y0u d!3 n0w

INCONSEQUENCE

2008-09-17T09:15:00.000-07:00

what's the good word, people. i realize haven't blogged in over 10 months, but i vow to not let you-die-now, well die. but not a lot has happened. i didn't move overseas. i didn't move back. i didn't have teeth yanked, reel in real swedish fish, switch jobs, write the soundtrack to a film, starfuck with the guy from west wing and billy madison, or visit the olympic village in vancouver. and i definitely didn't sell a gay childless couple some babies off the black market. it's been the same old shit.

so, in the spirit of my inactivity, i've decided to come up with a complete list of the most unimportant things ever:

kid rock - he rhymes the word 'things' with... 'things.' several times. irredeemable behavior at best. oh, and even though it's a logical option, try not to kill yourself while listening to that shitty song.
sarah palin groupies - behold their collective stupidity.
service oriented web enterprise portal technology

oh and my band didn't record a new album, so don't check us out on saturday, october 18 at jammin' java at 6pm...

[...if you care, right at this instant i hear within temptation the silent force...]

HER SHIRT SAYS WHAT EVERYONE ALREADY KNOWS

2007-09-18T08:55:00.000-07:00

in my triumphant return to blogdom, i'm going to depart from the expected vitriol driven by my subversive rejection to the soulless chasm of inefficiency and creative banality, also known as...any guesses? any?? it's...

...wait for it...

ding ding ding! corporate blah-ness!! trust me, i'm still good for a whole host of crm team noodle-scratchery, but i'll try to refrain.

what's even more psychotic is my alternative topic of the hour is almost as dubious as writing about corporate automatons whining about not getting their daily fill of starbucks and iphones. this phenomenally righteous, yet shameless dusting-off strays close to the planet-decimating expanding sun of blogosphere: the 'non-blog baby blog.' these textless picture-dumps simply register as nauseating peddlings of pious overparental haberdashery. overzealous parents brag about how their progeny is better than everybody else's, and do so silently. c'mon - gimme some insight into why i should care about your life. mundane activities like crotch cradling with daddy-kins become profound descriptionless monoliths for generations to come, like a statue of saddam hussein, or better yet, chernobyl. for christ - please just use picasa or flickr or something if you have no intention of writing a real blog so you don't show up in my search queries. just rid me of profundities such as, 'baby's first dunk.' so to kobe: dear lord i hate your honky parents. and your name too, unless you somehow grow up to be a 6'6'' black man that can shoot from 15 feet and play d. or a giant slab of flank steak. whatever, crackers.

but fuck it. this is my platform, and i'm about to get really sappy. deal with it. i write most of this from 35,000 feet above the atlantic, nestled firmly between a hippopotamus of a woman and a rhinoceros of a man. stray flakes of airborne peach cobbler that have all the flavor of manila folders, fall neatly into my lap from both ogreish directions. lamentably, i'm headed away from european valhalla and toward the ol' business jerk store, where plenty of bad idea production will surely take place. i have but 8 and a half hours to think. 8 and a half hours to sigh. 8 and and a half hours to be bored, so 8 and a half hours to write to my niece:

dear shiva-bean,
by the time you read this, you'll have no recollection of how your incriminating sideways glances towards me at the ripe age of 3 weeks only signify a hell of a successful poop. you'll have forgotten all about the way you'd cringe at me, almost with judicious contempt, just to be appeased by a pacifier in the form of my friend's dangling stuffed cow. no memory of waking me up on a saturday morning by peeing all over my (albeit ratty) shirt. and you wont remember falling asleep, so calmly and peacefully, in my lap and in my arms after one of your 83 daily meals.

no, you won't remember any of these things. but by that same token, i'll never forget them. i'll also never forget how ecstatic i was when your mother announced that she was having you. i'll never forget how you calmed down as your pops played you a cd made and given to him by the greatest force on the planet. and i'll never forget how you totally had me at hello the instant you first traced my day-old beard using the entirety of your chubby little face.

but i got to witness some other stuff during days 22, 23, 24, and 25 of your debut to the universe. for all the time that i've known her, your mom has been, well, uh...yeah, nuts. but this time, i saw a side in her i've never seen before; a side that convinces me that she'll be an excellent mother. you'll get all the attention, love, and spankings that you richly deserve. you'll also have all the love and attention from your entire world of uncles, aunts, grandparents, cousins...everyone who'll stop at nothing to make sure you have the best. we'll be fighting to be the first ones in line to spoil you with that ez bake oven when your mom denies you of one. or maybe not. make that barbies. ok, what the hell. alright, it looks like i'll just have to bribe you with that awesome new toy, 'super safe soft sponge-like object with extra cushioning,' i think it's called.

