All set to see JR & the Great One

Posted on August 14, 2006 by Steve

Tickets went on sale at 10 am today and thankfully the Rampage organization sent me an e-mail reminder Saturday afternoon.

Tickets to what? The Phoenix Coyotes are coming to San Antonio for a couple days to conduct some of their pre-season activities which should wrap up with a game against their AHL-affiliate The San Antonio Rampage. For a pretty good price, I can see Wayne Gretzky coach Jeremy “JR” Roenick, Curtis “CuJo” Joseph, Mike Ricci, Mike Comrie, Dennis Seidenberg and Paul Mara. Then again, it’s pre-season and no one wants to get the franchise players injured. They’ll be there and I was already set with my new Phoenix jersey via River City Sports of Canada.

Currently my friend Jeremy is set to go but if he can’t make it, then there’s the wife (if she can get the time off from work). After them comes to list of people I know who like hockey. I already scored that day off from work to get ready to drive there. Be ready for some pictures near the end of September.

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JPod by Douglas Coupland

Posted on August 12, 2006 by Steve

jpod

Welcome to Ethan Jarlewski’s life, the narrator and protaganist of JPod. Firstly, it has absolutely nothing to do with Apple’s iPod. The J moniker is a nickname tagged on to a pod of cubicles all accidentally occupied by people whose last names begin with the letter J. There’s Ethan, Kaitlin Anna Boyd Joyce, Brandon Mark Jackson, John Doe (his original name was ‘crow well mountain juniper’ because his mother, a militant lesbian, doesn’t believe in capitalization), Brianna Jyang and Casper Jesperson (always referred to as Cowboy or Cancer Cowboy because he smokes). Coincidentally, they are also on the same code-writing team for a rather bland, generic skateboarding video game at a nameless software publisher in Vancouver *cough* EA-Canada! If the job weren’t tedious and soul-crushing enough, enter a clueless executive named Steve. The powers that be constantly remind Ethan and his fellow JPodders about how Steve turned Toblerone around two years ago, as if overpriced candy has anything to do with making a successful, solid video game. Thanks to this past achievement, all of Steve’s lame-ass ideas (which will ruin the game) must be implemented since he’s the executive. Now the game has to include a stupid turtle which will widen its appeal for small children and dumb adults as it alienates the Tony Hawk fans.

Ethan’s life outside of work isn’t any easier. Enter his family into the story. They’re a train wreck already happening. His mother (Carol) grows pot in the basement of her house and has odd men falling in love with her at inopportune times. His father (Jim) struggles as an extra in numerous runaway/low-budget productions and obsesses over landing a speaking role. Ethan’s brother (Greg) sells real estate around Vancouver but gets entangled with shady Chinese gangsters, namely Kam Fong (he becomes part of the plot). The family’s various crises constantly intrude on Ethan as he’s trying to keep his sanity together with Steve’s ineptitude ruining his current project.

I haven’t read anything more recent of Coupland’s since All Families are Psychotic but JPod shares all the action and absurdities of Psychotic and Girlfriend in a Coma while keeping all the jargon/slang, personality quirks and attitudes of high-tech workers from Microserfs. How?

  • Action: not quite Hiassen or Ellroy, but confrontations involving guns and bikers.
  • Absurdities: namely Ethan’s trip to China midway through the book.

I think Coupland did an even better job capturing the mindset of high-tech workers by elaborating on their tastes, obsessions and constant distractions. Some may say the pages filled with random jibberish or Pi’s first 100,000 digits are a waste of space. I disagree, they capture what’s running through the narrator’s mind very well, especially the distraction elements. I also like Coupland’s grasp of the technical jargon. He uses it correctly, effectively and not excessively. (Maybe he can teach fact-impaired Michael Crichton.) Parts of the story can feel implausible, then again, it’s fiction and reality isn’t always interesting. One factor he has kept consistent throughout his books is nailing characterization, there’s always characters you recognize in your own life he captures so well with words; Steve the executive is a common bugbear in my own life and he articulates some of the intangible moods of our era.

