Danny Doom’s Booze Cabinet

The only setup I did for this picture is to put the helmet on Lily’s head. The baseballs, the Obama button, and the general cuteness were already there. As the Cubs shoot for the sweep today in Milwaukee! What else can I ask for this week? Oh yeah, how about Radiohead tomorrow! I can’t believe Lolla is already here, but I should have known by the 90 degree temps coming in. Bring it.

UPDATE:

Sweeeeeeeeeep!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It used to be that John McCain was the celebrity, hosting Saturday Night Live (with the White Stripes as musical guest) and cameoing in Wedding Crashers. Look at his IMDb page, it’s as long as Britney or Paris Hilton’s! But as we’ve seen, he’s willing to say anything right about now, and he’s rightly jealous of the attention that Obama receives both here and abroad. It’s funny how being respected by other nations is a bad thing in the GOP playbook. I’d rather say it’s called “looking presidential,” but it’s not surprising that Republicans would see this as a “foreign” trait. Today’s lesson for right-wingers: look up the word “diplomacy.”

I’m a little late to this, but Carrie Brownstein (Sleater-Kinney, NPR) writes about The Who and their documentary Amazing Journey: The Story of The Who (“It’s not a great film, by any means, but it does feature fascinating interviews with the two surviving original members, Pete Townshend and Roger Daltrey,” she says, and I agree). But the real point of her post is, how much do you need to know about your favorite bands, and does it necessarily improve your love/appreciation of them the more you know? See that post for more.

In the case of The Who, I’ve never read one book about them, instead schooling myself solely on their records and the great rockumentary The Kids Are Alright. You don’t need much more than that. Listen to Live at Leeds and ye shall know The Truth.

On the other hand, I read No One Here Gets Out Alive, the Jim Morrison bio, in high school and it opened up a whole world of other shit in addition to The Doors’ actual music (Huxley, Blake, Nietzsche, Kerouac, Ginsberg, Journey to the End of the Night by Celine, 50’s and 60’s jazz, Oscar Wilde, and more).

(Whether the book is any good, or even factual, is neither here nor there; it did what it did.)

The Doors and The Who came to me around the same time, and it’s obvious now that the mythology eventually gave way to the actual quality of the music, and that’s why I still listen to The Who today as much as I do. Not that I don’t still enjoy The Doors, but it’s clearly of two different levels. That’s not to take away from the pivotal very first moment when I heard the song “Not to Touch the Earth” on a Doors Greatest Hits cassette and was completely blown away, frightened and fascinated, and had to know more. Before all else, the music came first.

I could go on here, thinking about Cobain and Heavier Than Heaven, or Hammer of the Gods, the Led Zeppelin epic, but it’s a never-ending and indefinite conversation that I am having with myself. So I’ll stop now.

We are in the midst of a very tense series with Milwaukee, and so we’ve got all the voodoo going: the cats are wearing helmets, the teeth are being brushed, and the Cubs lighter is torching everything in sight. Last night’s victory was a real barn-burner. After attending Friday’s debacle at Wrigley I was feeling like a swoon was in the works, but now 2 games up I can breathe a little easier. Zambrano tonight. Keep your head on, Carlos!

UPDATE:

Way to keep it together, Z! 7-1 victory and a 3 game lead. Keep it rolling!

I’ve been meaning to post my wedding songlist–not in its entirety, there’s too many–but a sample of what we had going on, just to give you the flavor of it all (or to bring back memories). One of the most enjoyable parts of my wedding was that I had complete control over the music, so there was no “chicken dance” or hokey-pokey bullshit (sorry if you did–really, I’m very sorry for you).

I put together a “quiet set,” a “medium set,” and a “dance-y set” for the various parts of the evening, but today we will focus on the quiet set, which played during most of the post-ceremony/drinking and eating appetizers portion (bride and groom spent a good chunk of this time on the beach taking pictures), and also continued into dinner.

But first, the song that played while my lovely bride walked down the stairs and to the beach with her father was “Love” by John Lennon. I can’t tell you how perfect that song was–except that I just did. And then, after the ceremony ended, the guy who I left in charge of my iPod accidentally played “Untitled” by Blonde Redhead (off of Melody of Certain Damaged Lemons) as we walked down the aisle/sand, and it was totally perfect. I’m pretty sure the guy couldn’t understand a word of what I saying when I gave him directions, but he just smiled and nodded his head, sure, si, si! Anyway, nice job, sound guy from Cancun.

