But they were such cute well-scrubbed boys! If you want to scare people, you've got to give up on being cute and clean.
What would the answer to the riddle have been?
Is there anything in Manhattan that remains scary? It's been a while since I've spent serious time in NYC, but my recollection is that "bad area" now means "Starbucks is the only available option."
I have twice gotten on the G train to discover an empty car and a pool of blood. (Twice!) But admittedly one of those times was six or seven years ago.
4: I have an answer, but my understanding is that it's too soon to make 9/11 jokes.
6: It took my father about a week. ("Architectural criticism has gone too far!")
Clearly, you should have invited the punks to write a letter to Ask the Mineshaft.
Dear Tia: I try to be frightening, but boring women on the subway get this wistful, reminiscent look in their eyes when they look at me, and stifle giggles when I try to be repulsive. What can I do?
The problem, if anything, was probably that their acting was bad, and they would have done better to dress in a way that indicated they didn't want to fuck with people. Having lice has nothing to do with cleanliness. Lice prefer clean hair! Don't know about scabies.
my understanding is that it's too soon to make 9/11 jokes.
While I would not make them to someone who lost a family member, otherwise, why not?
Maybe someone can enlighten us; I bet the Isrealis have "How many suicide bombers can you fit on a school bus" jokes. The pain for them must be much too great not to joke about it.
And are much less likely in short hair, which this guy had. They didn't know from lice, or from scabies.
11/7 -- I think there is a use/mention thingumajig going on here.
Man, that shit was painful, not being scary. Especially going to a semi-elite private college, knowing that I wasn't fooling anyone but still wanting to be a badass. I had to get like a mile off campus before it worked consistently (although I was helped by bad personal hygiene).
I did kind of feel bad for them. I considered suggesting that they get off at Times Square and scare tourists.
more overheard conversations, from Camden Market:
"hey can you hear that?"
"what"
"that. that's the sound of punk being dead."
16 -- I am picturing you doing that, and addressing them as "you boys".
But the style just doesn't go away. I was in high school in the late 80's -- punk had been around for a long time by then. And these kids looked just like my high school friends. There's something wrong about having a time-honored traditional form of teenage rebellion; they need a new style.
the sound of punk being dead
Henry Rollins has a chat show.
I don't know about New York but the sure fire sign in Glasgow that the bar you've just walked into is really NOT one you want to spend time in is the presence of men in suits.
Fine if you're in a business district and it's, say, 6pm. Anywhere else, or at any other time, then time to beat a hasty retreat.
[And obviously the presence of large tattoo'd men wearing the football shirts of the opposite side of the sectarian fence from you. Also a very bad sign.]
Punk and other subcultures of that type -- with the possible exception of the nastier end of the skinhead movement -- just aren't scary.
The real hardcore nutters when I was growing up were football 'casuals' and they dressed like preppy Americans.
I also can't figure out what music they're listening to. Most of the formerly punk-ish labels are now churning out stuff like Against Me!, which seems almost like parody of a once-actually-rebellious music genre.
19 - Henry Rollins has excellent taste.
The real hardcore nutters when I was growing up were football 'casuals' and they dressed like preppy Americans.
The most violent thing I've ever seen was a group of these guys (though they actually were Americans, I presume) bursting out of a bar right by Fenway Park in Boston, all beating on this one dude. There were probably 12 of them. I'd be surprised if the guy lived through the night. I and the girl I was with hustled away as soon as we could.
the one with the mohawk and big stupid chains
This was already passé and silly when I was in high school in the early '80s. Twenty years later, it hasn't gotten any cooler.
I don't know about New York but the sure fire sign in Glasgow that the bar you've just walked into is really NOT one you want to spend time in is the presence of men in suits.
I really don't believe there is such a sign in NY. Oh, there's street crime -- people have gotten mugged in my neighborhood recently -- but there's not a category of bar it would be unsafe to have a drink in.
"I don't know about New York but the sure fire sign in Glasgow that the bar you've just walked into is really NOT one you want to spend time in is the presence of men in suits."
Yes, those Glaswegian Hasidim are vicious buggers.
22 -- and how would you know? Have you tasted him?
re: 23
Well, the middle classes are dangerous in groups!
125th on the 1/9?
Manhattan School of Music kids, for sure.
I'm amused at the thought of LB as the target of such a prank.
Hey, matronly woman heading for an office job here. I personify the bourgeois to be epatered.
But I like being boringly matronly.
