This is GOOP.

This week, for some reason, (relatively) popular actress Gwyneth Paltrow launched a website. And it is called Goop.com. Why Goop? ...I don't know. And neither does anyone else. It appears to be a store-based site, which would be awesome if the store wasn't already broken. So we're left with a perplexing page with the simple message: "nourish the inner aspect." Okay, WHAT DOES THAT MEAN? I like it when websites don't dumb down material for their audience, but this is the latest stroke of pretentiousness by that woman married to that singer of that second-rate British rock group that sold millions last year.

Or, it could be the funniest site ever. I'm not quite sure.

In lieu of meaningful content...

I present to you what will undoubtedly be the finest experience of 2009. This is the story of The Uncler.

The Uncler w/ Uncle Sam and Alyssa Milano from Alyssa Milano

Witness the resurrection of Uncle Sam, indeed. God bless ya.

The Politically Incorrect Oscar Report.

I give you the warning in the title.

Anyways, Oscar is all about awesome, totally non superficial things. I don't remember anything that's of note here other than that this year's ceremony went for two demographics that have seemingly NEVER EVER been targeted before at these ceremonies: young females (specifically teens who will probably sit through crappy technical awards to see Ed Cullen) and gay men. After all, Tonys host Hugh Jackman hosted the thing and...sung and danced a lot like he was at the Tonys. I guess this is supposed to be high energy, but it only proved that the era of the musical has been dead for a long time (which will be mentioned shortly).

So, let's get to some thoughts.

- Wow, too much makeup and not enough good expensive clothes.

I mean, everyone looked...pretty bad, actually. Even the secret loves of my life, Tina Fey and Anne Hathaway had pretty unflattering dresses, though, I felt they looked great in spite of this. (Amy Adams didn't, which depressed me a lot.) This also began a trend of evil. Also Miley Cyrus had more cleavge than 85% of the red carpet. This was disturbing on many many levels.

- Penelope won for Woody Allen's deal, and I realized Oscar has no love for the pole, and yes love for a random lesbian makeout.

No opinion really, just adds to the trend of this year's show being...pretty gay in the actual non-pejorative sense of the term.

- Hugh Jackman sang and did musical numbers.

He was a good singer, but...I still can't say I liked it. That is all.

- Milk won one too many awards.

I am not going to lie, I can't judge performances that I haven't seen. Now, Sean Penn is an actor's actor, so he's probably awesome in Milk and maybe more awesome than Mickey Rourke in The Wrestler. But wow, the Academy opened themselves a dumb can of worms by picking Penn over Rourke. Both of them are polar opposites. Rourke is a "tell it like it is" man that doesn't care who respects him and was actually probably the least hurt by him not winning, but that's exactly what makes him an interesting and great person. Not to mention, this was kind of the performance of his life and all. So instead of an impassioned speech with conviction, we instead got Sean Penn informing the viewer what they frankly should have the common sense to know, such as PROP 8 IS BAD. At the end of the day, it felt like the Academy was trying to make up for the fact that they voted Crash over Brokeback a few years back and never heard the end of it from critics. Too bad it came at Mickey's expense.

That said, Ben Kingsley had speech of the night for his awesome speech to Mickey. That was a moment where the award almost didn't matter in comparison to the people loving his comeback.

- Rogen and Franco revisiting Pineapple Express = fried gold.

Funniest thing of the night. One of those moments in a three hour telecast where I kind of felt I didn't waste my life away watching something. Although, in fairness, I can't act like my time is super precious anyway. I would've spent it typing on a computer probably instead. Still, it was worth it for such things as James Franco admiring James Franco's performance in Milk and for confusing The Love Guru with Slumdog Millionaire.

Beyonce and Hugh Jackman sung songs from Singin' in the Rain.

Not only did this actually happen, which made me weep for poor departed Gene Kelly, but this led to a medley in which songs from High School Musical and Mamma Mia were used. These films are not Singin' in the Rain or even Chicago for that matter. (And I can't stand Chicago.) And I knew then why men hate musicals (because say what you want, but Gene Kelly was a man's musical guy), because most of the ones that have came down the pike in the current century have all ultimately sucked beyond comprehension. These songs were not made any better by say Amanda Seyfried, whose entire claim to fame is being the chick from Mean Girls who said her boobs had a sense of whether or not it was going to rain. I wept for humanity.

- Random moments of laughter:
The Asian director with the comically bucktoothed look.
Mel Gibson's awesome new moustache (which you should search out).
Seth Rogen laughing at James Franco's inability to properly pronounce a foreign filmmaker's name.
Alan Arkin honoring "Seymour Phillip Hoffman."
Whatever committee that had serious thought that Jessica Biel, Zac Efron, Vanessa Anne Hudgens, Miley Cyrus, and Robert Pattinson should actually be in the building.
AR Rahman being awesomely nervous to accept two awards, and not nervous singing "Jai Ho."
Seeing the Millionaire Host from Slumdog and wishing that someone led to him yelling "You're absolutely RIGHT."
Will Smith.
Revolutionary Road being in the romance montage.

Oh, wow, this has gone far too long. I wasted my life once again, but eh, it was fun while it lasted.

Oh, and screw you Sean Penn. I still don't like you.

A Brief Intermission.

Due to the LONG ROAD TO MIDTERMS, I will briefly tap out of posting new blog entries for a little while. I might put up an Oscars blog, but I'm mostly going to try to study and focus on other duties at the moment. Look back at the past blogs, if you're a new reader. There's some decent analysis in those previous pieces, and eh, you'll hopefully enjoy the reading.

Thanks for your reading, and I'll be back fresh at some point, I'm sure.

