Monday, August 31, 2009

Junq Tour 2009: Winkler

Winkler is a small town in Manitoba. A small town with 16 churches! Just look at this map:



And if you can't find a suitable church in Winkler, take the five minute drive over to Morden (another small town) where there's 23 more to choose from.

The thrift store was obviously over-run with Christian material. I bought a couple of things that looked somewhat interesting:

Ghoti Hook - Sumo Surprise



WORST ALBUM COVER EVER. Musically, they're okay. They're a Christian punk rock band. The singer has a really horrible fake accent though. If you're going to sound british, then get a british singer! Still, I wouldn't mind hearing the album of cover songs they did called "Songs We Didn't Write" because we all know how much I like hearing other people's renditions of popular songs.


Five Iron Frenzy - Quantity is Job 1



This is apparently a Christian ska band, again decent on the talent level. This album gives us an okay cover of Electric Light Orchestra's "Sweet Talkin' Woman"

But the real treasure here is the spoof musical "These Are Not My Pants (The Rock Opera). I generally hate musicals, so I tend to enjoy the hell out of anything that spoofs them. I've put the entire Opera online for your listening pleasure. There's a very good chance that you will NOT be able to sit through the whole thing because it's really fucking retarded. Click Here to Listen!

The best treasure I found in Winkler isn't at all Christian related. It's a record entitled "Good Housekeeping's Plan For Reducing Off-The-Record"



There's an entire series of these things, but I'm guessing I've got a fairly early version which makes it all that much more entertaining!

Trim down that double chin with this exercise:



I really can't see how anybody can take this exercise record seriously with the music that they've chosen. I think the purpose is to degrade the fat woman into making her feel absolutely rediculous while doing these exercises. To see what I mean, click here and listen to exercise #2.

On the plus side, if you splice some of these segments together, you can make your own animated audio porno! Here's the one I made.


Next installment in the Junq Tour: The Pas, Manitoba. I found some fantastic stuff there!

Sunday, August 23, 2009

Old Shoes

And now for something completely different...



Check out this pair of shoes I found on the road!

Just kidding, I didn't find them on the road. I bought them...

brand new....

sixteen years ago (give or take a year) when Converse was still a company, rather than a line of shoes owned by Nike.



These shoes were all the rage in the early to mid-90s, and they weren't cheap. They cost somewhere around a hundred bucks a pair, sometimes more. Usually, shoes last me a year. These ones lasted just a bit longer. I'm surprised there's still some tread left on them, considering how many miles I put on these things. I still had one of the original laces until a couple months ago when it pretty much rotted off the shoe. That explains the black lace on the one shoe that was robbed off a newer, more worn-out pair that I retired.



I don't wear them on a regular basis. They're generally only used as a pair of "slip ons" to take the garbage out, do general yardwork, make a run to the garage, etc. Recently, I realized that they are going to need to be trashed fairly soon, as the hole in the left shoe is beginning to get much, much bigger. I can't use them in the winter anymore.

Wow, what a stupid thing to blog about...

Thursday, August 20, 2009

On The Road Again



Sometimes I shake my head in disbelief that I actually paid for something. This is one of those things. I paid a whole 25 cents for this stupid tape. 25 cents bought me a minute and thirty seven seconds worth of dread.

CLICK HERE TO LISTEN

It's amazing how much this cassette tells me about the people who recorded it. First of all, it was recorded in Singing Sensations Recording Studio in Branson, Missouri, as the label states. Second, the artist "Embassy Tours" is a travel agency here in Winnipeg. Third, the group name "The Singing Sexagenarians"; a sexagenarians is someone between the age of 60 and 70 years old.

So there you have it. This is a recording by a group of tone-deaf, crusty old people who went on a cruise to Branson, Missouri to make this recording, only to have it chucked into a box of shitty tapes at a yard sale.

And of course, I'm the one who got suckered out of a quarter.

Sunday, August 16, 2009

My New Netbook



So, here's the little HP 2140 netbook I won from the "How Do You Linux" contest. Pretty cool, huh? Well, it wasn't all that cool when I first got it.

It came pre-installed with Suse Linux 11. I hadn't tried Suse in a while, so I figured I'd give it a whirl. I went to go install some of my most commonly used apps, and there was next to NOTHING in the repositories. The thing that drove me the most nuts was trying to use the clumsy interface of the Banshee music player. I wanted XMMS, so I went to try and find it, or at the very least, Audacious. I couldn't find either. In fact, Banshee was about the only thing you could get for a music player. Okay, well maybe I could get used to Banshee.

