Today was my day off, so I decided to head to the Metropolitan Museum of Art to see the exhibit Punk: Chaos to Couture. While I enjoyed the exhibit, I have to say that it was a lot more "couture" than "chaos". Here's the press release for the exhibit.
The exhibit, situated on the second floor of the 'Met, started with a brief overview of punk's "Do It Yourself" aesthetic- an aesthetic born largely out of poverty, as slumming Lower East Siders in New York and working-class kids in England cobbled together distinctive looks out of worn clothing and found objects, forming a look which was calculated to shock middle-class sensibilities. One of the first displays featured a Vivienne Westwood designed red "parachute" tunic, paired with red bondage pants with a terrycloth drop seat. Ms Westwood, it must be noted, was one of the designers who shaped the English punk aesthetic in the 1970s, while running the boutique "SEX" with Malcolm McLaren, who went on to become the "Svengali" behind the Sex Pistols.
The next gallery focused more on the New York punk scene, including (hilariously) a mock-up of the men's bathroom of C.B.G.B.- thankfully, the exhibit did not replicate the hideous miasma which accompanied the original (let's face it, the club was a fetid hellhole, storied as it was). As there wasn't a single "fount" of fashion for the 1970's Lower East Side scenesters, this wasn't the most compelling portion of the show. The soundtrack of this part of the exhibit included snippets of such NYC classics as I Don't Wanna Go Down to the Basement.
Following on this was an exhibit of clothes sold at the various McLaren and Westwood run shops at 430 Kings Road, London. Among the infamous designs on display were the "Two Cowboys" shirt (modeled by Sid Vicious here), which was inspired by the gay fetish art of Tom of Finland, the "God Save the Queen" T-Shirt, and the "Tits" T-shirt (modeled by Steve Jones here). Additionally, there was a video filmed at the 430 King's Road shop featuring an individual completely encased in a latex bondage suit, complete with "gimp" mask. As an aside, Malcolm McLaren was fascinated by the topic of submission, and he asked the Sex Pistols to write a song about it, with hilarious results. The centerpiece of this area of the exhibit was a "compare and contrast" of the classic Westwood designs and contemporary designs inspired by the originals.
The next galleries explored four different aspects of the punk aesthetic, starting with "Hardware". This section started off with the safety pins, chains, and studs that adorned punk clothes. Johnny Rotten, in his typical blunt fashion, explained the provenance of the safety pin in punk fashion: “The arse of your pants falls out, you just use safety pins.” The exhibit featured designer clothes with gold faux safety pins, padlocks(Sid famously wore a padlock necklace), and studs.
The second aspect of the aesthetic that was explored was bricolage. This gallery featured plastic garbage- and shopping-bag dresses, and dresses made up to look like they were made out of newsprint. In this gallery, the sountrack featured snippets of Boredom by the Buzzcocks, New Rose by The Damned, and Identity by the X-Ray Spex.
The third aspect dwelt on was Graffiti and Agitprop, typified by the spray painted and stenciled jumpsuits worn by The Clash. Tragically, the soundtrack in this section of the exhibit was ambient music, no Mick, Joe, Paul, and Tory-or-Topper to be heard. Among the current examples in this section was Vivienne Westwood's "Climate Revolution" design.
The last facet of the punk aesthetic touched upon in this exhibit was titled "Destroy", and hinged on the ripped-and-reconstituted look necessitated by poverty (refer to Monsieur Rotten's quote about safety pins and the arse of his pants).
All told, I wanted to see more chaos and less couture, to hear more of the raucous music I love so well. The exhibit was good, but I probably wasn't the target audience. Anyway, here's a video featuring Vivienne Westwood in her salad days on the King's Cross Road:
It was nice to see the Met playing homage to punk, they have a heavy metal exhibit every day.
Showing posts sorted by relevance for query "the damned". Sort by date Show all posts
Showing posts sorted by relevance for query "the damned". Sort by date Show all posts
Tuesday, July 23, 2013
Saturday, January 22, 2011
Revenge is a Dish Best Served with a Side of Corn Dodgers
Uh, before you read this, get yourself to the bookstore and pick up a copy of Charles Portis' True Grit... better yet, pick up two or three copies, because you will want to lend the book to friends and family, and you most likely won't get it back. It's a quick read... I can wait. Good, no need to thank me.
I very rarely view films in the theater- most of the recent blockbuster movies have lacked any appeal. That being said, the siren song of a film version of a novel by one of my favorite authors, made by two of favorite filmmakers was enough to lure me into the local multiplex.
While the two film versions of True Grit are about a fourteen-year-old girl's quest to avenge the murder of her father, the novel is about an elderly woman recounting her quest to avenge the murder of her father when she was fourteen (a subtle distinction, but one which gives the novel a power that neither film can quite match).
The novel True Grit is not a Bildungsroman, the character of Mattie Ross is presented (albeit by an elderly Mattie Ross) as a fully developed individual- a hard-bargaining, stiff-necked, precocious character who pursues her goal in single-minded fashion. Throughout her journeying, her attitudes do not seem to change, although change comes to her in a very literal, gruesome fashion.
The geographic setting of the book is explicit, Mattie begins her journey at her family's land holdings in Yell County, Arkansas, near Dardanelle, traveling to Fort Smith, Arkansas, where her father was killed by a hireling, to obtain his body and to commence a manhunt for the killer, who has fled to the Choctaw Nation in the Indian Territories. The action takes place during the presidency of Rutherford B. Hayes, with the events being narrated at the time of Al Smith's presidential campaign. Much like Sergio Leone's Once Upon a Time in the West, which was released in the same year, the book concerns the transition of a lawless frontier to a settled region. In one of the book's asides, Mattie gives a short account of the Permalee boys Harold, Farrell, Carroll, and Darryl: A family of criminal trash! While Harold and Farrell are killed in the mounted affray which forms the narrative's climax, Carroll Permalee lived long enough to be put to death in the Electric Chair, and not long afterward Darryl Permalee was shot to death at the wheel of a motorcar by a bank "dick" and a constable in Mena, Arkansas.
Another major thematic element in the book is the difference between good men and bad, with Mattie's father being "the gentlest, most honorable man who ever lived" while his murderer is a coward, and trash, with a cur nature. Most of the men portrayed in the book occupy a middle ground, with deputy U.S. Marshall Rooster Cogburn, hired by Mattie to bring the killer to justice, having more in common with Sergio Leone's amoral gunmen than with the sanitized heroes of television westerns. Cogburn switches between the roles of a Falstaffian buffoon, a relentless hunter, a ruthless killer, and a protector throughout the book. Even Texas Ranger LaBoeuf, who joins Mattie and Cogburn, is motivated primarily by the prospect of a bounty on the killer's head, and, in a brutal scene, throws Mattie to the ground and thrashes her with a willow switch in order to dissuade her from joining in the manhunt (and, probably, because she has a "saucy manner").
Hanging over the action like a grisly specter is the Civil War, with the particularly bloody frontier war casting a long shadow. Cogburn is portrayed as a former member of Quantrill's Raiders, and the Lawrence Massacre is mentioned in a pointed exchange between Confederate veterans Cogburn and LaBoeuf:
"I was told in Fort Smith that you rode with Quantrill and that border gang."
Rooster made no reply.
La Boeuf said, "I have heard that they were not soldiers at all but murdering thieves."
Rooster said, "I have heard the same thing."
"I heard they murdered women and children at Lawrence, Kansas."
"I have heard that too. It is a damned lie."
"Were you there?"
"Where?"
"The Lawrence raid."
"There has been a lot of lies told about that."
"Do you deny that they shot down soldiers and civilians alike and burned the town?"
"We missed Jim Lane. What army was you in, mister?"
"I was at Shreveport first with Kirby-Smith-"
"Yes, I heard about all them departments. What side was you on?"
"I was in the Army of Northern Virginia, Cogburn, and I don't have to hang my head when I say it."
While the novel's events allow Cogburn a moment of heroic altruism, the novel is not the story of his redemption. In an attempt to follow up on him in later years, Mattie relates that he had gone north to Wyoming with a reckless character named Tom Smith where they were hired by stock owners to terrorize thieves and people called nesters and grangers. It was a sorry business, I am told, and I fear Rooster did himself no credit there in what they called the "Johnson County War." While not named in the novel, it's possible that Rooster could have been one of the heavies in Shane (veiled fanfic reference?).
True Grit is not unrelievedly grim, there are numerous humorous asides (as Mattie admits, she has a "discursive" writing style), and an absurd interlude in the middle of the manhunt. My favorite humorous passage in the book is this brilliant aside, which is side-splittingly funny:
I was sick the next day. I got up and went to breakfast but I could not eat much and my eyes and nose were running so I went back to bed. I felt very low. Mrs. Floyd wrapped a rag around my neck that was soaked in turpentine and smeared with lard. She dosed me with something called Dr. Underwood's Bile Activator. "You will pass blue water for a day or two but do not be alarmed as that is only the medicine working," she said. "It will relax you wonderfully. Grandma Turner and I bless the day we discovered it." The label on the bottle said it did not contain mercury and was commended by physicians and clergymen.
Along with the startling color effect the potion also caused me to be giddy and light-headed. I suspect now that it made use of some such ingredient as codeine or laudanum. I can remember when half the old ladies in the country were "dopeheads."
You have read the book by now, no? If you haven't, you are out of the will. If you have, read it again- you will no doubt find something incredible that you may have missed. True Grit is Charles Portis' best novel, even if it's not quite my favorite.