The "Screw Love" Playlist

Yes, today's THAT day. The day where relationships that are based around possibly true love or probably not true love culminate to celebrate while the millions of singles cry into their Cheerios. I did not cry into my Cheerios this morning. I woke up at 12:30 PM. Aha! So yes, today probably sucks for most of you. (I assume about 65% of you, but probably more.) So here it is, the "Screw Love" Playlist!

The "Guy Who Got Dumped By His Girlfriend on Friday Even Though We've Lived Together for Three Months" Song
Ben Folds Five - "Song for the Dumped"
Why?: Because Ben makes an awesome song that's really funny, really honest, and I'm sure that you thought about 95% of what Folds is saying after the dumping.

The "Yeah, It's a Messy Breakup. Fiona Apple is Necessary" Song
Fiona Apple - "Oh Well"
Why?: Because there will be a moment where you have to handle it. And you'll cry, it's human. So Fiona Apple knows your pain.

The "Yeah, I Don't Have a Date or Do Anything, Really" Song
Grinderman - "No P---- Blues"
Why?: Because a lot of people probably relate to this more than they'd want to think.

The "I Think This Has to Do With A Breakup" Song
The Hives - "No Pun Intended"
Why?: It's fast paced, not moody, really. I don't know if it has anything to do with actually breakups or not being in love, but it does have the line "I never wanted this to end". So take that for what you will.

That's enough. Any good person will tell ya that you can't dwell on crappy circumstances too long. Happy Singles Awareness Day, kids!

I listened to Chuck D speak and it was awesome.

I was less than a year old when the rap group Public Enemy released its seminal 1990 album Fear of a Black Planet to the masses. I was not even born when they released, It Takes A Nation of Millions To Hold Back. And yet I felt connected to the psyche of a man who is 31 years my senior and who talked about situations that I never dealt with. I never lived in an America where segregation was rampant, or as a white man, would've never dealt with the consequences of such a thing.

And yet this man is truly a man of warmth.

About 200 people I'd imagine showed up to hear the man speak, and he seemed to care about every single one. He was more honest than expected (although, I can't imagine a person as frank as he's been in his recordings being dishonest, I guess) and made his simple point for us to accept responsibility, not get trapped in materialism, and to save up and try our best to change our surroundings. History was brought up as a means to self-actualization. Whether it was music history, hip-hop history, or just history of culture regardless, ignoring the past only means that there's going to be a dearth of creativity later. (This example also led to a cute story where he brought up that the Rolling Stones took their name from a Muddy Waters song. This was just cool info to know.)

He also laughed at the Soulja Boy/Ice-T feud.

Then he said that people should take their place in society and do what we can to avoid the world being torn apart, either literally or figuratively. And it was a unifying thought. A unifying thought from a man that once told us to fight the power and that Elvis never meant crap to him, two things that I'm sure he still believes to this day.

Thank you, Chuck.

RIP Lux Interior

As a fan of a random sampling of punk, I'd be remiss if I didn't bring up the unfortunate death of Cramps vocalist Lux Interior. The Cramps were a fine, fine punk band that happened to love 50s rock a lot. And they were pretty awesome if you liked that sort of thing. And they have impacted my life directly more than say...the Stooges, who had the loss of guitarist Ron Asheton earlier this year. (Though, the Stooges are probably the better band and certainly more influential.)

Anyways, enough bull. Time to honor the crazy, wacky, and fun man that was Lux Interior.


Whoo Hee Ha Ha.
Bikini Girls with Machine Guns.


Wow. Suddenly the world is far too bland. RIP Lux.

The Hidden Stuff: Part 1.

As I continue to neglect my fine studies here at this university, I feel a need to make up for slow news days. Mind you, when I say "slow news", I mean that I don't really have anything to say about the Super Bowl since I literally did not watch a single frame of the actual game as it took place live. And I did make up a cockamamie theory about how this game has to be rigged because the fourth quarter looked impossibly unrealistic in it suddenly turning a game from sort of boring to (apparently) one of the greatest games ever, which means it'll be remembered like the Giants/Bills Super Bowl back in 1990 (or '91) was remembered: only sparingly and for one menial thing.

Anyways, this is not what this post discusses. This is my excuse to add more actual music discussion to the mix, and talk about some of the stuff that I can't really send to the paper on the issue of it being way untimely. Also, this list is just ongoing, because obviously, there's a billion albums in the world, and I've heard maybe a couple thousand or more of these. But there's always something that deserves even the slightest modicum of new attention. So here goes entry number one:

1. St. Vincent - Marry Me
Original Release: July 2007

In the indie songstress spectrum, people would bring up the coolness of Jenny Lewis, the soft voice of Leslie Feist, and the bravado of Neko Case. But not many really give points for being cute without being grating, which might actually be the most difficult part of indie music since at the end of the day, the music will always fit in with the right style.

However, Annie Clark's debut solo record under the name of St. Vincent is entirely charming. Clark's lyrics are more revealing of her own personal quirks, and her penchant for indie pop culture. (For example, the record's title comes from a reference to beloved cult television show Arrested Development.) She likes spinning the traditional pop song on its head, as there are definite hooks throughout, but that the guitar might be a bit noisy or that more atmosphere will be added to the proceedings. The minutia throughout Marry Me spread around the exact touches that make this record spectacular. (Such as the "bah bah bum bum" that's in the background on the video below, for "Jesus Saves, I Spend.")



I won't lie, you might not like it nearly as much. Half of the album is poppy, but in a noisy way and the other half is entirely comprised of vintage-styled -- as in 1940s, not 1980s -- ballads that are entrancing, but kind of hard to get into on first listen. Still, it's the wintertime and the industry's probably going to be in a drought of truly interesting material for the next couple of months at least. You can't hurt anything by at least attempting to give in to the catchy wiles of a striking woman from New York.

http://www.myspace.com/stvincent