Next, I went to install Opera because I personally can't stand Firefox. Opera also wasn't available. I figured at the very least, I could install WINE and run both Opera and Winamp for Windows. Ha ha, no can do. I couldn't even get WINE.

Next step, wipe the entire hard drive and install Xubuntu 8.04. I've got the whole thing set up the way I want - Opera, XMMS, WINE, everything... except the E17 graphical desktop environment which I want installed so badly. They're aiming for an official release at Christmas (as opposed to the buggy alphas), so I'll wait until then to install it. Still, everything on this little netbook is functional.



Oh yeah, and the T-shirt... I figured I was going to get a black T-shirt with the green lizard (the Suse linux logo) and maybe something that said "Suse Linux 11". Hey, I may not like their version of Linux, but I do like their logo.

So, when I went to open the package that came in the mail containing my black T-shirt with the green lizard on it, I got a surprise...



Yup, that's the shirt. It's blindingly green with the words "Super Fucking Dork" splashed across the front.

Thanks Novell, for the Netbook.

I'm currently building a case to lug this thing around, made from an old tape recorder! It's going to be a hackfest, and I'll post plenty of pictures. Stay tuned...

Sunday, August 9, 2009

Radio Prank Played Out: Superbowl in Miami (Manitoba)



Way back in January 1995, a selected group of people had won a trip to see the Superbowl in Miami. No, not Miami, Florida where the game was actually held, but in Miami, Manitoba where the game was shown on a TV in a bar.

Scruff Connors and Larry Updike who were radio DJs here in Winnipeg hosted this contest, and yours truly caught everything on tape. I faithfully listened to Scruff every morning, and would set up my reel to reel tape recorder to record the remainder of the show that I would miss while I took the bus to school. When I got back from school, I would playback the tape, and listen to everything I had missed.

Reel to reel tape was the only available media in the 1990s which could record hours of non-stop programming, maintenance free - well at least until the tape ran out. I had a few four hour tapes I used for this sole purpose.

Anyway, back to the prank. Here are two sound clips of Scruff and Larry going through the faxes that were submitted into the contest:

Faxes Part 1
Faxes Part 2

Pretty harmless, isn't it? After the 15 winners (and their guests) had gone to Miami to watch the Superbowl, a couple of them got together and complained to the media about what had really happened. Here is the recording of Scruff getting pulled off the air:

Scruff Gets Suspended

And here's the newspaper article (the next day) regarding the incident:



An investigation was conducted, where over 40 hours of recorded broadcast would be gone through, just to see if Scruff or Larry had at anytime mentioned that the winners were going to Miami, Florida. If they had, they would be deemed guilty and have the plug pulled on their morning show.

After the recordings had been gone through and the word "Florida" was never mentioned, Scruff was allowed to return to air. He didn't show up:

Scruff Calls The Station

And finally, here's the recording of him returning to work, dedicating a song to those who helped in pulling him off the air:

Scruff Returns!

This was not the first time Scruff had pulled radio gags. According to Wikipedia, Scruff held a contest in 1990 for listeners to see "New Kids". Limousines pulled up, and out walked mothers with newborns!

Now tell me that's not funny!

Tuesday, August 4, 2009

The 27 Worst Songs I Own

At long last, I've finally assembled a list of the worst songs I own. I've been working on it for quite a few months now. During the time it took to create this blog entry, one of the songs' original authors kicked the bucket. You'll be able to figure out who it is (Yes, it's Michael Jackson).

My friend Ashley, who helped judge these songs and levelled out my bias against them has been patiently waiting for me to get off my ass and finish this blog entry. The best part about this blog entry is, I made professional-esque countdown videos to upload to youtube. I also invented a new word, "professionalesque".

Anyway, feel free to watch the Youtube videos countdown to the most god-awful piece of shit song in my entire music collection. We're talking about 700 CDs, 200 cassettes, 300 LPs, and 200 8-tracks (those are VERY rough guesses.) Regardless, I have many, many hours (perhaps weeks or months) worth of music in my collection. I have been able to slim the entire collection down to the 27 worst songs I own. Below is commentary and the ratings that both me and Ashley have given to these 'masterpieces'. Since the artist felt it necessary to force us to listen to these songs, he/she fully left the door open for us to criticize them. So, let's get down to business!