Oh, and about the corn dodgers? There are plenty of recipes for anyone interested in making up a batch of trail rations or "pigeons".
I very rarely view films in the theater- most of the recent blockbuster movies have lacked any appeal. That being said, the siren song of a film version of a novel by one of my favorite authors, made by two of favorite filmmakers was enough to lure me into the local multiplex.
While the two film versions of True Grit are about a fourteen-year-old girl's quest to avenge the murder of her father, the novel is about an elderly woman recounting her quest to avenge the murder of her father when she was fourteen (a subtle distinction, but one which gives the novel a power that neither film can quite match).
The novel True Grit is not a Bildungsroman, the character of Mattie Ross is presented (albeit by an elderly Mattie Ross) as a fully developed individual- a hard-bargaining, stiff-necked, precocious character who pursues her goal in single-minded fashion. Throughout her journeying, her attitudes do not seem to change, although change comes to her in a very literal, gruesome fashion.
The geographic setting of the book is explicit, Mattie begins her journey at her family's land holdings in Yell County, Arkansas, near Dardanelle, traveling to Fort Smith, Arkansas, where her father was killed by a hireling, to obtain his body and to commence a manhunt for the killer, who has fled to the Choctaw Nation in the Indian Territories. The action takes place during the presidency of Rutherford B. Hayes, with the events being narrated at the time of Al Smith's presidential campaign. Much like Sergio Leone's Once Upon a Time in the West, which was released in the same year, the book concerns the transition of a lawless frontier to a settled region. In one of the book's asides, Mattie gives a short account of the Permalee boys Harold, Farrell, Carroll, and Darryl: A family of criminal trash! While Harold and Farrell are killed in the mounted affray which forms the narrative's climax, Carroll Permalee lived long enough to be put to death in the Electric Chair, and not long afterward Darryl Permalee was shot to death at the wheel of a motorcar by a bank "dick" and a constable in Mena, Arkansas.
Another major thematic element in the book is the difference between good men and bad, with Mattie's father being "the gentlest, most honorable man who ever lived" while his murderer is a coward, and trash, with a cur nature. Most of the men portrayed in the book occupy a middle ground, with deputy U.S. Marshall Rooster Cogburn, hired by Mattie to bring the killer to justice, having more in common with Sergio Leone's amoral gunmen than with the sanitized heroes of television westerns. Cogburn switches between the roles of a Falstaffian buffoon, a relentless hunter, a ruthless killer, and a protector throughout the book. Even Texas Ranger LaBoeuf, who joins Mattie and Cogburn, is motivated primarily by the prospect of a bounty on the killer's head, and, in a brutal scene, throws Mattie to the ground and thrashes her with a willow switch in order to dissuade her from joining in the manhunt (and, probably, because she has a "saucy manner").
Hanging over the action like a grisly specter is the Civil War, with the particularly bloody frontier war casting a long shadow. Cogburn is portrayed as a former member of Quantrill's Raiders, and the Lawrence Massacre is mentioned in a pointed exchange between Confederate veterans Cogburn and LaBoeuf:
"I was told in Fort Smith that you rode with Quantrill and that border gang."
Rooster made no reply.
La Boeuf said, "I have heard that they were not soldiers at all but murdering thieves."
Rooster said, "I have heard the same thing."
"I heard they murdered women and children at Lawrence, Kansas."
"I have heard that too. It is a damned lie."
"Were you there?"
"Where?"
"The Lawrence raid."
"There has been a lot of lies told about that."
"Do you deny that they shot down soldiers and civilians alike and burned the town?"
"We missed Jim Lane. What army was you in, mister?"
"I was at Shreveport first with Kirby-Smith-"
"Yes, I heard about all them departments. What side was you on?"
"I was in the Army of Northern Virginia, Cogburn, and I don't have to hang my head when I say it."
While the novel's events allow Cogburn a moment of heroic altruism, the novel is not the story of his redemption. In an attempt to follow up on him in later years, Mattie relates that he had gone north to Wyoming with a reckless character named Tom Smith where they were hired by stock owners to terrorize thieves and people called nesters and grangers. It was a sorry business, I am told, and I fear Rooster did himself no credit there in what they called the "Johnson County War." While not named in the novel, it's possible that Rooster could have been one of the heavies in Shane (veiled fanfic reference?).
True Grit is not unrelievedly grim, there are numerous humorous asides (as Mattie admits, she has a "discursive" writing style), and an absurd interlude in the middle of the manhunt. My favorite humorous passage in the book is this brilliant aside, which is side-splittingly funny:
I was sick the next day. I got up and went to breakfast but I could not eat much and my eyes and nose were running so I went back to bed. I felt very low. Mrs. Floyd wrapped a rag around my neck that was soaked in turpentine and smeared with lard. She dosed me with something called Dr. Underwood's Bile Activator. "You will pass blue water for a day or two but do not be alarmed as that is only the medicine working," she said. "It will relax you wonderfully. Grandma Turner and I bless the day we discovered it." The label on the bottle said it did not contain mercury and was commended by physicians and clergymen.
Along with the startling color effect the potion also caused me to be giddy and light-headed. I suspect now that it made use of some such ingredient as codeine or laudanum. I can remember when half the old ladies in the country were "dopeheads."
You have read the book by now, no? If you haven't, you are out of the will. If you have, read it again- you will no doubt find something incredible that you may have missed. True Grit is Charles Portis' best novel, even if it's not quite my favorite.
Oh, and about the corn dodgers? There are plenty of recipes for anyone interested in making up a batch of trail rations or "pigeons".
Friday, May 25, 2012
Cupp, Flynt, Fluke
The title of this post came to me because two of the aforementioned individuals have names that are almost words, while the third has a name which is any one of several actual words. Plus, "Cup, Flint, Fluke" could be the name of a game much like "Rock, Paper, Scissors"- Flint cracks Cup, Fluke envelopes Flint... bear with me people, this post is going to have some digressions and will most likely end up borderline NSFW because of the subject matter (though, to be honest, I am writing the post at work). Before I get to the body of the post, I recommend Substance McGravitas' and Vacuumslayer's (love the title!) posts on the subject to anyone who's reading this.
The Cupp kerfuffle began when Larry Flynt's porn mag Hustler printed a faked photograph of right-wing columnist S.E. Cupp with a penis in her mouth. Besides playing a conservative atheist who goes to bat for religious fundies (of the right sort, or the white sort), Ms Cupp plays a smoking hot "Canadian girlfriend" for trollish right-wing guys. As much as I hate to say it, Ms Cupp is awful pretty, by which I mean she is pretty, but she's absolutely awful. Cupp's basically a Wingnut Pixie Dream Girl... at the very least, she plays one on T.V.
At any rate, some editor at Hustler decided to photoshop a phallus in Ms. Cupp's mouth and to accompany said falselatio photo with some insincere "political" boilerplate:
S.E. Cupp is a lovely young lady who read too much Ayn Rand in high school and ended up joining the dark side. Cupp, an author and media commentator who often shows up on Fox News programs, is undeniably cute. But her hotness is diminished when she espouses dumb ideas like defunding Planned Parenthood. Perhaps the method pictured here is Ms. Cupp’s suggestion for avoiding an unwanted pregnancy.
Stories about the picture surfaced at Glenn Beck's The Blaze website (linked by SMcG, but I'll be damned if I'll link to Herr Beck), and ignited a storm of outrage on the right, oddly enough largely aimed at the National Organization for Women for not immediately condemning Larry Flynt. As Cupp herself put it:
"The National Organization for Women, NOW, will not come out and say, ‘Liberal women deserve more respect, and we are not going to defend conservative women.’ They are not going to admit to that. You have to wonder if they had done this to somebody like Nancy Pelosi or Michelle Obama, would that stand? Would no one make a stink about it? I have to think they would."
Of course, the idea that NOW is on top of every image put out by a spank-mag publisher, and has a rapid-response team to post criticism of the editorial staff is ridiculous on the face of it, but wingnuts aren't known for their sense.
Oddly enough, the fact that The Blaze posted the picture of the graphic graphic, albeit a blurred one, means that many, many more people will "see" the image than would have had they not put it up on the site. It's akin to the Streisand effect- the response ensures that the picture will gain more prominence. Additionally, I can imagine the "Blaze" readers rubbing one out while squinting in an effort to decipher the blurred region of the picture- a masturbatory effort harkening back to their nights watching the scrambled Skinemax signal on their parents' television in the forlorn hope that an approximation of a boob would be discernible through the visual "noise". I imagine that the majority of the sales of this issue will be to the conservative autolotharios mentioned in SMcG's post.
One individual who immediately condemned the picture was Sandra Fluke, who was recently the target of a similarly vile attack by the none-too-bright George Tierney Jr of Greenville, South Carolina. Tellingly, when S.E. Cupp was asked about Rush Limbaugh's non-apology to Sandra Fluke after his disgusting three-day rant, she deemed it "sufficient" (no direct link- story is at Newsmax, and I won't send them hits). It's also sufficient to say that Sandra Fluke has a hell of a lot more class than S.E. Cupp (not to mention George Tierney Jr of Greenville, South Carolina).
Now we get to Larry Flynt- the idea that Larry Flynt, a guy who has made his money by objectifying women, is a liberal is ludicrous... although I'd be willing to reconsider his "liberal" status if anyone can conclusively prove that his "Hustler Clubs" are union shops in which the strippers have generous benefits packages. Flynt doesn't map onto the traditional left-right axis- I'd consider him to be some bizarre permutation of a "libertarian", for lack of an adequate term. In response to the uproar, the loathsome Flynt characterized his faked phote as satire- to me, that statement doesn't pass the smell test... the picture is porn, and Ms Cupp is not a willing participant, therefore, the picture is outrageous and indefensible.