This seems just like normal, stupid adolescence. I wasn't there of course, but I'm not sure their attempt to freak you out and their "punk" styling had much to do with one another. I've seen many preppy kids do the same sorts of things to entertain themselves.
And I second (third?) the suggestion that their prank's failure had more to do with their bad acting and less to do with the mohawks and stupid chains. In fact, how could they have been dressed that such a stunt would have genuinely creeped you out, assuming the acting was still very bad? I bet you'd have seen through it and mocked them on this blog, regardless.
None of the above makes punk dress any less uncool.
At a festival this past weekend in a certain city in the Midwest I saw several infant to toddler age boys with mohawks. I was franky terrified.
23: Did you call the police?
No. We still had a long walk home. It was pre-cell phone days, at least for me.
My only direct experience with NYC crime these days was just a day or two ago, and wasn't that direct or at all serious: A friend of mine had come down from Syracuse to visit last weekend and left with a series of scratches on his girlfriend's car's door from it being keyed. We suspect the cabbie who got in a fight with my friend while said friend was standing in a spot and I was circling the block to park in it. I also see broken glass from car windows on my street not that irregularly.
My little sister used to drag me out to nu-metal shows. The entire audience was composed of little boys trying very, very hard to be scary. It was cute.
She would occasionally drag one of them home to meet us. They really didn't like it when I would tell them how adorable they were and ask what they wanted to be when they grew up. Multiple facial piercings just don't get the respect that they used to.
The most consistently dangerous neighborhood in Austin, at least from the point of view of being in peril of bodily harm, is west of the University of Texas campus where all the frat houses are.
Particularly on weekend nights. However, I have a friend in her 30s, matronly looking, who was carrying a (paper) bag of groceries to a friend's house in the area one afternoon, and these two frat dicks walking towards her just up and hit it and knocked it out of her hands and then continued walking on their way laughing. Luckily for them she wasn't packing any heat.
Of course, teenagers are always unintentionally funny, no matter what their clique.
"I mean, birds are dying! And it's, like, hard to wake up every day."
I wish I could watch that at work.
43: I think that turned out to be a prank.
45: Hmm. Sometimes teenagers are intentionally funny, too.
Re punk (if I have the typology right): can we all agree that the Dead Kennedys make us smile for precisely the same reasons that the Smiths make us smile?
47 -- I never made that connection (and I was a DK fan and never a Smiths fan, and a grimly devoted follower of the Jello Biafra censorship contretemps, but yes, that sounds just about right.
Ah, here it is: the death of emo girl.
13: What I was going for in 6 isn't quite the use/mention distinction as I understand it. That's the distinction between talking about a word (or a phrase) and talking about what that word (or phrase) refers to.
"'The house, known to the world by the name of Fallingwater, created through the efforts and imaginings of Frank Lloyd Wright' is an unnecessarily complex and awkward construction" expresses a low opinion of the single-quoted phrase. "The house, known to the world by the name of Fallingwater, was created by Frank Lloyd Wright, is an unnecessarily complex and awkward construction" expresses a low opinion about the house (one which I do not hold).
6 is an example of prateriteo.
David Neiwert says that a lot of modern white supremacists, especially the middle-aged ones, dress and (to outsiders) act quite normally.
WD, broken link. And was that misspelling intentional?
the same reasons that the Smiths make us smile
I'm not sure the Smiths make you and I smile for the same reason, sailor.
Praeteriteo is the intended spelling and link.
can we all agree that the Dead Kennedys make us smile for precisely the same reasons that the Smiths make us smile
No.
56: Slol, since when do you hate America? I can't claim a deep knowledge of either band, but the DKs seem like the Smiths, if the Morrissey could be bothered to look outward instead of staring endlessly into the mirror.
since when do you hate America?
Apparently since sometime after 9:40 last night.
Basically, I never liked the Smiths, is the point here.
Maybe someone can enlighten us; I bet the Isrealis have "How many suicide bombers can you fit on a school bus" jokes.
Not sure about the Israelis, but that reminded me of one of the greatest VW ads ever.
re: 59 That's what I'm talking about.
Praeteriteo is the intended spelling and link.
There's got to be a special subspecies of praeteritio involving allusion to a joke you might theoretically make but haven't the energy or wit actually to construct.
Oh, leave the poor punk kids alone. It's great that they get to play with being rebellious while keeping their grades up.
Also, to be fair, the punk pretense *does* scare some people. You can get all sorts of cool grownup cred by letting on that you're not one of them.
61: This is why English should be agglutinative.
There's got to be a special subspecies of praeteritio involving allusion to a joke you might theoretically make but haven't the energy or wit actually to construct.
