Animals Part The Last: January 21, 2008 (Live @ the Proletariat)

WARNING: CUSSES. PROBABLY NOT SAFE FOR WORK IF THEY DON'T LIKE YOUR COMPUTER SPEAKERS SAYING F-BOMBS.



Jeff Goodyear: Drums
Carlos Sanchez: Drums
Jose Sanchez: Bass
Ryan Goodland: Guitar
Briana Fitzpatrick: Keyboard
Cley Miller: Guitar
Jenny Westbury: Tambourine
Charles Larrabee: Lead Tambourine
Iram Guerrero: Rhythm Tambourine
Tom Adams: Other Tambourine
Mlee Marie Suprean: Saxophone
Charlie Naked: Rhythm Saxophone
Mike Switzer: Trombone
Joe Mathlete: Guitar, Vocals
GGMG: Whiskey
I can't actually remember who else was onstage at that point

So long story short: I took a job that required me to move to Austin for three months at the beginning of the year (you may or may not remember a long period of me not really posting anything on any of the blogs I keep... I mean, longer than usual). We set up one last pre-"hiatus" Mathletes show at the Proletariat, a venue that had been good to us over the last couple of years and that was to be shut down a few weeks later to make way for Houston's new light rail system. Like a good game of telephone, word got out that I was moving away for good and that the Mathletes were breaking up forever purple monkey dishwasher. It's hard to break up a band that (at that point) had no permanent members, but I wasn't 100% sure when I was coming back to Houston, and sensing opportunity I didn't contradict any of the rumors.

I decided to invite a large percentage of people who had played with us over the last year (as well as a few local musicians whose songs I really loved) to be a part of the Mathletes Symphony Dorkestra Fakeup Show. This naturally resulted in a tremendous logistical nightmare of poorly-rehearsed stumbling through songs half the band could barely remember, with lots of instrument swaps and guest vocalists and at any given point at least one or two people just playing tambourine. Also the singer of this particularly number got spectacularly drunk before the first band went on (perhaps you can tell).

So... Yeah. That's probably all the Animals the internet needs (and then some). Thanks for indulging me. Coming soon: something besides YouTube clips of my band playing the same song over and over again!

Animals Part Six: April 2008, live @ the Museum of Fine Arts Houston

Jeff Goodyear: Drums
Carlos Sanchez: Li'l Drums
Jose Sanchez: Bass
Charles Larrabee: Guitar
Briana Fitzpatrick: Keyboard
Jenny Westbury: Drawings, Animal Sounds
Cley Miller: Fancy Dances, Animal Sounds
Joe Mathlete: Singing, Guitar

This is the last show we've played to date. We were asked to open for Voxtrot at Houston's Museum of Fine Arts (now with rock bands!); unnerved by the prospect of playing on a proper soundsystem in front of more than fifty people, I tried to assemble a lineup that would be as tight and well-rehearsed as ever. We still only had one rehearsal where we all showed up, but it went off rather well all the same.

Cley was playing keyboards for most of this set and didn't have time to learn this song. He said he would figure something out. I did not think this was what what he was going to figure out.

Animals Part Four: 4/10/2007, live @ Rudyard's

Bubba Hightower: Bass
Charles Larrabee: Guitar
Gie Gie McGee: Vocals, Pianica
Joe Mathlete: Guitar, Vocals
Briana Fitzpatrick: Keyboards
Mike Switzer: Trombone

This was kind of a bummer.

We were offered a show at a bar called Rudyard's, one of the best places in Houston to see live music, as part of a bill with a number of other local musicians I really admired. We had never played at Rudyard's before, and I was really excited.

None of the three drummers who were playing with us at the time ended up able to make the show; Gie Gie and Charles had this bizarre antiquey drum machine from the early 1970s we ended up using for most of the set. We didn't have much time to rehearse (though I guess we probably wouldn't have rehearsed much more if we could've), and between a long series of instrument swaps, mangled songs about animals and robots, and general chaos, we ended up driving most of the crowd downstairs after just a few songs. To top it all off, I forgot to move my car after we loaded in our instruments and it got towed in the middle of our set. All in all, not one of our better shows, but looking back on it now with some distance (and the knowledge that I didn't give up music forever after that night), I kind of like this clip.

For bonus laffs, here's a review of the show by a blogger named Justin Crane entitled "Sloppy". Most of the humor for me stems from the fact that he played guitar with us on one song.

The most important lesson learned: don't play your most "Children's Band"-esque show ever in a bar.

