A Rubber Door

I begrudge no one their god given right to throw good money away. Lord knows I’ve been known to waste a dollar or two. That said…

When you’re at a concert, shut the fuck up. I can’t tell you how tired I am of people who can’t keep their mouth shut long enough to let a musician sing. It’s amazing. They spend their hard earned dollars to go to a show, and then talk through the whole thing. And they’re really dedicated to talking too; when the musicians starts playing, they talk louder, as if to say “doesn’t this guy with the guitar know we’re trying to have a conversation?”

I feel so bad for the musicians sometimes. It sounds as if no one is paying attention.

So if you’re one of those let me tell you this: it’s rude. It’s rude to the people around you trying to pay attention, and it’s rude to the musician. If you want to waste your money, that’s fine, but you’re wasting mine and everyone else around you who’s trying to listen. You’re also being rude to the musician who actually wants people to hear their music and not your mouth.

For the life of me I can’t understand why someone would pay for a ticket, a surcharge, and then talk through the show. It’s not like these shows are cheap. If you want to talk, go to a bar with a jukebox and talk there - it’s expected. Otherwise, shut the fuck up.

I got my ass up early today to get tickets for Radiohead. I generally have good ticket buying karma - I like to think it’s because I don’t steal music. Anyway - I kept track of the atomic clock, and promptly refreshed my browser at the right second - it actually took a second refresh to see an order form, but I was in! I put my order in, and got a message that no tickets were available - this was at ten o’clock and twenty seconds. I put a second order in, same thing. Finally the third order goes through and I’m on the fucking lawn. The fucking lawn! Who got reserved seats if twenty seconds is too late? I’ll tell you who - Stubhub - because they have plenty of great seats selling for $150 and up (more than twice face value) And don’t tell me that this is the way bands make their money because Radiohead makes none of that profit. Want to bet one day we find out that Ticketmaster is somehow making money off of Stubhub sales?

And what of Radiohead’s pre-sale? At fucking ten A.M. on Wednesday when I have to be in a meeting. I know it just wasn’t meant to be. Why are all these pre-sales during the work day, when people have to work?

I tell you, I kind of miss the days of going to a venue at five A.M. to wait in line at the West Coast Video - because that seemed to be more fair. As I sit here in a t-shirt and boxers, I realize buying tickets over the internet is insanely easy and convenient, but at the end of the day, is no more than a lottery, and winning means you don’t have to pay a surcharge to scalpers if you really want those tickets.

At least I’ve been lucky enough to see Radiohead five or six times in some really ridiculous venues (at the Trocadero opening for Belly for instance or a couple of years ago at Tower Theater), and seeing them a seventh time would be solely a luxury; I feel bad for the person for who this show would have been their first time. The system doesn’t work in your favor.

I know come August 12, I’m going to be annoyed when I’m sitting at home instead of watching my favorite band, but I’ll live. Oh well.

And Hillary Clinton isn’t any better. They’re both giving Obama hell for saying the following:

“You go into these small towns in Pennsylvania and, like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing’s replaced them,” Obama was quoted as saying by the Huffington Post.

“And it’s not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations,” he said.

To this, a McCain aide said the following

A McCain aide, Steve Schmidt, also criticized Obama for the comments, telling Politico newspaper “it shows an elitism and condescension towards hardworking Americans that is nothing short of breathtaking.”

This is a man that implies that the mortgage crisis is being caused by people not working second jobs, skipping vacations, or living on a budget all the while he’s one of the richest men in the Senate. He supports the tax cuts for the rich (of course).

And of course there’s Clinton who can only speak in soundbites and politically correct terms.

“As I travel around Pennsylvania, I meet people who are resilient, who are optimistic, who are positive, who are rolling up their sleeves. They are working hard everyday for a better future, for themselves and their children,”

Resilient just means they’ve put up with a lot of shit and not committed suicide or murder. What they are is working hard and not getting any further ahead.

Here’s the thing about what Obama said - it was cold and not PC, but he’s mostly right. These people are bitter and pissed off. Their homes are being foreclosed on, their jobs moved to India, the mom and pop stores have long been replaced by Walmarts. They should be more pissed off.

