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Archive for August 2001 I hope no one thinks I'm mocking Mr. Rogers, whose last new show airs today, but has no allusion to his retirement since little kids expect to see him the same time Monday morning. In fact, I find Mr. Rogers himself to be impossible to mock. Parody or mimicry is different -- but implying he's a fake doesn't work. Rogers dodged all the inherent evils of television, including commercialism; even the vaunted Sesame Street can't claim that (see endless Elmo promotion, on top of the fact that Elmo is a dumbed-down ripoff of Grover/corporate tool). Plus, Mr. Rogers often showed you the sets on his show, the puppets -- you were supposed to know it was pretend, and still like it. That would be devastating to watch on Sesame Street. Plus, for all his supposed weakness and ultra-simplicity, his was the only show to tackle divorce and war head on. DIVORCE AND WAR! You'd never see that on the freaking Puzzle Place. I have nothing but respect and admiration for Mr. Rogers. I was listening to a song I first heard around my junior year of college, and I suddenly realized I'm forgetting what that time in my life was like. It disturbs me greatly. I can feel those emotions, those motivations pulling at me, whatever they were back then, but I can't remember their causes anymore. I listen to a song and emotionally I'm taken back there, but there are few thoughts or memories attached to those emotions. I find myself listening more and more carefully to the music I listened to back then, straining my ears as if somehow I'll be able to extract some hidden information that lies between the chords, the verses. This feeling of desperation, of groping about for memories that should be there but aren't, makes the song difficult to listen to. I can't quite enjoy it like I did then; it's too intertwined with however I was feeling -- but unfortunately, not what I was thinking. It's oppressive; it's like drawing a breath but not getting any air. One of these days I'll make a log of everything I was thinking and feeling, so I won't forget anymore. I want to become a packrat of memories. Lookit Here's a good article about how moviemakers seem to be struggling to come up with a decent ending. Discussed are AI and Planet Of The Apes (Lincoln Memorial?! So what time is he in? What a pile.) I'm convinced that my guitar is the hardest guitar to play of all the guitars I've tried playing, and I don't like that at all. I'm also convinced that either the strings are a little heavier than most, the action is too high, or both. Next weekend I want to get someone to lower the strings. I'd do it myself but from what I've been reading, it's easy to screw up somehow. Damn guitars! I also want to buy a slide, a capo and a shoulder strap. CHUNG: Did you have sex with Chandra Levy? CONDIT: I decline comment. CHUNG: Did you have sex with Chandra Levy? CONDIT: What's important is finding her right now. CHUNG: Did you have sex with Chandra Levy? CONDIT: I admit I've made a lot of mistakes, but I had nothing to do with her disappearance. CHUNG: Did you have sex with Chandra Levy? CONDIT: I've cooperated fully with area police looking for Chandra. CHUNG: What kinds of sex with Chandra Levy did you have? CONDIT: I want to apologize to my constituents. CHUNG: So, sex? CONDIT: I decline comment. http://www.latimes.com/business/la-082301micro.story What a joke. But the fact this kind of thing apparently gets done a lot, and that there are outfits you can go to who'll handle it for you, is even worse. I have a throwaway gag in tomorrow's strip which alludes to some of this, but I wrote it before the cancellation. Now it seems kinda inappropriate. (Of course I'll run it anyway, but I'm miffed.) ---------- Electric Light Orchestra Cancels North America Tour By Dean Goodman LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Veteran English pop group Electric Light Orchestra, whose recent new album was greeted with a giant yawn, has canceled plans to mount its first North American tour in 15 years, the band's manager said on Wednesday. The group, led by 53-year-old Jeff Lynne, had already scrapped the tour's Sept. 7 opening date in Albany, New York, while at least one show was shifted to a smaller venue. In a calamitous miscalculation, the group booked two-dozen shows in large arenas that seat up to 19,000 people, while the new album, "Zoom," has sold just 52,000 units since its June 12 release in the United States. It spent two weeks in the top 200 pop album charts. 'That's like not even releasing a record when you're at that level," said Gary Bongiovanni, editor-in-chief of Pollstar magazine, a concert trade publication. In a statement, Lynne's manager, Craig Fruin, blamed a combination of economic and logistic factors. "ELO wanted to put on the grand spectacle with a massive stage and light show that the group is known for," he said. "And that's just not logistically or economically possible in this marketplace at this time." Fruin was not available for further comment. ELO, which Lynne co-founded in 1971, scored numerous hits on the American pop charts, such as "Evil Woman" and "Telephone Line." The group was known for UFO-shaped stages, 40-piece orchestras and 30-piece choirs. Lynne, who wrote, produced and sang on the hits, disbanded the group in 1986. He focused on writing for and producing other acts such as Roy Orbison and Tom Petty, and was also a member of famed "supergroup," the Traveling Wilburys, with Orbison, Petty, Bob Dylan and George Harrison. Pollstar's Bongiovanni said the overall concert market is tough this summer, with a glut of performers charging high prices in a difficult economic environment. Acts such as pop singer Janet Jackson and boy-bands 'N Sync (news - web sites) and Backstreet Boys (news - web sites) have been playing to a lot of empty seats, he said. On the other hand, the Madonna (news - web sites) tour is sold-out, while veteran acts such as Lynyrd Skynyrd and the Allman Brothers Band have also been doing