CHAMPION R.I.P.

So, I'm back after a "bust-in bust-out" trip to Vancouver and Seattle. It was a lot of fun, and I can't wait to get a solid night's sleep tonight. I didn't take much for photos, except these few. Champion were amazing, and went out on such a high and amazing note. It's so refreshing to see a hardcore band that actually cares about hardcore. Not out to chase any kind of celebrity, the same guys dancing for the other bands, their peers, their friends. I have the utmost respect for Champion, and I'm so happy to have been able to be there for such a special event, and watch them leave gracefully, forever etched in our hearts.
Check out this clip from the show, as you can see, it was full of energy, and the kids were there to send them off with respect and some stage dives!
Also, I'd like to thank Masumi for the new Gloomy digs, hand painted and all... THANK YOU!!!
It was awesome to see this guy... forever trouble making!
And finally, this was the only other photo I took. This is of the worst pieces of shit I have ever been sat next to in all my years of flying. I hate her... and I don't even know her. She ate like a pig, making all kinds of horrifying noises and left a full coke in the little magazine slot to almost spill on me while she heaved in her piggish breath. "Puke on her... It'll suck to puke, but it'll be worth it!" Thanks Hambone.

DOGGIE HOWSER, MD

So, this happen to me today...
Yeah, that's a dog, ready to be spayed.

Scrub.

No more wild nights on the town for this bitch! (NOTE: It's a female, I'm allowed to call it a bitch)

How weird is this... 500 or 2,000?

MARK YOUR CALENDARS

That's, of course, if you live in Winnipeg.

FUCK! ON WITH THE SHOW...

Well, my big Morrissey trip has gone straight down the tubes. Long story short, my "in" to the 2 sold out shows (King's Lynn & London) was a sort of form of six degrees of separation, through Tiger Army. Well, Morrissey, the unpredictable character he is, decided he no longer needed Tiger Army's use as a support act, and had them removed from the remainder of shows, eradicating all possibilities of "ins." I even went to the lengths of eBay to try and acquire a ticket, and go out there alone (those I was to meet out there bailed after the news was broken) but, found them to be way too expensive. So I took a $300 hit on the proverbial chin, and cancelled the flight. Thanks Morrissey!

As a consolation from "life," and it's cat-like way of having me always landing on my feet, I ended up getting a job, I wouldn't have been able to receive if I was gone away. So I took the job, and I booked a flight to hangout in Vancouver/Seattle for the weekend with friends and catch Champion's last show.

Still pretty choked about Morrissey though... fuck.

FEELING THE LOVE

Thanks Riina for the Gloomy Bear update and this amazing photo from what I'm assuming is the the Chax store in Osaka!

PHOTOS

I've managed to take my nerd level to a new low. I now have a "hiplog" via my Hiptop phone, (Sidekick for any Americans) which allows me to send pictures and updates right from my phone. Check it out, Hiplog, as I seem to be more interested in updating that the past few days.

I CAN'T QUIT YOU BABY

So I've been reading this book, "Killing Yourself To Live: 85% of a True Story" by Chuck Klosterman, and I came across this part in the book that I thought was so dead on, that I had to post it for others to read. The book is all together a pretty awesome read, and worth checking out, especially if you are a music nerd and want to hear about him visiting all these sites of famous rock star's deaths. Anyways, the part discusses Led Zeppelin and their crucial roll in not only rock music, but male adolescence. Here's the excerpt from the book:

