Fake Bands

"Tribute Bands" are a funny thing.

At least your Uncle PC thinks so.

Bands who make their living pretending to be much bigger, more successful bands.

The Blog has enjoyed several tribute shows over the years.

The best reason that The Blog can think of to see a tribute band is if that band is talented enough to render a plausible recreation of a concert by a group that no longer exists and has little hope of ever re-forming.

Mostly, if the original band is no longer not just performing, but also, if some or all of the original members are no longer breathing.

I'll come back to that in a minute.

There is another reason to see a tribute show.

For example, The Blog has seen the actual "Rolling Stones" perform several times in his life. In gigantic venues. In nose bleed seats. At ticket prices that rival the down payment on a new car.

But a few years ago, at the insistence of Mrs. Blog, we saw a Stones band that scored on every count that matters if you are going to sell the tribute. Every member bore an uncanny resemblance to their original counterparts, albeit (and this is actually a plus) to how the originals looked 40 years ago. They also nailed the sound. (An absolute must.) And, we had front row seats in a medium size venue (a local performing arts center.)

So even though the whole thing was an illusion, it was still pretty cool.

And the whole thing cost less than dinner for two at The Olive Garden.

On the other hand...

That show was framed as a "battle of the bands" between the Stones band and a Beatles band.

That particular Beatles band, (I won't name them, to protect the guilty,) was as mind numbingly awful as an "American Idol" audition reject.

Oh, they sounded okay, (even though a MacBook™ sat, prominently, on a stand in the middle of the stage and was, clearly, being used to reproduce the instrumentation that they weren't equipped for themselves.) Their cheap wigs and cheaper costumes made them look like they had gotten a deal on budget Beatles Halloween costumes from Party City.

And, their George Harrison, during their "Sgt. Pepper" era set, bore an uncanny resemblance (sorry to use that phrase twice in one post, but I have to here,) to my 60-year-old, Armenian auto mechanic. And that is hard to look passed.

And, a note to their "Paul..." If you are going to make a living pretending to be Paul McCartney, you might want to commit to learning to play left-handed.

Anyway... let's get back to the point of this post.

The Blog has seen a number of Beatles tribute bands. I might even be a bit of a connoisseur.

The band "The Fab Four" is, hands down, the best of the bunch. Broadway's  "Rain" (part tribute, part play) was excellent. There have been a few others that have ranged in quality from good to not good.

As I posted last night, Mrs. Blog and I went to Manhattan Beach's Pollywog Park to see yet another Beatles band...

                                                                "A Hard Day's Night."

As did everyone, evidently, in the Los Angeles South Bay.

I mean, look at this crowd! (And this is just the number that I could fit into one shot from my iPhone™ crap-cam.)

I'm not sure that an actual Beatles reunion, featuring a resurrected John and George, could draw a bigger crowd.

And, they were good.

Very good.

My only quibble, and it's a small one, the performance as a whole felt like a beat-for beat rip-off of "The Fab Four's" show. (Maybe they are more of a "Fab Four" tribute band like the old SNL bit about "Beatlemaniamania! An incredible simulation of an incredible simulation!") But, they did it well.

They had the sound. They had the look. The Blog got a little teary during "John's" performance of "Imagine."

So, thumbs up!

*One random thought...*

You will always win if you bet someone that the Beatles tribute band will come back from intermission dressed in Sgt. Pepper costume.

*End random thought.*

*End central point.*

*Back to the broader subject of tribute bands.*

Over the last couple of decades, tribute bands have become a music industry sub-genre all their own.

It's the damnedest thing.

Name a band that has ever existed with some degree of popular success, and you will find bands making a living (or, at least, beer money) performing their "tributes."

Love ABBA? There are tribute bands. The Doors? Yep. Pink Floyd? Of course!