well on the road even if they are not lighting up the charts. Neil Diamond has been adding shows for his upcoming tour. Part of ELO's problem, Bongiovanni added, has been confusion about the band's personnel. In recent years, former ELO drummer Bev Bevan -- who is estranged from Lynne -- toured under the ELO II moniker. The only other ELO member from the old days in the Lynne lineup is keyboardist Richard Tandy. As it stands, the lucky few who saw ELO tape three live performances this year -- a "Storytellers" episode for music cable channel VH1 and two shows for PBS -- may have been the last to see the groundbreaking group. Press release follows: ----------- DATE: AUGUST 15, 2001 ELECTRIC LIGHT ORCHESTRA CANCEL FALL TOUR The ELECTRIC LIGHT ORCHESTRA have cancelled their fall tour, which was scheduled to begin in early September. The decision was made today. ELO regret any inconvenience this may have caused fans who purchased tickets for the trek early on. "ELO wanted to put on the grand spectacle with a massive stage and light show that the group is known for," said management. "And that's just not logistically or economically possible in this marketplace at this time." Ticket holders can obtain refunds at the point of purchase. Fans will still be able to catch ELO in concert on a PBS special which is airing nationwide throughout August and September. ----------- That is awful, awful news. Dammit to hell. That makes me and all those who got to see the concert performances in Television City some months ago the luckiest bastards in the [ELO fan] world. Well, Sony has disastrously underpromoted ELO's new album and tour, and apparently PBS stations around the country are dropping the concert I attended from their schedules, even maintaining that the concert will air, then showing something completely different. The first show of the tour, in Albany, was cancelled, possibly due to some scheduling error, but more likely that no one bought any tickets. The trouble here is the venue size is too large for an ELO return tour. Not enough people care. They might fill a 5,000-seat hall, but not a 10,000-seat hall, and the 10,000-seat ones are where they're playing. Pathetic! Let my response to one fellow's defense of sprite comics assuage your potential anger: Crono in today's strip is less a representative of sprite comics, and more a figment of Chex's desire to stay current, a boiling-down of what he thinks web comics are about. You're absolutely right, it's no less of a comic than ones from people who can draw. In fact, some would argue being able to draw as a prerequisite to being a cartoonist is elitist, because you can have a great sense of humor without any drawing ability, and then what are you supposed to do, can it until you learn to draw "properly?" Obviously not. (Well, to that I'd argue you're just a writer, not a cartoonist. Cartoonist implies cartoons.) I was always a bit jealous of those sprite comics, because I like games in the same way. I'd want to do one, except now I prefer doing original stuff. I had a popular Half-Life parody site for about a year, and a Mechwarrior parody site four years before. It's a valid(-enough) medium. What I was trying to say with today's strip is, and it's more true for the thousands of lesser sprite comics out there (and perhaps the popular ones from time to time), is that the medium breeds complacency. (The medium of web comic breeds complacency -- I cut and paste too, even if a lot of drawn strips don't. CN would look better if I didn't, but I'm also trying to make a comment about laziness in web comics, as well as being lazy.) To Chex, sprite web comics represent the ultimate potential for laziness. Recycled pictures the author didn't draw, plus non-dialogue, plus a stolen sense of nostalgia -- which is really what catches the (albeit small) audience at first. "I liked Final Fantasy, so I'll like this strip." But the strip isn't Final Fantasy -- it's camouflaged. The strip can be funny on its own, but sprites give it an artificial, copyright-infringing boost. Thus they're irresistible to Chex. http://www.keo.org/uk/index.html Here's a startling concept -- I don't know how legit it is yet, but if French aerospace is involved, there's a slight chance I'll end up working on the CAD system for this thing. Anyway, the short of it is, they're planning to launch a capsule that will drift in space for 50,000 years, then return to Earth. They're letting people submit 6,000-character messages to put on board the capsule. Leonard already submitted my name, among others, to the microchip aboard Stardust, which will rendezvous with comet Wild2 in January 2004. What the hell, I might as well be on two satellites. Litter the heavens with me, with me! I'd much rather have a drop of blood in there though. You know damn well the future humans will clone that guy's brain, placing it into a robot body and crowning him god-king. Still have a slight headache, and I'm still a little tired. Stress? Things are picking up at work. I still feel a little dizzy, and my temperature seems to be keeping a hair above normal... this has been going on since last week. I'm going to go to bed really early and hope it's better in the morning. Someone found their way to my site by searching for "checkerboard bivariate assiduity princess cohen." If that was you, I don't want to meet you in a dark alley. I spent the majority of today and yesterday in and out of hospital after a rabies scare perpetrated on me by myself. I still have a headache, and I feel hot and tired, but that may be from the tetanus shot I got this afternoon; it turns out I needed that anyway. Still, I had a headache before that and was feeling jittery, so I freaked myself out. I guess I was just anxious about other things. It doesn't help when the doctors refuse to give a rabies saliva test because rabies is so rare. I couldn't stop thinking, "so that means I'll be the first case in California since 1953!" Well, if I'm still doing comics late next week, I guess that means I don't have it. |
