Hot Sh!t: Tobacco

Please to enjoy Tobacco's (aka Black Moth Super Rainbow's Tom Fec) recent collabo with that one scientologist guy. "Fresh Hex" is the name. Dig it hard, Fools.

(Bonus: kittieees!!!)

Hot Sh!t: Crystal Castles

Heya kids! Struggling with mojo deficiency this Monday?

Crystal Castles has "Empathy":

Hot Sh!t: Jay-Z on SNL

I probably catch Saturday Night Live once every 3 months and MAN, I'm glad I made this last weekend's episode my quarterly viewing.

Firstly, Betty Fucking White. The old lady's comedic timing is still Swiss Watch, people - at 88 years old! 88! Nothing sexxxier than a woman with ill comedy skillz, I say. Watch out, Betty, I'm comin' for ya', girrrl.

So, with the bar already set at heights Dick Fosbury would have trouble clearing, out steps Jay-Z.

Armed with a live band, Hova came out swinging with "Public Service Announcement" and never let up, as he and his ever-so-tight band tore through about a 10-minute medley of classics and, well, newer classics. The give-and-take between Jay and his band was mesmerizing. They were both on fire, but neither one overtook the other. The band laid down visceral, hard-hitting instrumentals and Jay-Z rode 'em to perfection.

You can argue all you want about who's the "best" MC alive right now. I know many of you would give Jay your first place votes, and many of you (this humble bloggist included) wouldn't.

But there's no arguing that on this night at least, live in front of millions, there wasn't an MC on the planet who could've topped him.

Hot Sh!t: Dante Lewis

"Pale Aqua" by Dante Lewis from Dante Lewis on Vimeo.

More of Dante Lewis here.

Hot Sh!t: Vampire Weekend - "Giving Up The Guns"

Let me get something out of the way right up-front...

...I fucking HATE Vampire Weekend. I really, really do.

As a matter of fact, I don't just hate them...I hate everything ABOUT them, as well as everything they stand for. From their floppy, collegiate-lad haircuts, to their inch-deep "sincerity," to their tendency to mistake blandness for ambiguity, they've found a myriad of ways to piss me right the hell off on a regular basis. Shit, I even hate their stupid, trendy little name. As a matter of fact, I've pretty much wanted to punch each of them in the throat since the very first time I saw them.

And when was that? Well, if I remember it right...it was on Saturday Night Live. They were the musical guest a few months back, at a time when they still weren't really on my radar yet. At least, not in any meaningful way. All I knew about them was that they were gaining popularity, and threatening to transition from Pitchfork-worshiped indie darlings into a full-blown underground sleeper hit. So, like all new music that makes its way to me via various media, I figured I'd gave them a fair shot. So I cleared my mind, turned up the sound, and opened my ears.

And I was almost immediately sorry I had.

For those who haven't heard them, I'll try to describe their sound, as it presented itself to me that fateful night:

Imagine, if you will, that you are a fancy Caucasian man with french cuffs and a crisp trouser-pleat. Also, you have a group of friends much like yourself: spoiled, unmotivated, bored with life, and demanding as all get out. Idle-rich little bourgeois trust-fund pieces of shit, the lot of you. And, you're all from CONNECTICUT to boot. You're also pretty sure that one of those guys is most likely mildly retarded, but you can never seem to remember which one. Hell, might even be YOU, for all you know. Doesn't really matter.

You all sorta play instruments (because your parents have been forcing you all to take various lessons of all kinds since you could walk), but this is really more of an on-paper sort o' deal. Usually, you all just sit around, smoke weed, and play video games.

Oh, and you LOOK exactly as deliciously punchable as all this, by the way.

However, one day, you get it into your head that you want to bring everyone together, and form a band!