Hell, there is even a Partridge Family tribute band called Sound Magazine who caught The Blog's eye and ear a few years ago when they contributed "Partrified" covers of KISS' "Shout it Out Loud" and "Radioactive" to a couple of charity benefit albums. I don't know if you can still find these on line. The charity web site, kissarmyonline.com no longer seems to exist. But, if you are of a certain age, that age where you grew up with the Partridges and graduated to the harder stuff thanks to KISS, you need to have these cover recordings on your iPod™!

And then, there are the sub-sub-genres in the tribute world.

The Blog is particularly enamored with distaff cover bands. Female dopplegangers of male bands.

                                                                     PRISS, anyone?


How about AC/Dshe, Judas Priestess, or Misstallica?

We've got 'em!

And then there are the novelty acts. Like..

                                                                            Mini Kiss

Or, the incredibly bizarre and hilarious "mash-up" (and we are still in the realm of KISS, here...)

Elvis Simmons and the Memphis Strutters.

(KISS may be the most 'tributed" band ever. KISS was the first band, that The PC knows of, who not only didn't object to the idea of tribute bands, they actively encourage them. At the rate that KISS is going, in a few more years, the official band may be made up entirely of new members. And Gene Simmons will keep going to the bank.)

In two weeks, Pollywog Park will host the popular Neil Diamond tribute band "Fabulous Diamond." They have played at Pollywog every year for several summers now. Mrs. Blog and I will be there. And, experience has taught us this...

"If you have to get to the park by 10:00 AM to claim your space for a Beatles tribute, for "Fabulous Diamond," we'll see you when the park opens at 6:00 AM."

"Fabulous Diamond" is that popular, even though their "Neil" breaks the first cardinal rule of tribute performers. He looks nothing like Neil Diamond. A pale, freckled, redhead who jokes about the fact that he doesn't have the look. He looks like one of "Harry Potter's" Weasley brothers in a silver lamé shirt.

But, holy shit! He has the sound. In spades.

                  ___________________________________________________

But, next Saturday night, Mrs. Blog and I, along with my youngest Blog Sister and Blog bro-in-law, will be attending a show by the never imitated, but (based on a quick YouTube™ search,) often covered, official lefty, funny, folk singer of The PC Blog, Roy Zimmerman.

In anticipation of that, allow me to share another favorite RZ number...

"The End of the Ship."

Roy Zimmerman and Other Diversions

After an insanely long day at work, shooting a pilot for a possible, future talk show...

The Blog and his Mrs. Blog will spend tomorrow...

(No! Wait! It's 1:30 AM. So I guess I mean, today.)

...camped out at Manhattan Beach, CA's beautiful Pollywog Park.

Every summer, from July through August, the city of Manhattan Beach hosts a free concert in the park on Sundays.

The concerts start at 5:00 PM. But, if you want a decent seat for the show, figure on staking your claim around 11:00 AM.

It is a great excuse to, totally, waste a Sunday doing pretty much nothing, except read a book, play Scrabble™, snack on cheese and crackers and drink wine.

This evening... A Beatles tribute band, "A Hard Day's Night."

And, next Saturday night, thanks to The Blog Sister, an evening with The Blog's official, lefty, folk singing, political satirist...

                                                                       Roy Zimmerman.

And, in anticipation of that, The Blog will spend the next couple of nights sharing some of his favorite RZ YouTube™ videos.

Tonight, let's begin with a classic...

...A spot on commentary about "traditional, biblical marriage..."

It is also, technically, astounding.

Roy shifts between two vocal sounds so smoothly that it seems like he is overlapping on himself. Which is not, humanly, possible.

But, here you go.

Roy Zimmerman sings, "I Want a Marriage Like They Had in the Bible."

Enjoy.

"Walk With Me."

*No humor tonight. At least, not much. Sorry.*

She took my hand and said, "Walk with me."

This afternoon, that gesture and those three, little words sent my heart into my throat.

I had heard the rumors and rumblings. I understood that some sort of change was in the air. It wasn't a matter of "Will there be a change?" It was a question of, "How radical will the change be?"

I'm contractually prohibited from discussing details about the projects that I work on. So please forgive me if I am a bit cryptic and uncharacteristically un-forthecoming tonight.