If your curious as to how these songs were rated, here's the system we used.

- Each song was given a rating between 1 and 5 (5 being the most listenable).
- If the listener cannot make it through the entire song, mark down the time the song was shut off.
- Ratings and shut off times are averaged out
- If one listener shut the song off and one didn't, the "listenable" time was pinpointed half way between the shut off time and the length of the song

Here are the comments:


#27 - Blue Oyster Cult - Moon Crazy
Ben: 5/5
Ashley: 3/5
Total: 4/5

Ben: I really love Blue Oyster Cult, but they did a few duds here and there. They shouldn't have done this song. It's not bad until they hit the chorus. The guitar solo is pretty good though. Maybe 'Hungry Boys' would have been a better choice for their worst song.

Ashley: This song is boring. What makes me sad is that this is an alphabetical list. Apparently my eardrums must suffer more. I guess this song is better than the last one, though. Not that that is saying much.



#26 - Kip Winger - Another Way
Ben: 4/5
Ashley: 3.5/5
Total: 3.75/5

Ashley: I'm not sure what is not listenable about this one. It's not my style but it's not horrid.

Ben: This song just sucks, much like most material written by Kip Winger. He did one great song for his solo career and this isn't it (note: it was his solo version of Down Incognito)



#25 - The Cars - Shoo Be Doo
Ben: 5/5
Ashley: 1/5
Total: 3/5

Ashley: I wasn't looking forward to this song. 1) It's The Cars. 2) The song's called Shoo Be Doo. And hey, I wasn't disappointed! It's terrible.

Ben: This song is just weird. It's like an 80s psychedelic break in the album (yes, I know the album came out in '79.) I actually kinda like the ending where Rik Ocasek flips out.



#24 - Canned Heat - On the Road Again
Ben: 3/5
Ashley: 2/5
Total: 2.5/5

Ben: I really do like the music. It's so groovy. And then that harmonica-voiced guy stabs himself in the ass with a knitting needle, AhhHH! On the road again...

Ashley: He sings like someone has a big meaty paw cupping his testicles that squeezes them on every high note.



#23 - Mark Prindle - Basswoop
Ben: 2/5
Ashley: 1/5
Total: 1.5/5

Ben: The entire Smilehouse album chews away at your nerves, but this song makes you finally go bezerk. The song was too short to shut off before I got sick of it.

Ashley: What. The. Hell. Where the fuck did you find this piece of shit?



#22 - Tori Amos & Robert Plant - Down By The Seaside
Ben: 2/5 1:40
Ashley: 2/5
Total: 2/5 4:46

Ben: Tori Amos sucks. Robert Plant can't sing anymore. Together, they trash a great song that was partially written by... Robert Plant. The music is kinda cool, but it sounds nothing like the original version of the song.

Ashley: Meh. Boring. Not terrible, but not anything worth listening to, either.



#21 - Stevie Wonder - Upset Stomach
Ben: 3/5 1:19
Ashley: 1/5
Total: 2/5 3:06

Ashley: That's exactly what I have after all this, an upset stomach. Fucking 80s shit.

Ben: Stevie Wonder has one of the coolest voices ever. This song has some of the shittiest music ever. Funny how many songs on this list refer to vomit (or vomit-causing activities) Incidently, this song is on the same album as the Ferris Wheel song.



#20 - John Kay & Steppenwolf - Bad Attiude
Ben: 2/5 1:08
Ashley: 3.5/5
Total: 2.75/5 2:53

Ashley: I sort of like Steppenwolf sometimes. This is okay. I wouldn't listen to it on my own, but I'm surviving it.

Ben: John Kay went and ruined the name "Steppenwolf" with his band of hacks using it for his solo career. The lyrics are stupid, the music is awful, and this is one of the three terrible songs that started off the otherwise great "Summerdaze" compilation CD.



#19 - XTC - Making Plans For Nigel
Ben: 2/5 1:19
Ashley: 3.5/5
Total: 2.75/5 2:43

Ben: Who the fuck is Nigel? Is he so retarded that he can't do anything for himself? HE MUST BE HAPPY. HE MUST BE HAPPY. This song makes me want to go on a Nigel killing spree.

