Next Best Records Blog

While everyone's fired up about the upcoming NBA Draft (as Roger Brown would say, word is that Greg Oden and Mike Conley, Jr. could each go in the top three picks), tonight's a good time to take a look back at what may have been the best move of last year's NBA Draft: Danny Ferry's drafting of Daniel "Boobie" Gibson in the second round.

With Larry Hughes on the bench for most of last night's Cavaliers-Pistons game with another injury, Gibson came through with 35 big minutes, netting 21 points to go along with 3 rebounds, 2 assists, and 2 steals. I suppose it doesn't mean that much to say that Boobie Gibson has been the best rookie in the conference finals (isn't he the only rookie getting significant minutes?). Nevertheless, Ferry scored major points in my book by getting Gibson -- a player who essentially won the game last night (along, of course, with LeBron) -- with the 42nd pick in last year's draft. Apparently there may have been something going on behind the scenes, given that Gibson had first round talent but only worked out for the Cavs (one assumes that Ferry told Gibson they'd pick him if he were available, and if he wanted to play with LeBron James it would be a good idea to stay at home after his Cavs workout).

Anyway, Ferry's gotten a lot of heat for not adding any pieces around LeBron (besides Hughes, I guess). Give him some credit though for finding Boobie. Here's hoping the Cavs can pull off the upset tomorrow in Detroit to take the 3-2 series lead . . . .

Posted by Renaldo at 08:44 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

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Yeah, it's been a while, but I've been busy.  I'm not so busy now, though, so expect more frequent posts from here on out.

About a week and a half ago I saw Times New Viking at the Ravari Room in Columbus.  As always, they were swell.  The new songs sounded good.  Here's an exclusive picture:

And, thanks to a tip from Bone Fresh, here's a non-exclusive YouTube video:

Posted by Renaldo at 11:23 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

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About a week or so ago, I saw Darlene Love was scheduled for the Letterman show, so I set the DVR.  I got around to watching it today.  She did "River Deep, Mountain High."  It rocked, even almost as much as the original (with an instrumental arrangement fairly similar to the original, with strings, backup singers, etc.).

I haven't really been following the Phil Spector trial, but it's pretty interesting how his work -- even his "failures" -- from the 60's continues to show up in relatively unexpected places, despite the fact that he's facing murder charges.  I dunno.  At least Darlene Love is still kickin' it.

Check it:

Posted by Renaldo at 01:07 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

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Ian e-mailed to let me know that in the past couple of days, people have come to the blog through Google searches for "times new viking" and "thomas jefferson slave apartments".  For some reason, that encouraged me or something.  Anyway, I took the opportunity to run my own Google search for "times new viking" to see what hit number we were, kinda like the "how many licks does it take to get to the center of a tootsie roll pop" challenge, but not really.  Either way, I gave up after going through 10 pages (aka 100 hits) of Google search results.  Somebody with even more spare time on his (or her) hands than me must've spent a lot of time combing through those searches to get to us.

It wasn't all fruitless, as I was intrigued by this page, which has a review of the recent Times New Viking/Spoon secret Jack Daniels show.  I was interested in going to this show, because I dig both bands, but ended up not going because a) I think you had to be in the know to get tickets, which I'm obviously not; b) I've seen TNV recently and Spoon about a year and a half ago, and so I didn't have a lot of motivation to "get in the know"; c) I had a final the next day (speaking of which, I'm supposed to be working on a take-home final right now . . . .); and d) the free drinks at the last liquor company-sponsored event I went to (some debut for a new Bacardi flavor, which I don't think is on the market anymore) were horrible and I had a really bad sugar-induced hangover the next day.

But I digress.  The dude didn't like TNV.  I won't really summarize his review (you can read it just as well as I can) aside from noting that he said TNV was "great" for their first song, "pretty okay" for their second, and "crap" for the rest of the set.  Then he really cuts into them.  Say it ain't so, Harry!  (By the way, Ian -- when you read this, make sure to put his blog on the NBR promotion list.)

Maybe TNV played a bad show.  Maybe the sound sucked.  Maybe the Jack Daniels/Skully's people weren't very accomdating of the best band (ok, maybe other than Spoon) that's played Skully's in the past few years.  Aside from all that, though, his review runs contradictory to my own experience listening to TNV's records and live show.  As I detailed a few weeks ago, they freakin' destroy shit (by shit I mean the majority of what you -- and I -- listen to).  No less an authority than my main man Bone Fresh confirmed this after seeing them last weekend.