The next part isn’t a spoiler because it’s mentioned in practically every other review out there. Coupland has inserted himself as a character in the story. Even during his book signing at Book People this Summer he admitted that it was a risky move. Kinky Friedman does it all the time and the recent illustrated works of Michael Moorcock & Walt Simonson have done it successfully. I could see the problem though. Many will accuse the author of indulging his ego and his nastier critics, namely, the jealous and bitter Jason Cohen and Michael Krugman, could pounce on it if this weren’t well executed. Thankfully, Coupland the author made Coupland the character more of a villain or a source of irritation for the narrator after their meeting on the flight to China.

Overall, JPod is a great read and excellent piece of contemporary fiction, even if you’re not familiar with Coupland’s past work, the videogame industry, what does an eBay ad read like, who are all the obscure characters on The Simpsons or the geography of British Columbia. Personally, the author has improved his storytelling for me, especially on his endings which felt rather rushed, sudden and/or anti-climatic. Coupland was already pretty skilled but after 15 years, he has only honed his ability  to document the mindsets of people around my age and socio-economic bracket.

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Good ol’ randomization without computers

Posted on August 12, 2006 by Steve

odddice

I had been looking for d12 with the months and hit locations for weeks through my local hobby store (Dragon’s Lair). They didn’t have any luck through their distributor after a few months so I resorted to the Internet thanks to a vendor in Canada called Advancing Hordes courtesy of enworld.org. Glad I did because the AH people had a better d12 of hit locations. The original one had 12 different locations but the better one went with a reduced number that is more “realistic;” torso is present four times which is more likely in a fight. Meanwhile, AH also offered two others I decided to purchase for their practical uses. The directional d8 is great for random directions and resolves the age-old “grenade” bounce rule by saying it lands in a direction from the target when the thrower misses. Since there’s no facing in D&D (or d20 Modern/Future/Past), I would go with the determination of where north is on the map. The other is a d30 with every letter of the (American English) alphabet on it with four “wild” markings. I hope to use it for passwords or random puzzles. No way should it be used for name generation, that’s so lame just like the make-your-own-Jedi-name crap; I prefer to use the Internet to look up real, historical/cultural names for my campaign. I am definitely looking forward to using the d12 hit location one when it’s my turn to DM again.

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The PowerMac G5 is dead, long live the MacPro

Posted on August 10, 2006 by Steve

In all the excitement this week, I forgot to blather on (maybe shill) for the new MacPro that was announced this Monday. I don’t work on Mondays at Apple so my energies are spent on anything but my job. When I did get in on Tuesday, I read up on it through the training materials, sorry, no spoilers or super secrets about it here. Think of the training modules I have access to as being deeper, more informative marketing information. It’s not meant as a dig, it’s just a fact since training really can’t predict the future of what someone in my position should know; the PowerBook 5300 is a famous example because everybody involved at Apple completely missed the mark on that product.

Last year, when Jobs announced the transition from PowerPC to Intel-based processors, my stomach fell. For 14 years Apple pushed, pushed and pushed the hell out of the merits of the PowerPC. Now would come all the backpedaling and revisionism along with all the PC geeks yelling “we told you so.” Thankfully, the migration starting with the iMac has been pretty impressive and the MacPro cinched it for me. I figured it would really wouldn’t differ too much from the PowerMac G5, it would be another version of the 8100, a transitional model that wouldn’t be much of an improvement until the second generation. How glad I was to be wrong with this. The new MacPro comes with four processors as a standard, can be expanded to 16 GBs of RAM, it stores four internal SATA hard drives, there’s ports galore on the front and back, even the bottom-end video card can drive the 30” Cinema Display (must have in the near future). Its price tag of $2500 seems intimidating since it lacks an entry-level Good Configuration around $2000 as the G5 did. The $2500 is really closer to being the Better (midrange) and you can strip it down in the CTO options to bring it down to a cheaper price. Again, $2500? Seems overpriced for an Apple-branded Intel box. I would immediately agree if it were compared to an el cheapo, craptacular Dell. If Dell built a tower with the same specifications, it would be $2800. I guess I will have to buy a copy of Windows XP to go with Boot Camp to get my new MacPro to be comparable, only with the price. The ease-of-use is still immeasurably cheaper.

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RIP Dr. James Van Allen

Posted on August 10, 2006 by Steve

His discovery of the belts named after him was pretty critical for the manned and unmanned space missions, especially the Apollo series. With their locations and intensities calculated out, all equipment is hardned against the radiation and spacecraft have trajectories to fly through their weak points.

