November 19, 2008
You, Robot
I have watched this piece of video so many times, it seemed appropriate to post it on the off-chance you haven’t seen it yet. This huge, prancing mule/spider robot hybrid sends chills down my spine. What’s amazing is its naturalistic animal “sense” of balance which is illustrated well by making it climb over piles of rubble, snow and ice, and by the researcher who kicks the robot in its robot ribcage and then watches it right itself. Imagine walking through the woods and seeing this massive buzzing monstrosity striding toward you. Mom was right. These are the End Times!
Clearly we’ve come a long way since the ED-209 enforcement droid. One day soon, I expect that this site will be written in its entirety by the Boston Dynamics Big Dog or one of his mechanized cohorts. Kudos to the humans who are making this happen.
Rick at 2:35 am
October 19, 2008
Hacienda
Here is a band named Hacienda; this rock-steady rocker is from their Loud Is the Night CD on Alive/Total Energy Records. Check out the amazing bass work and the cute latinas.
It looks like these guys might be blowin’ up. We can only hope.
Hacienda – “She’s Got a Hold on Me”
Rick at 6:52 pm
September 22, 2008
I Got Mad Cankles: The Art of Melissa & Trish, continued
The artistic vision of Trish & Melissa has been transformative, not only within their immediate environment, but in the minds and attitudes of coworkers and among their more politically-minded peers. Sadly, their work has gone unrecognized in the broader gallery world, the art scene’s leading magazines and curators having chosen to ignore two of the 21st Century’s most promising new conceptual artists in favor of trendy musical groups and performance art.
In our opinion, the institutionalized exclusion of these two cultural wunderkinds from the hallowed grounds of elite critical discussion is no less than a crime against art.
“Is it humanly possible to feel completely sick to the stomach when your [sic] around someone?
yes-√ no-☐
Glad you agree with me! Now I need you to please go home and take a shower to wash off the smell of camel and corn. Please.”
...
“I would normally say you aren’t worthy enough to fuck a human but I seriously can’t let myself as a P.E.T.A. member to [sic] allow you to fornicate with animals either. It’s complete animal cruelty! Please do the world a favor and shoot yourself in the face.”
“Dear fuckface: I wanted to again let you know my deep and concerned appreciation for you working here.
*clears throat* You working here has turned my delicate life into a everlasting nightmare surrounded by little demons tearing at my flesh… Every moment with you makes me beg for mercy from god to take my life. So thank you!... you heatheness banshee for making my days twice as long and making all my fears come to life. Without you I might just be happy! ♡ Melissa”
When, finally, the future scholars of aesthetic history locate these works and endeavor to illuminate the profound oeuvre of Trish and Melissa, these works will undoubtedly end up sold for thousands of hundreds of Euros at auction.
Until then, please remember to be courteous to girls who work in filing rooms.
Rick at 9:44 pm
September 20, 2008
Magoo
Magoo is a female possum who likes to eat a snack. She really does!
Rick at 2:15 pm
September 18, 2008
Headache City
Here’s a band I have never seen and know relatively little about. However, their music rocks my goddamn balls. This site is therefore incomplete without a plug.
They are called Headache City and they hail from Chicago. During my grand Illinois trip last year, my pal Melissa (who currently grooms the future Midwest rock ‘n’ roll hotties and poets of the coming decade through her Chicago little girls’ rock camp) loaned me their full-length self-titled CD. You know what happened next (hint: it involves my goddamn balls – see above).
The Headache City sound is a little bit garage and a little bit punk, but instead of the chaos or potential blandness of the latter they have substituted a steady pounding authority. It’s simple, catchy and unusual, yet there’s room for lots of variation. Could I get any more vague? Put it this way: Having never attended their gigs, I picture a few of their fans twirling like Ecstasy-addled hippies at a rave and still others solemnly headbanging like the crowd at an Emperor show. Anyway, it’s all real hooky and very fun, even during midtempo bum trips like “Tearjerker.” If you ask me, the band’s namesake song is the hit side – a hard charging, infectious, straight-down-the-middle anthem.
The City currently consists of Mike Fitzpatrick 
(guitar, bass, vox), Dave Head (bass, vox, guitar) and Lisa Roe (drums, vox). The player of groovy synth on the album is Norah who also runs the label Shit Sandwich upon which the full-length was released (as well as some of their singles). Norah is apparently no longer in the band… my sources can’t tell me when or why… so I think they’re a three-way now. Go hit the MySpace if you want more, better info.
Two of HC’s members (Lisa and Mike) also play in the fierce farfisa group Cococoma who are quite punishing on the aforementioned balls as well. They have a new-ish LP out on Goner Records, one of our favorite labels.
