I just had to post this picture of Jenny Lewis from Rilo Kiley. Who knew? Ben Seaver (from Growing Pains) missed out big time!

Doggone this picture! Why?!

If you don't already know about the Trachtenburg Family Slideshow Players then you are probably some sort of jackass who shouldn't be reading this blog anyway! But, if you insist on reading on then I will just tell you that what they basically do is take vintage slide collections that they find at estate sales, garage sales, thrift stores and turn the lives of anonymous strangers into pop-rock musical exposes based on their slides. I'm already regretting telling you this but, the drummer reminds me of a young Meg White in training. Doh! Now i've gone and said too much. Now if we could only get them on a double bill with the Shaggs. What? You've never heard of the Shaggs? Please remove this blog from your bookmark section as I bid you good day. I said good day! For more info on the Trachtenburg Family Slideshow Players click here.

Destructor was the first comic book I ever bought when I was a kid. I still have that very comic book to this day. It was put out on Atlas Comics which has since ceased to exist. Dave Cockrum worked on that character and created many others while working at Marvel. He also restarted the X-Men series in 1975 after it had been on hiatus since 1970 (due to low sales) helping to create new characters like Colossus, Nightcrawler and Storm breathing new life into the series. Dave Cockrum passed away on Sun, Nov. 26, 2006. His rendering of Wolverine is set to be used as a postage stamp in 2007. Click here for more info.

Mommy, can I ride the Game of Death ferris wheel again?
The raddest thing in the world happened on Sunday when a ceremony was held in Shunde (near Hong Kong) to formerly inaugurate the planning of a new theme park based on kung fu legend Bruce Lee! The article entitled, “Ground Broken on the New Bruce Lee Theme Park” comes to us care of the sensible Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) but probably should have been entitled, “Ground Broken and Shattered into a Million Pieces by Lightning-Quick and Deadly Fists and Kicks on the New Bruce Lee Theme Park.”

Of course, this news was announced a couple of months ago but we didn’t want to get our hopes up after they were dashed …um … frozen in liquid nitrogen and then kung fu chopped into a billion fragments about Shanghai’s Disneyland.

When you read the CBC article, the theme park -- which is receiving some mysterious funding and progressing with the approval of Bruce Lee’s supposed former mistress, Betty Ting Pei, and younger brother -- comes across as somewhat innocuous. Even reverential. Stated plans include a memorial hall, a statue of the film star, and a martial arts training academy.

Well that sounds tasteful. Die hard fans should really appreciate it. Not really a theme park. But…

But then you go back and read the earlier article from the Sunday Times (London) and it is revealed that they are also planning a roller coaster that emits Bruce Lee’s signature squawks and grunts! The park will be patrolled by robot-mannequin Bruce Lees! And the whole shebang is controlled by a special secret control room housed in a giant statue! Yes!

The park is slated to be finished in three years and we can pretty much guarantee, without doing any research or talking to anyone, that there’s going to be a hall of mirrors of some kind in this thing.

Photo from imutoo's flickr.com page. (via shanghaiist)

Happy Spanksgiving.

Ahh, Clifton's for the holidays. For info on Clifton's click here.

Wow! To see more vintage ads like this click here.

Circuit bending marching band.

Provided By:

http://absurdity.biz Check this site for great circuit bending stuff.

Click here for the complete EMA3 biography.

This is a picture I took of the Santa Monica Pier 2006.

I took this picture of D.J. Bonebrake playing the xylophone at Pike's in Long Beach at the beginning of 2006.

Jack Kerouac and Steve Allen.

Who knew K.K.K.ramer was related to the soup nazi.

You talking to me Elmo?

Now I know what I want for Christmas.
GR8 TaT2 Maker
Product Description
Open up your very own pretend play tattoo parlor. This easy-to-use tattoo maker kit includes an electronic tattoo pen and funky stencils. Using soft, safe pulsating action, the tattoo pen creates realistic, washable designs with dramatic effects. Requires two AA batteries (from amazon).
for more info click here.

So, I am up early on this beautiful Sunday morning Novemeber 19, 2006 and I was just thinking of Lady Sovereign and thought I might post one of her videos. To find out more about Lady Sovereign click here.

If you are a fan of Reno 911 like I am then get ready for their big screen debut coming 02/23/07.
To see the trailer click here.

The Slits are an all female punk rock band. The quartet was formed in 1976 by members of the bands The Flowers of Romance and The Castrators. The members were Ari Up (Arianna Forster) and Palmolive (Paloma Romera) (who later left to join The Raincoats), with Viv Albertine and Tessa Pollitt replacing founding members Kate Korus and Suzi Gutsy. Palmolive was replaced by male drummer Budgie (aka Pete Clarke), formerly of The Spitfire Boys and later to join Siouxsie and the Banshees. (From Wikipedia).