There's a comment I'm failing to find which would back up this point, but I like "Labsian praeteritio" as the name for that subspecies.
I failed to enclose the name for that rhetorical device in single-quotes, as I should have in 55, since 55 was mentioning, rather than using it.
Oh, leave the poor punk kids alone.
The only way we can shore up our diminishing generational cool is to take some of theirs. It's a zero-sum game, and the younger generation always wins. But we can fight a rear-guard action. Fer chrissakes, they're listening to music that was cool when I was younger than they are.
You can get all sorts of cool grownup cred by letting on that you're not one of them.
Actually, that just ruins all the fun.
Depending on the grownup, it can also be creepy.
Though this thread begs the question, what can teens wear to be scary these days? Punk has eaten itself, goth is somehow even more laughable, and nu-metal is below contempt (plus 14-year-olds can't be scary no matter what they do).
I personally think that potential teenage rebels should look to one example: Wham! "Choose Life" sweatshirts and day-glo short-shorts with 3-day stubble are the only true way to freak out the modern jaded urbanite and deeply disturb one's parents. Unless it's gay pride week, in which case tourists will probably just want to take pictures with you.
re: 68
I see the 'chav' (or 'ned') phenomenon* hasn't hit US shores yet.**
* by which I mean both the reality and the sneery middle-class hysteria.
** actually, I can't imagine what a possible US equivalent would look like.
cool grownup cred
Also, though I hate to break it to you, there's no such thing as this.
The concept of cool grownup cred seems, somehow, self-refuting. Is there a Latin word for that?
69: Actually, Americans started that stuff when the Tommy Hilfiger brand was taken over by gangster rap in the early 90s. Chavs with their "subversive" bootleg Burberry bobbins are just biting our style.
I see the 'chav' (or 'ned') phenomenon* hasn't hit US shores yet.**
Isn't Ali G a chav? If so, then it has.
70, 71: Jeebus, slol. So how's my life turn looking, one minute into the future?
71: We can pretend that oxymoron is Latin, if that helps.
I think self-refuting covers it nicely. But, while there is no such thing as cool grownup cred, you can suck every vestige of cool out of a situation through similar means, which can also be fun. "Nope, I'm a dull adult, and you're an unintimidating teenager trying desperately to project dangerousness. No one here is cool."
re: 69
The whole 'casual' thing (linked above) predates that by a decade or more and is pretty much the direct precursor of much of what gets labelled 'chav'. I suspect the process is the same -- coopting of expensive brands by those who wouldn't normally be the target market, etc -- but there's no real causal link.
'single-quotes' -- the cool kids call 'em "inverted commas".
67/70: Maybe I'm hanging onto the last vestiges of the pretty woman exemption. Don't destroy my illusions.
actually, I can't imagine what a possible US equivalent would look like.
I think it would look a lot like Christina Aguilera.
Actually from the little I know of chav style, it seems to be a variant/play on the U.S. gangsta bling look, i.e. "the underclass" wearing designer fashions and lots of shiny things.
So how's my life turn looking, one minute into the future?
I'm guessing that part of it is, it's still true that neither of us is cool.
By "chav" do you mean "gangsta"? Because I hate to tell you Brits, but that's so 1990s.
I believe chav means white kids trying to be "street" by wearing hoodies, bling, etc.
I think the echt middle-class hysterical reaction is the banning of hoodies and baseball caps from the Bluewater shopping center/re.
Damn, pwnd.
I suspect the process is the same -- coopting of expensive brands by those who wouldn't normally be the target market, etc -- but there's no real causal link.
The Teddy Boys were into that shit before anybody.
80: Well, chavs alwasy struck me more as white trash than gangsta. They were kind of trashy but mostly harmless a-holes in adidas and burberry caps while I was in England.
So I guess they're closer to the white kids in America who wore the ludicrously oversized Hilfiger stuff and backward baseball caps after they saw gangster rap videos on MTV (or maybe BET, if they were super daring).
I believe chav means white kids trying to be "street" by wearing hoodies, bling, etc.
But it's not a middle-class white kid thing like wiggas here in the States, or at least it wasn't originally.
In China, day laborers and construction workers all wore suit jackets with the brand label still displayed prominently on the sleeve.
the last vestiges of the pretty woman exemption
"Hot for teacher" ≠ "teacher is cool"
By "chav" do you mean "gangsta"?
My impression of chav is more "desperately would like to be gangsta". Think Kevin Federline.
