My Celeb Top 10

*Not necessarily in order of priority*

1. Amy Adams

2. Anne Hathaway

3. Eva Green

4. Tea Leoni

5. Naomi Watts

6. Kate Beckinsale

7. Regina Spektor

8. Jayma Mays

9. Perth Cafe Girl

10. Scarlett Johannson

4 More!!!!

So yup, I just checked, 4 more plays of Come On (Let's Go)! and it becomes my second all time most listened to song. It's 50 plays short of first place though. Damn Snow ((Hey Oh)) has a firm grasp on that title for a few more months to come...

What to Watch 2009-2019 Edition

Hi there. Note to self: so here's a list of what I have to watch

1. King of the Hill (if it's still on, this shit's still in the air)

2. The Simpsons

3. Family Guy

4. American Dad

5. Law & Order: Criminal Intent

6. House, MD

7. How I Met Your Mother

8. Law & Order: Special Victims Unit

9. Criminal Minds

10. Law & Order

11. Parks & Recreation

12. The Office

13. 30 Rock

14. Southland

15. Saturday Night Live

Stadium Arcadium Vs. MCIS

Okay, here goes, I was going to do this along ass time ago.

I will just do a straight up track vs. track comparison, whichever album has more points at the end gets the title of my favourite double album! (This works cus both albums have 2 fourteen track discs)

1. Dani California (Winner) Vs. MCIS

2. Snow ((Hey Oh)) (Winner) Vs. Tonight, Tonight

3. Charlie (Winner) Vs. Jellybelly

4. Stadium Arcadium Vs. Zero (Winner)

5. Hump de Bump (Winner) Vs. Here Is No Why

6. She's Only 18 Vs. Bullet with Butterfly Wings (Winner)

7. Slow Cheetah (Winner) Vs. To Forgive

8. Torture Me Vs. An Ode to No One (Winner)

9. Strip My Mind Vs. Love (Winner)

10. Especially in Michigan Vs. Cupid de Locke (Winner)

11. Warlocks (Winner) Vs. Galapogos

12. C'mon Girl Vs. Muzzle (Winner)

13. Wet Sand (Winner) Vs. Porcelina of the Vast Oceans

14. Hey (Winner) Vs. Take Me Down

Update after disc one. RHCP: 8 SP: 6

1. Desecration Smile (Winner) Vs. Where Boy Fear to Tread

2. Tell Me Baby (Winner) Vs. Bodies

3. Hard to Concentrate Vs. Thirty-Three (Winner)

4. 21st Century (Winner) Vs. In the Arms of Sleep

5. She Looks to Me Vs. 1979 (Winner)

6. Readymade Vs. Tales of a Scorched Earth (Winner)

7. If Vs. Thru the Eyes of Ruby (Winner)

8. Make You Feel Better (Winner) Vs. Stumbleine

9. Animal Bar Vs. X.Y.U. (Winner)

10. So Much I Vs. We Only Come Out at Night (Winner)

11. Storm in a Teacup (Winner) Vs. Beautiful

12. We Believe Vs. Lily (My One and Only) (Winner)

13. Turn It Again (Winner) Vs. By Starlight

14. Death of a Martian Vs. Farewell and Goodnight (Winner)

Update after disc two. RHCP: 6 SP: 8

Total after both rounds. RHCP: 14 SP: 14

Damn, it's a tie. Though there are many things wrong with the way I compared the two albums, and there were many head to heads that were not very easy to determine the winner, such as Disc One: 2, 4, 10, 12, Disc Two: 2, 3, 6, 9 & 14.

I'd offer a tie-breaker, but I prefer to not do that, neither edged the other one, and hey that's not bad at all...