So you start throwing it together, all half-ass and slapdash. No sense killing yourself, right? After all, you go to war with the band you have, even though it may not exactly be the band you want. Sure, the lead guitarist is really more of a mediocre cellist in truth, but that's okay. A lot of the tunings are relatively similar, and therefore mostly carry over. And hey, the tuning is a LOT similar between electric bass and upright, so the bassist will be just fine. And, well...a drummer is a drummer is a drummer, so no worries there, either. And you're the tallest one, so you get to sing! This'll be GREAT for our development as people!

And what actual SONGS shall you play? Glad you asked! Pass the hat, and everyone take a scrap, upon which is written a different genre. You each draw one, and whatever fate decides, that's what you'll do! Once you each have one, just throw a shitload of hyphens in between them, and then verbally explain to each other in as vague of terms as possible what your sound ought to be based on a limited grasp of the genres you wind up with.

All right...Whadda you got? "Imagine merry sea shanties mixed with fifties Afro-Cuban lounge music, except also new wave reggae!" AWESOME! Let's wind it up, tie a couple of pastel-colored, cable-knit douchebag sweaters around our necks, and ROCK!

(For the bold: See how much of THIS you can sit through, in case you'd rather experience the end result for yourself:)



Meh. Just...meh.

So, as I sat there and watched them for the first time, my overwhelming reaction was, "What in the holy living fuck is this even supposed to BE?!?" And it's not that I don't enjoy challenging music that can't be easily pigeonholed. But preciously twee, insubstantial little bounce-ditties sighed out by a bunch of douchelords in wing-tip golf shoes and polos? Guys who not only look like they still live at home, but who also refer to their parents as "Mumsy" and "Daddums" as they ask for the salt to be passed through clenched teeth? I think I'll fucking PASS, my friend.

"Behold - The CASIO!"

So, that's what I did - passed. Next!

Sadly, pass or not...as much as I would have LIKED to have never again seen Vampire Weekend after that, they were the proverbial bad penny what kept on turnin' up. In the intervening months, these here dainty dweeblets just got more and more inexplicably popular as I continued to try to ignore them. So duckin' them got progressively harder. And the occasions where I DID find myself exposed to them (and couldn't flinch away from their photographs or reflexively change the station fast enough), my initial assessment of their bizarro style was reinforced.

These guys are just plain odd...And not in an entertaining "Weird Al" Yankovic style, a geeky They Might be Giants style, or even in a charismatic Lady GaGa style. On the contrary, they seemed to be constructed entirely out of tweed, inaccessability, and condescension, scientifically-enhanced to be a mix of as many different incompatible elements as possible. Sort of like a motor-oil and duck-feather smoothie, blended with coffee grounds and mustard, then served in a chipped gravy tureen that's been soaking in bum urine for a week.

So, I officially filed them under: "I Don't Get It," and moved on with my life.

"Wait, if you're headed off into the sunset, can we come, too?"

Or, so I thought. Which brings us back up to this past weekend.

Last Saturday, I'm watching SNL again. Zach Galifinakis is hosting, and he's pretty funny and kinda unpredictable. The show seems to be cooking along just fine. But then, tragedy strikes. At one point, a commercial ends, and he introduces the musical guest.

"Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome....Vampire Weekend!"

"Oh fuck," I think to myself. "It's those Docker-douches again. *(Heavy sigh.)* Fine. I'm STILL willing to give them the benefit of at least a couple of bars as a chance to redeem themselves. But so help me, if they start singing about sweaters, or the sea? I'm hitting the fast-forward button on this bitch faster than a greased burrito." And I swear to Henry Rollins I am not shitting you that I literally had that exact verbatim thought.

"Awww. Why won't you WUV us...?"

The song ("Cousins") starts. And, I shit you not, the VERY FIRST LINE of it is, "You found a sweater on the ocean floor." GAAAH! I think I may have actually retched from shock and disgust. I hit the FF> button on my DVR remote so hard, I'm pretty sure I sprained my skin. That'll teach me to tempt fate by envisioning worst-case scenarios in advance.

But then...something happened that was both awesome and infuriating in equal balance.

