How Bad Do You Want It?

http://link.brightcove.com/services/player/bcpid1408996393?bctid=44289025001

This is an unbelievably beautiful and straightforward clip of James Ellroy talking about the realities of the book industry. It's in some dinky movie player format, unfortunately, but follow the link. It's brilliant, trust me.

Horrifying but enlightening photos from the war on drugs at The Big Picture.

I’ve yet to find a way to explain what I’ve written in a short amount of time and make it sound cool. Every time I try it just sounds like I'm explaining the rules of Dungeons and Dragons to the hottest girl in school.

Mike Knowles, "Hey, I Hear You Wrote a Book"

Sam Reviews the Fall Lineup, None of Which He's Seen

Mad Men - I know it's supposed to be fucking brilliant, but...an ad agency? In the sixties? I'll take a pass.

Dexter - OK, this sounds like something up my alley, but the guy who plays Dexter looks too pretty to live. The morality of the show seems really false, a la American Psycho. Glorification of serial killers masquerading as indictment of same. Pass.

Southland - Again, up my alley. Again, pretty-boy lead actor who looks unfit for the role he's playing. But good supporting cast.

Sons of Anarchy - Glorification of bikers. From the pilot, which Josh made me sit through, it seems like they misapprehend the fundamental nature of biker gangs. Pass, but bonus points for Ron Perleman.

Breaking Bad - Glorification of cancer-laden meth-dealing high school teachers. Basically this show is Weeds not played for laughs. Pass minus one for constant fucking advertisements.

Cougar Town - Really?

Hung - Really?

No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency - Come on. Her name is Precious? Laaaaaame.

Gossip Girl - Show about snotty cunts in high school, marketed to people who weren't popular enough to be snotty cunts in high school.

CSI - They replaced Grissom with MORPHEUS...and no one could tell the difference.

The Hills - Makes WWE look like Masterpiece Theatre.

How I Met Your Mother - Really, Doogie, who gives a shit? I always confuse this show with the John Ritter one where he died and they kept going, in "tribute" (wink wink) to his enduring legacy.

That One With Glenn Close and Ted Danson Where They're Lawyers Or Something, Might Be Off the Air Now, I'm Not Sure, But She Sure Was Good On the Shield - I heard it was well-written, but not from anyone I'd trust.

This Post - Basically setting all my hopes on A) Treme, David Simon's N'Awlins show, and B) the hope that HBO will air Last of the Ninth, David Milch's cop show pilot with Ray Winstone. otherwise, I'm remaining blissfully ignorant. Screw you guys, I'm going home.

A Gun That Shoots Around Corners--No Shit

Badass Trailer # 2

Don't you wish they still made movies like they did in 1987?

I am SOOOO there.

Stop me if you heard this one: Michael Moore and Roman Polanski walk into a bar full of underage kids...

In Michael Moore's latest film, he admits to being a practicing Catholic, and interviews several Catholic priests, who all say that capitalism is un-Christian.

Maybe. You know what else is un-Christian? Protecting kiddie-rapers by shuffling priests around to different parishes and hindering their detection and prosecution. Just sayin'.

On a similar note, as much as I love Chinatown and MacBeth and The Ninth Gate, I'm glad Roman Polanski is going to jail. The celebrity outpouring of sympathy for him makes me nauseous. I don't care if he made restitution to the girl, I don't care if she forgave him, you don't drug and fuck underages kids.

One of the greatest, funniest encounters is in Martin Amis's book Visiting Mrs Nabokov, where Amis interviews Polanski. Polanski tells him, "Look, I want to fuck young girls, you want to fuck young girls, everybody wants to fuck young girls."

And Amis responds with, "No, everyone doesn't want to fuck young girls." Classic.

If you're at all on the fence on the issue, just read the transcript of Samantha Geimer's testimony. Graphic shit.

Let me give one more example of how the movie uses observation instead of wheezy cliches. When Q, the writer, is giving his speech, he pontificates about ``piloting the boat of inspiration to the shore of achievement.'' James utters a loud, high-pitched giggle.

In a lesser movie, James would have continued, making some kind of angry and rebellious statement. Not in ``Wonder Boys,'' where James thinks Q is ludicrous, laughs rudely once and then shuts up.

Roger Ebert's highly favourable review of Wonder Boys

You don't know why, but you've always felt something missing from your life. You've never been quite able to pinpoint it, though. A certain connexion between pop music and classic literature, something ephemeral, hinted at, but always receding from the forefront of your conscience. Until today.

Here is Jerry Lee Lewis playing Iago in a version of Othello. Don't ask how, don't ask why, just listen and love.