and your pappy ain't too shabby either. oddly, watching him parade you around in no more than a speedo and bathrobe (it *is* amsterdam, after all) during early morning changings screams nothing but devotion. in fact, he's clearly the better diaper outfitter out of the two. that may not sound like much, but when you emerge from diaperland to check into trouserville with nary a scratch, you'll know who to thank. but keeping in mind that he might be staring at starcraft replays during some of your adolescent years, i'll make sure that you're not stuck listening to lame dutch abominations, lame british abominations, and lame...um...miscellaneous bizarreries. and although no amount of browbeating can leave your life devoid of aging irish foolishness, you'll definitely be privy to your generation's classics.

by the time you lay the full teenage angst-laden rebellion down on mama and papa, when the likes of rihanna and the white stripes replace louis armstrong and led zeppelin in the lexicon of the contemporary classics, when the tag team of richard branson and mark cuban actually figure out how to clone and sell human souls, and when your uncle has more than just a peppering of grey in his wig, people are going to start wondering if you'll end up at harvard, cambridge, or even better - the university of maryland at college park. although at this rate, i'm sure by then it'll be better known as 'pepsi presents, a joint reebok/hyundai project: maryland university by michael bay - buy me buy me buy...'

at that point, i'll leave it up to you to locate the milky way's last remaining blu-ray disc player so that your crazy uncle can relax with his own collection of the classics. you can do this from the internet 2.0 etherplug-i-tron terminex in your corner office, or from the break room at the hospital, or from behind your drumset while on tour with the rolling stones (some things never change). ok sure, you'll have to wade through an endless deluge of suri cruise, mary-kate olsen jr., and zahara jolie-pitt thornton bale-depp-paltrow buscemi-knoxville fansites, but i promise you that it'll be worth the effort. and know in the back of your mind that during your stewart copeland-esque drum solo during the 8th encore, all the while you're being uber-loved and uber-cherished by your proud parents and relatives who are wondering why they are still paying your hovercar insurance and holodeck utility bills.

but for now, just keep pooping it up. and stay friends with the monkey.

with love, always -
~proud unckey suvo

[...if you care, right at this instant i hear abba gold...]

HEY CRM TEAM LEAD, I'VE CONFIGURED THAT KNOWLEDGE TRANSFER STRATEGY WORKFLOW FOR THE UPCOMING BOILER PLATE WEBINAR. BOO-YAH!

2007-02-22T10:32:00.000-08:00

certain things have no place in certain habitats.

bull sharks have no place in petting zoos, jane's addiction has no place in music, and it would be unwise to unleash this walking, talking abomination anywhere in public.

so when i glanced over my shoulder at what two of my slovenly unathletic, mouth-breathing coworkers just did, i've ruled that something must forever be banished from the workplace, punishable by having all their batbelt-worn priceless necessities of life be immediately confiscated and destroyed. that, and maybe a thorough eye gouge, ironically administered by this.

(but that's just a clever photoshopped hoax, right? they don't actually make those, do they? there's no way a sane person would buy that kinda shit. holy fucking fuck. the next thing you're gonna tell me is that they invented a keyboard so that the beautifully sculpted, herculean tech support staff won't ever have to dangerously overexert themselves by frantically moving their hooves by extra fractions of an inch to type up trouble tickets. oh...umm, dear god.)

let me back up a little before i start making less sense than i already am. there are generally three distinct orders of species whose daily cohabitation in any sea of cubicles, laptops, and baseless arrogance lead to many an excited yet illogical violation of their own personal dignity:

a) people who take themselves too seriously (ie. overachieving incompetent crm team lead and his ilk),
b) people who don't give a shit (everyone else minus two people), and
c) people who don't give a shit whilst violently mocking the entire immediate populace (me and this one seriously jaded douchebag in software testing).

the oversimplified rule of thumb is that nobody more than one order apart from another can engage in effective communication together. ideally, you always want a-orders to hang out with other a-orders, b's with b's, and so on. this holds true, mainly due to that in part and parcel, a-orders love the smell and taste of their own excrement. but it's when their ass-pounding desire to share their feces with everyone takes over that makes for seriously dubious interaction. take for example a conversation typical to those i have every day:

crm team lead: did you get my value-add recommendations to the latest and greatest deck on the vendor core competancy metrics? the pivot dashboard? i don't think i have to remind you that this is a mission critical living document.
me: dude, huh?
crm team lead: and when you get done with that, let's assemble the tiger team for a configuration breakthrough session. or would you prefer a lunch n' learn?
me: i'll kill you, i swear.
crm team lead: what was that? i didn't hear you - i was listening to the sound of my own voice on a continuous loop in this hot bluetooth earpiece i got from the nextel outlet. and now i have to go, (reaches out) high-five, my brother!

