Anthony Kiedis: Present Day Punk-Scat Singer or Lyrically Disabled

You must have done something "note"-worthy if The Simpsons mocked you. P.S. I'm a sucker for puns.

The Red Hot Chili Peppers are an interesting band to listen to.  Yes, I have some nostalgia and sentiment for a band that as a pre-teen I considered punk and hardcore.  They represented an energy, electric guitars, and often humorous and memorable rhyming lyrics that appealed to a suburban me who knew no better.  I understand some people dislike this band and view them as pop-punk that is more of an act than it is music.  As I've gotten older I find myself finding some merit in those statements, but that is mostly due to Anthony Kiedis' lyrics.

I doubt any self-respecting music critic ever wrote that Anthony Kiedis was the voice of his generation, but compared to some of the other voices out there (Fred Durst, Rachel Black, etc.) he's definitely not the worst choice, is he?  The majority of his lyrics seem to find rhymes out of convenience or laziness more than a cohesive or distinct message.  But doesn't that say something about this band?  On their best songs they are led by Flea's dominant bass riffs and accompanied by Frusciante's electric riffs.  Really, Kiedis is akin to a hype man in the rap world, a la, a more composed Flavor Flav.  His role in the band is the entertainer, and judging by his musical intentions revealed in his autobiography, this is a role he relishes. 

His position in the band has resulted in countless fun rhyme schemes that often showcase his talent for rhyming states with regular words.  This propensity for state rhymes is overused to an often comedic effect, let alone the song "Dani California" which is apparently an ode to rhyming states and really no other purpose (see also "Around the World" and "Especially in Michigan").  Below is a particular excerpt of nonsense from a song that uses no states as rhyming tools - "Can't Stop."

"Can't stop, the spirits when they need you
Mop tops are happy when they feed you
J. Butterfly is in the treetop
Birds that blow the meaning into bebop"

Those lyrics make about as much sense as casting an ex-gangster in a family film.  The final line in this exerpt brings up a point I want to touch on.  Few would dare comparing The Chili Peppers with the snifter-of-scotch-drinking high-class world of bebop and jazz music.  But I believe there are similarities between Kiedis and the scat singing in vocal jazz.  Scat employs vocal improvisation that matches the tempo, melody and rhythm of a jazz ensemble.  A scat singer uses the sound of their voice to imitate the sound of an instrument.  They accomplish this with nonsense syllables or other wordless sounds.  Although Kiedis uses actual words that rhyme instead of syllables, the effect is the same.

The high-octane and quasi rap-punk vocals in Chili Peppers songs flow with the instruments backing Kiedis.  And although I assume he writes these lyrics instead of improvising them, the convenience and quickness of his lyrics give off a vibe of him pulling this off the top of his head.  Maybe I'm grasping at straws with this scat comparison and just trying to make excuses for lyrics that seem to cycle between stating the obvious ("Slay the plague for it's contagious" and "Autumn's sweet we call it fall") and the asinine ("What am I to fly my kite on/Do you want to flash your light on" - Good job rhyming "on" with "on").  At least Kiedis and Flea have their acting careers to fall back on.

Mario Kills Raccons, PETA Kills Childhoods

Yum, looks like dinner and a show.

According to PETA, Mario, the lovably mustachioed plumber that inhabits a world of magical sewer drains and evil mushrooms, is an endangered animal skinning, bloodthirsty, two-dimensional menace.  Despite the obvious fact that Mario is a video game and therefore not reality, PETA attempts to sully the Mario name because of his of Tanooki suits.  In the game, the Tanooki's raccoon-like fur gives Mario super powers.  PETA's outrage resulted in the creation of their own 2-d game in which you play as a skinless Tanooki corpse chasing down the vile animal-killer Mario.  The web page for this game includes images of Mario reveling among the corpses of his latest victims.  They really don't hold back on trying to ruin my childhood and many others with images like this.

I remember this game filled with a few less decapitated raccoon heads.

Pretty gruesome images, I especially like that the decapitated raccoon head had the wherewithal to cross his eyes into X's, reinforcing that he did not survive the decapitation.  Also, the animal's lifeless eyes were still able to muster a massive and colorful tear, perhaps a silent protest to his current  body-less situation.  This opens the floodgates for different organizations to take their shot at horrifying the childhood icons that I once viewed as innocent and wholesome.  I'll take an attempt at listing the upcoming scandals to be brought to light, all I need is the accompanying cartoon photographs.

A wise man once said, "Put Meat Loaf in the Rock Hall of Fame."

1.) Elves are non-magical little people held as Santa Claus' slaves.