Ashley: Lame but I'm not loathing it.



#18 - Deep Forest - Forest Hymn
Ben: 1/5 1:22
Ashley: 5/5
Total: 3/5 2:36

Ashley: I'm sorry, did you actually pick on a band that I like? Regardless, this is not the real Forest Hymn, at least as far as I can tell. It's a remix. Yeah, definitely a remix the longer I listen to it. Okay, so the song's weird but I think it's cute. It's definitely not their best song, but it's not that terrible.

Ben: Ashley, how can you like this? That kid sings like Starvin' Marvin from South Park.



#17 - Smokey Robinson & Syreeta - First Time On A Ferris Wheel
Ben: 2/5 1:24
Ashley: 1/5
Total: 1.5/5 2:31

Ashley: *puke*

Ben: How you puked on me. Like your first time on a ferris wheel. The nausea is so horribly real.



#16 - The Thrown Ups - You Lost it
Ben: 1/5 1:39
Ashley: 1/5
Total: 1/5 2:27

Ben: If you really want to piss someone off, play this song. This beats out William Hung as just plain awful.

Ashley: This sounds like high school band, except worse. Ironic that the next band I have to listen to is alluding to what I wanted to do because of the last song. Their band name is appropriate.



#15 - Edie Brickell - Big Day Little Boat
Ben: 2/5 1:13
Ashley: 2/5
Total: 2/5 2:24

Ben: I actually have an Edie Brickell album, but this song came off a benefit album. Those poor kids. SMILE! SMILE! For everyone!

Ashley: Bleeeccch. I hate her voice and there's that stupid country flavour to the song that can go to hell. The lyrics are dumb, too. She whines.



#14 - Helmet - Custard Pie
Ben: 1/5 1:24
Ashley: 3/5 3:21
Total: 2/5 2:23

Ashley: This song is pointless. I'm not writhing on the ground in pain, though, so I guess I'll give it a 3.

Ben: Maybe it's because I like the original too much, or maybe it's because I picture some slobbering drunk trying to sing this, and he's ready to throw up.



#13 - 95 South - Whoot, There it is
Ben: 2/5 1:30
Ashley: 3/5
Total: 2.5/5 2:19

Ben: I can make that constant bass sound by producing feeback with the treble turned all the way down. Gives me a headache. It also sounds like there's something crapping in the background when they yell "WHOOT!".

Ashley: It doesn't sound very different from the crap on the radio these days. A shitty beat with a load of stupid repetitive lyrics. The only thing redeeming is the low bass and that's ONLY because I'm a bass addict. The song would be much better if it was just the bass and nothing else.



#12 - Meat Loaf - Paradise By The Dashboard Light
Ben: 1/5 3:05
Ashley: 1/5 (Can I give it less than 1?) 0:32
Total: 1/5 1:49

Ben: Meat Loaf is to rock music what Kim Mitchell is to rap music. This turd never ends either.

Ashley: I HATE Meatloaf. HATE HATE HATE HATE. This song especially.



#11 - Ventures - Deep Deep In The Water
Ben: 2/5 0:59
Ashley: 1/5
Total: 1.5/5 1:48

Ben: Instrumental-only surf-rock bands should not sing and play country music. 'Nuff said. Other than this song, the album is great.

Ashley: I keep hoping there's one more song, just one more, that will be semi-listenable and save me from this crap, but then this song came on. It's like the shit my mom listens to.



#10 - Honeymoon Suite - Lethal Weapon
Ben: 2/5 0:57
Ashley: 2/5 2:35
Total: 2/5 1:46

Ben: This sounds like something that belongs on a benefit album. 'Nuff said.

Ashley: Eh, mediocre crap. It reminds me of the radio. They play crap like this on the radio, or they used to or something.



#9 - Uncanny Alliance - I Got My Education
Ben: 1/5 2:43
Ashley: 1/5 0:44
Total: 1/5 1:44

Ben: There's a 12 minute version of this piece of trash out there somewhere. Thank god I don't have that version. This was obviously a message for the youth of the day, but after listening to her say "I GOT MY EDUCATION" for the zillionth time, I just wanna slap the bitch and go on welfare.

Ashley: This song is full of fail.