I guess I just have trouble computing why anyone wouldn't like TNV -- a band that not only rocks, but also has strong roots in the great rock tradition of the Buckeye State.  Perhaps I have an over-inflated sense of the quality of my musical taste, but I think they're the bee's knees.  To put it another way, I've seen probably hundreds of shitty bands.  For instance, the last time I saw bands at Skullys, both bands -- who will remain nameless (actually, I just can't remember their names) were shitty.  I know shitty bands when I see them, and TNV isn't shitty, or "crap" or "juvenile" or "lackluster" or "amateur" (I've now seen each of the words in quotes used to describe TNV).

I trust my own musical judgment.  And Gerard Cosloy's (in the mid-90's alone, he didn't steer me wrong with Pavement, Yo La Tengo, Chavez, Spoon, Helium, Run On, and many more -- besides, he also put out the second greatest record of all time, Alien Lanes).  Don't believe the hype (or the anti-hype).  Do yourself a favor and check out TNV (it looks like they're playing the Ravari Room on the 11th -- that's right, the place that's attached to Hound Dog's Pizza -- so you know where I'm going to be after I get beaten over the head at the Palace Theatre that afternoon).

(And, Ian, sorry about breaking yr no-cussing policy.  Just remember, neither you nor the Belgians can hold me down.)

Posted by Renaldo at 06:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

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. . . you put off writing a paper that's due in a matter of hours by researching for another paper that's due in a matter of days.  20 years of school is enough.  What did Dylan say?  "Twenty years of schooling then they put you on the day shift."  If only.  In our case, they make you pay two grand more so you can take more classes so you can maybe actually use your degree.

I did learn one thing tonight, though.  NEU!'s first album is good to listen to when you're trying to churn out some paper.  Ooh ooh ooh that Motorik beat . . . .

Posted by Renaldo at 09:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

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Somebody (does the name Ian Wying sound right?) has been posting a lot of iMixes on iTunes lately, and so it came to be that I handed in a list of songs for an iMix centered around my old radio show on the University of Dayton's Flyer Radio.  It ran on Sundays (in a variety of time slots) from Fall '00 to Spring '03.  It was a good show -- it even was named "Specialty Show of the Semester" at one point.  They said we had "great energy."  By we, I mean the revolving cast and crew of the show, which including Timmay, Blairman, and our resident vibologist (vibrologist?) Dr. Burky, Master of Vibology.  Anyway, it was kind of fun to make a list of songs I used to play, even though iTunes didn't have them all.  With the help of the aforementioned Herr Wying, here's my attempt to post the iMix to the Blog for your perusal:

A lot of these songs (the Mulchmen song, for example) remind me of greasy ham and cheese omlettes, if only because the first timeslot for the show was the "hangover slot" (aka 8 a.m. to 10 a.m. Sunday mornings). We would grab a KU breakfast then take it up to the radio station on the second floor. A lot of times the door was locked because the guys before us (in the "super-hangover slot") never really ever showed up. It wasn't until I was given the door code a few weeks into the semester that we were able to go on the air regularly. Onetime Timmay and I didn't realize the clocks had changed, and so we showed up an hour early to do the show. It wasn't until Dr. B showed up an hour later that we realized we would be doing a three hour show. Those really were the days.

Anyway, I like the mix. The only thing it's missing is the bands that aren't on iTunes and our on-air banter. "Over the Neptune/Mesh Gear Fox" probably opened 95% of the shows, and I think we played "Flying Pizza" on 95% of the shows as well. You'll notice a lot of longer songs on the mix. That's because I would get lazy -- it was easier to cue up three CD players (which is what we had at the station) with three songs that were 4+ minutes long than have to keep putting 2 minute songs on over and over. For this reason, Devo's "Smart Patrol/Mr. DNA" was a favorite, as was the 7 1/2 minute version of the Electric Eels' "Flapping Jets" (which is brilliant and epic in every regard anyway).

Other favorites that aren't included: Pufftube's version of "The Boys of Summer"; Braniac's "Go Freaks Go"; Death of Samantha's "Coca Cola & Licorice"; and the New Salem Witch Hunters' "Summer's Here At Last" or "Last Patrol." Throw in Gem's "Nothing But the Quiet Now" and the Easter Monkeys' "Splendor of Sorrow" for good measure as well. Oh yeah, and I used to play a lot of Thomas Jefferson Slave Apartments' Bait and Switch album as well.

I guess there's a lot of good Ohio music. I had tons of stuff to play back then (and it was always cool getting calls from the Dayton bands--or their friends--after I played one of their records), and there's still a lot of cool stuff going on in the Buckeye State.

Posted by Renaldo at 11:17 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

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