So that’s it. And now, if after skimming the previous text, you actually want to download these songs and listen to this fine, fine band, perhaps even purchase their records and “support” the “scene,” then I have succeeded in my mission. Hooray for public relations!
p.s. All photos shamelessly stolen from the band website and defaced by me.
Headache City – “Headache City”
Headache City – “Down the Drain”
Rick at 12:35 am
September 9, 2008
Nothing Doings
Occasionally, people come across old Toestubber posts and – perhaps not realizing that we’ve been dormant almost a year with nary a peep on the site – they make contact to supply me with updates and/or additional insider info. It’s great when a pile of research falls into my lap, sparing me the effort. There are several such emails I’ve been holding back for the date when I’d be posting again.
Recently, Michael “Mickey Crash” Oakleaf was kind enough to write.
He was the drummer on the infamous The Nothing 45 which was reviewed here a couple of years back. The Nothing is one of those bands that’s been a big mystery to many learned scholars of early New York punk rock. As I mentioned in the old post, singer Trixz Sly had a tiny background role in the movie Driller Killer, their only record is impossibly rare (though it has been reissued on compilations, most notably the Killed By Death series)... and that’s about all the direct info I could find at the time. Let’s get the real scoop from Mickey Crash hisself:
“I was in touch with Trixz up until a few years ago when he passed away in Miami, Florida. I’m happy that people like the record after all these years. At the time it was made, we had a very hard time and ended up giving most of the 45s away to fans, etc. We were banned from Max’s and The Mudd Club. Most people thought Trixz was a troublemaker and no record companies were interested.
“There’s a video on YouTube of the band’s second incarnation (after Angel left to join the Rockats) playing at The Showplace in Dover NJ in early 1980… The keyboards were by Webster Smith (Rex Smith’s brother). He joined along with Phil after Angel left in February 1980. Eddie Spit (Fields) replaced Angel on guitar.” ...
... “The bass player, Phil Shoenfeldt, and I left to join Disturbed Furniture a few months after the video was shot by Al Zero. Bobby B. Wild (guitar) left in August of ‘79 shortly after the single was made.
“The record was recorded at Bernard Fox Studios in NYC by an engineer named George(?). An intern there named Judy DiBerardino adopted the band to record for her senior high school project. It was recorded in one afternoon, in July or August of 1979, and mixed a few days later by George and Trixz. The crazy tambourine part was overdubbed by Trixz, and the rest of the band wasn’t happy about it. I remember when we were recording that George used every pad available to cut down the hot mic levels, but all the meters were still pinned. He gave up and rolled the tape despite the distortion. 
“I went on to a career in audio, and currently manage Kampo Cultural Center which has several recording studios and an art gallery/performance space not far from where CBGB used to be. Before that I worked at Sony Studios. I’ve played in many other NYC bands and still play drums (most recently with Brett Smiley)... Angel and I have been talking about putting out a CD of the remastered 45 plus some unreleased tracks. With any luck it might happen before we kick the bucket too.”
The video (above) suffers a bit from poor technical fidelity (probably in part due to loud-as-fuckness), but to Nothing fans, it’s certainly worth seeing, for context and for some unheard tunes!
A very sincere thank you to Mick for taking the time to set the record (ahem) straight on this amazing artifact.
And here’s the music again, for a brief time…
Rick at 9:46 pm
September 7, 2008
Fear and Humiliation With a Dash of Old Spice: The Art of Melissa & Trish
Trish and Melissa are a pair of talented young women who spend eight long hours a day inside a single tiny administrative office filled with two large desks, many file cabinets, computer equipment and each other. To pass the time, they like to write and draw for each other’s entertainment.
“Listen slut. Your breath smells. I can smell it all the way over here. It smells like you were eating rotten snatch. Get a breath mint. You are making our office stink. Go wash your mouth with some soap and water. I am so tired. Let’s leave!! You are stupid. I have to piss. What are you doing over there? Besides not working? You are stupid. I can hear you humming over there. SHUT THE FUCK UP STUPID! You are stupid.”
“Look here you shell of a hag. My breath might stink but at least I don’t have some type of air-born [sic] disease coming out of my vag and mouth.
Everytime you open your legs or mouth the Department of Health shows up just to make sure you haven’t infected anyone. I’m seriously gonna have to talk to someone about the health hazard I work with. You’ve made me sicker as soon as you stepped in the room. You decrepit piece of shit. You fucker. You fucking suck! You fucker! Die you piece of shit! ha!! Of course I mean every single word of this and may the curse I place on you be transmitted to your children and family threw [sic] your disease infested mouth and vagina! Good day! I SAID GOOD DAY!”
More to come.
Rick at 12:27 am
September 10, 2007
Happy Returns
We’re back after a five-month hiatus. No explanations will be forthcoming. Let’s get right to it.
