TWINKIES! I’m just trying to keep up my end of the bargain.
I’m leaving for Sarasota, FL tomorrow. I wish that I could say it was music related but alas it is not. I’m going to a wedding. I’m pretty much being forced to go but it’s ok. It’s sort of my duty as an American citizen I suppose. I’m not really all that big on weddings. I think it’s kind of pointless except for the breaks the government gives you for some reason. I’m not sure I’ll ever understand that. I think it’s one of the many ways “the man” is trying to bring a brother down. If you wave the carrot of lower taxes in front us we’ll do anything. You want me to obliterate my scrotum?! No way! You say you’ll lower my taxes? Well…ok. And that’s the story of why I obliterated my scrotum.
I’ll only be gone for four days. When I get back I’ll be preparing for the first MPF show in Philly. This project has been going really well. We’ve been very productive on a lot of fronts and it’s all been quite rewarding and satisfying. There sure will be more crap when I get back and maybe I’ll even do some posts on the phone. Eerie black magic that is.
Sarasota…More Like Boreasota
•December 9, 2009 • 1 CommentTwinkie The Kid Part 2: Bean Bag Plush
•December 6, 2009 • 1 CommentBy far my most popular post has been Twinkie The Kid: The Twinkie Holder. The next most popular post has only a quarter the amount of posts! Does anyone have an explanation for this? Perhaps I’m not the only that’s gone through a Twinkie The Kid phase. Maybe it’s the glorification of Twinkies from Zombieland. I know Woody Harrelson had me itchin’ to get my “twink on”. (Feel free to spread this phrase that I’ve just coined. Especially the next time you see a “bear” or “motorcycle enthusiast” wearing all of his leather apparel.) Well for whatever the reason, from now on all of my posts will be Twinkie related. Nah. Not really. That’s crazy talk.
Here’s another piece of crap from the great eBay rampage of ’03.
His crotch and butt contain the bean bag portion. The implications are somewhat obvious. I know that I don’t like getting hit in my bean bag. You see what I did there?
This kid is just filled to the tippity top with cream. Please don't stare at his crotch.
Strangely, he doesn’t have his signature lasso once again. It doesn’t seem like it would be that difficult or costly to put some brown yarn in his hand. Oh well. I hope you enjoyed the second installment of the Twinkie The Kid experience. In keeping with the jackercrap tradition I leave you with the rump.
Back dat thing up!
Tanks
•November 29, 2009 • Leave a CommentHappy Holidays! Happy Capitalization! Happy Capitalism! Happy Everything!
It's quite festive right? Anything red equals holidays and also blood. Pimp my blood.
I’ve got some fun posts planned for the near future. It’s going to be oh so much fun!
Shows That I’ve Peeped Lately
•November 17, 2009 • Leave a CommentOver the past month or so I went to some real neato deato smeato concerts. (Are we still calling them concerts? What are the hipster losers calling them these days? Rawk shows? Gigs? Smegma?)
First up was Thursday and Far at Bowery Ballroom. Oh yeah and the terrible opening band, Midnight Masses. Some of the most boring music I’ve heard in a long time and their performance was even more boring. This is exactly the kind of crap that Pitchfork is going to tell you is so hip right now. It was kind of sad actually because all six members sang but they did the most boring harmonies and background lines possible. It’s really a waste to have that many people in a band that can sing and just have them doing “ahhhhhhhh” on one note for a whole song. So I’m sure this time next year this band will be huge and having Carrie Underwood open for them.
Far was amazing as expected. I’ve been listening to them for over ten years and it was great to finally see them live. They didn’t play any new material from their upcoming which was good idea I believe. I was surprised that at least half of the audience seemed to know the songs and that some mini pits broke out. It’s too bad that the only shirts they had were youth small since I clock in at over 500 pounds.
Thursday played their “breakthrough” album, Full Collapse, from front to back. Personally, I would have preferred to hear War All The Time instead but Full Collapse translates better live than the recording. Geoff, the singer from Thursday, had also joined Midnight Masses and Far each for a song so that was something that happened. After playing Full Collapse Thursday played about six more songs including Jet Black New Year, which is scientifically their best song for sure. I’ll be seeing them again in December and hopefully they’ll play some of the better songs off of Common Existence. Also playing that show will be Dillinger Escape Plan(!), Glassjaw(!!!!!!) and United Nations(?!). When we got flyers for this while waiting in line we thought it was a joke because the lineup is almost too good to be true.
Sorry ladies, take your tampon napkin somewhere else!
The next night I saw Far at the Mercury Lounge. The two opening were both crap in their own way. The first band was trying to do some Elvis Costello nerd pop nonsense and the second listened to way too much of Finch’s What It Is To Burn. Luckily Far destroyed everyone’s face. They got to pull out some more songs than the night before and even did a little of a bit new song, which was pretty chill and about Chi from the Deftones who has been in a coma for over a year now. I hope the new album isn’t junk and that they stop by to visit me again.
