Edwin MacPhisto

Just rent Do The Right Thing, and your doubts about Spike Lee being occasionally brilliant should be washed away pretty quickly. Fantastic stuff...and not racist, either.

This is my favorite Kylie picture. Ever. I'm glad to see it return. I'm also glad (or disheartened?) that an off-the-cuff wank reference is good for another dozen posts.

Well, I was just listening to "Love At First Sight" and ferociously masturbating to the Fever liner notes, so her music's recently on my mind.

Oh, come on, Jack's right on the money. It's practically a Raven promo. Look, if doctors historically can't help you, at least try dialing down the silly, self-perpetuating rhetoric a bit. And listen to Kylie Minogue. It might turn it all around. I'm actually kinda serious about that last part.

Oh, pandas. For whatever reason, we decided that pandas had a place in the Midnight Carnival. I'll be damned if I can even remember the first time pandas came into vogue, but I'm almost certain it had something to do with Raynor. They've been dropped on enemies, raised up in worship...we were weird, yep. If I get some time this week I'll try to backtrack and stir up some old memories about their origins. Anyway, they were prevalent, and the peak of panda justice was probably my first US (or, ahem, UK) title defense, against Neilsen of the Jungle. It was booked as a Stairway to Hell match, i.e. the ladder with barbed wire hanging above, pinfalls or submissions to win. So I had the brilliant idea of having the Carnival come out pre-match, kill the lights, chant "PANDA, PANDA, PANDA" really loudly, and replace the barbed wire with a small stuffed panda wrapped in barbed wire. There wasn't really much point to this since Neilsen got the barbed wire anyway, but I ended up using the ladder to pin him anyway. So, yes. I'm in the record books as the winner of the only Stairway to Panda match in history. Bitter justice, however: I lost the US title a few weeks later to Grimedogg via X's match, when the Apostle - one of those aforementioned Horsemen - dressed up in a panda suit and then chokeslammed Edwin to give Grimey the win. Yes, after this, I somewhat moved towards serious angles. Somewhat.

I always figured Surfer Rosa was one of those "musts" when getting into indie music. In hindsight, it kinda feels like the must. What else could compete? Maybe some Sonic Youth, but hell, I've never heard an album of theirs all the way through. Ain't I a stinker?

About five years ago I was just getting into the Pixies. I was lucky enough to find all the albums together in a package deal on EBay, and I won the auction for $25. Then I laid down on my bed and listened to them all in a row one afternoon. It was awesome.

He's got energy, but he's always been a bit of a joke to me. I don't know how to take the man seriously, and his latest album is lame. Come on, DMX, didn't you used to be hard? I'd put "Song Cry" and "Heart of the City" ahead of those two songs as far as power goes. And sheeit, that's just off one album. Nas is all right, not bad, but that awful middle period really takes the shine off of him. RZA is easily the worst rapper in Wu-Tang and it shows on his solo stuff. Production? Fantastic. Actually rapping? Gimme GZA, Ghostface, or Raekwon any day. There's so much denying. Those albums blow. Except Doggystyle, of course. I don't think even Snoop believes he's done anything particularly good since 1996. Nowadays he pops off the occasional good guest spot ("P.I.M.P.") and the occasional lame guest spot ("Holidae Inn"), and that's about it.

I think the massive love - outside of a catchy single - is because they're not much of a hairband. No, I really mean that. I mean, sure, there are the 2 power ballads and what-not. But I feel much deeper connections to AC/DC and Zeppelin than Poison, and songs like "Black Shuck," "Givin Up," and "Friday Night" would sound ridiculously out of place on, say, a Nelson record. I agree with Chave here - beneath everything, these are really good, funny pop songs. Someone earlier drew an analogy to Queen and I think it's a pretty good. They're obviously not on that level, but despite the ridiculous theatrics and conscious exaggeration, they're still writing and playing good music. I can't wait to see them live.

You slag it too much. The first two are the best and I do think Trompe Le Monde holds up better than Bossanova, but cockness is sporadic at best. "All Over The World," "Is She Weird?," the aforementioned "Velouria," and especially "The Happening" are stellar jello. Rest of the album isn't too bad either. Though I would take the B-sides album over either of the last two studio ones. It's awesome.