They were Estonian treasury agents, on a mission ultimately from Cthulhu.
No, plenty of chav are real deal, they grew up in crummy housing schemes (i.e. "the projects") and aren't just trying to be "street".
68: The aforementioned question has not been begged anywhere in this thread.
Standards, people!
they grew up in crummy housing schemes .
So now "chav" is a synonym for "English"?
they grew up in crummy housing schemes
I remember one purported etymology of "chav" being an acronym that began with "council house" but I can't remember the rest of it.
92: I refuse to ever call the actual gang-involved kids "chavs", since that would mean they actually produced something good when they created Grime. Sure, a lot of chavs are lower-class, but they were more rowdy and annoying than actually violent and scary, which is why I said they really reminded me more of white trash than actual gangsters.
Here is a an article about middle aged people trying to be cool. I am 40 and actually do a decent number of the things mentioned in the article. The new pornographers is all about the neko case.
You know what is really fucking stupid in terms of teenage clothing?
Hollister's. I hate that damn store. Oh, let's all look like anorexic surfer chicks by paying for an overpriced faded tee.
When one points out to one's beloved youngest calasister that she lives in a for all intents and purposes landlocked state, one is rewarded with an eye-roll.
93: Indeed, I am aware of the original usage of the phrase, but Utahraptor agrees that you're being overly pedantic.
All clothes are stupid. Everybody should be naked.
Here is a an article
Oh, but isn't the neologism alone proof that whatever this is, it isn't cool? I mean, you can do, wear, listen to and watch what you like. But, you know<eyeroll>.
Everybody should be naked.
Well, if you live in a semitropical paradise like North Carolina, sure.
97: Yeah my point wasn't that they were gangsters, it was that they weren't privileged middle-class kids pretending to be from the 'hood.
Didn't think you were unaware, nor was particularly confused by your usage. I would just like to maintain BTQ = presupposes the conclusion and use, as suggested in the linked thread, "raises the question" or an equivalent for your usage.
Re etymology, the OED states that it's Romany from a word for "man" or "boy."
Lake Erie doesn't get good all that often.
the OED states
The OED is actually a little more waffly than that.
Oh, let's all look like anorexic surfer chicks by paying for an overpriced faded tee. When one points out to one's beloved youngest calasister that she lives in a for all intents and purposes landlocked state, one is rewarded with an eye-roll.
And up here it's been quite amusing to watch the wholesale rip off of the surf and skate cultures by the snowboarders. Bunch of twits.
I remember one purported etymology of "chav" being an acronym that began with "council house" but I can't remember the rest of it.
Council Housed And Violent.
But I'm certain that the acronym came after, not before, "chav" came into use. Sort of like the etymology of the word "gay" is not an acronym from "Got AIDS Yet?" (God I hate Fred Phelps).
I am somewhat surprised that this "Urban Etiquette" article has not yet been turned into a Becks post. Perhaps it's overly NYC-centric, but our posters these days are pretty NYC-centric as well.
ThatNew York Magazine article is annoying. Its moral position, from a brief glance, seems to be: "Once you turn 35 and have a child, you should DIE INSIDE. It's OVER OVER OVER for you. Just GIVE UP already."
re: 104
Yeah, 'chav' isn't about middle-class kids trying to be 'gangsta' or 'street' and there isn't, I suspect, a nice easy US analogue. Stereotypical small-town southern mullet-wearing white trash would be the closest comparison.
Many/most of the people labelled as chavs or neds genuinely are from working-class areas and aren't playing at or co-opting street style from somewhere else.
gay married couples with kids from a best friend-cum-surrogate
For some reason this usage of "-cum-" always cracks me up. [/beavis]
Wham! "Choose Life" sweatshirts and day-glo short-shorts with 3-day stubble are the only true way to freak out the modern jaded urbanite and deeply disturb one's parents.
God, that look scared me enough back in high school. It would be a terrifying acid flashback to see it now.
I remember asking a girl at my high school what exactly she thought the oversized "choose life" t-shirt meant, and she said, no kidding, "You know, its about choice, and life." Really.
Stereotypical small-town southern mullet-wearing white trash
Hey don't talk dirt about 'Postropher!
I have two technical things to say that are totally unrelated to this thread:
(1) just fyi, I always see this at the bottom the the comments page:
"Odd number of elements in hash assignment at lib/MT/App/Comments.pm line 68.
Use of uninitialized value in list assignment at lib/MT/App/Comments.pm line 68."
