New Site Added to Blogroll - Candygurus

Who likes candy? Well shit, who DOESN'T like candy? But these guys like it a lot. I mean A LOT. The whole site is dedicated to testing and rating all the different types of yummies out there.

I am posting this for two reasons - I know one of the two guys who runs the site, and because they are funny as hell. I laugh my ass off every time I read a new review or post. Here is one of the more recent ones:

It’s not fair to blame the masses for the faults of a few. Like, you can’t say every Iranian is a numbnut; just the dumdum leaders who use religion to hide behind a fascist regime stuck in the middle ages. Similarly, just because there seems to be an inordinate amount of crap candy out of Mexico, it’s not like there is no good Mexican candy. On the contrary, we found a few items worth purchasing again. Unfortunately, these Serpentinas aren’t them. Perhaps if I had grown up on these…? M A Ybe if I had been force-fed these as a chillun I could find some semblance of candy satisfaction? As it stands, I couldn’t be more putrified.

Serpentinas are terrible. They are inedible. I put them in my mouth and immediately relegated them to the spitter pile. Wanna re-enactment? Watch any Seinfeld episode where Kramer is lauding some kind of fruit and then tries some inferior piece that Jerry bought and immediately spits it out and says, “no – that’s no good.” Insert me as Kramer. Done.

Simply: bad. Just awful. If you happen to come upon them in some international foods aisle, I suggest you slowly turn back around and slink away.

Check out Candygurus here.

RIP Allen Klein - I Guess

With all the celeb deaths in the last two weeks - Farrah Fawcett, The Gloved One, Billy Mays, Karl Malden, Steve McNair etc, a pretty big one got glossed over - Allen Klein.

Klein was the famous New York businessman who managed business affairs for the Rolling Stones and later The Beatles - hosing both groups in the end.

He is one of the many reasons for the rift between Paul McCartney and the other Beatles that hastened the band's end. Later, the other three Beatles said Paul was right and they never should have signed on with Klein. Oh well...

Read the Wikipedia entry for the gory details of all his various business noodlings, but for now, dig the take on Klein from the Beatles parody movie The Rutles. Klein is played by John Belushi and his two henchmen are SNL writers Tom Davis and Minnesota Senator Al Franken (whaaaa?):

Fellow Floydian Slip Scores Big Hit

I have to share this. My buddy Ehren Ebbage, from the Floydian Slips, has a song on the season finale of ABC's Eli Stone this Sunday.

The song is called Land On Me. It's a great tune, off of his new album Ten Cent Souvenir.

Ehren was also in Isor Wallobee, a band I led for a few years in the mid 90s after I quit The Strangers, after 5 years on the road and about 1,000 shows across the country with that band. 

The story of how I met Ebbage is kind of funny. I didn't really have direction after leaving The Strangers, and was living in Eugene Oregon. So a buddy and I started having pick up jams at local clubs.

One night I see this guy watching the band through the window. At the break, the waitress hands me a note. Ebbage was 19 and couldn't get into the bar but he wanted to jam. For some reason I went out and talked to him and we agreed to get together and play.

From those jams, we put Isor Wallobee together and had a two or three year run and a CD I am still really proud of. Until he turned 21, he'd have to either stay onstage or leave the venue at set breaks! Classic.

Anyway, he's gone on to get into producing, recording, writing and touring etc. Congrats on this great score, dude!

Neil Peart Launches Cooking Site

Rush drummer Neil Peart has bounced back admirably from the tragedies of separately losing his only daughter and his wife in a short horrible year back in 1998. Not only is he back on his game with Rush, kicking ass harder than ever, but he is remarried and is expecting a new baby this summer. Well, his wife is. Good for him!

Now Neil is branching out into another one of his passions. Cooking. Like motorcycling, Neil got into cooking rather late in the game, saying on his Web site, "I was in my forties before I learned to cook anything more complicated than soft-boiled eggs."

Now, Neil is launching Bubba's Bar and Grill, a site that will offer recipes for "good, simple food" from Neil's alter ego, "Bubba."

From Neil's site:

“I have learned a few things about preparing good simple food that might be worth sharing. In this space I will assemble and present some of that lore, along with some simple recipes, because it seems a shame that other Bubbas (of any gender and ethnicity) should have to suffer the foolishness of my youth — I was in my forties before I learned to cook anything more complicated than soft-boiled eggs.”

Visit Bubba’s Bar ’n’ Grill, where you will learn about “The One Hour Rule,” “The Queen’s Portion,” and why Bubba says, “If you want to impress a woman, bake her a pie.”

The site opens July 4.