I might also add that you may notice that I have eschewed the usual "third person" self-reference, much like I do when I write a eulogy.

Because that is where my head and heart are at, right now.

I am in a sad frame of mind.

(If you know me personally, you can probably figure out what and who I'm talking about. If you don't, well, maybe in a month or two, I can clarify.)

This morning, in an informal meeting with my immediate boss, in a hallway in an office building in an historic Hollywood movie and television studio, I was assured that whatever degree that change was, (and no one was committing, at that point, to what that degree might be. Maybe because, at 8:30 this morning, no one really knew, for sure. Or, maybe, because that's just how it goes in Hollywood,) that my own situation would not change much at all. Except that I can expect to be making a few new friends in the near future.

And that is a good thing, as far as it goes.

So, it wasn't like I didn't see it coming.

Never-the-less, minor or radical, the coming change wasn't going to make me happy. That much, I knew.

All day long, as the optimism lobe of my brain kept telling me that everything was going to be fine...

A voice kept replaying in a loop, over and over, in my head.

It was "Ren and Stimpy's" Mr. Horse.

                                                                   "I don't like it at all."


We have been together for five years, she and I. Longer than that, if you count the slow, year or two "roll out" and pilot that led to these past five years. So, let's say seven years. That feels more accurate.

And, at approximately 12:30 PM, as she headed toward the stage exit...

She took my hand and said, "Walk with me."

And we walked.

She put her arm around my waist. And, I put my arm around her shoulder.

And we walked. And we talked.

This was an unusually intimate moment for us.

I am pretty sure that the last time we were this demonstrative of our mutual affection was the night that she got on a plane to a very dangerous part of the world, and I was legitimately worried about her safety. 

*Digression*

On another TV show that I work on, the subject came up, with a guest in my make-up chair, that I worked with this person. The guest said, "Oh! She is so beautiful! Is she as nice as she seems?"

I answered, "Between you and me, I have, sort of, a secret crush on her."

A coworker overheard that and said, 'Yeahhhh. It's not much of a secret."

Busted.

*End Digression*


"So," I asked, "What's going on?"

"This is it," she said. "I'm done here."

Her five year contract was up. And, eleventh hour negotiations with the company fell apart.

It happens. That's show business,

She went on.

"I didn't tell you this morning, because... well... you know."

I do know.

She is not one for long, tearful good-byes.

I pulled it together and sniffed back the tears that were threatening to fall.

"But," she said, "Whatever my next project is, you know who will be the first person I call."

I sniffed some more.

We hugged.

Then we hugged, again.

And then, we hugged one more time, for good measure.

And she said, "I love you, you know. And it's been a great ride, this past five years."

Now, I am struggling to keep my shit together.

"I will not cry. I will not cry."

And I said, "I love you back, you know. And it has been that."

She headed to the parking lot. I headed back to the stage.

We will see each other again. I am sure of it.

But, tonight, there is a hole in my heart.


And I am feeling a bit of grief,  as if I have lost a member of my family.

                             ___________________________________________________

On a completely different note and shifting of gears...

Evidently, the greedy, petty cock-biters at CBS.com...

(Not to be confused with the greedy, petty cock-biters at Time Warner Cable...)

...Have caught on to the whole anonymous web proxy thing, and have figured out a way to block the download of their video player to anyone who tries to access their video content via that route.

So, disregard the advice The PC shared a couple of nights ago.

The Blog has tried a couple of web proxy sites, tonight. With no luck.

CBS seems to have successfully prevented TWC subscribers from accessing their content.

As mentioned in that earlier post, TWC is sending a tech crew out the The Blog House to hook up antennas. So, score one for TWC and zero for CBS.

But, a funny thing has occurred to The Blog.

While about half of CBS' programing...

(Their one hour "episodics" i.e., "NCIS:LA...") 

... are produced by CBS' parent company's sister subsidiary, Paramount Studios...

...their top rated sit-coms...

