Beer Giant Busted for Unauthorized Use of a Dead Kennedys Classic

Talk about extreme irony: about 20 years ago, a major soft drink manufacturer sought the rights to the Dead Kennedys’ Holiday in Cambodia for a tv commercial. As you might have guessed, the band’s label, Alternative Tentacles, turned down the request. Fast forward to 2011: as reported in NME and the Guardian, Heineken was supposedly forced to remove a Spotify banner ad featuring Nouvelle Vague’s sarcastic loungey cover of the DKs’  Too Drunk To Fuck because of complaints that it would “encourage binge drinking.” The official story is the ads were removed not because of copyright infringement, but because an industry watchdog group flagged them as being inappropriate. As a matter of principle, the DKs remain unwilling to sell out their music for use in commercials: the band’s attorneys have been in contact with the beverage conglomerate, which might be a more plausible explanation for the ads’ sudden disappearance. Stay tuned…

The Bible Thief

This one was impossible to resist, via the Lefsetz Letter. A reader responds to a post concerning the pros and cons of the Kindle (mostly the pros, actually):

“My Kindle was stolen off my seat on a United flight back from London to LA two months ago. Went to the restroom, came back, gone! Theft at 35,000 ft. I reported it stolen to United (we decided not to search everyone on the plane!), but I left the account on to see what happened next. A week later, I got a notice from Amazon that a book had been purchased on my Kindle acct. What did the thief buy??

The Bible, Old AND New Testament, only $0.99 (public domain)…”

The Ten Best Christmas Songs of Alltime

…heh heh heh…

 

10. Linda Draper – Merry Christmas

The New York acoustic rock siren is typically pensive and hardly festive here: play this one early Xmas morning, hungover. Merry Xmas, not.

 

9.  The Pretenders – 2000 Miles

A reader suggestion, thanks for this! The link is a nice live version on youtube.  

 

8. The Reducers – Nothing for Christmas

Bet these Connecticut mod punks never realized how prescient this snide holiday tune would turn out to be when they originally released it as a vinyl single in 1988. Still available on the excellent Reducers Redux compilation from 1991.

 

7. Stiff Little Fingers – White Christmas

The alltime best version – maybe the only good version – of the bestselling song of alltime, classic funny irreverent punk rock, 1978 style.

 

6. Ninth House – You’re a Mean One, Mr. Grinch

Back when they were an artsy, Joy Divisionesque band, the New York rockers used to have a great time with this one no matter what the time of year. Never officially released, although there are several excellent bootleg versions kicking around, particularly from Arlene Grocery circa 2000.

 

5.  Tom Waits – Christmas Card from a Hooker in Minneapolis

Spot-on. Words cannot describe. The youtube link above is a priceless live version.

 

4.  The Pogues – Fairytale of New York

Shane MacGowan and the late Kirsty MacColl play dysfunctional drunken couple, trading insults and invective in perfect holiday style. This link’s a live version too.

 

3. Amy Allison – Drinking Thru Xmas

If this song isn’t universal, you find one that is. “Twelve shots of liquor lined up on the bar/You’ve got all my money and the keys to the car.” It’s vintage Amy. Nice to see the song up on her myspace again.

 

2. Florence Dore – Christmas

Although first recorded by the Posies in the mid-90s, Dore wrote it, and it’s her version from her lone 2002 cd Perfect City that really provides the chills. Xmas may not be suicide season, but this one makes it seem like it is.

 

 

1. Olivier Messiaen – The Birth of Our Lord

As we’ve noted here before, this piece isn’t titled The Birth of Christ. The great composer always put his Catholicism front and center…but maybe he was working for the other team? Nothing but brooding and hellfire in this macabre multi-part suite. The link above is a youtube clip from one of its quieter sections.