Sam's Unhappy Experiences with Minor Celebrities

Yesterday I poked my head into the wrong office in the SFU English department and found myself face to face with Michael Turner, author of Hard Core Logo. He's the artist-in-residence at SFU this term, and his book is on the syllabus for the course I'm TAing. I won't say that it was a brilliant book, but it was enjoyable, original, well-written and represented Vancouver in a way that I recognized, even though a lot of the clubs he brings up, the Smiling Buddha for instance, were gone long before I had a chance to haunt them.

So what did I say to him? "Dude, I read your book. It was awesome!"

I couldn't've embarrassed us both more if I'd bear-hugged him and paid a confused Asian photographer to snap a shot of his head wedged under my arm.

Why was this so bad? 1. Turner's published more than one book, and to just assume that his career ended with HCL is really insulting; 2. He was trying to get his office set up and didn't in any way invite the intrusion; 3. He's a tiny guy with clammy hands who wears Tartan jackets, an ex-punk rocker, not the kind of person who enjoys being cornered by fat guys in black trenchcoats.

And to be honest, his book wasn't awesome. Hard Core Logo was clever and well-executed but I found it easy enough to put down to read James Ellroy's Blood's a Rover, which is authentically awesome, a masterpiece in fact. So not only was I uncouth, I was insincere, and ex-punk rockers only thrive on one of those adjectives (though let's face it, punk itself is based on both those).

As strange an encounter as that was, it wasn't even in the top five strange encounters with minor celebrities--and that's as much of a segue as I'm writing. Here they are.

5. DANNY CAREY, TOOL. I met him at a music convention in Anaheim, at the height of my Tool fan-dom. He wasn't doing a booth signing, but he was nicely making an exception for a young child. When the kid left, I pushed my way up to him with another drumhead (not even his brand), thrust it into his hand and said, "I listen to Lateralus every day." Yeah, that's what a guy going incognito at a convention wants to here. He scowled at me, but I got the autograph.

4. JIMMY CHAMBERLIN, Smashing Pumpkins. Some people love that band. The only song of theirs I really dig is "The Beginning Is the End is the Beginning," which Jimmy Chamberlin doesn't play drums on. This was at the same convention where I met Danny Carey, and Chamberlin was signing autographs in a booth. Some young kids approached him, and he signed their stuff, but he had a real attitude about it. I just observed them, and this shouldn't be taken as a sweeping indictment of him, but he seemed like a choad. I mean, people like autographs, and that's part of your job, and alt-rock angst is no excuse for treating little kids badly. Danny Carey had a reason to brush me off--I was aggressive and he wasn't selling anything. But if you're sitting in a booth, though, at least make the effort.

3. RAY BROWN, famous jazz bassist (oxymoron?) who played with Frank Sinatra, was married to Ella Fitzgerald, and played on albums from Oscar Peterson to the Brothers Johnson. I saw a clinic he gave, and he was really cool. But aggressive ol' me approached him after the clinic, snagged an autograph, and told him, "It's an honour, sir." Boy, he looked disgusted with me. But you know what? It was an honour. He played with Bird.

2. DALE CROVER from the Melvins. Everyone knows that the Melvins were Kurt Cobain's favourite band. No one knows what they sound like. I got his autograph anyway, and told him I'd seen him do a show in Seattle (not mentioning that that show had been on TV). His response: "Yeah, you know, I don't live there anymore." Nice guy but strange.

1. The lead singer from EVERCLEAR. What a DOUCHE that guy was. His music is unlistenable, and he was fucking rude, too. He was sitting in the back eat of a Hummer smoking a stogey ata stop light in Surrey. My brother and I saw him, nodded at him, and with great disdain he looked us over and scowled. This wasn't 1996 when he was riding high, this was 2003-and-struggling-to-get-that-sixteenth-minute. Uggh. He looked really bad, too, like Fred Durst with a soul patch and hair plugs. It's one thing when the drummer from Tool gives you the high hat, but Everclear? My great regret is that I didn't lob the Slurpee I was drinking into his car.

Runner-Up: MIKE MANGINI and HORACIO 'EL NEGRO' HERNANDEZ (yes 'El Negro' is his nickname), legendary drummers (oxymoron?). Andrew and I saw a clinic they put on at the Central City Brew Pub. A drum clinic--at a pub, yes. Let's just say that by the end of the night, all four of us were drunk, and El Negro was writing random gibberish for autographs. That guy can not hold his liquor. The note he wrote for me was, "TO SAM. DRUMS = MONEY! NEGRO." I shit you not.

People who were really cool to me: Diana Krall (who called me "sensitive,"), Elvin Jones from John Coltrane's band, Josh Freese from A Perfect Circle and Devo, Kerry King and the other guys from Slayer, Joey and Corey from Slipknot, Dave Weckl from Madonna's band, Michael Bland from Prince, Steve Gadd who played with Paul Simon, Gene Hoglan from Strapping Young Lad, almost everyone from the Vancouver jazz and metal scenes, and the late lamented Dimebag Darrell and his brother Vinnie Paul from Pantera and Damageplan. Mensches all.