In reporting the news, ClassicRock.com listed a hilarious run of possible cringe-worthy recipe titles based on Rush songs, including Lakeside Pork, Jacob’s Larder, Red Bruschetta, Thyme Stand Still, A Passage To Bangers & Mash, Pesto and my fave, Fry By Night.

My money says that if Neil's site catches on, he will publish a cookbook, and wouldn't it be cool to see Neil have a cooking show on the Food Network? Cookin' with Neil!

Maybe it could be Cooking With the Neils and he could co-host with fellow Canadian Neil Young. They could have Bob and Doug McKenzie suggest Canadian beers to compliment the food. OK, where do I pitch this idea?

Keith Emerson Joins Spinal Tap Onstage

Spinal Tap finished their "world tour" of one gig at Wembley Stadium last night. The band was joined by Keith Emerson on Hammond for Heavy Duty and a few other songs according to reports.

Emerson also appears on the song on Back From The Dead, Tap's new studio album, which is excellent by the way.

Anyway, someone posted a couple of short videos to their Flickr account. Check it out:

Chickenfoot’s Chad Smith Sustains ‘Serious Injury’

According to a statement from the band, Chickenfoot drummer Chad Smith suffered a serious injury on stage during Monday night’s concert in Paris.

The statement reads, “We are sorry to inform our Spanish fans that Chickenfoot cannot perform tomorrow night in Madrid due to a serious injury to drummer Chad Smith. ”

“Chad was performing on stage last night in Paris and during the show he hurt his right arm badly. He has torn his small bicep and cannot play the show Wednesday, July 1st. The band is very sorry they cannot play for their Spanish fans this week and plan to return as soon as possible.”

Eeeks. I'd think they'd have to take a few shows off to allow Smith to heal. In the meantime, I am still enjoying the new album.

Pete Townshend Windmill Contest

The Who are giving away a Strat signed by Pete Townshend to the person who submits the best 30 second video of them doing a Pete Townshend windmill (that was BOWLING...). Contest details here.

The contest ended Sunday and I had been getting emails about it for a few weeks but blew them all off.

I kind of wish I had entered, as there are many lame entries and I could have been a contender! But there are a few great ones too. I like the ones below, especially the guy who drew blood. I think there should be a rule for this that if you don't draw blood, you are disqualified.

When I was 13 or 14, I was doing windmills in my room (playing to either Who Are You or live Won't Get Fooled Again from the Kids Are Alright soundtrack) and my hand hit the glass light fixture cover on the ceiling. It came crashing down and shattered everywhere. My mom ran in and said what happened, are you hurt? I said No and looked at my hand, which was covered with blood. I wish I had a video of THAT!

Here is the man himself, from a recent tour. Note how he almost certainly has wounded himself doing this. When Townshend does the windmills, his nails go flying. He bleeds. It's real, not some bullshit stage move. Dig it:


There were tons of lame submissions. Here are a few cool ones:

I like how this guy even put the number on the guitar and even looks like a young Pete (and he bleeds too):


This guys has all the moves down and likely hurt himself. Good man.


Love how this guy used a real gig. Band doesn't sound too smoking but I dig how he is throwing windmills all over the place in LA Woman!

Neil Young and Paul McCartney Go Apeshit

I am really not sure what to say about this, except that even though it doesn't sound that great, make sure to watch all the way to the end. The last two minutes are the payoff.

Michael Jackson Death Brings Down The Internet

You would have had to have been off the grid hiking in the Appalachians or hooking up with your Argentinian mistress if you had not heard that Michael Jackson the "king of pop" died yesterday of heart failure.

I was never a big fan, so this news isn't devastating me like it would if this were, say Neil Young or Geddy Lee. I mean, Jackson hasn't really been significantly creatively active in the last couple of decades if I recall, and that whole pedophile thing doesn't sit too well.

But I am clearly in the minority on this, and I fully expect to be inundated by Michael Jackson for the next few weeks. I am ready. Bring it on.

The one interesting side-product tidbit is that so many people were freaking out about Jackson's death yesterday that the Internet almost ground to a halt.

Gotta give the guy some credit for being that big of a deal to that many people. CNN posted a comprehensive story on what happened here. Excerpt:

"Between approximately 2:40 p.m. PDT and 3:15 p.m. PDT today, some Google News users experienced difficulty accessing search results for queries related to Michael Jackson," a Google spokesman told CNET, which also reported that Google News users complained that the service was inaccessible for a time. At its peak, Google Trends rated the Jackson story as "volcanic."

As sites fell, users raced to other sites: TechCrunch reported that TMZ, which broke the story, had several outages; users then switched to Perez Hilton's blog, which also struggled to deal with the requests it received.

CNN reported a fivefold rise in traffic and visitors in just over an hour, receiving 20 million page views in the hour the story broke.