According to Dr. Phil Plait of Bad Astronomy, the Moon-Landing Hoaxers will use the Van Allen Belts as proof that the the landings were faked since all astronauts would’ve died of radiation poisoning as they traversed through it. Rather odd they believe in what probes report from space while they just handed you the rope to hang them with in the argument. As I stated earlier, thanks to Dr. Van Allen (and the numerous other scientists involved), the belts were mapped out along with their radiation levels. Thus, the Apollo spacecraft only travelled through the weakest points so the astronauts were exposed to the equivalent to a couple chest x-rays.

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My car makes it to 100,000 miles

Posted on August 10, 2006 by Steve

Must be a slow news week to go on about this, but that’s why I bought a Volkswagen 10 years ago (I also didn’t go to GenCon, happening now in India-No-Place). When I was a prisoner of Austin’s mediocre mass transit system and visiting Houston every other weekend in 1996, I noticed all the older VWs still running up and down the main avenues. I made a mental note to get one if the day ever happened when I could buy a car, little did I know it would be sooner than I anticipated nor planned.

At 100,000+, it’s holding up adequately. The oil change guy said it’s leaking transmission fluid so that’s something else I’ll need my mechanic Toby to check into while I’m having the airbags’ circuitry repaired. If it weren’t for Toby, I wouldn’t be wavering on my decision to make the next car a VW. Due to all the ineffecient, large, fuel-sucking designs of the last several years—Taureg, Phaeton and the new, unimpressive Rabbit (23/30 mpg, what crap!)—I have a feeling that GM has planted their inept people’s brains into VW’s decision makers. The future is better mileage through cleaner diesel, hybridization and/or improved efficiency, not ethanol (poor energy output versus gasoline) or hydrogen (no one has the technology to crack water, it still comes from cracking petrochemicals). I have debated with the wife over a used diesel VW Beetle that we could experiment on with biodiesel, which does produce more energy than what’s put into it by a factor of 3.2. With all the fast food we Americans eat, there’s a pre-built infrastructure courtesy of MacDo, Wendy’s, Jacques dans la Boite, Burger King, etc!

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Eric “Rico” Desjardins officially retires

Posted on August 9, 2006 by Steve

This one was expected ever since the news was given in July that the Flyers wouldn’t re-sign him. Eric “Rico” Desjardins is another great Defenseman I am going to miss. He was from the Quebec school of hockey—tough, physical and a good puck-handler. He was also a scoring Defenseman (the role now given to Joni Pitkanen) who was key to playing point-man on the Flyers’ anemic power play; the problems with their PP isn’t necessarily Rico’s fault, I agree with Pannachio’s theory, they think too much.

Desjardins had a pretty good career with the Flyers and Canadiens (he’s the only Defenseman I know with a hat trick in the Stanley Cup) but recently he had been plagued with injuries which weren’t really his fault. The last two major ones I remember really hurt the Flyers in the playoffs, especially when they were up against Tampa for all the marbles in the East. His broken foot blocking the puck was done out of grit and Roenick accidentally broke his arm in a collision; painful and humiliating for both players.

Thanks for the decade of service Rico. I know his tenure as Captain was right after the whole Lindros debacle so even a 55-gallon drum of teflon couldn’t make it smooth, but he tried. Hopefully he’ll get a coaching gig in the minors like Eric Weinrich did.

August 12 Update: I think there’s a good chance they might retire ol’ 37, and they should. According to more stories in the Philly paper and Flyers’ website, Rico is rated at as the number two Defenseman of all time. Who’s number one? Mark Howe, who also hasn’t had his number retired. Maybe they can do a joint ceremony because the way things are going next season, it’s a big, fat chance the Flyers will have anyone that great soon.

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The Converse Store returns to Austin

Posted on August 8, 2006 by Steve

Good thing I have a coupon

Good thing I have a coupon!

Last night I was in Chuck Taylor Paradise! The new outlet mall in Round Rock has a Converse store that is truly an outlet store (most of these so-called “outlet” malls charge just as much as the regular places). Here they have discontinued colors and styles collected from all the retailers who sent them back. Their loss is my gain because some pairs go for as little as $20. You know me, the louder the look, the better (the wife wants to photograph all my Chucks).