2.) Mr Feeny was a Nazi.

3.) Rookie of the Year is kicked off the AFI Top 250 Films because it's implausibility due to a blatant disregard for child labor laws.

4.) Coca-cola destroyed the enamel of Polar Bears, who also lack opposable thumbs making it impossible for them to drink bottles of Coca-cola.  Class action suit on behalf of the polar bears takes Coca-cola for everything.

5.) Mr. Rogers sold his neighborhood to developers looking to build a Super Wal-Mart.

Smoke your cares away down in Fraggle Rock.

6.) The characters on Fraggle Rock abused a myriad of drugs to deal with their fame.  (Ed. note: Actually this wouldn't surprise anyone really.)

7.) Ms. Pac-Man took over following Pac-Man's tragic Blinky, Pinky, Inky and Clyde overdose.  The tempting blinking lights called to Pac-Man feel until one day a taste of Inky or Blinky with a side of fruit just wasn't enough, he delved deeper into the underworld and started experimenting with all four characters, blinking or not.  "We knew his lifestyle would get the better of him eventually, but he couldn't be reasoned with," Ms. Pac-Man says, "I hope in his passing some little yellow balls out there can learn from his story, and that I can continue eating the hell out of some cherries to preserve his legacy."

8.) The banana phones Raffi sung so passionately about was actually written by Sprint.  The company looked to profit off cheap Honduran labor by combining food and cellular technology.  This would result in edible phones that would need replacing every 4-6 hours after being eaten by their owners.

9.) Lucky Rabbit's Feet were created by slicing the fur off of the Easter Bunny.

10.) Joe Paterno and Penn State football would be involved in a sickening abuse cover-up. Yikes!

Ode to the Liars and the Lazy

My parents don't buy this excuse due to my lack of feline DNA.

Often I will hear a friend exhaustively proclaim, "I had such a productive day!"  Really, did ya?

More times than not their daily docket will have looked something like basic chores, a little exercise and going grocery shopping.  I won't sit here and claim that I am any different.  I do the exact same thing.  Exaggerating to appear productive, normal and even hard-working is as downright American as apple pie.

In this post I will attempt to call bullshit on myself to break one of my "productive" days down.  As previously mentioned, I am for all intents and purposes unemployed.  Yes, I deliver pizzas 4 nights a week.  But the majority of my life is free time, which I spend in a myriad of unproductive ways.  Below are the edited highlights in my schedule for a recent day I considered "productive," followed in parenthesis by the unedited meaning of the productivity I truly achieved.

Bob Barker Wants You! to get out of bed.

-Woke up early = (Woke up in time to watch The Price is Right).

-Made the family breakfast = (Ate some cold pizza on the couch).

-Did the dishes = (Looked at the dishes and thought aloud that somebody should get to those).

-Washed 4 loads of laundry = (Seperated whites from colors and put them in a machine that did all the work for me.  Total time of actual activity completed by me: 2.35 minutes).

-Went for a run in the park = (Walked to the mailbox and back with enough energy left to complain about the cold weather).

-Showered = (Well that's just a lie).

-Searched for jobs online = (Daydreamed about being Morgan Freeman's voice double.  This is similar to a stunt double, but they would use my voice to fill-in for his dangerous vocal work, i.e. singing, screaming, conversing with Ashley Judd.  Disclaimer: this position is contingent on me sounding far more like Mr. Freeman, which will probably require expensive surgery or training).

-Completed the New York Times crossword puzzle = (Finished one level of Angry Birds).

-Went shopping = (At the local liquor store).

-Read an article on getting my resume noticed by employers = (Watched a mid-day Family Matters marathon on Nickelodeon).

As you can see I lead quite the extraordinary life.  I'm just waiting for MTV to contact me about appearing in True Life: 24 Hours Is Far Too Many for 1 Day.  Ed. note: I never once changed out of my pajamas in the documented day...or week.

Internet Movie Birthday Database (IMBD)

This 4-disc set is only $23 on Amazon and completely unrelated to this post aside from one joke.

As I do on every November 10, I decided to surf over to the web site IMDB to look up Clint Eastwood's directing credits.  The man directed 35 movies in 40 years!  Not to mention he was acting in some of those films, and in a host of others throughout those years.  Having that prolific a career as an actor and director challenges the prolific "scoring" career of Wilt Chamberlain both on and off the court.  Granted, all of Eastwood's movies weren't instant classics, or even worthy of wasting an instant-noodles dinner while watching (looking at you Space Cowboys and Hereafter).  Still, his numbers are impressive and he was Dirty Harry so he gets a pass on some of those.