A little further along in the show, I had gotten up to take a leak (not yet the awesome, nor the infuriating part). Then, as I was coming back down the stairs and making my way over to the couch, I heard Zach Galifinakis say, "Once again...Vampire Weekend!" At this, I instinctively doubled my speed and lunged for the remote, so as not to have to be subjected to so much as another measure of one of their unique bastardpieces of avant-garbáge. And wouldn't you know it? The little bastard squirted out of my still-wet hands (from the sink, you freak...not the piss), and down into the inky abyss 'twixt the sofa cushions it went.

"Tee-hee! Good luck!"

"Well, shit!" I blurted as I began to spelunk for it, cursing my misfortune. But...it was at that point that the awesome/infuriating thing happened.

See, their second song was good. REALLY good, actually. Stopped me in my tracks. And, as the introductory measures flew by, it seemed to be getting even better. So, thrown a bit by the band's sudden, unprecedented failure to suck, I temporarily abandoned my search-and-rescue mission for the remote, sat back, and did the unthinkable: I listened to a Vampire Weekend song all the way through.

And this is what I heard:



Yup...Out of nowhere and apropos of nothing, Vampire Weekend had all at once decided to hit on every cylinder. This performance of "Giving Up the Guns" is a multi-layered sundae of pure, candy-coated confection. The arrangement is a loving hómage to everything I like about sunny, mid-eighties synth-pop, while still managing to not sound dated. The instrumentation is precise, energetic and well-rehearsed without being mechanical. And lyrically, it's fantastic.

(History lesson: the words borrow heavy inspiration from a deliberately-regressive period in pre-war Japanese history, one where the natives made the conscious decision to excise encroaching colonialism, and return to more traditionally-feudal ways [literally, "giving up the guns" in favor of returning to swords]. Via deft symbolism, the band has paralleled aspects of this movement in order to convey the singer's similar wish to go back to a simpler time in his OWN life...one when things weren't so confusing. And it did so in a way that wasn't ham-fisted or pretentious.)

In short...Who the hell WERE these guys, and what had they done with Dracula's Holiday?

As I watched and listened to it play out, I don't think I closed my mouth for the whole five minutes. To say that I was pleasantly surprised would have been understatement on par with, "Hitler was sorta crabby." It's just so rare when a song hits me like that, especially thanks to a band I more or less actively hate on.

However, when it was over? I was in a weird spot. I mean...here was a band I had LONG ago dismissed as being little but fringe novelty. Passable-at-best if you're into that sort of thing, but nowhere near my personal cuppa, eh? But now, they had just spent a healthy couple of minutes completely and pleasantly shocking the shit out of me, and doing so by demonstrating a depth of skill and meaning, the likes of which I would scarcely have thought them capable. A least, not based on their track record with me to that point.

"Boo-yah, motherfuckers! HOOO-AH!

And thus: I find myself perched pointily upon the horns of dilemma. How can I honestly detest a band capable of creating such a careful, well-crafted number as this? And yet, I feel I must in light of the fact that the sum total of everything else I've ever heard from them sounded like Muzak coming out of a country-club men's shitter. How DARE they defy my expectations after having worked so hard to reinforce those same expectations prior to this? Who in the hell do they think they are? Where do they get off?

And...Whatever was I to do?

Eventually, pragmatism will always out. And that's why I've decided...I'm still not a fan of these turbo-'tards. Nope, not remotely. And that's okay. However, I reserve the right to really, really dig that individual song. So I really have no choice but to keep the chip firmly adhered to my shoulder-surface. I guess I can make it easier by telling myself that I'm doing it out of resentment; resentment based on the fact that that a band I loathe happens to be the one that does the song, rather than someone GOOD whom I actually enjoy. Thus, I'll hate them even more because they are capable of doing a really stellar tune once in a while, but seemingly choose not to. Obviously, I'm not going to try to hide the fact that this is over-rationalization at its worst. Even so, that's my story, and I'm sticking to it.

Y'know...It's hard work being an atheist hipster asshole a lot of days. But anything worth doing is worth doing correctly, I always say.