 ...i.e. anything from Chuck Lorre...

... are produced by Warner Bros. Television.

A subsidiary of...

...wait for it...

Time Warner.

*The Blog Predicts*

This dispute will be settled before the fall season begins.

Because neither side has a choice.

Hey! Have You Heard?

Racism is dead in America.

America is enjoying a post-racist society.

Well, except in Arizona.

Striking a Blow (or Two) for The Little Guy

Let me confess something, right up front.

Here in this space, your Uncle PC can be a bit of an unapologetic asshole. That is, sort of, the purpose of this blog.

As stated in my profile and on the very first post, "This is a place for spleen venting..."

Here, The PC can be un-pc. He can blow off steam and be as crude and vulgar, sarcastic and pissed off as he wants.

And, hopefully, be entertaining and funny in the process.

But, (and here comes the confession,) out in the real world, your favorite blogger has always been a bit of a doormat.

Sure, my closest friends know my blog side well. They are the ones who encouraged me to write this stuff down, to begin with. But, in general, out in the big, wide world, the "public me" puts up with a lot of shit with his mouth closed, making no waves, most of the time.

There! I said it.

And, "Why," you may ask, "are you saying it now?"

Excellent question! Thanks for asking.

It's because tonight, your Uncle PC is feeling like a bit of a bad-ass.

I don't know if it's my advancing age, my random glimpses of the reality of mortality, or maybe this blog has just rewired my head, but I am putting up with a lot less shit than I used to.

And not putting up with shit got a couple of things accomplished today.

If you live in Los Angeles, New York City, Dallas, Chicago or any of the other markets affected by the battle royal between Time Warner Cable and CBS Television Networks, or if you have been visiting The PC over the last week or so, you know what is going on.

While each side points fingers and calls the other "greedy," those of us who get our television through TWC are not seeing our favorite CBS shows. TWC has blocked CBS networks in their major markets and, in retaliation, CBS has blocked their internet video content to anyone (like me) who gets their internet through TWC.

Both sides are behaving badly.

The awesome blogger and retired television writer Ken Levine summed it up best...

 "It’s Goliath vs. Goliath. Or more like General Zad vs. Bane. Who do you root for – the gazillionaires at Time-Warner or Sumner Redstone's Viacom? What’s fun is watching the public cat fight."

And, it would be fun, if it wasn't for the fact that Mrs. Blog is not getting her "Young and the Restless" and "Big Brother." And The Blog is missing "Under the Dome."

And, while The PC feels that both sides are culpable, the bottom line is, of the two companies, TWC is the one that sends The Blog a bill for service every month.

So, TWC is the company that has been on the receiving end of The PC's wrath.

Now, it has been fashionable, for a very long time, to deride the cable industry in general and TWC specifically.  Forget baseball. Bitching about bad cable service and it's strangle-hold monopoly is America's favorite pastime.

But, I have never, ever had a beef with Time Warner. I have always gotten excellent service from them.

Even last month when the signal kept dropping out on my favorite channels and it took them a month to find and fix the problem, TWC's techies worked hard and diligently and did find and fix the issue.

Kudos to them!

And, TWC gave me a hefty credit for the month.

But, this week has been different.

Mrs. Blog and I went into the TWC store to voice our complaint about the blackout.

And, I get it. The low level, probably not much higher than minimum wage employees at the store have no control over the battle being waged by their corporate masters.

Fuck, most of them are probably as pissed about not seeing this week's "Big Brother" as Mrs. Blog is.

What set The PC off was the total indifference displayed by said employees. Our concerns were met with literal eye-rolls and shrugs.

"You're going to cancel your service if the issue isn't resolved by the end of the week? Fine with us. Bring your equipment in and we'll cancel your service. Whatever."

To paraphrase a very old SNL bit...

"We don't care. We don't have to. We're the cable company."

 I demanded to speak to a supervisor.

After trying to feed me the official company line, which I had already gotten from the company themselves, the supervisor gave me an antenna and instructions for hook up, so we could get CBS over the broadcast airwaves.