Taking Inventory V. 6.0.1

1. Gish

2. Siamese Dream Vinyl (Original Pressing)

3. Siamese Dream

4. Smile EP

5. Pisces Iscariot

6. Earphoria

7. Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness

8. The Aeroplane Flies High

a. Zero - Single

b. Bullet with Butterfly Wings - Single

c. Thirty-Three - Single

d. Tonight, Tonight - Single

e. 1979 - Single

9. Adore

10. Machina/The Machines of God

11. Still Becoming Apart

12. Rotten Apples

13. The Smashing Pumpkins - Greatest Hits Video Collection 1991-2000

14. Zeitgeist - Promo Version

15. Tarantula - Single

16. That's the Way (My Love Is) - Single

17. Zeitgeist

18. Zeitgeist Purple (Target Edition)

19. Zeitgeist Deluxe Edition (w/ 76 page booklet)

20. Zeitgeist Silver Best Buy Re-issue

21. American Gothic EP

22. If All Goes Wrong DVD

---

23. Infinite Sadness Tour Poster

24. Blinking With Fists (Book of Poetry)

25. Autographed Sheet Music for Tarantula

26. Zero T-Shirt

27. Zeitgeist T-Shirt

28. Zeitgeist Poster

29. Zwan T-Shirt

Taking Inventory V. 6.0

1. Gish

2. Siamese Dream Vinyl (Original Pressing)

3. Siamese Dream

4. Smile EP

5. Pisces Iscariot

6. Earphoria

7. Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness

8. The Aeroplane Flies High

a. Zero - Single

b. Bullet with Butterfly Wings - Single

c. Thirty-Three - Single

d. Tonight, Tonight - Single

e. 1979 - Single

9. Adore

10. Machina/The Machines of God

11. Still Becoming Apart

12. Rotten Apples

13. The Smashing Pumpkins - Greatest Hits Video Collection 1991-2000

14. Zeitgeist - Promo Version

15. Tarantula - Single

16. That's the Way (My Love Is) - Single

17. Zeitgeist

18. Zeitgeist Purple (Target Edition)

19. Zeitgeist Deluxe Edition (w/ 76 page booklet)

20. Zeitgeist Silver Best Buy Re-issue

21. American Gothic EP

22. If All Goes Wrong DVD

---

23. Infinite Sadness Tour Poster

24. Blinking With Fists (Book of Poetry)

25. Autographed Sheet Music for Tarantula

26. Zeitgeist T-Shirt

27. Zeitgeist Poster

28. Zwan T-Shirt

Taking Inventory V. 5.0

1. Gish

2. Siamese Dream Vinyl (Original Pressing)

3. Siamese Dream

4. Smile EP

5. Pisces Iscariot

6. Earphoria

7. Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness

8. The Aeroplane Flies High

a. Zero - Single

b. Bullet with Butterfly Wings - Single

c. Thirty-Three - Single

d. Tonight, Tonight - Single

e. 1979 - Single

9. Adore

10. Machina/The Machines of God

11. Still Becoming Apart

12. Rotten Apples

13. Zeitgeist - Promo Version

14. Tarantula - Single

15. That's the Way (My Love Is) - Single

16. Zeitgeist

17. Zeitgeist Purple (Target Edition)

18. Zeitgeist Deluxe Edition (w/ 76 page booklet)

19. Zeitgeist Silver Best Buy Re-issue

20. American Gothic EP

21. If All Goes Wrong DVD

---

22. Infinite Sadness Tour Poster

23. Blinking With Fists (Book of Poetry)

24. Autographed Sheet Music for Tarantula

25. Zeitgeist T-Shirt

26. Zeitgeist Poster

27. Zwan T-Shirt

All-Star Lineup

I've been thinking, if I could create a fantasy all-star band with whoever I wanted, who would the band consist of? Well, I think I've finally decided on an answer.

The main problem I used to have was that I was putting Billy Corgan on lead vocals, and that messed things up, but I watched a video of him recently playing just guitar and he was awesome, just rocking it out (I still think it's too bad someone had to die, but his tribute concert saw Billy rocking, and my being able to finish this list and also I got to hear a new BC song).

So here goes:

Lead Vocals: Jon Bon Jovi

Backup Vocals: Jeff Tweedy

Lead Guitar: Billy Corgan

Rythm Guitar: Tom Petty

Bass: Flea

Keyboards: Dennis DeYoung/David Bryan

Drums: John Bonham/Jimmy Chamberlin

Roadie: Bono

Taking Inventory V. 4.0

1. Gish

2. Siamese Dream Vinyl (Original Pressing)

3. Siamese Dream

4. Smile EP

5. Pisces Iscariot

6. Earphoria

7. Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness

8. Adore

9. Machina/The Machines of God

10. Still Becoming Apart

11. Rotten Apples

12. Zeitgeist - Promo Version

13. Tarantula - Single

14. That's the Way (My Love Is) - Single

15. Zeitgeist

16. Zeitgeist Deluxe Edition (w/ 76 page booklet)

17. Zeitgeist Silver Best Buy Re-issue

18. American Gothic EP

19. If All Goes Wrong DVD

---

20. Blinking With Fists (Book of Poetry)

21. Autographed Sheet Music for Tarantula

22. Zeitgeist T-Shirt

Taking Inventory V. 3.0

1. Gish

2. Siamese Dream Vinyl (Original Pressing)

3. Siamese Dream

4. Smile EP

5. Pisces Iscariot

6. Earphoria

7. Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness

8. Machina/The Machines of God

9. Still Becoming Apart EP

10. Rotten Apples

11. Zeitgeist - Promo Version

12. Tarantula - Single

13. That's the Way (My Love Is) - Single

14. Zeitgeist

15. Zeitgeist Deluxe Edition (w/ 76 page booklet)

16. American Gothic EP

17. If All Goes Wrong DVD

---

18. Blinking With Fists (Book of Poetry)

19. Autographed Sheet Music for Tarantula

20. Zeitgeist T-Shirt

Coming Up Next: Battle of the Double Albums!

My next blog post will be an extremely in depth, long-ass post about the comparisons of 2 different double albums...

Taking Inventory V. 2.0

1. Gish

2. Siamese Dream Vinyl (Original Pressing)

3. Siamese Dream

4. Smile EP

5. Pisces Iscariot

6. Earphoria

7. Rotten Apples

8. Zeitgeist - Promo Version

9. Tarantula - Single

10. That's the Way (My Love Is) - Single

11. Zeitgeist

12. Zeitgeist Deluxe Edition (w/ 76 page booklet)

13. American Gothic EP

14. If All Goes Wrong DVD

---

15. Blinking With Fists (Book of Poetry)

16. Autographed Sheet Music for Tarantula

17. Zeitgeist T-Shirt

Whole Lotta Deaths...

What do Michael Jackson, Romeo LeBlanc, Farah Fawcett and Sky Sunlight Saxon have in common? They all passed away this weekend. Guess who took most (ie. 90%) of the media coverage? Michael Jackson, yup. He also is credited for almost taking down the internet, or taking the biggest chunk of the internet offline for a single person.

Taking Inventory

I was recently taught at work to take inventory of things as I go along, seeing how I work at Fort Malden with a bunch of old artifacts, that makes sense. Yesterday I went to a downtown record store called Dr. Disc and I picked up some new (well old) records. Two of which are Smashing Pumpkins albums. So, to apply what I have learned, here is an inventory list of my Smashing Pumpkins stuff.

1. Siamese Dream Vinyl (Original Pressing)

2. Earphoria

3. Pisces Iscariot

4. Rotten Apples

5. Zeitgeist

6. Tarantula - Single

7. That's the Way (My Love Is) - Single

8. If All Goes Wrong DVD

---

9. Blinking With Fists (Book of Poetry)

10. Autographed Sheet Music for Tarantula

11. Zeitgeist T-Shirt

12. Smashing Pumpkins Zeitgeist-themed keychain (no longer in my possession)

Albums worth listening all the way through.

I think the title just about sums up the point of this post.