While visiting the Internet's Movie Database, I came across their "Born Today" section and was amazed at the depth of their Happy Birthday wishes. Their research team would even find a gaffer/coffee boy on the set of the early 90's TV series Dinosaurs and cheer him after he blew out his candles.  Their section today (Nov. 10) honored the living (Ellen Pompeo from Old School), the dead (Brittany Murphy, Roy Scheider the wild-jawed sheriff in Jaws), the crazy (Tracy Morgan), the forgotten (Sinbad), and some guy named Bin Won.  In all, the section gave three cheers for 822 people born on today's date that worked in some capacity for a television show or movie.

That must be have been an incredible amount of work to compile when the IMDB page launched.  Sure, it's easy enough to discover the "stars" birthdays.  For instance, I share my birthday with Mike Myers, Sir Ian McKellen and Dmitri Martin.  I hope to see all of my readers at our joint birthday celebration this May in Dubai.  But how much time must it have taken to research just the birthday of the Aladdin soundtrack guy, Tim Rice?  Don't misunderstand me, Aladdin was a classic, but never did I ever wonder the birth date for the guy who put the music in the film together.  I was fine just assuming he didn't even exist.  In my 8-year-old mind, the songs from that movie were never written.  Instead, the cameras just happened to capture the characters as they sang these catchy tunes off the top of their heads.

All I can say is I am astounded by how much pointless work it must have been for this web site to inform me that today Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure director Stephen Herek was born.  You would have thought Bill and Ted could have launched Stephen Herek to become a household name.  Very similar to how Taxi Driver did for Scorsese, but it didn't work out.  But on his IMDB birthday, Herek's b-day is just as important as Scorsese's.  I just feel that all this work should be rewarded by somebody, since the results won't even be browsed by most.  Just counting to 822 would be a daunting task for me, let alone finding that many people with the same birthday.

Occupy the NBA

The "madman prophet's" show looks eerily similar to a few on cable news today.

"I'm mad as hell, and I'm not going to take this anymore," remains one of the most memorable quotes in film history.  It comes from Sidney Lumet's Network and is proclaimed by the main protagonist, Howard Beale, on his television program to spark the interest of the nation.  That phrase resounds throughout the country once the prime-time prophet instructs his viewers to yell it out their windows.  This scene vividly reminds me of something currently taking place.

I'm getting fed up with all the tiffs being played out through the media, the arguments over the money made by millionaires, and the divide it has caused in this country.  No, I am not talking about the Occupy Wall Street movement.  They had their chance.  Why should I occupy myself with the division between the 1% of this country that owns nearly half the wealth and the outspoken 99% who have to scrape to get by?  Who wouldn't rather occupy themselves with the division between two public groups of millionaire's arguing about a 50-52.5% share of the NBA's revenue?

That's why I am calling for an Occupy the NBA movement that will take a few cues from the Occupy Wall Street demonstrations.  Listen OWS, nobody likes bankers. We all just assume they cheat, but we play the game anyways.  It's the exact same concept as Monopoly.  But while they sit in drum circles and explain how the wealthy have destroyed the middle class, and any chance of security for the vast majority of Americans, there are over 400 men a being kept from playing a game for measly million dollar salaries.  How can Michelle Obama claim to be fighting obesity in this country while these professionals sit locked out of their gymnasiums, private jets and multi-million dollar weight rooms?

While it is easy to make jokes about the epidemic of terrifyingly off-rhythm drum circles that have invaded the current Wall Street protests, they do teach a lesson in Protest 101.  Music gets the message out.  I just don't have the time to read or listen to speeches anymore.  Kennedy's Inaugural Address and Dr. King's "I Have a Dream" speech don't fit well on my Stairmaster playlist.  But toss some Dylan or Woody Guthrie on my iPod and I will climb those stairs all the way to freedom.

This seems like an area where the NBA Lockout protests could easily succeed.  There are countless musicians with vested interests in professional basketball.  These include Usher and Jay-Z who are part owners of the Cavaliers and the Nets respectively.  Yet, the only song mentioning a lack of basketball  I could discover was this.

The NBA lockout deserves a song that wishes for an end to the lockout instead of a wish for more athletic talent.  At the very least, Shaq and Metta World Peace (Ron Artest's new name should be inspiring some progress) could combine their failed music careers to pen a hit protest ditty.  Obviously, their version would involve more lyrics about Cristal and bikini-clad ladies, faster rhymes and probably a sample stolen from an 80's rock song, but something with a powerful or satiric message like this Woody Guthrie cover could do wonders.