clearly the lines of communication here are an afterthought - especially on that last part. crm team lead is making a dreadful attempt to connect with someone way out of his order. which puts me in an unenviable position. do i turn my back and roll out, leaving him there looking like a complete dingus? or do i oblige, and we both end up looking like complete dinguses? since the degrees of said mouth-breathery increase as you approach the alphabetical top of the list, you need to maintain your always fragile image as you upgrade toward c-order status. but poorly producing b-order employees certainly have their purpose.

which is why to help me educate my new mandate (and my original point) from a formal perspective, i've employed the services of a fictional but prominent b-order denizen of the cubicles to serve as my conduit to everyone else. her name is beth ann, a systems integration specialist.

at the time of this post, beth ann legally changed her name to 'angyl-magdylyne' as a result of her massive transformation through suffering a series of identity crises. look at her; she was constantly ridiculed through her formative years keeping her sub-par in every facet of life. c's on report cards. 3rd string soccer midfielder. boyfriends that steal from her.

how did she get this way? was it a lack of human interaction? was it that her focus was on getting that used '88 camaro instead of on her personal hygiene? was it her oblivious but encouraging mother, then in the midst of her third marriage? in any event, her burgeoning desire to become a fashion school student, thereby gaining the crass individuality that she would give her ovaries for, was ultimately quelled due to her lack of talent. naturally, she did what anyone would do in her shoes - learn powerpoint and settle into a role in office management for years on end, forgotten by the world, but not by a host of eating disorders. every office has a beth an--er, angyl. yeah, angyl. gotta love feminazis.

so everyone listen up as angyl-magdylyne says, 'thou shalt never high-five, chest bump, fist pound, or anything else popularized by our favorite jive-talking cycloptic waste of life in the office.' you're gonna look like idiots. it's that simple.

[...if you care, right at this instant i hear arcturus's sideshow symphonies...]

OPUS ONE: HOW TO MURDER YOUR WIFE

2007-02-12T15:54:00.000-08:00

it should be painfully clear by now that i spend my free hours moonlighting as a sentinel of world culture. admittedly, my presence is oft uninvited, but i have taken upon myself to make the biggest of sacrifices to provide you with only the most biased and caustic commentary imaginable (wait, that doesn't even make any sense). but even all my vigilant watchdoggery can't keep up with one commonly overlooked bit of idiosyncrasy: band logos. the pop music world is filled with cool ones, not so cool ones, and ones that somehow attack all your senses rendering you worse off than helen keller (ooh, slap my taint and call me 'sassy'!). but let's get our collective head out of our collective ass for two moments. pop logos tend to mirror the quality of the bands themselves - bland and derivative; boring and shitty; just plain gay (who are these dorks anyway?)

incidentally, a lot of talented bands elect to keep it real and go with ordinary and non-threatening logos. they shouldn't be confused with the aforementioned 'boring and shitty' category. no; they're simply too cool for school. it's kinda like brad pitt thinking, 'i know i'm rich, good looking with hair more tussle-able than yours, can get any creature this side of the equatorial guinea to fuck me, but i'm going to let my overly unselfish and subdued, nay, non-pretentious behavior speak on my behalf.' (here's where tyler durden pauses to think about his fifteen extra guestrooms filled with sacks of yen.) 'oh dearest womb raider, don't make me choose. can't we just adopt them all?'

back on the ranch and keeping with how the craftsmanship of logos can somehow resemble the hallmarks of the bands they represent, there are the logos that are half-assed rip offs of the other, much better ones.

anyways, in the pantheon of band logos, only a scant few have withstood the rigors of time. which ultimately brings me to my point; my calling. yes, i've decided to turn over a new leaf and give up being a satirical pain in the ass to focus on being the gandhi-esque philanthropist i truly am.

so, odin's court - question for you. as a band that's ever so eager to please, not nearly cool enough to have a plain logo, and yet overly devoid of any real talent, how can you avoid contracting the dreadfully shameful kelly bundy syndrome and steer clear of being hammered in ass by father time? ladies, your answer - start a black metal band. (to be continued...)

[...if you care, right at this instant i hear the jackie brown soundtrack ..]

BOUTROS, IS DISNEYLAND PART OF THE U.N.?

2007-02-08T09:16:00.000-08:00

so it's 1216 on a tuesday afternoon, i'm chilling with crazy old pretentious crm team lead, and i've never been as suicidally bored as i am right now.

ok, once before.

and maybe it's been several months since i last posted, but it takes awhile to get over an former icon of sexual promiscuity getting tittyraped, repeatedly, by father time. oh christina, your blatent refusal to cheat the ravages of age like so many of your celebrated and esteemed brethren, is beyond mysterious.

in any event, i leave you with the most important contingent international law has ever contractually honored:

[...if you care, right at this instant i hear muse's black holes and revelations...]

SEND IN THE PUSSY POLICE

2006-10-17T08:16:00.000-07:00

(new shit soon, i swear - once i figure out this human cloning thing. i'm close though, really. for now, i'm off to the eddie bauer outlet for my new tech jacket, jong il edition.)

