What we've become

It seems this blog of mine has quickly become little more than a chronicle of things that I'm sick of. Add another one to the list: Jack White. I'm officially fed up with Jack White. I've been sitting on wanting to comment on this for around a week now, could never get around to it, but the last straw was that performance on the last Late Night with Conan O'Brien. I think Jack used to have fantastic instincts. Now, if he has them, he ignores them in favor of doing something that's unexpected or a forced change of direction to show that he's quirky. First of all, he can't get off this idea that Meg needs to sing. There's an idea especially evident in indie that an untrained voice is an honest voice. But an untrained voice is not the same as an untamed voice. People like Bob Dylan, Roscoe Holcomb, Joanna Newsom, these are voices that are eccentric as far as singers go but make great vocalists. They make their own sound but it makes perfect sense. But then there's people who just can't sing, who generate no interest with their voices, and generally disrespect the entire history of singing with their mouths. It's why I haven't listened to any new indie rock in probably at least a year, it seems like nobody in the genre has any interest in singing anymore. (Do have a new Neko Case coming out on Tuesday, so I am siked about that.) But back to Meg, she just can't sing. And let's face it, Jack is pulling the strings in that band, he needs to let that go. Then there's this performance overall. It was shit. Slowed down "We're Going To Be Friends," had Meg sing and play some toy guitar, phrased it to make it different. Not only do I think it was irrelevant to the occasion, it was just a shitty performance. I can guess at what he thought he was getting across, but he missed. Wide. And there's been a lot of points in his career where you can look at him perform and he looks totally contrived in what he's doing, self-conscious of making himself look a certain way. I guess you can say that's been their whole shtick, but it over the top on that performance. They should've dressed LaBamba like Bette Midler and had him get sensual on the desk, that would have been an improvement. So yeah, stack it up. Last White Stripes record was mainly uninteresting, Raconteurs records are good for about one listen if that, and that awful performance. Jack White is not something I look forward to anymore.

What I do look forward to: what has become my weekend ritual. The last several weekends, every morning I get up and make an oatmeal which consists of this: instant oatmeal, Fiber One, unsweetened vanilla Almond Breeze, pumpkin, sugar-free maple syrup, I Can't Believe It's Not Butter, pumpkin pie spice, splenda, and Reddi-Whip. It's the most amazing bowl of oatmeal I can imagine. Combine that with a cup of coffee and park myself in front of the television for some stimulating viewing. The last month or so it's been dominated by Mel Gibson. Got through all three Mad Max movies and all four Lethal Weapons. Only one interruption, one day I watched Top Gun because the first VHS copy of Lethal Weapon 4 I got was somehow empty. Had to find another one, which I did, and watched last weekend. So I'm all out of Mel now. This weekend it will either be Navy Seals or cartoons. A couple weeks ago I heard the Ducktales theme song on the radio, and it made me want to go download a bunch of random episodes of cartoons I used to watch. So I have several episodes each of Ducktales, Tiny Toons, Animaniacs, Eek the Cat, Cartoon Planet, Taz-Mania, and several more that I need to start viewing. So far I've only really been going for ones that I watched in middle school and early high school. The interest in going back to the 80s isn't really there right now. I've also been mixing in a few live action shows such as Superboy and The Young Riders. If I could find an episode of Catwalk I would be in heaven. Should be diving into those this weekend, and finding more. It's frustrating though, because lately my take on nostalgia like that is that I should avoid it all costs, because it only makes me realize I am very old and I should have other things going on. AND that this and other media has decided to buy into other avenues that make these kinds of shows extinct, i.e. destroying cartoons with technology. Ultimately it comes down to, this stuff isn't coming back and even if it did I couldn't be a child again to enjoy it. And simultaneously wouldn't necessarily want to be but desperately want to have that kind of interest in something. Whatever, I have to shut up now because I really don't want to turn this blog into a diary.

TV on DVD

Semi-random decision for this week: I think I'm going to stop buying TV shows on DVD. Because it's becoming painfully obvious that the only real reason I do that anymore is for the purpose of collection, which seems pretty silly. When I bought the first couple seasons of House and the first four of One Tree Hill it was with purpose. I had gotten into those shows way late and needed to catch up. But every time I go into Best Buy I look at that last season of House and wonder if I should pay for it. I saw every episode when it was on, it's really really unlikely I ever break them out to watch again, so if I bought it I'd really be buying it just to have it. Sort of the same with the last season of One Tree Hill. Definitely had to buy it if for no other reason than to have the cameos from me and the Kissicks. But I bought it in September, and I didn't even open it until December when I had some time and decided to browse the special features. I think my money would be better spent buying shows that I've never seen but there's a good chance I'd like, rather than buying episodes I've already watched. Like The Shield. Had never seen a minute of it, but I'd heard it spoken of and decided to take a chance on it. And now it's a month later and I'm almost into the sixth season. (But, I didn't buy those either. Got the first season for Christmas and after that has been ddownloads. Moral dilemma.)

Other updates: I am horrible at predicting MMA fights. I actually ordered the UFC 94 pay-per-view because the card was so good and it really felt worth supporting. And it really was a good show. No buyer's remorse. But only one of my picks panned out. Machida, who dominated, and who is getting a lot more love now, which is for the good. But I never expected GSP to destroy Penn like that, and really didn't expect Guida to lay it on Diaz. And I had no idea who Jon Jones was, but I do now. Too bad for Stephan Bonnar. Last weekend I also got Lethal Weapon 2 and half of Lethal Weapon 3 watched with my breakfast viewings. Is it just me or do the sequels get zanier and zanier? Probably going to get through the rest of 3 and watch 4 this weekend. I'm still upset with myself that I didn't finish 3 last weekend. I just ran out of time. There were like six times during the Super Bowl though that I thought I would turn it on, but I had problems turning off the game. I wasn't even paying that much attention to it until the 4th quarter. 4th quarter was a pretty nice reward though.

Oh, one thing I'm looking forward to for 2009 is paying a lot of attention to whoever Soulbounce tells me to pay attention to. The last few weeks I've bought (on cd unfortunately) the Jazzanova, Reel People, and Foreign Exchange albums from last year. And I went through all of last year pretty much thinking nothing good was coming out of music, and there's three records that are really great. I also got the new Platinum Pied Pipers (LP!) which is fantastic. I like this whole modern-producers-making-throwback-soul trend that's going on. I can buy into it. Also got the new AC Newman LP. Didn't exactly blow my skirt up, but it's good. Don't think the new one has anywhere near as much energy as The Slow Wonder did or as most of his New Pornos stuff does, but neither did the last New Pornos. I guess it's just what he's doing now. I have to hand it to him, he's nailed his own set of characteristics that make his songs distinctively his. I guess other people can sing them, but there's really no mistaking an song that he's written. On the horizon, just bought an LP by The Points, mostly because a buddy of mine from work recorded it in his home studio. It's pretty good, something I would have been a lot more into back in college. He played me the demos when he was making them and I enjoyed it, so it's worth the buy. Next week I should be getting the live Astral Weeks in the mail, which I'm really curious to hear. And also looking forward to this tribute to Q-Tip mixtape thing Soulbounce reported on yesterday. The De La version of "Excursions" they posted was unreal, so I'm looking forward to checking that out. Mixtapes are something I have to explore more. I don't really even understand what they're all about, but I've listened to a few in the past couple months that have been fine listens.