Brrrrrrrrrrr......

Hey folks, nice to be bloggin' again, it's like my two weeks is up, time to make a new mark on the ol' internets.
Just wanted to touch base, and make a few observations.
1. It's the 2nd day of November, and it's the first snow of the year! I am woefully under-dressed for today, time to get the coat out, for those of you that live in California, a coat is thick jacket, with long sleeves, sometimes with a cap or hat attached.
2. Viennale film festival: Not much interesting this year, a bit of a disappointment. We managed to see a film on an Italian mafia-murder case, the interesting documentary "My Country My Country" and John Turturro's "Romance and Cigarettes" which is really a Coen Brothers movie in disguise.
I was kind of disappointed that Jesus Camp, wasn't playing, but maybe next year?
We wanted to see The Pervert's Guide to Cinema which seems like a great documentary featuring Slovoj Zizek (sorry, I dropped the accents) and his ideas and ramblings about the movies. Vienna being the city that it is (I can't help but think that in most towns, a movie screening about a Slovenian philosopher's film theories would be half full, at best) the movie was hopelessly sold out, and we didn't have half a chance of getting in. Lots of art school kids in attendance, looking arty.
3. Raymond Pettibon at the Kunsthalle in Vienna, We all know and love the work of Raymond Pettibon, you know the guy who did the Black Flag art? Yeah well now he's a pretty major and respected artist, and some of his drawings are on display in Vienna. I attended the opening, and it was funny to hear the museum director, go on and on about Pettibon, and then Pettibon, went up and struggled to utter and mumble a few words, and say thanks. I talked him into drawing Gumby and Pokey in my sketchbook, so now I have my own Pettibon drawing!
A few days later Greil Marcus gave a lecture about art and politics, and talked about: Riot Girl, Philip Roth, Bikini Kill, Sinclair Lewis, Sleater Kinney, T.V. on the Radio, and Green Day. When asked about Raymond Petibon, he said something to the extent of "Eh, not a fan."
4. Erwin Wurm at the MUMOK. Erwin Wurm, is pretty bitchen, I like the guy's work, I'll forgive him for the Red Hot Chili Pepper's, because he didn't make it, they were just "inspired" by him. Good Stuff, some of the best artwork I've seen in a while, like Charles Ray, with a sense of humor.
5. I caught them all. I caught/evolved every Pokemon in Pokemon Pinball advanced, I am a nerd.

Peasant In The Big Shitty

Hi folks, not much to say, it's been a month, and we've been busy. Holeeeeeeee moleeey, have we been busy. I hope you enjoy the re-design (O.K. I just switched blogger templates!) I just saw one too many blogs with the old format I was using, and decided to make a switch.
We had a quick visit to the island of Ischia, and the city of Naples (Neapolis, the Latin name, which I like more.)
Naples, whoa! A city going on all burners, 25 hours a day, it was amazing to see scooters speeding downhill in the wrong direction, scooters cutting through the pedestrian zones, seeing live octopus being sold on the street, laptops and cell phones being sold on the street, and seeing 2000 year old pornography at the museum. An amazing chaotic city; Rome, London, L.A. Vienna, and N.Y., don't have a thing on Naples. Now, every city I have ever visited before seems like a tranquil hamlet. After a 100 meter walk from the train station to the bus station, I found that someone had opened my backpack's outside pocket, and I guess they didn't think my ink pens and pencil sharpener were worth stealing. (Good thing they didn't find my passport and ipod shuffle!) I guess I had gotten off with a slight warning. And yeah Mt. Vesuvius is always looming overhead, a city at the foot of an active volcano.

What a city, we only had two days, and I had a cold, but I eagerly want to return to Neapolis!