The last show I went to was Pinback at the Irving Plaza. I saw them there before and for a bigger venue it’s pretty cool. Pinback seemed kind of tired this time around. I’ve seen them about 10 times at this point and I’ve never heard them play the songs at the actual tempo that’s on the album before. Maybe they’re getting too comfortable on their new rock star tour bus. It was still a good show and Rob Crow can do no wrong in my eyes. Speaking of Rob Crow, he did some karaoke before the opening band and invited people from the audience to come up and sing a song as well. I thought it was a much better way to kill time before the opening band than staring at an empty stage for an hour. Once again, the opening band was junk. I really didn’t need to hear some more indie garage rock that Pitchfork probably loves. Pinback didn’t even have a new tour ep this time around. I mean if you’re going to tour behind the same album again you might as well take some more of my money.
Cockaoke.
I’m seeing Cave In this week. It should be a good show but I’ll be missing at least the first opening band since I’m playing a show in the city earlier in the evening. I probably won’t be missing much but you never know. I like to at least give the opening bands a chance even if their recorded material is crap. Some bands are just much better live and aren’t very good at capturing that on a cd. I’m looking at you One Minute Silence and Filter (besides Short Bus).
I’ll probably be seeing Melt-Banana again too. They always put on a great show and I feel a certain kinship with them. Wink…
Japanese princess?
The Better Donnybrook
•November 5, 2009 • 19 CommentsI’m hooking you up yet again. I got that uploading fever kid. You’re welcome.
Fact: At a time there were two bands named Donnybrook. According to wikipedia one is “a Los Angeles, California, hardcore punk band” and the other is “a Tribal Metal band from Maine”. Can you guess which band is better? Great! Me too. So here’s a little bedtime story for you. During my first semester at college in Boston I went to go see Dog Fashion Disco play a show at Bill’s Bar. (Anarchists of Good Taste is still listenable.) I can’t remember if there was some terrible opening band but let’s just assume that there was. Suddenly Dog Fashion Disco was taking the stage to rawk the faces of the baker’s dozen of people in attendance. I don’t think I was the only one surprised to see them go on so early especially since they were billed as the headlining act. After DFD played I overheard in the dead quiet room that they had played early because they didn’t want to play after the next band who were really good. I think admitting something like that is really respectable and rare. Most headlining bands get terrible bands to open for them for this exact reason. I decided it was probably worth my time to stick around and check out the next band who of course wound up being Donnybrook…the good one…from Maine. Without a doubt they blew Dog Fashion Disco off the face of the Earth.
I felt like I got it right away and was on board with them for the whole show. It was a perfect blend of Mr. Bungle/Faith No More, Tool and all that is good in music. As I recall they didn’t have any cds with them for some reason and that was a major bummer. I did end up finding it in Newbury Comics the next day though. I was lucky enough to catch them a couple of years later at the Middle East Upstairs for an even smaller crowd but it still a great show. It’s always the really great bands that have a hard time finding their audience like the situation with Haste.
I remember seeing them in Metal Hammer or a similar brutal magazine discussing the lyrics for one of their songs even though they were unsigned. According to this interview they had offers from TVT and Roadrunner. It’s a shame that it didn’t work out for them in terms of finding a label or distribution though I’m not sure they would’ve been marketed properly anyways. From my understanding they put out three proper eps. I’ll be sharing their first ep with you today. The second ep was produced by Johnny K and it was clearly an attempt at sounding more polished and radio friendly. With this ep they made the unfortunate move, in my opinion of course, of reworking some songs from the first ep. This reworking basically meant throwing in a chorus or two more and taking out all the interesting and unique parts. The third ep was along the same lines as the second which is to say I liked them both but would rather listen to the first one.
I offer up Donnybrook’s first ep, Bleeding The Grain, for you fans of the jackercrap.
Tracklist
1. Radio Killed The Underground Star
2. A Better Way To Waste Your Life
3. Breathing The Final Dance
4. Cold Confusion
5. Grey Sketch Of Red
6. Poetic Tightfist
http://rapidshare.com/files/302956219/Donnybrook_-_Bleeding_The_Grain.zip
As I mentioned in my first upload this is for preview purposes only and to my knowledge is out print. It’s hard to find info about these guys actually. Wikipedia doesn’t have an actual entry for them. However, they did change their name to Red Cloud Revival and have released one album which you can and should purchase at cdbaby. They’ve got a concise myspace page to explore as well. Unfortunately, they seem to only sporadically do shows at this point but please support them by buying a cd. Check out this cool video, especially considering it was probably made on the budget of a cheese sandwich, for Poetic Tighfist. You might notice that this song is on Bleeding The Grain but this is a different version done by Red Cloud Revival. (I still prefer the original for the record.) This should give you a good idea of what you’re going to get from the upload.
