To me, this is the sign we were waiting for that autotuning things that are not music has reached critical mass. Thank you Gregory Bros, thank you legion of multitrackers that can’t actually sing, and thank you T-Pain. It has been a wonderful year, but now, I think we can put this on the shelf and break it out again over Christmas 2015 with a sense of warm nostalgia. Either that or this is, like everyone has feared/speculated on, the next generation of music. All music will be increasingly esoteric and abstract forms of autotuned layered nonsense.
Well, at least it’s not trance.
Though, I have to say, this is a cut above the Autotune the News productions. There’s some real thought that went into this, and they did autotune Stephen Hawking, a man who’s only voice is ALREADY DIGITAL. Redigitizing the already artificial, even further dehumanizing it? I’m pretty sure Shirow Masamune is telling you right now that he told you so.
I’ve been researching ways to make my flat panel tv look cooler. I think it’s weird that not a single company has released a model that looks cool. I mean I guess if you play PS3 and like the Matrix, you’re gonna be wanting some shiny plastic black monitor with a stupid light up logo. I do not. Behold Joe Wilkerson’s M21. For $3600 (minimum) you get this walnut beaut. Problem: it’s $3600.
My sister thought it was ugly – which hurt my feelings – but then I realized she buys seasons of NCIS for her AppleTV…
Ok, so that thing about driving to an arby’s was a lie also, and he didn’t check it anyway so once again I’m talking to myself. And you, dear reader, mustn’t forget about you.
What we did do, was rent a 30 person party bus, drive it to New Jersey and go to Medieval times, then drive it back and go to Donnybrook. This was fucking epic. Pictures and Video (!) to follow. What I didn’t get on video was that during the birthday announcements Robin and Kosuke got the Lord Chamberlain to say “And all the wenches who find themselves smitten with the essence of Matschullat Thunderbox”
Hello dear reader, sorry for the lack of updates in the last 2 days. Paul came over and I lost about 2 days of my life to Modern Warfare 2. BUT in much better news we’re having a party for Carter’s birthday tonight! It’s a surprise, but Carter has been so remiss in posting here, that I’m going to do what he did to me to him, follow? I’m going to reveal Carter’s birthday surprise on this blog, and then see if he checks it by 6pm today when we pick him up, SO:
At 6pm today we will pick up Carter outside his apartment in a stretch hummer, then drive to the airport where our good pal Chris has taken the liberty of getting us a Gulfstream that is going to fly us to fabulous KENNYBUNKPORT! Where we will have a fantastic dinner of fresh, seriously fresh, Maine lobster. Then since Carter wants to go home and see people, we will fly back to New York, drop him off, and then the rest of us are going to SANTA CRUZ for the weekend. Should be good times. Anyway, let’s see if Carter responds to that.
OK (did you know that OK is a sideways person? Shit blew. my. mind the other day)
OK so that was a lie. What we are actually doing is picking Carter up in a party van and driving him to an Arby’s about 3 hours upstate! We’re going to party all the way up, get some roast beef, and then party down! WOO! But someone needs to stay sober and drive and I say it now, not me, so when this comes up later I can say I already said not it.
Let’s see what happens. Also, I don’t have time now, but the last two days have shown me something, something that I want to share. COMING UP (probably tomorrow) 10 Reasons Why Modern Warfare 2 Is Better Than Sex, Cheese and Your Mom’s Homecooking.
Oh and just so you don’t think I shortchanged you on this post: Did you see Kristen Wiig’s impression of Natalie Merchant a couple weeks ago? Holy crap.
Some days, I don’t know what the point of being alive anymore is. I mean, other than stumbling upon or being sent something on the internet and then duly reblogging/reposting those items that catch my fancy. Hours a day are spent absent mindedly-snaking my way through the internet like a pipe-cleaner in a pipe that will not, for the love of god, just stay clean so I can get on with my life….maybe make some friends? Go out to dinner? SEE THE SUN?
