- It has been far too long since our last “Albums to Avoid” feature, so I felt like I needed to return with a real stink bomb of an album, one so atrocious it could go down in the annals of music history as an all-time steaming, stinking pile of monkey crap. After searching not very long and not very hard (didn’t need to), I’ve found it…..“Doll Domination” by the Pussycat Skanks. Yes, the same group of dancing skanks who brought you abysmal pop music that is basically about how hot they are and them dancing in trampy outfits is back. The group established a name for itself as Spice Girls 2.0 in 2005 with their gawd-awful debut album full of formulaic, lame, heavily produced and synthesized bubble-gum pop. Now, they’re back with an album that is even worse than the first one, which I didn’t think was possible, to be honest. They’ve enlisted the help co-writers and producers that include Timbaland and Sean Garrett, because let’s face it, a quintet of skanky pop tarts isn't going to be able to craft a dozen or so songs at that low a level of musical quality without some help. You have to be really trying to create something that bad and you need lots of help to do it. Whether it’s dancy tracks like "Out of This Club" with noted perv and serial rapist (allegedly) R. Kelly or a clunker like "Love The Way You Love Me", this album sucks from the start and goes downhill from there. Lead singer Nicole Scherzinger basically uses the album as a promotional vehicle for herself, which would be a good idea….if she had any real musical talent. She sings lead and background vocals for the album's 16 tracks and seems to think she’s the next Beyoncé. Not something I’d aspire to, but if you’re going to have those aspirations, it would be helpful to have the talent to reach them. Throw in a cheesy, amateurish cover featuring the Skanks posing seductively on motorbikes, mix it with a bland, visionless album filled with uninspiring songs and you have one of the most awful “Albums to Avoid” that I’ve ever seen or heard…..
- A few months have passed since the whole martial law/human rights abuse/violent crushing of a democratic revolution in Myanmar, so perhaps you are wondering if anything has changed. Nope…still the same. We know this because this weekend, a former aide to Myanmar pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi was re-arrested less than 24 hours after being freed by the military government in a mass amnesty. Win Htein, 64, who had been in prison since 1996 (12 years behind bars, yikes), was among seven members of Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy party released in an amnesty granted to 9,002 prisoners around the country. Party spokesman Nyan Win said Htein was arrested 17 hours after being released from Kathar prison in northern Myanmar and not surprisingly, authorities gave no reason for arresting him. Family members had actually traveled to Mandalay, halfway to where he was imprisoned, to meet him, but he didn’t show up. They were later told by prison authorities l that Win Htein spent the night at a guest house in Kathar and was then taken back to the prison. Htein had been serving a 14-year sentence on charges of providing false information to the foreign press, but his release had appeared to be a hopeful sign - for less than a day, as it turned out. He joined Suu Kyi's party when it was formed in 1988 and served as a personal assistant and senior adviser to Suu Kyi and her deputy Tin Oo. Since then, Htein has been repeatedly arrested, tortured and imprisoned. He is among some 2,000 political prisoners being held in Myanmar, Amnesty International. The most prominent is Nobel peace laureate Suu Kyi, who is under house arrest in Yangon and has been in detention for about 13 of the past 19 years. Authorities claim this week’s amnesty releases were for prisoners exhibiting “good moral behavior,” but most observers say this and the rest of their plan for the country is a sham designed to cement the military's power. It’s an allegation I tend to believe, since Win Htein gave an interview to the Democratic Voice of Burma, a Norway-based shortwave radio station and Web site that is run by exiled Myanmar dissidents, in which he said he could not accept the new constitution but that “if we oppose or go against the constitution, we will be sent back to prison.” What happened? Yes, he was then sent back to prison. The country’s military junta is still a douche bag and he’s still ruling with an iron fist, so don’t believe a word of the propaganda he and his administration are spewing…..