(2) A long time ago in a galaxy far away, I remember there was some way to have the comments, upon reopening to see new additions, open to right where you left off last time you were reading. I just now remembered that this feature was once available, how handy it was, and was wondering how/why it disappeared.
Just to not be totally off-topic here -- kids with extreme facial piercings still freak me out. Not in a "scarred for my physical safety" sort of way, but in a "what the hell is the matter with you?" kind of way.
Oddly, 45 year old men with similarly freakish facila piercings don't bother in the same way. Probably because I don't look at them and see a future of lost opportunities....
Or a semi-tropical paradise like the northeast today. Why is there so much humidity and when can we send it somewhere else?
I read that New York article at the gym once and it amused me. Like 'adulthood' is set in stone by the boomer generation, who, I'm sure, as soon as they turned 35, emulated their greatest-generation parents perfectly. Psst, magazine. Styles can change and you can be a grown-up and listen to music. Aren't you a damn style mag?
re: 116
Shouldn't that last "really" be "rilly"? If going for the retro-80s vibe?
Probabilities to them are certainties to you.
Probabilities to them are certainties to you.
Sez you.
117: Yeah, I'm not from a small town!
Shouldn't that last "really" be "rilly"?
It should be rlmente.
Yeah, 'chav' isn't about middle-class kids trying to be 'gangsta' or 'street' and there isn't, I suspect, a nice easy US analogue. . . . Many/most of the people labelled as chavs or neds genuinely are from working-class areas and aren't playing at or co-opting street style from somewhere else.
I really think the US analogue is inner-city youth, usually but not exclusively black or latino (I've seen white and east asian versions, for example), with lots of designer labels, big gold jewelry, tricked-out cars, the latest phones and ringtones, expensive liquor brands, etc.
A lot of the look/style is about conspicuous consumption and about not being ashamed of, and indeed actively and loudly playing up, your underclass status in the face of snobbery: "Yeah I'm a lout/thug, so what? What you gonna do about it?"
My sense of 'chav' is 'gangsta absent a racial dynamic.'
You're probably right that the "trailer trash and proud" thing here is something similar in terms of attitude, I just don't see the same focus on designer brands and labels that's characteristic of the chav and ghetto fabulous styles.
126: I don't know that there are comfortable middle class kids in the UK trying to look all chav, though.
88: No, no, I'm not talking about the teacher role. The teacher role requires one to not be cool, or you lose all fucking authority over the little twerps.
132, see 128. Also, I'm not sure chavs are really copying the gangsta look, although there are some similar elements. And it's not just about clothes. Plus, stereotypical chav music is not hip-hop, it's dance.
112 - I'm not getting my New York magazine subscription while I'm in Virginia. You'll probably see a bunch of belated "OMG! The idiocy!" posts related to NYMag articles around, oh, July 19.
About the "grups" article (the one about people over 35 who won't grow up), the neighbors we went with to Dave Matthews (no need to tell me DMB sucks, read the link) brought along their 2 year-old kid. I was trying to figure out if that made us accessories to hopeless adult-grup-toolishness but it didn't feel like it at all. It all kind of worked without being obnoxious. I think it's only because our neighbors aren't annoying hipsters but earnest, down-to-earth, blue-collar folk.
Fine, gangsta + dance music. Of course it's gonna change a bit in translation, but if you don't think that that look is borrowing from American black hip-hop you're deeply delusional.
Re. surf style in landlocked states: shut up, all of you. We totally dress PK in little Hawiian shirts and the like, b/c they go with his long hair and b/c most little boy clothes are ugly and b/c we miss home, y'all. SO THERE.
and b/c we miss home
Not much surfing in the valley, either. Where you gonna go, Don Pedro?
re: 135
I'm sure there are elements of borrowing from US hip-hop but much less than you think. Elements of that look have been around here for a very long time. Kids were looking a lot like that where I grew up a long time before hip-hop went mainstream in the UK and the look comes as much out of a combination of late 80s acid-house, 'madchester' and early 80s 'casual' looks.
I don't think central Scottish neds (the north-of-the-border equivalent of 'chavs') really reference hip-hop much at all or if they do its in a way that's been filtered through a lot of other layers first. They may listen to Eminem and 50 cent but they *looked* that way years before either even existed (as a recording artist).
Of course it's gonna change a bit in translation, but if you don't think that that look is borrowing from American black hip-hop you're deeply delusional.
Agreed, there's borrowing going on in terms of the look, but saying chav is "gangsta + dance music" is overly reductive and inaccurate.