Here’s a sample of the Quiet Set:

A Love Supreme–John Coltrane (the whole thing)
“Playground Love”–Air (from the Virgin Suicides soundtrack)
“Brother Woodrow/Closing Prayer”–The Afghan Whigs
“New Orleans Instrumental No. 1″–R.E.M.
“Videotape,” “Kid A” and “Treefingers”–Radiohead
“Fly” and “Road”–Nick Drake
“Waltz #1″–Elliott Smith
“Bombed”–Mark Lanegan
“The Seer’s Tower” and “Concerning the UFO Sighting…”–Sufjan Stevens
“My Man”–Billie Holiday
“Blue Spanish Sky”–Chris Issak
“Postcards from Italy”–Beirut
“Naked As We Came”–Iron & Wine
“Nobody’s Fault But My Own”–Beck
“Black Eye”–Jeff Tweedy (from the Sunken Treasure dvd)
“Good Woman”–Cat Power
“Blue Red and Grey”–The Who
“Tom Traubert’s Blues” and “The Piano Has Been Drinking (Not Me)”–Tom Waits
“Measuring Cups”–Andrew Bird

I also threw in a Thom Yorke solo piano version of “Analyse,” some instrumental songs from the “Until the End of the World” soundtrack, and various great jazz songs from Chet Baker, Thelonious Monk, Miles Davis and Charlie Parker. Ah, listening to it right now…

The Unitarian-Universalist church promotes progressive social work, including advocacy of women and gay rights. The Knoxville congregation also has provided sanctuary for political refugees, fed the homeless and founded a chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, according to its Web site.

Unitarian churches can vary dramatically, most congregations retain a deep commitment to social justice, which has led them to embrace liberal positions over the years. Unitarians were among the first to ordain women, support the civil rights movement and back gay rights.

- AP News

A deep commitment to social justice? Ample reason to shoot it up, Jim D. Adkisson thought, so he loaded up his guns into a guitar case and went to church. That’s one way to fight the culture war! Two people died before he was subdued and arrested (five more are in serious or critical condition).

Adkisson was, of course, disarmed by unarmed citizens. Is it because:

A) armed citizens–both legal and illegal–never seem to be able to unholster fast enough in those moments?

B) frightened of being arrested by the “Man,” they sit silently, vowing to take up arms against the government one day, when the time is right?

C) they forgot to pack heat when getting dressed for church that Sunday morning?

Or, did you answer D) it’s because the armed citizens were holed up in their triple-locked fortresses pissing their pants, cradling their never-been-used weapons, typing furious screeds for the 2nd amendment on anonymous website message boards like cowards?

If you voted for D, you are correct! As we await the vigilante justice that an armed society can one day provide…

So I’m pretty sure I once posted these somewhere, I don’t know if it was here or on the MaM site, but…I was going through some stuff and found some notebooks with MaM Tour Diaries scribbled in them. Ah, what a time we had. I may post some other things as I go through them, as kind of a summertime special vacation break, which may or may not interest you. But I am in charge, I make the rules, so that’s that.

This is from the ill-fated “Preacher with a Boner Tour,” circa 2003, where we infamously drove from Chicago through Louisville to Nashville, to North Carolina and back and played only one show the entire tour. (It’s long, but yet, edited for length):

Day One: We pulled into Nashville, parked right on Broadway on the main strip of country and western bars and made a call to S____. Turns out she was a block away, I could see the neon sign of the bar from where I stood at the payphone, so we meet up, S and D, me, Nate and Rick, and the night starts with a nice shot of Makers—boom!—it all seemed to explode, it felt like we had been boozing all night, a rush of excitement, and a country band playing…Lynyrd Skynyrd! Ahhh! Then on to the next bar, more country, a drink a bar, on down the line and lots of laughs. Ended up at the Ramada Inn for some more beers and a rare smoke of the mota for me. Wild bed jumping ensued, and in true rock fashion the bed finally broke…

Day Two: We decide to hit the Springwater and check it out. We walk in, and instantly the meeting and greeting begins. One of the other bands is there already and the booker Kara welcomes us all with some free drafts and we all talk. Talk turns to food and before we know it we are handed a bag of BBQ pork sandwiches for everyone in the two bands—nice! I sit and talk to Kara for a while, turns out she used to work at SST in the old days and was a roommate of D. Boon’s! Wow, I’m way blown away by the stories she has of Watt and Henry Rollins and the whole scene.

Next, we get caught up in a McDonald’s scandal, Kara shows up back at the bar with a truck full of McD benches that were in the garbage out back and wants us to help bring them in. Then the McD folks show up and they’re pissed, she can’t take them! Kind of funny, we help put a few benches back in the truck and go back in the bar. Kara’s funny, she seems like a real impulsive type, like “hey, look at those benches! They’d be great in the bar!�

Time for music, that’s why we’re here, and we’re quite drunk but capable. Not a big crowd, but some dude comes and dances alone in front of us. I’m all for it. A good reception by the folks, lots of great comments and I give away stickers and buttons and a few discs…

Day Three: Wake up to rumbles on the tracks, giant freight trains shaking the house, good morning, conductor, but I feel pretty good and it’s time to hit the road. Goodbye to the girls and we set out for NC. A show in Chattanooga never pans out, calls go unanswered, and we have no choice but to make the big drive to the ocean. I drive for the first time, through most of NC but for the final two hours, a mostly good and easy ride, but as it turns dark I start to lose my nerve, feeling uncomfortable, and I hand over the wheel to Nate.