On the subject of porn... porn has been with us since genus Homo wised up. Porn is a vast industry, and it's not going anywhere. While a great deal of porn is misogynistic and demeaning, porn per se is intrinsically no more demeaning to women than, for example, a column by S.E. Cupp. That being said, I think that there should be a certification process for porn akin to that used for coffee, so conscientious consumers can choose coercion-free, sex positive porn which justly remunerates the performers. Porn consumption should be like meat consumption: occasional, and with a consideration of ethical standards.
Both Substance McGravitas and Mark from Newcorpse note that Limbaugh's attacks on Sandra Fluke really can't be compared to Flynt's hit piece on Cupp. Vacuumslayer brings the lulz with the title, but makes a serious point. For sustained snark, this thread at the mothership is pure comedy gold, with "not a gator" knocking it out of the park:
I’m a little surprised (maybe pleased?) at all the people defending Sippy Cupp here, but, you know, somebody put the character “Sarah Palin” in an actual porno four years ago and I didn’t see this amount of denouncing going on. Tactics or is it the shoop itself?
Sippy Cupp uses that same “sexy schoolmarm” look to get attention while claiming that everyone loves her for her “ideas”. Except that unlike Palin, who is extremely sincere about her fire and brimstone old tyme religion (Palin sincerely believes she should get her way and other exist to serve her whims), Cupp is such a fake you can see the peeling paint from the other side of the teevee screen.
How can she be “shocked” when someone “punks” her carefully crafted smexxxxy™ image? She does this shit on purpose because she wants money, money, money and she thinks she can get it out of “teh rubes” who she believes to be afflicted with the old ultra-stupid. She’s a panderer who has more contempt for her marks than Ritt Momney on his worst day. And what’s worse, she’s a bad liar to boot.
Heh, "smexxxxy™" indeed!
UPDATE: I wrote this post between 4AM and 8AM today while on the job since 4PM the previous day, and I forgot a couple of salient points, one of them being a BIG ONE.
The big point that I missed is that, according to the Newscorpse post, S.E. Cupp thanked Larry Flynt for his photoshop:
Cupp: If I could just express a little gratitude for Hustler – and I’m being completely serious here – There is an accompanying sidebar to this story and why they did this to me. And in that paragraph they say it’s because she’s lovely, she’s smart, she’s fine, but she happens to be a crazy conservative, she’s pro-life, and wants to defund Planned Parenthood. And for that she deserves a phallus in her mouth. That is essentially what they’re saying and I have to commend that as being incredibly honest. [...] So I wish that the media entities that perform this kind of misogyny would just come out and do what Hustler did instead of just beating around the bush and pretending to be fair, pretending to be above that.
Beck: So may I translate? I think what I’m hearing you say – correct me if I’m wrong – is that Hustler Magazine has higher standards than the media and the National Organization of Women.
Cupp: That’s exactly right. They are more straight forward. They have uncomplicated this belief system, which exists on the left and the right, that my being pro-life, my political views make this OK. It justifies it and I, essentially, deserve it. That is honesty on this issue I have never seen before.
Besides thanking Flynt, Cupp did thank Sandra Fluke for condemning Flynt. Of course, she did complain that NOW didn't release a statement, but they are so busy fighting an onslaught of Republican legislation that harms women that Sippy's plight is, rightly, on the back burner.
Another thing I want to note is inspired by a comment by Aunt Snow:
Gosh, I am wondering how a righteous, God-fearing right-winger might have managed to stumble upon the image.
I mean - it's not like it was out there in the public square. Anyone who objects to an image in "Hustler" that degrades women would have had to actively seek out the magazine and purchase it.
I imagine that at least one, possibly all, of the Hurr Hurr "Hawt Conservative Women" Righties set a Google alert for "S.E. Cupp porn" and that the information about the picture came up, leading them to make an issue of it. Of course, most people reading the story have asked, "Who the hell buys porn magazines anyway, besides old dudes and winos?" The very notion of walking into a store and plunking down a greasy wad of dollar bills for a beatin' bible is almost quaint, in a sleazy kind of way. Speaking for myself, I get all of my Smut on the internet.
The Cupp kerfuffle began when Larry Flynt's porn mag Hustler printed a faked photograph of right-wing columnist S.E. Cupp with a penis in her mouth. Besides playing a conservative atheist who goes to bat for religious fundies (of the right sort, or the white sort), Ms Cupp plays a smoking hot "Canadian girlfriend" for trollish right-wing guys. As much as I hate to say it, Ms Cupp is awful pretty, by which I mean she is pretty, but she's absolutely awful. Cupp's basically a Wingnut Pixie Dream Girl... at the very least, she plays one on T.V.
At any rate, some editor at Hustler decided to photoshop a phallus in Ms. Cupp's mouth and to accompany said falselatio photo with some insincere "political" boilerplate:
S.E. Cupp is a lovely young lady who read too much Ayn Rand in high school and ended up joining the dark side. Cupp, an author and media commentator who often shows up on Fox News programs, is undeniably cute. But her hotness is diminished when she espouses dumb ideas like defunding Planned Parenthood. Perhaps the method pictured here is Ms. Cupp’s suggestion for avoiding an unwanted pregnancy.
Stories about the picture surfaced at Glenn Beck's The Blaze website (linked by SMcG, but I'll be damned if I'll link to Herr Beck), and ignited a storm of outrage on the right, oddly enough largely aimed at the National Organization for Women for not immediately condemning Larry Flynt. As Cupp herself put it:
"The National Organization for Women, NOW, will not come out and say, ‘Liberal women deserve more respect, and we are not going to defend conservative women.’ They are not going to admit to that. You have to wonder if they had done this to somebody like Nancy Pelosi or Michelle Obama, would that stand? Would no one make a stink about it? I have to think they would."
Of course, the idea that NOW is on top of every image put out by a spank-mag publisher, and has a rapid-response team to post criticism of the editorial staff is ridiculous on the face of it, but wingnuts aren't known for their sense.
Oddly enough, the fact that The Blaze posted the picture of the graphic graphic, albeit a blurred one, means that many, many more people will "see" the image than would have had they not put it up on the site. It's akin to the Streisand effect- the response ensures that the picture will gain more prominence. Additionally, I can imagine the "Blaze" readers rubbing one out while squinting in an effort to decipher the blurred region of the picture- a masturbatory effort harkening back to their nights watching the scrambled Skinemax signal on their parents' television in the forlorn hope that an approximation of a boob would be discernible through the visual "noise". I imagine that the majority of the sales of this issue will be to the conservative autolotharios mentioned in SMcG's post.
One individual who immediately condemned the picture was Sandra Fluke, who was recently the target of a similarly vile attack by the none-too-bright George Tierney Jr of Greenville, South Carolina. Tellingly, when S.E. Cupp was asked about Rush Limbaugh's non-apology to Sandra Fluke after his disgusting three-day rant, she deemed it "sufficient" (no direct link- story is at Newsmax, and I won't send them hits). It's also sufficient to say that Sandra Fluke has a hell of a lot more class than S.E. Cupp (not to mention George Tierney Jr of Greenville, South Carolina).
Now we get to Larry Flynt- the idea that Larry Flynt, a guy who has made his money by objectifying women, is a liberal is ludicrous... although I'd be willing to reconsider his "liberal" status if anyone can conclusively prove that his "Hustler Clubs" are union shops in which the strippers have generous benefits packages. Flynt doesn't map onto the traditional left-right axis- I'd consider him to be some bizarre permutation of a "libertarian", for lack of an adequate term. In response to the uproar, the loathsome Flynt characterized his faked phote as satire- to me, that statement doesn't pass the smell test... the picture is porn, and Ms Cupp is not a willing participant, therefore, the picture is outrageous and indefensible.
On the subject of porn... porn has been with us since genus Homo wised up. Porn is a vast industry, and it's not going anywhere. While a great deal of porn is misogynistic and demeaning, porn per se is intrinsically no more demeaning to women than, for example, a column by S.E. Cupp. That being said, I think that there should be a certification process for porn akin to that used for coffee, so conscientious consumers can choose coercion-free, sex positive porn which justly remunerates the performers. Porn consumption should be like meat consumption: occasional, and with a consideration of ethical standards.
Both Substance McGravitas and Mark from Newcorpse note that Limbaugh's attacks on Sandra Fluke really can't be compared to Flynt's hit piece on Cupp. Vacuumslayer brings the lulz with the title, but makes a serious point. For sustained snark, this thread at the mothership is pure comedy gold, with "not a gator" knocking it out of the park:
I’m a little surprised (maybe pleased?) at all the people defending Sippy Cupp here, but, you know, somebody put the character “Sarah Palin” in an actual porno four years ago and I didn’t see this amount of denouncing going on. Tactics or is it the shoop itself?
Sippy Cupp uses that same “sexy schoolmarm” look to get attention while claiming that everyone loves her for her “ideas”. Except that unlike Palin, who is extremely sincere about her fire and brimstone old tyme religion (Palin sincerely believes she should get her way and other exist to serve her whims), Cupp is such a fake you can see the peeling paint from the other side of the teevee screen.
How can she be “shocked” when someone “punks” her carefully crafted smexxxxy™ image? She does this shit on purpose because she wants money, money, money and she thinks she can get it out of “teh rubes” who she believes to be afflicted with the old ultra-stupid. She’s a panderer who has more contempt for her marks than Ritt Momney on his worst day. And what’s worse, she’s a bad liar to boot.