This blog (if you can still call it that after five months) is no stranger to Japanese TV and movie themes, and, well, I did promise, oh, let’s see… five goddamn months ago… to post up some of these 7-inch records I purchased abroad, so let’s pretend this is the first in a series.
Jinzoo Ningen Kikaidaa was based on a comic book, and it falls squarely in the Tokusatsu category of action TV shows – or, if you prefer English, “nerds in funny costumes.” Jiro is a young guitar-playin’ man driving a sidecar-equipped motorcycle, who is, in reality, a crazy-looking robot android, Kikaida. With a bizarre half-semi-translucent head with pupil-less baby-doll eyes, rocket feet and super-strength, he battles the varied creatures/robots of the Dark Destruction Corps using space age weaponry and fancy karate techniques. If I was ten years old, I’d be all over that shit.
Stuart has an information-rich webpage devoted to the Jinzoo Ningen Kikaidaa television series. Unfortunately, it’s one of those sites where an mp3 suddenly starts playing really loud, and you have to make a split-second choice: do I scroll down in a panic while the page is loading and try to locate the player and hit PAUSE, or hit the Back button and hope my browser doesn’t trip over itself and freeze for the duration of the song? It’s nervewracking, that’s what it is. Be reassured that Toestubber Dot Com will never do that to you. On the plus side, after you silence his HTML, Stuart will tell you much more than you thought you ever wanted to know about our mechanical hero, even providing these hilarious drawings Stuart made when he was a young fan!
If you find you’re hooked, the DVD box set is for sale from this otaku store.
A very enterprising former kid (“Inframan”) translated the mighty words to Yuuki Hide’s rendition of the title theme song:
The guitared Jiro, our hero
He’s a gentle and strong robot
Battling with evil once again today
With a guitar punch, strikes them down
Finish off the Dark Robots
Side Machine, car of the future
Tearing up the atmosphere, it runs
Even in water it floats
At mach speed it flies off
Finish off the Dark Robots
Kikaida is an android
Like a jet, he flies in the air
The sure-death move is the Giant Swing
With the Double Chop he smashes
Finish off the Dark Robots
‘Nuff said.
On Stuart’s tribute page, the aforementioned translator delivers an amazing list of Kikaidaa episode titles that sound like a cross between a Chinese seafood menu and sci-fi hentai schoolgirl porn: 
“Making Babies Cry Red Devil Tigerfish,” “Sponge Green Lives Thrice,” “Blue Electric Eel The Evil Hands Glisten!” and “Madder Red Squid Targets The Pretty Girl Scholar” should whet your appetite.
I acquired this record (on clear blood-red vinyl, with 10-page cardboard booklet) for about six bucks, probably ‘cause the former owner scribbled on the cover here and there, as you can see from the scans. Don’t curse the Japanese child. You’re getting 3/4 of it for free.
Jinzoo Ningen Kikaidaa Opening Theme (MP3)
Robot Drama: Track 3 (MP3)
Jinzoo Ningen Kikaidaa End Theme (MP3)
Rick at 12:35 am
April 15, 2007
International Male
The week since my return from Tokyo has been flavored with the worst jet lag I’ve ever experienced.
Eleven-hour sleeping jags punctuated with ridiculous insomniac episodes. As Yoshi says, in his most disdainful voice, “Of course.”
Anyway, the city was awesome, as predicted. I love this place. When I was younger, I would dream of traveling. Idle dreams. It didn’t become clear until later that international travel doesn’t just happen to you – you actually have to do things.
Of course, these days it’s a little harder in some ways. At LAX, on the way to my flight, an eagle-eyed, superstitious DHS airport screener literally yelped with glee to see my half-drunk bottle of water going through the xray machine.
Her: Oh! What’s this? You’re not allowed to bring this in here.
Me: There weren’t any signs saying that.
Her: It’s been on the news.
Me: Yeah, I just really thought we’d be over that stuff by now.
Her (deadly serious): Oh, no. It’s going to get worse! They tried to blow up a plane. As long as they can make bombs with this stuff, it’s going to get worse. We can’t let you take liquid on a plane.
Me: But that’s not true. It’s scientifically impossible…
Her: It is true, sir.
Naturally, I wasn’t allowed to drink the remainder of my potentially explosive dihydrogen monoxide on the spot, in front of her. This rule might seem kinda counterintuitive if – as I had assumed – the purpose is to screen out toxins and liguids other than water! But that’s some pre-9/11 thinking right there. Who knows if terrorists have figured out a way to combine a colorless, odorless liquid with stomach acids to form a time-released explosion with the power to depressurize a cabin at 35,000 feet? I think it was in that 24 episode where Jack Bauer’s adversary had the really awful diarrhea.
