Embarassment - O - Meter

What song is more embarassing to be caught listening to:  metal version of Miley Cyrus or metal version of Phantom of the Opera?





Kudos to you if you thought, for a second, that Nightwish would cover the classic Iron Maiden song.  Andrew Lloyd Weber?  Oh my fucking God.

Answer:  Nightwish is definitely higher on the Embarrass - O - Meter.

You read it here first: Bruce Wayne adventures

I have this new idea for a Batman comic. It would be told from the Bruce Wayne point of view rather than Batman. In this series Bruce Wayne is a business mogul that uses the Batman brand to further his business agenda.

Scenarios would work like this: Batman would bust a bank robbing crime ring. He would then invest in their targets, because those banks must have a lot of money.

Another scenario is that Bruce Wayne buys up a bunch of properties in a high crime ghetto. Then as Batman he patrols the area. Crime goes down and the area becomes known as a "Batman Neighborhood" and quickly gentrifies. Bruce Wayne then makes a killing in the real estate boom.

Just remember you read it here first.

Starship Troopers: A movie ahead of the times

Starship Troopers was a movie ahead of the times.  I know what you're thinking.  The book was better.  The plot was juvenile, the acting wooden.  Campy.  But watch it again and look at the details.  Embedded journalists.  Watching newsfeeds in a youtube like manner.  It was a movie that was oddly prescient in depicting how future wars are waged.  The dramatic show down where they are ambushed in hills that look like Kandahar.  The search through mountainous caverns for the leader.  Remind you of anything?





Just saying'

Some people think the movie is pro-war.  Some people think the movie is satirical and is anti-war. Why do you think they dressed Doogie Howser like Dr. Mengle?



Is this a pro or anti war statement?

Anyways, feel free to disagree, but first watch the movie with a critical eye.  Think critically about the themes and the way the movie is presented.  And remember; I'm not arguing that Starship Troopers is a good movie.  I'm just arguing that it was ahead of the times.

Are we in a whiskey bubble?

There was no doubt in my mind that vodka had become a craze.  A mania.  An extraordinary popular delusion.  The crowds were mad for vodka.  The proliferation of brands alone told me this.  Crystal skull vodka.  Black vodka.  Quadruple distilled vodka.  Expensive vodka.  I mean who pays more than 40 dollars for grain neutral spirits anyways?

The whiskey renaissance, meanwhile, was producing new and interesting brands.  Amrut Indian whisky is a solid entry in the new "Indian whisky" category.  Rye whiskeys are coming back from near death with some solid brands.  But then this caught my eye:  St. George's English whisky.  Sounds very exciting and promising indeed.  But then to learn that the first batch that can be legally called whisky, merely 3 years old, has completely sold out.  Has whiskey become a craze as well?



But there's more.  There is the first whiskey produced in Chicago since prohibition, Lion's Pride.  Again a very young whiskey selling for quite a lot (more than 40 dollars a fifth) for being two years old.  Shouldn't your price be based on taste and not location?

I'm starting to get the impression that young men are watching Mad Men and drinking whiskey in large quantities because they want to be Don Draper.  Funny digression:  the Mad Men generation largely drank blended Scotch whisky and not the single malt Scotches that are popular among these pretentious young men.

So what do you think?  Are these new whiskies part of the great whisky renaissance?  Or is whisky starting to become a craze, a mania like vodka?  A whisky bubble perhaps?  And is that a bad thing?

Champion of the internet

First, a refresher on the original you all know and love, the Airwolf theme



Airwolf on electric guitar



Awesome!  Please make one for Streethawk.  Thanks!

collective memory

I've been thinking about memories since reading this weird trip on the old Crow blog.  It is weird because I've never heard of the sitcom Too Close for Comfort before.  That itself is kind of weird because I was raised on sitcoms.  I remember watching Small Wonder, the show with the little girl robot.  Sure everyone claims they liked that show because VH1 I Love the 80s mentions it.  But I can remember episode gags.  Like how the robot girl Vickie was super strong and could drag the dad around.  And how they used green screens to show the dad demonstrating how he'd make the robot girl age with the girl getting bigger via green screen.  And just to show you how much I love sitcoms I'm going to drag up a sitcom from the 80s that only I seem to remember:  Down to Earth.  Thank God for IMDB or I'd probably go crazy, but I remember the sitcom about the flapper who dies in the 20s and comes back as a guardian angel for a yuppie family.  The catch phrase of the show was "wacky do".