[...if you care, right at this instant i hear borknagar's quintessence...]

THE DUST AND THE SCREAMING, THE YUPPIES NETWORKING

2006-08-25T12:08:00.000-07:00

my sincerest of apologies for the lack of postings this week. but as you know, the cogs of corporation must spin vigilantly. awesome new posts next week, but until then, enjoy this innuendo-esque pic which subliminally (but completely) recaps my week. watch how crm team lead, hogan, demands certain things out of his plebes, his warriors, his me.

[...if you care, right at this instant i hear within temptation's the dance...]

EPILOGUE, OR THE SUM OF ALL MY HATE

2006-08-17T00:35:00.000-07:00

and so ends my first blog post ever. it only took me several weeks to finish it too - the model of efficiency. just to recap, you, the accidental reader, should check it out in this order:

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14

and finally the current monstrosity.

should you have laughed? maybe. should you have been moved? probably not. should your only lasting memory of this overdrawn bullshit be a burgeoning desire to question the legitimacy of ll cool j's career? fuck yes (see #3 above).

ladies love cool james todd smith has given the world an abundance of bizarre spoils courtesy of the most dubious of careers. from making shit albums, to making shit movies, to public speaking gigs with the shit republican party (not a joke), it's hard to believe that a schmuck who is responsible for the incomprehensible foible of never being seen without a baseball cap (which ultimately resulted in the popularity of these hideous creations) could, at one time, successfully 'knock you out.' as far as i'm concerned, he'll forever be pegged as the pile of human waste that had to take a backseat to justin timberlake. if that last pic was intended to provide budding actors with some visualization depicting the increasing stages of on-screen prowess, job well done. and by 'well' i mean 'makers of edison, go commit mass suicide.'

there are a few honorable mentions to hand out real quick. i'm going to make any mention of them really quick and really tiny from left to right, they are:

dynamite hack covering nwa's boyz in the hood. hilarious, but loses points because it's not the whole song. plus i hate ugly frat boys that get more chicks than i do.
steve burns covering they might be giants' dead. loses points because the vid makes no mention of tiny toons.
some guy covering some other japanese guy's (koji kondo kataku) super mario brothers theme. loses major points for rushing. lay off the rubber cement huffing (why the hell is he playing bass in shop class?) for one hour and slow...the...fuck...down.
opeth covering iron maiden's remember tomorrow. loses points because you need a game genie strapped to your face to watch the vid. why the hell do people do this? tekken vids? really?
kelly sweet covering aerosmith's dream on. loses points because she's less feminine than steven tyler.

another thing - it seems that experienced bloggers and annoying intarweb pop-up coders alike opt to add those smiley icons and/or current song of choice to indicate their frame of mind during the creation of an entry. i actually kinda like this concept and i'm more than comfortable in claiming that i invented the practice. so, in a vain attempt to conformingly sexify this blog, i'll add a simplified mood vehicle in the form of what album is inspiring me to write the latest drivel. scroll down and check it out for yourself. apropos, if you're stupid enough to click on a smiley download pop-up and now your computer has chlamydia, good - you deserve it.

maybe you'll notice that the album sometimes steers an ironically contradictory tone in my writing that you can call me out on. like, how on earth could someone enjoying a meekly conservative lindsay lohan cd perform the venomous and heinous act of producing such a hate-filled diatribe? actually, don't answer that. but it's still ironic, kinda like in the way fidel castro would enjoy the fruits of some capitalist utopia. but that could never, ever happen.

i leave you with a final musing. the overall popularity of a band can boil down to one simple ratio that i've cleverly dubbed 'one simple band ratio,' (or 'nambla,' for short). nambla can be defined as:

nambla(x) = (# songs other bands covered by x) : (# songs by other bands x covered)
where x = artist

just for us laymen, the higher the number on the left side of the ':' with a corresponding lower number on the right indicates a more prolific band/artist. in other words, if the number on the right is bigger than the number on the left, you've got a pretty shitty band. and yeah, i stole the whole nambla thing from the daily show, but again, i have no problem in saying that they stole it from me. observe below these points of reference to give you an idea of what kind of scale we're dealing with:

nambla(limp bizkit) = 1:9
nambla(korn) = 1:2
nambla(u2) = 3:2
nambla(alice in chains) = 2:1
nambla(paul anka) = 5:2
nambla(david bowie) = 3:1
nambla(nirvana) = 15:4
nambla(celtic frost) = 13:3
nambla(beatles) = 14:1
nambla(pink floyd) = 76:1

and the absolute showstopper (in my highly comprehensive and sophisticatedly scientific method), the runaway winner of this event is abba with a staggering nambla of 102:1. (i'm really glad that nobody else claimed that 'nambla' moniker for themselves. especially not some wacko organization that is clearly a vicious underground child molestation ring operating under the guise of gleeful summer camp enabling young boys to explore their sexuality. yup i'm glad; really glad. so glad that you can go ahead and add the 2nd 'a'.)

