Q: Is the free world's most loathed enemy finally dead?

A: I just received a phone call from my close personal friend Fidel Castro, who is reporting to T.A.M.S.Y. exclusively that Perez Hilton is dead.

The official announcement will be made sometime in the next 65 years.

Everyone in Los Angeles, please be mindful of each other's flaws, and keep your cocaine intake below .05 grams.

UPDATE: Fidel just texted me this photo:

Q: Does Harry Potter burn out or fade away?

A: As first reported very early this morning on TorrentFreak, J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows — the most eagerly anticipated book in the history of paper — has leaked to the Internet four days ahead of its scheduled release date.

On one hand, T.A.M.S.Y. hates to ruin a surprise. On the other hand, with the cat already out of the bag, there's really no point in waiting.

SO HERE IT IS — the final page of the final chapter of the final successful book series ever. Click to enlarge:

SPOILER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Of course, there's no point in buying the book now, but if you need an extremely heavy paperweight, this will do.

Q: Why are we stopping in the name of love?

A: Ask Christobel.

Joan As Police Woman
Christobel
Real Life, 2006

Cousin Doug introduced me to Joan As Police Woman last week, and I've had the Brooklyn trio's debut on rotation ever since. It's good stuff (although, for some odd reason, it's currently only available in the UK).

The band's frontwoman is sexy Joan Wasser. You may not know the name, but you've likely heard her violining one place or another; aside from extensive work in studio and on tour with a who's who of top-shelf rockers, she's a former Dambuilder, sometime Johnson (of Antony & the... fame) and erstwhile lover of the late Jeff Buckley.

Those of you at SXSW should check out JAPW's live act on Thurdsay and/or Friday (the band's complete touring sked, plus more music for sampling, is available on Joan's MySpace).

If you're not at SXSW, make yourself useful and create an entry for the band on Wikipedia. And if you're Stephen Thomas Erlewine, you may review Real Life here.

ETC., ETC.: Peruse the lyrics for "Christobel"; or purchase the Real Life import via Amazon.

Q: How is RottenTomatoes.com like a box of chocolates? And is "Crash" the worst Oscar winner of our time?

A: One of T.A.M.S.Y.'s longtime favoritest Web resources is film-review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, an absolute must-visit for the discerning/poor moviegoer. I base most bucks dropped at the cineplex on R.T.'s advice, and rarely has the TomatoMeter let me down (the memorable exception being Monster's Ball, which 85% of the nation's critics saw drunk).

So T.A.M.S.Y. is shocked and dismayed and and horrified and aroused to report we've uncovered a scandal amidst RT's vines — a ghost in the machine that's certain to ROCK THE FILM INDUSTRY TO ITS VERY CORE.

Either that, or it's a tiny computer glitch that no one except me will care about. Hard to predict, really. Either way: T.A.M.S.Y. EXCLUSIVE!!!


POINT BEING: Bedridden with Oscar fever, I was surfing through Rotten Tomatoes' extensive coverage of past winners. Specifically on my mind was whether Crash, last year's debaclish Best Picture winner, was the worst-rated film (75%) of the modern era to take that honor¹.

Well, turns out that Crash is only the second-lowest-rated film since the 60s. Forrest Gump (74%) just barely edges it out.

...OR DOES IT!?! The Answer May etc., etc.

I was sort of surprised to see Gump rated so low — not necessarily because it was great, but because it was overrated. It may not have deserved to beat Shawshank or Pulp Fiction, but it was pretty well received, and a way less surprising choice than Crash. I decided to check if something might be skewing the numbers. Small sample size? Poorly summarized reviews? Anti-Hanks fervor?

It turned out to be way simpler than that: The numbers are being skewed by... the numbers. The TomatoMeter for Gump cites 31 "Fresh" reviews and 11 "Rotten." In reality, there are only eight Rottens. Count 'em yourself. That pushes Gump up to a 81%, which seems just about right.

SCANDAL!!!²

Of course, it's possible that the TomatoMeter is wrong on other films too. It's possible that everything you know is wrong; that up is down and left is right and diagonal is diagonal in the opposite direction; that it's a Jewish conspiracy, or an anti-Jewish conspiracy, or a conspiracy by self-loathing Jews. It's possible that Freddy Got Fingered is the greatest work of art in the history of humankind, and no one even knows it.

But I'll leave all that to someone else to figure out, because this post is already so very long.

EXTRA CREDIT: Find other weird math glitches on Rotten Tomatoes! Figure out what is causing the errors! Create accompanying charts and amusing PhotoShop collages! Post them in the comments! Wake me up when you're finished!