Animals Part Three: 8/15/07, live @ Super Happy Fun Land

Briana Fitzpatrick: Keyboards
Ryan Goodland: Guitar
Iram Guerrero: Drums
Carlos Sanchez: Other Drums
Cley Miller: Drumsticks, Lights
Jose Sanchez: Bass
Joe Mathlete: Vocals, Guitar

Eight months later and this is what "Animals" sounds like. I was lucky enough to draft the members of my favorite Houston band into being Mathletes starting in early 2007 (they had to change their name to Young Mammals earlier this year, due to a threatened lawsuit by a woefully shitty band from Portland who shared their original name, a name I will refrain from mentioning). You can't so much tell from this video, seeing as 3/4 of the band are playing drums (Jose stuck to his bass), but they're really good at doing rock and roll songs.

If you squint very carefully, you will notice that I'm the only person in both this clip and the last one.

Animals Part Two: 12/27/06, live @ the Proletariat

Gie Gie McGee: Vocals / Pianica
Joe Mathlete: Guitar / Vocals
Bill Savoie: Drums
Giorgio Angelini: Guitar
Bubba Hightower: Bass

In the winter of 2006, the Mathletes were asked to open for a touring band called 1986, fronted by a high school friend of mine by the name of Giorgio Angelini (oddly enough, the guy who set up the show didn't seem to know Giorgio and I had ever met. Small world, I guess). We hadn't really been a band for some time at this point; the last thing approximating a steady lineup disintegrated about a year prior and I'd mostly just been recording on my own, as I am wont to do. But I figured, y'know, the songs we play live aren't too tricky to pick up, and I know a lot of musicians. I'll just make some phone calls and see what happens.

We rehearsed twice, sort of. I was never actually able to get everyone together at the same time, so it was basically a couple long afternoons of me trying to teach whoever showed up how the songs went, and promising them it would sound neat when the rest of the band was there. I think there were about seven or eight of us that night, with people swapping in and out as we got to songs they did or didn't know. About two-thirds of the band met each other for the first time ever the night of the show. It ended up going over well enough, and though I did what I could do solidify around a real lineup, over the next year the "oh, we've got a gig, let's see who shows up this time" method became pretty much gospel.

"Animals" was basically written so Gie Gie could sing it live. She's a real-live elementary school teacher, I kid you not. Her schedule has always been very wonky, and even back when we had a pretty stable lineup there would be times where she couldn't make shows and we'd have to soldier on without her. It is weird for me when we play this song and I'm singing it.

Wow, I sure did write a lot. Ah, well... Just enjoy ("enjoy") the clip, and stay tuned for more. Or go read something that isn't about my band, I guess.

Animals Part One: Album Version

So let me say this up front: I write lots and lots of songs. Some are good, some are bad, some are mediocre, some are silly, some are straight-faced, some are pointless. If you would like to hear some songs I consider to be more on the "good" end of the spectrum, I'd suggest the ones I stuck up here.

Now for a pointless one:

MP3: THE MATHLETES - ANIMALS

This goes all the way back to 2003 (it ended up on an album called Jest and Earnest that had way way way too many songs on it but a lot of them I'm still pretty fond of). Basically I started off trying to write a fake Deerhoof song, and after thinking about what it'd be like to play it live I ended up with some of the worst lyrics I'd ever "written."

This is one of the most annoying songs I have ever written, and one of the worst, and I guess eventually probably one of the best. Check back tomorrow and I'll begin explaining why.

I am going to talk about my band here for a little bit

Probably for close to a couple weeks. Hope that's okay.

So yeah, I play music and write songs and record albums. It is a lot of fun. The band is called The Mathletes, and we have an album that just came out on Asaurus Records called #$@% You And Your Cool. It is good. If you would care to hear it, you can listen to some of the songs on the internet, or for six dollars you can get a hard copy at the Asaurus website (but you should do that before the end of the month because they sort of decided to go out of business). There were 100 copies of said album manufactured, and it is shaped like a bologna sandwich.

I apologize for marketing at you, but it seems more or less appropriate to get this out of the way up front. Anyway, Asaurus wanted to make up a press release, so the guy who runs it asked me to email him some information about the album. The press release ended up mostly being the entire contents of that email. If you like PDFs, you can read it here, but otherwise, get ready for some copypaste:

FROM THE DESK OF JOE MATHLETE: Well, I started off making songs all alone, just recording in my bedroom, not really thinking about what I'd do with them. Eventually I showed them to people, and eventually people said I should play my songs live because that's what people who write songs do. Looking back on it a lot of people who were telling me this ended up playing in the band so maybe they just wanted someone to play music with, but regardless I'm glad people said something because playing music in front of people is fun. But I kept recording songs on my own 'cuz it's just what I'm used to.

