Super Awesome Stuff of the Week

2012, Week 8

Tue, 28 Feb 2012 08:00:00 +0000

#TomThon Week One

For two weeks of the year WFMU (Wikipedia) hosts a two week fundraising marathon. WFMU is a listener sponsored radio station, and the way they make their operating budget is through the marathon. They don’t take sleazy corporate grants or shady government subsidies or any of that stuff.

Leading the charge is the aptly named ‘The Best Show on WFMU’ and the week one show was a doozy. Featuring Ted Leo and Julie Klausner live in studio and joined by Vance the Puppet and Gary the Squirrel (who I fucking love by the way), you can watch the whole three hour show below (the music section lasts for ~19 minutes at the start):

If you don’t fancy watching the full three hours, here’s some highlights:

Coming up in the week two show (Tuesday February 28th, 9PM-midnight EST (I’ll let you figure out when that is for your timezone)) is the return of Ted Leo who will be joined by John Hodgman and Patrick Stickles (from Titus Andronicus)!

While we’re here I might as well give you some info about the 2012 Best Show Fun Pack which can be secured with a donation of $75 or more:

Best Show Magazine – with contributions from John Hodgman, David Rees, an unreleased “Timewaster Letter” from Robin Cooper (aka Robert Popper) and Michael Kupperman! An extended interview with Michael Nesmith! An all-star Q&A with Scharpling and Wurster, with questions from Patton Oswalt, Amy Poehler, Paul Rudd, Paul Scheer and so many more!
A flexi-disc featuring music from Kurt Vile and The Reigning Sound recorded just for this!
A CD of all new comedy from Scharpling & Wurster, Zach Galifianakis, Vance The Puppet, Jen Kirkman, Gary The Squirrel and more!
A download of the Radiovision Conference Panel with Tom Scharpling, Ira Glass and Marc Maron! It’s a funny and revealing conversation – hear Tom GOMP an audience member live!
An all new Best Show sticker and a Vance stress ball! Unbelievable, right?
Anybody who pledges $500 or more gets a colour vinyl version of the 2011 premium single Rated GG! It’s the only way you’re ever going to get one of these!
If you pledge at least $1000 you get to visit WFMU to watch an episode of The Best Show live and in person!

I’d like to personally thank everyone who donated during Week 1, WFMU is a rare thing and it’s important that we help keep it going. If you haven’t pledged yet, please call 1-800-989-9368 (USA) or pledge online at www.wfmu.org and be counted!

All Together Now - Everything The Beatles Ever Did

Every Beatles tune, played together, sequenced in order of lengths, with the longest starting first and all 226 tunes ending together.

A new public release version of this piece is available for download at http://ramjacradio.bandcamp.com/

Man Walks All Day to Create Spectacular Snow Patterns

For 5-9 hours a day, artist Simon Beck walks the frozen lakes of Savoie, France, creating massive patterns in the snow. Each piece is approximately the size of three football fields!

View more here.

How Was Your Week? Live!

With a guest list of Sandra Bernhard, Tom Scharpling, Joe Mande, Ira Glass, and introducing Leigh Hendrix, you’d be daft not to listen to this week’s special live episode of Julie Klausner’s ‘How Was Your Week’. Oh, and Ted Leo and the Pharmacists perform too!

Listen to the episode here.

2012, Week 7

Sun, 19 Feb 2012 00:24:00 +0000

Mr. Happy Man

I’m not sure it’s possible that I’ll ever find something that will better fit what I’m aiming for with this blog than the following video. Here’s the magnificent Johnny Barnes, enjoy:

Not New This Week But New To Me:

The First Chord of “A Hard Day’s Night”

This is one for the music nerds. If you’ve ever wondered just how the first chord of A Hard Day’s Night was created, all is revealed:

Kandle - Know My Name

I was having a little mooch around Bandcamp this week and discovered this song. Give it a listen, you might like it:

The full EP is available as a pay-what-you-like download here.