Heh, "smexxxxy™" indeed!
UPDATE: I wrote this post between 4AM and 8AM today while on the job since 4PM the previous day, and I forgot a couple of salient points, one of them being a BIG ONE.
The big point that I missed is that, according to the Newscorpse post, S.E. Cupp thanked Larry Flynt for his photoshop:
Cupp: If I could just express a little gratitude for Hustler – and I’m being completely serious here – There is an accompanying sidebar to this story and why they did this to me. And in that paragraph they say it’s because she’s lovely, she’s smart, she’s fine, but she happens to be a crazy conservative, she’s pro-life, and wants to defund Planned Parenthood. And for that she deserves a phallus in her mouth. That is essentially what they’re saying and I have to commend that as being incredibly honest. [...] So I wish that the media entities that perform this kind of misogyny would just come out and do what Hustler did instead of just beating around the bush and pretending to be fair, pretending to be above that.
Beck: So may I translate? I think what I’m hearing you say – correct me if I’m wrong – is that Hustler Magazine has higher standards than the media and the National Organization of Women.
Cupp: That’s exactly right. They are more straight forward. They have uncomplicated this belief system, which exists on the left and the right, that my being pro-life, my political views make this OK. It justifies it and I, essentially, deserve it. That is honesty on this issue I have never seen before.
Besides thanking Flynt, Cupp did thank Sandra Fluke for condemning Flynt. Of course, she did complain that NOW didn't release a statement, but they are so busy fighting an onslaught of Republican legislation that harms women that Sippy's plight is, rightly, on the back burner.
Another thing I want to note is inspired by a comment by Aunt Snow:
Gosh, I am wondering how a righteous, God-fearing right-winger might have managed to stumble upon the image.
I mean - it's not like it was out there in the public square. Anyone who objects to an image in "Hustler" that degrades women would have had to actively seek out the magazine and purchase it.
I imagine that at least one, possibly all, of the Hurr Hurr "Hawt Conservative Women" Righties set a Google alert for "S.E. Cupp porn" and that the information about the picture came up, leading them to make an issue of it. Of course, most people reading the story have asked, "Who the hell buys porn magazines anyway, besides old dudes and winos?" The very notion of walking into a store and plunking down a greasy wad of dollar bills for a beatin' bible is almost quaint, in a sleazy kind of way. Speaking for myself, I get all of my Smut on the internet.
Thursday, August 20, 2015
Old Man of Providence's 125th Birthday
Today marks the 125th anniversary of the birth of H.P. Lovecraft, a pulp horror/science-fantasy author who lived in obscure poverty, but whose legacy has, over the past four decades become as vast as an extraterrestrial monster/god. I have been a fan of HPL since my adolescence, as a perusal of my blog will reveal, but I am aware that the man was a racist even by the standards of his less-enlightened age. It's the typical conundrum of the fan- how does one separate an artist's oeuvre from that individual's racism, sexism, homophobia, or other form of bigotry.
There's a great post about Lovecraft on the website of The Atlantic which perfectly encapsulates the complexity of Lovecraft's legacy. Lovecraft was a nativist antisemite who married a Jewish immigrant from the Ukraine and mentored a teenaged Jewish kid from the Midwest. Much of the horror that Lovecraft tried to elicit was rooted in fears of race-mixing or biological regression. His fear of a multicultural society is palpable in one of his infamous lesser works (the idea of Lovecraft feeling a frisson of horror as he passed the anything-but-sinister Ferdinando's Focacceria reduces me to a gale of guffaws).
Not having Lovecraft's hangups and, indeed, being the descendant of immigrants that Lovecraft would have considered "undesirable Latins" or "wild Celts", I find most of Lovecraft's horror tales overwrought and somewhat comical, though at his best, Lovecraft could be genuinely unsettling. Lovecraft did, however, conjure up an "eldritch" image of the universe, with humanity being an insignificant link in a chain of being spanning vigintillions of years and the breadth of the universe, seen and unseen. Given his view of ignorant, beleaguered humanity facing an uncaring universe, Lovecraft's racism is particularly vexing- if we're all we've got, why would we allow our small differences divide us in the face of an existential threat from powers that we can barely comprehend?
There is evidence that, shortly before his death at the age of 47 from intestinal cancer resulting from decades of poor (literally) eating habits, Lovecraft was beginning to engage in a bit of self-analysis. From a 1937 letter to fellow pulp author Catherine L. Moore, Lovecraft lambasted his thirty-three year old self:
I can better understand the inert blindness & defiant ignorance of the reactionaries from having been one of them. I know how smugly ignorant I was—wrapped up in the arts, the natural (not social) sciences, the externals of history & antiquarianism, the abstract academic phases of philosophy, & so on—all the one-sided standard lore to which, according to the traditions of the dying order, a liberal education was limited. God! the things that were left out—the inside facts of history, the rational interpretation of periodic social crises, the foundations of economics & sociology, the actual state of the world today … & above all, the habit of applying disinterested reason to problems hitherto approached only with traditional genuflections, flag-waving, & callous shoulder-shrugs! All this comes up with humiliating force through an incident of a few days ago—when young Conover, having established contact with Henneberger, the ex-owner of WT, obtained from the latter a long epistle which I wrote Edwin Baird on Feby. 3, 1924, in response to a request for biographical & personal data. Little Willis asked permission to publish the text in his combined SFC-Fantasy, & I began looking the thing over to see what it was like—for I had not the least recollection of ever having penned it. Well …. I managed to get through, after about 10 closely typed pages of egotistical reminiscences & showing-off & expressions of opinion about mankind & the universe. I did not faint—but I looked around for a 1924 photograph of myself to burn, spit on, or stick pins in! Holy Hades—was I that much of a dub at 33 … only 13 years ago? There was no getting out of it—I really had thrown all that haughty, complacent, snobbish, self-centred, intolerant bull, & at a mature age when anybody but a perfect damned fool would have known better! That earlier illness had kept me in seclusion, limited my knowledge of the world, & given me something of the fatuous effusiveness of a belated adolescent when I finally was able to get around more in 1920, is hardly much of an excuse. Well—there was nothing to be done … except to rush a note back to Conover & tell him I'd dismember him & run the fragments through a sausage-grinder if he ever thought of printing such a thing! The only consolation lay in the reflection that I had matured a bit since '24. It's hard to have done all one's growing up since 33—but that's a damn sight better than not growing up at all.
In his seminal essay Supernatural Horror in Literature, Lovecraft wrote: The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown. By Lovecraft's admission, he was secluded, and had a limited knowledge of the world- it is no wonder that he was afraid of the "other". For this reason, I look on the man with more pity than contempt- his bigotry was a product of his terror, a terror that insured the two main aspects of his legacy- his cringeworthy racism and his fantastic literature.
There's a great post about Lovecraft on the website of The Atlantic which perfectly encapsulates the complexity of Lovecraft's legacy. Lovecraft was a nativist antisemite who married a Jewish immigrant from the Ukraine and mentored a teenaged Jewish kid from the Midwest. Much of the horror that Lovecraft tried to elicit was rooted in fears of race-mixing or biological regression. His fear of a multicultural society is palpable in one of his infamous lesser works (the idea of Lovecraft feeling a frisson of horror as he passed the anything-but-sinister Ferdinando's Focacceria reduces me to a gale of guffaws).
Not having Lovecraft's hangups and, indeed, being the descendant of immigrants that Lovecraft would have considered "undesirable Latins" or "wild Celts", I find most of Lovecraft's horror tales overwrought and somewhat comical, though at his best, Lovecraft could be genuinely unsettling. Lovecraft did, however, conjure up an "eldritch" image of the universe, with humanity being an insignificant link in a chain of being spanning vigintillions of years and the breadth of the universe, seen and unseen. Given his view of ignorant, beleaguered humanity facing an uncaring universe, Lovecraft's racism is particularly vexing- if we're all we've got, why would we allow our small differences divide us in the face of an existential threat from powers that we can barely comprehend?
There is evidence that, shortly before his death at the age of 47 from intestinal cancer resulting from decades of poor (literally) eating habits, Lovecraft was beginning to engage in a bit of self-analysis. From a 1937 letter to fellow pulp author Catherine L. Moore, Lovecraft lambasted his thirty-three year old self:
I can better understand the inert blindness & defiant ignorance of the reactionaries from having been one of them. I know how smugly ignorant I was—wrapped up in the arts, the natural (not social) sciences, the externals of history & antiquarianism, the abstract academic phases of philosophy, & so on—all the one-sided standard lore to which, according to the traditions of the dying order, a liberal education was limited. God! the things that were left out—the inside facts of history, the rational interpretation of periodic social crises, the foundations of economics & sociology, the actual state of the world today … & above all, the habit of applying disinterested reason to problems hitherto approached only with traditional genuflections, flag-waving, & callous shoulder-shrugs! All this comes up with humiliating force through an incident of a few days ago—when young Conover, having established contact with Henneberger, the ex-owner of WT, obtained from the latter a long epistle which I wrote Edwin Baird on Feby. 3, 1924, in response to a request for biographical & personal data. Little Willis asked permission to publish the text in his combined SFC-Fantasy, & I began looking the thing over to see what it was like—for I had not the least recollection of ever having penned it. Well …. I managed to get through, after about 10 closely typed pages of egotistical reminiscences & showing-off & expressions of opinion about mankind & the universe. I did not faint—but I looked around for a 1924 photograph of myself to burn, spit on, or stick pins in! Holy Hades—was I that much of a dub at 33 … only 13 years ago? There was no getting out of it—I really had thrown all that haughty, complacent, snobbish, self-centred, intolerant bull, & at a mature age when anybody but a perfect damned fool would have known better! That earlier illness had kept me in seclusion, limited my knowledge of the world, & given me something of the fatuous effusiveness of a belated adolescent when I finally was able to get around more in 1920, is hardly much of an excuse. Well—there was nothing to be done … except to rush a note back to Conover & tell him I'd dismember him & run the fragments through a sausage-grinder if he ever thought of printing such a thing! The only consolation lay in the reflection that I had matured a bit since '24. It's hard to have done all one's growing up since 33—but that's a damn sight better than not growing up at all.