The antenna didn't work.

Five return visits in three days, accompanied by as many shrugs and eye-rolls from every low level "customer service" (HA!) employee that he encountered...

...Brings us to today.

A brief meeting with a tech supervisor got this result...

"Here's what we're going to do. We don't usually do this, but we want you to be happy. So, we will send out a technician, at no charge, to get you hooked up to a working antenna. That should see you through until the whole dispute is resolved."

Huzzah!

Finally someone who was interested in satisfying a paying customer.

Without a singe rolled eye or shrugged shoulder.

That's all I wanted.

Score one for the little guy.

Now, on to CBS's petty bullshit.

CBS is blocking internet access to it's video content to TWC internet subscribers.

Thanks to a suggestion posted in the comments on a FoTB's Facebook thread, The PC checked out an internet "proxy server" called...

                                                                      HideMyAss.com.

Don't laugh.

Okay, go ahead and laugh. The site, truly, is indelicately named.

But damned if it didn't do the trick!

He accessed CBS.com through this anonymizing server and, lo an behold, got full access to CBS.com's content.

Tonight, Mrs. Blog got caught up with "Big Brother" and The Blog got to watch last Monday's "Under the Dome."

And, finally, there is peace and happiness in The Blog household. And, The PC is now Mrs. Blog's hero.

BAM!

That is the sound of The Blog sticking it to The Man.

And it feels pretty fucking good. 

The Final Zimmerman Rant: Finally

Your old Uncle PC admits it.

He, like so many Americans, has developed a pretty short attention span when it comes to news cycle arcs.

As such news cycles go, the killing of Trayvon Matin by vigilante George Zimmerman has held The Blog's interest, and maybe even passion, for an unusually long period of time.

While checking on The Blog's blog traffic, this evening, he saw several hits in the past week on a post about the disgusting Trayvon themed gun targets that was posted in May of 2012.

That's over a year ago.

Wow!

And, as mentioned in a recent post, in the weeks following a jury's "not guilty" verdict for George Z., The Blog has been chewing on the story like The BlogDog chews on her favorite toy.

                                         (A plush, squeaky Joker dog toy. If anyone cares.)

And, as mentioned, The Blog's research has resulted in a jam packed file of story links and graphics that have happened since the verdict.

The PC promised that this post would be an epic.

But, you know what?

After all that research and so many disheartening revelations about his fellow man...

The PC is sick of it all and is ready to just put a lid on it.

So, instead of the planned epic, I'm going to try to sum it all up as briefly as possible.

Here we go...

The case came down to this...

An unarmed, black, teenager, walking home from a 7/Eleven, was followed, confronted and shot to death, by an armed adult with vigilante tendencies and a history of racially tinged 911 calls and a legally checkered past.

This is fact. No one, not even Zimmerman's defense, denies that.

The defense lawyers did their job. They successfully confused a jury of lay women enough to cast "reasonable doubt" and find in favor of Zimmerman.

Did the jury find correctly, within the parameters of the law?

It would seem so.

Was justice served?

I don't think so.

But, as "they" say, it is what it is.

As disturbing as that is, that isn't what is sticking in The PC's craw.

What bothers me is the fact that in the weeks following the shooting, and in the weeks following the verdict...

... Mostly white, mostly middle class, mostly male, (mostly parroting the millionaire punditry,) and exclusively "conservative" folks, some public figures, others, just plain folks and some friends of The PC...

...Have spent an inordinate amount of time and energy defending Zimmerman, defending lax gun laws and "Stand Your Ground" laws and blaming Trayvon for his own death.

It started out with the once cool, but now pathetic, Fox "News" favorite "selfie" tweeter and Bill O'Reilly boy toy, Geraldo Rivera...

...blaming Trayvon's death on the way he was dressed.

                                                      Seriously. This guy needs a hoodie.

And then, there is the whole denial that race had anything to do with the case.

Or, even, the denial that racism still exists in today's America.