We pull into Wilmington and go right to the WE Fest, it’s at a bar called Bernie’s, a place we would get to know all too well over the next three days. Bands are rocking, it’s about 11 at night, and Nate greets lots of pals from previous trips here. Rick knows some folks too; I know no one! Beer is cheap and we enjoy what’s left of the night. We’re on standby, ready to play should anyone cancel or break down. Nothing tonight. We go back to the place on the inner coast to stay but end up walking across to the real beach, the Atlantic Ocean, as the full moon lights our way. It’s beautiful and impressive. The waves crash in and the three of us are walking just out of reach of the water; occasionally it catches us by surprise and soaks our feet. I start screaming out Quadrophenia to the waves, “loooooovve! Reign o’er me! Can you see the real me? Can you?!? Can You?!?�

There’s a giant pier and I run up to see if we can go on it—no go, it’s closed off. Then the moon grabs our attention again and we start to watch it intensely. Deep drunken conversation follows. We stare at the moon and we can feel ourselves moving, it’s going so fast! The earth is turning and we stand in one spot until the moon goes under the pier. Wow, truly amazing to be watching the gears of the universe grind and move. The plan is to see the sun come up but we come up just short. Back at the place we try to stay awake, I lie on a swinging bench but it’s real uncomfortable. Rick and I decide to go to the van to sleep; Nate grabs an inflatable raft and sleeps under the stars, surrounded by ducks when we left him. The night is cool and we fall asleep in the van. No sunrise for us.

Day Four: I wake up and it’s scorching hot, the van is a coffin. We’re dying like dogs! I wake Rick up and we head over to get Nate—there’s nothing but ducks there! I try to get to the ocean during the beautiful hot day but other stuff slows things down and soon enough we’re back at the WE Fest, hanging around to see if we’ll get our shot. A blur of bands over the three days we were there, but some that stood out were…the madness known as Jake the Evil Redneck, who performed with a sideshow of bouncing, bountiful, fire-breathing babes and passed out vibrating eggs, anal beads, and butt plugs. It was quite a spectacle. I believe Saturday night was also the night I witnessed the winner of the Greatest Ass in the World contest. Wow. Lots of pretty girls roaming these parts.

At one point I stumble outside, needing some air, and walk to the NY pizza joint where I had eaten earlier that night (Hawaiian pizza!). I look over and see Rick across the street sitting on a ledge so I walk over and join him. Then I decide I want another piece of the pie, so I walk back and go in for another slice. I get back and Rick is talking to a homeless guy. I eat my pizza quickly and don’t say much. Our poor asses can’t help much. We grab Nate and head out to the docks where the USS NC ship sits, take a breather and enjoy the sights.

Day Five: Sunday began as the others had, quite slowly, but another beautiful day greeted us. We headed to a BBQ at a girl’s place where a spoken word reading broke out and we awkwardly shifted around and kept a distance. Met some more cool folks and listened to stories about G.G. Allin and crazy shit from that whole scene, while Rick threw in some of his Wesley Willis tales. Funny and interesting. Then it’s back to this bar, quite tired of this place by now. We were pretty certain that our chances of getting up there and playing were pretty grim and we settled in the attached bar that separates the music space with a closed door, so it was a nice get-away spot.

Nate heads to the van for a rest and Rick and I sit and talk to the bartender, Karen, and it turns out we know her! She used to bartend at the Mutiny in Chicago and was working at our first show there last July. Wow, very weird, so that’s pretty cool. We sit and watch the X-Files movie on t.v. and play occasional games of Galaga and Golden Tee. I meet a guy at the bar through X-Files conversation, which soon turns to a southern/Civil War/history lesson, but not like I feared, this was no redneck freak. Our new friend, Johnny Puke, sits down and we…look for new ways to pass the time, but let’s face it, this trip is over and we finally leave Bernie’s for good.

Day Six: Going home. We drive to somewhere outside Lexington, KY, and find a cheap place to stay. We walk to the local mart to get a six-pack and some snacks, but wait—it’s a dry county! The local behind the counter suggests the next county, 30 miles one way or 60 miles the other! Or, we could find a bootlegger. A what? A bootlegger. Yes, we are in the part of the country where a good bootlegger is still in demand. Whoa. Instead we share the five beers we had in the cooler from the night before. It’s a Law & Order fest on cable and off to sleep.

