Archive for October, 2007

Shooter, Elvis and the Jack of Hearts

Wednesday, October 31st, 2007

Yeah, I got this blog title from a track off of Bob Dylan’s “Blood on the Tracks” album.  It’s appropriate, though, because I’ll be talking about Dylan later on.

 So, this past weekend I took a road trip to Milwaukee to see Shooter Jennings play a club called The Rave.  It looked a hell of a lot like the place Wayne & Garth went to see Alice Cooper in the first movie, so now I have to watch it again to verify that.  Anyway, it was a decent venue with a small crowd, but a hell of a show!

The opening act was a gentleman by the name of Eddi Spaghetti, frontman for Texas punk band The Supersuckers.  He came out with his guitar player who was dressed like a 70’s porn star, but played like a rock star.  Spaghetti did some acoustic versions of Supersuckers songs, and even covered an old Merle Haggard song called “Misery and Gin” which was the highlight of his set.

 Then Shooter came out.  Shooter may be best known as the spawn of country music legend Waylon Jennings, but is a great musician in his own right.  I had listened to his albums “Electric Rodeo” and “The Wolf” before the show, and I can honestly say they’re both damn good country-rock records.

 What I wasn’t prepared for was his live performance.  I’d expected a toned down guitar rock show, but what I got was pure brilliance.  He was good.  Damn good.  He put on a better show in this club than most bands play in an arena. 

 And the band - let’s just say that the lead guitar was better than Jimmy Page on a good day.  I could have sat there all night listening to him solo.  I’d pay to see this performance again.

Monday.

 I paid a visit to the Chicago Theater to take in a performance by rock legends Elvis Costello and Bob Dylan.  Amos Lee opened, which was ok, but I wasn’t paying much attention to him.  Other people at the show informed me that he was fantastic.

Costello took the stage and played an acoustic set for about an hour.  I don’t really know a lot of his music, but what I heard has inspired me to check him out further.  He played one tune which may have been called “I Want You” which had me riveted.

Then Bob and his Band played.  I wasn’t expecting much because Bob is, well, Bob.  His voice isn’t what it used to be.  He growled though his first two songs, “Cat’s In The Well” and “Lay Lady Lay” - but as he went along, he seemed to come to life and sounded a whole lot better.  I was thrilled to hear “You’re A Big Girl Now”and “Highway 61 Revisited” and even more surprised when he closed with “Like A Rolling Stone.”

He, Amos Lee, and Costello came out for the encore and did an excellent rendition of “I Shall Be Released”,  then went into “Thunder on the Mountain” and closed the night with “All Along The Watchtower.”

I’m not going to give the performance a good or a bad review.  Bob can’t do a bad show, because he’s Bob Dylan.  He’s a music legend.


Choosing Who is Right for You: The Cockpunch Scale.

Monday, October 22nd, 2007

I would like to share with you my method for choosing the candidate I will vote for. I call it The Cockpunch Scale. Basically all you need to do is to watch and listen to the many douchbags we have running for nomination and every time they say or do something that makes you want to punch them in the cock (or in the case of Clinton, a cuntpunch) they get one cockpunch point. When it comes time for you to vote on primary day you take the candidate with the least amount of points and vote for them. For the presidential ballot you take the score of the one that is running for president plus 1/2 of the cockpunch score for the person they choose for their runningmate.
Example:
Presidential Nominee and Cockpunch score:
Bob - 10
Vice Presidential Nominee Cockpunch score:
Clone Bob - 15

So
10+(15/2)= X
10+(7.5)=X
Rounding time!
10+8=18

The score for that Presidential pairing is 18. If that score is less then the other runners you would vote for Bob and Clone Bob.

Now that Brownback has bowed out of the race the cockpunch score of this race has dropped drastically. Fucking Brownback. Fuck. I can’t even articulate how much I hate that useless piece of shit. Now that he is gone I have to concentrate on telepathically sending brain cancer to Huckabee.

With the way things are going the Republicans seem to be favoring Giuliani and that probably won’t sit well with the conservative fuckstick vote. There are even murmurs of the Christian right splitting off and forming their own party if Giuliani gets the nod. For this reason alone I want Giuliani to snag the nomination. I would love to see the Jesus Army start their own party instead attaching themselves, parasite like, the the Republicans. It would be much easier to separate the true nutjobs from the ones who are pandering to them. Like dressing them in tinfoil pants. After that the Republican party could get back to what they do best, performing gratuitous oral sex on big businesses and the rich. I, for one, think they have been sidetracked for too long by having to bend over for the evolutionarily challenged crew. It will be good to see them get back to what they do best.

What would they call their new party? I have no idea but I bet the words family or values make an appearance. Maybe even both. And I know who could lead them into classic third party obscurity…
Brownback.