2012, Week 6

Wed, 15 Feb 2012 02:01:18 +0000

Posters, Flyers And Notes From The Streets Of New York City

A collection of weird, funny and/or slightly scary posters, handwritten notes and flyers found on the streets of NYC.

Visit the website.

Not New This Week But New To Me:

PressPausePlay

The digital revolution of the last decade has unleashed creativity and talent in an unprecedented way, with unlimited opportunities.

But does democratized culture mean better art or is true talent instead drowned out? This is the question addressed by PressPausePlay, a documentary film containing interviews with some of the world’s most influential creators of the digital era.

Visit the website for more info.

2012, Week 5

Sun, 05 Feb 2012 09:22:03 +0000

Tim and Eric’s Billion Dollar Movie

Professional comedians/weirdos Tim and Eric have made a movie. If you’re in USA (or can get a USA iTunes account and credits) you can watch it online now and it’ll be in cinemas soon. Here’s the trailer:

Not New This Week But New To Me:

A Man Falls, Injures Himself

The story of an unfortunate fall, my heart bleeds…

AUGUSTA, GA - Orville Smith, a store manager for Best Buy in Augusta, Ga. told police he observed a customer, later identified as Tyrone Jackson of Augusta, on surveilance cameras putting a laptop computer under his jacket. When confronted the man became irate, knocked down an employee, drew a knife and ran for the door.

Outside on the sidealk were four Marines collecting toys for the Toys for Tots program. Smith said the Marines stopped the man, but he stabbed one of them, Cpt. Phillip Duggan, in the back; the injury did not appear to be severe.

After police and an ambulance arrived at the scene, Cpt. Duggan was taken for treatment.

“The subject was also transported to the local hospital with two broken arms, a broken ankle, a broken leg, several missing teeth, possible broken ribs, multiple contusions, assorted lacerations, a broken nose and a broken jaw ….. injuries he sustained when he slipped and fell off the curb after stabbing the Marine,” according to a police report.

Patton Oswalt Does Something Odd

From Patton Oswalt on Twitter:

Forgot I did this. I stayed absolutely motionless in the opening scene from a KING OF QUEENS episode. EERIE:

2012, Week 4

Sun, 29 Jan 2012 00:05:00 +0000

Bon Jovier

Ever wondered what it would be like to hear a Bon Jovi song performed in the style of Bon Iver? What a stupid question, of course you have. You need wonder no more because here’s Miracles of Modern Science to show you:

Ice Cube’s Good Day

Using a process of elimination, Donovan Strain identifies when Ice Cube’s Good Day was.

Visit the site.

Alabama Shakes

I found this band via Marc Maron on twitter, I think he puts it quite nicely:

Holy fucking shit! Where did this voice come from? I cried when i heard it.

Here’s the band performing ‘Be Mine’ on KCRW this week followed by ‘You Ain’t Alone’ from last year (maybe my favourite song of theirs):

2012, Week 3

Sun, 22 Jan 2012 09:18:00 +0000

Todd Glass Comes Out

I’m pretty sure everyone has heard about this by now but I’m repeating it just in case it has somehow slipped you by. GO AND LISTEN TO THE TODD GLASS EPISODE OF WTF. NOW.

“I always thought my cause wouldn’t be pro-gay—it would be like, ‘Leave everybody the fuck alone.’”

Now you’ve listened to the episode, here’s one of my favourite Todd Glass bits:

Hello

Made by Matthijs Vlot
mattatjeoorlog.nl

The Bugle has a New Home

The Bugle, a satirical podcast formerly from TimesOnline, is now free from its corporate shackles. For all the info you need regarding the change of home, listen to this clip:

If you subscribe to the show the above clip should have arrived midweek. If it didn’t (and Friday’s full episode too) you need to update your feed to http://feeds.feedburner.com/thebuglefeed.

Visit the website.

