Giuliani takes step toward White House bid
WASHINGTON - The man once dubbed "America's mayor" has taken the first step toward becoming America's next president.
Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, a Republican moderate who achieved near-mythic popularity for his handling of the Sept. 11 attacks, filed papers Friday in New York to create the Rudy Giuliani Presidential Exploratory Committee Inc. A copy of the document was obtained by The Associated Press.
Creating an exploratory committee does not make Giuliani a declared candidate, but it does mean he intends to travel the country gauging support and preparing for a White House bid.
"Mayor Giuliani has not made a decision yet," Giuliani spokeswoman Sunny Mindel said in a statement Monday night. "With the filing of this document, we have taken the necessary legal steps so an organization can be put in place and money can be raised to explore a possible presidential run in 2008." [READ MORE]
Elton John Says Religion Promotes Hatred
From a conversation between The Scissor Sister's Jake Shears and Elton John, printed in The Guardian:
EJ: I think religion has always tried to turn hatred towards gay people. Religion promotes the hatred and spite against gays. But there are so many Christian people I know who are gay and love their religion ...
JS: My Mom's a Christian and she loves me; that whole side of my family is Christian and I have no problem with it. I just feel we need to stop worrying about pro-gay movements and start worrying about fundamentalist movements. It's not just about how gay people are treated - it's about how people are treated in general.
Read entire interview here. Thanks to The Huffington Post for the dig.
The Greatest Website on the Planet: Colbert on Demand
A VLM personal favorite: Colbert on Slutty Costumes
Music
Featured Album: Tenacious D, The Pick of Destiny
A couple years back I saw Tenacious D live at the Alliant Energy Center in Madison with Weezer and I've been a huge fan ever since. Besides, I share the same initials as KG, Kyle Gass, and I have a buddy Phil who looks a lot like JB. Now all I need is Phil to turn into a sweet guitar playing partner with the initials JB and we can start out own rock supergroup.
Tenacious D's The Pick of Destiny hits shelves today in support of their film of the same name, which I can't wait to see. Jack Black might be one of the funniest people on the planet if you look past his hosting of the MTV Awards, but I blame the writers for that one.
Here's what Rolling Stone had to say about today's release:
Any album that begins with the line "A long-ass fucking time ago in a town called Kickapoo" can't be all that bad, but somehow the soundtrack to Tenacious D's long promised movie The Pick of Destiny never quite takes off. The fifteen tunes here tell the fictitious story of how Jack Black met Kyle Gass, formed Tenacious D and later fought some sort of demon to obtain the mythical pick of destiny. Many of the songs, such as "Break In City (Storm the Gate)" and "Car Chase City," exist solely to advance the plot and will be funny only to tweeners who have watched the movie eight times (not that there's anything wrong with that). The music is Tenacious D's trademark overwrought Seventies folk metal, featuring cameos by Meat Loaf, Dave Grohl and, of course, metal god Ronnie James Dio. This soundtrack would be a great bonus disc for the movie's eventual DVD release, but as a stand-alone it falls way short of their vastly superior debut album.
Tenacious D - "Kickapoo"
Tenacious D - "The Divide"
Tenacious D - "The Metal"
A couple more tracks available at the recently-engaged Neiles Life.
Featured Artist: A Block of Yellow
A Block of Yellow are here to help with all the Hip Pop that is necessary
for a good and happy life. That distinctive ‘ABOY sound’ created under the
influence of influential sounds like the Kinks, the Supremes, and the Stone
Roses can certainly work wonders. The Clash, Fela Kuti, and yes even the
Quarrymen provide the additional touchstones the ABOY boys touch on to
place their sound squarely where it needs to be.
A Block of Yellow - "It's Almost Over"
Tuesday Tunes
The Magnetic Fields - "Yeah! Oh! Yeah!
The Magnetic Fields - "Two Characters in Search of a Country Song"
Beirut - "The Bunker"
Last but not least....
Two quick things. One is that I've got a lot on my blogging plate and not a whole lot of time to do it between 5am and 530 am...so if you've sent me some tracks or albums to review, please be patient and I'll do my best to get to them as soon as possible. I'll work on updating my blogroll and what not as well if I ever get a moment.
Also, I'm hoping to have a few more contests on here once I figure out what the hell I'm doing.
Secondly, I noticed that the blog looks a lot different in Safari because the words fade into the background, so I apologize for that and don't know why that is happening. Everything looks okay in Firefox and IE, but if you're a Safari user and you've stuck around thanks for the effort.