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¹ By the way, I'm defining "the modern era" as having started when Midnight Cowboy took home Best Picture of 1969. Midnight Cowboy is weird on its own, but what makes it a particularly odd choice for the Oscar is that the 60s' Best Picture picks were dominated by musicals (like My Fair Lady and Oliver! and The Sound of Music and the toe-tappin' Lawrence! of Arabia!).

The 70s, conversely, were dominated by the grit of the Godfathers and Deer Hunter and Cuckoo's Nest and that sort of thing. Hollywood's output is usually a few years behind the zeitgeist, but it seems like it took them extra long to notice that America had lost its innocence in November, 1963³.

Originally, I was looking for the worst ever, but it didn't seem fair to include Oscar-winners like The Greatest Show on Earth (38%) and Cimarron (36%), because the sample size on RT is too small for films that old.

² The SCANDAL would be more SCANDALOUS if Fox, which owns RT, had anything to do with these films. But it doesn't: Gump was financed by Paramount, and Crash by Lions Gate.

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³ J.F.K., blown away, what else do I have to say?

Q: Is our Jennifers a woman every night?

The Jennifers: Not much too young to keep you satisfied.

A: The Jennifers aren't a woman any night. They may take you by surprise, though. Their Baltimore-based power-pop is so inviting, you might even sing.¹

The Jennifers
Mrs. Gray
Colors from the Future, 2007 [buy it!]

I'm going to go out on a limb and call that song rock music's finest Oscar Wilde allusion of 2007. It could also be rock music's finest Jennifer Grey rhinoplasty allusion of the decade, but maybe I'm reading too deeply into the lyrics.

QUESTION: The Jennifers have been around since the mid-'90s, and their name and sound are very familiar. Do any of you Clevelanders recall them having a song in rotation on WENZ back in the day? Am I making that up?

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¹ I hope Roger's reading this, since he's the only person who has a chance of catching my Styx references.

Q: Who do you love?

A: Ted Leo and the Pharmacists! The band's forthcoming Living with the Living has leaked, and T.A.M.S.Y.'s got the hook-up.

Check out these fine tracks, and then do what I'm doing and buy the album, lest my friend at Touch & Go yell at me. And because it's really very good.

Ted Leo & the Pharmacists
The Sons of Cain [link ceased link revived!]
Ted Leo & the Pharmacists
Who Do You Love? [link desisted]
Touch & Go, 2007

The first song was previously available on Pitchfork. The second is T.A.M.S.Y.'s very own almost-Valentine's Day sort-of-EXCLUSIVE.

P.S.: And remember to check out one of the band's 45,000 annual live shows.

UPDATE: See comments.

Q: Why do you have to take three pills each day?

A: Otherwise the virus will surely gain / travel through your veins / to your heart, your brain / ending all the life that you seem to know...

So goes "Janet," the opening track on Kiss Kiss' fantastically schizo debut, Reality Vs. the Optimist, one of my favorites albums of 2007 so far. Which is a little surprising, since I'd, uh, never really heard of them before randomly stumbling into it.

Most everything I know about Kiss Kiss, I learned from their MySpace page: They're a five-piece orchestra rock ensemble from Milton, NY (across the river from Poughkeepsie); they've been together three years, during which they've amassed 9,044 friends, apparently thanks to their high-energy live act; they're currently touring the east coast; they're on some label called Eyeball Records; and 20% of them is a hot chick.

Kiss Kiss: Gotta lose your mind in Milton Rock City

I understand that metaphor might be difficult to grasp; it makes more sense if you think of it as I just really needed some lame-ass excuse to incorporate the KISS logo. Kiss Kiss doesn't really have anything in common with KISS, although there are isolated moments where they sound a little like Queen. Other times they sound like emo Devotchka. Other times, like a post-rock Weezer being savagely mauled by wolves inside a violin.

And, you know, they totally fuckin' rawk. But you don't have to take LeVar Burton's word for it.

Kiss Kiss - Janet
Kiss Kiss - Dress Up
Reality Vs. the Optimist, 2007

You can hear more over on MySpace. "Machines" seems to be a popular track, and the band's blog says it's being made into a video.

What makes Kiss Kiss stand out is its ADHD style, incorporating a ton of different instruments and noises in a constant battle against time, or time signatures. If I had to come up with a criticism, it'd be that sometimes they move too fast, abandoning songs or melodies before bringing them fully to fruition.

Aside from that minor gripe, I love what they're doing, and see big, big things in their future. By which I mean, several years toiling as a revered underground rock group as the music industry implodes.