How the Other Half Lives, Pt. 5

[Editor’s note – this is an occasional feature, a sounding of sorts, a test to see how polluted the waters are, to suss out what’s popular and see how many bad bands there are by comparison to the good ones we feature here. Last time we did this we surveyed the entire month of June at Bowery Ballroom. This time around we went through the whole month of December at a popular LES venue. Batting average-wise, the club only scored 18 good acts out of the 92 they booked for the month which translates to a sub-Mendoza line performance…but eighteen good shows in thirty days? That’s more than one every other day, even better when you consider that the whole Xmas week is a wash. Good work, Arlene Grocery. The individual acts are listed on our NYC live music calendar. For anyone interested in seeing the whole list of who’s playing there this month, notes are below – I didn’t edit them because I think they’re way funnier just the way they were when I got the email…]

Arlenes’ December calendar:

NATE VAILL acoustic band from ohio – no website

QUINN MARSTON AND THE SEDUCTION KIT pop – they have a residency is it a guy or girl, hard to tell REALLY AWFUL ,

BELLEVUE’S FINEST electronic disco – they complain about trendoids but that’s what they are

RACHEL ZAM not her real name – Snorah Jones wannabe – not bad but not great either

JUANO LIPPI BAND generic folkie wimp

Last Charge of the Light Horse – tuneless pretentious Replacements wannabes

VOX POP horrid corporate crap

AFICIONADO 10-pc Kansas wannabes from upstate – they have a song called Deaf Ears which is obviously autobiographical

NICK TATE – British folkie – good chops, awful songs

SPUTEN DUYVIL lame white funk/metal

THE NEVERBEENS – female-fronted band w/some potential – some country, jazzy pop

THE NEW COLLISIONS powerpop – add this to calendar, sounds like a good live band

12/4 YARN. FREE SHOW DOORS AT 8PM add this – they’re good

PHOEBE HENRY corporate lite fm pop. she doesn’t like cats, what a bitch

GIA MARX corporate lite fm pop dunno if she likes cats or not but she still sucks

12/5 9 PM IMPOSTOR SYNDROME female-fronted riff-rock with some potential, some bite, a little PJ Harvey but less raw, their record label is called Spinach Pie Records 🙂

V try finding this on myspace – there’s a Philly grunge/pop band called V who really suck…

I LOVE MONSTERS trendoid band fronted by a Celine Dion wannabe

BANANAMANANIMAL tuneless mathrock meets tuneless white funk

THE ELECTRIC MOJO MACHINE they have a jazz drummer but no website

12/6 7 PM KIRA SKOV – add her to calendar what a trip – voted best female vocalist in Denmark sounds like the Shocking Blue – big bluesy voice, excellent garage/psych band

12/6 8 PM NEW MADRID altcountry from oklahoma – add them

THE PUBLIC SECRET mopey downtempo stuff from Germany

STILL DIVISION – Pearl Jam wannabes – can’t believe anybody thinks crap like this could ever be popular again

THE FRESHMEN hip-hop from Florida? “R&B” from Milwaukee – can’t find them – stupid band name anyway

CHERRY S/T – campy computerized disco

HIGH TOLERANCE 80s hair metal from Long Island – figures

SUGAR MAMA from Boston – guitarist has serious Hendrix fixation. they like ska, lots of good things going on now if they could only find a singer

BB GUN trendoids from Brooklyn messing badly with cliched Black Oak Arkansas redneck rock – is this the band you saw outside McCarren Pool on Make Music NY day?

VILLACOMA ponderous, boring Death Cab wannabes – they rehearse at Ultrasound which is expensive, right?

A ROOSTER FOR THE MASSES really annoying, strident Gang of Four-ish white funk – bands like this make me want to vote Republican

DAY OF FIRE – awful corporate metal band from Nashville

12/9, 8 PM ALEC BERLIN pro musician – seems like a nice guy, stuff is derivative (Beatles, Radiohead, Elliott Smith), not bad – let’s list him http://www.myspace.com/ALECBERLIN

12/9, 9 PM KRIS KELLY – lots of strings on his myspace songs – very Radiohead – not bad – list him too ok?