Mika Miko (click here for more info)

Part X-Ray Spex, Part B-52’s, part New York Dolls, the five members of Mika Miko pogo onstage in their friends’ underwear while the two lead singers, 18-year-old Jenna Thornhill and 20-year-old Jennifer “Victor” Clavin, sing into microphones that have been rigged into a phone receiver by tech-head Clavin, who also plays guitar and keyboards.

Clavin shares a Highland Park apartment with Thornhill, who sometimes plays saxophone or keyboards. The others, including Clavin’s 17-year-old bass-playing little sister, Jessie, and her 18-year-old drummer/boyfriend, Jerik Edrosa, still live at home. Guitarist Michelle Suarez, 19, has a job at a juice bar in the Northridge mall, helps build airplane parts for her dad’s business, and wants to go to “hair school in Alhambra” after she comes back from a family trip to Argentina this summer.

The girls first saw Edrosa on a Silver Lake bus. “He had a nice, clean-combed Mohawk,” they explain almost in unison. “He looked superpunk.”

Later that night, they approached him at Headline Records on Melrose, and soon he was in the band.

Their songs “are about the dumbest things,” explains Suarez. Like “Tighty Liberace,” which she wrote for her pet chinchilla of the same name.

They have played more than 30 shows, usually with their friends’ bands like Hello Astronaut, Goodbye Television or Wives.

Mika Miko credits its success in large part to Dean Spunt, the 22-year-old singer and bass player of the L.A. band Wives. Spunt, who, along with all of the members of Mika Miko, volunteers at the Smell, was the first person to introduce the band to the all-ages club and its owner, Jim Smith.

It’s also Spunt’s indie label, Post Present Medium — which he funds by working both as a bike messenger and at Vegan Express on Ventura Boulevard — that will release Mika Miko’s first 7-inch this summer.

Mika Miko once saw a band at the Smell eat its “own shit and piss.”

Well, they’re not sure if it was real, “but it looked real,” says Clavin.

Thornhill, who took her high school proficiencies and is studying sociology at community college, reads David Sedaris, Kafka and Dorothy Parker, and sees a shrink.

“My shrink’s husband directed Full House,” she says. “Oh yeah, Full House.”

They all love Siouxsie and the Banshees, the Cure, the Slits, Johnny Thunders, Television, MC5, the New York Dolls, Velvet Underground, Free Kitten, Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass Band, Blondie and Richard Hell. And they all like riding bikes.

Thornhill says their target audience members are “anyone who dances,” but they love it if there are “a bunch of 12-year-olds and 16-year-old Goth chicks” at their shows.

Their best show was when they got kicked out of Spaceland because they asked for virgin piña coladas. Being underage, “We were not allowed to go anywhere but the stage and the back room,” explains Thornhill, who during the day says she “sleeps a lot” and “looks for jobs.”

“We were saying in the microphone what we wanted, and the [Spaceland] lady got really annoyed with us. She was like, ‘Those little fuckin’ pre-teen bitches.’ I’m sure she meant it in a really nice way . . .”

Their name means “storytelling in Japanese and a lot of other things in different languages,” explains Suarez, after playing an energetic set in a friend’s bedroom at an East L.A. house party. Like, “Vagina, Vagina in some South American language,” which they discovered on Google. Mostly, though, they “just like the words, a little poem,” says Thornhill, who, like her bandmates, is rather drunk.

“No one can ever say it correctly,” interjects Clavin. “They always go ‘Miko Miko’ or ‘Mika Mika.’”

“We don’t give a shit,” says Thornhill. “It’s cool if they wanna say Miko Miko.” (Review by Seven Mcdonald from the LA Weekly.)

Both these bands will be playing together on
November, 17 2006 at The Troubadour
Los Angeles, CA 90001.

Upon first glance Ryden’s work seems to mirror the Surrealists’ fascination with the subconscious and collective memories. However, Ryden transcends the initial Surrealists’ strategies by consciously choosing subject matter loaded with cultural connotation. His dewy vixens, cuddly plush pets, alchemical symbols, religious emblems, primordial landscapes and slabs of meat challenge his audience not necessarily with their own oddity but with the introduction of their soothing cultural familiarity into unsettling circumstances. (From Mark Ryden's Bio.) For more info Click here.