[...if you care, right at this instant i hear dark tranquillity's damage done...]

NUMBER, WHAT?

2006-08-09T21:26:00.000-07:00

i'm due for one of my trademark changes of heart that makes me ever so popular with all my closest friends. i've decided to go with a song that's not exactly a cover to cap off my list of well, best covers.

about as often as kirstie alley tries to obliterate the fuck out of her esophagus by cramming fistfulls of pure lard through her system, an artist or band will completely run out of money. naturally, as their thirst for expensive hookers and papi's finest llello remains unquenched, this forces them to do some inexplicable things to help recoup their losses. sometimes a band will release some half-assed 'remix' album that was completed end to end in the studio by a visionless, mixing board-slider molesting intern. incidentally, the typical custom for the band during this critically important recording period is to sit thousands of miles away in a vomit-soaked living room of some 'homeboy's crib,' passed out and pantsless. needless to say, the results speak for themselves.

(for example, about two months ago i ended up at the local waxie maxie's as i could no longer slay the violent urge to own my copy of the new white stripes remix album. so you'll understand how cheated i felt when i opened the case and the cd was covered in jagermeister stickers and bong resin. true story.)

((oh, completely unrelated: you did it, yanni - looks like you'll continue to run uncontested in your dubious race to become history's finest role model. don't worry though, while you're getting raped in prison, this fucker will be more than happy to fill in for you on tour. wow, how the mighty have fa-- just...wow.))

it's probably clear by know that i've gone in favor of a remixed song over a true cover. to boot, i've decided to go with a visual masterpiece of which my aforementioned most closest of friends have heard me talking about for the past 2+ years. since i'm all about girth, i'll even make the youtube clip bigger for you by 130 pixels, diagonal (a whopping 125% increase in area).

but before i continue, have any of you accidental readers ever worked in a sterile office environment?? surrounded daily by corporate automatons, steadfastly working in unison to create meaningless crap like the 'delivery efficiency matrix for enterprise strategy e-service initiative'? frequently violated by humorless and incompetent braggarts who constantly obsess over their newest gadgetry, boring family, pissfully dull lives, and have successfully popularized the concept of not ever being caught without one of these pieces of shit?

and similarly, being metally raped by crm team leads who walk around all over the place with those stupid bluetooth earpieces when they're clearly not talking to anyone on the phone? do they think they look cool? are you serious? i mean, when i get off my motorcycle, the first thing i usually do is take off the goddamn helmet, not leave it wrapped around my face like some bizarre, sordid yuppie status trophy for everyone to gawk at. when i was getting coffee a few days ago, some numbnut walked in with the earpiece on, and said 'good morning.' was it wrong of me to assume that he was talking on the fucking phone when i ignored him?? i got the weird cold, skunk-eyed stare as i walked out. fucker.

(sidebar: if the last couple pics were slightly beyond confusing, sap and bearing point are two leading tech development/consulting firms. why the fuck do they have anything to do with golf? 'holy gosh, martha! phil mickelson just hit a birdie on a par 4! looks like we have a new place to do all of our role-based expediency/return on investment paradigm analyses!!')

now that i've wasted so much of your time, just watch the vid. it's simply an immaculate embodiment of hopefully every rebelious employee's dream - seeing their humble daily dungeons demolished by what turns out to be a living shout out to the years past. (plus adding guitars meritorious of dimmu borgir songs doesn't hurt either. [well maybe not, but cheers again if you got the reference.] brilliantly played, depeche mode.)

NUMBER TWO

2006-08-03T08:03:00.000-07:00

fiona apple - covering the beatles' 'across the universe'

maybe you were expecting rufus wainwright's version of this song. i happen to really like it too - it's actually better than most of these other covers, but it makes no sense to rant about two covers of the same song in two different places when i can bore you all about it all right here. the big problem with rufus's version (other than the inexplicably long, chokingly-suffocating youtube load time) is that the otherwise beautifully done rene magritte-ish vid is tainted with that brat dakota fanning.

i could seriously go on for days about dakota fanning; about her pretension-laced flicks, her pretension-laced acting, her pretension-laced interviews, but it all comes down to this - she totally thinks she's better than everyone else. and the worst part is, she's probably right. she makes me wish i were dead.

plus the vid inevitably stars rufus wainwright, who i'm not particularly attracted to (yet). which brings me to my next point...

say what you want about fiona apple. anorexic?? maybe. ass-rapingly liberal?? possibly. but if she doesn't have your dong's attention beginning with that scene when her hair starts to come undone ('...images of broken light which dance before...'), you're fucking gay.