"Whenever I find myself in an argument about the greatest rock bands of all time, I always place Zeppelin third behind the Beatles and the Rolling Stones. This sentiment is incredibly common; if we polled everyone in North America who likes rock music, those three bands would almost certainly be the consensus selections (and in that order). But Zeppelin is far and away the most popular rock band of all time, and they're popular in a way the Beatles and Stones cannot possibly compete with; this is because every straight man born after the year 1958 has atleast one transitory period in his life when he believes Led Zeppelin is the only good rock group that generates that experience.
A few years ago, I was an on-air guest for a morning radio show in Akron. I was on the air with the librarian from the Akron public library, and we were discussing either John Cheever or Guided by Voices, or possibly both. Talk radio in Akron is fucking crazy. While we were walking out of the studio, the librarian noticed the show's 19-year-old producer; the producer had a blonde mullet, his blank eyes were beyond bloodshot, and he was wearing ripped jeans and a black Swan Song T-shirt with all the runes from the Zoso album. The librarian turned to me and said, "You know, I went to high school with that guy." This librarian was 42. But he was right. He did go to high school with that guy. So did I. Everyone in America went to high school with that guy. Right now, there are boys in fourth grade who do not even realize that they will become "that guy" in two decades. Led Zeppelin is the most legitimately timeless musical entity of the past half century; they are the only group in the history of rock 'n' roll that every male rock fan seems to experience in exactly the same way.
You are probably wondering why that happens; I'm not sure, either. I've put a lot of thought into this subject (certainly more than any human should), but it never becomes totally clear; it only seems more and more true. For a time, I thought it was Robert Plant's overt misogyny fused with Jimmy Page's obsession with the occult, since that combination allows adolescent males to reconcile the alienation of unhinged teenage sexuality with their own inescapable geekiness. However, this theory strikes me as "probably stupid." It would be easy to argue that Zeppelin simply out-rocks all other bands, but that's not really true; AC/DC completely out-rocks Led Zeppelin, and AC/DC is mostly ridiculous. Whatever quality makes Led Zeppelin so eternally archteypal must be "intangible," but even that argument seems weak; here in Big Sky Country, I'm listening to "Heartbreaker" at rib-crushing volume, and everything that's perfect about Led Zeppelin, seems completely palpable. There's nothing intangible about the invisible nitroglycerin pouring out of the Tauntaun's (NOTE: His car) woofers. Everything is real. And what that everything is--maybe--is this: Led Zeppelin sounds like who they are, but they also sound like who they are not. They sound like an English blues band. They sound like a warm-blooded brachiosaur. They sound like Hannibal's assault across the Alps. They sound sexy and sexist and sexless. They sound dark but stoned; they sound smart but dumb; they seem older that you, but just barely. Led Zeppelin sounds like the way a cool guy acts. Or--more specifically--Led Zeppelin sounds like a certain kind of cool guy every man vaguely thinks he has the potential to be, if just a few things about the world were different. And the experience this creates is unique to Led Zeppelin because it's manifestation is entirely sonic: There is a point in your life when you hear songs like "The Ocean" and "Out on the Tiles" and "Kashmir," and you suddenly find yourself feeling like songs are actively making you into the person you want to be. It does not matter if you've heard those songs 100 times and felt nothing in the past, and it does not matter if you don't normally like rock 'n' roll and just happen to overhear it in somebody else's dorm room. We all still meet at the same vortex: For whatever the reason, there is a point in the male maturation process when the music of Led Zeppelin sounds like the perfect actualization of the perfectly cool you. You will hear the intro to "When the Levee Breaks," and it will feel like your brain is stuffed inside the kick drum. You will hear the opening howl of "Immigrant Song," and you will imagine standing on the bow of a Viking ship and screaming about Valhalla. But when these things happen, you don't think about Physical Graffiti or Houses of the Holy in those abstract, metaphysical terms; you simply think, "Wow. I just realized something: This shit is perfect. In fact this record is vastly superior to all other forms of music on the entire planet, so this is all I will ever listen to, all the time." And you do this for six days or six weeks or six years. This is your Led Zeppelin phase, and it has as much to do with your own personal psychology as it does with the way John Paul Jones played the organ on "Trampled Under Foot." It has to do with sociobiology, and with Aleister Crowley, and possibly mastodons. And you will grow out of it, probably. But this is why Led Zeppelin is the most beloved rock band of all time, even though most people (including myself) think the Beatles and the Rolling Stones are better. Those two bands are appreciated in myriad ways and for myriad reasons, and the criteria for doing so changes with every generation. But Led Zeppelin is only loved one way, and that will never evolve. They are the one thing all young men share, and we shall share it forever. Led Zeppelin is unkillable, even if John Bonham was not."

I am definitely on round two, or maybe even three of "Zeppelin phases."

I WILL SEE YOU IN FAR OFF PLACES

I did it! I just bought my flight to London, and I'm finally going to see Morrissey live! This is going to be unreal. I'm going to declare it the "Week of Morrissey" and post a bunch of pictures from the journey, as well as hopefully get a Moz related tattoo. May 23rd to the 29th... here I come!

MICKEY NEEDS A HOME

If you live in Winnipeg, this rad dog, Mickey, needs a home! Tara and I, puppy sat him a long time ago when he was just a small guy, and when we found out he was still at the shelter months later, we took him in for the weekend again. He needs a home. He's really friendly, and still a puppy and capable of being taught so much. If you're at all interested please leave a comment or check him out at The Winnipeg Pet Rescue Shelter
Here's some photos of him in action...


So noble...
And playful...

Here's some photos from when we first met months ago...



He's been living at the shelter since back when he was a little puppy and it's really no way for any animal to live. Someone take him home and give him the love he so desperately seeks!