Thank you youtube, for giving me my sanity.  Nobody seems to remember the show but me.  Wacky Do!

Collective memory is a weird thing.  Growing up in metro Detroit lots of old people told grand stories of old Detroit.  School teachers told me this tall tale more than once:  back in the day (the 50s and 60s) if you got off the train in Detroit you'd be immediately accosted by Ford and GM recruiters just begging you to come work in the factory.  No really, many people told me this story with heartfelt sincerity.  Back in the day they were so desperate for workers that the car companies sent recruiters to canvass the streets like some hobo looking for money for St Ides.  Just begging you, no matter who you were, to come work for middle class wages with no skills or education.  Please baby please!

To this day I've never really found any hard evidence for this.  It is such a tall tale that it is hard for me to take seriously.  People say this went on through the 70s even.  Could this really have happened?

Death metal for adults

Today my boss threatened to fire 2/3 of my co-workers.  I need a vacation.



Finally, death metal for adults.  Maybe they will start making death metal songs about 401k plans, job interviews, the resume grind, and things that actually matter to me.

The James Bond survey

James Bond was the creation of Ian Fleming through a series of novels and short stories.  Ian Fleming's James Bond is probably most well known to people through the movie franchise, and his portrayal by Sean Connery.  While I do appreciate the Connery Bond, I much prefer the books.  The James Bond of the books is a different sort of animal from the movies.  A good primer on James Bond is to be found HERE.

According to the late, lamented website Make Mine a 007, Bond drinks no fewer than 317 drinks throughout the series of books authored by Ian Fleming (the cinematic version lags considerably behind despite there being more movies than books). One hundred one of those are whiskies or whiskey cocktails, with Bond heavily favoring bourbon over scotch — not an accident that Bond champions the American drink over his closer-to-home companion, really, since Bond also rails against the vileness of tea and expounds at length about why he prefers coffee. But scotch need not worry. Bond’s usual drinking buddy, the American CIA agent Felix Leiter, seems to have two functions in the novels: to slap his forehead and exclaim, “James, you’re right! Why didn’t I think of that?” and to order Haig and Haig scotch whiskey.

I suggest you make your way through the Bond series chronologically, since they tend to, especially as the books progress, become episodic.  My favorites are actually the Bond short stories.  I wish there were more of these.  They can be, at times, like a travel story in a contemporary lifestyle publication from yesteryear.  He travels overseas in every book except Moonraker and in almost all the short stories as well.  The Caribbean is a popular assignment destination.  He advises you on what to wear and what to drink.  For example when in Jamaica wear Sea Island cotton shirts and drink Red Stripe beer.  When in the Virgin Islands I advise you to wear 100% rayon shirts and drink Cruzan aged dark rum.



Funny when I look at this picture and read the reviews I really wish I liked Scotch whisky.  If only they didn't have that bitter flavor.

James Bond really is a lifestyle.  His tastes are exacting, but not necessarily lavish.  Eggs and toast for breakfast, pink champagne after dinner, and a woman who was strong yet vulnerable and probably carrying some emotional baggage.  Bond liked them complicated.  But I must warn you that you may end up with a craving for specialty cigarettes after reading the books.  As Bond says never smoke habitually; It is a pleasure, not a habit.

If you do find the quirks of Mr. Bond to be fascinating, you'll want to bookmark the Commander's Club for reference.  It aided me in my aspirations to excellence, and filled me with the resolve to be uncompromising with my tastes, no matter the variety of snobbery that pushes me.