Top 25 in my iTunes Library:

1. Zeitgeist - The Smashing Pumpkins

2. Long Road out of Eden - Eagles

3. Mary Star of the Sea - Zwan

4. Let It Come Down - James Iha

5. Poison Kiss - The Last Goodnight

6. Machina/The Machines of God - The Smashing Pumpkins

7. Lost Highway - Bon Jovi

8. The Crane Wife - The Decemberists

9. Honeysuckle Weeks - The Submarines

10. The Historical Conquests of Josh Ritter - Josh Ritter

11. About Love - Tara Watts

12. Mr. Hollywood Jr., 1947 - Michael Penn

13. Highway Companion - Tom Petty

14. Beauty & Crime - Suzanne Vega

15. Full Moon Fever - Tom Petty

16. Californication - Red Hot Chili Peppers

17. Stadium Arcadium - Red Hot Chili Peppers

17. Working Man's Cafe - Ray Davies

18. Revolver - The Beatles

19. Crush - Bon Jovi

20. Vampire Weekend - Vampire Weekend

21. Wilco (The Album) - Wilco

22. Fleet Foxes - Fleet Foxes

23. Blood Sugar Sex Magik - Red Hot Chili Peppers

24. Weezer (Green Album) - Weezer

25. Three Flights From Alto Nido - Greg Laswell

Finally, but most importantly, Nancy Pelosi is a lying coniving bitch.

Wilco (The Band)

You'll soon find out why I put "the band" in brackets in the title today...

The reason is because, their new album is called Wilco (The Album) and the opening song is called, Wilco (The Song).  This sort of brings me back to Weezer and their 3 colorful self-titled albums.

Overall, after a complete listen through, my first impression is, solid album, I'm liking what Jeff Tweedy is doing with the Wilco brand, 3.5 stars out of 5 for me.

Let It Come Down, Let It All Come Down

My friend Peter showed me this one song by James Iha (you know, former guitarist for The Smashing Pumpkins, and current biotch to Taylor Hansen) called "Be Strong Now", which was a pretty catchy tune, iTunes informs me that I listened to it 47 times.  I had, until now, been unable to find the complete Album, which by the way is called "Let It Come Down".  It's not on iTunes, it wasn't on ebay at the time, nor amazon, I did find a vinyl version of it, but that does nary a thing for me.  However, I recently (ie. yesterday) realized I had a demonoid account and I did a search and lo and behold, there it was!  I downloaded it and it's such an amazing album, so my question, why did it not chart THAT well, and also, why is James waiting so long for a followup album, a second solo album has been rumoroed to be in the works for the past 5 years, so like, what gives?

"I Lick the Polished Chrome..."

That's a line from the last song to be released by Billy Corgan and Co. way back in February for the Hyundai Genesis coupe commercial which debuted just prior to the SuperBowl called FOL.  FOL apparently stands for Feel Our Love, and Hyundai claimed on their website that FOL was written exclusively for the commercial by The Smashing Pumpkins (ie. Billy Corgan).  However, didn't Billy make those suits look foolish, pocketing a healthy amount of money for that song, when in fact the song was not newly written, that it was actually a demo written during the Zeitgeist era of the band, which was scraped from the final album.  At the time, the song was known as XOX, but where am I going with this?

Well, today after the brazillionith (ah! take that George Bush) time, I finally got fed up with Apple Safari's internet browser constantly crashing on me while I'm browsing for "stuff".  So, once again, I have made Google Chrome my number one browser and Mozillar Firefox my browser for "stuff".  And that's where I got that polished chrome line, and I referenced FOL in the process in this blog posting, and dropping Smashing Pumpkins anywhere I can is just plain sick. <- In the good way of course.

What to Watch

I apparently, have a bunch of shows to watch, which is the downfall of following a series a few seasons in so that I can have an uninterupted run of episodes for a few weeks, the downfall being, the show hasn't ended its run yet, so I have to follow it as it happens now.  Here's my list:

1. King of the Hill

2. The Simpsons

3. Family Guy

4. American Dad

5. Law & Order: Criminal Intent

6. House, MD

7. How I Met Your Mother

8. Law & Order: Special Victims Unit

9. Criminal Minds

10. Law & Order

11. Parks & Recreation

12. The Office

13. 30 Rock

14. Southland

15. Harper's Island

16. Prison Break

17. Saturday Night Live

Though, by the end of the tv-season, I feel confident I can take off a few of the listed shows, with Harper's Island only slated as a mini-series, it'll end its run soon, Prison Break is not being picked up for a 5th season, and King of the Hill maybe out the door too.

Down to 14, awesome! (Y)  I think, I may shed off Southland (or maybe NBC will can it, who knows), Parks & Recreation isn't funny (actually!) despite it coming from the writers and showrunner of The Office.  And... How I Met Your Mother has yet to be confirmed for a 5th season, though that seems like a formality than anything.

So there you have it, my list of shows to watch, I hope to not pick up any new ones and by 2 years down the road, Law & Order should have ended its run, with creator Dick Wolf finally satisfied to take the title of "Longest Run" for a tv show, and Special Victims Unit might not be able to continue, or at least do well enough to survive if the two leads of the show are actually canned (which is what NBC is threatening because of the current contract negotiations).

Nothing at All

My summer has began, and the Blue Jays are kicking serious ass this year.

So Long Jimmy Pt. 2

The title is not only a homage to Jimmy Chamberlin, it's also a homage to that song by James Blunt, but that's not all! It's also a homage to the song I Am One Pt. 2, which up until a few days ago, everyone thought was a newly written version of the classic song I Am One, written for the 20th Anniversary shows, but I'll get to that later.