OK so now we're back laying low, and hiding out from the man.
Top Ten:
1. Alan Moore's Top Ten comic, I like it even more because the city is called Neopolis, and seems to be a cross between Naples and (Superman's) Metropolis.
2. The Stranglers' "The Raven" This might be their best record, great new wave, but it's really pretty punk. Great keyboards and cool guitar, fat bass, fucked up lyrics and everything you would expect from the dirty old men of punk.
3. Roy Loney solo records, I downloaded some great out of print stuff from a great website called Powerpop Lovers (too lazy to link) and I discovered the Flaming Groovies singer's solo records have some great songs.
4. The Flys, more good stuff from Powerpop lovers.
5. Lee Perry: Scratch The Upsetters Again, another great find from the Vienna Library.
6. Japanther! Live! More NYC/Rhode Island drum and bass noise rock, but with some good harmonies and great songs.
7. Raymond Pettibon doodling and autographing in my sketchbook!!! And the overwhelming Pettibon exhibition at the Vienna Kunsthalle.
8. Being able to read Roberto Calasso's "Marriage of Cadmus and Harmony." A really interesting approach to Greek mythology, it seems more rewarding than Edith Hamilton.
9. Slowly slogging through Brian Greene's " Fabric of the Cosmos" he gives the lowdown on space and time, it turns out OUR experience of reality isn't really reality.
10. EMPIRE "Expensive Sound" The guitarist from Generation X, did this little ol' punk band in 1981, turns out this very obscure record would be a huge influence on American underground music. Those DC hardcore kids ate it up and this record was a big influence on Embrace/Fugazi/Gray Matter/Soulside (And who knows who else?) . AND it turns out it was a favorite of a very young teenage guitarist in San Diego, back when he was starting his band Pitchfork. This record is finally available on CD with a bunch of x-tra nasty bonus cuts. I'm planning to do a full review of this when ever I get the time. Thanks to J. for turning me on to this.
Later Folks.

Helvetica: The Movie

I never thought anybody would make a movie about a font!
To celebrate the 50th anniversary of Helvetica, a documentary is being released.
The movie promises to examine the world of typography, graphic design and global visual culture.
The Helvetica Movie is being directed by the Producer of the Moog Documentary and the Wilco Docementary, and will feature a boatload of interviews with people who are superstars in the graphic design-world. (Stefan Sagmeister, Tobias Frere-Jones, Jonathan Hoefler and Erik Speikermann, to name a few.)

Helvetica (and its bastard cousin Arial) are like the cosmic microwave background radiation of the typographic universe, it's so ubiquitous, you hardly notice it. It's nice to see someone pointing it out!
Helvetica: The Movie!

Camping Out On Cookie Mountain

(File under: judging a book by its cover.)
I Recently picked up TV on the Radio's new record, "Return to Cookie Mountain." It's a pretty good record too, I like it.
But this has nothing to do with the music; looking at the CD cover, and the inside booklet, and the especially atrocious looking back-cover (not pictured here), I thought the record looked like something from 1992. Then I realized that is was released on 4AD, and looked again at the credits, and discovered that yes, indeed, the graphics were done by the once-great Vaughan Oliver.
Vaughan Oliver did some great work for 4AD back in the day, I even have a collection of his work, (This Rimy River: Vaughn Oliver and Graphic Works 1988-94.) But looking at the TVOTR cd I can't help but notice how stuck in time his work looks nowadays. Even David Carson has moved on and has let his graphic style evolve, but Oliver's work appears to be caught in some kind of time-warp-loop.

We will crush you!!!

Y'know, this has been bugging me for a while now, and I saw this DVD in the post office and finally thought to say my two cents.
Meet Disney's newest addition to Hundred Acre Wood, Heffalump.
Now, Heffalump (or Lumpy as he's called in the movie) is cute and all, but he looks suspiciously similar to the mascot of the GOP.
Is Disney trying to push a conservative agenda on our children? He's purple too, are they trying to say let's all get along (red and blue states) under benevolent Republican hegemony? Look how ONE Heffalump outweighs nearly all the other residents of Pooh's forest! No, our society is not all equal! The needs of the many (Pooh's multi-cultural pals) do not outweigh the needs of the few! (Thanks, Spock!)
I think this poster speaks volumes.

And if you think this sounds ridiculous, just think about Jerry Falwell's attack on another purple character.

(Although, I like this alternative poster quite a bit, and it works well in German.)