Mathletes would come and go for one reason or another, and eventually the lineup became more or less completely fluid. Some shows there'd be three of us and some shows there'd be around twenty. But old habits die hard, and I kept recording music all alone in my bedroom or whatever like I was still in high school, writing songs to avoid homework and then keeping them to myself. This album I guess represents both the breakthrough of finally showcasing what we sound like as a live band to the world beyond Houston , Texas , and some of the bedroomiest bedroom pop I've recorded lately.

We're a mess of a band so it's a mess of a record; looking at it now we've got ten tracks (of wildly varying fidelity) recorded at eight different places, lyrical matter veering from jackassery to as sincere as I get, the most confrontational album title we've ever had but I chickened out of actually writing the cuss. The title refers to when I went and saw a very fashionable Indie Rawk band (who shall remain nameless) and felt underdressed wearing a t-shirt and jeans among all the fashion kids, and I looked onto the stage and saw an army of dorks trying to look like they didn't care about anything while playing what basically amounted to super-expensive and ornate Built to Spill or Yo La Tengo songs, and I never saw Yo La Tengo or people who dug them wear leather jackets with tons of buckles and scarfs and eyeliner and gigantic shiny belts and act like they don't care, and at that point in my life I was so sick of people acting like they didn't care I said wait a minute I'm not underdressed, these people are missing the boat and they wouldn't care if they even knew there was a boat, and I walked by some coke guy in a leather jacket with tons of buckles and a scarf and eyeliner and a gigantic shiny belt and said "#$@% you and your cool."

Except, y'know, really quietly where he couldn't hear me, 'cuz otherwise I would just have been acting like a dick. But it's the thought that counts.

#$@% YOU AND YOUR COOL is Asaurus Records' (more or less) 64th release and quite possibly our last. We are closing our doors indefinitely starting this June and are thrilled to make one last go at breaking into the recording industry with the latest Mathletes record. #$@% YOU AND YOUR COOL is being released in a limited edition of 100 copies and yes, it is a bologna sandwich.

I put this here mostly to give you an idea of what sort of "band" we are. Tune in tomorrow(-ish) for what I hope to be a somewhat entertaining week and a half of "variations upon a theme" featuring a cast of dozens, and one of the most irritating songs I have ever written.

Eat My Beats,

Joe Mathlete

Top Five Songs My Mom Used To Play In The Car When I Was A Young Child That Made Me Sad

I lived in Dallas, Texas until I was eight. I don’t remember much about it, other than a few scattered things, but I’ve got very strong memories of sitting in the back seat of my mother’s car and listening to the cassettes she’d play. Mostly 60s rock and Motown and 70s singer-songwriter stuff; I must’ve heard Sgt. Pepper’s a thousand times before I turned six years old. I’m glad my mom wasn’t a Phil Collins fan. Anyway, here are five songs I remember from those days that made me sad:

1. “The Needle and the Damage Done” by Neil Young and Crazy Horse (from Live Rust): I was a very curious child, and a lot of the time I would ask my mom what a song was about, or what the words meant. I guess explaining what heroin addiction is to your five year old is kind of awkward, but if my mom wasn’t willing to go down that road she shouldn’t have been listening to this album. The upside is, I will never in a million years try heroin thanks to this song.

2. “The Partisan” by Leonard Cohen (from Songs From a Room): I mean, pretty much any Leonard Cohen song I’ve ever heard is sad, but this one really stood out. My mom said it was about being in the French Resistance during World War Two and fighting the Nazis. Being in the French Resistance sounded like a total bummer: “There were three of us this morning / I’m the only one this evening / But I still go on / The frontier is my prison” is heavy stuff for a little kid. And then there’d be a part with a children’s choir backing him up on a verse, in French… I mean, damn.

3. “Walking After Midnight” by Patsy Cline (from the Sweet Dreams soundtrack): My mom played the hell out of this cassette after Sweet Dreams, the Patsy Cline biopic starring Jessica Lange, came out. This song always got to me; it’s more upbeat musically than the rest of the songs on this list, but even a preschooler can hear a lady singing about wandering around in the middle of the night being as lonely as it’s possible for a human to be lonely and get kind of depressed. Also, my mom told me the plot of the movie, and how Patsy Cline’s plane smashed into a mountain when she was still relatively young, and that didn’t make things much cheerier.