Supposedly Donnybrook had over 60 songs but only released a third of that. If anyone has any Donnybrook music besides the three eps please send it my way. If there is any interest I’ll post the other 2 eps as well.
My Cabin Fever Broke
•November 5, 2009 • Leave a CommentAlright. So I can see how these websites/blogs/fansites can end up three years out of date now. My lack of motivation, inspiration and free time have kept me away from jackercrap. I suppose it hasn’t been that long and I had already stated that my updates would no longer be daily. I’ll stop crying now.
I wanted to give a quick summary of my trip to New Hampshire. I also wanted a helmet but I’m still waiting…
Day 1 – Gerry and I left New York around 7pm and arrived at his girlfriend’s parent’s house in Connecticut around 9pm. We did the obligatory shooting of the breeze and I watched Gerry and the father talk about the new truck. It was life altering to say the least.
Day 2 – After staying the night and picking up some supplies we needed for the cabin we left for NH around 7am. The drive alone was about 6 hours but we stopped at a grocery store and Whallmart to stock up on phoods. By the time we got to the cabin it was snowing lightly and our butts were numb. We quickly unloaded my packed to the roof van and got settled in.
Days 3-7 It’s hard for me to distinguish specific days in my mind once we were actually at the cabin. Most days included some backgammon and Scrabble. Gerry had never played backgammon before and he really blossomed into a wonderful backgammoner. That’s a word right? Could I use that in Scrabble? So yeah…wake up around 9 or 10 in the am and begin breaking the fast. Then would come the morning crap in the outhouse. For reals yo. We were “roughing it” as they say. We were also “throughing it” too. Then the afternoon was generally spent doing music related stuff and luning the ch. We sampled all sorts of sounds out there like chipmunks farting. At night we’d watch a movie or two and we were always dining the ner. We watched Drag Me To Hell, Trick ‘r Treat, Adaptation, 12 Monkeys, UHF, Brothers Solomon, Primal Fear and the appropriate Cabin Fever. I hadn’t seen Drag Me To Hell and Trick ‘r Treat previously and I really enjoyed them both. I haven’t lost hope for the future of horror just yet.
In terms of leaving the cabin we only made a couple trips. We went to a nearby lake and shot some footage for possible inclusion on one of our upcoming youtube smash hits.
We also got some local pizza one lonely evening. We got to play some Terminator 3 (would’ve preferred 1, 2 or Salvation) pinball and I watched Gerry shoot stuff on one those Buck Champion 6000 deals.
Day 8 – We woke up early for the long ride back to NYCitti. We made a quick stop in CT to drop off the stuff we borrowed. The shower I took when I got home felt so delicious. We took two “showers” while we stayed at the cabin. We would boil some water which we would dump into a bag (a shower bag!) with a little lever to slowly let out water. We had to do this outside in freezing weather in a little shower cubicle while the turkeys and pheasants watched.
I could go on and on about all the little details of our trip but…what happens in cabins is shown on TLC late at night. It was a great trip. The ends.
Haste Makes Waste
•October 23, 2009 • 1 CommentHowdy. I got back from New Hampshire Tuesday evening and have been catching up on my New York life for the past couple of days. As I had expected, we had no internet or phone at the cabin in NH. It was actually quite liberating. I don’t have the time or motivation to really describe the whole week just yet. Soon my precious.
So instead of the usual nonsense that I write about here I thought I’d do something a little different. I guess to “make up” for not posting for over a week. This is my first upload of downloadable crap. I’m planning on doing this from time to time but I certainly don’t want to be expected to upload junk regularly. Here are some more disclaimers for the future of downloads here:
1. I will only post on rapidshare. It’s really not a big deal.
2. I will post only things that are out of print (to the best of my knowledge).
3. If you want to post my links somewhere else please ask first and please give credit where credit is due…to me.
4. All downloads on jackercrap are for preview/evaluation purposes. If you like what you hear/see support the artists by buying their cds, dvds, shirts, thongs, tickets to a show or blood.
Now that that’s out of the way we can finally start. How many of you have heard of the band Haste? Probably not many of you unfortunately. Haste were one of those really great bands that wasn’t promoted much or properly and got kind of lost in the shuffle. It’s usually the bands who stylistically fall between the cracks that have a hard time finding their audience. They weren’t quite metal and they weren’t quite hardcore. It also didn’t help that they were on a label like Century Media at least in terms of genre.