Just ask the "Kenyan Half-rican" that America voted into the White House, twice.

There is some serious "post-racism" for you.

And, oh, The Blog's white, conservative friends love to glom on to quotations from successful African-Americans and "share" them on Facebook, when said rich and famous black men criticize their black brothers (often, out of context,) who weren't lucky, talented or educated well enough to rise up from their lowly existences.

"That Bill Cosby," they say, (*ahem* That's Dr. William H. Cosby, to you.) "That Charles Barkley, that Morgan Freeman, that Barak Obama," (and yes, that is President Obama, to you.)...

"They know that it's not about race."

Actually, they do.

Some of them, from their rarified air of success, may have forgotten. Because, The PC has observed, close up, the tendency that rich, super successful people, (or those who marry rich, super successful people,) forget what it's like to not be rich, very quickly. 

We will get to that in a post, soon.

But our President remembers.

He remembers what it was like to be brown skinned in America.

Those store detectives that followed him around didn't know or care that his mother and grandparents were white. They only knew that his skin was dark.

*DIGRESSION*

Many, many years ago, the lily white Blog wore his hair down to his waist. (That's when he had hair.) Those same store detectives, (well, not the exact same ones. The Blog lived in Ohio. The Prez lived in Hawaii,) But, the same sort, profiled your Uncle PC, based on his appearance. He wasn't black, but he was a long haired, hippy freak. probably high on "Mary Jane" and looking to steal the store blind.

*END DIGRESSION*

Where was I?

Oh, yeah.

So, Trayvon Martin has been tried and convicted of his own murder, in the mainstream and social media because he was a black kid, wearing a hoodie, walking home in the rain.

And, George Zimmerman walks free.

A couple of days ago, Mr. Z. was pulled over by a Texas cop for speeding.

He had a firearm in his glove compartment, which, in Texas, is evidently, okay.

He was let off with a warning, which, according to Texas law enforcement, is standard procedure.

Right.

After the cop posed for celeb pix with George.

Go Facebook!

Seems legit.

But, The Blog has seen this before.

George Zimmerman is a "bad penny."

He will turn up again.

His type always do. Just ask O.J.

Unless his speedy trek through Texas was a trip to south of the border.

In which case, we may never see him again.

For now, The Blog is done with him.

And good riddance.

Let me leave you with one final thought...

Got it?

The Blog still has that folder full of research. He's going to hang on to it for now.

Because, even though he is done with George Zimmerman, he isn't done with some of the stuff he has collected.

More about those subjects, later.

Superman vs. Batman

Just a quick "fluff" post.

Nothing deep, angry or important.

Just this...

At the San Diego ComicCon, about a week ago, the "Man of Steel" director, Zack Snyder, dropped a huge hint about what is coming next in the DC Comics/Warner Bros. movie universe.

Watch the announcement here.

Supes vs. Bats.

Who would win?

It seems like a no-brainer.

Superman in nigh on indestructible.

Batman is a mere mortal with access to a bunch of rich man's toys.

But, wait!

Superman is "The Big Blue Boy Scout." Killing is not his thing.

Batman is "The Dark Knight." A deeply disturbed vigilante, yes. But, killing isn't his thing, either.

So the answer to the question is sort of like "Tic-Tac-Toe."

No one can win this game.

Or, maybe, both will win.

A long time ago, in Blog years, The PC posted his story about his own glimpse of the Jon Peter's idea for re-booting Superman.

(The Blog isn't going to go track it down. Feel free to search my archives and find it for yourselves.)

That post linked to a hilarious talk by "Clerks" director Kevin Smith about his take on Jon's "Superman" ideas, and why it was the worst piece of shit ever.

(The Blog agreed. In spades.)

Now, listen to this YouTube™ post, where Kevin gets, totally, behind the new "Superman/Batman" movie concept.

(It's just audio, but stick with it. It's worth it, if you care about the topic.)

If Kevin approves, then The Blog is on board.

Here's looking toward 2015!