It was good - close to great, but some of the puppet stuff towards the beginning was mad retarded. All the relationship business and parallels were exceptionally good, and the big purple honking puppet may be the absolute highlight. Bad timing, though. Angel gets cancelled, and anyone tuning to see if all the uproar is so grand...gets a show built around puppets and knowing character backstory. Whoops. What's gone mostly unsaid here but seems to be really interesting is the restoration of Gunn's powers following his unseen deal with the creepy doctor. The Senior Partners probably won't be happy with his upgrade...and neither will his colleagues after finding out what he had to give up. I know no spoilers for next week and don't want to - it looks like it could have even more gravity than the likes of "You're Welcome."

Yesterday was a goodnik. Ghostface Killah - Ironman Velvet Underground - Loaded Nico - Chelsea Girl Outkast - Aquemini The Unicorns - Who Will Cut Our Hair When We're Gone? Allmusic's 2-and-a-half star rating for the Unicorns album is nonsense, by the way. It's at least a healthy 4 of 5.

Alpha step, omega step. What a charmer. With the exception of the mediocre Ludacris track and maybe a few too many skits, it's pretty much impeccable. I've probably listened to it a dozen times since getting it last Tuesday.

That's because it has that incredibly unique Eminem-produced beat. Please tell me you didn't just put the words "unique" and "Eminem-produced beat" anywhere near each other, let alone the same sentence. That in itself is a joke. Em may be a talented lyricist, but when it comes to the production, the guy's beats are clones of each other (and that's not a good thing). I thought he was being sarcastic. "Incredibly unique" is what tipped it off. That song is pretty generic. Speaking of which, Eminem is coming out with a CD in March I believe. How well will that one sell? YPOV gets the cookie. I thought "incredibly" was the giveaway, too. Eminem's beats generally blow, but I will give him credit for "Renegades" off of The Blueprint, which is one of his first notable tracks and actually probably remains his best. It's got a nice start-stop minor key thing going on.

Nah. Like I said, I'm probably too critical of popular fiction, especially now. More conventional "here is a suspenseful story with twists!" stuff hasn't really been up my alley for quite some time. In the past three months I've read lots of Joyce, Hemingway, and Nabokov, and gotten probably more ensconced in lit appreciation and analysis of craft than ever before. For all the fun stories he can tell, Grisham's prose is pretty flat by comparison. It's regrettably pretentious, but I can't tolerate most New York Times Bestseller list type stuff anymore. Someone get me a long cigarette and a beret. If I could be reading The Partner or, say, The Sun Also Rises, I'm not going to need much time to make my choice. Related to this, I recommend either The Sun Also Rises or A Moveable Feast as perfect choices for anyone looking to get into Hemingway. Which, really, should be everyone.

The Rainmaker and The Firm. Got one out of the library when I was 14 or so, picked up the other from my mom's collection during a slow summer. Just couldn't get into them. But, also: I'm a nerdy-ass English major who's revelling in James Joyce and the expatriates in Paris right now, so my opinions of more popular literature are probably unfairly skewed.

I'm hoping and expecting Edwards to take a handful of states on Super Tuesday, preferably at least one or two of the big ones. The fact that my Florida primary vote could actually still mean something is a welcome surprise.

OMG RED STORM REICH YEEEEEEEEEEEEAH RSJL BLACKOUT YO! I actually didn't think it was that bad an idea. Kinda collapsed, though. And Z was lurking wayyyy back in the day. Fuckin' groupie.

I really hate John Grisham. I've never been able to get through a book of his (boring prose! I'm a lawyer! Wheee!) and have no intent at ever trying again.

Um...50-Cent debuted at number one and stayed there for 2 weeks, until, coincidentally enough, Norah Jones moved back up to #1. It's a #42 debut for Body Language, by the way. At least Kanye sold 440,000.

Man, Dama. You're not stupid, but you're stubborn, and it's making you look stupid. Just chill a bit and try not to exacerbate the people who bother you. You don't "lose" or anything if you do that and you'll be a lot less pissed off when the day is over.

HOLY SHIT WOW UM KTHX YEAH That was a GREAT episode of character-building, parallel arcs (multiple interrogations, cases of distrust between spouse figures), and a...WOW...ending. It's too bad, because she was one of my favorite characters in the 24 universe. But godDAMN was that incredible. Wow.

That's because it has that incredibly unique Eminem-produced beat. Also, FrigidSoul, I'll put you in a trash can and roll you down the stairs. Like, at least four stairs. Don't front.

fuk u nas ecobar 4 life I too voted Heartbreaker. What I've heard off Gold wasn't thaaat awful, though.

Big, big surge from Edwards. I'd really like to see him do well on Super Tuesday, because I find him infinitely better than Sam Eagle.