Here’s where Obama is wrong - it’s not just middle America that’s bitter. It’s not just the small towns - it’s the big cities too. It’s not just white people - it’s people of all colors. They look at the government, the lack of jobs; the bending over backward for banks, insurance companies, or pharmaceutical corporations and wonder why they don’t bend over backwards for the citizens of this country. This government made it harder for hard working people to get the relief of bankruptcy, but corporations don’t seem to have this problem.

It’s a wonder that Ralph Nader doesn’t have more support when you see how stacked the cards are against the people.

Thanks Merujo for introducing me to Dance Party Friday. Every once in awhile I look to see if there are any new episodes and who am I kidding - there are always new episodes. Here’s a good one for a Friday at the end of a long week.

Wish Philly news was this fun.

The last week has been crazy.  Work has up and decided to be, well, work.  Haven’t had a real day off in over a week - and last week I spent 5 evenings in auto dealership negotiating Kristen’s new car.  Thank goodness that’s over.  So what do I do tonight?  Go to an auto dealership to buy a car for myself.  Still looking though. Want to lower my payment and get something more fuel efficient.

The week will pick up tomorrow - Spoon is playing at the Electric Factory (sold out and I have tickets) and Saturday night it’s Kathleen Edwards.

Check out the following video from Canadian singer/songwriter Kathleen Edwards.  She’s truly an amazing songwriter - draws an awful lot of comparisons to Lucinda Williams.  

Don’t say you’ll change after the next time
You wouldn’t even be yourself if you weren’t telling a lie
Maybe 20 years in state will change your mind

I won’t even comment on this story, just share.

Johns Hopkins University said Friday that it had programmed its computers to ignore the word “abortion” in searches of a large, publicly financed database of information on reproductive health after federal officials raised questions about two articles in the database.

You can read the full story here: Health Database Set Up to Ignore ‘Abortion’

OK I have to comment.  This doesn’t even make sense; regardless of your position on the subject, you can’t whitewash and censor.

Apparently another attack took place in the SEPTA terminal near where a man was beaten to death last week. This woman was lucky, and survived her attack. The SEPTA police was able to catch 5 of the 10 thugs by stopping the subway train at the next stop and capturing them there where the woman identified her attackers.

This is ridiculous. On top of this the DA has charged the five with robbery and assault charges; here’s my idea - in light of what happened last week, these idiots should be charged with attempted murder. If you want to send a message this is the best way.

Another thing - for years, crime has plagued other parts of Philadelphia, leaving the Center City relatively safe. Murders in the city, while not non-existent, still are rare. But it couldn’t stay confined for too long. Allowing
crime to run rampant (yes I said allowing) only allowed crime to overflow. Maybe now the city will care just a little bit more. When it was in the poor and working class neighborhoods, it was important, but now that it’s in the tourist and business areas, I guarantee the city will squash this.

A few weeks ago I preordered the latest R.E.M. release Accelerate (iTunes) after hearing all the great reviews. Preordering got me a bonus track and the single early and I would have hoped the album as soon as it was out. Unfortunately that wasn’t the case - the album was available right after midnight yesterday, but as of 3 P.M. I hadn’t received notice that I could download my album, so I sent an email to Apple. A few hours later I had an email saying I could download my album.

In my email to Apple I mentioned that this wasn’t the first time this had happened and it makes no sense. It seems to me that you’d want to get the album out to those he preordered it at least when it is commercially available, if not before then. These are your biggest fans. The ones that would beat the drum for the album.

Then today I got an email from Apple that turned my opinion.

Thank you for preordering “R.E.M Accelerate”. It appears that since you last contacted iTunes Store Customer Support, you have successfully purchased and downloaded this selection. I do apologize for any frustration this issue may have caused.

I have issued you 5 free song credits for your inconvenience. When you sign in to the iTunes Store with this account, the song credit will appear by your account name in the upper-right corner of the iTunes window.

I still think that Apple should work to make sure that their best fans are better taken care of, but this was good customer service. The took a bad situation and turned it good - at least for me. I was planning to write about how they screwed up, and they at least turned it into a compliment on how they take care of their customers. Yeah, yeah 5 free songs makes me feel better - customers can be made happy with free stuff - more companies should remember that.