The drummer auditions were a couple of days back, in some unannounced location, to determine who would replace Jimmy Chamberlin, who has recently left The Smashing Pumpkins. *Insert side-rant*

I used to always wonder, if it was "The Smashing Pumpkins" or, "Smashing Pumpkins", but Billy cleared it up for me, and everyone else, when he and Jimmy appeared on that CBC show, hosted by that George S. dude. I think the show is called "This Hour" or something. I remember George's transition into introducing the band, and the way he did it, it was so unassuming and I wasn't even expecting The Smashing Pumpkins to be the featured guests, because he was talking about grunge, Nirvana, alternative, Radiohead, stuff like that, and I remember thinking, well, he has to at least mention Red Hot Chili Peppers, which he didn't, but I soon forgot once Billy and James showed up! (This was my pre-go to smashingpumpkins.com days) Yeah, so it's official, it's "The Smashing Pumpkins", according to Billy. So it bothered me alot, when the Pumpkins were on this new show called "The Chris Isaak Hour" and he kept calling them "Smashing Pumpkins" *side-rant over*

So, back to the drummer auditions, I remember reading how there were originally 600 applications, and then people on the o-board (official forums) kept raving about some dude named 1111phil11111 or something, I think I got the number of 1s incorrect, anyway, I took a listen, sure, it sounded good, but I don't know, chalk it up to bad audio or something, but it didn't sound very good. And I guess whoever did the screening, wasn't too impressed with him, because he didn't make the cut, and wasn't invited to the auditions on April 14, because the pumpkins site did an interview with him and he expressed exasperation that he wasn't getting any new information, so that means he dun make da cut. Then, they reported, that there were now well over 1000 applicants. And there were many people registering on the o-board, and creating threads asking where the auditions were going to be held, because they had heard no additional information.

There was also this pretty peculiar thread, where the guy said, how he already bought the ticket to LA and was already staying at a friends house, and how he always wanted to do this (I don't know about you, but no shit he'd like to do this, if Billy said, "George, come to LA and be my bitch for a year, I won't pay you or anything, but you get to chill with me 7-8pm on Sundays, every other week, I'd for sure do it!) Anyway, the guy was saying, that he was there, and he wasn't going to stay if he wasn't going to get any more information on the process, so I quickly responded, in an effort to defend Billy, and up my post count secretly wishing I'd get flamed for my attitude, thus providing the venue and opportunity to retort and watch my post count sky rocket, but the logic isn't there, if you are already there, you paid for your ticket and you are already in LA, why don't you stay and see what happens? Like, it didn't make sense at all, cus according to the dude, he was about to just get up and go back to Denver or wherever he is from.

Tonight, there was a nice sneak attack on the smahsingpumpkins.com homepage, a sort of wrapup of the auditions, it said how they auditioned 12 people (out of 1000+!) and one was a friend of the current guitarist, who their band "The Lassie Foundation", I think I can come up with a better name than The Lassie Foundation, how about replace Lassie with a word that starts with a Pu and the rest stays about the same, but change the ie into a y, keeping the double s. The other person of note, was the drummer for.....

SYSTEM OF A DOWN!!!!

Yup, John Dolmayan of System of a Down auditioned for this, now this is strange, I'm guessing John Dolmayan doesn't know anyone close to Billy, cus had he come forward, like in early March with his interest to play with the Pumpkins, I don't think Billy would even have done this whole audition thing, because that's usually how it works, Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers got Dave Grohl to cover drums for them, when Stan Lynch was going through his initial stages of menopause, and Tom Petty would eventually move on to use Ringo Starr on his solo album, so the industry ties are there and that's what usually prevails, so it's sort of a shock to see this happen the way it is. Not to compare apples and oranges, or as Billy likes to spell it, Appels + Oranjes.

BUT...

SOAD do seem to have quite the following, and judging by their album sales, in 12 years, they have sold around 20 million albums worldwide, maybe cus the whole band is like Lebanese or something and the great people of Lebanon are supporting their home grown.....
were you expecting me to say terrorist - muscians, but from figures that I have, the Pumpkins have sold around 18.5 million albums in the US, though they celebrated their 20th anniversary last year, technically, their first album came out in 1991, and they were broken up from 2000-2006 and Zeitgeist came out in 2007, so really, they've only been around for 11 years, but that's me playing fast and loose with the rules and the RIAA.

So here's to John, maybe you'll make the cut, going from a really popular band to another really popular band, maybe that dude from the Pv$$y Foundation will make it instead, or maybe that 1111phil111 dude will be douche enough to bitch about it and Billy gives him the job just cus he wants to show phil how much he sucks, who knows.

Now, onto my reference to the I Am One Pt. 2 song, recently, Smashing Pumpkins archivest, Zachary Quinto (someone I think on netphoria called him a rat bastard, and I don't know why they did that, but I like the name and it's stuck to Quinto, in my regards), so, rat bastard Quinto shocked the mailing list when he said I Am One Pt. 2 is actually from 1989, oh snap, oh no he didn't!

But yeah, that's what happened, and I hope he knows what he's doing in the Pumpkins archives, cus like, I will pay to just look at that thing, it must be like, the holy grail.

Toronto Blue Jays?!?

Holy Crap! During the off season and during spring training, I was way down on the Jays because I perceived them to be at one of their lowest of lows in a very long time. With the exodus of AJ Burnett, BJ Ryan sucking balls, Sean Marcum and Dustin McGowan out (how typical of pitchers to do that), I had very little faith left in the team, and with hitting as bad as last season (supposedly) I thought that this year would be a struggle to fight to be not-last place in the highly competitive American League East division. But boy was I wrong! It turns out the hype around Travis Snider and Adam Lind were pretty accurate, as I've seen both play and boy, they sure can hit! I remember reading this one blog analyzing OPS, slugging and other hitting stats, claiming that with the arrival of long-time manager Cito Gaston, that the Jays had improved significantly in hitting over the team that John Gibbons had managed. And yeah, I can see the difference, though this might just be the effects of other teams pitching not up to regular season par, since the Jays were hitting collectively around .233 in spring training, and that isn't a very good batting average, so I don't know, but as of right now, I'm sold on this team, and its players, batters like Marco Scutaro, Scott Rolen, Kevin Millar, Adam Lind, Aaron Hill have been so fun to watch, and so far I've seen the whole rotation pitch once, and they're all really good, I was impressed with the rookie pitchers Ricky Romero and Scott Ritchmond, and Doc was as excellent as ever.

