Aug 242010
 


My friends, it took me long enough, but I finally manned up and spent a few days with that Prince deep cutz collection that hrrundivbakshi demanded that I confront for Hear Factor. It was one of the most difficult series of listening sessions I’ve ever encountered, but I am a better man for it – and you, HVB, are a better man for having put me through it.

E. Pluribus, you’re a good egg, too – and thanks for never making me sit through anything as painful as those Prince deep cutz. However, I need to call you into this, too, because you like to make a big stink about how exquisite your tastes are, yet you can’t even begin to appreciate anything remotely in the “Art Rock” camp, can you? I’m calling you into this alongside hrrundivbakshi because I think he can put a little heat on you. I think HVB has it in him to find a bearable angle on Roxy Music. I doubt you do, but I hope he will shame you into opening your mind a little bit. As painful as it may be for one of you to budge, I’m confident that your need to distiguish yourselves from each other will result in one of you expressing something profound and fascinating, something more than what we may expect.

Now, if you have some time, I want to know if either of you have it in you to appreciate Roxy Music. I’m offering a completely unbalanced sampling of two songs each from my favorite two Roxy Music album for your analysis, gut responses, and possible pleasure. In case you need a visual, I’ve also placed a video of the band playing another favorite from their debut album. I feel this will demonstrate the band’s usefulness in the research that is done in RTH Labs. Please take all the time you need, or at least as long as the tracks last. Let me know if you have any questions. Thank you.

“Virginia Plain”

“Re-Make/Re-Model”

“Amazona”

“Mother of Pearl”

Don’t think the rest of you have not been summoned as well. I urge those of you who’ve stayed on the sidelines through past discussions about Roxy Music to step forward. Do you want to be part of the angry mob forever, or do you want to stand out and be your own person?

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Aug 202010
 

Hrrundivbakshi,

Your feelings are important to us. Although typically think of you as our moral compass and expert on the teachings of the Holy Trinity of Rock and all matters regarding guitar tone, we care about how you feel. We know that hippies typically don’t make you feel good about yourself or the state of humanity. I suspect that the following videos might make you feel worse. My aim is not so much to see if I can annoy you, but to provide us with an opportunity to empathize with your reactions to the following “interviews.” How do the things being said make you feel? How does the fact that someone filmed these “interviews” make you feel? Our feelings are important. Sometimes it only takes the expressed feelings of one Townsperson to open the rest of us up to our own feelings. I look forward to empathizing with your feelings and, possibly, sharing some of my own. I or some other Townsperson may even determine who a certain “Vito” is and share nerdy facts about his existence or the circumstances surrounding these important video findings.

I thank you in advance for the depth of feeling you are likely to share with us. Here goes!

First, an off-camera David Byrne (?) “interviews” Chris Frantz.

Then, David “interviews” someone only identified (as far as I can tell) as “Vito.”
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Oct 152009
 


Rock Town Hall’s Department of Translation has uncovered the meaning of scrolling text at the foot of a 1970 video of Blood, Sweat & Tears performing “And When I Die.” For years translators have been unable to crack this lost Japanese dialect. Until now! The exact translation, which is believed to be a running commentary from an unidentified Japanese rock analyst, follows. Continue reading »

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Mar 252009
 

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I know that some of you have been dedicating your time-wasting efforts to Facebook. That’s cool. I have also been making some time to help this social networking site jump the shark. Everybody needs the chance to rub virtual elbows with “friends” you otherwise wouldn’t have made the effort to stay in touch with, as proven by the fact that before Facebook you had not been in touch with them for the past 5 to 10 years.

I know, too, that there’s a desire to allow various “apps” into our web-interactive lives to enable us to share personal details with friends, such as our 5 Movies That Shaped My Breakfast Choice This Morning and our 5 Movies That We Thought About While Taking a Dump Later in the Afternoon. Some of the apps are pretty cool, allowing us to easily embed album cover or DVD box images into our lists. It’s not so easy to do things like that in the Halls of Rock, and beside, Mr. DogModic himself frowns on the posting of too many lists without supporting thoughts. He thinks we can do more than that. He thinks we should provide each other opportunities for disagreements, tangents, and the like. Shoot, this place doesn’t even allow us the option of clicking on a little “thumb’s up” icon. WTF?!?!

Do not despair: I hear you, Facebook-inquisitive Townspeople! As focused and unwavering as you may think I am in encouraging us to meet the objectives of Rock Town Hall, I’m a bigger and baser man than that. I don’t want you wasting your hard-earned blow-off time on other sites when you could be here, not only rubbing virtual elbows with knowledgeable, interesting, humorous rock nerds but skinning virtual knees and elbows as you dive for the loose balls of rock criticism! In this bigger and baser spirit, I offer you Rock Town Hall’s first quiz, the What Townsperson Are You? quiz. Our apps are not yet as advanced as those you might have found so engaging on Facebook, but answer the following questions and within 24 hours of your submission our specially devised Rock Town Hall apps will spit out the answer you’ve been secretly dying to know!
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Mar 062009
 

CONFIDENTIAL MEMORANDUM

FROM: Milo T. Frobisher, Senior Engineer
TO: Thebackoffice, Mr.moderator, RTH Marketing Dept.
RE: Real Virtuality Helmet

Gentlemen, as you know, we’ve been collaborating with York and Warwick universities on a new, fully immersive personal entertainment device, tentatively called the “Real Virtuality Helmet.” I’ve attached an explanatory diagram which should help illustrate its manifold functionalities — I’m sure you’ll immediately see, as we did in the Lab, how groundbreaking this technology is, and how it might be specifically put to use in the world of popular music entertainment.

We’ve reached a point in the unit’s development were the headset has come out of the lab and is being “designed to market.” At this point, per our previous memorandum of understanding, I’m handing the project back to you for the appropriate market research, to determine how the typical Townsman or Townswoman might be most likely to put this device to use.

For more detailed information on this device, please visit: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1159206/The-headset-mimic-senses-make-virtual-world-convincing-real-life.html .

Please ask your readers to pay close attention to the fact that the device immerses users in a virtual environment that replicates sound, vision, smell and taste — so, presumably, the rock and roll-related environments it simulates should feature elements that stimulate not just the eye and ear, but the nose and tongue as well.

In any case, please keep me posted on responses to your membership inquiries. Once we’ve received sufficient actionable input from RTH membership, we can finalize design.

Thanking you in advance,

Milo

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