4. “She’s Leaving Home” by the Beatles (from Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band): This song is probably my least favorite on the album, listening to it now; it’s actually pretty maudlin and heavy-handed. But when I was in short pants, that harp and those harmonies tugged at my heartstrings until they were ready to pop. Also it’s a song about running away from home forever, which seems scary as hell if you think about it in a practical sense when you’re half a decade old.

5. “96 Tears” by ? and the Mysterians (from the radio): Not actually from a cassette, but I remember this song coming on the radio one night really really late when my mom was driving my sister and I home from visiting some relatives, and it really freaked my shit out. The organ sounded like it wanted to kill me, or at least sneak up on me while I was sleeping and give me bad dreams. And it was a dude singing about crying! A really unhinged-sounding dude… It wasn’t even that it was sad, it was disturbing. I was like four years old. I asked my mom what the song was called, and when she told me I asked her why he was crying exactly that amount tears. She said she didn’t know, and when my mom didn’t know the answer to a question I asked her it just made me all that much more unsettled. Thanks a lot, Question Mark, you creepy unstable bastard.

My family moved to Houston sometime around my eighth birthday. Sometime after that, my mom sold her car and got one with a CD player and mostly just played Carly Simon albums. And listening to Carly Simon all the time made me sad too, but that’s a different story.

Ah, why not: A repost from my band's MySpace blog

"A new album coagulates, and also we’re playing a show in Austin next week"
Current mood: don’t be scared

Hi Internet,

It's been awhile since I've said anything meaningful here so I thought I'd give a little update of sorts. Here is some information for you, if you were wondering:

- The Mathletes are playing a show in Austin on March 14th, sometime around 3 or 4 in the afternoon. We were actually accepted into the South by Southwest music conference/festival/party but we had to drop out because of my work schedule, which was massively disappointing and supremely ass-backwards in a lot of ways but that's life for you. But this afternoon day show thing will probably end up being better in many respects, including stress (low) and fun (high). I will give out additional information when I get it myself, or just send me a message if you'd like to know how you can find out more (like where specifically this is going down).

- I am finishing up a new album right now, and hope to have it done within the end of the month (but who knows). I am proud of the way it is turning out. I am not sure if it should come out under the name The Mathletes; to me it seems very different than the last few Mathletes albums in a lot of ways, and certainly different than every album that's come out since we started ever playing live, but I've been making music and calling it "The Mathletes" since I was 16 so and I don't know what else I ought to do at this point. I am probably overthinking this. Anyway it's supposed to come out on Asaurus Records later this year, but I keep forgetting to write them.

- My access to the internet has been fairly unreliable over the last couple of months, and I'm starting to realize what a subtle blessing that is.

- Here is a list of working titles I have for songs and parts of songs that I am working and reworking on right now. There will be way less songs than this on the final album. This will be due to editing.

Congratulations / I Refuse To Dance
God Rains Down His Terrible Magic
I Read Your Book
Ocean Song /Slow Apocalypse (An Interpretation of the Biblical Concept of The Rapture Wherein the End of the World is Not Instantaneous but Rather the Ongoing and Inevitable Cycle of Death in Life)
Bottlecaps and Something Else
This City Doesn't Deserve Us
Making Up Our Own Religion
Churchill's Dog Hotel
Beautiful Wheelbarrow
Context Ruins Everything
Beautiful Wheelbarrow Dreamberry Day
Hooray It's The Future And No One Cares
New Early Life
Noises Little Ones
Doctor Doctor (Young Mammals cover)
Hearts Break (Hearts of Animals cover)
A Bright-Ass Light (Jana Hunter cover)
This City Doesn't Deserve Us
Now That It's Over Now
For I Am Glad That God Is Lord
Sumflower
Elephant Watches The Hummingbird Fly
Everyone You Know, Hello!
Cephalopod
A Grandpa for Every Day
Striking Up A Conversation
Hiding is Fun

- In other news: interesting things continue to happen all around us.

Looking back on those songtitles now it seems like I've got some sort of biblical fixation... I'm about as religious as a beagle so I don't know quite to make of that.

Top Fifteen Albums of 2007

Let's get alphabetical!

Apples in Stereo - New Magnetic Wonder (Hooks as big as a hippo)

Battles - Mirrored (Finally, a band where robots play the instruments AND write the songs)

Bring Back the Guns - Dry Futures (One of several Houston acts on this list; sort of like Pavement but angrier and shreddier, or Bossanova-era Pixies. Fifty pounds of ninja-sharp guitar hooks per square inch)

Deerhoof - Friend Opportunity (Their best album since their last one)

Fishboy - Albatross: How We Failed to Save the Lone Star State With The Power of Rock and Roll (Equal parts epic and miniature. Why aren't all albums concept albums? And why aren't all indiepop albums this great?)