So, keep up the good play, and watching how the Yankees are not doing so great even with their new cash-infusion of talent (AJ Burnett among that cash crop), the Jays might have a chance! They finished last year with a record of 86-76, and they were 11 games out of the division lead, it's not that much of a stretch to see this new hitting behemoth of a team squeeze out another 10 wins and they might just come out on top!

Jays record: 4-1

Review: Inkheart

If this blog site would allow me emoticons, and Roger Ebert had theoretically not trademarked his two thumbs review system, I would give this movie two very big thumbs down (N) (N)!!!!
Maybe I was cranky because I was tired, but this was one really bad movie, Brandon Fraser was disappointing, he was sorta acting like a stick, and that little girl in the movie must be down-syndromed or retarded, cus there were times where I was going, please, what are you doing? Such as blurting out Toto's name and revealing to the bad dudes that she could also read shit out of books, or when she gave away to the bad guys that the chick caught in the net was her mom. And there were some serious reality checks needed for the people in this movie, such as this dude named Dustfingers, who keeps on like, double-crossing or screwing over George of the Jungle and his downed daughter, like come on man, if I were George I would have abandoned his ass.

Overall Plot:

George and downed girl searching for books, downed girl has no idea why and bitches about it, does not follow apeman's instructions and some shit happens.

They go to downed girl's great aunt's house, who is played by the Queen. She seems mean, and really weird, like mentally crazy messed.

That dude previously mentioned who will screw over apeman and famjam, does so, the bad people show up. Soon apeman's powers are revealed, we see crazy shit like a unicorn, minotaur, and other fantasmagorical creatures.

There's this really babe chick who can't talk, turns out she's apeman's wifey. Screwjob finds out lets her escape but doesn't actively help to reunite her with her family, and even though he was supposed to help her escape, he unlocks her chains but when she gets stuck under a crumbling building or something, he just leaves her there, like what?

More shit happens, they bring along some thieving dude from Ali Babba or Alladin or something. They go find the author, author gives them manuscript, downed girl finds out she can read too, the Queen bails on them, author backstabs too, everyone's back at the bad dude's castle.

More shit happens, nothing really exciting, turns out the top bad dude kept a copy of that book with him so he could bring some dude named the shadow from the book.

The girl reads, and her pappy had a plan to screw the whole thing up, but downed girl almost f'ed everything up cus she started to read, which I will give her, she had no choice but to, but she read way to fast, like come on, let's not get too excited here downed girl.

Greedy author writes another passage downed girl reads it and all the bad dudes disappear and the castle was lit on fire by Ali Babba and screw-job.

Basically the end.

So Long Jimmy

I'm usually a very frequent visitor to the smashingpumpkins.com site, but I haven't been to since March 20 Friday afternoon. I go on that site today, and guess what, in my absence from visiting the site, some legit news actually happened:

THE SMASHING PUMPKINS' BILLY CORGAN ANNOUNCES THE DEPARTURE OF JIMMY CHAMBERLIN FROM THE GROUP

CORGAN SET TO HEAD INTO THE STUDIO TO CREATE NEW SMASHING PUMPKINS MUSIC

The SMASHING PUMPKINS' guitarist, singer, songwriter and founding member Billy Corgan has announced that drummer Jimmy Chamberlin has left the group. Chamberlin joined the band Corgan founded in Chicago in 1988 and played on all their albums except Adore (1998). Corgan will continue to write and record as SMASHING PUMPKINS with plans to head into the studio this spring.
___

The only good piece of news in this blurb is, that Billy plans on releasing more music, hopefully in album format *fingers crossed*. Ever since he said they're done with albums, I was sorta weird-ish about it all. Now what makes me wonder is, it's been a couple of days now, how come there are no new developments? Like, how about the reason why?!? Man, I'm pretty peeved, but at least Billy is doing what he does best, he's soldiering on, and I've always sorta expected this day to come, where Jimmy won't be by his side anymore, just because some of the stuff that Billy says are pretty wonky. At least they aren't going on hiatus, like my other favourite band (Red Hot Chili Peppers I'm talking about you!)

So now when Billy and Jimmy's appear on the Chris Isaak Hour in a pre-taped episode, it's going to be pretty weird, since this was taped back in November of 2008, man will they even show this episode anymore?

Another note of interest, Jimmy's other band, which is aptly named The Jimmy Chamberlain Complex, which has been on hiatus ever since the Pumpkins got back together, there seems to be a test post on their new blog and apparently, JCC just registered for a twitter account, so who knows if the recent activities of JCC are connected to JC leaving SP.

Oh and please, no Kenny Aronoff, that creepy guy with the goggles who replaced Jimmy back on the Adore tour. Wooo, how about Chad Smith from the Peppers? That would be a good way for me to lay back on the Peppers need to get their sh!t together and get back together.

Oh and, where the hell is the media on all of this? Like seriously, are the Smashing Pumpkins so insignificant and or by-gone that something of this magnitude isn't even news-worthy? Or is it because there is a significant amount of information missing from that short blurb that was posted on the Pumpkins website?

Oh and Billy, if you are reading this, or someone from Irving Azoff Management, I played the drums in grade 5 music class, it was a mixed class, grade 5/6 so I'm better than a drummer from a class of straight up grade 5s, because there were grade 6s in that class too. Okay, sweet deal.

The Fogh is Lifting

Does this name ring a bell? Jaap de Hoop Scheffer? Nope? Didn't think so. Though, that man fills a pretty important position, the Secretary General of NATO. And apparently he's leaving that post soon. And the person that seems to be the favourite to replace him is Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen. However, Defence Minister Peter Mackay seems to be in the mix too. Now I know at least one person who would root for Mackay to take the position, drumroll please.....
Elizabeth May! See, she's already committed to running again in Mackay's riding of Central Nova, and with Iggy already committing a Liberal candidate in the next election there, her chances of coming out on top are very slim. So if Mackay leaves and goes to Europe, or wherever NATO is headquartered at, the riding will be Mackay-clan free, which hasn't been the case in a good decade plus. And speaking of Iggy, he was in the news twice today, once for phone calling Brian Mulroney cus it's his b-day and another is that Iggy and top Liberals are meeting in their Quebec provincial lair discussing party tactics for an upcoming election if that happens.