So without getting into a whole history lesson on the band I wanted to share some of my thoughts and opinions about them. (History lesson here.) Sometimes you catch a band at just the right time if you’re lucky. Maybe if you had heard a certain band an album before or after you might have written them off. It’s frustrating to think about all of the great music that I might be missing because one album or song from a certain point in a band’s history didn’t appeal to me. With Haste I first heard the album When Reason Sleeps and was instantly on board. I’m not so sure this would have been the case if I had heard their debut album Pursuit In The Face Of Consequence first. While it’s still a good album, especially when you see the path that they were on, I don’t think I would have bothered to check out any of their albums after that. I would have missed out on their last and best album The Mercury Lift which included a lot more singing/melody and timeless songs. I played the hell out of that album and was even on their street team at the time. Haste always remind me of the hours I spent in the Learning Center at Berklee working on scores and listening to The Mercury Lift on my walkman. (Yeah. You remember life before iPods?) I was really bummed when one of the two singers was kicked out/quit, depending on who you ask, and then when they eventually called it a day.
I was lucky enough to catch them at Hellfest in Worchester, MA. They were definitely a live band and really ripped my scalp off. I’ll never forget when one the mics stopped working and both singers were sharing one mic. I sing. Hand off mic. You sing. We both sing. Pretty funny stuff. Speaking of live shows that’s exactly what I’m offering today. The now defunct record label Law Of Inertia was putting out a magazine briefly and included a cd of a Haste performance in an issue. The recording is from 2001 just before When Reason Sleeps came out. The show was at The Metro in Austin, TX as part of SXSW aka South By Southwest music festival. The quality is good and it includes a good mix of songs from the first two albums. Here you go:
http://rapidshare.com/files/296593049/Haste_-_Live_Law_Of_Inertia.zip
I'm too lazy to scan this stuff.
This recording is mainly for people who are already fans of Haste. If you’ve never heard them please listen to the music on their myspace page first. If you like what you hear you can purchase their albums here. If you want to read an interesting interview go here. If you want learn about kayaking go here.
If there’s enough interest I’ll post more hard to find stuff from Haste in the future. Did I mention that there’s not even a wikipedia entry on these dudes? And in the post that never ends here are some videos.
Anniversary Of An Uninteresting Blog
•October 13, 2009 • Leave a CommentCan you believe that it’s been a whole month of jackercrap already? For an entire month I have posted some sort of crap every stinkin’ day. I’ve already given myself a few pats on the back so no need to congratulate me or anything.
I’m leaving tonight for Connecticut and then the cabin in NH in the morning. That means probably a week of no posts or Taco Bell. You’ve been forewarned though that when I get back I’m going to have lots to post and torture you with.
Wizard! You shall not pass!
Packs
•October 12, 2009 • Leave a CommentToday I spent most of my time packing up things to bring to the cabin. I was mostly just gathering up all my random instruments. I sure do have a lot of this crap. I found something really neat today too. I’m planning on doing a post about it when I get back from NH.
I never mentioned this but I did end up seeing Zombieland and really liked it. It was a true horror-comedy film in my opinion. I’m glad it did well at the box office too. It was number one the first week and number two the second week. Hopefully, those idiots at the studios will realize that they can make money off of R-rated horror/horror-comedy movies…if they don’t suck. I know that Slither didn’t help with it’s poor box office performance even though it’s also a good movie. Here’s hoping that the Weinsteins and the other bags of tools running the studios start greenlighting some better crap!
Exhausted Changes
•October 11, 2009 • Leave a CommentI just got back from a weekend in Philly and I’m a little more tired than usual. Since I had a show there Friday night I wound up staying two nights instead of the usual one night at my drummer’s place. They have 3 kids who wake up around 5 or 6 in the morning and starting running around yelling crap about monsters and what not. They also have a new cat that likes to attack me in the middle of the night. What I’m getting at is that it’s hard to get a decent amount of sleep in that house and that I’m glad I don’t have kids at the moment. We had a good rehearsal this weekend though. We were mainly running through the set for our upcoming show. It’s probably going to be our last show in NYC for the rest of the year. We’re trying to focus on playing elsewhere and by elsewhere I mean closer to our drummer’s house and family.
Tuesday night I’m leaving for NH. I’ll be staying there with the other member of MPF for a week. We’re staying in his girlfriend’s family’s cabin. We’re going to be doing a lot of writing, recording and being jerks. I’m really looking forward to it. It’s going to be just swell to get away from everything once again and focus on music. On that note, I’m not going to be able to post anything for that week most likely.
This whole blog thing has been a really interesting experiment/experience for me. At first part of the whole deal was that I wanted to post something everyday as part of the quantity over quality journey. Since I’ll be taking a brief hiatus due to the circumstances of the cabin in NH I’m planning on doing things differently when I get back. I’ll try to post something every 2 or 3 days and hopefully it will be something more substantial than “I ate a sandwich.” We’ll see how that goes but I definitely want to make posts of better quality. Yup.
Jackercrap 