JIMMY REEVES Texas bluesman like Jimmie Vaughan – good stuff – http://www.myspace.com/jimmyleereeves woops thats Jimmy Lee Reeves – this Jimmy Reeves is a saccharine James Blunt wannabe – barf

12/9, 11 PM SETTLY – Marcellus Hall’s bassist – good player, kinda funny – add him too – can’t believe it, 3 more or less good bands on a Fri night here

Billy Walton Band fonkeh fonkeh wotbos

Austin Stitch – looks like club got the band name wrong – nothing online except a knitting group in texas

BRANDON CLARK corporate grunge prettyboy from Atlanta

KELLY WATERS no relation to Muddy – corporate “R&B” ho from the UK who does a song called Up Inside Me

MISS VINTAGE – Coldplay wannabes from Philly

12/14 10 PM AMERICAN AQUARIUM from Raleigh – good band – like the Bottle Rockets – add them. Also at Hank’s 12/15 9:30ish http://www.myspace.com/AMERICANAQUARIUM

12/16 7 PM LANA MIR – funny she does a song called I Wanna Be Adored but sounds nothing like Randi Russo – Ukrainian expat – not bad – bossa nova pop = add her http://www.myspace.com/LANAMIR

12/16 8 PM HOLDING BACK ENTIRELY can’t figure out whether they’re retro 80s, 90s or what – some potential , some decent tunes – give them a chance http://www.myspace.com/HOLDINGBACKENTIRELY

BROOKVILLE wimpy downtempo/triphop

12/16 10 PM THE GREY RACE 90s Brit style pop band – good songs! add them http://www.myspace.com/thegreyraceband

LUCKY GHOST a more camp Decembrists – some potential but they need a singer

Northern Public – death metal from Michigan

the Philtons – myspace isn’t working – but they have good top friends (Your New Best Friend, Satanicide)

Water for Ivan – acoustic guitar/cello, nice sonics but a work in progress

Measure – keys/vox – triphop/downtempo – kinda pretty, dreamy – add them http://www.myspace.com/measuremusic

the Standard Model middle period REM wannabes, not a good era to imitate

the Red Directors club prob got bandname wrong, nothing online

RADIO DRAMA loud fast pop from Long Island w/Radio Disney vox

AGENTS OF KARMA funky stoner metal

MERCURY MORNING corporate band from NJ – Interpol/u2 infls

12/13 9M THE AYE AYES barband rock/pop w/funny lyrics give em a chance http://www.myspace.com/THEAYEAYES

CARLON goofy stoner stuff – they have a residency in Jan?!?

LEFT ME BASHFUL acoustic wuss

WINDSOR PARK WALKERS big 90s Spiritualized sound – not bad nothing special either

MOSHIACH OI – Orthodox Jewish hardcore – one of their songs is called I Wanna Learn Torah, no joke

12/18 7 PM SIX CHASING SEVEN funk/reggae from Lynchburg VA w/horn section – good stuff! http://www.myspace.com/sixchasingseven

THE TELEPHONES “blues/metal duo” – myspace not working

STOLEY PT corporate emo

12/18 10 PM THE VOXYS lo fi Dublin garage riff rock – not bad, could be good live http://www.myspace.com/THEVOXYS

ACEY SLADE campy disco metal

iris PILL they play various awful corporate styles

Jared Campbell wretched corporate lite FM singer-songwriter

Justin Trawick fonkeh fonkeh wotbo from the VA suburbs

Derek James fonkeh fonkeh wotbo who admits to being ” a finalist in the Williamsburg Singer/Songwriter Competition,” woohoo!

IPPAZZI Dave Matthews wannabes – better than but not by much

13TH FLOOR obviously not Roky Erickson fans – metal – good for a laugh

SANITARIUS thrash metal

BROTHERS MOVING Danish acoustic Americana band – not awful, nothing special

THE GAIT LINE WORKERS club got the name wrong

12/21 9 PM SPECIAL PATROL GROUP not the cover band from the UK – their Pretty Vacant is pretty good http://www.myspace.com/patrolspecialgroup

this is a NYC band, 90s style powerpop, guy/girl vox, lyrically driven, intriguing but let the girl sing, keep the guy away from the mic http://www.myspace.com/gravityinreverse

