Word To VH1: Originality Is Allowed

(re-posted from my collectibles blog)

Just like the Yvette Nelson card I featured earlier, this superb Kiss Card is from Benchwarmer's 2007 Gold Edition set, and features Megan Hauserman, the 21st of only 24 models asked to kiss a card rather than autograph it. These cards are rare and quite valuable.


Since then, however, Megan has come a long way. She is pretty much VH1's go-to girl when it comes to Reality TV series, seeing as she's appeared in all of the following shows: Beauty And The Geek (Season 3), Rock Of Love (Season 2), I Love Money (Season 1), Rock of Love: Charm School, The Great Debate, Megan Wants A Millionaire, The Truth Commercial and, of course, Rock Of Love: Where Are They Now. So, really, it seems VH1 is really interested in finding this poor gal somebody to love. Unfortunately for them, it's been reported that she is currently engaged with one Anthony Scirpoli, of Cerca Trova Fashion, a jewelry company. I guess she found her millionaire after all.


She was rewarded for all her hard work in 2008, at the Fox Reality Awards by winning the coveted Best Awkward Moment trophy with Bret Michaels, for their moment in Rock Of Love 2.


Seriously, though, VH1 should branch out and try new people on their shows; it's becoming quite an incestuous relationship of spin-offs and sequels that never seem to end and just keep blending into one another. We know where this is going: they're trying to get Flavor Flav to hook up with Bret Michaels - not happening.

Quote Of The Day

From journalist Pat Hickey, of the Montreal Gazette, in today's column:

While I have a soft spot for Ron Hextall, there are those who insist the Flyers haven't had decent goaltending since Pelle Lindbergh learned that a Porsche is tougher to stop than a hockey puck.

Ba-da-bing!

Video Of The Week: Cee-Lo Green

Yes, him. You know him from his rapping days in Goodie Mob, from his singing in the electro-pop duo Gnarls Barkley, and now he's gone solo again with his album The Lady Killer and the the web-video of the Fall season, Fuck You!

Sure, the video is very similar to Sean Kingston's Beautiful Girls, both in colours, images and theme - but it's assumed. And, of course, features the four-letter word that will both ensure he can never perform it on network TV in the U.S. but will also get him enough notoriety to actually make it onto those shows. Catch-22? More like ''catch all you can''. Kudos, Cee-Lo Green.

Melissa Auf Der Maur & Final Flash @ Cabaret Juste Pour Rire, November 6th, 2010

First things first: if your band has the word ''final'' in its name, it can't be a very good band. If it's Final Flash, you'd better make sure you either start or end with a bang or show some genitalia on stage, or else you'll be inviting puns and put-downs with open arms.

What I witnessed with this band is a very solid rhythm section, with the drummer leading the charge and the bass player following suit; the bassist, however, needs to work on his rock moves, because bobbing your afro-clad head maniacally only goes so far. Perhaps he should take a cue from The Lindbergh Line's Karl Leblanc, who has magical, wonderful poses. But that's where the good stuff ends. The keyboardist doesn't sound like he's part of the live mix at all, and the guitarist's wankey-yet-airy vibes were overshadowed by the boredom of the band's dark-jam-band sound. And then there's the singer... singing clichés and inanities, in this day and age, at least requires a spectacular voice, and not only does this guy not deliver - not even close - but he also does it in the thickest of French Quebecer's accents that demands all the attention and steals it from the rest of the music, pollutes it even. Their record is called 'Homeless', probably as a shitty metaphor for a touring band - but their songs lack so much in sincerity that it's an insult to all those who have actually suffered that plight.

And from there it can only go one of two ways: either the lead act will easily surpass its opener, or the whole evening will have been stained with filth and would have been better left alone.

I'm happy to say Melissa Auf Der Maur more than exceeded my expectations and delivered a major league, top-notch, no-holds-barred barrage of melodic fury showcasing at once a fierce attitude, grace, and the cutest local-girl shyness we weren't sure she still had in her.

Fronting a band of young'uns fresh recruited barely a week earlier - and whose rhythm guitarist looked like and pretty much played the part of Josh Homme - she led the show like a maestro, be it the sounds but also the light show and projections, which she collaborated on; my personal highlight was Meet Me On The Dark Side, which I featured as a Video Of The Week recently, but, in all honesty, every song was a highlight and expanded what the albums had presented as a sonic vision.