It doesn't have to be derivative of gangsta to be strongly parallel to it -- a lower-class culture of unapologetically appropriating upper-class consumer goods can easily have arisen spontaneously in both countries.
re: 139
It's a long running strand in British working-class culture. 1970s darts players all looked like modern hip-hop artists [I am totally not kidding] in expensive leisure-wear and gold. I've seen the argument made -- in jest -- that the whole of hip-hop style is defined by working class British pub-game fashion of the late 70s.
The early 80s casual scene was all about rocking various obscure or hard to get Italian and French labels.
60s working class hard-cases in cities like Glasgow wore expensive suits and jewellery.
And on and on and on.
The designer clothes + bling thing is emphatically not an import from the US.
Nor, even, is the expensive trainers and tracksuit thing. I remember in the late 70s kids making a big deal about their new Adidas or Gola trainers and not having the 'cool' trainers made you an object of scorn. All of that predates hip-hop's arrival in the UK.
That's not to say there's no influence at all but to claim that the 'chav' look is some kind of UK response to hip-hop fashion is to completely misunderstand it.
134: Free associating from DMB, Ann Coulter is a Deadhead. I wonder, given her obvious inability to string together a couple of sentences without saying something calumnious about liberals, if it casues her trouble in her day to day life.
Ann: How much for an orange mocha frappucino?
Barista: What size orange mocha frappucino?
Ann: A medium liberals love terrorists please.
Barista: I'm sorry, I missed that.
Ann: Tell me how much a medium Monica Lewinsky blew Bill Clinton in the oval office would be?
Barista: Ms., you can't use that sort of language here.
Ann: Traitor.
Ann Coulter is a Deadhead
Actually, there's another band that Ann likes better.
Wow -- that's enough to put somebody off the Dead.
But then Ann Coulter breathing is enough to put somebody off oxygen, if she were interviewed about it anyways.
Dead fans in general are reason enough to put anyone off the Dead.
If we're honest, we'll admit that the Dead are enough to put anyone off of the Dead.
Dead fans in general
Sure -- but only rarely in particular
147: I'm honest. Scrupously so, in this case.
139: Well said (as usual), LB.
139: Yeah, sorry, I was really meaning to call chavs more a parallel to the US gangsta and white trash groups than a derivative. Even if I clearly said otherwise earlier in the thread, ignore that, I meant to be correct.
Also, that New York Magazine article kind of riled me. It has a lot of good rules of thumb for urban living, but I also despise the openly sexist etiquette suggestions.
147 -- I could be honest without saying that.
It doesn't have to be derivative of gangsta to be strongly parallel to it -- a lower-class culture of unapologetically appropriating upper-class consumer goods can easily have arisen spontaneously in both countries.
Hence the Zoot Suiters, Teddy Boys, and Chinese Construction Workers mentioned above.
22: You'd better see them while you still can, Becks.
But . . . whatever shall Becks do? Wherever shall she go??
Now that they've broken up, I should probably buy an album.
Q: How many deadheads does it take to change a lightbulb?
A: None — they don't change it; they wait for it to burn out and follow it around for twenty years.
Don't know their music but: this seems pretty classy to me. Going out on a high note, with an enthusiastic fan base -- seems to me like they should be able to transition pretty smoothly to solo careers and continue to make good music. (Assuming based on the positive reviews from people I respect, that their music actually is good.)
154: I can't believe it, but I feel bad for Becks. That seems like a gut punch bit of news to get.
the Dead are enough to put anyone off of the Dead.
This gets it exactly wrong. Oh SCMT, why do you hate America so much?
OK, I kind of figured this might be coming because they've been flirting around the issue for a long time and they practically had to drag Corin kicking and screaming to do The Woods. That's one of the reasons I went out to SF and snatched up tickets to the East Coast shows.
BUT STILL!! THIS SUCKS!!
154: WHAT?!?
This just fuckin bites! And I really didn't want to go to Lollapolooza, but I haven't seen them live yet.
I'm going to go cry with Becks now.
Don't worry, Becks. I'm pretty sure the Dave Matthews Band is still going strong.
And at least they didn't all go down in a plane crash or something. Jeez people, a little perspective!
They'll be doing a reunion tour before you know it. Why just this past month I've seen both the Violent Femmes and Echo & the Bunnymen. Sonic Youth too, but then they never really broke up.
Just to be clear, the second sentence of 167 is not at all earnest.
I don't want anyone's grief-clouded eyes misinterpreting me.
142: A calacompliment! Thanks.
The Grateful Dead suck like Primus sucks.
Granite rocks like marble rocks.