VICTORY BY REVENGE fallout boy wannabes from Maryland – godawful

PATRICK PORTER dorky folkie who usually plays the Sidewalk

NICK KRATZ electric blues – exc. chops, good solos but material’s not that strong -he’d be a great lead guitarist in somebody else’s band

RISE PHOENIX RISE Good Charlotte wannabes from PA

RADIO FIX from Connecticut – lame tuneless boring indie stuff

SLEEP WELL somewhat frantic Death Cab wannabes

FIRST IN SPACE poppy Youngstown OH jangle band – they can write a decent tune but the vox are lame

THE WIND-UP wimpy Brooklyn indie pop

WINDSOR CIRCLE myspace not working but they like Weezer which basically means they suck

4NORMANDY corporate garbage from Jersey

HIGHWAY GIMps pretty good garage band

TOM HOOD AND THE TRAILMEN – country rock from Long Island – older band – cdbaby page not working

12/28 8 EMMA TRINGALI AND THE WALK INS – singer/songwriter – distinctive voice, decent tunes, not a wimp – like Linda Draper w/o the Ph. D., http://www.myspace.com/emmatringali

9 LULLA – not the really good bossa nova chanteuse from Italy http://www.myspace.com/lullilu but a really good pianist/chanteuse singing Japanese classical ballads http://www.myspace.com/lullatunes

ANIMAL BONES awful Fallout Boy wannabes with girl singer – how come I’ve never heard of any of the bands they like, oh yeah that’s because they SUCK

JAY WILEY BAND Ryan Adams wannabe

ANGRY DRAGON death metal

MORGAN AVENUE – female fronted loud poppy band not awful – only one of their myspace tracks is working

SCARLET FADE the Xian Partridge Family – no joke – they must have a stage mom & a megachurch where they can play – why here? – or did they rent out the club?

Hyacinth House – love that band name – good acoustic Swedish Americana goth band http://www.myspace.com/wwwhyacinthhousese

Good Cop and Bad Cop Mix It Up Again, Pt. 2

[Good Cop sits on the edge of her bed at a Motel Six somewhere in the Midwest, twirling her ponytail and talking on her phone. Bad Cop, dressed undercover as a hoodlum with a doo rag and a clip-on skull-and-crossbones earring, leans back on his bench on the D train passing through Bensonhurst, talking to Good Cop on his cell. He has a bad connection and talks loudly, oblivious to his fellow passengers]

 

 

 

Good Cop: We’re tanking.

 

 

 

Bad Cop: So is everything in the world.

 

 

 

Good Cop: We’re getting a third the hits we got over the summer.

 

 

 

Bad Cop: The center will not hold. Abandon hope, all ye who enter here.

 

 

 

Good Cop: I think we should go global.

 

 

 

Bad Cop: Like the depression?

 

 

 

Good Cop: Nobody here is going out anymore. Your live music theory only holds up for so long. If nobody is going out then we’re irrelevant. You follow?

 

 

 

Bad Cop: You think it’s better somewhere else? Good fucking luck finding a bar that’s open, that hasn’t been foreclosed on yet.

 

 

 

Good Cop: Maybe we should revisit the political slant we started out with. It is an election year, after all.

 

 

 

Bad Cop: We still haven’t officially endorsed anybody.

 

 

 

Good Cop [withering sarcasm]: Like Lucid Culture is going to endorse…Ron Paul.

 

 

 

Bad Cop: Hey, don’t dis my boy Ron!

 

 

 

Good Cop: We should spend more time on London, Paris, you know, where good things are happening.

 

 

 

Bad Cop [in a broad British accent]: And I suppose you’ll be taking the QE2?

 

 

 

Good Cop: You know what I mean. Otherwise you’ll be writing for an audience of one. Did you ever read Le Chaos et la Nuit?

 

 

 

Bad Cop: Creo que si. Just kidding.

 

 

 

Good Cop: That’s French. Montherlant, famous novelist from the thirties and forties. It’s about a guy slowly losing it, writing rightwing editorials that nobody will ever read.

