Edwin MacPhisto

Michael Jackson, "Human Nature."

I listen to a lot of stuff, and I have a similar glassy heart for John Mayer. It's simple, unbridled hate for his snivelly, saccharine work. I do have a soft spot for the first Counting Crows album, but 10 years of poor follow-up and a lot of weight gained between all the members hasn't done a lot for them in my eyes.

Say it ain't so! I like it a lot. Fun take on things--and way to work in your original mission statement. Methinks I will enjoy this one.

Live from VENUE WHEN IT'S NOT 4 IN THE MORNING HOO DIDDLY. SWF Lockdown for Wednesday, August 20th! Due time: 8PM EST Send to: Grand Slam! Your commentators remain Bobby Riley and Cyclooooooooooone Comet! Venue: The King-Dome, in Fargo, North Dakota! The Suicide King's personal arena is the venue for the tournament kick-off! King's ego will be in high gear for sure. Check, uh, this here link for some more Kingdome info. The road to Genesis begins here. Check out Storm for King's word on the matter. Get set for a 24-man, double elimination tournament. The winner takes on the SWF World Heavyweight Champion in the Genesis IV main event. We've trimmed some of the problems that plagued 2001's tournament and amped up the opportunities that made it great, so get ready. Tonight is the first round--12 matches. All parameters are the same: Word Limit: 5000 Standard singles rules, with DQs and count-outs in effect. The JLers listed have not been bumped. This is a special opportunity for these guys to make their careers. If you do well in the tourney, we'll obviously take note. And if you make it to the end...well, then hats off to you. Everyone involved is encouraged to keep up angles and plan for Genesis accordingly. Remember, only one of you is going to be in the world title match at the PPV, which means that the rest should certainly keep your programs and character developments going. Now might be a good time to rock a board promo or two and really set things out. In any case, after this show and Smarkdown, people will be eliminated, tourney matches will be emptying, and the regular match schedule will be interspersed with the tourney. This opportunity is great, so go for it. Just have a backup plan! As for the tourney format: Winners fly into the winner's bracket, and losers drop down into the loser's bracket with one last shot to keep hope alive. But we'll cross that bridge when we come to it. For now: the opening round of the SWF Genesis IV Title Tournament. (I'll add descriptions in the morning. Many of these are random pairings, but you guys deserve a little setup.) Michael Craven vs. ??? --Coming off a close gambit at the ICTV title, Michael Craven opens the tournament. Irate at coming so close to the title, he issued a special first-round challenge to whoever thinks he can take on the King of Nightmares. The call has been answered, but we don't know yet who's stepped up... Marker: Edwin MacPhisto "The Sacred One" Andrew Blackwell vs. Xcalibur --Blackwell, a former world champ, has got to be a favorite heading into this tournament. But Xcalibur himself pulled a win over Quiz on Storm. A hot match-up between two master manipulators, for sure... Marker: Edwin MacPhisto Nathaniel Kibagami vs. English Dragon --Nathaniel Kibagami is here, and Nathaniel Kibagami is very angry. English Dragon, the JL's resident bluebood Brit, has got one hell of a test ahead of him... Marker: Edwin MacPhisto Jay Dawg vs. "The Sinner" John Duran --JAY DAWG IS HARDCORE...and back. JOHN DURAN...is new! But he's 2-0 in the SWF. Can he take his winning streak to 3 with a victory over the old-school SWF mainstay, or will Jay Dawg be main eventing Genesis two years in a row (god help us)? Marker: Grand Slam Crow vs. Apostle --One's dark, brooding, and a bit crazy. The other is dark, brooding, and a bit crazy. My money's on the dark brooding crazy guy. Marker: Grand Slam Quiz vs. Mak Francis --Mak's proving to be a dominant ICTV champion, but here's a man who's got the rare match over on The Franchise. Quiz snatched the tag titles at Ground Zero, and this half of an II/DJ rematch should be smokin'. Marker: Grand Slam Danny Williams vs. Viktor Tarankov --The Red Rage, JL champion, is in the house...the house of Danny Williams. Watch those elbows, Vik. I hear they're a doozy. Marker: chirs3 Dante Crane vs. Stryke --Markus Cirillo's running mate comes up against another Aussie. Unfortunately, we're going to have to the loosen the anti-AU glass ceiling a bit and let one of them through... Marker: chirs3 Dace Night vs. Ejiro Fasaki --Hey now, this should just be awesome. Random brackets work out great sometimes. JL history, tag history, and a little bit of blood. It's the High Priest of Horrorcore vs. the US Champion, and it should be darn skippy if you ask me. Marker: chirs3 CIA vs. Spike --CIA's still masked, but Atlas is revealed. Shockingly enough, beneath the white face was Spike, former IGNWF champion and the man behind one of the biggest upsets in IGN/SWF history. A history lesson: he became champ when no one expected him to, defeating then-dominant champion Rane in one of the fed's first classic matches. Spike'd certainly like to hang an SWF belt next to his old IGNWF title...but that was then, and this is now. CIA's gonna do everything in his power to stop this blast from the past. Marker: Suicide King Show vs. Aecas --Show is big and looks like Chevy Chase. Aecas is big and looks like motherfuckin' hell. It's hossariffic, and the ring's bound to shake when these two relative newcomers brawl it out. Marker: Suicide King And your MAIN EVENT, ending round one with a bang... Judge Mental vs. Annie Eclectic --Beezel shed "his" mask on Storm, revealing that he was, in fact, a she--the luminous Annie Eclectic. Under a man's masquerade, Annie was able to rise to the heights of ICTV champion. Can she become the first woman to carry the World Title? The spotlight is on for the Hardcore Queen's "official" return to the ring, but she squares off against Judge Mental, who pounded Sacred into pulp on Storm only to get faked-out at the last second and put down with the Cruel Fate. Can Judge get on the trail to the greatest singles title in the land, or will Ms. B show this old "friend" her true strength? Marker: Suicide King