Hot Sh!t: The Sleigh Bells - "Ring Ring"

Thanks to the "gem of the AM dial" for introducing this gem to my ears:

Hot Sh!t: Aloe Blacc's "I Need a Dollar"

Very rarely does Reno hear a song and immediately run to the computer to find it. As he was sitting on his gloriously shaped ass, fitting nicely into his well executed ass grooves, Aloe Blacc's "I Need a Dollar" came on during the opening credits to the new HBO comedy "How to Make it in America." The show...basically a reverse Entourage exchanging LA for NY and Show Business for Fashion Business...but thats not what i'm here to share with you dickjerks. No.

Its this piece of musical brilliance, bestowed to us by none other than Reno's favorite record label, Stones Throw. Bravo fellas. Bravo.

Hot Sh!t: The Heavy

The Heavy are a band from the UK. They were formed in the fall of 2007. And in less than three years, these guys have managed to kick more ass than a three-legged man in a hip-hop video.

Like a lot of folks stateside, they first came to my attention after their blockbuster appearance on The Late Show with David Letterman a few weeks ago. Their timing was good: it was the middle of the late-night snipe-fest, everyone was taking pot-shots at Jay Leno over his greedy-grabbing of The Tonight Show back from the far-superior Conan O'Brien, and ratings were up across the board. How fitting then that The Heavy grabbed the ball and ran with it in such spectacular fashion.

They performed their single "How You Like Me Now?", and the response was so overwhelming, Letterman invited them to do a rare encore during the closing credits. How rare, exactly? Well, in nearly three decades of broadcasting on late-night TV, Dave has asked exactly one band to play a second number to close the show. And that band was The Motherfucking Heavy.

So, enjoy, kids. They just don't make 'em like this anymore.

Hot Sh!t: The Slew

Listen.

Enjoy.

Repeat as necessary.

Hot Sh!t: So awesome, it actually HURTS.

If you've never bought anything from ThinkGeek.com, excuse me for a moment while I narrow my eyes at you, and regard you with vague suspicion. If you've never even BEEN to ThinkGeek.com, you are so far off my buddy list that it's like you never even fucking existed in the FIRST place.

ThinkGeek is a nerd paradise of super-dorky gadgety shit. And there's so much of it that after just minutes of browsing, anyone who's even dimly aware of the concept of "the internet" will undoubtedly find something there that makes them squeal like a 13-year-old girl who just saw that sparkly vampire movie douchebag hanging around outside the Abercrombie and Fitch. Want some freeze-dried astronaut ice cream? There it is. A pen that's a video spycam? You've come to the right place. An electric t-shirt that has a built-in wi-fi "hot spot" detector? Motherfucker, ThinkGeek will hook. Your. Azz. UP.

Of course you don't need Laser-Guided Scissors. But now, you know that
they exist, and you WON'T BE ABLE TO LIVE WITHOUT THEM. You're welcome.

But recently, they've outdone themselves.

Last April Fool's Day, ThinkGeek featured a gag product. They figured geeks, being smarter than the average bear, would look at a calendar and realize that their collective leg was being pulled. However, they failed to take into account the sheer overwhelming power of raw nerd lust. Within minutes of this very-not-real item showing up on the website, several thousand very-ACTUALLY-real "orders" started pouring in by the bucketload. By mid-afternoon, ThinkGeek had created a phenomenon...and a gigantic P.R. problem. Hell hath no fury like thousands of disappointed nerds with internet access.

The fact was, ThinkGeek had come up with an idea for a product so panty-dampeningly awesome that they should have expected the demand. Problem being, the item in question would be near-motherfucking-impossible to actually produce. Not impossible within the laws of time and space, mind you, but almost. No, what made it damn-near impossible was something typically even LESS flexible than physics: licensing, trademark, and rights issues.

But then something deeply fucking awesome happened.