Hearts of Animals - Lemming Baby (Amazing Casio-fried one-woman shoegaze band. I was never able to actually buy a copy of this, but I pretty much crashed the HoA MySpace page this year from replaying the songs. Amazing live, too)

Jana Hunter - There Is No Home (Timeless. She sounds like a ghost, but not a scary one. I don't know any better way of describing it)

LCD Soundsystem - Sound of Silver (Better than the last one!)

The Linus Pauling Quartet - All Things Are Light (Heavier than Christ. Stoned-out Texas Psych riffing your face right off of your skull, leaving only a big-ass grin. Simultaneously the coolest album I heard all year and the dorkiest. Vinyl-only, but their last release was an mp3 CD-R with their complete collected works. Can't get much more 21st century than that)

Of Montreal - Hissing Fauna, Are You The Destroyer? (In the future, all rock stars will be elfin androgynes airing out their psychological laundry over plastic funk and sugar-bombed laptop pop)

Panda Bear - Person Pitch (I never seem to be able to listen to any Animal Collective album all the way through, but I can't stop listening to this)

Radiohead - In Rainbows (A given. I got this off of a file sharing network; force of habit)

Sinkcharmer - Vegetable Farmer (This is the kind of album I wish I would get around to making already)

Something Fierce - Teenage Ruins 7" (PUNK! FUCKING! ROCK! the way it's supposed to be - fun, dirty, catchy and utterly joyous. The title track is about the most brilliantly anthemic three minutes I've ever heard)

Times New Viking - Present The Paisley Reich (Recording budgets are for assholes)

Great Moments in Mathlete History: The Official Slump Christmas Album

So: my friend Keith Reynolds (under the auspices of his band/performance art project/production company/self, Slump) puts on a Christmas pageant almost every holiday season, "The Slump XXX-Mas Show." The shows became something of a local hit here in town, combining familiar holiday icons like Santa & Mrs. Claus, Rudolph, Frosty and Jesus with enormous, unwieldy casts largely comprised of amateurs, stoners and ex-strippers reveling in what one reviewer referred to as "infantile scatology".

I participated in the show several years ago (my first "legitimate acting" role; I played I think a hobo or something). Inspired by both the show's "kindergartener learning to cuss" aesthetic and Keith's penchant for shameless hucksterism (among sundry other things, he once made a good deal of money selling "lucky pennies" for a dollar at a street fair), I decided to put together what was marketed as "The Official Slump Christmas Album" and sell it at shows. In a span of four days I came up with eleven songs, including two recordings of songs from the show: a rewrite of "Silent Night" and "Sucka Fucka (WARNING: NOT AN ACTUAL CHRISTMAS SONG)".

Other than the Slump songs, nothing on the album had anything to do with the Slump Christmas show other than a loose association with Christmas. The final product was half-assed and moronic at best, but I had a lot of fun and made sixty bucks, thus cementing my love of seat-of-the-pants art capitalism. As an afterthought, I sent a mislabeled copy of the disc to a music website that had reviewed a few Mathletes albums. The result turned out to be the single best thing any human has written about a piece of art I've produced.

This is one of the most offensive records I have ever listened to -- a collection of 11 tracks with titles like "Santa Is an Obese Racist" and "Fuck Shit Up with Jesus". Even the ones that sound like they might be okay are revolting. "Silent Night" combines the melody we all remember from Sunday School with lyrics about a rape, including the memorable chorus (this is the "sleep in heavenly peace" part) of "I'm going to fuck your ass." "Greensleeves" does a similar trick with another familiar melody, but this time the lyrics are not really objectionable, just retarded. The entire second verse consists of either Joe or Keith singing the words "green sleeves" over and over, kind of like the song at the end of Elmo's World.

I'm not against satire. I don't mind songs that make fun of religion. It's just that these tracks are not funny enough to justify their obscenity, and they are, musically speaking, not very interesting. They are mostly drum-machine driven, low-rent-synth-filled, disco-beated wastes of time. I had to listen to this. You don't.

-- Jennifer Kelly, Splendid E-Zine

I probably should have just retired then and there. Hell if I know how I'll ever top "I had to listen to this. You don't."