In his seminal essay Supernatural Horror in Literature, Lovecraft wrote: The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown. By Lovecraft's admission, he was secluded, and had a limited knowledge of the world- it is no wonder that he was afraid of the "other". For this reason, I look on the man with more pity than contempt- his bigotry was a product of his terror, a terror that insured the two main aspects of his legacy- his cringeworthy racism and his fantastic literature.
Friday, March 6, 2015
Countdown to the Solemn Feast of St Patrick: The Good Coulter
In keeping with tradition here, I spend the first couple of weeks of March counting down to St Patrick's Day. Today, I'll post a weepie that I posted before as a tangent to another post. The Town I Loved So Well, by Phil Coulter, describes the transition of his native Derry from a hardscrabble working-class town with not enough work, to a shell of a town, bombed out by The Troubles.
Grab a handkerchief, you're going to need it. At best, the life that Mr Coulter describes is far from idyllic:
In the early morning the shirt factory horn
Called women from Creggan, the moor, and the bog
Whilst the men on the dole played a mother's role
Fed the children and then walked the dog
And when times got tough, there was just about enough
And they saw it through without complaining
For deep inside was a burning pride
For the town I loved so well
With his talent, he was able to find a way out of the hard-knock town, the dream of many a striver:
There was music there in that Derry air
Like a language that we, we all could understand
I remember the day that I earned my first pay
When I played in a small pick-up band
There I spent my youth, and to tell you the truth
I was sad to leave it all behind me
For I learned about life, and I found a wife
In the town I loved so well.
Upon his return, though, he finds that his town has been riven by sectarian violence and government repression:
But when I returned, how my eyes have burned
To see how a town could be brought to it's knees
By the armoured cars and the bombed-out bars
And the gas that hangs on to every breeze
Now the army's installed by that old gas yard wall
And the damned barbed wire gets higher and higher
With their tanks and their guns, oh my god, what have they done
To the town I loved so well?
The song ends on a cautiously optimistic note, a wish for peace, though Mr Coulter mourns a past which is irrecoverable... so as not to spoil the climax of the song, I'll let you listen for yourselves:
As with a lot of modern Irish music, the song has been covered by a plethora of performers, with Luke Kelly and the Dubliners and Paddy Reilly singing particularly choice renditions of the song.
Wipe your tears, my dear readers, Phil Coulter didn't only write tearjerkers... along with Glasgow's Bill Martin, he wrote this bouncy little number:
You can't cry all the time... especially not on a Saturday night.
Regarding the title, the bad Coulter would be the one perhaps best known for her upcoming role in Sharknado 3.
Grab a handkerchief, you're going to need it. At best, the life that Mr Coulter describes is far from idyllic:
In the early morning the shirt factory horn
Called women from Creggan, the moor, and the bog
Whilst the men on the dole played a mother's role
Fed the children and then walked the dog
And when times got tough, there was just about enough
And they saw it through without complaining
For deep inside was a burning pride
For the town I loved so well
With his talent, he was able to find a way out of the hard-knock town, the dream of many a striver:
There was music there in that Derry air
Like a language that we, we all could understand
I remember the day that I earned my first pay
When I played in a small pick-up band
There I spent my youth, and to tell you the truth
I was sad to leave it all behind me
For I learned about life, and I found a wife
In the town I loved so well.
Upon his return, though, he finds that his town has been riven by sectarian violence and government repression:
But when I returned, how my eyes have burned
To see how a town could be brought to it's knees
By the armoured cars and the bombed-out bars
And the gas that hangs on to every breeze
Now the army's installed by that old gas yard wall
And the damned barbed wire gets higher and higher
With their tanks and their guns, oh my god, what have they done
To the town I loved so well?
The song ends on a cautiously optimistic note, a wish for peace, though Mr Coulter mourns a past which is irrecoverable... so as not to spoil the climax of the song, I'll let you listen for yourselves:
As with a lot of modern Irish music, the song has been covered by a plethora of performers, with Luke Kelly and the Dubliners and Paddy Reilly singing particularly choice renditions of the song.
Wipe your tears, my dear readers, Phil Coulter didn't only write tearjerkers... along with Glasgow's Bill Martin, he wrote this bouncy little number:
You can't cry all the time... especially not on a Saturday night.
Regarding the title, the bad Coulter would be the one perhaps best known for her upcoming role in Sharknado 3.
Saturday, December 3, 2016
Make Mordor Great Again
One of my bloggy heroes is Tengrain, who I often refer to as the 'Patron Saint of Small Bloggers'. He's been a great supporter of not only myself, but of other denizens of this bloggerhood. I have to note a bit of not-at-all acrimonious disagreement with him regarding this post, a disagreement which stems from my disagreement with the Washington Monthly post to which he links... the author posits that Hillary Clinton's campaign failed to point to a villain, but I think that's bunk... the real problem is that a bunch of bigots decided that fellow victims, people much more marginalized than themselves, were the villains. There's a lot of cognitive dissonance involved in, for example, watching a bunch of Mexican immigrants laboring in a field and characterizing them as lazy moochers (a perennial calumny aimed at African-Americans who toiled without pay to enrich their masters since before this country existed), and there's a lot of cognitive dissonance involved in believing that a serial-prevaricator and kleptomaniac would do anything to stop the immiseration of the working and middle classes.
Tengrain comments on the post:
One of the great archetypes of literature and film is the little guy triumphing over evil. From David and Goliath to Frodo vs. Mordor, the best heroes are the everyday, average people, who find themselves in an extraordinary situation and somehow or other win.
The problem is that the Trump voters believed that Frodo is the villain, sneaking over the border of Mordor in order to commit terrorist acts against Barad-dûr and to put the Ringwraiths out of work by imposing burdensome regulations against Evil Sorcery. They voted for Sauron, and he’s going to Make Mordor Great Again.
Tengrain continues:
We on the left don’t tell stories, we recite facts. We believe (correctly) that the facts matter, but we don’t know how to give them context. So instead of telling a story, we implore our audience to listen to and study our earnest 200-slide Powerpoint presentation, and learn from their betters… and we end up wondering why we lost?
The problem here is that the stories, based on facts, are out there... We have facts about climate change, but the story is written in blood and wreckage in the 'reddest' region of the Heartland. We have facts about Obamacare, but the story is being written about the loss of benefits that accrued to impoverished Trump voters.
The problem with liberals 'telling stories' is that these stories, rooted in facts, cannot penetrate the bubble of epistemic closure (NY Times link, so ration those clicks). The potential audience for these stories has been pre-conditioned in their churches, their firing ranges, their right-wing media cocoon, to characterize any 'leftist' narratives as lies, facts to the contrary be damned. The typical Donald Trump voter could be hit over the head by a wind-borne Ford F-150 and still believe Dear Leader's lie about Anthropogenic Global Warming being a Chinese hoax.
I don't have any answers to this dilemma... I just don't know what sort of narratives could convince the typical Red State Trump voter. I am an uber-nerd who attends science lectures in a bar, I live in a neighborhood with a very high immigrant population, two of my dearest friends and mentors are Muslim men, I have friends and co-workers from a wide array of backgrounds, creeds, sexual orientations. There is no narrative I can communicate with a Trump loyalist which wouldn't be seen as suspect. I've spoken to these people, and they tend to reveal their true ugliness to me because I look a lot like the guy in my profile picture, and they tend to see me as simpatico.
Again, I wish to stress that I have nothing but love, respect, and admiration for Tengrain, but I just can't see this strategem working. Tragically, the aggrieved white bigots who supported Trump are going to have to hit rock bottom before they reconsider their support for a guy who is going to further immiserate them. Even more tragically, they are going to take the rest of us down with them, and I didn't sign up for a one-way trip down the caldera of Mt Doom.
Tengrain comments on the post:
One of the great archetypes of literature and film is the little guy triumphing over evil. From David and Goliath to Frodo vs. Mordor, the best heroes are the everyday, average people, who find themselves in an extraordinary situation and somehow or other win.
The problem is that the Trump voters believed that Frodo is the villain, sneaking over the border of Mordor in order to commit terrorist acts against Barad-dûr and to put the Ringwraiths out of work by imposing burdensome regulations against Evil Sorcery. They voted for Sauron, and he’s going to Make Mordor Great Again.
Tengrain continues:
We on the left don’t tell stories, we recite facts. We believe (correctly) that the facts matter, but we don’t know how to give them context. So instead of telling a story, we implore our audience to listen to and study our earnest 200-slide Powerpoint presentation, and learn from their betters… and we end up wondering why we lost?
The problem here is that the stories, based on facts, are out there... We have facts about climate change, but the story is written in blood and wreckage in the 'reddest' region of the Heartland. We have facts about Obamacare, but the story is being written about the loss of benefits that accrued to impoverished Trump voters.
