Went to a comedy showcase at the UCB theater tonight - I actually wasn't sure what to specifically expect going in, I figured it would mostly be some sketches and improv, but it was a bunch of short monologues and two improv groups, and it was all pretty dang funny.

One of my recent favorite comedians Chris Gethard came out and did a bit as his character Uncle Billy;



Which I absolutely love, and assume was just a one-off kind of thing for that video. But, nope! He came out in character, as "trying out my stand up act". What I love about it is that I think about the idea of the character (which is summed up in said video), and in theory, should be like "My lord - that is HORRIBLE", and it's totally, totally funny. In such a wrong way, but so, so funny. My sketch teacher also did a monologue/one person quick show where he was the worlds fattest man demanding credit from the world record book, which was also funny (and ironically, he referenced Denny's, which I pretty much based my homework on this week).

When I got off my train home, the weather was like, creep-ily weird; It had obviously been raining earlier, but had stopped by the time I started walking home. Yet, rain was coming down off the trees, as if it was POURING - if that description makes any sense. Also, there was really bright lightning, over and over and over again - with barely any thunder. And by bright, I mean there was practically daylight for a few quick seconds at a time, and by barely any thunder, I mean I'd been walking for a few minutes, seeing numerous flashes, before I heard the slightest roar - it almost sounded like bombs were going off miles away. I picked up my pace in a hurry to get home, expecting to turn on the news and see a breaking story that we were under some sort of attack, and completely screwed - and I never made it out of here.

I went to see my buddy Ray's band Prohibition last night in Brooklyn. It was pretty good, and I was glad to see him again. We were able to catch up a little bit, even though the show ran late and I had to rush back to the subway, to make it to the PATH, to make it to my train home on time. But It was a good show, I enjoyed their tour mates Acne Attack, and my other buddy Dan and I laughed at a lot of things there. Also, I think I may end up on another short tour this summer. Hooray!

Also, I woke up this morning to see a weird looking package downstairs, which turned out to be copies of the new Maximum RockNRoll, which contains an interview I did with The Unlovables. Back when I first finished college (a few years ago now) and was making it a point to get more actively involved with music again, I wanted to get an interview (or story/piece/whatever) into Maximum RockNRoll, Punk Planet, and Razorcake. Now, I have an interview in the first, had my old zine ripped apart in the second, and am now a regular contributor/staff-ish type person to the third. I think that's alright.

ALSO, I kind of have the ideas to start a stupid new band, and a stupid new zine (the two aren't really actually related, aside from the fact that they are both ridiculous, ridiculous ideas). Do I REALLY want to go through with these?

Personal struggle;


I really, really want to be more productive writing-wise. Like if I was knocking multiple interviews a month, plus other assorted little articles/stories/etc, I'd be way excited. For now, I'm doing OK, but I would like to kind of kick it up a notch. The problem with that is that the large bulk of that is going to involve interviews, because there's only so many stories you can write about how you went to a show and had a crush on some girl or such nonsense. And therefore, the heart of the problem is that when you do an interview, you have to eventually transcribe it.


And I really, really, REALLY hate listening to myself.


It's bad enough that I dislike hearing myself talk in general, but sweet lord, I talk like a goon. I mean, I think I just counted six or seven "Ummm"s in one sentence. The actual action of sitting and doing the actual transcription (and going back and forth from playing it back, frantically typing along for as much as I can, then going back and doing that over and over again) doesn't bother me. It's just sitting there, thinking "REALLY? I sound THAT dumb??"


Maybe I can figure out some sort of loop hole for the future, where I have sheets of paper with all my questions written on them, and then distribute them to the individual band members, at which point I start taping, and they go through and answer them one by one. Also, preferably they'd throw in their own back and forth banter as well. Then my life would be AMAZING.


Seriously, using "like" three times in one sentence? What am I doing?


Never mind, the computers about to crash anyway. Hooray!

SOMETHING FROM AROUND THE TIME OF MINNEAPOLIS I COMPLETELY FORGOT TO MENTION;

So I'm in a wacky little band called Lost Locker Combo. (This isn't the part I completely forgot about.) We play songs about doing homework and holding bake sales and Russian satellites. Also, we all dress in red sweater vests. Also, we do all sorts of dumb stunts while we play.

A few weeks back my friend Kat is all like "THERE IS A JAPANESE LOST LOCKER COMBO", and I'm like "Guh?", and she's like "WATCH THIS" and shows me this;



They are called Retro Honpo. And my mind is kind of blown.

Here is a video of us playing on Bedford Avenue in Brooklyn;

(and here's another video from the same part of the show, that's a bit darker/harder to see, but you get a better idea of how dark it was and how hard it was raining)


And here is Retro Honpo playing at some public place, presumably in Japan;


Clearly, I can only hope that this now leads to us going on tour in Japan. Or, at least getting one of our songs in some crazy Japanese Guitar Hero game;

I don't know what it says about me/what I'm doing with myself right now that I've watched each of these roughly thirty times this morning - not counting the rest of the weekend;





There's purpose behind it, I swear.

ATTN. PATTON OSWALT FANS;

It seems that a number of you wish to download his limited EP Frankensteins And Gumdrops. This EP was available as part of a premium for those who pledged to WFMU during a recent pledge drive.

I've decided to grant your requests; I will give you a copy of the tracks for the price of $30,000. If you are interested in partaking of this offer, please comment below.

I officially put all the record reviews online - it'll just be a little longer until I add them to the "written" list over on the side - they'll be updated soon anyway, both the list AND the reviews, as the next Razorcake deadline is coming up sooner than I thought. In fact, it totally caught me by surprise when my advance copy of the new issue arrived today.

So, today I read a little, watched some sketches, did the bulk of the next issue preview, FINALLY put the God Damn Doo Wop Band interview on my computer as to start transcribing that, and then put those reviews online (though there's still some dang layout/whatever it's called issues, which aren't TERRIBLE, but still kind of bug me). Now it's Saturday night, and I'm going to sit at home watching Mad TV, and SNL. It's like I'm in high school again!