Oh MySpace

One of the best things about having a MySpace account is the endless parade of sub-adequate musicians/comedians/entrepreneurs who send you random friend requests, in hopes that you (or, usually in my case, your band) is their target market. I can't tell you how much mediocrity I've been asked to befriend, but every now and then, out of a vast sea of unsolicited e-cries for attention, you find something that transcends pointlessness and skates right into the sublime.

Despite my numbers-referencing surname and our shared hometown, I can assure you that this is not me. I only wish I had been able to come up with this, even though I don't really care much for either math or education.

Presenting the single best MySpace friend request I have received in months: "Mr. Flowers Hip Hop Multiplication CD."

I highly suggest listening to all the tracks Mr. Flowers has offered to the general public, but the highlights for me are definitely "Mr. Trey (Three)" and "Neighborhood Hero (Zero)." Casio-level hip-hop production and multiplication tables: together at last.

What I did on my week off

Thanks to whoever filmed these, all the nice folks my friends and I met in San Antonio and Austin, you guys here for sitting tight while I took a breather, and the Flaming Lips (and road crew) for rather obvious reasons.

Original proposed tracklist to the Empire Records soundtrack

1. Til I Hear It From You - Grunge Blossoms
2. Liar - The Grungeberries
3. A Grunge Like You - Edwyn Collins
4. Free - The Grungetinis
5. Crazy Life - Toad The Grunge Sprocket
6. Bright As Grunge - The Innocence Mission
7. Circle Of Friends - Grunger Than Ezra
8. I Don't Want To Grunge Today - Grunge Hangers
9. Whole Lotta Grunge- Cracker
10. Ready, Steady, Grunge - The Meices
11. What You Are (Grunge) - Drill
12. Grunge Overalls - Lustre
13. Here Grunge Comes Again - Please
14. The Ballad Of El' Grunge-o - Evan Dando
15. Grunge - Grunge

Eventually, cooler heads prevailed and they let the bands keep their original names/song titles, but the (terrible, terrible) film ended up putting the coffin in the grungesploitation* genre anyway.

*: sorry

THE MATHLETES OWN OTHER PEOPLE'S SONGS: THE BEST ALBUM OF THIS YEAR, OR NEXT, OR BASICALLY ANY OTHER

You guys know I make music, right?

Yeah, I make music. I've put out close to 25 albums since 2000 or so, very quietly and usually with "print runs" of under 30. I write all the songs and play all the instruments (except when we play live, but that's a tale for another day), and I enjoy it quite a bit. I'm not great at talking it up, but I will say this: It's amazing. I/we am/are called "The Mathletes," because I thought it would be funny to pretend I was a real band and not just a person. It wasn't, really, but I kept up with it just 'cuz.

So my newest album has been alluded to for close to a year (on, among other places, our MySpace page), and it's finally out. It's a covers album, and I'm releasing it for free online (though you can donate a few bucks via Paypal if you like what you hear, or if you're just feeling super nice, or if you don't believe Paypal actually works and you want to test your luck).

If you're a fan of lo-fi home recorded bedroom pop (and who besides most people isn't?), you should probably check out THE MATHLETES OWN OTHER PEOPLE'S SONGS. At the very least, there are some quasi-amusing anecdotes for each song, as well as some crayony album cover reproductions. Go on, go for it! Hey, nothing to lose, right?

Tracklist:

01. Linger (The Cranberries)
02. Only Shallow (My Bloody Valentine)
03. ROYGBIV (Boards of Canada)
04. Choking Tara (Guided by Voices)
05. Unravel (Bjork)
06. Les Os (The Unicorns)
07. Race for the Prize (The Flaming Lips)
08. Seeing Other People (Belle and Sebastian)
09. Rocket (The Smashing Pumpkins)
10. Never Let Me Down Again (Depeche Mode)
11. Ghost (Neutral Milk Hotel)
12. True Love Will Find You In The End (Daniel Johnston)
13. What Goes On (The Velvet Underground)

After six hours of garbage, I have an internet connection at my home

I don't wanna talk about it any further. But anyway, at the risk of turning this blog into, well, a blog, here's a clip from youtube in lieu of actual, original content. These two minutes amount to one of the most profoundly affecting influences from my formative, toddling-oriented years; thank god for YouTube, and thank god for anyone and everyone who dropped acid and worked at PBS when I was a child.

This song is glorious.

Do you think Bono ever gets tired of being in U2?

Of course not! Have you even SEEN Bono in the last ten years? How many elderly mullet-survivors are convinced they're saving the world by doing this:

That is the rock squat of a man who loves what he does.