Years ago, there used to be an official Converse outlet store in Austin up around the northwest next to the Borders at Great Hills and 183. Sadly, Converse went down for the count a few years ago and the store closed by 2000. Then Nike bought them, revamped their lines, outsourced the labor the to China and jacked the price $10. I have to concede that it’s better to have them around than not at all. I suppose it balances out the T-shirts I buy from American Apparel and jeans from Lucky (both great US-made brands). Part of the Nike-induced comeback has been Chucks being more widely available through Journeys, Pac-Sun, Hot Topic, Jarman and other trendy mall retailers. The prices and selection have been a crapshoot although I have to say that the people with Journeys at Lakeline and Barton Creek are always good to me. But Chucks are a small segment of their business and I don’t think they’re as lucrative as an overpriced pair of Air Jordans. This store may be a subsection of the Nike building yet it’s nothing but Converse with the majority of it dedicated to Chucks (low and high tops).

With my 20+ pairs (I will be doing an audit again to check how many I do have), you know I’m going to be tormenting the poor staff up there. I made sure they took my phone number to alert me to anything unusual. I’m already on the list for the next shipment this week because I really want a pair in UT’s colors; they call it burnt orange here, Converse classifies it as Burnt Sienna. I am not a UT patriot but I do need a pair to match my Longhorns hockey jersey. Now I will have to resist the lure of driving up to that mall every Monday morning to see what’s available and probably talk a retailer into parting with another Converse display because the one I own only holds 21 pairs.

The staff gets a break until next month.

The staff gets a break until next month.

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Milwaukee ‘bones up’ on its look for the next season

Posted on August 7, 2006 by Steve

admiralsgrayadmiralswhite

When I was researching my Eric Weinrich story Saturday, I almost forgot about Milwaukee’s August first announcement for their new logo and jersey. I thought the one they’ve had since the 1980s was fine despite the Cap’n Crunch comment I received from a hockey ignoramus at work. I assumed they had to make a change when they joined the AHL but it wasn’t too bad, I only thought losing their old colors for some rather lame ones stunk. I’m still puzzled as to why the AHL keeps two franchises named Admirals too (Norfolk isn’t very good so they have to change despite the idea of there being a large naval fleet sailing on Lake Michigan).

Well for some inane reason the Milwaukee organization changed it again. Thanks to Johnny Depp, pirates are popular again and we all know how the city of beer and brats (pronounced ‘brauts,’ short for brautwurst) was terrorized by Captain Pabst blockading Miller Valley with his armada of Blue Ribbons back in the 1800s. I really hate it when teams pursue short-lived fads such as gang colors (see the Charlotte Hornets and San Jose Sharks) or names everyone will label as dated in three seasons (see the Toronto Raptors). But upon further inspection, I think the new look is more inspired by Tim Burton’s Corpse Bride and The Nightmare before Christmas so they could sell more jerseys through Hot Topic and promoto Goth Night at the Bradley Center.

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KMAG turned 4

Posted on August 5, 2006 by Steve

Today is the “official” fourth anniversary of KMAG. The goal this year was 6000 songs and again, I fell short by 245. I’m not too distraught, I managed to get the remaining 116 songs I didn’t achieve last year and even if it’s not 6000, it’s still six times more than any real radio station (including XM’s Fred & Lucy according to my observations of them at Kenny’s). The goal for this time next year will remain another 1000, thus 7000 will be its entire catalog. I’m optimistic on meeting this thanks to the FM transmitter I bought for my iPod recently. I can squeeze in another 3-4 albums a week just on my commute back and forth to work; this week I cleared out “older” albums from Sparks, Prince and Rhett Miller.

As of this writing, it has also played 533,628 songs (it’s off too until the OS updates go through and it restarts). I will probably only make a plug when it hits 600,000 songs if I’m having a slow week but I know I will when it hits 750,000 and 1,000,000.

And remember, I will always plug checking it out. You may put in your opinion to me; I may ignore it if it lacks merit such as “this is mommy music, play more boy music.” In iTunes, just do Command-U and paste in this:

http://66.136.218.35:8000/kmag

For those who insist on not using iTunes, the same path does work with other MP3 players such as WinAmp.