Yeah, maybe it will be like Ogged retiring. After a while, they'll get bored (or cancer), they'll realize they miss the interaction with the fans, and you'll be able to see them opening for REO Speedwagon on a cruiseship.
>About the "grups" article (the one about people over 35 who won't grow up), the neighbors we went with to Dave Matthews (no need to tell me DMB sucks, read the link) brought along their 2 year-old kid.
I took my pre-school age kids to see bands at free concerts and the like but they usually aren't that excited . They do like gnarls barkley in star wars outfits though.
They'll be doing a reunion tour before you know it. Why just this past month I've seen both the Violent Femmes and Echo & the Bunnymen. Sonic Youth too, but then they never really broke up.
Yeah, but I always feel kind of fake watching the reunion, even if I wasn't alive during the band's actual heyday (as in Echo & the Bunnymen, Mission of Burma, Os Mutantes, and, well, everyone else who's cool and now touring again). It also really feels like I'm just watching the facsimile of the original, a bunch of older people going through the motions of 20-year-old glory.
Now I'm all depressed again.
JAC, I don't remember where you are but tickets are still available for Philly and NYC and haven't gone on sale yet for DC. I bet they're going to get snatched up right quick when word starts to spread. Apo scooped the S-K blogs I read on this so I don't know how far the word is out yet.
172: I like Gnarls Barkley period. The Stars Wars outfits is just gravy. Extra special point for Chewbaca drumming.
>Yeah, but I always feel kind of fake watching the reunion, even if I wasn't alive during the band's actual heyday (as in Echo & the Bunnymen, Mission of Burma, Os Mutantes, and, well, everyone else who's cool and now touring again). It also really feels like I'm just watching the facsimile of the original, a bunch of older people going through the motions of 20-year-old glory.
I got Mission of Burma and Os Mutantes tickets. Plus, Vashti Banyun for the combination of fakeness and novelty.
174: I'm in Chicago, that's why I'm pouting, especially since I currently wouldn't have anyone to crash with in NYC for the purposes of music tourism. Otherwise, I'd be going to Les Savy Fav's free pool party July 9th for sure.
177: Yeah, I'm going to Pitchfork festival as well, the rest of the line-up should be fantastic. I completely geeked out when they announced Liars joining the bill, since I adored their show here a couple weeks ago.
178: Bleh! I am missing both Pitchfork and Lollapallooza because I will be out of the country for work. I would be going to them both, and this sad news makes it
SO MUCH WORSE.
Bleh, I say.
I do feel much less insane now for embarking on the three-nights-in-a-row Philly/DC/NYC trip I had planned. Too bad it will be the last.
I would like to second everything Becks has to say re: S-K breaking up, especially 162.
even if I wasn't alive during the band's actual heyday (as in Echo & the Bunnymen
Jesus Christ, is this possible?
They're children here, Matt. Children.
With w-lfs-n traipsing around Europe, Labs off fighting the zombies of political correctness, and Weiner leaving in a Kangaroo's pouch or something, it appears there is only Cala left to make sure I don't make false or otherwise improper philosophical claims. Oh, I guess Rob H-C has been around more often lately. I say this in light of 51, which I think is fine, but not really any better than my just copying the wikipedia examples about the number of letters in 'copper,' not in copper.
I thought 51 was a clever example. Punk.
Thanks, though I just looked back and realized I forgot to change the repition so that it would match the original. Stupid revisions. And there doesn't seem to have been any need for me to capitalize 'kangaroo' in 192.
w/d, Primus is from El Sobrante. They could never, ever suck, not even ironically.
Fallingwater, however, according to a friend of my mom's who housesat it for a summer, is always dank and mosquito-ridden, due to the stream running through the living room. It's pretty in pictures, though, and I quite like some of his other houses.
And to pick up another, earlier theme of the thread. I've had plenty of bad experiences with particular individuals of The Greatful Dead. I'll never forget how a mourner for Jerry Garcia totally accosted me and presumed that I felt his pain, when I was just peaceably sitting on the sidewalk, waiting for my friends to come out of the communal nudist hottub in the Berkeley suburbs. That old guy totally harshed my mellow!
They could never, ever suck, not even ironically
Primus and their fans use to disagree. I've never seen them, though I have seen one or two of Les Claypool's side projects.
Do the suburbs also count as the People's Republic?
Fallingwater...is always dank and mosquito-ridden
I took a tour and I don't remember that, but I don't really remember anything else about the tour either.
I have no opinion on Primus, but I don't see how being from El Sobrante can earn someone an exemption.