Apparently, Kip Hawley isn’t the only idiot around here. And here I am bitching about our Homeland overlords; that’s so 2003.
Anyways, back to the fun stuff: Japan! Please check out my 130+ gallery of memories... and don’t judge me for photo-stalking the Singapore Air hostesses. You haven’t flown a mile in my pants.
In the weeks to come, I will be sharing rips of some great-looking records I scored in Tokyo. I also got a lot of old weird japanese pop stuff from the bargain bin at punk store NAT Records in Shinjuku (Shinmei Building 2F, 7-33 Nishi-Shinjuku, Tokyo 160), but trust me, I made the rounds. This is only about half of the 7-inches that I nabbed, and we’re not even talking about all the magazines, comix and CDs. Just what I needed! (Sarcasm.) However, your gain is my loss, or will be, or something.
Anyway, I’d like to thank all my Tokyo pals for the warm welcome they gave me in spite of my rude ways and Western odor. Shout outs to Onoching, Masami, Wild OX, Terumi, Elizabeth, Mike, Nori, Atchan, Rockin’ Jellybean, Shaku, and all the other cool folks whose names I cannot recall right now. Special thanks to Kazuha for letting me crash in her Nakano manshon, among her literally priceless collection of 1950s porcelain, Funny Face and Weird-Ohs premiums, Sailor Jerry flash art, and her handsome tomcat Sue.
==============================
Miami soul singer George McCrae is mainly known for this monster disco hit from my childhood. 
There’s probably a good “A Star is Born”-style film drama to be drawn from his former romantic/management relationship with his hitmaking ex-wife Gwen McCrae (I like her records, too), but George was there first in 1974, riding the crest of the disco wave with some smooth crossover soul for those of us too young to Hustle. The steady rockin’ backing group is none other than KC’s Sunshine Band!
George is still going strong – check out his rather primitive webpage that makes my browser crash. Read his grandiose bio that, with its superstar hyperbole, deserves an audiobook reading by the guy from J&H Productions! No matter, this is still a great song. Now let me get back to my nihongo benkyo o suru. What? Oh, that’s French, baby. It means, “You are incredible.”
George McCrae – “Rock Your Baby”
George McCrae – “Rock Your Baby (Pt. 2)”
Rick at 7:42 pm
March 28, 2007
Shibuya Bound
Bye bye for the next couple of weeks… I’ll be over in Tokyo, getting showered with cherry blossoms, attending noise-rock shows and sleeping in the finest of capsule hotels. Not like I would have updated much anyway, but hell, if you’re still reading this blog I suppose you’re owed an explanation. A weak one.
To balm those injured feelings, enjoy this tune from Canada’s Del-Gators. It’s taken from the 2001 Pound Down! CD on Sympathy; the band featured King Khan’s cute sister Cocobutter Khan as well as other garage royalty. While you listen, picture me soaking in a sento bath. Don’t worry, there will be photos.
The Del-Gators – “Move Mr. Man”
Rick at 3:42 am
March 10, 2007
Got to Have It
From Rotten.com via Boing Boing, here’s a collection of horrible skin diseases from The Stereoscopic Skin Clinic, a 
New York-published 1911 atlas of 3-D medical photos – rendered as 32 hypnotically vibrating, creepy-crawly GIFs.
If, after that, you need to cleanse your mental palate (and who could blame you?), simply click on Marilyn Maxwell’s dreamy face on the right and watch the delightful 1942 short “Dreamsville, Ohio” starring Charles “Buddy” Rogers and Biff Morgan & his Cats.
Finally, more audio hilarity in the form of the legendary Bacon & Eggs Watch call – by a brilliant chain-jerk who sometimes went by the names Persimmon or Peach, and her unnamed boyfriend/husband. This epic bit of nonsense takes us back to the sad historical period when the Swatch company had a Beanie Baby-like buyer’s frenzy going on the collectables market. (Yep, that’s how I achieved my millions.) Answering an ad by an enterprising young couple who are hawking the newest limited-edition breakfast-themed Swatch timepiece, phone-sex veteran Persimmon and her amoral partner spend a half hour playing the speculators like a double bass, dragging them through improbable deals, lesbian come-ons, tears, insinuendos, bizarre Tourettes-style outbursts (“take the rose out of your ass!”) and escalating accusations of sexual impropriety. We promised this mp3 to ol’ Berliner chum Wi11iam13 a couple of weeks back, so here.
For the next couple of weeks I’ll be preparing for a 10-day visit to Tokyo, home to a few Toe Stubber fans, where I will be open to offers of food, sex or future employment. You can’t miss me. Fiery red hair. I’ll be wearing a dashiki.
Persimmon & Husband – Bacon and Eggs Watch call
Rick at 4:08 pm
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