#8 - Kim Mitchell - Acrimony
Ben: 2/5 0:58
Ashley: 2/5 1:54
Total: 2/5 1:26

Ashley: I was expecting some more whining, seeing as how it's a female name, but this shit comes through my speakers. Fuck it, I'm skipping

Ben: Kim Mitchell shouldn't rap. He wrote some great songs. He wrote a great chorus for this song, and ruined it with his inability to rap.



#7 - Michael Jackson Impersonator - Bad
Ben: 4/5 1:26
Ashley: 1/5 1:12
Total: 2.5/5 1:19

Ashley: I can barely hear the guy, I had to turn up the shitty music to hear the shitty singing. Unimpressed. I guess it doesn't help that I hate Michael Jackson?

Ben: Ashley, the singer is a WOMAN. I know MJ isn't exactly masculine, but this chick doesn't have that certain edge that MJ posesses. Oh yeah, and the music is poorly done too.



#6 - Tragically Hip - Highway Girl
Ben: 2/5 1:29
Ashley: 1/5 1:09
Total: 1.5/5 1:19

Ben: I really hate this band. This isn't the worst thing they ever did, but it still sucks. This is the first time I've ever listened to the lyrics and... they're really stupid.

Ashley: I also fucking hate the Tragically Hip. I hate the lead singer's voice. I hate this song too.



#5 - Buster Poindexter - Hot Hot Hot
Ben: 2/5 0:59
Ashley: 1/5 0:46
Total: 1.5/5 0:53

Ben: The beginning is cool with the OLE! OLE! thing. But then a guy in a hawaiian shirt pukes into a trumpet and it all goes to hell from there.

Ashley: Oh, not this fucking song. Ben, I hate you. I'm skipping it (:46) because I like my sanity, thanks. Anyway, I remember enough of it to say it's one of those shitty songs that catch on with people because it's retarded and they have no sense of musical taste.



#4 - The Royal Mixxers - Black Dog
Ben: 1/5 0:50
Ashley: 1/5 0:54
Total: 1/5 0:52

Ashley: Guh? Gonna make me throw up, that's what this song is going to do.

Ben: Oh Man, Led Zeppelin must have been rolling in their graves when this came out, and they aren't even dead yet. A rap version of Black Dog is just wrong.



#3 - Tyrannosaurus Rex - Wind Cheetah
Ben: 1/5 0:36
Ashley: 1/5 1:07
Total: 1/5 0:51.5 (not rounded to break tie)

Ben: If Marc Bolan had left this off 'Beard Of Stars' and replaced it with one of the outtakes (Blessed Wild Apple Girl comes to mind) it would have been the greatest album of his career.

Ashley: Weeeeeeird. Not the good kind of weird, either. The "why would you want to listen to that" sort of weird.



#2 - Guns N Roses - My World
Ben: 1/5 0:28
Ashley: 1/5 0:53
Total: 1/5 0:41

Ben: For those who hated Chinese Democracy, listen to this piece of shit three times in a row and you'll think different.

Ashley: OH MY GOD WHAT IS ASSAULTING MY EARS



#1 - Sammy Davis Jr - Candy Man
Ben: 1/5 0:27
Ashley: 0/5 0:10
Total: 0.5/5 0:19

Ben: Oh fucking hell...

Ashley: I HATE YOU. I don't care, it gets a 0, or -10 or some other negatively infinite integer, or how about a divide by zero error?




And that's it! I hope those of you who actually watched the videos haven't died from puking your guts out. Ashley thinks we should do a second round using songs she has in her collection, and maybe we should! We'll see how good the response is to this round.

Monday, August 3, 2009

I Won!



I was working on my next blog entry (which is taking FOREVER to complete) when I got a new email which informed me that I had indeed won 3rd place in the "How Do You Linux" contest! Here's what's heading my way in the mail:



Ain't it nice? The first thing I'm gonna do with it is install Linux on it!


...oh wait, it's coming pre-installed with Linux. Awesome!

Well then, the first thing I'm gonna do with it is install E17 to make it look nice and sexy!

THANK YOU FOR ALL THE VOTES! You guys kick ass.

Unfortunately, I didn't win the $2000 to go with it. The first two placements went to a couple of Russians, so there will be no Thrift Store shopping spree.

I'm going to finish this blog entry by playing an infamous quote by Jim Belushi from the movie "Red Heat"....

CLICK HERE FOR THE QUOTE