Old John Kass, he of the Chicago Tribune, complains about the media’s perception of McCain, that “liberal bias” that paints him as “old and grumpy.” I dare you to find his past columns in which he complains of the media portrayal of John Kerry or Al Gore as a windsurfing northeastern elitist and heavy-sighing internet inventor, respectively. “It’s because they’re true!” he’ll say.

Well, guess what? McCain is old and grumpy, and he smiles awkwardly at all the wrong times.

But who cares? I want to know about the part of his column in which he relates that Obama “sank that three-point shot in front of American troops and hit nothing but net.”

Who needs foreign policy expertise when you’re so cool, you risk a three-point shot and make it on camera?

Did he really? That’s awesome! The election is sealed.

An English major/editor’s odd coincidence: I am looking up the word “well,” as in well-researched or well trained, and the usage of a hyphen or not in particular situations, and as I am doing that the random iPod shuffle that I am listening to brings up John Lennon’s “Well Well Well.” Well? Weird.

And just before that I received an e-mail about a musical project, and of course, what came up on the random shuffle? The subject of this musical project! A strange morning here in The Booze Cabinet.

Right now? Liam Finn’s “Second Chance.” And yeah, I did receive an Empty Bottle e-mail this morning in which Liam Finn was one of the featured upcoming shows. OK, now I’m stretching it.

It’s kind of sad:

In Manchester last night, there was just one reporter and one photographer waiting for McCain as his plane — a white, blue and gold Boeing 737-400 emblazoned with his campaign slogan, “Reform, Prosperity, Peace” — touched down on the Wiggins Airways tarmac.

The Vietnam War veteran limped as he made his way down the metal stairway, a leather briefcase in one hand and a cell phone in the other, and walked straight into an awaiting Chevy Suburban.

Meanwhile…

Obama acknowledged that the U.S. commander in Iraq, Gen. David Petraeus, does not want a timetable for withdrawal of U.S. combat forces.

“He wants to retain as much flexibility as possible,” Obama said. “What I emphasized to him was … if I were in his shoes, I’d probably feel the same way. But my job as a candidate for president and a potential commander in chief extends beyond Iraq.” Obama said he also needs to take into account the security needs in Afghanistan, the views of the Iraqi government and the potential domestic uses for the money now being spent in Iraq.

That’s already more thought put into the situation than Bush has put in his entire presidency. Next, Obama will juggle, pat his head, and kick Dick Cheney in the nutsack!

McCain “wrote” an op-ed for the NYT and they read it and said “eh. No. Try again?” Just doing him a solid because, as Jason Linkins writes in the Huffington Post, it “spared McCain no end of embarrassment, because the op-ed is rivetingly dumb and laden with inaccuracies.”

In short, there is just not one word of that op-ed that makes a lick of sense. Far from complaining, the McCain camp owes the Times a little gratitude.

It is amusing to watch as both Bush and McCain come around to Obama’s way of thinking on Iraq, all the while criticizing him for…wanting to lose? It appears that the only way we can “win” in Iraq is if a Republican brings the troops home instead of a Democrat. Unless Bush moves quickly–and he won’t–Obama will be ending the debacle in Iraq, and not a moment too soon. Sucks to be you, McWeiner.

I was only there on Friday night. I had a great time, and I thought Mission of Burma was pretty good, Sebadoh a little lackluster, and Public Enemy was…somewhat entertaining. I missed the one band that I really wanted to see, alas, as I had too much to do yesterday. Here’s what I missed:

When the Brooklyn-based old-school punk band Les Savy Fav made its first Pitchfork appearance several years ago, the crowd very nearly surged out of control, thanks to the group’s amphetamine overdrive and a wild performance by vocalist Tim Harrington, who spent much of that show half-naked and in the field amid the crowd.

Fans expected the musicians to up the ante on their return visit, and they didn’t disappoint.

While somehow leading the band in performing tunes from its fourth album, “Let’s Stay Friends,” Harrington ran through the masses, rolled in the remaining mud puddles, hopped inside a garbage barrel that he then encouraged his fans to pass through the crowd and finally donned a one-piece flesh-colored body suit with his internal organs drawn on it–no actual nudity this time, thank you very much–while leading the crowd in a chant of, “This is my body/This is what it does/I try to make it better/But I know it’s gonna bust.”

Mind you, all of this was more effective for the fact that Harrington is a portly, bald, bearded and otherwise delightfully mild-mannered fellow who looks more like a mathematics professor than a punk-rock front man.

What a great band. Well, they’ll be back someday.

The Who, via Stereogum, with Pearl Jam, Flaming Lips, and others. “Who Are You,” “Baba O’Riley,” oh man, I have to see this whole thing. PJ’s “The Real Me” is transcendent.  Holy shit! Sweetness!