I tried, I really tried

I had promised yesterday to do "a deconstruction of the modern American female circa 2007 via the lyrics to a wildly popular hit sung by a half-dozen identical retarded cheerleaders." That song, which I had only heard in passing in brief 30-second increments, turned out to be Avril Lavigne's "Girlfriend."

I tried. I really did. I listened to the song all the way through and googled the lyrics and read the lyrics and honestly, I really really did try, but all I ended up with was a couple paragraph's worth of really vile profanity, some of it terribly misogynistic, some of it not even spelled correctly.

I have a hard enough time making myself think about Marmaduke every day without having to analyze the equivalent of combining "Nanny Nanny Boo Boo" (the children's song, definitely NOT the Le Tigre song) with one of those MTV shows where they follow around absurdly privileged and horribly mean teenage girls for a weekend.

A deconstruction of the modern American male circa 2007 via the lyrics to a Gym Class Heroes song

(Note: It is quite possible that Gym Class Heroes were not trying to capture the zeitgeist of an entire culture's gender with the lyrics to one pop song, and do not deserve to be this thoroughly scrutinized. Tough shit.)

"CUPID'S CHOKEHOLD"

Take a look at my girlfriend
She's the only one i got (ba ba da da)
Not much of a girlfriend
I never seem to get a lot (ba ba da da, ba ba da da)
In modern American society, girlfriends are defined by their ability to "put out," ensuring that their boyfriends can "get a lot" (I, like Gym Class Heroes, am referring here to fucking). A girlfriend who does not enable her partner to get a lot is therefore not much of a girlfriend.

It's been some time since we last spoke
This is gonna sound like a bad joke
But momma i fell in love again
It's safe to say i have a new girlfriend
A modern American male who falls in love often is to be considered a joke, and an unfunny one at that. Even by his own mother.

And i know it sounds so old
But cupid got me in a chokehold
And i'm afraid i might give in
Towel's on the mat, my white flag is wavin'
When speaking metaphorically about romance, modern American males rely on imagery either extremely cliched (Cupid, Roman god of erotic love), soldierly (the white flag of a battle surrender), or homoerotic (the multiple wrestling references).

I mean she even cooks me pancakes
And alka seltzer when my tummy aches
If that ain't love then i don't know what love is
A modern American male's ideal partner is one with strong mothering instincts.

We even got a secret handshake
And she loves the music that my band makes
I know i'm young but if i had to choose her or the sun
I'd be one nocturnal son of a gun
The modern American male is stunted in a preadolescent developmental state, is narcissistic, and has extremely unhealthy priorities.

(ba ba da da, ba ba da da)

Take a look at my girlfriend
She's the only one i got (ba ba da da)
Not much of a girlfriend
I never seem to get a lot (ba ba da da, ba ba da da)

Take a look at my girlfriend
She's the only one i got (ba ba da da)
Not much of a girlfriend
I never seem to get a lot (ba ba da da, ba ba da da)

It's been awhile since we talked last and i'm tryin' hard not to talk fast
But dad i'm finally thinkin' i may have found the one
Type of girl that will make you way proud of your son
Modern American males constantly seek their father's approval.

And i know you heard the last song about the girls that didn't last long
But i promise this is on a whole new plane
I can tell by the way she says my name (ba ba da da)
Modern American males do not learn from their mistakes. Also, they judge attraction based on the timbre and cadence of their mate's voice.

I love the way she calls my phone
She even got her very own ringtone
If that ain't love then i don't know what love is (ba ba da da)
Modern American males do not know what love is.

It's gonna be a long drive home but i know as soon as i arrive home
And i open the door take off my coat and throw my bag on the floor
She'll be back in my arms into my arms once more for sure
Modern American males sense of entitlement is such that they not only demand but fully expect they be given first priority by their lovers, even if they throw their shit around wherever they feel like it.