2012, Week 2

Sun, 15 Jan 2012 00:01:00 +0000

Real Estate - Easy

The streak of great music videos directed by Tom Scharpling continues. Featuring the misadventures of the band’s streat team (lead by US comedian Chris Gethard), here’s ’Easy’ by Real Estate:

Ken Plume Chats with Jesse Thorn

Ken Plume loves to chat. Even more so, he loves to chat with people he finds interesting – really, the only criteria worth mentioning. In “A Bit Of A Chat With Ken Plume”, he brings those conversations with interesting people to you, the listener.

This week on ‘A Bit of a Chat…’ Ken speaks with Jesse Thorn about Guttenberg’s PIP, Bullseye, hot boxes, The Randy List, stapler phones, and the future.

Visit the site.

Jesse Thorn Chats with Chris Gethard

Jesse Thorn and Chris Gethard twice in one week! This time Jesse plays the part of interviewer as he talks with Chris about P. Diddy, using both mania and depression to shape his comedy, and confronting Internet trolls in person. The high/lowlight of this interview though is the story Chris tells about the time when he was three years old and he beat up a midget. Take a listen below:

This interview was featured on this week’s episode of Bullseye with Jesse Thorn. Listen to the full episode here.

Not New This Week but New to Me:

Viva Vox Choir - The Prodigy Mix

Live a cappella Prodigy medley (Out of Space, No Good, Smack My Bitch Up, Omen, Breathe, and Firestarter) performed by Viva Vox choir from Serbia, Belgrade, Zemun at Sava Centar, December 2011.

2012, Week 1

Sun, 08 Jan 2012 08:42:00 +0000

Bullseye with Jesse Thorn

This week one of my favourite podcasts The Sound of Young America was relaunched with as Bullseye with Jesse Thorn. It’s the same great show you’ve come to expect over the years but rejigged slightly and with a less embarrasing name.

If you’ve never heard the show, here’s how the good folks over at Maximum Fun describe it:

Bullseye is a public radio show about what’s good in popular culture. With a keen editorial eye, Bullseye sifts the wheat from the chaff, and brings you hot culture picks, in-depth interviews with the most revered and revolutionary creative people and irreverent original comedy.

Bullseye is equal parts funny and fascinating. Whether you’re already plugged in to the culture map, or looking for a signpost, Bullseye will keep you on target.

Episode One features interviews with the cast of Downton Abbey (Hugh Bonneville, Dan Stevens and Joanne Froggatt) and Chris Lilley (creator of HBO’s Angry Boys). You can listen to the Downton Abbey interview below:

To celebrate the launch of Bullseye, The Sound of Young America has been made available as a torrent. Here’s Jesse to explain:

I decided a few weeks ago that the best way to remember the show would be to offer a free torrent of all of it. Every single file we’ve got. Every episode. 500 or so, by my count. More than 15 gigs. A few videos I found lying around, too.

The contents of this torrent are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs License. That means you can share them non-commercially as freely as you like. In fact, I hope that you will. Feel free to upload the torrent to public trackers, as well.

I do have two requests.

First, remember that we’re supported by your donations, so if you are a donor, thank you, and if you’re not, please become one.

Second, if you can, please seed this torrent, so others can share in the fun.

For more information please visit MaximumFun.org.

@StealthMountain

Someone created a Twitter spellcheck bot that sent people tweets when they typed “sneak peak” instead of “sneak peek”. Some of the responses are pretty funny, you can read them here.

David Weinberger’s Top Ten List of Top Ten Lists of Top Ten Lists

David Weinberger’s top ten list of top ten lists of top ten lists.

2011, Weeks 1-52

Sun, 01 Jan 2012 00:04:00 +0000

Welcome to this new blog where I, John, present some of my favourite things from the past week(s). To get things started I give you a look back at 2011 in the form of a MEGAPOST.

So in no particular order, here we go…

Tim Minchin & The Heritage Orchestra

I’ve been a recent convert to Tim Minchin’s comedy. Part stand-up, part musical comedian, fully wonderful. Even if this record & DVD aren’t to your tastes you at least have to applaud the ambition involved. Come on now, a 55 piece orchestra at a comedy gig, when you have ever seen that before?

