Wednesday, May 26, 2010

Green Monkey Mix: Food & Drink Track Listing

I have a few people that I am waiting on selections from. I'll add them when I receive them.

01 - Bucket of Grease - Les McCann [splotchy]
02 - Lady Marmalade - Labelle [splotchy]
03 - Hold All The Butter - The Bats [splotchy]
04 - Have A Cuppa Tea - Kinks [splotchy]
05 - You Left The Water Running - Wilson Pickett [splotchy]
06 - Hooch - The Melvins [splotchy]
07 - Champagne and Misery - The Clean [splotchy]
08 - Potato Chips - Slim Gaillard [splotchy]
09 - Salty Candy - Adam Green [nelson]
10 - Gold for Bread - Blitzen Trapper [nelson]
11 - Mint Car - The Cure [nelson]
12 - One Bourbon, One Scotch, and One Beer - George Thorogood [nelson]
13 - Jesus and Tequila - Minutemen [nelson]
14 - Beer - Reel Big Fish [nelson]
15 - Mince Meat - Dangerdoom [nelson]
16 - Nugget - Cake [nelson]
17 - Coffee and T.V. - Blur [eblair]
18 - Ice Cream Man - Tom Waits [eblair]
19 - Glass Onion - The Beatles [eblair]
20 - Underneath the Bottle - Lou Reed [eblair]
21 - Slow Like Honey - Fiona Apple [eblair]
22 - Pigs on the Wing (Part One) - Pink Floyd [eblair]
23 - Fuckin With My Head (Mountain Dew Rock) - Beck [eblair]
24 - Fruit Tree - Nick Drake [eblair]
25 - Cherry Pie - Warrant [flannery]
26 - Old Dogs, Children and Watermelon Wine - Tom T. Hall [flannery]
27 - Boat Drinks - Jimmy Buffett [flannery]
28 - Orange Crush - REM [flannery]
29 - I Love Rocky Road - Weird Al Yankovic [flannery]
30 - A Taste of Honey - The Beatles [flannery]
31 - Hot Potato - The Wiggles [flannery]
32 - Heinz Baked Beans - The Who [dena]
33 - Party in My Tummy - Yo Gabba Gabba [dena]
34 - Brown Mushrooms - Shonen Knife [dena]
35 - Butterbean - The B-52s [dena]
36 - White Lightning - George Jones [dena]
37 - Mars Bars - The Undertones [dena]
38 - Cigarettes and Chocolate Milk - Rufus Wainwright [dena]
39 - Orange Juice Blues - The Band [zippy]
40 - Orange Appled - Cocteau Twins [zippy]
41 - Hot Cake - The Fall [zippy]
42 - Candy and a Currant Bun - Pink Floyd [zippy]
43 - Cheap Wine - Rain Parade [zippy]
44 - Emperor Tomato Ketchup - Stereolab [zippy]
45 - Eggs and Sausage (in a Cadillac with Susan Michelson) - Tom Waits [zippy]
46 - Orange Song - Yo La Tengo [zippy]
47 - Hot Chocolate Boy - Beat Happening [andy]
48 - Red Vines - Aimee Mann [andy]
49 - Cheese & Onions - The Rutles [andy]
50 - Strawberry Fields Forever - The Beatles [andy]
51 - Sprout and the Bean - Joanna Newsom [andy]
52 - Apples in the Trees - Mirah [andy]
53 - Ginger Snaps - Dean & Britta [andy]
54 - The Man Who Loved Beer - Lambchop [andy]

Tuesday, May 25, 2010

Thursday, May 20, 2010

Anyone up for a new Green Monkey mix? (FOOD & DRINK)

Anyone? Anyone?

The theme for this go-around is going to be Food & Drink. All the songs must have a food and/or drink in the title. Each participant has eight songs to play with.

Let's have 8 open slots to keep things interesting. With me participating, that leaves room for 7 people.

Participants have been picked!

If you haven't already done so, please leave your song choices as a comment on this blog post!

Splotchy
nelsonofnelson
Christian Blair
E. Blair
Flannery Alden
Dena Tarlin
Zippy49
Andy Aldrige

Here are my tracks.

01. Bucket of Grease - Les McCann
02. Lady Marmalade - Labelle
03. Hold All The Butter - The Bats
04. Have A Cuppa Tea - Kinks
05. You Left The Water Running - Wilson Pickett
06. Hooch - The Melvins
07. Champagne and Misery - The Clean
08. Potato Chips - Slim Gaillard



If you're identified as participating, feel free to add your tracks in the comments!

Tuesday, May 18, 2010

Monday, May 17, 2010

Concert Review: The Back Pockets At An Undisclosed Location

So, I saw the Atlanta, GA band The Back Pockets a few months ago at The Hideout. They were the opening band. There were two other bands, their names being Bland Indie Rock and Some People Who Think Singing California Über Alles A Capella Is Amusing. It didn't matter. I loved The Back Pockets. I had no prior knowledge of them, no expectations, and they blew me away.

I Googled them afterwards and found their blog. I also found their MySpace page, which listed tour dates. I would periodically visit it to see if they were returning to Chicago. Hey, they were coming back here on May 16th. Yes!