Get the Hell outta hur Bill

Bill, Bill, Bill, why oh why are you still sticking around? I'm of course not talking about Bill Clinton, but rather another Bill, this Bill in fact worked for Bill Clinton, then backstabbed Hillary and joined the Barack bandwagon and then was rewarded for his Judas Iscariot tendencies with a plush job at the Commerce Department, which is way better than being the top dawg watching over a state named after the country that Texas is so deftly trying to protect itself against and then he had to give that plush cozy job up because he was under investigation by the Federal Bureuau of Investigation. Ding ding ding, we have a winner! I'm talking about Bill Richardson, the governor of New Mexico. He's back in the headlines, well at least at cnn.com. He's signing into law, putting a stop to death sentences in his state. In what was once a pasttime for the whole family, is now something that is apparently to be ashamed of. Though I cannot claim to support the death sentence just because of my fear of incompetance by those working for the system, I'm just sorta peeved that this man has not had the decency to step down.

Not so Chipper are we?

I've followed this edition of the World Baseball Classic pretty much from start and to the anticipated finish. And one thing is for sure, it's sorta on the drawn out side of things, like please. But today I read what a certain someone who plays 3rd Base on the Atlanta Braves and Team USA said. He was like, we had to stay a week in Toronto to play 3 games, and it ain't Las Vegas that's for sure. Well Chipper Jones, I'm calling you out, it's not like Hotlanta is anything like Las Vegas either, so STFU! Oh and don't get injured please, I need you in my fantasy pool.

Team Canada: From FTW to WTF?!

When Team Canada announced their lineup for the World Baseball Classic, my initial reaction was sweet, let's take a look, but when I saw the inclusion of no marquis MLB pitchers (and there are plenty of them), I was sorta worried. Names like Rich Harden, Ryan Dempster, Jeff Francis, Erik Bedard and *cough cough* Eric Gagne were not on the list. Almost all barred from playing because of their proven records with the DL list. But going in, I was still thinking, they can do it, they beat the mighty US of A last time didn't they? And they did, 8-6. And this time, the game was real close, even with sub-par pitching names, they lost 5-6. So in a do-or-die situation against Italy, I thought, no problemo. Uh, the pitching was pure BS. And subsequently, they got downed 6-2. Man, that was a letdown, in an almost sure game, the boys didn't pull through. But that's sports, you never know what will happen. I'm just hoping the next edition, and I'm hoping they don't wait another 3 years before hosting another one, Canada will do better.

Reppin' It

Our boy Cannon is reppin' Canada in the Middle East, May is still a bitch, and Iggy Pop is doing good work.
----
Minister of Foreign Affairs Lawrence Cannon is meeting with both Benyamin Netanyahu and Tzipi Livni, one of whom will be the next Prime Minister of Israel. Oh and I spelled Bibi's name right, I think that's like how they spell it using some sort of translation from his Hebrew name or something. I know, weird.

I wasn't refering to the month May earlier, but rather Green Party Leader Elizabeth May, who doesn't seem to get it, she had her best chance during the last election, MacKay was sorta unpopular and Green politics was all the rage, now that we are going into a recession, or rather we are in one and heading steady towards depression, she'll get even less attention from voting public, not to mention Dion didn't run a Liberal candidate against her in Central Nova, which gave her an upper edge cus she didn't split votes with another leftist party, but with Iggy Pop running the Liberals now, he's running a full slate of candidates, which means 308 ridings will be targeted, barring any last minute withdrawals, and that means May is out of luck.

Whoops.

c-PACKing it in

The annual CPAC conference, that is, the Conservative Political Action Conference, had it's annual straw-poll, this time for the 2012 Republican presidential hopeful, again with Willard Mitt Romney taking it home. I find this interesting, because Romney has been pretty low-key since McCain shored up support for his bid to succeed W, and Bobby Jindal and Sarah Palin especially have certainly not been low-key, yet they came in second and tied for third respectively. CPAC goers voted for the most conersative candidate to support and Romney again is their man. Nice going Mitt, and maybe in 2012, you won't step down from your presidential campaign and tell it to a shocked roomful of CPAC attendees.

Tinted Windows :|

What happens when Taylor Hanson smashes a pumpkin, drinks from a fountain belonging to wayne and turns a cheap trick on a street corner? Tinted Windows. That's right, the new "supergroup" (and I'll explain my slant on supergroups later). Tinted Windows consists of Taylor Hanson of Hanson fame (if you have no idea, just think Jonas Brothers but not a Disney product), James Iha formerly of The Smashing Pumpkins on guitar, Adam Schlesinger of Fountains of Wayne on bass and Bun E. Carlos of Cheap Trick fame on the drums. It sounds good, on paper, in terms of the guys involved, except Hanson, he seems alright but he's not a rock sorta guy you know? And unfortunately, as the front man he I guess gets to decide what the direction the band takes, and it's that pop crap that Miley, the Jonas' and whoever else like Back Street Boys or the newly reformed New Kids from the Block or whatever it's called are trying to sell. Now, I would say, good for them, make some money while your doing this thing that you want to do, but come on, if these guys were like in their 20s or something then I can see this thing rolling along, but James is in his 40s, so is Adam, and Bun there well, he's creeping up on 60. Taylor is the odd-man out, clocking in at 25. But like, I can't see girls getting behind such a band, especially with a guy who's name is representative of what he looks like and almost a senior citizen. No disrespect to Bun, he does his thing with Cheap Trick, but seriously, they aren't going to be picking lots of teenage girls.