Anyway, the internet has pretty much become akin to an electron cloud (fig1), wherein the points mapped are not probability but actual transmission. Actually there’s probably a math god somewhere who has an accurate algorithm for measu – i haven’t read xkcd.com lately. I’ll go check that right now. Here, look at this.
Hahahah, ah xkcd. You never fail to hit my nerdy funnybone. Oh, what’s that? Oh yeah, ok here’s a good one.
xkcd.com
Oh but what I wanted to tell you about was Succeedblog. Which is like GMH to FML for FailBlog
ok, you up to speed? Now, SucceedBlog is kind of annoying in that optimistic internet way. Which is funny because internet savvy is always equated to a general sense of misanthropy thanks mostly in part to the misanthropists of Anonymous and the 4/7chan mafia. But they are the silent arbiters of the intarweb and I beseech them to forgive me if I have spoken out of turn. Anyway, that aside, Suceedblog is annoying because I don’t care about watching people accomplish things, though now that I think about it, I will probably be able to out more robots for my Robots Today column by watching people to extraordinary things…
And this post has devolved into stream of consciousness. What did I want to say…?
AH YES.
Ghostbusters. Remember how I said that Rolcats was the weirdest meme I know of? Well, a little bit of trolling on Succeedblog and I’ve found something slightly weirder. Additionally, I think it may have already passed meme status and quietly coagulated to a proper subculture. (Side note: Another weird thing about the internet is that you can come crashing through the brush upon a species of gorilla that no one has ever seen before and be like “HOLY SHIT NEW GORILLAS!” and go all Jane Goodall on its ass. Then, you log immediately onto Facebook only to discover that 15 of your friends are Fans of it and someone just posted a picture of you, watching it. It blows.) Anyway, so multitracking is a trend I first discovered (yeah, like Columbus, he discovered America, you know) about 2 years ago, just as a simple tool to bypass expensive recording software for amateur musicians uploading their stuff to youtube. Now apparently, sometime either well before or after that, this became a thing.
Right? I mean, besides the overwhelmingly conflicted feelings I have over whether or not this guy needs to be rewarded for his nerd-street-cred in learning every part of the Ghostbusters theme song or dragged out into the sunlight and introduced to a real girl, there’s this insightful little comment below it.
I mean, I’m loath to read any youtube comments as I’m relatively certain the genuine stupidity can leap through the FUCKING SCREEN AND CRAWL INTO YOUR EYES….but that last little tidbit there…why…whatever could he mean? So I, being a good detective and ultimately your advocate dear reader, follow up.
I find:THIS
So many heads haven’t been seen since the days of the Hydra and Cerberus! My god! It’s a one man Barbershop Quartet! Anyway, so I guess this is a thing too. Couldn’t embed, but you get the picture. The internet has really opened our eyes to the people around us, insofar as it makes us aware of subcultures that should have remained in the subbasement. LIKE ONE MAN A CAPELLA. Sweet mercy. See below.
I DON’T THINK I NEED MENTION THAT THERE ARE A LOT OF THESE VIDEOS.
Thanks for sticking with me, dear reader, as we trolled the internet again, for more bullshit. In the meantime, let’s kick it old school with this video of the 2004 presidential election.
Our friend Aaron sent this to us a while back and I wanted to post it but I didn’t know if it would fit in on the blog. But then I realized that there wasn’t anything that didn’t fit in on the blog and this entire website is an exercise on what the combined kitchen sink of mine and Carter’s internet consciousness looks like.
Here’s the link, fair warning, you have to have a fairly robust internet connection for this to really kill. Otherwise you’ll be greeted by a bunch of spinning youtube loading screens. Which is endlessly infuriating…so, don’t say I didn’t warn you.
Personally, I really like the Xylophone, Guitar, Bass, Muted Trumpet and one below the bass that is all spoken word. If I were better as ASCII diagrams I would be better at trying to do this:
[x][x][ ][ ][ ]
[x][x][ ][ ][ ]
[x][ ] [ ][ ][ ]
[ ] [ ] [ ][ ][ ]
like this sounds good, but do it however you want.
i h8 you ASCII noids.