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Lousy trade to Chicago

Posted on August 5, 2006 by Steve

At first, I was going to write about the retirement of US-born player Eric Weinrich but I was pretty tired last night and let it go until this morning. Then I see the news on my EPSN widget first thing about Michal Handzus being traded to the Chicago Blackhawks. This has now pushed me over into the “Fire Bobby Clarke” Camp. I would agree with the Philadelphia Inquirer staff about the Flyers being crowded at Center. However, Keith Primeau remains a maybe with his last concussion and I predict he will retire by training camp to free up the money on the salary cap Philly is pushing on thanks to Gagne holding out for more than $5 million/season. I would also take Handzus over veteran (translation, rapidly aging) Centers Petr Nedved (has-been) and Peter Forsberg, the Swedish Eric Lindros (or Bill Walton for NBA fans). Handzus was a crowd favorite and as pitiful as last season was, he brought his A game to the Flyers more often than Forsberg or Nedved did. This is how Bobby Clarke rewards him? Thanks Mr. Number 16. I really doubt Marty Murray can step up to Third Line since he’s under six feet tall and the younger guys Richards and Carter are put to better use scoring as they demonstrated on the Phantoms’ Calder Trophy Winning Season. What did my Flyers get in exchange from Chicago? Why another player who won’t live up to his press and be sent down to the Phantoms by training camp. Obviously nothing was learned from the Zhamnov or Ellison acquisitions. The Left Wing we got for Handzus is Kyle Calder and Chicago probably dealt him because the Blackhawks’ cheap-ass owner lost the arbitration hearing. So Clarke went ahead and took him for more money than Handzus which puts the Flyers closer to the salary cap and the guy only has a one-year contract. Already I’m predicting a repeat of Alexi Zhamnov. Once again, I predict, the Flyers will be eliminated in the first round of the Playoffs by a team with more speed, grit and knows that opening faceoff is at 7 pm, not five minutes into the second period. 
 
On to a nicer paragraph, the retirement of Eric Weinrich. Although his career as a player doesn’t end on such a high, glorious note as Chris Chelios (a more famous US-born Defenseman), I am still very happy for him and applaud his contributions to US hockey through his 17 pro seasons, 3 in the NCAA with the University of Maine and the 1988 US Olympic Team. You couldn’t tell that from his NHL career since he played for eight teams. Trades aside, he was a strong, reliable Defenseman who handled the puck pretty well from the games I saw during his tenure with the Flyers. Weinrich is also the 190th player to make it past the 1000-games-played milestone during his 15th NHL season (one would have to play 12.2 consecutive seasons without an injury to do this). I know that doesn’t sound too impressive yet keep in mind the NHL has been around 90 years and US-born players are in the minority of this league. I was pretty irked when Philly traded him to the Blues during the 2003-04 season. Weinrich had little choice though because Hitchcock wasn’t playing him, it was go to the Blues or sit on the sidelines. I recall an ESPN story saying he contemplated retiring instead of being traded (to the Blues) but his wife and children convinced him to keep going because they supported his career and wherever that would take him. Thankfully, his hockey days aren’t completely over, it just enters a new chapter this Fall as an assistant coach for the Portland Pirates (the AHL affiliate for the Ducks in Maine). I think he’s going to do very well and I hope to see him on the coaching staff of an NHL franchise in the near future.

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Monster Manual IV fails to impress

Posted on August 3, 2006 by Steve

mmiv

This sourcebook is mislabeled. Sure there are new monsters—various types of undead, creatures from the miniatures game and at least one new template (Lloth Touched). However, the reader may be confused when stumbling across entries for gnolls, ogres, etc. (“race” monsters). The opening paragraph on these entries states the creature has been covered before in MM but here are some more details and several pre-made NPC versions with class levels. For a DM, a pre-made gnoll ranger, orc barbarian or drow wizard does save some time yet this should be reserved for another book. Traditionally the MM books are for showcasing the core (or foundation) version of the monster, without class levels, unless it’s a “race” monster that starts with only one hit die, then the default is a 1st level warrior. Besides being a waste of space, there are also pre-made NPC versions with classes from the supplemental Complete sourcebooks: a gnoll warlock and a drow ninja. This may upset some people who either lack these materials or irk players who don’t have those classes in their campaign (again, it equates to wasted space). 
 