There’s a wide range of musical styles covered in the performance, here’s one of the more gentle and less-batshit-crazy numbers

The Music Videos of Tom Scharpling

Following on from 2010’s superb video for Ted Leo’s Bottled In Cork, undoubtably the best music videos of the past year have come from Tom Scharpling (with producers Robert Hatch-Miller & Puloma Basu). Sometimes funny, sometimes weird, always gorgeous:

and here’s a bonus trailer for John Hodgman’s book That Is All:

Me1 vs Me2 Snooker with Richard Herring

This is easily the most unique podcast I’ve heard for a long time, in which Richard Herring might have finally lost his mind. It was bound to happen sooner or later and it’s a joy to listen to:

A series of exhibition snooker matches in which Richard Herring recreates his lonely childhood by playing himself at snooker and commentating as he plays.

Visit site

Fucked Up Presents: David’s Town and David Comes to Life

If you’ve ever wondered what a rock opera from a hardcore punk band would sound like, do yourself a favour and pick up a copy of Fucked Up’s David Comes to Life. It’s great, really great. You know what’s just as great? The album Fucked Up released solely to promote DCtL, David’s Town. Released on Record Store Day and limited to 2000 copies (of which I have one!) the album featuring fake bands (Fucked Up with guest singers) is easily worthy of a release in it’s own right and would certainly feature in many a ‘Top 10 of the Year’ list.

From David Comes to Life, Turn The Season:

From David’s Town, Unrequited Love (featuring Coco Hames from The Ettes):

The Blizzard

A quarterly football book/magazine featuring some great writing and beautifully put together. It’s well worth checking out even if you’re not much a sports fan. For example, there’s an article in issue 1 detailing the amazing story of Alexandre Villaplane, France’s first World Cup captain who was executed aged 39 for “high treason and acts of barbarism”. It’s a fantastic read and if you’d like to sample it before buying the print version there is a pay-what-you-want digital version available on their website.

I cannot recommend this publication highly enough, it’s fantastic.

Visit the site.

Low Times

The new music podcast and website from Tom Scharpling, Daniel Ralston & Maggie Serota. The show showcases in-depth interviews with some top musical talent, including Janet Weiss (Wild Flag), Patrick Stickles (Titus Andronicus), Damian Abraham (Fucked Up), Alex Turner (Arctic Monkeys) and many more. The website features articles such as ‘A Brief History of 1980s (American) Football Rap’ and is currently running a vote to find the worst lyrics of all time.

Visit the site.

Danger Mouse & Daniele Luppi - Rome

American producer Danger Mouse and the Italian film composer Daniele Luppi released in 2011 a spaghetti western-inspired album titled Rome with vocals by Jack White and Norah Jones. It was recorded during sporadic sessions over a five-year period at Rome’s Forum Studios and was inspired by the film soundtrack work of Ennio Morricone. The instrumentation was done mainly by musicians who played on the original Ennio Morricone scores.

Two Against One (featuring Jack White):

Vance the Puppet

The Best Show on WFMU has had yet another stellar year and recently launched a new star, Vance the prog rock loving puppet.

Follow Vance on Twitter.

On a related note, if you’ve never heard The Best Show before, the Best Show Gems podcast has recently released a perfect introduction to the show. Click here and listen to the episode dated December 26, 2011.

The Todd Glass Show

If you like your comedy silly, look no further than The Todd Glass Show. It’s a really fun podcast where Todd is joined by his comedian friends with conversation and improv bits. It’s worth starting with episode 1 rather than just jumping in due to the number of running jokes that are now going on in the show.

Visit the site.

Honorable Podcast Mentions for Not Being New But Still Being Great

I’ll just drop these here in list form without descriptions, this post is far too long already:

The Best Show on WFMU
The Bugle
Comedy Bang Bang
The Maximum Fun podcast family
The Pod F. Tompkast
The 40 Year Old Boy

There you go, the best of 2011. Not a bad year! I’m sure I’ve forgot a few things, but what’re you going to do?