Fur is one of the most aesthetically beautiful movies I have ever seen. It's sort of like watching a Mark Ryden painting come to life. (Click here for more info)

Is a burrito a sandwich? Judge says no. Click here to read this amazing story.

For D.J. Jazzy Jess and T. Count how many times you see the letter 'G' in this video.

POLYSICS are
HAYASHI Guitar, Voice, Programing
KAYO Synthesizer, Vocoder, Voice
FUMI Bass, Synthesizer, Voice
YANO Drums


In 1997, Hayashi, still then in high school,
and great admirer of DEVO forms POLYSICS.
The band experiences various members changes
but their very orginal "look"-the sunglasses and uniforms,
origianl live performance, the blasting guitar sound,
synthesizers and vocoders attracted many.
Plus their fusion with computer music made them sound
very orginal and astonishing. Prease to check out most honorable Polysics click here

"In the 1980s, Los Angeles was energized by many alternative locations for self expression. From 1980 to 1984, I used black and white photography to document the Bad Influence series of Rock (punk) bands from East L.A. along with other bands of the time. Music, art, and performance was and is a natural combination. Between 1980 and 1987, I was a member of ASCO, a conceptual multi-media performance art group. I served as consultant, stylist, and referee." Diane Gamboa
To see a cool slide show of some of her pictures along with a commentary on the East L.A. punk rock scene click here.

This is one of my favorite pieces of artwork ever by Kozyndan.
kozyndan are Los Angeles based mad scientists. they are working on a secret formula for controlled nuclear fusion, and are creating a line of edible chickens. For fun they like to take long deep breaths and dip their heads into bowls of rasberry jelly and lemon curd. They live indoors and don't paint on walls. the couple also moonlights as freelance illustrators. (click here for more info on kozyndan.)

Transformers 7/4/7 (click here)

Make 'em moan
Gossip is young + full of blood. We have existed for 5 years. We are a punk band consisting of 3. We are interested in art, change, the underground, dancing, fashion, punk history, crime and movements. We will nvr die. We are artists, poets, cooks, writers, feminisits, designers, musicians & djs. This is life dedication to action, passion & drive. We are from Arkansas (Beth & Brace) + Washington (Hannah). We have three full length albums ('Movement' + 'Thats not what i heard' + 'Standing in the way of control'), various 7"s & no pets among us. We have toured with Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Le Tigre, Erase Errata, John Spencer Blues Explosion, Stereo Total, White Stripes, Sonic Youth, Sleater Kinney, Har Mar Superstar, Les Georges Leningrad, The Kills, Tracy + the plastics & Glass Candy. We just recorded our new Lp "Standing in the way of control" with Guy Picciotto (hes in Fugazi & has recorded Blonde Redhead, Quixotic, The Crainium, Fugazi and lots of other good shit) & Ryan Hadlock at Bear Creek studios in Seattle (the Lionel Ritchie song 'Dancing on the ceiling' was also recorded there!). The new Lp titled "Standing in the way of control" comes out January 24th on Kill Rock Stars. We will be releasing the "Standing in the way of control" dance 12" October 11th on Krs as well. It comes backed with a remix by our homies Le Tigre & art done by Brace & Kim Gordon.
click here for more info about The Gossip

EMA3, an electronic band from Los Angeles, California, was formed in 1998 by Dennis Carlin (The Leaving Trains, Sluts For Hire) and Fred M. (The Helpful Nuns, Twinkle). The band has undergone countless set up changes, from primitive drum machines and analogue synths, all the way to their current "soft synth" foray.

Click here for the complete biography.

4616 EagleRock Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA 90041
MAP.

Auntie Em's (click here)

Best tuna salad in town! Awesome enchiladas when you can get them.

I spent many hours at the Garmar Theater in Montebello while I was growing up. Sadly, the theater has been replaced by a strip mall like so many other great buildings in L.A. that should have stayed on as landmarks. I love and hate L.A. .

Please go. More masa please!At "The tamales capital of the world"
MacArthur Park - Mama's Hot Tamales Cafe� (click here)
(between Parkview & Alvarado Street on 7th Street, Los Angeles)
November 10, 11 & 12, 2006
Friday: 3pm - 8pm
Saturday:10am - 9pm
Sunday 11am - 6pm

Best Tamale Contest, Tamale Eating Contest, Biggest Tamale Contest, Tamale Making Classes, Non-profit Booths, Commercial Booths, Art & Crafts Booths, Kids Zone.

My minions.

Suicide.(click here)

8-Bit at Mr. T's.
(Picture taken by Vanessa Sepulveda with my camera.)2006.
Check out this rare interview.

Hello,

Day one.