Ever since DMG II appeared last summer, all adventures and Dungeon NPC listings switched over to the new format with everything the opponent could do in combat. It’s complete yet cumbersome and gobbles up more pages. It does save me some work on the tactics of the villain(s) or when I transcribe the stats to my monster/initiative cards. With MM IV I don’t find this format helpful when it comes to explaining a monster’s stat breakdown. The past format from MM 3.5 edition did it better. 
 
Another bone of contention critics will classify as padding in MM IV will be the maps and pre-made encounters. Maps in a MM sourcebook on monsters? There is precedent in other sourcebooks such as various temples in Complete Divine and all Forgotten Realms material. The maps and encounters do dovetail nicely with the pre-made NPCs. It saves time for the DM should the players need a wandering monster encounter for XP, it’s a short night, the DM’s pressed (frequent situation for me) or there’s a rut in the campaign. Again, I don’t feel this belongs in a MM, it should be reserved for Dungeon and encounter books filled with short adventures. 
 
Bottom Line: Of all the MM books in this series, MM IV is the most disappointing and least useful. If you don’t own the other source materials, the templates for the gnolls, drow and orcs won’t do you much good. If you don’t plan on running a campaign with Tiamat’s followers being rather prominent, most of these monsters are pointless. With those two disqalifiers being pretty strong supplemented with the less helpful format and strings of encounters, IV is only for completists, map fanatics or people with $35 to blow.

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Parts of KMAG now on the road

Posted on August 2, 2006 by Steve

It’s no secret that most radio stations bite thanks to the Telecommunications Act of 1996 (really the Clear Channel Power Grab Act) and Austin is sadly no exception. Sure KUT, the Austin NPR station, is great but only when there’s a news program or interview you want to hear, the music programs are a crapshoot. The alleged Alternative station 101X has made some improvements yet it’s still predominantly filled with awful Emo, Nu-Metal and Pseduo Rap and/or Punk. And don’t even get me started on Bob FM (the designation Austin got for the new Bob/Fred/Jack format Oldies stations have).

As of Thursday, it’s no longer a problem! I’ve been itching to get my iPod to play in my car effectively. First, I tried one of those cassette adapters. Blech! Not only are the heads on my tape deck dirty, it’s old and the sound was pretty tinny. Second, I’m not investing much money in my 10-year-old car since I hope to replace it in the next couple of years. Thanks to a quick and effective demonstration from my friend Jeremy, I got this little FM transmitter on the bottom of my iPod. Two problems solved; no more Austin radio and I can catch up on my albums to add to the KMAG Stream! Jeremy let me test it on my iPod and pointed it to my home stereo to make sure it would work and the best frequency he knew of here, 97.7 FM. The sound quality is pretty decent too. Its ease of use is helpful, no more untangling of cables, I just bring the iPod in, start it/stop it a couple times until 97.7 picks it up. My drives around Austin aren’t very long so I don’t spend 5-10 minutes setting it up just for a 20-minute drive to work.

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MTV began today in 1981, then sucked by 1984

Posted on August 1, 2006 by Steve

Maybe it’s no mistake that MTV’s first day on the air coincides with the Charles Whitman murder spree. MTV has done a great job at murdering good taste, intelligence and, most of all, music.

MTV sucking wasn’t always so. Back when my family moved to Houston in 1982, we were pretty excited about getting cable TV since we heard from the neighbors that it came with over 30 channels, compared to it just filling up the VHF part (channels 2-13 for those of you born in the Eighties). I had also heard my classmates at Strake Jesuit raving about the new Cheap Trick video for “She’s Tight.” After the cable TV was installed, my brother and I checked out MTV right away. It wasn’t too weird because we had seen Video Jukebox on HBO for years but that show was used to fill time between movies. MTV was constant videos whenever there wasn’t a commercial [few then] or a VJ blathering needlessly; only Alan Hunter was amusing.

Within weeks my parents were yelling at me for watching it too much. What did they expect? I was 14, living in a new city (almost another country), going to a private school with a student body that came from all over Houston and we didn’t exactly live in a neighborhood conducive to making new friends. Besides, Comedy Central, the SciFi Channel, Cartoon Network and original content on Nickelodeon were another decade away.