Now, onto the topic of a supergroup, maybe I have been skewed in my view, because of what I have seen, but I guess Tinted Windows is closer to what I would consider a supergroup, cus when I think that term, I think all-star team of rockers, but some groups have not shaped up to my expectations, such as Zwan, as much as I love Billy and Jimmy, but it's basically the Smashing Pumpkins (or rather the reformed pumpkins) with some dirty mexican on bass and another one on guitar and some white dude named Sweeney on guitar. Come on, that ain't a supergroup! I mean, if it were, then the new Smashing Pumpkins should be classified as a supergroup. I mean, when compared to the Travelling Wilbury's no "supergroup" can match up. I mean please, Bob Dylan, Ray Orbison, Jeff Lyne, Tom Petty and George Harrison! That's a hell of a team right there.

McSlimeball

You know what ticks me off? Really obviously slimey politicians, liek they don't even try to hide the fact. Like, Obama, good for him, he has hardly let his slimey-ness rear its ugly head. But the man picked to replace Obama's slimey senate seat, has no reservations about being the handpicked Johnny Q. Slimeball of the Public, also known as the junior senator for the people of Illinois. I mean that smile Roland Buriss puts on his face, just gives it all away and his repeated claims of being elected before many times, most for the position of State Comptroller or something, but please, I never believed his many statements that he never lobbied for the position from ex-Governor Rod Blagojevich, like please! Oh by the way did you know Rod Blagojevich has a brother named Rob? I understand it was probably easier on their immigrant parents by giving them simple names, or maybe they didn't know too many other names to choose from, I digress however.

Here's what some fancy-schmancy Democrat from the totally not-corrupt state of Illinois had to say about Roland Burris.

"I think Roland actively wanted this job," Hare said on CNN's American Morning. "I think he went out and tried to do everything he could to get the job but most importantly, he was under oath, and three times before this impeachment panel he was asked and he denied all three times that he had any contact, never raised any money.

Uh, how about had you guys in the State Congress stripped Rod of his powers of being Governor earlier, Roland would never have become the senator in the first place?

TC, JR and Sophing

A new thing was posted on the Josh Ritter web merch site. A reader set, of 3 books and a tote bag. The 3 books of Josh's favs. Drop City by TC Boyle, who is like the only American author that I have read works by, so I feel like me and Josh have like a special connection, like oh my god, like. The other books are, The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz, which I have also enjoyed (oh shit 2 for 2), and the third is one called Independence Day, which I think is the novel the movie was based on, and I liked that movie (3 for 3 woot!), who cares that the cover of that book looks nothing like aliens are invading Earth :O.

Next, for some reason, call it a fan's intuition, I had the desire to check out the Smashing Pumpkins onilne offerings, and lo and behold, yesterday they added new stuff to the online store, with some 20th anniversary tees, and a messenger bag I was trying to snipe earlier, but to no avail. Oh, and I should mention, I checked yesterday, probably like minutes after they upped it to the site.

And finally, I got a call 2 hours earlier telling me I made the soph team at Essex, this is really cool cus I don't like rejection, and now, just to clear another hurdle, I need to win my appeal of my current status. If I get that, then I'm golden.

Sweet.

(Come On) ((Hey Oh))

I took a look at my top 25 most played playlist in iTunes, and guess what? My current fav, (Come On) Let's Go! is behind my all time most played, Snow ((Hey Oh)) by more than 100 plays. That, in my opinion, is some crazy stuff man. Also, I have found that I have a predisposition towards songs that have brackets in them lol, That's the Way (My Love Is), (You Want to) Make a Memory just to name a few.

Obama the Vetter

Bill Richardson, Tom Daschle, and Nancy Killefer. Why do these names stand out? Well, that Nancy chick's name doesn't really, I had to copy/paste that from where I get my news, but still. What do these three have in common? Well they're all Democrats, okay, but also, they have "issues" which have caused Obama to look like a very shitty person to pass judgement. They were tapped by Obama to lead their respective portfolios of Commerce, Health & Humnan Services and Chief Performance Officer. But they all had something wrong with them, in Richardson's case, there's an open FBI investigation into the way his administration handled something or other, I couldn't have been bothered to find out what, it was just funny to see that his desertion of the Clintons in the primaries have now come back to bite him in his face, and to think, he thought his turncoatedness would have resulted in him being named VP ahahaha. And Tom, oh Tom, he apparently had some tax issues, with a rented car and driver, and owed backtaxes in excess of 100,000 USD. And Nancy, supposed to be Obama's go to gal on efficiency and performance issues, also had tax issues, this one surrounding one of her houses. Whoops. Pick again Obama.

TSP, not SP

I had always wondered, as a pretty anal iTunes tagger, whether I should tag the pumpkins stuff as The Smashing Pumpkins, or just Smashing Pumpkins, so I looked to their albums for help, and their very first album, it said Smashing Pumpkins, but by the second album, it was The Smashing Pumpkins. I had alternated between the two, and retagging about 500+ songs in iTunes takes a few seconds, which is pretty annoying, and then the whole synching ordeal too, it just was such a pain going back and forth. So I was rewatching, this time the full interview given by Billy and Jimmy on This Hour with that George dude from CBC, and Billy said that the band is officially The Smashing Pumpkins, and that it said Smashing Pumpkins on Gish only because he couldn't get it to fit with the artwork, so there you go, I can now leave my pumpkins stuff tagged with The Smashing Pumpkins in peace now.

New Year's Resolution

Kinda late, but here I go: Practice the violin 30 minutes everyday, because, I have realized how much I have lost in terms of skills and technique. 30 minutes won't do much, but it should put the hold on losing any more skills.

Where did my Walls Go?

I had only one video up on youtube and it was the official music video to Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers' single Walls (Circus) from their soundtrack album She's the One. Anyway, it's been up for quite some time, let's say 3 months, who knows, anyway it was doing decently, maybe around 3000 views by now, and it was the only version up on youtube so I was like, sweet I'm contributing like legit. But now, the vid is gone, I noticed this after uploading FOL to youtube and I'm like where my Walls go? Apparently, Warner Music Group has complained of copyright issues or whatever. That's awesome, so now I have to come up with a creative way to up it again ahaha.

