The Webbies was okay. I found that this year I knew many people working the event (some as volunteers hosting and others there as entertainers) than I did in the audience and potential recipients. There were net celebs: I recognized Howard Rheingold; Stewart Brand was there, I heard tell. The press has not been positive about the event, and neither is the pulse on plastic. The 5-word acceptance speeches are always good for a chuckle.

Survival Research Labs put on a show to close the evening. SRL had a giant Tesla coil, a gracefully lumbering machine called Running Man, a thing like an unfolded idiot box out of water that flip-flops along (I would call it Jacob's Elevator Shaft, but I doubt they thought of that) with some anime-esque illustration on one side and something I don't recall on the other, and another behemoth of some sort. At any rate it was a lot of fun. About halfway through a forklift brought forth a steaming barrel and poured it into a giant junk petri dish. What came out was a molten flesh-colored substance that inside sources say is a homemade version of "silly putty", the recipie for which is available on Nickelodeon's website, rumor has it. All the machines (except the Tesla Coil) gathered round and dipped what woulda maybe been their probiscuses in the hardening goo. much fun was had by all.

For me there was an exciting contrast with the first time I ever saw an SRL show (1995's Crime Wave) which was right after I moved to San Francisco. That was a much bigger show--this was after all just a small demonstration for the wanna-be Oscars of the internet's first post-boom year--and I was very excited to be there, having heard SRL's legend long before moving to this city. And I was okay getting the few glimpses that I did amongst a gigantic crowd for the event. Last night I had ringside seats, hanging out with my friends that were working on the show. Being amongst it, not just spectating. This town is an incredible world.

an update because I haven't posted in so long. I am still obsessed with World Cup. And in fact I'm pretty pleased with
how the round of 8 has shaped up--pretty much everyone that I wanted (including the US, England & Turkey) have made it to the quarter finals.

tonight I am going to the webbies which is kinda weird, and hopefully will be fun. The last time I went was as part of bianca in 1998. I had different hair back then.

An update on Brazil's drama that caused the last red card in the game against Turkey.

I stayed up late tonight watching the world cup live.
Yes, I'm indulging in the time benefits of being unemployed.
If you don't know the Cup is being played in Korea & Japan this year and so most of the games start at 2:30AM or 4:30AM. Tonight one started at 11:30pm (Mexico vs. Croatia), so I started watching it and kept on to the next game (Brazil vs. Turkey).

I have found BBC's coverage to be very helpful, where New York Times was, not surprisingly, a bit wanting. SO I went BBC which has a full profile on every player of every team. It would be nice if they listed the player's jersey numbers, so that I could look up who I was watching without waiting for them to turn around so that I can see their names. Oh, did I mention that the only channel I can watch the games on (since I don't have cable) is a Spanish language one? It's fun when someone scores a goooooooooooooooooooooooooooooal, but in general it's pretty uninformative for mono-lingual me.

Anyway, I wanted to talk about the Brazil vs. Turkey game which is on as I write. The Turks are really impressing me. Playing with a lot of heart against one of the most talented and high profile teams in the entire World Cup finals. The BBC coverage while the game is in progress makes it sound much more one-sided than it has been.. Turkey has played them eye-to-eye in a very rough and tumble game. They have not been intimidated and have had the stamina to play Brazil step-for-step, never letting up.

Their goal keeper's play in particular has been terrific--he is a solid unflinching competitor. What mistakes he has made, matters of instants and inches he has the benefit of a long frame and quick reflexes to recover from. A real pleasure to watch. The ref on the other hand has lost control of the game a bit--and Brazil is all too eager to tell him how he should call the game and subvert his authority when he doesn't strongly exert it.

*sigh*, case in point, just now, with a couple minutes left there was a red card and penalty in the box called on Turkey which was completley bunk--the ref just kinda took Brazil's word (and acting) for it. They scored and that's a shitty way for this game to be decided (it's now 2-1, Brazil will surely win).

O shit. And it just got even worse. with another red card. You will probably read about it. I'll link it tomorrow when there's a chance. Really not a classy way to win for Brazil against a worthy opponent.

Turkey will have a difficult time now making it to the next round (not sure how good China or Costa Rica are). They should protest the ref's calls, if they can, that was nonsense. I look forward to watching Turkey play again; they can play a tough game. Brazil has some great players who want to win at any cost, but I hope that they have referees with a bit more backbone and skepticism in the rest of the tournament. And I hope they get knocked out as soon as possible.