(actually, i think fiona's version is one of the best cover songs out there, to the point where it can stand alone as its own thing; its own plagiarized 'thing.' go ahead - attack my convictions. i'm prepared to defend myself.)

(...but i'm not prepared to defend anyone in the event that you're still not convinced about said chokery... what a weird legacy he has left us with.)

NUMBER THREE

2006-08-02T07:29:00.000-07:00

brad mehldau trio - covering 'exit music (for a film)' by radiohead

radiohead can be represented in any list ever created; even ones that include any or all of the following words in its title: 'greatest', 'worst' 'sports' 'dunks' 'terrell' 'owens' 'video games', 'ever.'

(those were real lists on espn.com. speaking of which, espn should no longer be considered a credible journalistic outlet anymore. i'm not sure they really were in the first place, but they definitely masquerade as one. that's ac slater in the pic hosting some espn show, people. ac fucking slater.

furthermore, any group that has to resort to the likes of a kid rock giving his angle on anything while on the 'budweiser hot seat' (jeez) should immediately be stripped of its associated press-ship. and the espys?? what kind of pretentious bullshit is that? for starters, it's called the 'espys', as in 'ESP(N)ys'. for the love of christ, why even bother with such a crass display of faux-exclusivity? was the domain 'http://espn.espnespyawards.espn/~espn.html' already taken? seriously though, this is totally a different (and nauseating) topic altogether.

but since i'm a hypocrite, i'm going to continue watching/reading/ogling...)

so mehldau's freakish technique somehow manages to accentuate his insane talent rather than deter from it. just check out the clip about 2 and a half minutes in, where it looks like he's trying to multitask by playing a sick solo while keeping a cell phone secure between his chin and shoulder. that, or he's trying to hide a massive goiter from the crowd. whatever.

napoleon dynamite makes a surprise appearance on bass too.

the only thing knocking this version down a peg is the 'louder than a locomotive' ride cymbal the drummer is clearly trying to rape with his sticks. and violently to boot. give that shit a rest and tittyfuck a hi-hat once in a while - it won't kill you.

NUMBER FOUR

2006-07-31T15:11:00.000-07:00

apocalyptica - covering metallica's [insert any song title]

call me a cheater on this entry, but i've managed to completely run the gamut on metallica. i've broken it down into a system of complex neurological stages, each more deserving of intense clinical study than its predecessor. for example, there's:

stage 1: 'metallica is the greatest shit ever - i want to touch tips with james hetfield.'
stage 3: 'metallica is a brutally transcendent band that will prove to be a major influence for budding bands, generations to come.'
stage 4: 'first metallica show - holy fuck, incredible drumming.'
stage 7: 'sixteenth metallica show - eh.'
stage 12: 'every other metal band does it better.'
stage 15: 'why did i waste my time with 'load' and/or 'reload' in the first place?'
stage 18: 'and why the fuck did i play that game of 'who's in my mouth?' with james hetfield?'
stage 22: 'i have nothing but categorical contempt for every idiot who still wears metallica shirts - including members of metallica'

have you sat through at least 9 seconds of that atrocity, 'some kind of monster?' if so, it should now be painfully obvious that james, lars, and co. have their heads completely up their asses. they used to be kinda awesome; how they got here from there is anyone's guess. gentlemen, that bullshit's not cool at any age.

anyways, i know these apocalyptica clowns sometimes look like they'd rather spend their time rubbing their cocks all over one another instead of playing the cello, but i've logged enough time in orchestras to know that these cuties are phenomenally gifted. their solos alone on a live cover of 'one' are totally absurd. but since the last few have been live songs, i chose their studio version of 'nothing else matters':

NUMBER FIVE_v. 2.0

2006-07-28T08:21:00.000-07:00

tori amos - a nirvana's 'smells like teen spirit' cover

actually, i really like that last clip with the two argentinian clowns, but it probably makes sense to post a real cover here. i decided to go with this chilling version of a song originally done by a band who wrote an entirely different song sardonically titled, 'rape me.' this version is just simply awesome. and it befits this equally awesome artist who happens to actively support anti-rape campaigns. sadly, anybody who gives at least three shits about tori amos would understand why.

so just this time only, out of respect to tori amos's case for the women's empowerment movement (see bjork/harvey), i'll put the abortion jokes on hold. nambla is still some bullshit, though.

NUMBER FIVE

2006-07-27T11:38:00.000-07:00

two random argentinian dudes - covering 'sunday bloody sunday' by u2

what is it with that country? their chief export is this. thus creating such things like this. which somehow begat this.

and now:

btw, rightfully fork over my golden ball - i found yet another doppelganger, this time for our portly monstrocity mentioned above. raza azteca!! or not, whatevs.