The problem with liberals 'telling stories' is that these stories, rooted in facts, cannot penetrate the bubble of epistemic closure (NY Times link, so ration those clicks). The potential audience for these stories has been pre-conditioned in their churches, their firing ranges, their right-wing media cocoon, to characterize any 'leftist' narratives as lies, facts to the contrary be damned. The typical Donald Trump voter could be hit over the head by a wind-borne Ford F-150 and still believe Dear Leader's lie about Anthropogenic Global Warming being a Chinese hoax.
I don't have any answers to this dilemma... I just don't know what sort of narratives could convince the typical Red State Trump voter. I am an uber-nerd who attends science lectures in a bar, I live in a neighborhood with a very high immigrant population, two of my dearest friends and mentors are Muslim men, I have friends and co-workers from a wide array of backgrounds, creeds, sexual orientations. There is no narrative I can communicate with a Trump loyalist which wouldn't be seen as suspect. I've spoken to these people, and they tend to reveal their true ugliness to me because I look a lot like the guy in my profile picture, and they tend to see me as simpatico.
Again, I wish to stress that I have nothing but love, respect, and admiration for Tengrain, but I just can't see this strategem working. Tragically, the aggrieved white bigots who supported Trump are going to have to hit rock bottom before they reconsider their support for a guy who is going to further immiserate them. Even more tragically, they are going to take the rest of us down with them, and I didn't sign up for a one-way trip down the caldera of Mt Doom.
Thursday, November 25, 2010
Happy Thanksgiving
Thanksgiving is my kind of holiday- we Americans demonstrate our gratitude to a largely benevolent universe in typical fashion- we eat like porkers and drink like hell... but not today. This year, I'm working, but it's a quiet, pleasant day. My sister, her husband, and their two sons will be passing through the area on Sunday, so I'll get some "family time" in, but today, it's all about a quiet day on the job, and a couple of beers when I get home.
Anyway, there aren't too many Thanksgiving carols, but I figured I'd post the ones with which I am familiar. The first is a cute little ditty by the Damned, the B-side to the single "Smash it Up":
While the "Turkey Song" is fun, the reason it's important is that it inspired one of the greatest songs ever written. Apparently, a German fan asked Shane MacGowan if he knew the "Turkey Song" by the Damned, and the brilliant, though addled, songsmith interpreted that as "Turkish Song of the Damned", and wrote a spine-tingling song about retribution from beyond the grave, inspired by a funny novelty song:
Unfortunately, my favorite Thanksgiving song, and perhaps the most touching love song ever written, cannot be "embedded", but no Thanksgiving would be complete without listening to it.
Note: Yeah, Thanksgiving wouldn't be complete without listening to "Alice's Restaurant", but every radio station worth a damn is playing it. I tend to like to post more unorthodox selections. Happy (U.S.) Thanksgiving, all.
Anyway, there aren't too many Thanksgiving carols, but I figured I'd post the ones with which I am familiar. The first is a cute little ditty by the Damned, the B-side to the single "Smash it Up":
While the "Turkey Song" is fun, the reason it's important is that it inspired one of the greatest songs ever written. Apparently, a German fan asked Shane MacGowan if he knew the "Turkey Song" by the Damned, and the brilliant, though addled, songsmith interpreted that as "Turkish Song of the Damned", and wrote a spine-tingling song about retribution from beyond the grave, inspired by a funny novelty song:
Unfortunately, my favorite Thanksgiving song, and perhaps the most touching love song ever written, cannot be "embedded", but no Thanksgiving would be complete without listening to it.
Note: Yeah, Thanksgiving wouldn't be complete without listening to "Alice's Restaurant", but every radio station worth a damn is playing it. I tend to like to post more unorthodox selections. Happy (U.S.) Thanksgiving, all.
Saturday, November 1, 2014
All Saints' Day Damned
It's been a l-o-n-g time since I've posted a video by the Damned. Being a child of the radio rather than the T.V., I never knew that there was a video for the song Grimly Fiendish, from the 1985 Phantasmagoria album. The song's strange, bouncy vibe is served well by an "Addams Family"esque video (better yet, it's like "Grimly meets Gorey):
The Damned's later sound is a far cry from the gloriously raw punk of their early releases:
I missed a bit about a tempest-in-a-teapot regarding members of the Damned turning on the Christmas lights of the city of Cambridge. It makes perfect sense to me, though, as Captain Sensible sang one of my favorite Christmas songs.
The Damned's later sound is a far cry from the gloriously raw punk of their early releases:
I missed a bit about a tempest-in-a-teapot regarding members of the Damned turning on the Christmas lights of the city of Cambridge. It makes perfect sense to me, though, as Captain Sensible sang one of my favorite Christmas songs.
Friday, April 2, 2021
Just in Time for Good Friday, a New Satanic Panic
Today being Good Friday, I figured I'd spend some time on the lastest evangelical Christian persecution 'scandal'. The craw-thumpers have decided to play their greatest hits, and have revived the old Satanic Panic that was all the rage (literally) in the 1980s. Being a Northeasterner, I was insulated from this nonsense, which adversely effected nerds in the Heartland, so my laughter at this bullshit is untinged with bitterness. The Satanic Panic had real victims, though, as smalltown weirdos were singled out, and in one instance, convicted of capital crimes by fundamentalist Christian zealots. It was a bad time, a stupid time, and people who should have known better got involved in spreading the nonsense.
The Satanic Panic, if it ever really went away, came back in the form of rhe QAnon conspiracy theory complex, complete with the tropes of devil worship, ritual human sacrifice, and cannibalism. Recently, the Satanic Panic revival has gone into overdrive with the right-wing backlash against music artist Lil Nas X, whose new single, a standard 'sex and drugs' song, features a video in which the singer visits heaven, then plummets to hell via stripper pole for a lap dance with Satan, who he then kills. This video being insufficient provocation, Mr X paired it with a marketing campaign featuring devil-themed sneakers (eventually blocked by a lawsuit from Nike) featuring a drop of blood encased in the sole (another callback to the original Satanic Panic). Lil Nas X, had an improbable smash country hit a few years back with Old Town Road, originally written as a spoof of country music, but experienced a backlash from the established country music industry. It's important to note that he is a proudly out gay black man, so he has no love for racist, homophobic fundamentalists... they already believed that he is damned, so he embraced it in order to troll them. Truly, he doesn't give a damn what they think.
The controversy over Lil Nas X' video is destined to increase sales, as no publicity is bad publicity. Again, it's funny that the song isn't about Satan, but then again, a lot of the bands caught up in the old Satanic Panic weren't singing about Satan, either. It's just another skirmish in the ongoing culture war being waged by right-wingers who can't run on actual policy successes... it's the evergreen bullshit they always use to rile up the rubes. As I've said before, the greatest trick the authoritarians ever played was convincing the world that the devil exists.
Monday, August 23, 2021
Tailor Made to Push My Buttons
Have you ever read an article which seems like it was written specifically to get a rise out of you, and perhaps you alone? Via Lawyers, Guns, and Money, we have an article from the New York Times Magazine which concerns the development of herbicide resistance in a common weed:
A farmer in Kansas, Nicolet had plnned his season around the herbicide, planting his fields with soybeans that were genetically modified to survive being showered with the chemical. He was well aware of dicamba’s tendency to vaporize and drift from field to field, causing damage to crops and threatening nearby wildlife and trees, but he didn’t feel as if he had much of a choice: Dicamba was one of the last tools that provided some control over Palmer amaranth, an aggressive weed that would quickly go on to choke out his sorghum crop — and that threatened to overtake his soybeans too. “There was a little bit of a moment of panic there for a few hours,” Nicolet said; he was worried that a season without dicamba would mean devastation for his farm.
If there’s a plant perfectly suited to outcompete the farmers, researchers and chemical companies that collectively define industrial American agriculture, it’s Palmer amaranth. This pigweed (a catchall term that includes some plants in the amaranth family) can re-root itself after being yanked from the ground. It can grow three inches a day. And it has evolved resistance to many of the most common weed killers, continuing to reproduce in what ought to be the worst of circumstances: A three-day-old, herbicide-injured seedling, for example, can expend its last bit of energy to produce seeds before it withers up and dies. Unchecked, Palmer amaranth can suppress soybean yields by nearly 80 percent and corn yields by about 90 percent.
This topic pushes my buttons because it involves one of my obsessions, the use of herbicides to kill useful plants... Palmer amaranth is edible, leaves, stems and seeds. It is somewhat toxic to livestock, though, which is one reason farmers might hate it. Amaranth varieties were a staple among the Aztecs, and high end amaranth flour is available.
The go-to guy for eating the weeds is Green Dean, who's mantra is 'Eat the Weeds':
Of course, a weed is a plant growing somewhere it isn't wanted, so the problem is that Palmer amaranth is unwanted, utility be damned. In the comments, my favorite misanthrope, M. Bouffant, posted his typical misanthropy:
You can all yak until you're blue in the face, but the only problem actually confronting this planet is seven billion idiot primates on the loose, who seem to think they have some "right" to eat everything. Until y'all face up to the necessity of sterilizing your entire species it's just gum flapping & misdirected outrage.
The problem is that we don't eat everything, there are plenty of plants we have forgotten to eat.