The actual legal holder of the trademarks it would have been necessary for ThinkGeek to have licensed in order to produce the item caught wind of the kerfuffle. And, lo and behold, they thought this thing was just as pants-shittingly fantastic as the whole rest of the Nerdrosphere. So, phone calls were made. Details were ironed out. And when the dust settled, the item that had started out as a gag and that had inspired thousands of orders was now an actual goddamned thing you could legitimately buy, bring home, and weep hot tears of dweeb joy over.

This is one of the rarest of beasts in all of creation: not just a "win-win," but a triple play - a "win-win-WIN." ThinkGeek was happy. The owner of the trademark was happy. And the nerds? Some of them experienced their first orgasms NOT involving elf porn.

Enough dancing around. Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you: The Tauntaun Sleeping Bag.

So. Much. Mother. Fucking. WIN.

Yes, the lining has a print which resembles intestines. Yes, the fluffy, lovable head doubles as a pillow. And yes, the zipper pull, which allows you to get inside and experience the life-affirming warmth therein, is a tiny replica of Luke's lightsaber...So you can pretend like you're Han Solo, slicing the sucker open as you kneel upon the perma-frozen tundra of Hoth. SQUEEE!!!

Y'know, I'm not even the world's biggest Star Wars fan, but I am a carbon-based life-form. And Star Wars is like the fucking Beatles...a pop-culture touchstone so universal that even people who claim to hate it at least admit a grudging respect. Suffice it to say, I want THREE of these.

Only in the age of the internet could something like this happen. ThinkGeek cooked this thing up as a gag, and duped up a sample. Nerds everywhere filled streams and rivers with spontaneous genital fluid. And LucasFilm was all like, "Hey, fuck the lawsuit, we want one of those, too. Let's do this." Big ups to them. That exhibits a level of cool that ALMOST makes up for retcon-pasting Hayden Christensen into the ghost trio at the end of the special edition of "Jedi."

(You're still on the hook for Jar Jar though, George. And yes, I'm well aware of the Yoda Backpack. That settles us up on Li'l Vader screaming "YA-HOO!" in "Phantom Menace", but you still have a lot to answer for, you fucking bearded bastard.)


For added fun, say, "And I thought they smelled bad...on the OUTSIDE!" every single time you take this thing away from your kid and huck it into the washing machine. See how long it takes him to start rolling his eyes and mouthing it along with you.

Hot Sh!t: Speech Debelle

"The Key" off her recently released (Oct. 1) debut album, Speech Therapy.

Hot Sh!t: A look at summer's best tunes.

Hard to believe, but James Brown has been dead for almost 3 years.

Had he lived to hear Black Joe Lewis and the Honeybears' Tell 'em What Your Name Is! this last summer, he most assuredly would have exclaimed, "Gotda', hat'sumfonkeehee-it, heah!" (Goddamn, that's some funky shit, heah!)

Hot Sh!t: A look at summer's best tunes.

It's summertime, and for you, the livin' may be easy.

But while you're sitting around the pool, chasin' the muff around, the members of Chicago's Baby Teeth are hard at work, pushing the envelope, taking it to the limit and stoking the flames of destiny as the moment of truth draws near…

Watch them now, as they give it all they got… at Hustle Beach.

Hot Sh!t: A look at summer's best tunes.

All this week, THE Blaine Fridley is organizing a review session of the best jams of the recently-deceased summer.

Pay attention.

There will be a quiz.

You wouldn't want to start off the fall semester on the wrong foot, now would you?

When it comes to the hottest track of the summer, the title belt goes to the only man with more retirement announcements to his name than Brett Favre -- Mr. Sean Carter.

And while #4's decision to come back will be debated until about week 10 when Bernard Berrian catches a touchdown pass with Favre's arm still attached to the ball, nobody should really be questioning HOV's decision to continue making music.

With D.O.A. (Death of Auto-Tune), Jay-Z proves he's as good (or better) than he's ever been.

Added bonus? The track wrestles the soprano sax out of Kenny G's evil clutches and returns it to the forces of good.

Grade: A++. Simply put, if you do not like this song, you should be immediately placed on the "do not fly" list because you're obviously a terrorist.

