Tag Archives: laughter

When Mike Replaced Joel

By the year 1993, I was hooked something fierce on a cable show called Mystery Science Theater 3000. It combined everything I adored about weird television; puppets, obscure humor, cheesy sets and B-movies. One could learn about the golden age of TV from the well-rounded cast and writers, through their rapid-fire gags and “riffs”. Nobody knew it was a show that would shape the world of entertainment, and become a household word. It was just this wonderful thing we all watched for two hours on Sunday morning, instead of church.

Then word began to spread that the host and creator of the show, Joel Hodgson, was leaving.

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Filed under Faint Signals, Movies You Missed, Nostalgic Obsessions, Robot Toy Fetish, Saturday Movie Matinee, Thousand Listen Club

Stickers All Over The Door

Those of us who were children in the late 1970s remember a form of schoolyard wampum that was ubiquitous at the time. We traded them with each other, and bought them from the corner sweet shop with our allowance, for 25 cents a pack. We’d huddle and inspect each other’s collections, muttering “got it, got it, need it, got it, need it.” We carefully stored them in plastic sleeves for the future, in meticulous fashion.

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Haha! I was totally kidding about that last one. We stuck them all over our bedroom door, until our parents grew furious and made us scrape them off with a putty knife, turning them into garbage.

They were STICKERS. Continue reading

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Filed under Bad Influences, Faint Signals, Late To The Party, Magazine Rack, Nostalgic Obsessions

I Don’t Like The Drugs (But The Drugs Like Me)

"The sedative for coughs", until 1913.

“The sedative for coughs”, until 1913.

Here in Atlanta’s Little Five Points neighborhood, we lost another local musician to heroin. I won’t write his name here, because I don’t want to inextricably link him with the drug that killed him. But there’s an anguished frustration every time this happens, when the needle takes yet one more.

Junk has been a cancer on music since before Charlie Parker played a note. It has taken too many casualties to list here. It seeps into cinema and art like toxic groundwater. No one does better work while on heroin. It improves no experience; it only makes one atrophy. What it does, is put your soul in terrible pain, and then dulls it. Nothing it does helps you or anyone else in any legitimate way. Continue reading

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Filed under Bad Influences, Don't Know Don't Care, Idiot's Delight, Worst Of All

Movies You Missed: Entertainment

Comedian Gregg Turkington created the Neil Hamburger persona in the 1990s; a bespectacled, bilious nightclub performer with an impossibly greasy comb-over, a bowtie, and three cocktails tucked under his arm. I first saw him on the talk show Tom Green used to broadcast from his LA home, and it was obvious even then that Turkington was crafting a comedy image on par with Tony Clifton, or Otto & George.

Hamburger is not impressed with the neck and legs of Thora.

Hamburger is not impressed with the neck and legs of Thora.

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Filed under Movies You Missed, Saturday Movie Matinee

Damnable Dog

From BIUL #2.

From BIUL #2.

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Filed under Bad Influences, Comix Classic & Current, Magazine Rack

Bad News, Worse Timing

“Great minds think alike.”

That and coincidence are the reasons why in 1984, This Is Spinal Tap had a counterpart from the UK, Bad News.

The runner-up in the pants-stuffing joke competition of 1983.

The runner-up in the pants-stuffing joke competition of 1980s mockumentaries.

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Filed under Bad Influences, Faint Signals, Idiot's Delight, Late To The Party, Movies You Missed, Nostalgic Obsessions, Saturday Movie Matinee, Thousand Listen Club, Worst Of All

Hearts Are Trump

Gonzo journalism is a style of journalism that is written without claims of objectivity, often including the reporter as part of the story via a first-person narrative. The word “gonzo” is believed to have been first used in 1970 to describe an article by Hunter S. Thompson, who later popularized the style.

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So last weekend I was about a hundred feet from Donald Trump.

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Filed under Bad Influences, Don't Know Don't Care, Idiot's Delight, Worst Of All

The Thankless Life

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A harsh truth of reality: not every movie gets a sequel, and this isn’t a bad thing. Only one thing grants a movie a sequel; money.

Money and passion are often confused by consumers. They feel the same, in many ways, and they produce similar results. But for creative people, money and passion are completely different creatures. The latter is fuel, and the former is a means to an end. You can possess a passion; money, you can only hold. Continue reading

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Filed under Bad Influences, Faint Signals, Late To The Party, Movies You Missed, Nostalgic Obsessions, Saturday Movie Matinee

Lost Loves: Exit 57

For an all-too-brief twelve episodes, there existed a program called Exit 57, from 1995 to 1996. If you enjoy sketch comedy, you already know about it. It was the first place most people saw this guy:

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Filed under Bad Influences, Faint Signals, Girls of BIUL, Nostalgic Obsessions

A Can’t-Miss Proposition

2009 was a tense year for BIUL; I was still decompressing post-movie production, and dealing with myriad life-changing bullshit. At some point I drew a comic strip about Living Colour.

No idea who the woman with the awful hair is supposed to be.

No idea who the woman with the awful hair is supposed to be.

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Filed under Bad Influences, Comix Classic & Current, Faint Signals