Local boys! Who bring on the funk! (In other words, I have absolutely no objectivity on the subject.)
By Berkeley suburbs, in this case, I meant somewhere around Cedar and Telegraph. Quiet streets, wood-shingled houses, elm trees. I wish I still knew where the communal nudist hottub was, and what the code is these days. That place was awesome. (It had a strict no-talking-at-all rule, which seemed to work.)
What I remember about the Fallingwater tour: when someone in the group remarked on how small the doorframes were, the guide said that that was because people were shorter back then.
Cedar and Telegraph don't intersect. I think you still know where the house is and are hiding it.
Is anyone else having problems loading and reloading the blog today? I find myself having to reload multiple times to get to the end of some of the threads.
We should have a nudist hottub thread, with a strict no-commenting policy.
It'll be located near two posts that are on different sides of the blog.
Oh, crap, you totally caught me. Cedar, what the hell was I thinking? What's the one that is actually Highway 13, that goes by Cafe Strata at College? Anyway, somewhere closer to the Rockridge area; southwest Berkeley, somewhereabouts.
It was awesome, man, really fucking far-out. Until those damned deadheads showed up, of course.
Is anyone else having problems loading and reloading the blog today? I find myself having to reload multiple times to get to the end of some of the threads.
You might find it easier to get to the end of the thread if you just relax and let things happen.
Maybe I should try pressing F5 at different angles.
Cala left to make sure I don't make false or otherwise improper philosophical claims.
Oh, how you presume I have a clue.
You might find it easier to get to the end of the thread if you just relax and let things happen.
I've been having some problems where it loads the first three or four comments and then stops -- with the comment box and everything -- but if I scroll down I get to the last comment. Not sure where the error lies.
I think Ashby is 13 and Ashby and College could get you close to leafy residential areas. I don't have a very distinct image of that side of the city, though.
On an unrelated note, my memory of visiting Rietveld's Schroder House centers on how long and dull the experience was, a feeling fueled only in part by the fact that the guide spoke only in Dutch. The most humiliating moment was when the American contingent of the group attempted to sneakily retreat away from the tour and out of the house only to discover the front door was locked from the outside. We had to climb back upstairs to face the disapproving stares of the German tourists. We wanted to say, "Screw you, we're art historians," but were too ashamed.
Later, stopping at a shop nearby, we chatted with some local Dutch girls working there. The topic of why we were visiting came up, and someone admitted, "The Schroder House is really boring." "Oh, I know!" one of them replied. "They take us there every year in school. I'm so sick of it!" We agreed.
Yes! Ashby is what I meant. Ashby and Telegraph is very nice, but was just emerging from just a little bit seedy about when Jerry died. The nudist communal hottub was around there, maybe a bit north.
(Everywhere I grew up thinking were slums are now unaffordable.)
136: He has a Guayabera too. Anyway, the idea is "home-ish." Also, "does it lack a superhero? Cool."
Maybe I should try pressing F5 at different angles.
There's some dispute as to whether the F5 key exists.
Best just to focus on the mouse controller thingy between G and H.
(Disclaimer: This comment might be funny if I could find the appropriate link.)
Oh how cute. While 500ing the "Window" menu include "Loading Unfogged Happy Fun Page!"
Best just to focus on the mouse controller thingy between G and H.
I love my pointer nubbin.
I babelfished 215 into French and back, to see if it would make more sense, and got:
Oh how nice. While 500ing the menu of "fenêtre" include "the happy page of recreation of Unfogged of loading!"
I'm surprised that it didn't catch "fenêtre" on the rebound.
I babelfished 215 into French and back
Dude.
to see if it would make more sense
This is the part I don't get.
215 was intended to convey "After I hit 'Post', when I look at the 'Window' menu, one of the windows is listed as 'Loading Unfogged Happy Fun Page!'" Or, more perlocutionarily, "Safari sucks." But it came out with that computer-translated feel.
I understood what 215 meant, I just didn't know why you thought more computer translation would reduce the computer-translated feel. Inflecting your verbs would be a better method.
215 was one of the most realistic fake Engrish sentences I'd ever read, until Matt went and blamed it on his computer.
Please to include the happy kitten page for great lucky.
221: I was more trying to say that because of my ineptitude in 215 (done by hand, apo!) it couldn't have reduced it. In a hyperbolic kind of way.
cross-commented to Standpipe's blog (comment 40)
You actually babelfished it, though. That's commitment to a bit.
Never let it be said that I lack follow-through.