Hot Sh!t: TheSnuggiesutra.com

Fact: 78% of people consider the Snuggie a terribly stupid product.

Fact: 99% of people would gladly wear one in a cold basement if they knew nobody would ever know.

Well, that was before thesnuggiesutra.com.

Taking the armholes and presenting ideas for sex for the unusually cold or bashful just opened up sex sans night terrors for like 30% of people over 45 (yeah, we're obsessed with statistics here at the DoF.)

While this site is certainly a satire site, its effect will be legendary.

This could do for older women what Viagra does for my dad...gross.

Soon, we'll begin to reference it in every day conversation as required knowledge for this generation's pop culture lexicon.

Because, really. What woman doesn't want to try the Superwoman? Right now.

Hot Sh!t: The Bees

But for some reason in the US, they're known as A Band of Bees. No matter what you call them, their music results in a massive erection.

These two cuts are off of 2007's Octopus.

http://www.thebees.info/

And my favorite tune…

Left Foot Stepdown - A Band Of Bees

Hot Sh!t: Rock Cookie Bottom

Jonathan Mann of RockCookieBottom.com is a visionary.

Last January, Jon decided that as a challenge, he was going to write, record, and film a video for a new song every day. And even though I can't exactly IDENTIFY with that sort of work ethic, I can certainly respect it.

Some songs are inspired by fan requests. Some simply by seemingly-mundane things that happen in his life. Still others find their roots in current events. Take song #109, f'rinstance. While earlier compositions in Johnathan's experiment have titles like, "Penguins Having a Party," and "Wren The Polyamorous Polar Bear And His Story of Redemption," #109 deals with a topic that's come up a lot in the news lately: Waterboarding.

Now, you might think it's more or less impossible to come up with a jaunty little pop ditty about the Bush Administration's favorite torture technique, but you'd be wrong. And, if not dead wrong, at least, "fearing for your life due to severe physical and emotional distress" wrong. But, hey...To give credit where credit is due, Jonathan got a little help with the lyrics. Minus the ad-libs, they're lifted more or less verbatim from the recently-released CIA memo by former Deputy Assistant Attorney General John Yoo entitled: "Torture Memos: Waterboarding." Gotta love how the Bushies are STILL staunchly denying that Waterboarding is torture, yet that's the official title of the motherfucking memo. But, I digress. On with the musical goodness:



Isn't that nice? It takes a virtuoso like Mr. Mann to take something as shameful as Waterboarding, and turn it into something so...well...tolerable. I like it so much, I'm not even gonna give him shit for the air quotes. Fuck, he didn't write the memo.

If you wanna check out more of Jonathon's work, hit him up at RockCookieBottom.com. Tell him The Diary sent you.

Hot Sh!t: Look at this fucking hipster

Hand-picked hotness you need to check out. Or not. You know, like, whatever.

Hey everybody, look at this fucking hipster.

Hot Sh!t: Adventures in Babysitting

The tagline reads "THE EXCITEMENT IS INFECTIOUS! (LIKE PINKEYE)." Which is funny, because with the amount of fecal matter my eyes have been exposed to while trolling the blogosphere, you'd think I'd be a chronic pinkeye sufferer by now. 

Thankfully, Adventures in Babysitting is 100% excrement-free. Just the finest blend of all-natural humor, rich in essential wit and intelligence. 

Check it out.

Hot Sh!t: Stephen Strasburg

In this age of steroid use in baseball, rarely do you see the kind of stunning natural talent and ability that Mr. Strasburg displays. Hey batters: instead of wetting your pants when that nasty curve comes around, take a ball! Oh, wait... It's not going to matter once he throws that 101 mph heat. Take a look at highlights from this complete-game, 23-strikeout shutout performance:

Click here for the video.

Here's to hoping he doesn't end up substitute teaching at his old middle school, hitting on his high-school sweetheart in front of her dweeby fiance, and launching partially nude, herpe-ish crack whores off the back of his jet-ski.



Click here for the video.