TMBG

My friend Michael is practically forcing me to write a blog post on the upcoming concert in Milwaukee featuring They Might Be Giants by tagging me in posts twice this week. Well, I'm going to cheat, since he did most of the heavy lifting with his first post on the subject earlier. His experience pretty much mirrors mine, except I've not gone back and filled in the gaps in my TMBG collection. So all my favorite songs of theirs will be considerably 'old school'. In whatever order they occur to me...

"Birdhouse In Your Soul"
"Kiss Me Son of God"
"My Evil Twin"
"Ana Ng"
"Don't Lets Start"
"Istanbul (Not Constantinople)"
Let's face it, all of LINCOLN
"I'll Sink Manhattan"
That last one, they did live on MTV's 120 Minutes when they hosted that show sometime in the early 90's, I believe, probably on YouTube somewhere, definitely on a video cassette buried in a box in the garage, but if I'm lazy enough tonight to not post any images, I'm too lazy to go look for links. G'night.

What I'm Listening To

Here's a little companion piece to the Summer Movies post I did an eternity ago, mostly about which podcasts I'm listening to. I'll throw in a bit on music at the end...

I'm a little surprised at how many podcasts I actually take in on a monthly basis. Most of these shows are weekly and last about an hour, and I can usually squeeze in a few during the day in between taking care of the kids and driving around doing errands. But unless I'm playing World of Warcraft, I have to give the 'cast my undivided attention; I can't concentrate on what's going on in the show and, say, read a magazine or surf the web. If I do that, I'll miss big chunks of the 'cast and find myself rewinding to hear what I missed. So I'm often dividing up each show, listening to part of it here, the rest of it there, etc..., which isn't ideal, but it doesn't take away my enjoyment, since the 'casts I listen to are almost always entertaining. These are all available on iTunes, and all are free to download.



THE B.S. REPORT It's a sports-related pod hosted by ESPN.com writer Bill Simmons. If you're not into sports, it's probably not for you. Also, if you're into sports, but not into pop culture references scattered throughout your sports, it's probably not for you.

DOUG LOVES MOVIES Comedian Doug Benson loves movies. Loves the shit out of them. His weekly show 'plops' on Fridays, and is usually recorded live in front of an audience at the UCB Theater in Los Angeles. He has guests (3 most of the time) that play the Leonard Maltin game, a kind of 'Name That Tune', but with movies. The guests range from awesome (Edgar Wright, John Lithgow, Paul F. Tompkins, Sarah Silverman, Scott Aukerman) to awful (Tig Notaro is terrible every time she's on), but Doug is almost always hilarious. My favorite show.

THE POD F. TOMPKAST One of the more...different shows here. You may remember Paul F. Tompkins from his time on MR. SHOW WITH BOB & DAVID (or not). I would never have guessed his podcast would be so damn fascinating and funny. It's a monthly show that started a little over a year ago, and it's worth downloading them all and listening to them in order because the show contains a serial called "The Great Undiscovered Project", featuring Ice-T, Andrew Lloyd Weber, Gary Marshall, John C. Reilly, The Cake Boss, and tons more...all voiced by Tompkins. That's just a small portion of the show, which also features bits from his live variety show, Paul's off-the-cuff ramblings, and a phone call to his pal, comedienne Jen Kirkman. I was shocked at how much I love this show.

WTF with MARC MARON Marc's a stand-up comic who's been doing it for about 25 years, along with a stint as the morning show host on Air America. I first saw him as the host of Short Attention Span Theater on Comedy Central back in the early 90's. He's kind of...dark. Anyway, he brings guests into his garage for interviews, usually fellow stand-ups. I was a little worried the show would get into the dreaded "what IS comedy?" territory*, but that's far from the reality of what happens. There are episodes that really surprise me, because I go in thinking "I'm really not that interested in this person", but Marc really pulls some cool stuff out of them. I'm thinking of guests like Ed Helms, Jimmy Fallon, Sandra Bernhard...nothing against any of them, but I never thought I'd enjoy spending an hour listening to them talk. My favorite's are the shows with Doug Benson, Kevin Smith, Louis C.K., Janeane Garofalo, and Demitri Martin. The Gallagher episode is a must listen.