 

 

 

Bad Cop: Now what on earth prompted that analogy?

 

 

 

Good Cop: Not to dis your boy Ron, but…

 

 

 

Bad Cop [threatening]: Hey, I mean it. Basta.

 

 

 

Good Cop: OK, OK. But we need to branch out. People aren’t going to shows.

 

 

 

Bad Cop: People aren’t buying cds. Or anything at the supermarket that’s not on sale. Although people are still drinking. Maybe we could review beer?

 

 

 

Good Cop: Yeah right. There are more beer blogs than there are breweries. Besides, I don’t drink beer.

 

 

 

Bad Cop: I am fully aware of that [belches].  So what are you doing? Moving to Prague? Oh yeah, that’s so 1998. How about Philly? Portland? Bridgeport?

 

 

 

Good Cop: What I’m saying is that we’ve got to expand our audience, stop being be so New York-centric. This is cyberspace, remember? The Ukraine, the Galapagos islands are right next door.

 

 

 

Bad Cop: Sure thing, Paris Hilton. What’s up with you, did you find my stash?

 

 

 

Good Cop: I don’t smoke pot. You know that. I also want you to break out that alltime top 666 list, that’ll force you to put up a new post every day even if it’s just a single song. Lists are huge, they generate tons of hits.

 

 

 

Bad Cop: I know, the 20 hottest chicks on tv.

 

 

 

Good Cop [exasperated]: Dude, zip it.

 

 

 

Bad Cop:  The 20 hottest porn videos on youtube?

 

 

 

Good Cop: How about the top 20 times McCain has flip-flopped on an issue…

 

 

 

Bad Cop: The top 20 times Obama has flip-flopped on an issue.

 

 

 

Good Cop: See, now you’re thinking. What I’m saying is, let’s get out of the box, let’s make the site more fun. Right now we’re just appealing to one small and rapidly shrinking segment of the population. I think the whole concept of what this was supposed to be in the beginning is starting to make a lot more sense.

 

 

 

Bad Cop: Throw a whole lot of shit against the wall and…

 

 

 

Good Cop: No! But let’s make things fresh and exciting again, huh? I feel like this is starting to become like a clique thing, the thing you hate the very most and I don’t want that either. Remember how psyched you were in the first weeks of Lucid Culture?

 

 

 

Bad Cop: Yeah, when we were getting four hits a day and three of them were you on your blackberry.

 

 

 

Good Cop: I’m also going to shake up the live music calendar. More descriptive, less wordy. OK with you?

 

 

 

Bad Cop: What, the job wearing you down? Maybe we should trade places. You go out and deal with all the assholes and see all the shows and I’ll stay home and surf the web.

 

 

 

Good Cop: No thank you. Maybe when I get back to town to stay I’ll join you sometime.

 

 

 

Bad Cop [pulls a flask from under his arm, opens it and takes a swig] : Good, then I’ll have a designated driver.

 

 

 

 

Uh Oh, Does This Mean We’re Trendoids?

Couldn’t resist nicking this post (slightly edited) from Agent Jay, who put it up on his always awesome ska band the Slackers’ myspace page:

 

 

If you tell everyone in Brooklyn you’re from where you’re actually from, like California, Florida, Ohio, Massachusetts etc…; and tell everyone outside Brooklyn, you’re from Brooklyn…

…YOU MIGHT BE A TRENDOID.

 

If, when you say “I remember back in the day, when this neighborhood was cool,” you mean 5 years ago…

…YOU MIGHT BE A TRENDOID.

 

If you have a lumberjack beard but the closest bunch of trees to you is in McCarren Park…

…YOU MIGHT BE A TRENDOID.

 

If your American Apparel V-neck shows off your man-cleavage…

…YOU MIGHT BE A TRENDOID.

 

If you’re showing more ass-crack than a refridgerator repairman…

…YOU MIGHT BE A TRENDOID.

 

If you have to cover your tattoos and/or remove your piercings for your day-job at the office…

…YOU MIGHT BE A TRENDOID.

