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Monday, May 12, 2008

Mother's Day Hangover

Well the weekend flew by in the blink of an eye....hope you survived spending Mother's Day with your Mom or worse yet spending it like I did with my Mother in law...In laws are a tricky thing....they want you to be involved in all their family get togethers but they never fail to remind you that you're not a real member of the family. I've learned the key to surviving any family gathering, whether its with your family or the in-laws, is to just keep your head down and make yourself invisible if you can. Nothing will bring you more joy or more pain in life than family.

Much thanks go out to the O.M.O.M. and his lovely Mrs. for entertaining me and Mrs. Furniss Saturday night. The first summit against the Pussification of America was a huge success and I look forward to sharing with you the many grand ideas that we came up while consuming mass quantities of alcohol and tobacco.

Ya know I like kids...really I do....but if one more kid were to open his mouth yesterday and ask "Why is there no Children's Day?" I would have hung him from a ceiling fan. I found myself responding like my Dad did when I was a kid "Do you have to go to work? Do you have summer's off? Do you pay for your food or your shelter?Do you not wear better clothes than I do? Then shut your pie hole because (wait for it)...EVERYDAY IS KIDS DAY!"

Speaking of kids, the new James McMurtry record Just Us Kids, is outstanding. Downloaded it yesterday and listened to it 4 times in a row. Best record of the year to date. McMurtry's 8th studio record (9th overall) in 17 years may be his finest work. McMurtry's lyrics have always been excellent and he's in fine form here. What's really amazing is the arrangements. The music has as much going on as his stories. God Bless America is an angry rant at corporate America while Cheney's Toy portrays Bush as nothing more than a puppet for the Vice President. The Governor is a murder mystery set to song while Fireline Road covers incest (yep..incest). Bayou Tortoise has an incredible guitar line and is a great opening track. Ruby and Carlos details a marriage gone bad and does such a great job of sharing their story you feel like you've invaded the couple's privacy. My fave cut to this point is Hurricane Party which tells the story of a man who decides to stay in New Orleans instead of leaving when Katrina came only to watch the city drown. Just Us Kids may be McMurtry's finest work and that's saying something cuz the man has put out some quality material.

Cruel twist of fate for me...Flight of the Conchords are playing Value City Arena Friday night and due to a scheduling issue, I won't be able to attend.

Kudos to Sirius's E Street Radio...last night they ran Bruce Springsteen's special show to benefit the Count Basie Theater. The show took place last Wednesday and was nothing short of amazing. The band played the Darkness on the Edge of Town and Born to Run records straight thru. The horn section of the Max Weinberg 7 joined for the Born to Run portion of the set. The Big Man was in fine form throughout and the show was a whole lotta fun. I can't remember the last time I heard Clarence Clemons sound so good. The Big Man just ripped it up....Since those records are Sax heavy, the Big Man knew the spotlight was on and he delivered. Nils played one of the greatest guitar solos ever at the end of Prove it All Night....

David Coverdale is telling the press that he expects Whitesnake to be asked to open on a Led Zep 40th anniversary world tour....I'm calling BS on this one....not on a Led Zep tour...at some point Bob Plant is gonna cave and do it...but no way does he allow Coverdale, who Plant views to be a clone of himself, to open.

Poison drummer Rikki Rockett told TMZ.com that he plans to hold a press conference this week to address the rape charge he's facing in Mississippi. The charges against Rikki have always seemed bogus...if he did it he deserves to face the consequences but given how much time it took for the case to come to light I call BS on this one too.

Its been a long time since I was interested in listening to a John Mellecamp record but since I heard his new record is being produced by T Bone Burnett, I'm very much interested. The downside is the record is being distributed by Starbucks...the bright side is it sounds like the record is a return to the rootsy sound of Mellencamp's holy trilogy of Scarecrow, the Lonesome Jubilee and Big Daddy...Life, Death, Love, Freedom is scheduled to be released in mid July.

Does anyone really care that Extreme has reunited and is not only touring but putting out a new record? I realize More than Words was a huge hit but did any of their records really sell that well? Was their following bigger than I thought it was? I always found them to be shite and Gary Cherone's voice makes my skin crawl...same tone on every song. Its cool they are touring with Kings X but how big is their fanbase these days? Kings X didn't have too may fans back when they were critical darlings and poised to be the "next big thing." The show comes to Cleveland's House of Blues in August.

Tens of thousands die in a cyclone in the former Burma, then 20 some odd folks die in storms here in the states...todays its an earthquake in China that kills thousands (and the count is sure to go MUCH higher)....The Rev. John Hagee will surely blame this on God being angry for some reason or another....I suspect if God is behind this he's offended by the Extreme reunion.

I'm off to go talk about the end of the world..........

3 comments:

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O.M.O.M. said...

Glad you and the Mrs. could make it over, next time we will burn some Jimmy Buffett albums.

I channeled your dad yesterday and gave that same speech nearly verbatim. Since my oldest has become a teenager I have become the stereotypical grouchy father.

I thought the first Extreme record was pouffy haired wuss metal but I enjoyed albums 2 thru 4. Minus the wussy ballads, that is. I'm still a big King's X fan, so I'm sure I'll be there in August.

Blast Furniss said...

Kings X I loved...I knew they would never break thru after Rolling Stone named them their "hot band" of the year...since the same "honor" was bestowed on Enuff Z'Nuff the year before I knew the Kings X record (think it was Faith, Hope, Donuts)would tank and 'sho 'nuff it did. I still listen to them tho..killer debut and Gretchen was great. As for Extreme, all the guitar guys at the time raved about Nuno...to me he was always and Eddie Van Halen clone. He's had success scoring movies here lately so I'm actually kinda surprised he agreed to do the Extreme reunion.

Can we throw Jimmy Buffett himself on the fire?

I love being a father..most of the time...but there are moments...I often wonder how I survived to adulthood...my folks had ample reason to kill me while I was growing up. Once you become a parent its easy to understand why some animals eat their young.