The early years of MTV were great too. As FM radio started its slide into replacing AM for crappy commercialism and the Boomer Classic Rock backlash was in its infancy, MTV truly was a bastion for new bands to get attention. I still take issue with the old farts who complained about acts they claimed had bad music yet strong videos. It usually meant Duran Duran and they were jealous because Led Zeppelin, even if they were still together, would just recycle footage from The Song Remains the Same movie. Sniping aside, MTV did open my mind to bands I never would’ve liked back in Central Illinois such as Adam Ant, Split Enz, INXS, Squeeze (“Black Coffee in Bed” was play ad nauseum during our first month of MTV), the Producers, Fixx, the Sherbs and Talk Talk, just for starters. I wasn’t always a New Wave purist then because there were videos from Asia, Zebra and Pete Townshend I thought were awesome (I still enjoy their music).

The Summer of 1983 is when I saw what I could’ve become too if my family hadn’t moved to Houston and in some small way, MTV. We were back in Central Illinois for a month due to an ugly situation. Meanwhile, Cindy Nash (another story, my brother’s is the best) held a reunion party for our class of 30-35 kids; I know, completing eighth grade from St. Agnes, quite the milestone of achievement. It was exciting to see most of the kids I was friends with, yet rather horrifying to hear most of their tastes in music matching Jim Anchower’s. That could’ve been me getting stoked over an upcoming Triumph with Night Ranger concert. *Shudder!*

Sadly, MTV’s decline began pretty quickly by the mid Eighties. The Arena Rock bands started to make videos as bland as their music, Rap made its inroads for time, Metal was getting more play too and crap other than music was being shown to raise the ratings. Allegedly, just staying focused on music wasn’t enough so MTV’s metamorphosis into a lifestyle channel commenced with BritCom reruns, game shows and embracing the has-been publication Rolling Stone. All the hot air expended on MTV allegedly being influential and a touchstone for pop culture became the network believing its own hype. By the time I was in college, the channel was irrelevant to anyone over 13. It still had some high points worthy of attention: Beavis & Butt-Head, 120 Minutes (aka the Janet Jackson-free zone) Liquid Television and the Unplugged series of shows. Otherwise, it has been responsible for spawning reality show imitators, standup comedy overkill and prolonging Johnny Knoxville’s 15 minutes. This is definitely a case of the bad overwhelming any good that may have come from MTV.

Any hope of regaining what used to be through MTV2 and VH-1 Classics have been dashed too. The proliferation of commercials and recycled VH-1’s flaccid programming on VH-1 Classics this year was disheartening (this happened to NickToons too). They even ruined the replay of what was to be MTV’s first day on the air because it was masked with the equivalent of a Bush signing statement; it’s not the actual footage minute by minute, just the videos and with the VH-1-style captions. Disappointing since TV Land does snapshots of entire evenings of prime time network TV from the Seventies all the way down to the actual commercials.

Despite the replay’s inaccuracy, I have recorded the whole 24 hours on my DVR and hope to get it transferred off for the sake of nostalgia to share with my friends. I have only gone through the first hour to enjoy the snapshot of what used to be cool in 1981; REO Speedwagon, Rod Stewart, April Wine and .38 Special. Almost as funny as the dated fashions (remember those girls trying to look like Pat Benatar?). I did skip ahead to catch some glimpses of other performers which led to more laughter; Lee Ritenour, Cliff Richard and Carly Simon! Seems MTV wasn’t always a cool as it claimed. Just like when you find an embarrassing yearbook picture of the current class bully.

MTV is now 25 and it’s doubtful the annoying network will blow its own brains out at 27 like another creatively exhausted rock star. Too late if it did, MTV has cloned itself with MTV2, VH-1, localized MTVs in numerous countries (hard to believe they’re actually expending the energy for New Zealand) and now VH-1 Classic has picked up the disease. I can only hope my nieces, nephews and my friends’ children find MTV and its ilk to be as clueless as Rolling Stone was to me when I was a young adult.

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Check out my friend Lazz’s handiwork!

Posted on August 1, 2006 by Steve

For my birthday, my friend posted a really cool piece of artwork he did to go with my favorite Goldfrapp song lyrics (really my favorite song all year) on his blog! 
 
Check out his other pieces too. Especially if you like Pink Floyd. 
 
Thanks Lazz! You rock.

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