NUMBER SIX

2006-07-26T18:50:00.000-07:00

cradle of filth - 'hallowed be thy name,' iron maiden

another metal shout out.

it seems that any search request in youtube will return a mind boggling array of random scenes from some random anime flick. i get it, people. to you 29 year-old virgins who feel that providing the world with your favorite scene of a squid from outer space fucking a shapely japanese geisha with big eyes and small mouth, not to mention setting it to some metallica song, will legitimize your aversion to actual human contact: cheers, i get it.

but try it sometime. go to youtube.com and search for any word or phrase out of an ordinary dictionary. take, oh i dunno, 'hot lunch,' and you'll get clip screen captures that look like this crap.

and i definitely don't need this when all i want to do is watch is a clip of psycho sid justice blowing out both of his legs on live tv. i guess all of this explains the clip below. the song is set to some corn-studded turd of a japanese cartoon since no real vid exists.

(crm team lead, this is a chance for you to pull up your favorite excel spreadsheet about enterprise metadata configuration strategies and ignore the visuals altogether - call it an 'optic sorbet' if you want.)

NUMBER SEVEN

2006-07-26T17:34:00.000-07:00

pj harvey and bjork - covering the rolling stones' song, 'satisfaction'

then the rare cover comes along that's so superior to the original, it makes you wonder what would happen if you could somehow go back in time and successfully have mick jagger's parents unfucked.

actually, i admit it. this version is just, well...eh. but i went to a u2 concert a few years ago and their opener, harvey, completely stole the show. yes, stole it from u2. the intensity she has on stage is seriously unmatched by anyone else claiming to be in her league.

and you're worthless if you don't like bjork. that is all.

(btw - nice display of the women's empowerment movement, i might add. it makes me wish i had all my kids aborted.)

NUMBER EIGHT

2006-07-26T14:25:00.000-07:00

sepultura - covering u2's 'bullet the blue sky'

so, i gotta stay true to my metal musical roots. hahahahahahahahahahahahaha!!

hahahahahaha! get it?? 'roots'? 'sepultura'? hahahahahahah... no?

fuck you, that's why.

NUMBER NINE

2006-07-26T13:58:00.000-07:00

jamie callum - covering the overly covered 'everlasting love' (i guess originally by buzz cason. thank you, wiki)

this song has been covered no fewer than 83 times by bands, pop stars, judo instructors; everyone. i like this quasi-jazz version the best even though the video is a total disaster. don't get me wrong, i'm a huge fan of that squinty-faced nightmare renee zellweger and all, but this is a mistake. do yourself a favor and read any random issue of national geographic when you click below.

NUMBER TEN

2006-07-26T12:22:00.000-07:00

muse - covering nina simone's 'looking good'

anyhoo, from here on out, i'll be nice and try to leave the banter to a minimum so that you can decide things for yourself. this version is definitely an homage that befits the legacy of the late doctor simone. to the good doctor, i've been waiting my whole life for this. bravo.

THAT'S IT, THAT'S THE LIST

2006-07-26T11:10:00.000-07:00

oddly enough, i'm actually not a fan of cover songs. the bad tend to greatly outweigh the good. besides, i'd rather venture into uncharted waters with a unique artist rather than constantly look for that anchor; that point of reference buried in an otherwise brilliant stand-alone song. why not just write a new song in the first place? same thing with movie remakes, btw. did we really need another rollerball? really?? was the original even all that good? whatever.

and the other caveat, what anyone accidentally stumbling onto this blog, ready to shoot down all my musical tastes is about to see is definitely NOT a comprehensive list - it's just a compilation of things (post-90s) that reside on youtube. there's a killer version of pink floyd's goodbye cruel world by anathema. nowhere online. smashing pumpkins covered joy division's isolation. nope, not online either.

oh, and one final disclaimer, my only intention is to appeal to a wide range of musical tastes. i like to think that i'm somewhat diverse, but i have my creature comforts. i could do a 'best of dimmu borgir cover project' if you want, but the only person that would care is this guy.

don't be that guy.

PREAMBLE RAMBLE

2006-07-26T10:01:00.000-07:00

first let's get to the bottom of what a bad cover doth make. take this example of afi covering the cure. technically, it's not that bad - all of them play their instruments reasonably well and the singer seems to hit most of his...um, 'notes.' but from their arrangements all the way down to the inflections of the singer's voice, a doppelganger has been born.

(sidebar: speaking of doppelgangers, doesn't the afi singer look freakishly like a screamo version of another well known singer? i'm just sayin'. oh, and what's up with those retarded michael bay-esque quick edits in the first 50+ seconds of the clip? you shouldn't have to suffer full blown dimentia while watching some shitty music vid.)

they even ape the drum fills and guitar solos ver batim. even though it's these elements that make the song so uber-recognizable in the first place, this is the equivalent of (upcoming analogy for any chicks stumbling onto my bandwidth by mistake) not just wearing the exact duplicate of another girl's dress to prom, but the same dress worn by the prom queen the year before. from a musician's standpoint, where's the challenge in that? someone might tell me...