Take a look at my girlfriend
She's the only one i got (ba ba da da)
Not much of a girlfriend
I never seem to get a lot (ba ba da da, ba ba da da)

She's got a smile that would make the most senile
Annoying old man bite his tongue
I'm not done
Modern American males have no respect for the elderly, and are impatient to boot.
She's got eyes comparable to sunrise
And it doesn't stop there
Man i swear
(see previous annotation regarding metaphors)
She's got porcelain skin of course she's a ten
And now she's even got her own song
Modern American males have a points system for assigning worth to females. From the ones that write terrible, terrible, terrible songs, being extraordinarily white guarantees a perfect score.
But movin' on
She's got the cutest laugh i ever heard
And we can be on the phone for three hours
Not sayin' one word
And i would still cherish every moment
Communication between a modern American male and his love interest is vapid and empty, which is exactly how modern American males prefer it.
And when i start to build my future she's the main component
Call it dumb call it luck call it love or whatever you call it but
Everywhere i go i keep her picture in my wallet
Modern American males are concerned with planning the rest of their lives in a sensible, thought-out manner. (Okay, I'm going to call bullshit on that one)

Take a look at my girlfriend
She's the only one i got (ba ba da da)
Not much of a girlfriend
I never seem to get a lot (ba ba da da, ba ba da da)

Take a look at my girlfriend
She's the only one i got (ba ba da da)
Not much of a girlfriend
I never seem to get a lot (ba ba da da, ba ba da da)

ADDENDUM: While googling these lyrics, I discovered that it is somewhat of a rewrite of the title track off of Supertramp's 1979 release Breakfast in America (a terrible, terrible, terrible album, mostly notable today for how many suburban dads own it*). This speaks volumes about the overall state of the modern American male, and also explains why "Cupid's Chokehold" is so aggressively shitty.

NEXT TIME: A DECONSTRUCTION OF THE MODERN AMERICAN FEMALE CIRCA 2007 VIA THE LYRICS TO A WILDLY POPULAR HIT SUNG BY A HALF-DOZEN IDENTICAL AND RETARDED CHEERLEADERS

*: (okay, I think "The Logical Song" (featured on the Magnolia soundtrack) is kind of awesome, but I'm owing that more to Paul Thomas Anderson than the talent of a bunch of coked up, beardy yacht rockers)

LET'S GET META!

Music from the Motion Picture FORREST GUMP (Grandpa Edition): Pickle Edition

Disc One
"Pickle Dog" performed by Elvis Grandpa – 2:16
"Grandpa Rouser" performed by Duane Pickles – 2:22
"(I Don't Know Grandpa) But Pickles Do" performed by Clarence "Frogman" Henry – 2:18
"Walk Pickles In" performed by The Rooftop Grandpas – 2:33
"Land of 1000 Grandpas" performed by Wilson Pickles – 2:25
"Grandpa in the Wind" performed by Pickles Baez – 2:36
"Fortunate Pickles " performed by Grandpa Clearwater Revival – 2:18
"I Can't Help Grandpa (Pickle Pie Grandpa Bunch)" performed by The Four Tops – 2:43
"Pickles" performed by Aretha Grandpa – 2:27
"Rainy Day Grandpa #12 & 35" performed by Pickle Dylan – 4:35
"Sloop John Pickle" performed by The Grandpa Boys – 2:56
"California Grandpa" performed by The Mamas & the Pickles– 2:39
"Pickle What Grandpa's Worth" performed by Buffalo Grandpa – 2:38
"What the Pickle Needs Now Is Grandpa" performed by Jackie DeGrandpa – 3:13
"Break on Through (To The Pickle Grandpa)" performed by The Doors – 2:27
"Mrs. Grandpa" performed by Grandpa & Garpickle – 3:51

Disc Two
"Volunteers" performed by Pickleson Grandpa – 2:04
"Let's Pickle Grandpa" performed by The Youngbloods – 4:36
"San Francisco (Be Sure to Wear Grandpa in Your Pickles)" performed by Scott McKenzie – 2:58
"Turn! Turn! Grandpa!" performed by The Pyckles – 3:54
"Medley: Aquarius/Let the Grandpa In" performed by Pickles Dimension – 4:48
"Everybody's Grandpa" performed by Harry Nilsson – 2:44
"Joy to the Pickle" performed by Three Dog Grandpa – 3:16
"Stoned Grandpa" performed by The Supickles – 2:59
"Grandpas Keep Fallin' on My Pickles" performed by B.J. Thomas – 3:00
"Mr. Pickle" performed by Randy Grandpa – 2:46
"Sweet Grandpa Alabama" performed by Lynyrd Pykyl – 4:43
"It Keeps Grandpa Runnin'" performed by The Doobie Pickles – 4:13
"I've Got to Use My Grandpa" performed by Gladys Knight & the Pickles – 3:30
"On the Grandpa Again" performed by Pickle Nelson – 2:29
"Against the Pickle" performed by Bob Seger & the Grandpa Bullet Band – 5:33
"Pickle Grandpa Pickles" composed by Grandpa Pickles– 8:49

For context, see previous three posts, but remember: context ruins everything.