New song tonight, this one’s called “Break Me.” It’s about swatting flies. There, that does it pretty good. Pump it and enjoy. And may your flies be swatted. Update: This one’s going out to MC-Gabe, who is an iron man.
The best way to stay on top of this site’s updates (and any other blog site for that matter) is by using an RSS reader. If you are tech savvy you already know exactly what I’m talking about, you’re just as attached to your reader as I am to mine.
However if you are new to readers, here is a very nice little 2-minute primer from our friends at Google Reader, which is the one I’ve been using for several years and have totally bonded with. (Btw you do not need a gmail account to use it.) I found the video yesterday using — you guessed it — my reader.
Because I’ve been thinking about you lately, dear listener(s). I know how you operate. You check this site once, maybe twice, listen to some tracks, then you forget all about it until you see me somewhere. Then you ask about it, and maybe you check it again when you get home. Because you’re a lot like me — you’ve got kids to raise, doctor appts to deal with, diapers to change, teams to coach, a busy life to live. Me too. That’s why I have Google Reader. (And yes, Google is paying me huge money to say that.) When there’s a person’s site I want to keep up with, I subscribe in my Reader and that’s it. Done. I log into my reader when I have some internet time, check out the new posts, and go on with my life. So, in addition to, say , my sister’s site and various friends’ sites, I subscribe to a pile of technology and cycling sites, ecology sites, a stack of music sites, artists sites, news sites, business sites, start-up sites, etc etc etc. More or less corresponding to the interests I have or the people I dig. Each topic gets its own folder. It’s my connection to the world. Or at least to the part of it that’s online.
So — if you don’t have a reader, watch the primer and get going — the 21st century awaits, and it’s a great time to be alive. You can subscribe to this site’s feed with http://www.launchday.com
Sonic Youth has signed with Matador, and Pavement is planning a tour.
Just checking — it’s 2009, right? I’m not about to enjoy eight years of Clinton again, am I?
Or Am I?? <Twilight Zone theme playing…>
New track today, called “Let’s Take A Photograph.” It’s about a family vacation. Remember those? Families, I mean, not vacations. Boys and girls, grow up, get married, pump out a few kids, and visit the Grand Canyon. That’ll make a man outta you if you can pull it off. There, that’s the sum total of my life’s advice. That and turn it up.
Enjoy.
(And don’t forget to take some pictures.)
New song today, this one is called “The Phony Homies.” It’s a mellow little number about a guy that listens to the wrong people, takes a back seat in the direction of his life and ends up in a tangle. Crank it and enjoy …
Remember the old days, when being Friday was its own reward? Not today my friend(s). Despite the awesomeness of Friday, or perhaps because of it, I’m pleased to implement the first installment of what will no doubt become legendary Friday rewards:
The Bon Jovi Crossroads album for $2 at amazon.
That’s right folks. Such time honored American anthems as Livin’ On A Prayer can be yours for practically free. Do yourself a favor — at least listen to the first few (free) seconds of Blaze Of Glory. I don’t think you’ll be disappointed. “An old coat for a pillow … the earth for last night’s bed.” Gosh that tickles my hobo wildness. I bet it does yours, too.
And those first few chilling seconds of Lay Your Hands On Me — the wailing guitar behind the jungle tom tom awesomeness, the manufactured crowd chant of “HAY.” It must be barn time, everyone screaming for hay like that. I literally have goose bumps right now listening to it. That’s the complete rock kit right there. He read the memo. He got the “rock-for-dummies” book and studied his little puffy bangs off. $2 bucks folks. It’s perfect. You’re welcome.
I’ve smacked little labels onto the songs on the music page so you have a little bit of a hand making sense of them. (By “you,” of course, I mean my valued listener(s), in other words the handful of accidental visitors stumbling onto this site looking for NASA launch schedules or news from the New Horizons satellite — it’s still flying btw, check back in 2015 for Pluto pics.)
My old pal john once told me “once you label someone you own them.” Or something like that. I dont really know what that meant but I remember it every time I label something.
Btw thanks to the genteel rants from the always funny Mattrix, I’m now paying attention to making sure I capitalize and punctuate correctly. ITS OUR INTERWEB AND WE WANT IT SPELLED RIGHT. It may not be punk rock, but it gets our corporate emails answered quicker.
And speaking of accidental visitors, type “PETA hotline” into the google thing and guess who has front-page results. PETA Peta! (And that makes PETA Pete verrrrrrrrry happy!)
Added a “music” page, realizing my life-long dream of having a single page w/ all the tracks on it. Is that asking so much? No. It is not asking so much.
I even found a music-themed icon on the interweb and placed it next to the new “Music” link you will now clearly observe above, under the banner. Not only a new link, but even a new icon. Oh yeee-ah, that … just … happened.
And, lastly, just in time for 2009 – I redid the vocals on “You Dont Get Another One,” which is, as of now, called “A Mess Of Wanting You,” which is a title that actually has something to do w/ the content of the song, which is sometimes a pretty good idea, but is also a title that I can actually remember to the tune of the song, which is grrrreat.
Feeling the cool refreshing breeze of change a-blowin’, I renamed Deed Hanger too and redid the intro vocals. Im calling it “I Want It For Free,” which also has the advantage over the previous title of actually having something to do with the song, and the even more super amazing advantage of also reminding me of the tune of the song. Now that’s just crazy enough to work.