The only song I found a bit uncomfortable listening to was Father's Grave, sung live to a backing tape with Glenn Danzig's voice pre-recorded, but the rest of the crowd seemed to go nuts over it. Then again, I was at her father's funeral 12 years ago, so to hear Danzig singing ''I dug your father's grave'' repeatedly might affect me more than others, and I understand that.

All in all, not only did she save the night from being an utter failure, she made it one to remember in a venue that will shut its doors on December 31st. And if I don't end up going to Killing Joke in two weeks, I'm glad this is the last show I'll have seen there.

Word to the promoters, though: even if you are fucking one or more members of Final Flash, the legitimate hometown openers for this should/could/would have been either Priestess, Uncle Bad Touch, or Dead Messenger.

Photos courtesy of Amelia Robitaille/Meet You At The Show

Not Nick But Nora's Intimates

Well, it's pretty much all over the web now, so it's no use denying it's there.

I'll just go ahead and say it: Kat Dennings, the superb(ly talented) lead actress from Nick And Nora's Infinite Playlist, now has nudes online. Apparently, they were taken from a cellphone. Maybe in the future, she'll be more careful in her choice of one-night-photographers, but hopefully not too much.

It even had my friend Allan Lento exclaim ''my penis wants to get out of my pants!''

She is, indeed, quite a specimen of our species. I hope to fucking God, should he exist, that she does not go the Hollywood/anorexia route in the future and instead remains the entity I'll be dreaming of tonight.

You can buy Nick And Nora on Blu-ray here, but she also has decent roles in Defendor and Charlie Bartlett, as well as smaller roles in London, The House Bunny, and The 40-Year-Old Virgin. She'll also play in Thor, which should be good.

Video Of The Week: Mick Jagger

Ok, so sometimes my Video Of The Week is something I'm truly fond of (see Pearl Jam, Melissa Auf Der Maur, or Besnard Lakes). Other times, when I need a good laugh, it's pure, unadulterated, terrible, terrible cheese - like Hall & Oates.

I still haven't made up my mind about last week's post, which side it falls on.

But this week, it's no contest - the cheese is back - in a big fucking way.

I usually catch a lot of flack for my opinion that The Beatles are nowhere near the best band of all time. Some of my arguments include the fact that they're cheesy, half their catalogue consists of inanities ('Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da', 'Love Me Do', 'She Loves You'...), some of their best work was performed by others (see Eric Clapton's masterful job on the White Album), and at least one band member's legacy as a solo artist (John Lennon) comprises more profound subject matter - and is just plain better than his output with the band.

You could also contend that while the Beatles were singing their early teen-friendly ditties, The Who was already talking about their ge-ge-ge-generation. That Cream was more talented in every way. That The Rolling Stones were making something more important in transforming the blues into a way to pass real emotions onto real adults while also snorting the planet's complete drug supply and helping keep the rest of humanity drug-free by sheer lack of availability.

And I'd add that, after Elvis Presley shocked America's puritans and scared its parents shitless (and rendered their daughters shirtless), you weren't allowed to have a bona fide parent-safe clean Boy Band put so high in the hierarchy of rock - a dirty medium if there was ever one. It would be like saying the Backstreet Boys have had a bigger impact on music than Radiohead or Pearl Jam: inaccurate and impossible. Not to mention stupid.

But then the Stones took themselves out of the equation with stupid shit of their own, which includes pretty much Mick Jagger's complete solo career. And, sure, I could have hit two turds with one stone and featured his ''hit'' song with David Bowie, I'm just not strong enough to withstand that song at the moment, let alone its accompanying video. But this one comes close enough, I promise.

For starters, it ''takes place'' in a street. Well, mostly a highway, and via a terrible use of blue-screen technology, more apparent than weight on Roseanne Barr or orange on John Boehner's skin. Secondly, it includes some dancing on said street, although for many, it's mostly from pretending to run while smiling.

There also seems to be 10 variations on each single member of the Village People. Maybe there was a convention in town and Jagger had a blast there and invited them all over for the shoot, who knows?

But mostly, it's full of shit - and by shit I mean utter, perhaps even otter, crap. The song's called Let's Work, but it clearly doesn't, and neither does the video.



Mick Jagger - Let_s Work
envoyé par MKH30. - Regardez la dernière sélection musicale.

The Rally To Restore Inadequacy

I'm a big fan of Jon Stewart and his Daily Show, and also of Stephen Colbert's Cobert Report. I watch the show(s) every night (4 nights a week anyway, but I curse the fact that they don't tape/air on Fridays), I buy the books.

