The Friday Blog of Random Rambling...

So, I kinda blew my stack yesterday.

I don't feel bad about it, I stand by what I said. I am completely and utterly sick of the politics of division, and the empty mouth-service people pay about trying to end it, all while cursing the opposition out of the other side of their mouth. Oh, yeah, everyone says they want to change things, but that change always seems to basically come down to, "just start thinking like me."

You want change? Be change. Stop hating, and yes, my fine Liberal friends, hate is not the sole purview of the Right. I have very, very much grown sick of the hypocrisy of the Left on that score. Bear in mind...I'm a pretty freakin' liberal guy. We're supposed to be better than that.

So, anyway. I'm done. I detest talk of politics, for these very reasons, but every six months, or so, I'll have an utter meltdown of anger over the whole state of the way we relate to each other. The close-mindedness of damn near everyone in this country that wants to talk about politics. It's disgusting.

It's funny, I was listening to Hear in the Now Frontier, a Queensryche album from 1997.

It struck me, that all of the social comments they make, and the album is very much supposed to be a "state of the world" in 1997, for the end of the Clinton years, are just as valid today. It's still about corporate influence, a coarsening of society and social interaction, the vast swaths of people that seem to regard the words of sideshow acts like Limbaugh and Olbermann as something to be taken as gospel.

It's all there. Nothing's changed. Same shit, over and over.


The Voice Inside

Do you know the people fighting for your head?
What you think, the things you read and what you see.
What you hear and how you choose your right from wrong.
Yeah I hear the sound of a coming new wave.

Have you ever been lonely?
Afraid to speak your mind?
Are you ever reminded to trust the voice inside?

Now I know the reasons for the other side,
and I see a different point of view this time.
I will be a stronger person if I try.
I will see the other side of this day.

Are they really controlling
the way you use your mind?
Are you ever reminded to trust the voice inside?

Have you ever been lonely?
Afraid to speak your mind?
Are you ever reminded to trust the voice inside?

And, lo, the wheels just keep on rolling...

Purchased this little beauty this week, came in with the new comics.

 Now, when I was a kid, it was the glory days of MEGO toys, and their really distinctive action figure style. The 8-inch, articulated bodies with cloth costuming. Dolls for boys, essentially. They had a huge, runaway hit with their World's Greatest Superheroes line. The line encompassed both DC and Marvel comics characters, which today would just be unheard of.

I loved those damn things. I love all of MEGO's lines. There's a really, really good website that serves as a record of all of their action figure products The MEGO Museum. They had a ton of licensed properties, from the Superheroes, to Star Trek, to Planet of the Apes, to Happy Days. It was fantastic, because all the figures/dolls were made the exact same way, same scale, same bodies, etc. It was so easy to have the Fantastic Four team up with Batman, or have Superman visit Fonzie

The line was vast, especially for Superheroes. I mean, Green Arrow got a figure, as well as most of the Teen Titans. These were pretty obscure characters, in the overall scheme. What always made me sad was that MEGO never, ever did a figure for The Flash, who was always one of my favorites. It's doubly odd, because they did do his sidekick Kid Flash, as part of the Teen Titans.

Well, Mattel and DC comics have teamed up to revive this figure format, and, lo and behold...the did the Flash! A childhood wish comes true. the figure looks great, too. Twenty-plus years of toy technology and development at play I guess.

Although, the Batman figure....Not so great.

I mean, it's a definate step up from the original MEGO, the gloves and fit of the costume, for example, but, man...the cowl. It is a removable cowl, which was a feature on one of the MEGO versions (they actually had "Secret Identity" versions of Batman, Robin, Superman and Spider-Man, with a change of clothes and the whole bit...New head for Parker, too) , so that explains much. Still, I would've preferred a figure that looked better with a permanently affixed cowl...that's just me.

Still this whole "Retro Action" line is really, really cool. They've revived a lot of old figures, and added some that were missing from the MEGO line (Flash, of course, Green Lantern). Love that this is being done, the figures ain't cheap, as Mattel is clearly aiming for the adult collector, but I love that they're out there.

Let's see...

I am looking forward to seeing The Green Hornet this weekend. I've read some really nice reviews, and I've had a friend that saw a preview tell me it wasn't great. I dunno, there's something about what I've seen, and the Michael Gondry factor, that makes it seem like something really fun could be going on here, at least for me.

 I'll let you know what I think.

Outside of all that...I dunno...

I am fully expecting to get back to work on music this weekend. I'm hoping I can get some rough mixes of everything I have in process right now off to Pauly C fairly soon, so he can think about bass parts.

It is interesting, after working alone for so long, to have to try to communicate to Paul what I'm thinking for the basslines. For the last several years, I'd just pull out my bass, and do it. Usually, I wouldn't even think about how to play it...I just would. That's a change, with trying to bring more voices on board.

I've also developed a, probably crazy, plan that could get me a live drummer. It's long term, and would require planning and effort to execute. The very nature of it, however, has made things like using a click track vastly important. It's making me think more strategically, all while trying to put my own ducks in a row with the guitar tracks...

and vocals.

Oh, man do I wish I knew someone who could sing like the idea in my head. This is the one thing that's nagging at me. I am really, really confident right now that I can make something that sounds good, drum machine or live, with the new Portastudio. The point where I start to waiver is on the vocals.

First, I'm having a lot more trouble than I used to with writing lyrics. Second, I know I cannot....Y'know, I should probably say "it'll be really difficult"...execute what I do hear in my head with my own voice. Thing about it is, this project, under any of it's names, and through all the stops and re-starts, was a power trio in my head. The songs have, generally, been designed so as to be playable, in a theoretical live setting, with a guitar, a bass, and drums.

Y'know, in the epically long shot that would ever happen.