THE SMODCAST NETWORK Kevin Smith's SMODcast shows are hit or miss for me. I love the original Smodcast, but that's because Scott Mosier may be the coolest person in the world. Kev & his wife Jen's show PLUS ONE is fun, but gets old real fast, as does TELL 'EM STEVE-DAVE. HOLLYWOOD BABYLON is a riot, featuring Kevin and L.A. radio personality Ralph Garman discussing all things entertainment in front of a live audience. I gave up on JAY & SILENT BOB GET OLD months ago, it just, well, got old.

There's a couple other shows I'll check in with occasionally, like SCRIPTNOTES, a screenwriting podcast, or the television-centric FIREBERG & ICEWALL, but those are the main podcasts I listen to.

Music wise, the only cd I've bought lately is Pickin' Up the Pieces by Fitz & the Tantrums, an awesome 60's soul-inspired disc that I can't stop listening to. And thanks to Mr. Trader, I've got a few TMBG albums to absorb as I get back into that band following their excellent show at the Pabst Theater in Milwaukee last month. Still buzzing about that show...


*"Comedy is the ability to make people laugh without making them puke." - Steve Martin

Great American Beer Festival '11

So, late last year, Dawn and I were watching Art Mann Presents on HDNET, which isn't really that surprising because we like the show and watch it semi-regularly, we don't watch every episode but I'm glad we watched this one. If you haven't seen the show, amiable host Art Mann goes to different parties and/or conventions where there will be lots of people drinking and generally partying it up. This particular episode had him in Denver at the Great American Beer Festival, and damn if it didn't look like fun. So shortly after that, we made a commitment to make it to next year's event, which was pretty easy, actually. We bought tickets for the Friday and Saturday portion of the the fest, foisted the kids off on friends and family, and headed off to the foot of the Rockies for a weekend of drunkenness and debauchery. Well, drunkenness anyway for sure...

Dawn made me take a picture of the bear.

The Great American Beer Festival is an annual event held in Denver that features over 2400 beers from 465 breweries from around the country. Although companies like Budweiser and Miller had a presence, the breweries were predominantly smaller, regional types. Rather than pay to become members of the Brewers Association or the American Homebrewers Association, which got you into VIP-type of events and cost more, we just bought two tickets for both nights and didn't worry about special events.

Due to my totally justified aversion to flying, we drove out to Denver, but not without making a stop in lovely Manhattan, Kansas, to visit Mr. & Mrs. Mojo and the always charming J-Rod. Thanks to the Mojos for letting us stay at their estate for the evening. I stayed up way too late and had more fun than I should have.

We got into Denver early Friday afternoon, and after freshening up at our hotel, we hit the fest a little after 6 p.m. The convention runs from 5:30 to 10:30, but last pour is 9:45. The convention center was about two blocks from our hotel and it was a beautiful day in downtown Denver so we had a nice walk with dozens of other people headed our way. We moved quickly through the line into the event, traded our tickets for plastic cups, and stood amazed at the amount of people already there getting their drunk on. Brewers tables were lined from the front to the back of the hall, all with signs announcing the names of their beers and where they were from. The fest had them roughly joined by area, so we hit the 'local' beers of the Great Lakes area first, with some Goose Island, Leinenkugle and plenty of others to get started.

Just inside the convention hall

Over the course of the next three hours or so we sampled dozens of beers, if not hundreds. I tend to prefer lagers and darker brews, which meant that it wasn't too long before I felt like I'd swallowed several loaves of bread. Fortunately, there were several areas with tables & chairs where we could relax for a few minutes before diving back into the fray. Even though the sample size of each beer was roughly an ounce, it adds up quick. We managed to survive the night and make the walk back to our hotel where we passed out relatively quickly (hey, that drive from Manhattan, KS to Denver really wipes you out, then throw a couple cases of beer on top of that).

Let me take a moment here to warble the praises of downtown Denver; it's fantastic. The 16th Street Mall is many blocks of shops and restaurants, blocked off from regular traffic, that we spent several hours wandering through. There are free buses travelling up and down the street, lots of outdoor eating and cafes, and it's a great place to people watch. Granted, it's probably not the same in the middle of February, but for a beautiful fall Saturday it was perfect. I recommend the Rialto Cafe, great food and service, and their Farmhouse Stack on the brunch menu was awesome.