 

If you have to show-off your tattoos/piercings for your day-job at the tattoo/piercing shop…

…YOU MIGHT BE A TRENDOID.

 

If you think you’re “poor” because you don’t have enough money to go out drinking, see The Shins, buy a new iPhone, get that new tattoo/piercing, go vintage clothing shopping AAANNNDDD pay your $700 a month rent…

…YOU MIGHT BE A TRENDOID.

 

If you think your band is really innovative because you’re ripping-off some OTHER band nobody’s ever heard of…

…YOU MIGHT BE A TRENDOID.

 

If you think you’re “Old School” ’cause you DJ off a laptop instead of an ipod…

…YOU MIGHT BE A TRENDOID.

 

If you really like 80’s music ’cause you weren’t actually around in the 80’s and didn’t have to hear it every fucking day, everywhere you went…

…YOU MIGHT BE A TRENDOID.

 

If you sit on the floor of the subway platform, against the wall, because you haven’t been in New York long enough to know that’s where people like to piss…

…YOU MIGHT BE A TRENDOID.

 

If you think you’re “ghetto” because you live in Bed-Stuy or Bushwick (or LES, Washington Heights, Echo Park, The Mission, Brixton, Hackney, Kreuzberg, etc)…

…YOU MIGHT BE A TRENDOID.

 

If you’re wearing something Pat Benatar threw out in 1983…

…YOU MIGHT BE A TRENDOID.

 

If you’re wearing something Axel Rose bought in 1986…

…YOU MIGHT BE A TRENDOID.

 

If you’re wearing an Iron Maiden t-shirt…

…YOU MIGHT BE A TRENDOID.

 

If you don’t want to see pictures of last New Year’s Eve ’cause that’s when you were in your “coke” phase…

…YOU MIGHT BE A TRENDOID.

 

If you don’t want to see pictures of New Year’s Eve 2 years ago ’cause that’s when you were in your “experimenting with homosexuality” phase…

…YOU MIGHT BE A TRENDOID.

 

If you don’t want to see pictures of yourself in high school ’cause that’s when you were into Ska…

…YOU MIGHT BE A TRENDOID.

 

If you wish New York was sketchy again, like it was in the 80’s, ’cause you weren’t here to know exactly how fucking sketchy it was…

…YOU MIGHT BE A TRENDOID.

 

If you spend most of your time complaining about TRENDOIDs…

…YOU’RE DEFINITELY A FUCKING TRENDOID!

 

The Slackers are definitely at the Music Hall of Williamsburg on Dec 20

The Year’s 10 Best Moments from American Idol

1. The football game goes over time

2. Cut to a commercial

3. A fire truck, ambulance and police car go by outside

4. A fire truck and ambulance go by outside

5. An ambulance goes by outside

6. A garbage truck goes by outside

7. Considerable yelling on the street outside

8. Somebody’s having a party next door, you can hear it through the wall

9. Chinese food has arrived

10. Pee break

Where Are They Now, Pt. 666

This myspace bulletin just in from the legendary Kool G Rap (formerly of Kool G Rap and DJ Polo), author of such ghetto classics as Rikers Island, Talk Like Sex and Ill St. Blues:

 

“IF YOUR LOOKING TO HAVE THE LEGEND KOOL G RAP ON YOUR NEXT SONG AS A FEATURE 16 BAR VERSE OR JUST A HOOK….IF YOUR SERIOUS ABOUT DOING THE BUSINESS…HIT DOMINGO ON HIS MYSPACE PAGE FOR THEM OFFICIAL RATES ON KOOL G RAP!!!”

 

That’s right: for the right price, your group, your band, your single could have the great Kool G Rap on it for a whole verse.

 

Probably better than anything you could ever come up with, too.  

In Memoriam – Charlton Heston

Self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head.

An Open Letter to Eliot Spitzer

THIS MESSAGE WAS DELIVERED VIA BLACKBERRY WIRELESS

ellie boo

now wil u mry me lk u prmsd u wd

tm dc pos

xo cashley

ps in st barts w yr ducatzzzzzzzzzzzzzz