Watch this first, otherwise we have no basis for conversation.
Ok, so something else you should know, is that I spend most of my time dwelling in the nebulous, schismatic anti-world that exists between performance art, highbrow postmodernism and good ol fashioned theater. It is a hellish slum of a place populated by performers displaced by the mainstream, artists who have eschewed the mainstream and people who just couldn’t find the mainstream despite the fact it has a big glowing sign that says “THIS WAY TO A NORMAL LIFE.”
We’re going to kind of blow past the “Is it art” question right here, because it’s a useless thing to ask anymore. Art is a reality tunnel more often than not. Since our infatuation with non-representation, abstraction and deconstruction began we have begun to question, in a broader sense, intent and integrity. By which I mean, does it want to be art, and if so, what other art is it in dialogue with? Now this is also useless in a certain way, due in part to our cultural preoccupation with the current and the next. Cultural paradigms of the 20th and 21st century shift like the position of Zeno’s Arrow so that what we crave is not understanding as much as it is the power to signal “This is the now right now” and “This is going to be the now tomorrow” and be right on both counts. It’s a byproduct of our new ontology; one that does not necessitate that beings be grouped, or categorized together but rather is a celebration of complete individuation and atomization. The most successful that an art object, or any object for that matter, can be in the new ontology is to be itself completely. A kind of non-literary hermeneutic circle.
Now, where in God’s name does Lady GaGa fit into all of this? Let me begin with an anecdote about the first time I watched this video:
My sister came over and I showed her some of the adorable videos put together by Pomplamoose who are totally adorable and have a LOT of instruments in their tiny recording room. So then, my dear sister is like “oh that’s great”, have you seen the video for Lady GaGa’s new song? Carrie, how in heaven’s name are you getting from A to B here? Seriously, cute couple in SF making music in their apartment…oh let me show you this terrifying latex crown wearing, polar bear burning shitshow.
So anyway, I’m watching this thing, trying to figure out how they made her eyes so big, and how they did that thing with her spine/hoping it’s not real, why the polar bear, the list goes on, when it suddenly occurs to me that I should be liking this. It’s a cogent vision, almost Bacon-esque in its treatment of the human form, dramatic costume changes, butts, it has a lot of the trappings of performance art but there seems to be something lacking. Something that makes it self-assured, something that makes it…good. Maybe it’s because all Lady GaGa songs are tailor made for narcissistic gays to hit the clubs and go “This is my song!” Maybe it’s because Lady GaGa has an outstanding voice and for reasons passing understanding decides to mumble and monotone her way through 90% of her oeuvre. Maybe it’s because while so much of this is striking, so much of it also reeks of Damien Hirst concotions of Warhol grade self-importance. Is her outrageous behavior A) Brilliant Marketing B) 47 Cards Short of a Full Deck C) Childhood Neglect? I just don’t know anything about this video. It’s self contained, fractured narrative structure begs me to come inside despite how scary it is (cause it is fucking scary and uncomfortable), but the thinly veiled references and metaphors of success external to the world violate the established parameters of this context.
Maybe she’s telling us everything when she’s walking around in that gigantic gold sequin number. “Walk, walk fashion baby work it move that bitch car-azy” By which I would hazard a guess that she means, “Don’t read into it to much, it’s fashion.” This makes sense, fashion is an experimentation with human style, it does not need to rely on anything else other than the body in space. It has influences from other art forms on a sliding scale, willing to take and forsake at a moments notice. So if that’s what’s going on here, why is she singing?
In summation: This bitch is making my head hurt, but I must understand what the hell is going on here.
I’m not much of a war junkie, other than my penchant for kicking 12 year old ass in Call of Duty, but this RULES. It’s a pen made from a Browning WWII-era .50 cal machine gun bullet casing. I’m seriously not much of a gun nut, but I do love pens and history is pretty awesome too….so basically this pen is a brass awesome stick. Did I mention the African Blackwood? I’m scared to find out how much one of these is….
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