Was now the last time 'til the end?
Danko Jones is unwaveringly reliable. When you buy one of his CDS -- any one of his CDS -- you know exactly what you're going to get: straight-up hard rock with crisp, juicy guitar riffs and pure lyrical testosterone. Here is everything I have learned from Danko Jones' music: Danko Jones loves the ladies, crucifies his enemies, rocks all night long, and will continue to rock 24/7 without rest until he is dead and burning in hell.
His 2003 album was called We Sweat Blood, and at that time, I didn't think it was possible to come up with a title that screamed "Danko Jones" any harder. But he has one-upped himself with his latest: Sleep is the Enemy. It also happens to be a great album -- the first half is pure traditional Danko, and the second half sees him successfully stretch his legs into the heavier territory of bands like McLusky.
The best song is "When Will I See You Again," which sounds like Danko almost maybe considering writing a straight-up weepy ballad before changing his mind about fifteen seconds in and whipping out the metal riffs. I don't think it's too easy to get Danko's CDs outside of Canada and Europe, but regardless of where you live I would recommend making an effort to check out his stuff.
Sam Logan
Postcards from Hell
There is a new Zebrahead album -- albiet one that is only available in Japan, where the American band is astoundingly popular. This is their first album to feature their new lead singer. I think they picked him because he sounds almost exactly like their old lead singer. Does that happen a lot in the music industry? I suppose it makes sense, but it just seems like bad manners to me! It's one step above replacing your singer with a robot that does impressions.
Do you like Pokemon? Claire is looking to sell off her massive pile of American and Japanese Pokemon games. As for me, I fully endorse any activity that removes Pokemon-related products from our home, so I figured I'd mention it here. You can check out this forum thread for all the details.
Actually, now is a good time to check out the forum in general. We've just added a bunch of new sub-sections, and are doing our best to make it a friendly, welcoming place to post about extremely important internet topics like punctuation, 80's cartoon shows, and mind-numbing amature flash animations.
Sam Logan
EDIT: Wow, I totally spelled "Noosehead" wrong in the last panel of today's strip. Exciting times, publishing on the intertron without an editor!
Fixing this is going to require editing the actual artwork, so it's going to have to wait until tonight. In the meantime, please imagine that I know how to spell.
Knowing is half the battle
Do children's shows still have segments like these?
When I was a kid, about one in four cartoons would end with something like "Noosehead Says." I guess it made sense with shows like Care Bears, but on most programs these educational moments seemed totally out-of-place and bizarre. Your favourite characters would spend a good 20 minutes trying to convince you to purchase their ancillary toy line, and then about 30 seconds teaching you about handgun safety or used drug needles. It demonstrated a very interesting balance of priorities.
My favourite was the segment at the end of Sailor Moon. Since the original Japanese show did not have these educational tidbits at the end, they had to assemble them by cutting and pasting random footage from throughout the series. I wonder who got paid to scour through the Sailor Moon archives, searching for that one video clip that best said "watch out for child molesters."
(Also, if you were an 11-year-old who'd never seen anime before, you'd have watched Sailor Moon too so shut up!)
Sam Logan
