Visible Hand

(NOTE: This is the original unedited version of the piece that ran in the Hook.)

Wow. Invisible Hand’s been getting a nice “happy ending” from the conspiratorial press and disc jockey establishments around here for a few solid months. That’s just annoying.

I’m sorry, but as a rule I always despise any and all flavor-of the-season bands. As far as I’m concerned local press anoints them just to piss me off. I ask you: how many acts du jour actually end up in nationally recognized or sustainably profitable music “careers?” Few, my friends, far too few.

Dan Deacon at the Southern 10/28/10

Dan Deacon brought his super-spazmodic freaky electro-loop delicious digital weirdness to the Southern on Thursday, October 28, and a good time was had by all. All the cool kids were there and they brought their bands to warm up the show. I got drunk and talked smack. Deacon took the floor (he sets up on the floor) and whipped us into a frenzy with a series of silly visualization exercises and dance contests. Too much fun. Here are some pics:

Concentrated E’Ville

6 Day Bender’s new album kicks like a keg-standing mule

(NOTE: This is the original of the version of my piece for the Hook.)

Is this thing on? Cripsy Duck to Command Central… come in, Command Central.

What the hell am I doing? It’s been eight long, boring years since my semi-self-imposed sabbatical from print music journalism. Who am I kidding? Just because there’s been nary a sentence fragment of interesting music writing in this town since I was summarily fired from C-Ville all those years ago is no reason to think I can just jump back in and pick up where I left off. Or maybe…

WTJU Town Hall Gives Management a Frickin’ Clue

On Monday evening, about 200 or so community members, DJs past and present, and various supporters flooded a town hall meeting held by UVa’s Department of Public Affairs (now in charge of TJU) to let ‘em have an earful of what it means to love something as thoroughly as Charlottesville loves WTJU.

Carol Wood, head of Public Affairs for UVa, got up and assured us that our voices were important and the turn out was impressive. Next – looking like a hapless villain sent down from central casting – came Burr Beard, the new WTJU station manager. After admitting he was from out of town and basically had no clue what a WTJU was, he stammered something along the lines of, “gee guys, gosh, I still think an all-Americana station would work in this market, shucks.” He damn near got himself laughed out of there. But the announcers and those assembled were respectful, knowing full well they need a qualified station manager who is ready to go to bat for them.

Not More Fucking Banjos!

AHHHHHHH!

Burr Beard, the man brought in to revive WTJU from its slump, is proposing turning major blocks of programming to “Americana” or “Roots” – generally, folk, blues, country and country rock – making that the new “station identity.” The notion sickens me so badly I couldn’t even make it through the proposal.

Ok, I’m all for banjos and bluegrass and “Wagon Wheel,” and ironic tattoos and Pabst Blue Ribbon, but enough already! This Americana thing is not the end-all-be-all. (Whatever happened to rock and roll?) It’s already been an excruciating decade of weekend-redneck toothless hipsters forming Hank Sr. tribute bands. I’M OVER IT. Moving to Brooklyn, taking up banjo and heroin and getting a tattoo of bacon does not make you an artist. ENOUGH!

Cripsy Duck’s Confessions of a WTJU Addict

(DUCK NOTE: Recent discussions of reformatting WTJU, our beloved multi-format college/community radio station, inspired this retrospective rant.)

“I LOVE RADIO! I have learned of more incredible music listening to WTJU 91.1FM – local multi-format UVa radio – in my umpteen years in Charlottesville than anywhere else. Something about broadcast makes music seem more alive, and the djs have always been so deliciously anarchic. Heaven is a kickass TJU rock show.”

That’s verbatim from my personal Myspace page under “Music.” (Copied and pasted, actually.) I wrote that in 2005 or whenever I set that thing up. (Oh Myspace, so much promise, and then… Murdoch. Blech.)

At that time, I had been listening to WTJU for about twenty years. The station had gone through some mostly cosmetic changes, but one beautiful, crucial thing remained constant: when a DJ was on his game, and you were in the mood: MAGIC.

Justice Unserved

Justice, that blind old bat, has swerved off the highway, into the woods and is headed right for the quarry!

EmmaKate Martin and Benjamin Bryant, protesters attempting to block access to Massey HQ in Boone, W. Va on May 17, have been hit with $100,000 bail. This for charges of trespassing and littering. Uh huh.

Let’s see if I’ve got this right. Massey makes billions blasting the tops off ancient mountains, ignoring safety regulations and regularly KILLING its own employees through criminal negligence (29 just last month, remember?), and CEO Don Blankenship is out and about, doing fine, sipping wine. Meanwhile, activists attempting to non-violently protest these abuses receive enormous penalties for inconveniencing the aforementioned abusers.

Wanna help? Call Boone County Magistrate Snodgrass’s office and demand a bail reduction. (304) 369-7360

Thanks to http://climategroundzero.net/.

You Are All Fuckers and I Hate Me

No, it’s not that bad. You haven’t done anything wrong. And I’m ok. Just venting.

Or am I? Haven’t posted in… what’s it say down there? Eight months! If you’re still reading this then… GOOD JOB! (get a frickin’ life)

But HUMANITY has ISSUES! I’m concerned!

Nobody believes anyone else is telling the truth. The Truth – THE FACTS – are never told. Nobody is asking THE QUESTIONS.

WE SHOULD ASK THE QUESTIONS. WE should KNOW THE FACTS. We need DATA pronto!

Then again….

“Planets are disposable…”

Have a day!

If Max Baucus Has His Way, I’m Joining the Racists – I Mean, Teabaggers

By now it is common knowledge that Blue Dog Montana Democrat Senator Max Baucus is a kept man, a lap dog of the health care lobby.

“In the past six years, nearly one-fourth of every dime raised by Baucus, D-Mont., and his political-action committee has come from groups and individuals associated with drug companies, insurers, hospitals, medical-supply firms, health-service companies and other health professionals. These donations total about $3.4 million, or $1,500 a day, every day, from January 2003 through 2008.”
– The Montana Standard, June 14, 2009

With Baucus’ bill finally emerging from the Senate Finance Committee, we are learning he intends to carve chunks off of Medicare, reduce aid to people struggling with health care premiums, and force everyone into the private insurance system by levying fines for those unwilling or unable to buy in. How that’s going to work, I cannot say. If you can’t afford insurance, you can’t afford a fine for not having it, either.

Not only would all this be a total betrayal of any half-ass attempt at improvement President Obama may have intended for our dilapidated health care system, but it would be a total give-away to the very pirates who have ruined the system in the first place: the same interests whose lobbyists have been dumping money into Baucus’ campaign coffers for the past six years.

Preamble to the Capitalist Constitution

We the Corporations of the United States, in Order to dominate a more profitable Union, establish Monopoly, insure domestic Subsidiaries, provide for the golden Parachute, promote Warfare in general, and secure the Blessings of Opulence to ourselves and our Prosperity, do highjack and subvert this Constitution for the United States of America.