Midnight Madness 4/6/08

He's got 99 Problems and Beyonce ain't one of them

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It's been a slow week in entertainment, let's see if there's anything worth covering:

Charleton Heston died-The legendary actor passed away this week. A charismatic performer with a stentorian voice, Heston starred in classics like Ben Hur and Planet of the Apes. In his later years he became known as the representative for the NRA.

Bye Bye Malubay- Ramiele Maulbay was voted off American Idol this week, I thought her loyal fanbase would have kept her in longer as this was her first visit to the bottom three. She hadn't given a great performance in weeks but it didn't seem to matter in terms of votes until this round. I found it ironic that she carped on Jasmine Trias early on but had a similar run of continuously advancing on mediocre performances.

Leatherheads takes a hit - George Clooney's romantic comedy did not perform well at the box office. It didn't look like anything I wanted to see but thought this was the type of movie that his fans would want after the slew of serious roles he's taken. Wrong again, I'm 0 for 2 so far.

The rent was too Hardcore!-I watched a documentary on the early 80's Punk rock scene called American Hardcore, it was educational getting the background stories on bands like Bad Brains, Black Flag and Minor Threat. Still glad I didn't get into Punk as a kid, slam dancing is the most annoying thing ever. My philosophy has always been that slam dancing is like football. If I want to play football, I'll play football. I do not want to play football while watching a concert. I can play football for free in the street.

Jay Z and Beyonce get hitched - Guess he's not irreplaceable.

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My Dad gets a score under 90 in golf - I don't play golf but understand this is a benchmark score to attain. Congratulations Dad!

Do the Curly shuffle - I always wanted to do one of those lists of songs that appear on shuffle play on your IPOD as some kind of rorschach test dealies so here goes what's playing on my IPOD at random:

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Human League "The Sound of the Crowd" - nice memories of playing my Dare! record in my bedroom, it seemed so modern back then with the austere white record cover and I used to wonder how Phil Oakey was able to get two ladies at the same time (The rumor at the time was that he was dating both women who didn't know about each other until they joined the band. This later turned out not to be true. Hard to say who started that rumor).

Concrete Blonde "Everybody Knows" -from the Pump Up The Volume soundtrack where Christian Slater played a high school nerd who hosted an angst filled radio show from his basement. One of my all time favorite songs, it was written by Leonard Cohen and has great lyrics like "Everybody knows that you love me baby/Everybody knows that you really do/Everybody knows that youve been faithful/Ah give or take a night or two/Everybody knows youve been discreet/But there were so many people you just had to meet/Without your clothes/And everybody knows"-the whole song is poetic like this, it's good stuff. Concrete Blonde delivers a howling rendition but Don Henley's version isn't bad either.

Nirvana "Serve The Servants" - the opening cut from the In Utero album, one of many songs Kurt Cobain seemed to write about the price of fame at that time. I like Cobain's music but find his Sainthood status confusing because he killed himself, kind of a strange thing to idolize.

Pearl Jam "I Got Id" -Wow, the grunge fest continues. From the Merkinball Ep, this song was all over the radio in 1995. And just when I was thinking I don't listen to enough 90's music. Always found it interesting that this song wouldn't get beeped for words like "Sh*t" which popped up a few times in the lyrics. I've never understood this tune, but it's got a beat and you can dance to it. Another work song, heard this on the radio both going to and coming from work when my tape player wasn't working in.

Dashboard Confessional "Hands Down" - Emo powers activate! Form of - a one hit wonder. Shape of - a pretty good song and proof that modern music doesn't have to be garbage. That's not to say this is the greatest song of whatever, but it's good.

Corinne Bailey Rae "Like A Star" -one of my favorite songs from last year, this ballad has a jazzy languid beauty with a nice vocal. It's rare for me to take to a relaxing song like this, but "Star" has a great mood that I dig (ya dig?). Hard to believe she once fronted an Alterna Hard Rock band due to her love of Led Zeppelin. Sadly, her husband recently passed away due to a suspected drug overdose.

Eric Clapton "Motherless Child" -from the From The Cradle disc, where Slowhand was properly criticized for mimicking the original vocalists styles too closely. It was the least noticeable on this track, probably because he played it for years. I often think of that scene in Twister where the truck driver air guitars to this song, it is a fun song to mildly rock out to. If you like Clapton, I do recommend the disc because it has some amazing guitar playing.

Metallica "Disposable Heroes" -from Master of Puppets, my fave Metallica album. A great attitude song, if you ever need inspiration to get pumped up for something this is one of those songs to listen to beforehand. I used to listen to this song a lot, I probably should go back to playing it more often. Back to the front!

I think eight is enough for this post, I can see why people do this because it's pretty fun. Before leaving, I do want to deliver this important message to save the children-