertained. On the other hand, however, it is the women who assume the dominant role. They are elevated to a higher status, both contextually and literally, as the stage places them above the male clients. The men offer up their money hoping to get a little extra attention or a better show, sitting wide-eyed and panting like pups. Thus it is a bit difficult to say who is really in charge, the birds or the blokes. Ah, no matter then! Come, let us have some tea."
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loose, echoey, sad, beautiful.

Where do you think Destroyer fits into the North American music scene?

"In the far corner, face to the wall."

I found this little interview with Destroyer (Dan Bejar) and thought I would direct you to it. It's not very recent and the author's little story at the beginning is a bit hokey, but I like Destroyer's music, and I like what he has to say about his own sound and his mostly unnoticed place in the modern music world.
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live at the Fillmore...
























Poster art by Me.
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and the gumball cracks.


Paul Klee, "The Place of the Twins"

If you will recall, when I finished my album Synestheseus I mentioned a couple songs that didn't make it on because of techinical difficulties (meaning I either didn't have the proper equipment or the proper equipment wasn't working like it should at the time). Those incomplete songs have remained as mp3s on my computer, being shuffled around and swept up into various files. So yesterday I came across the base instrumental I made for a song called Twin Study, and I decided to finally finish the damn thing. I don't have my electric guitar, my amp, or a proper microphone, so I had to rely on my wits and experimentation. I've put it up on the myspace page.

Yeah, it's a wierd song, but what else would you expect from me? At the time I wrote it, I was inspired by twins and people who's names sounded like 'twin'. Oh, and twin study refers to psychological research on genetics. Do the song's words make sense of these concepts? Goodness no. Good luck deciphering.
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