'but it's those guitar leads, vocal inflections, and drum fills that make the song what it is. it's impossible to expound on. by the way, on a somewhat related note, i'm a homo and i want to fellate you.'

to them i'd say something like, 'robert smith and co. already did that version. it's called the original.' it'd probably be peppered with no fewer than 18 'fucks' and a punch to the dick for saying 'expound', but i digress.

furthermore, let's approach this from a different angle. say you're cruising down the road in your 1999 black chevy cavalier when, BANG!! the engine explodes. you realize that you need to buy a new car. you have two options:

a) seek out another new 1999 chevy cavalier, identical in every way except this time it's grey instead of black
b) exercise a morsel of creativity and get something different

if you picked 'a', you're a boring, unimaginative little shit and i'd rather have cancer than be your friend. i tend to explore the validity of a cover song in kinda the same way. you're dismissed.

so you need to make a great song better without ruining the allure of the original. that's the whole crux of the cover song concept - to pay homage, not to replace. nor to imitate. so, i'd also offer my hypothetical antagonist from two paragraphs ago this version of that same song by georgia's katie melua (not the one in the states, the one in europe. check out her accent.) and to be fair, it's a live version too (there's a studio version online, but rather than a music vid or something, it's oddly set to a slideshow of joaquin phoenix. since i like the song so much, i'm now gay for joaquin phoenix. thanks for posting it, fucker).

anyhoo, you'll notice right off the bat that all the guitar solos are elegantly different (only hints of the original chops remain), her (absolutely mesmerizing) vocal licks are stylishly different, and whoa, is that a completely different drum pattern altogether?? you heathen!! and look at her. she's so freakin' sexy. step aside, joaquin, now all i can think about is eastern europe. critical mass averted.

but alas, melua doesn't crack my list...
(what a monumental step back for the space program, btw...right?)

TAKE COVER

2006-07-26T08:44:00.000-07:00

'blog.' short for 'weblog.'

'intriguing concept.' short for 'gay.'

yeah, most of the blogs i've read are totally gay. there's top 10 baby pictures - gay. venomous postings about how ford mustangs don't come in 5 liter engines anymore because of 'them democrats' - gay. pictures of home improvement projects... top 10 links to local news articles covering the pittsburgh steelers' superbowl victory parade... pictures of babies doing home improvements - i hate them all.

...and youtube linkdumps. everyone videotapes everything now. ergo, people post shitloads of crappy youtube clips on their blog like it's going out of style. maybe it compensates their greed.

their greed for providing the world with nary an original thought. i mean, is it necessary to post a 20-second clip of people laughing at nothing more than a rubber duck with flashing lights inside of it, all the while urging everyone to comment on its sheer hilarity?

yes, the clip exists. what it proves though, if anything, is a total fucking mystery.

it's almost as hilarious as watching a bunch of unanimated, out of touch, self-fellating corporate pricks leeching onto their bogus perception of pop culture; each afraid to give into their (sadly, very real) utter lack of knowledge about well, anything. (shit, actually that's not fair. i'm sure they know about all the lowest local mortgage rates, and the best way to mine data from an multi-threaded archived document management system.) so be fair when you watch them, yammering and 'starbucksing' on at the proverbial water cooler:

PROCESS STRATEGY ANALYST: hey, did you check out that new cheerios commercial during survivor last night?
CRM TEAM LEAD: no, i was having dinner with the ol' ball and chai...
(everyone breaks into laughter for twelve solid minutes. this is followed by an awkward pause)
INFRASTRUCTURE MIGRATION SPECIALIST: but seriously, that was the one where a desheveled ben stiller in a cat suit asked that CGI scooby-doo if that was his 'final answer,' right?
PROCESS STRATEGY ANALYST: that's the one!
CRM TEAM LEAD: no, he did not just go there!
FUNCTIONAL TEST CASE MANAGER: (walking in with a panera bread tote bag) booyah! he totally did!
(more uncontrollable laughter)
FUNCTIONAL TEST CASE MANAGER: so anyways, who wants to come over to my place after the...(*wink*) 'rat races' and meet *my* boring wife, eat some meatloaf leftovers with us, and say hello to my twin boys, john and joe - they just started the 2nd grade, and gosh, their homeroom teacher really...

thankfully, that cheerios commercial doesn't exist...yet.

but these are some of the people that are responsible for some of the most asinine blogs ever. so to inaugurate (or deflower, whatever you prefer) the intarweb with my brand of worthless bullshit, it's only fair that i leave you with something that befits this platform, which i've now hopefully deemed unoriginal, excessive, and stale. i give you a top 10 youtube linkdump of what else - some of the best cover songs in history. naturally.

(but before i roll out:

...fucking hilarious. comment!)