OMG more FOL

Oh man, I'm still G.L.O.W-ing about FOL! Ahaha get it? G.L.O.W.-ing, as in their last single G.L.O.W. that was released as a digital 45 along with SuperChrist and was a playable and downloadable track off Guitar Hero World Tour. Spin Magazine Online put out the commercial on their website, and it was just so awesome.

"Can I please just talk to you?
Here it's deep and drained and blue
Come on and feel our love
Come on and feel our love
Come on and feel our love
...."

Awesome!

Where the Blue Jays Migrate

With teams reporting for spring training in less than a month, I have perpetually awaited some news of the Blue Jays making a move, and nothing has indicated that JP is going to get into the mix, well he has signed Mike Maroth and Matt Clement, but please, they are both damaged goods. So right now, their starting lineup consists of possibly, Roy Halladay, Jesse Litsch, David Purcey, and those two if they can stand out enough during the Grapefruit league. The Jays really need bat power, and they don't got any of that right now. It's going to be another tough year at the Skydome, I mean Rogers Centre.

Bloggin bout Blago

Whoah, I go to cnn.com and their big headliner news thingy was Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich being found guilty by the Illinois State Senate, 59-0. He was impeached by the State House with one member voting nay for his impeachment. I guess when prominent Chicagonian lawyer well known for defending high profile people with uphill cases (Conrad Black, another former governor who is still in the klink) backed out of defending Blago, that was probably a sign that he was screwed. Though I do agree with Mr. Bighair that this does set a bad precedent, technically he is still innocent yet both houses found him guilty and have removed him from his post and barring him from future elected office in Illinois but I can see how this can backfire for those involved in leaving this man out to dry, Blago is found not-guilty in a court of law, and he makes his money by touring the tv outlets and other media forms, and one day the people of Illinois demands that he be allowed to run again which would bode very not well for those that voted for him to be striped of his duties.

OMG FOL

Oh my goodness, I guess staying up late does serve a purpose, a very beneficial purpose. I just found out that in a few short days (though they'll seem long), the Smashing Pumpkins will debut a new song, entitled FOL during the SuperBowl pre-game. It might go right before the kick-off. The song will be used in a Hyundai commercial for one of their non-domestic p.o.s., anyway, I like the pumpkins, so I'll take a gander at the pre-game - and then after scouring the internets for the release of it, I'll probably end up buying it at iTunes - I'll come back and check out the half-time show which features Bruce Springsteen as entertainment. I remember watching Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers rocking out last year and I'm expecting big things from the Boss.

Carousel of Nations.... Not

Earlier tonight, me and my roommate Steven went downstairs to the Soph Carousel for next year's applicants. I was sort of dreading it because I already went through a Staff Carousel (seriously carousels and group interviews seem to be like Western's theme or something ahaha) and that staff one was like 4 hours long, so I wasn't really relishing the fact that I had to do it again. Anyway it's over now.

George Out.

Blackberry

So today I got some blackberries.... the fruit, not the phone. Anyway, I think it's my first time eating them, and ugh, I don't know I was expecting a sweet taste, apparently the middle of the fruit is bitter, so I guess it's like eating a small grapefruit or something, but this wasn't what I expected so I'm kinda let down by it all. George approval index: 2.5/5

Electronic Shopping

Ever since I got my credit card back in November of 2008 (weird saying 2008 as last year), I've been happily ordering stuff online ahaha, be it ebay.ca or amazon.com or wherever else. The only negative aspect of this that I don't necessarily see the charges on my credit card right away and could have easily slipped into debt pretty quickly but due to my clever financial moneuvering, I am now in the green like I should be ahahaa.

Zeitgeist

There perhaps isn't an album that I love as a whole more than the one that came out on July, 07, 2007 by the Smashing Pumpkins titled Zeitgeist. There haven't been much love for this album, only being certified Gold in the US of A around 8 months after it's debut. But, this album is what really got me into the Smashing Pumpkins, and boy, am I glad that I give this album a listen, and today it became my only album to get 5 stars for every single song on the album in my entire library.
--
Also, today President Barack (weird saying that), called Canada's Prime Minister Stephen Harper and discussed his upcoming trip to Canada. I guess Prez Obama is taking an easy one as his international debut as the president of the free world by going to a country that is considered very friendly towards Democrat Presidents. Though, Barack, at least during the Democratic Primaries posed the biggest threat to NAFTA among all of the candidates. So it was weird seeing how most of Canada rooted for the man from Hawaii. I guess the love-fest continues.

The Further Conquests of Josh Ritter?

Okay, so the first few posts will be recycled from facebook.
--
Okay, so I've been a real big fan of a singer called Josh Ritter, and in case you don't know who it is and would like exploring some new music, I recommend the album "The Historical Conquests of Josh Ritter", and you'll notice that's where I borrowed my very clever title from. Or if it's individual songs that you fancy, I recommend "Good Man" which was played on an episode of House, and "To the Dogs or Whoever". Well anyway, so I was listening to one of his live albums and I made myself a promise, that I would go see him if he comes near me, ie. Toronto or Detroit or something in between. So I take a look at his tour dates, and it goes something like this:

January 07, 2009 Tokyo, Japan
January 30, 2009 Kodiak, Alaska
January 31, 2009 Anchorage, Alaska
July 04, 2009 Cork, Ireland

At first, I was extremely disappointed, because those are the only shows he is doing for the first half of the year. But then, it dawned on me, why is it that there is a long break in between the Anchorage and Cork shows? Break? Possibly, he's been touring pretty much non-stop, however I think he's also planning on recording another album, he hasn't had one out since the last one, "The Historical Conquests of Josh Ritter" in 2007 and he usually has an album out every year or every other year, so I think it's due and I hope this is why he has such a long break.

I'm back, for good this time... fo sho

Okay, so I realized that I said I was coming back, and that was like more than a year ago, but this time, I'm back, for good, at least for the time being aha.