The Silent Disco

We returned Saturday night to discover that the second evening is a LOT more popular than night one. Wow, the place was packed, making it a little more difficult to maneuver from table to table. That certainly didn't stop us from enjoying ourselves, but as a result we left maybe 30 minutes earlier than the night before. Still plenty of time to drink and people watch, plus Dawn got in some karaoke, wowing the convention hall with her rendition of Pat Benatar's "Hit Me With Your Best Shot". There was no encore. I wore my Repo Man shirt on Saturday, and was pleasantly surprised how often I received comments on it. One vendor exclaimed "Repo Man! How many people know that movie?", to which I replied, "Only the cool ones." He loved it. On line to the bathroom, I got into a mutual admiration society with another guy who had on a Pork Chop Express shirt. We almost got married right there.

Bull &Bush were really the only vendors putting on a show.

Admittedly, drinking so many different beers, they tended to blend together. One Irish Red or Belgian Wheat can taste like any other after a while, but the reason you go to an event like this is to try everything. So every fruity, vegetable-y or even pepper-y beer I could find, I tried. Most of them sucked. The Chili beer was terrible, but then again, I don't like chili's, so big surprise there, right? Same for the Beet beer. But without a doubt our favorite drink of both nights was the Peanut Butter Beer, from Blue Moon Brewing Company. They tapped that keg at 7pm both nights, and we went back for more until they ran out. I would buy that beer in a heartbeat, but they informed us it was a special brew done just for the Fest, due to the prohibitive cost of making it. They put real peanut butter in the mix, and it tasted exactly like you'd think a peanut butter beer would taste. We loved it.

We had a great trip to Denver, and I'd recommend both the city and the Great American Beer Festival for anyone who likes beer. It's an awesome time, and well worth the trip. One note of caution; be sure to get your tickets early, they sell out every year. Tickets will probably go on sale late June, early July, so keep an eye on the GABF website, and always drink responsibly! I doubt we'll make it next year, we'll be saving up our cash for year two of this event. :^)

Went to GABF, got the shirt.

Movies I Shouldn't Like

HBO and Cinemax had one of their free preview weekends a while back, and I like to surf through those times and record movies and shows to my DVR that I wouldn't normally go out of my way to watch. One of those movies was a film that by all rights I shouldn't have liked, but did, and it got me thinking about other movies I like more than seems logical. Maybe I'll do a series of posts on this, starting with the movie that sparked these thoughts, GET HIM TO THE GREEK.

As you can see from the poster, it's brought to you by 'the director of FORGETTING SARAH MARSHALL and the producer of KNOCKED UP and SUPERBAD.' Normally these proclamations are designed to draw people in, this one pushed me away. I am not a Judd Apatow fan, the comedies he's made or been involved with all seem to have a lack of characters for me, and I find them to be boring. So I had no right enjoying GHTTG. I'm not a Russell Brand fan, I can't recall him ever making me laugh. This film should've been high on my list to avoid. Rock & Roll rarely works in movies, when film makers are trying soooo hard to convince you that their lead actor is the Greatest Rocker Ever, but the songs all suck, well, that's a death knell for a movie about music.

Go figure, I recorded the movie, made my wife watch it with me, and within 10 minutes I was already loving Brand's character Aldous Snow. I bought it all, and mainly because he's incredibly believable in the role of a debauched rock star. And the music ain't bad either. Jonah Hill is o.k.

So it may not be a perfect movie, the end's a little goofy, but I liked the characters enough to see me through any problems I had with the plot. It's always fun when a movie surprises me and confounds my expectations, and GHTTG certainly did that. Good on them.

Finished

I finished up reading Juliet, Naked by Nick Hornby, and managed to find the time to consume the last 150 pages in one sitting, something that's not too easy with a toddler running around the house like some sort of crazed wolverine on a sugar buzz. But the important thing is that I actually wanted to finish the book that fast. The last third of the book was fascinating because I had no idea how it was going to wrap up, or even how Hornby was going to tie off his various story threads before the end. I thought it was a satisfying conclusion, maybe a little abrupt, but when you've spent page after page constructing your characters as well as Horby did, I feel you're allowed a little shorthand at the end.

My favorite example of finishing a book in one big chunk is Jonothan Carroll's The Land Of Laughs. It's the story of teacher who meets a girl who's as obsessive about a certain children's author as he is. The two of them travel to the author's small Missouri hometown to write a biography, and of course it all goes horribly wrong. I spent the last portion of that book in a tense little ball on my recliner, I had no idea what was going to happen, but I was pretty sure it wouldn't be a happy ending (spoilers!). Just a fantastic book, and one I need to re-read in the very near future.