I get to mark JD vs. Apostle? Sweeeeeet. I'll be gone for the next two days, but this will make it all worthwhile, or something like that. Actually, it probably won't at all, but hey, fun match.

The formerly masked man and woman both make the most of their first nights "out," so to speak. Great promos from Spike, wasting no time in shaking things up, and a big, big main event win for Annie. Some tournament surprises, a few sure things--the brackets for the next round are going to be veeeeeeddy interesting.

You know, we can just start calling you Sean Atlas if you like on the cards and what-not. "Blah blah, I am Spike, but Spike is old, this name has more syllables and is therefore better and also won't get me confused with that JL guy, et cetera." Or we could just bypass both names entirely and call you Toothpaste.

What, no info about Strangler's upcoming Playgirl spread? You cheat us all, Mark. Otherwise: very nice. More of the fun "inside the business" type stuff that also adds a little more depth to the King/Mark scenario.

::lifts Aussie glass ceiling:: ::reinstates on behalf of Crow::

Oh no, not again.

More or less, but you really need to fuse that with the grind-style intensity of...uh..."Mean Mr. Mustard." I'm really reaching for material here. Ouch.

Now why couldn't they just release a merry jaunt called "Corpsegutting Christmas" and bring us all together? Fuckin' Beatles.

::sets tape to record Lockdown:: I'm impressed you had all the old quotes on record. Mad skills, my man.

Well, there was the time you said the thing about the Allen wrench and the baby shampoo. You were right; it does have a certain tingle.

Outkast, "Hey Ya," again. Come out sooner, album. Please?

Outkast, "Hey Ya." Wow.

Yeah, I would have liked some Rollins Band stuff too, but Ramones were good enough for me. It was just such a nice, upbeat shift after all the liquid aggression. Also, I would have avoided any Circle Jerks songs after the initial Kieth Black Flag salvo, because he looks sorta like a zombie-mummy and I think I might have gotten nightmares had he persisted.

If I'm paying $50-60 for a ticket (U2, Radiohead), they damn well better give me an encore. Favorite encore I've seen, though, was when the Rollins Band came back out and sent us home with some Ramones covers. Good, fun way to end things. There are some shows where an encore just doesn't make sense. Tool, for example--at the 2 shows I hit, they ended their set with the three-part suite from Lateralus and the song "Lateralus." It was just too huge and spectacular a finish--about 40, 45 minutes of interconnected mastery. Coming out 5 minutes later to play "Prison Sex" would have diluted a lot of the grandeur of the experience.

Mos Def, "Rock N' Roll." Go Mos, go.

NIN lyrics are immature and often ridiculous, and I think most of us sorta wear them out by the time we pass 15 or 16, but I don't care because I love the soundscapes Reznor creates. That might be why Broken is my favorite album of his: 22 minutes of concentrated rage, and the vocals are more a half-distorted ranting with occasional loveable phrases like "fist fuck" pushing up through the surface. I wish the guy did more instrumentals. "A Warm Place" is probably my favorite track on Downward Spiral.

Don't fuck with Inc, man. Motherfucker looks like Vin Diesel.

Write however you want, IL. I'm marking, and I'll just take into consideration however you or Craven approach it. No worries indeed.

Yeeeeeeeah, that's kind of EXACTLY what I was looking for. Very nice stuff, Duran. The clipfest does a quick pick-up for those of us out of the loop on Duran's creds, and the RANDY TURNER REFERENCE (god, it's such a shame he never got a chance to grow further) brings the wayback juice for people with good memories. The spot I quoted is my favorite part--there's Duran in a nutshell, with a motivation, a plan of action, and a goal. Cool, cool, cool stuff.

Rando, I promise you that it'll all make sense when you get there. There might be an error or two on the bracket graphic--I think we don't go to three-ways soon enough on there--but don't sweat it. There's no reason to worry about this stuff now--it doesn't matter what number you are, nor can you possibly figure out who you might be facing in round 3 if you lose one match but x no-shows and y gets an upset but z wins as expected--just ride it out and write for Wednesday before worrying about the future.

Yep. The loser's and winner's brackets will be running simultaneously. It will take 7 shows altogether to crown a tourney winner, leaving one show extra for ADDED HOSTILITIES! I'm tinglin' with excitement already, I am.