Q: Voulez-vous ecouter Suki Brownies avant les dudes de Pitchfork?

A: They're not on Pitchfork, All Music, or Amazon yet, but Suki Brownies are worth a listen.

The Brownies formed in 2004 in Lyon, France, when guitarists/childhood pals Romu and Joe met Suki, a punky Brit chanteuse. Like the Coneheads, they come from France but talk English.

Check out "Papa," a bouncy, three-minute pop ode to childhood rebellion and messy bedrooms.

Suki Brownies - Papa

Très catchy -- and as with a lot of great pop songs, it's somehow familiar but new-sounding at the same time. I swear it could have been a big alt-rock radio hit in 1996, except it came out in 2006 (or possibly 2007 -- I can't locate a release date for the band's S/T debut, although it's available for purchase right now directly from the band). Can't you Clevelanders imagine hearing this on WENZ 107.9, back in the day?

For more on the band, visit their official site, or read the poorly translated biography on their MySpace. Their homepage says they're "currently in search of distributors, record companies, labels as well as gigs in order to promote the release of their first album." So if you happen to be any of those things, keep them in mind.

Q: Who is your number one source for obscure Swedish rock?

A: You may recall my previous Swede-related posts, highlighting the excellent folk-rock of Herman Düne. I note that Giant has been left off of everyone's "best of 2006" lists, probably because they've never heard of Herman Düne, probably because they're not reading T.A.M.S.Y. For shame, young American tastemakers.

For those of you (Leah and Brian) who probably found the gentle, lovestruck strummings of "I Wish That I Could See You Soon" to be a tad on the, what's the word?, pussy side, I have a harder-driving Swedish-rock alternative for you. It is no less awesome, and considerably more Swedish.

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[ingenting] - Mycket Väsen För Ingenting [mp3]
Mycket Väsen För Ingenting, 2006

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The band's name, "[ingenting]," means "[nothing]" in Swedish -- and a quick Google search for "Mycket väsen för ingenting" reveals (via Swedish Wikipedia) that it translates to "Much ado about nothing." Ah, Swedish humor. You'll find that all much more interesting once you listen to the song a couple times and have the words "Mycket väsen för ingenting" stuck in your head.

[ingenting]: Deserves a Wikipedia entry very mycket.

The band's label, Labrador Records, describes [ingenting]'s album as "a glorious mix of psychedelic folk, sunny 70's pop and sinister proggy overtones. A slightly schizophrenic and highly wonderful collection of songs that tastes of the Swedish country side as well as decadent urban night life and crushed dreams."

Sure. Yes. I was just going to say that. So instead I'll just say the album sound like the Vines having sex with Sigur Ros. In other words, highly recommended.

The only downside is that the album is only available as a pricey-ish ($20 import, what with the U.S. marketplace's surprising lack of enthusiasm for Swedish-language psychedelia. So hey, here's another track, in case you weren't already convinced.

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[ingenting] - Punkdrömmar [mp3]

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Seriously, are these Swede dudes sweet or what?

Q: Has TV on the Radio become the voice of our generation?

A: Uh, I don't know. Ask Cokemachineglow.

But first, check out this video for TV on the Radio's "I Was a Lover," and tell me what you think...

Q: Can't get enough of them crazy Swedes?

A: Then you'll love Swedes Please, a whole blog dedicated to the music of them crazy Swedes. And they've got "I Wish That I Could See You Soon" available for your downloading pleasure. If I knew how to say "merci!" in Swedish, I totally would.

And just to cover all my bases, here's a different sort of Swedish music video.

Q: Did I leave my heart in San Francisco?

A: No, although I did leave several veins there once. Still, at least 57% of my left ventricle remains in the city that never sleeps and barely slept with me, N to the Y to the mofo'ing C. It's a conflict 'tween East and West that threatens to tear me asunder like so much Kit Kat bar, as I look to plot my next move from here in Cleve-O.

So here's a little song about nostalgia for the Big Apple -- from of all locales, Sweden's Herman Düne, who are much like their countryman Mr. Jens Lekman except minus the unbearable droning idiocy. If you can even tolerate Lekman (which many people inexplicably do), you'll want to make sweet unprotected love to Düne's new album, Giant. And I'm not just saying that because we're MySpace besties.

Herman Düne - Take Him Back to New York City [expired]
Giant, 2006

That one goes out to Sexy Teenage Susie in B to the R to the mofo'ing Ooklyn. And if you kiddies enjoyed that, perhaps you'll enjoy this music video, "I Wish That I Could See You Soon," the album's first single.

Love them crazy Swedes!