I've found that in the past three years or so, Colbert has been more consistently funny, while Stewart has adopted a more serious approach. Colbert 'pretends' to be a Conservative while Stewart is openly 'Liberal' and has shifted his sarcasm not towards the message but more towards the news outlets delivering it - as has always kind of been the show's mandate.

But Stewart rides a high horse that needs to be put down: as an avowed Leftist, he went hard on George W. Bush's presidency - particularly the last three years - and time and time again has pretty much told the Democrats where they should attack Republicans to win seats and, hopefully, elections.

But since Barack Obama's election, probably because he wants to appear like the only 'fair and balanced' pundit out there rather than a blind follower, Stewart has repeatedly called Obama on every single one of his 'failures' or mistakes, often times making it seem like he's doing a worse job than Bush ever did.

And we're talking about the third President ever in ranking in terms of getting bills passed, including a historic health care bill, tax cuts for the middle class (which people actually believe was a raise in taxes), a bailout that was paid back in full by the automotive industry, and finished combat operations in a wildly unpopular war, all while staving off another Depression in the worst economy of our lifetimes.

But with the Tea Party firing up the Republican base and Stewart and the like diminishing the Democrats' accomplishments, is it any wonder Obama's party lost the House and barely kept the Senate?

Keith Olbermann and most of the other journalists at MSNBC have also been a target of Stewart's criticism, as he compared them to Fox News in their defense of the Left (where Fox News is pretty much the Republicans' mouthpiece). Except we've seen for 8 years how Fox News and NewsCorp in general not only don't even pretend they're an actual news network, but they go to great lengths to prove their points, most times being unethical (planting evidence then saying there's wrongdoings, such as during their Acorn reports or with their former male stripper asking Bush softball questions at an official press conference), and even go as far as hirting all the leading Republicans to serve as correspondents: Sarah Palin, Mike Huckabee, Newt Gingrich, Liz Cheney, and Karl Rove, to name a few.

Part of Stewart's Rally To Restore Sanity was to have pundits stop calling everyone 'Hitler'; well, Jon: stop calling every news outlet Fox News. And grow up, and see what the world is made up of. To quote Olbermann: you can't work on “the assumption that if the good guys stand down, the bullies will too.” Life isn't a fairytale, it's where reality lies - and in the real world, you have one party that led for 8 years on fear and cutting rights one at a time, and another one who vowed to do all it can to put an end to this. Shit takes time. You can't topple Washington and reform it in one night, those who run it and have run it for years (big companies, big lobbies, fat five-term-and-more politicians who forgot how the real world operates) don't want to let go of the stick, and you have to pry it out of their mouths; for some it takes strength, for others it takes wisdom, and others yet it takes time.

Let the Democrats do their work, or endure Republicans again. It's a two-party system, there is no other choice.

Even Bill Maher had a take on this. A good one, as you can see below. Here's one part that struck me:

“The message of the rally, as I heard it, was that, if the media stopped giving voice to the crazies on both sides, then maybe we could restore sanity. It was all nonpartisan and urged cooperation with the moderates on the other side forgetting that Obama tried that and found out…there are no moderates on the other side. When Jon announced his rally, he said the national conversation was dominated by people on the Right who believe Obama’s a Socialist and people on the Left who believe 9/11’s an inside job, but I can’t name any Democratic leaders who think 9/11’s an inside job. But Republican leaders who think Obama’s a Socialist…all of them.”

Look in the mirror, Jon. You are not the middle-ground voice that most Americans view as the voice of Reason. For many of them, say fans of Larry The Cable Guy (i.e. people who can't afford actual cable and live in trailer parks), you are a rich, Jewish entertainer from New York/New Jersey that politicized the Oscars for a couple of years - all things they hate. Add that you are open-minded, tolerant, neither racist nor homophobic, educated, have traveled abroad, an avowed Democrat, an entertainer - and one who makes his audience think, at that! - and they have even more of a gut urge to disagree with you on all points.

It's good to show both sides of a story, to hit either side who makes or says something stupid. But you can't bash your own side more than the opposing side even when it's unwarranted just to give you enough credibility to be listened to when you do bash the other. It won't make Bill O'Reilly swing your way in an argument nor Sean Hannity defend you when Olbermann gets pissed off. All it does is fuel their fire and have them say: ''See? Even Jon Stewart agrees with us!'', thus giving your opponents undeserved credibility. It's called shooting yourself in the foot. And you're just as bad a shooter as Dick Cheney was.