Anyone who visited the site yesterday may have noticed that things were amiss. We were indeed hijacked by the old robot porn pirates but thanks to our crack web enforcer Bob at TehCompany.com things are back to normal now so feel free to wander around the site and if the urge strikes why not visit the SHOP and pick up new stuff from The Buddy System or a comic while you wait for the upcoming release of Ruby Isle’s full-length “Night Shot.”
Thanks to everyone who let us know about the problem, here’s to hoping we can dodge the roboporn uprising next time!
Our friends at Noise Pop have launched The No Free Lunch Campaign with Lewis Black to show support for service industry workers being screwed by buyout firms. They can describe it better than I can so here you go…
“Comedian Lewis Black filmed a “rant” against the greed of these “Buyout Barons.” Indie rock band Radio 4 contributed a great track for it too. Go to http://www.july17action.org to check it out, and find out how you can get involved by signing a petition or registering to attend an action on July 17, 2008 in your area.
Noise Pop became friends with SEIU, the largest Union in the country that represents hospital and healthcare workers, doormen and other service employees, last year in Austin when they partnered with us at our show and Zach Galifianakis brought some comic relief about the healthcare system in this country. It was a great way to engage our audience about an important issue. Now SEIU is taking on Private Equity and once again Noise Pop has teamed up with them to produce our first short film entitled “No Free Lunch”, written and directed by Antonino D’Ambrosio of La Lutta NMC and starring hilarious political comedian Lewis Black with original music by dance-punk band
Radio 4.
Check out the video here - http://www.july17action.org/ or http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ASCAama93R0
Below is an article in today’s NY Times about the campaign.
BUSINESS / WORLD BUSINESS | June 4, 2008
Union Takes Anti-Buyout Campaign Worldwide
By MICHAEL J. de la MERCED
The Service Employees International Union, one of the country’s biggest unions, will call upon people to attend protests against buyout firms in July in 100 cities in 25 countries.”
Earlier tonight, Hillary Clinton missed a chance to prove us all wrong. She could have defied expectations and proven herself to be a uniting force in our country. But she didn’t.
At the end of a gross display of ego and hubris, Clinton asked Americans to go to HillaryClinton.com and tell her what to do next. Well I did and so should you. Here is what I said:
Senator Clinton,
Tonight you had the opportunity to celebrate the fact that our country has just nominated the first black candidate from a major political party. Unfortunately you chose not to stand with the future president of the United States and engaged in a vain attempt to steal the spotlight on an historic day.
You owe Americans an apology for your ego driven display in New York this evening. For the good of the country, for the good of your political future and legacy, it is time for you to step aside and move on. We all have.
Tonight America moved forward towards the kind of bright future that we all deserve. Tonight I am proud to be an American after 8 years of heartbreak and an empty wallet. Tonight I pulled my cracked check card from that empty wallet and donated another $10 to the Obama campaign. Consider doing the same HERE.
We have been nominated for Best Live Band in the Flagpole Music Awards (the local Athens art weekly) and you can help by voting for us in that category and any of the write-in categories that you think we may deserve.
I’m back with another slice of psyche pop heaven from the Young Sinclairs, this time we’ve got an upbeat little number called Engineer Man. It’s the best thing since The Pretty Things dropped Old Man Going.
A few weeks back before the new South Park commercials ripped off The Electric Company we took our own stab at copping some visuals from one of my fave shows as a kid. Seriously, we ripped ‘em off first. Promise.
Anyway, we have finished up a demo recording of the song which accompanies said visuals and just posted it on our MySpace page. Go have a listen and let us know what you think. Plus this one has singing! Oh and if you haven’t added us as friends yet please do!
Also mark your calendars for our FREE show at the Go Bar coming up on April 5th. If all goes as planned we will be debuting another new jam!
PLUS: Summer East Coast shows are in the works with The Sad Cobras, Ruby Isle and Spring Tigers! There is also talk of possible West Coast shows this summer but let’s not get ahead of ourselves. Blowing up yo.
being into music isn’t just an interest…it’s a fucking full time job for some folks.
Music Snobbery is something that most people of a certain demographic will take part in from their late teens well into their early 30s. for most music snobs it was likely that during college they would spend some time working for the local college radio station or at a record store honing their craft…or maybe even starting a band to help out in the endless cycle of trying to be cool and get laid…..or if they were really lucky and had some rich parents or a trust fund they might even put out a record or two on their own label..this is the Mortal Kombat finishing move of Music Snobbery. this is essentially what happens to people who didn’t like sports or weren’t good enough to make their highschool baseball team. and this goes on and on until they stop caring as much about music because they either:
a)have a kid and have less time to devote to finding out about cool music or
b) get burnt out on trying to one up their friends and retire from music snobbery content with the knowledge that they have excellent taste and can no longer learn anything of true value.
back in the olden days before the Internets it was a very difficult thing to be a music snob, you had to read magazine articles and books about underground rock n roll to hear about new bands or “important” older bands and then you had to devote lots of time and money into traveling to out of the way independent record stores or ordering things through the mail without ever hearing it first. this made for some interesting discoveries (raincoats, wipers, vaselines….aka anything kurt cobain listed as a major influence) or it could result in some really crappy cds that you couldn’t sell at the used cd shop (free kitten, gumball!). and back in these happy times it really meant something to be able to namedrop some bands on other music snobs to let them know you were in the know and not a total poseur.
then something terrible happened: THE INTERNET. and everything went to shit and it was as easy as clicking on your mouse and downloading a song by some obscure band from scotland that only had 2 eps and you could suddenly claim you’d heard them way before anyone else or whatever. the effort was now totally gone. but even though it has become much much easier to know about cool music, it’s still important to be into the right cool music…especially if you are a person younger than 23 who is talking about music to a person older than 29. there are certain bands that you must be aware of if you are to ever shed the label of young poseur. post punk as a genre is really a cottage industry for a good name dropper to verse themselves in. liking the Cure and The Smiths don’t count.
the top 25 bands to name drop if you are worried peope think you are a poseur
1. Sonic Youth (although very popular at one time, you must always list them as one of your favorite bands)
2. The Nation Of Ulysses
3. Nick Cave (Bad Seeds/Birthday Party)
4. Gang Of Four (it’s important to understand that all dance punk bands are gang of four clones)
5. The Jesus And Mary Chain (it’s important to call bands out for ripping off the JMC)
6. Modern Lovers
7. ESG (also good to play their songs at dance parties to impress certain people)
8. Pere Ubu/Rocket From The Tombs
9. Mission Of Burma
10. The Fall/Wire (UK punk bands that stayed aroud forever and everyone likes to list as an influence)
11. Joy Division/New Order
12. The Clean/The Bats/The Verlaines (any indie band from new zealand as this is the birth of indie pop and that’s what the Shins are)
13. Can/Faust (or any krautrock band really, you can’t go wrong)
14. James Chance
15. The Stone Roses (unless you are british…then it’s like listing Nirvana as your favorite band)
16. The Replacements
17. The Gun Club/X/The Zeroes (other early LA punk bands as they are less popular than New York and London bands)
18. Suicide/New York Dolls/Television (70s new york city punk that isn’t the Ramones or Blondie)
19. Swell Maps (important to note they influenced Pavement)
20. Captain Beefheart (although i don’t know anyone who actually listens to them who isn’t 40)
21. Pylon (unless you live in athens…then it’s not big deal)
22. The Sonics/the Monks (garage punk pioneers)
23. Neu!
24. Drive Like Jehu/Jesus Lizard/Big Black (thinking man’s dude rock)
25. The Wipers/Raincoats/Vaselines (aka the Kurt Cobain obsessions)