Another chapter of Protest 101 the NBA should read describes the necessity to win public approval by demonizing the other side of the argument.  I mean just watch how masterfully these propagandist Occupy Oakland protesters villianize these harmless Police Officers that are just trying to keep the peace by disregarding any definition of the word peace.

It shouldn't be too hard to find David Stern or some NBA owner shaking hands with a ruthless dictator.  And if they can't find this with a basic Google search, the players should be able to scrap together a little cash from their meager salaries to hire an expert Photoshopper to create a photo of commisioner David Stern playing bridge with Saddam.

You would have to imagine that if the NBA players could gain the backing of the general public via any of these two options, that it just might swing the owners to concede a percent or two to bridge the gap between the 50-50% share the owners want and the 52.5-47.5% share the players want.

Or the two sides could just look "compromise" up in the dictionary and agree on somewhere around a 51-49% share and end this silly argument between two groups of exorbitantly rich human beings.  Then we can get back to watching 99% of this country embarrass themselves by demonstrating for an end to money's indomitable influence over politicians.  If only the company big-wig from Network, could get the protesters to put down their snare drums for a second so he could heartlessly explain how money rules the universe and specifically how the men with that money do it, they would realize that the wealthy in this country are far more "American" than they are.

Consolers of the Violent

We play instruments in black-and-white just as well as in technicolor.

Sorry for the long delay, but I've been on the couch watching Halloween movies without my wisdom teeth the past week.  I'm sure everyone reading this was on the edge of their La-z Boy chairs after I teased a Brad Pitt and Jack White connection in this blog.  Well, worry not.  In this blog I will blow your mind into believing that the 1999 film version of Fight Club and The Raconteurs 2008 release Consolers of the Lonely share some major commonalities. 

To those who haven't seen the movie, I will ruin it for you in this next sentence, so be prepared.  The major twist in the end of the movie unveils that the seemingly radically different two main characters are actually the same person.  The cool, muscular, anti-corporate Brad Pitt is a figment of Edward Norton's soft, pale-skinned and twisted imagination.  The two sides of Norton's coin work together to create "Fight Club," the violence-prone, anti-establishment, anti-advertisement club Norton's character starts in the basement of his rundown house.  His creation overpowers him and grows to have chapters throughout the country.  The monster he created ends up moving past what Norton thought he was getting into and not even he can stop this powerhouse.

"No wonder so many girls like me." -Brad Pitt on the Occupy Wall Street protests.

Similarly, Consolers of the Lonely manically splits itself into two categories.  It pits the dark, edgy and heavy songs like "Consolers of the Lonely," "Attention," and "Five on the Five" against the softer Americana-vibe of "Rich Kid Blues," "Old Enough," and the bonfire sing-along ready "Carolina Drama."  This difference in feel, sound and vibe is even apparent in the demeanor and appearance of the chief songwriters, Jack White and Brendan Benson.  Similar to the differing appearance of Tyler Durden and unnamed narrator played by Norton, White's pale skin and dark hair give him a more hardcore look than the comparably cuddly Benson.  Don't get me wrong Benson is a total badass!  "The Swamp" is one of the greatest songs ever written about purchasing vegetables and prostitutes from the same South American man.  Yes, it might be the only song about that, but still....keyboard solo.

Anyways, these personality differences you might describe as good vs. evil, but more accurately: edgy vs. straight-edgy, go a long way in rounding out the sound of the album and the story in the film.  The  protagonists and antagonists complete the story by somehow working together in an imperfect harmony (Fact: the actual harmonies in Consolers of the Lonely are perfect, just ask Olmec).  They both develop a grittiness that isn't too hot in today's popular culture. 

Fight Club's visual atmosphere appears scratched up especially whenever Brad Pitt's character is featured.  It makes the audience feel the loss of control taking place in the main character's life.  Also adding to that feeling of chaos and danger is the choice to shoot the majority of the film at night.  And everyone knows all the fun and danger takes place at night.  Except for human mistakes like Kenny Chesney and Uncle Kracker.

Consolers of the Lonely has the same nighttime dangerous feel to it.  By randomly alternating between slow and fast, hard and soft, a chaos is created that leaves the listener guessing what's next.  And I could bore you with more comparisons between these two classics like how they are both throwbacks to old staples (Raconteurs to the Who, and Fight Club to The Graduate, which director David Fincher explains far better than me), but I think these hits just boil down to being badass.  They are both manly entertainment that I would associate with drinking Scotch, fishing with your bare hands and fighting Nazis.

For your enjoyment, the lighter side of Fight Club....