Monday, June 23, 2014
Television Fan
I'm not a big fan of television, but I do like Television, one of the bands which comprised the mid-to-late 70's NYC music scene. Unlike some of the bands which anchored the scene (cough, Ramones*, cough), Television had a sophisticated musical style, centered on sonic tapestry woven by the interplay of the two guitarists. While the band released two critically lauded albums in the 70s, Marquee Moon and Adventure, they didn't crack open the American record charts (hey, they blasted out the disco on the radio those days). Television's influence does seem apparent in some of the more melodic alternative rock that hits the college radio airwaves, though. Here's a 1985 performance of Marquee Moon's title track by Television co-founder Tom Verlaine:
While the critics loved the band, the feeling was not universal, as this funny number from The Damned amply displays.
*I've noted before that the Ramones, while musically unsophisticated, were conceptually sophisticated- there was an ironclad discipline behind their look and sound, which only seemed primitive, or as the Ramones would put it, D-U-M-B.
While the critics loved the band, the feeling was not universal, as this funny number from The Damned amply displays.
*I've noted before that the Ramones, while musically unsophisticated, were conceptually sophisticated- there was an ironclad discipline behind their look and sound, which only seemed primitive, or as the Ramones would put it, D-U-M-B.
Friday, April 7, 2017
Bombing, Not Even Three Months In
Back in December, when asked by my friend Frenchie, who (naturally) is Italian, if I thought that Trump would launch a nuke, I replied that I didn't think he would, but that he would attack Iran, a long-held Republican fantasy. While this hasn't come to pass, Trump's Tomahawk missile barrage on a Syrian airfield occurred not even three months into his presiduncey. This new policy on Syria contradicts Trump's old attitude toward President Obama's potential courses of action in Syria... I guess that the Kenyan Usurper's use of America's penis substitutes was beyond the Pale for Vulgarmort.
The idea that Trump was motivated by concern for the 'beautiful babies' is belied by his refusal to succor refugee children. Why actually rescue children when you can bomb the hell out of an airfield?
This attack on Assad's regime is a puzzler- the area is such a quagmire, is the U.S. really going to fight against two sides in a multi-pronged civil war? Is ISIS the number one enemy or is Assad's regime? This is a repeat of the muddled U.S. policy in Yemen, in which our military is fighting both the extremist Sunni group Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula and the Shiite Houthi rebel group. Fighting against both sides in an armed struggle only makes sense if one is playing the two sides against each other for personal gain... and in a creepy sidenote, Raytheon is making a fistful of dollars since the Tomahawk strike, Syrian civilians and American taxpayers be damned.
In one odd turn of events, the alt-right Trump base has gone ballistic because of the strike, though, as a leftist, I would dispute their assertion that the attack appeals to 'leftists'. Chuck Schumer is a centrist, despite his support of fillibustering Gorsuch.
My primary concern at this point, being an observer of current events and a cynical bastard, is that Trump, citing Iran's support for Assad's regime, will pivot and launch an attack on Iran. I predicted such a move back in December, and I sure hope that I am wrong.
The idea that Trump was motivated by concern for the 'beautiful babies' is belied by his refusal to succor refugee children. Why actually rescue children when you can bomb the hell out of an airfield?
This attack on Assad's regime is a puzzler- the area is such a quagmire, is the U.S. really going to fight against two sides in a multi-pronged civil war? Is ISIS the number one enemy or is Assad's regime? This is a repeat of the muddled U.S. policy in Yemen, in which our military is fighting both the extremist Sunni group Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula and the Shiite Houthi rebel group. Fighting against both sides in an armed struggle only makes sense if one is playing the two sides against each other for personal gain... and in a creepy sidenote, Raytheon is making a fistful of dollars since the Tomahawk strike, Syrian civilians and American taxpayers be damned.
In one odd turn of events, the alt-right Trump base has gone ballistic because of the strike, though, as a leftist, I would dispute their assertion that the attack appeals to 'leftists'. Chuck Schumer is a centrist, despite his support of fillibustering Gorsuch.
My primary concern at this point, being an observer of current events and a cynical bastard, is that Trump, citing Iran's support for Assad's regime, will pivot and launch an attack on Iran. I predicted such a move back in December, and I sure hope that I am wrong.
Tuesday, June 18, 2019
These Are the Armies of the Right
Tonight, there will be a big Trump rally/campaign kickoff in Orlando. The various septs (or sects, if you’d prefer, though I like the callback to ‘septic’) of MAGAland are assembling. Among the more outre members of the group are the QAnon Cultists and the Pinochet-loving Proud Boys. Both groups are arrayed in their typical uniforms for this event, lending (to my nerdly eye) an air of ‘cosplay-of-the-damned’ (curseplay) to the proceedings.
I’m reminded of the outlandish gangs from the 1979 movie The Warriors, from which I’ve taken the post title- each in their fanciful dress code. I can’t dig it, though, I can’t dig it at all.
I’m reminded of the outlandish gangs from the 1979 movie The Warriors, from which I’ve taken the post title- each in their fanciful dress code. I can’t dig it, though, I can’t dig it at all.
Friday, March 25, 2016
No Trip Like the Nostalgia Trip: Retro Futuristic Edition
I've been poking around some of the weird corners of the intert00bz and, as a result, I've been on Gary Numan kick. Oddly enough, in all the years I've been blogging, I've only mentioned Gary in one post, and even more shockingly, I only have one post mentioning the fantastic concert film Urgh! A Music War. At any rate, I have been binge-listening to Mr Numan's back catalog, starting with his dystopian sci-fi/horror masterpiece Replicas, originally credited to his band Tubeway Army.
Replicas opens up with Me! I Disconnect from You, a story about isolation and alienation:
Are 'Friends' Electric?, which hit number one on the UK charts, continues the same theme of urban anomie:
Down in the Park is a straight-up horror story about androids and machines which hunt, abuse, and kill humans for the entertainment of the patrons of a club (no Laws of Robotics for these killbots). I am reminded of a William Gibson story, but the song was written before Mr Gibson's writing hit the bookshelves. The concert footage in Urgh! A Music War somewhat undercuts the grimness of the song- it's hard not to laugh at the wee, weird car that Gary rides in during his performance, disquieting lyrics be damned:
Gary is still active, and seems to perform entire albums during his shows:
He'll be playing NYC in May, I may have to consider buying tickets for this show.
Replicas opens up with Me! I Disconnect from You, a story about isolation and alienation:
Are 'Friends' Electric?, which hit number one on the UK charts, continues the same theme of urban anomie:
Down in the Park is a straight-up horror story about androids and machines which hunt, abuse, and kill humans for the entertainment of the patrons of a club (no Laws of Robotics for these killbots). I am reminded of a William Gibson story, but the song was written before Mr Gibson's writing hit the bookshelves. The concert footage in Urgh! A Music War somewhat undercuts the grimness of the song- it's hard not to laugh at the wee, weird car that Gary rides in during his performance, disquieting lyrics be damned:
Gary is still active, and seems to perform entire albums during his shows:
He'll be playing NYC in May, I may have to consider buying tickets for this show.
Friday, March 15, 2013
World's Dumbest Public Intellectual?
Ya know, I'm a fairly prolific blogger, and, at the risk of sounding boastful, a fairly well-educated individual. At least once a month, I write a post which involves some research to supplement my beer-sodden perception of a scientific lecture. That being said, I never made a claim to be a "public intellectual". I basically consider myself an "educated yahoo".
Now, Thomas Sowell actually won a prize for intellectual achievement... let's see, via Monsieur McGravitas (I'll be damned if I'm linking to "Townhall") what a conservative "intellectual" serves up to his audience, let's check out his big brain, so to speak:
Roman conquests had historic repercussions for centuries after the Roman Empire had fallen. Among the legacies of Roman civilization were Roman letters, which produced written versions of Western European languages, centuries before Eastern European languages became literate. This was one of many reasons why Western Europe became more advanced than Eastern Europe, economically, educationally and technologically.
Of course, Sowell purposely ignores the fact that, at its greatest extent, the Roman Empire extended well into Eastern Europe and, even more egregiously, that Roman culture persisted in Eastern Europe long after Odoacer marched into Roman and proclaimed himself king of Italy. Sure, by the seventh century, the Eastern Roman Empire used the Greek language for most purposes, but "Roman letters" were not unknown to Eastern Europe. Additionally, Greek letters were perfectly suited for speakers of Slavic languages when Cyril and Methodius adapted them for such use in the 9th century. Sowell also ignores the fact that a Romance language speaking population persists in Eastern Europe to this day (note to self: self, you gotta put up a review of Masters of Atlantis one of these days).
More importantly, literacy rates in Europe in the Middle Ages were pretty piss-poor, and an educated person in Eastern or Western Europe would probably be literate in both Latin and Greek, to the extent that such a person could make a translation of a blasphemous, esoteric text from Greek to Latin three centuries before he was even born.
Sowell also ignores the fact that Eastern Europe was dealt a harsh blow in the 13th Century which left it reeling while Western Europe was beginning to get its shit together, as public intellectual Smut Clyde rightfully points out.
It's tragic how, in order to write for "Townhall", Sowell has to completely forget or ignore history (perhaps his hippocampus was damaged). I hope that each paycheck leaves just a little bad taste in his mouth, just a tiny frisson of shame at how shoddy his reasoning and writing are. At the very least, Sowell's disparaging of Greek culture should lead to some interesting conservative infighting, as at least one fanboy is probably sharpening his makhaira even as I write.
Now, Thomas Sowell actually won a prize for intellectual achievement... let's see, via Monsieur McGravitas (I'll be damned if I'm linking to "Townhall") what a conservative "intellectual" serves up to his audience, let's check out his big brain, so to speak:
Roman conquests had historic repercussions for centuries after the Roman Empire had fallen. Among the legacies of Roman civilization were Roman letters, which produced written versions of Western European languages, centuries before Eastern European languages became literate. This was one of many reasons why Western Europe became more advanced than Eastern Europe, economically, educationally and technologically.