The long march of the whiskey renaissance continues

While we still sit in the midst of a vodka bubble, the long march of the whiskey renaissance continues.  This time we check in with the Germans, who are trying to parlay their beer brewing and schnapps fermenting skills into a new whiskey tradition.  You have to check in on those Germans every once in a while.

Bohn belongs to a group of around 40 malt-whisky makers in Germany, the most prominent of which are the Slyrs distillery in Bavaria and the Spreewald Brewery in Brandenburg. The Sloupisti single malt from the Spreewald Brewery was awarded the equivalent of an Oscar by the high priest of whisky, critic Jim Murray. He included it in the "superstar whiskies that give us all a reason to live" section of the 2010 edition of his "Whisky Bible."

So there it is.  I suppose it is not altogether surprising that the whiskey arts should find their way to the Germans, nor should it surprise that the Germans are meticulously honing their craft in said arts.

Hat's off to the Wikipedia booze photographer

Have you searched for booze brands on Wikipedia lately?  If not, you should check it out.  Someone out there has purchased and photographed stock pictures of all kinds of booze.  They are all the same sort of picture.  The bottle on the left with a snifter full on the right.  Check it out.







See what I mean?  Whomever this person is, I admire their work.  Buy a bottle, pour a snifter, and take a picture.  It works.  He or she has made it through a lot of whiskey too.

Whisky review: Canadian Club 10 year

I sought the Canadian Club 10 year.  It felt like spring.  Canadian whisky is a spring drink for me.  Light like the spring air.  At just under 20 dollars for a fifth, it is well priced.  It, like other Canadian whiskies like Windsor Canadian, Rich and Rare, and Canadian Mist is a light whisky.  It doesn't have much of the rye flavor that I found overpowering in Black Velvet.  It has faint hints of sweetness, but not the heavy vanilla flavor you get out of a bourbon.  It was exactly what I wanted at exactly the right price for what you get.  Under 20 dollars for a smooth, mellow, drinkable whisky.

Maybe I should add some sort of notes about the nose and the finish and whatnot.  If you want that, just ask and I'll throw an addendum up.

Sheen remixes

I know everyone has been enjoying the Charlie Sheen lolz lately, and we here at Mister Booze enterprises are certainly no exception.  I'm trying to compile some of the best Sheen remixes and mashups on the pooptubes.  So far this is my favorite.



If you find some more good ones, hit me up.  Thanks.

Gearing up with the king

The snow is melting away, the days are getting warmer, and the sun is more intense.  Spring isn't here yet, but winter is in its dying throes.  I've been old school this weekend and listening to the great one himself, mister Elvis Presley.

Sure, you don't like Elvis.  That's lame old person music, and Elvis was a phony that made watered down white bread versions of great black music and sold it to white audiences with a wink and an awe shucks smile.  Well that might be true but fuck it - these are great songs anyways.  That old Sun Records stuff has the same sort of magic as the old Johnny Cash material from Sun Records.




An atmosphere that can't be recreated. Like a window into a past world that can only haunt you.



Boom chicka boom.

So there it is.  It is old and raw.  Not exactly black metal or anything, but it doesn't sound like the stuff sweaty teenage girls are getting wet to these days.  Also, if you ever wondered why all old punks end up Rockabilly at some point I can sum it up with one video.

From the '68 comeback special



Dyed black hair, black leather jacket, black leather wristband, black leather pants...and grandpa guitar.  Back before there were any punks and at the same time that all the kids were dressing like mod douchebags right before everyone went hippie.  If you were a punk and had to be like anyone from 1968 I think Elvis is your only choice.

Marching on towards spring

The weather has the sort of pall that comes with early spring.  It is, I suppose, March.  It is time to break out the 35mm lens and watch Donnie Darko and drink Canadian whisky.  Speaking of which, the reviews for Canadian Club seem good and it is very cheap and I am very broke these days.  So you should hopefully get a review soon.

In the mean time here is a small review for Bolla Chianti.  It is cheap - around 6 bucks - and good.  Goes well with spaghetti and meatballs and watching the Jersey Shore and fist pumping.  Pictures to come later.