Meanwhile another game is about to start and I am NOT going to watch it. G'nite.

Congress gave the FDA the gift of conflict of interest as it expanded the "user fee program" with little fanfare, as a rider on the bioterrorism bill.

The drug and biotechnology industries pay about $160 million yearly in user fees to the FDA, but that sum would jump to $260 million yearly in 2007 under the proposed expansion. The new money would not only allow the agency to hire more staff but also to upgrade its technology and improve management at FDA headquarters. In return, the FDA would commit to maintaining its speedier pace for new drug reviews and to more quickly move applications for new uses of older drugs. In addition, it would begin pilot programs to further speed review of certain fast-track drugs.

Meanwhile, Salomon Smith Barney committed to the same structural changes that Merrill Lynch announced earlier this week, in an effort to make their research analysts separate from their investment bankers. The two brokerages have more in common than that: SSB has been subpoenaed by the same NY Attorney General whose investigation and threat of criminal charges caused Merrill to make those changes. A juicy summary of ML's crimes and concessions.

Lester Bangs died 20 years ago. He was a rock critic guy. If you're like me (if you're like my age, or were at least in 1987) then maybe you heard of him for the first time at the end of side 2 (they had sides back then!) of REM's Document album, immediately preceded by "Lenny Bruce and...". Or if you were less obsessed with the mumbly boys from Athens than I (who still recall planning for the day in August, I think, when the new album would come out and buying it on cassette at Plan 9 Music, but I digress like a madman or a big dog), then you didn't hear of Mr Bangs 'til the video for "It's the End of the World as We Know It" came out. Or else you're older, were listening to Iggy, Lou Reed & the Velvets before Lester hisself was, you've gone through 4 iterations of love/hate for Bangs, you're tired of it, and you think I'm an idiot for not being hipper sooner, and you hate me. Or you're younger, you're only aware of Lester Bangs because he shows up in a recent film, and I think you're an idiot and I hate you.

Anyway, it was right about '87 that time that Psychotic Reactions and CarBuretor Dung was published collecting for the first time Lester's wild & wide writings from years writing for Rolling Stone, Creem & Village Voice. The book is startling, loud and contradictory as the letter fuck. It's full of drugs too, which is kinda how Lester died, besides having the flu. It was in 1992 that Bruce Sterling dis-interred Lester for a post-autopsal blind marriage by short fiction with San Francisco cartoonist Dori Seda who expired in a startlingly similar manner and likewise with plenty of potential in the bank.

A few years back Bangs' essay on Elvis' expiration was stapled into the front of a picturebook on the King's early years; Lester likens EP's latter-day rep to that of The Pentagon, "a giant armored institution nobody knows anything about except that its power is legendary", and then calls him the "perfect cultural expression" of the Nixon years, and thsu opines that "we might all do better to think about waving good-bye with one upraised finger". There really is no other voice like his. [pauper's hint: rip off amazon--yeh, that's right I even linked to 'em when I said it!--and read his entire intro on the sample pages they provide without buying the damn thing. Don't worry, there are legions buying it for the subject and not the author, very much in spite of LB in fact].

Here's a great restrospective article on Lester, which includes some curves I'd never heard before. Of course I haven't [yet] read the book on him. And wait, there's more...

FURTHER STUDY:

• a rant on Patti Smith
  
• a musing on Van Morrison's Astral Weeks
  
• an interview/article on/with Brian Eno circa '79
  
• And a list of more links from, where else, RockCritics.com
  

[gone fer so long and then back with this...]

mash it up! mash it up!

[...] But, suddenly, the recording changes course when, instead of the gravelly voice of Kurt Cobain, the smooth R&B harmonies of a Destiny's Child hit appear on top of the grunge music. As the recording moves on, it is clear that the song is neither fish nor fowl; it is a crossbreed that neither band ever intended, or even dreamed of.


[ snip ]


Songs like this one, which combine different hits without adding any original music, may represent the first significant new musical genre to be lifted out of the underground, developed and then spread, mostly via the Web. The songs, called mash-ups or bootlegs, typically match the rhythm, melody and underlying spirit of the instrumentals of one song with the a cappella vocals of another. And the more odd the pairing the better.

I'll call 'em mad versions as a tip of the chapeau to the old Jamaican sound system scene, where versions were releases of new vocals over the same rhythm track, which happened very frequently (albeit with the originator's knowing the rules of the game--but then none of them xpected to be millionaires, in some countries as a musician you can expect to be employed, but not rich. Kinda like teachers in America. doh!).