Of course, Sowell purposely ignores the fact that, at its greatest extent, the Roman Empire extended well into Eastern Europe and, even more egregiously, that Roman culture persisted in Eastern Europe long after Odoacer marched into Roman and proclaimed himself king of Italy. Sure, by the seventh century, the Eastern Roman Empire used the Greek language for most purposes, but "Roman letters" were not unknown to Eastern Europe. Additionally, Greek letters were perfectly suited for speakers of Slavic languages when Cyril and Methodius adapted them for such use in the 9th century. Sowell also ignores the fact that a Romance language speaking population persists in Eastern Europe to this day (note to self: self, you gotta put up a review of Masters of Atlantis one of these days).
More importantly, literacy rates in Europe in the Middle Ages were pretty piss-poor, and an educated person in Eastern or Western Europe would probably be literate in both Latin and Greek, to the extent that such a person could make a translation of a blasphemous, esoteric text from Greek to Latin three centuries before he was even born.
Sowell also ignores the fact that Eastern Europe was dealt a harsh blow in the 13th Century which left it reeling while Western Europe was beginning to get its shit together, as public intellectual Smut Clyde rightfully points out.
It's tragic how, in order to write for "Townhall", Sowell has to completely forget or ignore history (perhaps his hippocampus was damaged). I hope that each paycheck leaves just a little bad taste in his mouth, just a tiny frisson of shame at how shoddy his reasoning and writing are. At the very least, Sowell's disparaging of Greek culture should lead to some interesting conservative infighting, as at least one fanboy is probably sharpening his makhaira even as I write.
Friday, October 14, 2016
Shuddersome Old Gringo
Tonight, I am preoccupied with work, so I decided in advance to compose a chilling little tale by Ambrose Bierce: author, satirist, gadfly. Bierce disappeared in revolutionary-era Mexico after accompanying Pancho Villa's army for a while. Bierce's disappearance was the subject of the 1989 film Old Gringo, hence the title of this post.
Bierce's place in 'weird fiction' will forever be secure by virtue of such horror works as The Damned Thing (which manages to be blackly funny even as it puts a chill up one's spine) and The Boarded Window. Bierce's An Inhabitant of Carcosa, slight as it is, spawned a major horror franchise which still resonates with current writers and fans of the weird.
The first story by Bierce that I read, in 7th grade, was An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge. SPOILER AHEAD- READ THE STORY When The Sixth Sense came out, one of my co-workers told me I HAD to see the movie, and I would never guess the big twist was. I guessed the twist immediately, which kinda freaked her out, and I immediately thought, "She really needs to read her Bierce!"
Bierce's place in 'weird fiction' will forever be secure by virtue of such horror works as The Damned Thing (which manages to be blackly funny even as it puts a chill up one's spine) and The Boarded Window. Bierce's An Inhabitant of Carcosa, slight as it is, spawned a major horror franchise which still resonates with current writers and fans of the weird.
The first story by Bierce that I read, in 7th grade, was An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge. SPOILER AHEAD- READ THE STORY When The Sixth Sense came out, one of my co-workers told me I HAD to see the movie, and I would never guess the big twist was. I guessed the twist immediately, which kinda freaked her out, and I immediately thought, "She really needs to read her Bierce!"
Monday, October 19, 2020
Playing Greatest Hits for Biggest Shits
Oh, yeah, the right wing noise machine is at it again, trying to recapture that 2016 high with a lurid story about Hunter Biden's laptop, basically rehashing the Anthony Wiener laptop story. The evidence free conspiracy theories are all of a kind- this new one even alleges that, besides incriminating evidence of collusion with China, there is video of Hunter Biden torturing and molesting children. This is just like the Wiener laptop hard drive, reputed to have contained a video of Hillary Clinton and Huma Abedin cutting a child's face off before sacrificing her to obtain her sweet, sweet adrenochrome.
It's lazy and stupid, but these are lazy and stupid people. The supposed source of the data is a Trump supporter with a sketchy story about obtaining the data on Biden's drives, and the promoter of the story is Rudy Giuliani... even convicted felon Bernie Kerik is trying to recapture his fifteen minutes of fame by jumping on this lurid fantasy, tailor-made for the QAnon crowd. The reporters at Rupert Murdoch's New York Post tried to keep their names off the byline. Flimsy evidence be damned, though, idiots have been spreading it on social media.
Like the Hillary/Huma video, evidence of Biden's crimes will never come to light, since it's all made-up nonsense. That being said, Hunter Biden has lost my vote!
Tuesday, May 24, 2022
Getting Damned Sick and Tired of This Story
It's happened again, a week and a half after the last headline-grabbing massacre (one of many that occurred that week)... another mass shooting, this one killing fourteen elementary school students and a teacher. The shooter was an 18 year old high school student from the same town, Uvalde, Texas. It's monstrous that someone that age, indeed any age, would kill little kids.
As sad as I am, I have to note that I am fortunate to know many kindhearted and responsible teenagers. My upstairs neighbor's children are very good at helping their mom watch over the gaggle of kids that descend upon their place every afternoon while their parents are still at work. They help watch over a coterie of younger children, and ensure that everybody is well looked-out-for.
I also have to pay my respects to the teenage counselors who work at the athletic program in which I am a volunteer coach. These youths, many of whom came up through the program, and who I have known for years, are responsible for looking after the kids in the program, making sure they move from class to class in orderly fashion, and chaperoning them on water and bathroom breaks. I really can't say enough for these caring, responsible young women and men.
It breaks my heart to read of teenage mass murderers. I'm not a naive person, but it boggles my mind that boys (yeah, it always seems to be boys) could be so cruel, and could obtain the instruments of death so easily. How did their parents, and our society as a whole, fail so that these killers are produced?
It's a conundrum, and one which our society seems particularly blasé about trying to solve. I'm not in the mood to watch the coverage, with the same empty calls for thoughts and prayers. I wouldn't even describe my feeling as déjà vu, because that would imply that this is a discrete prior feeling I've experienced before, whereas this is a continual occurrence, without even time for recovery.
Wednesday, August 8, 2018
Was Geddy Lee Playing a Joke?
I have to confess that I actually like several songs by Canadian libertarian band Rush... though I find their earnest Libertarianism to be silly and their sci-fi lyrics are often goofy, I have to admit that a song like Red Barchetta gives me goosebumps. While poking around the t00bz, I found a reference to a Rush song I'd never heard, 1996's Virtuality, which in typical earnestly nerdy Rush fashion is about the internet:
It's certainly not the band's best effort, but it's inoffensive. What struck me about the song was lyrics of the chorus:
Net boy, net girl
Send your signal ’round the world
Let your fingers walk and talk
And set you free
I was immediately reminded of Elton Motello's 1977 trash classic Jet Boy, Jet Girl, which was recorded over the same background track later used in Plastic Bertrand's better known (because it's not filthy and problematic) Ça plane pour moi. Even though I am listening to it on the job, Jet Boy, Jet Girl is not safe for work (working alone has its benefits):
The Damned adopted the song as part of their repertoire:
I wonder if Geddy Lee and his bandmates were having some fun when he wrote the chorus to Virtuality, or if it was a fluke. While their oeuvre tends to be earnest, if not necessarily serious, Geddy was known to participate in a joke occasionally.
It's certainly not the band's best effort, but it's inoffensive. What struck me about the song was lyrics of the chorus:
Net boy, net girl
Send your signal ’round the world
Let your fingers walk and talk
And set you free
I was immediately reminded of Elton Motello's 1977 trash classic Jet Boy, Jet Girl, which was recorded over the same background track later used in Plastic Bertrand's better known (because it's not filthy and problematic) Ça plane pour moi. Even though I am listening to it on the job, Jet Boy, Jet Girl is not safe for work (working alone has its benefits):
The Damned adopted the song as part of their repertoire:
I wonder if Geddy Lee and his bandmates were having some fun when he wrote the chorus to Virtuality, or if it was a fluke. While their oeuvre tends to be earnest, if not necessarily serious, Geddy was known to participate in a joke occasionally.
Friday, December 25, 2009
Merry Christmas!
Well, I'm working on Christmas, but it's quiet and peaceful. I feel a small compulsion to post a wistful "Christmas" song, so here's the inimitable Captain Sensible, with a melancholy, somewhat odd, ditty:
A lot of Captain Sensible's "solo" efforts were collaborations with Robyn Hitchcock, but the songwriting credit for "OCCTM" goes to Captain Sensible and Tony Mansfield. I like to think that a certain (Robyn) Hitchcockian whimsicality was foremost in their minds when they wrote the song.
The lush production values are a far cry from the sound of earlier efforts in which the good Captain played a part (Brian James on songwriting credits for "Neat Neat Neat").
Edit: Please note that I am just as much of fan of the Damned's earlier stuff, but did not embed the video because I wish to avoid cluttering the blog with too many videos.
A lot of Captain Sensible's "solo" efforts were collaborations with Robyn Hitchcock, but the songwriting credit for "OCCTM" goes to Captain Sensible and Tony Mansfield. I like to think that a certain (Robyn) Hitchcockian whimsicality was foremost in their minds when they wrote the song.
The lush production values are a far cry from the sound of earlier efforts in which the good Captain played a part (Brian James on songwriting credits for "Neat Neat Neat").
Edit: Please note that I am just as much of fan of the Damned's earlier stuff, but did not embed the video because I wish to avoid cluttering the blog with too many videos.
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