I didn't recognize the bar they were playing at. It was in Logan Square. The bar had a MySpace page, but it didn't have a proper website. I had never seen a music venue that didn't have its own website. Hmm.

It turns out it wasn't a bar. It was this.



It was someone's house. I hadn't seen a band play at a house since college. I got to the house and stared at it for a couple minutes. There was a minivan parked on the street that I recognized from the Hideout -- it belonged to the Pockets, so I figured I was in the right place. A guy came out and started talking on his cellphone. I politely interrupted him after a couple minutes. I thought I remembered him being in the band. He was! He went in and got one of the people that lived at the house.

She came out and told me yes, the show was at the house, and to come back at 9pm. I went and got a burrito, took a picture of some Sidewalk Liquor, walked for a bit, had a beer, returned.

I didn't know anyone at the house. They were tattooed and smoked a lot. I sat down in the corner of the basement and waited. For about 45 minutes. Until the show actually started.




The first band was actually a solitary woman who played some organ, but mostly played guitar. She had a pretty voice. The second band I did not dig. By this time I was sweating and overheated. The windows were covered with soundproofing and the small basement room was filled with people.

The Back Pockets were the last to play, but once they started to play, I was glad I had come. They are what I would call artsy-fartsy. They are theatrical. I am being completely complimentary when I say this. They had drawn on a whole bunch of cardboard boxes, and had arranged them around the room. Some of the bandmembers wandered through the audience during the set, sometimes crawling, sometimes dancing erotically, sometimes in costume (for one song, an eerie ostrich with glowing yellow eyes pecked at the crowd), sometimes just knocking into people.

They were brimming with creativity, and passion, and earnestness for good music. I liked them a lot. I hope they can make a living at doing this, because they deserve to.

I bought a CD of theirs after the show for $7. They had hand-painted each CD sleeve. I think mine is very pretty.



Their MySpace page has some music you can stream, but I had trouble playing it. I have uploaded a few tracks for you to hear. I hope you like them.



Support Interesting Music! Support The Back Pockets!

Saturday, May 15, 2010

Thursday, May 13, 2010

I'm God's Lonely Man...



Oh fuck you, Twitter.

Hey folks, are you like me? Do you have natural defenses you carry around with you everyday, a "personality cushion" that protects the scared little child deep inside, that you use to interact with people in the cold, heartless outside world?

Does this cushion somehow not exist when you're on the Internet? My cushion works like that (or rather, doesn't work). My feelings can get very easily hurt. It sucks.

A couple people unfollowed me on Twitter recently. It bugged me. I mean, it *really* fucking bugged me. Why? I don't know. It's like a form of rejection. And the insidious thing is, you're not notified that you're being unfollowed. Okay, maybe that's good. I don't know. And I don't know why they unfollowed me. Was I too verbose? Did I insult their sensibilities? Was I too ethnic?

Who the fuck knows. Okay, I am a fucking pisser. I unfollowed those fucking motherfuckers that unfollowed me.

But it didn't stop there. I found a website, Friend Or Follow, whereby I could find out who I was following that wasn't following me.

Holy shit, there were a lot of people that *used* to follow me that had apparently stopped following me at some point. THOSE FUCKERS. THOSE DIRTY MOTHERFUCKERS.

There are of course celebrities and such that aren't going to follow you. That's fine. And if I want to follow Harry Hamlin, I'm not expecting him to follow me. But what about all the peons such as myself? Well, to me there is an implied reciprocity. I follow you, you follow me. Simple. But then you go and surreptitiously unfollow me? Well, fuck you.

I was following 220 people earlier today. Now I am following 126. Take it away, Travis...




P.S. Um, there are a lot of people that are following me that I am not following back. I'm working on rectifying that, okay? SHEESH.

P.P.S. I unfollowed Harry Hamlin.

Tuesday, May 11, 2010

Thursday, May 6, 2010

So, I Have The Filmmaking Bug Now

I have another short that I want to make.

I know the basic story elements, but need to write the script, and all the other stuff that comes after writing the script.

For now, I can tell you the title of the film.

Lizard

Stopfuckingwithnature.org


I was riding on a stretch of the Salt Creek Trail, when I saw a couple people pulling up plants.

I asked them what they were doing. They were pulling up garlic mustard. I talked to them a bit. One of the guys said that the plant was brought over from Europe a while back, and then sort of went all crazy and stuff (my words, not his).

They mentioned they were volunteering under the auspices of the Cook County Forest Preserve, and also mentioned a website Restoringnature.org -- it's part of the Des Plaines River Valley Restoration Project.

You can volunteer to help at the website. As I continued to ride, I saw TONS and TONS of garlic mustard plants.

It made me think of kudzu, and other species introduced by people into natural environments, often resulting in unexpected consequences.

I don't know, it seems that nature does what nature does, and when people are dumb enough to introduce something into an ecosphere, maybe they're doing the same thing as a bird dropping seeds into an unfamiliar forest. Nature is all about species waxing and waning, landscapes changing, etc.

Part of the mission of this organization is to keep biodiversity, but also to restore wildflowers that have lived in the area. Is it worthwhile? Is it a losing battle? A compelling case for volunteering is made here.

So, should I volunteer? Should you?

Hey, I like garlic and I like mustard.

Wednesday, May 5, 2010