- Thank the Lord, the justice system finally got one right, striking down a lawsuit brought by one of the biggest tools around, attorney Roy Den Hollander, who has crusaded against feminism and recently sued a university over its women's studies program. Judge Miriam Goldman Cedarbaum tossed Hollander’s most recent moronic lawsuit out of federal court in Manhattan on Monday, saying that nightclubs can price their products as they wish because they're not acting as representatives of the state. Hollander had ass-hattedly claimed that ladies' nights at Manhattan nightclubs discriminate against men by offering women free or discounted admission and drinks. To make his case, he feebly and erroneously attempted to link the state to the discounts because it licenses the sale of alcohol at clubs and bars. But hey, at least he took his defeat in a mature and professional fashion….oh wait, no he didn’t. Hollander called the judge a feminist and said her dismissal of his lawsuit was representative of the discrimination inherent in many American institutions. Nice move, Roy, name-calling the judge. Hard to see why you lost the case and are universally loathed by nearly everyone who knows about you. The lawsuit allegedly sought to represent men over the age of 21 who entered Lotus, the China Club and several other New York nightclubs on a ladies' night since June 21, 2004. However, Hollander was the only one idiotic enough to follow through on a lawsuit regarding the matter. The nightclubs correctly argued that the prices charged to men aren't so burdensome that they amount to denying them entry and that male customers actually might benefit from ladies' nights because so many women attend. Yeah, I think that’s kind of idiotic thinking, night club owners, because dammit, dudes want cheap drinks, they don’t have any interest in having hot women around them getting drunk at cheap prices….oh wait, they do, unless of course they’re a total tool like Roy Den Hollander. Sadly, you have to expect this kind of stunt from Hollander at this point, because just last month he sued Columbia University, saying its women's studies program is discriminatory and unconstitutional because the school didn't have a comparable men's program. Must be nice to be able to waste the time and money to bring frivolous, pointless lawsuits that are a total waste of everyone’s time……
- Now THAT is how you celebrate a big win for your college’s football program. A couple of weekends ago, a frat party at Vanderbilt University fraternity following a win over the University of Mississippi kinda, sorta got out of hand. When I say got a little out of hand, I mean that the party resulted in the arrest of 57 Sigma Chi brothers. The fraternity boys were busted early Sunday morning at a campground where they were celebrating their beloved Commodores downing the rival Rebels. As usually happens in these situations, an uptight, square, stick in the mud who likes to rain on people’s parades ruined the fun. In this case, it was campground's manager, who called cops when partiers refused to quiet down in the middle of the night and decided to set off fireworks. Additionally, in looking at the mug shots of those arrested, a few of them may - may - have had a beer or ten. Police found multiple kegs at the site, strewn around, and those arrested have been charged with crimes including disorderly conduct and underage drinking. I’m sorry, but are they not supposed to celebrate a big win? How else would you like them to do so? You want them to hoist a root beer, exchange high-fives and play ping pong? No, this is college, where you get hammered, cause trouble and make an ass of yourself when your team wins big. It’s not a true celebration until someone is arrested, period. The Sigma Chi brothers at Vandy understand that, and you know who else does? The so-called Notre Dame 37. These intrepid students were arrested the very same weekend as the Vandy students when Indiana police broke up a kegger at an off-campus home in South Bend. Like the scene in every bad teen movie or TV show when the cops raid a party, suspects scattered, with many attempting to hide inside the house (under beds, inside closets, and in the attic and basement). After searching the premises, officers rounded up more than three dozen individuals, most of whom were charged with underage drinking. Quite an assumption to make, given that the only evidence found was three empty kegs inside the home and "hundreds of empty beer cans and drinking cups." And how do you know the people at the house didn’t pick up those kegs when they were already empty and were looking to recycle them for some extra cash? Unfortunately, among those arrested were several Notre Dame athletes, both male and female. Again, this is college, I don’t know what it is you people are expecting…….
- Tonight’s episode of Prison Break began with a bang and got better from there. Michael and his crew managed to track one of the Company’s Scylla cardholders, Nathaneal Edison, to a horse racing track and had put a plan in place to copy the card at the track. While Brad Bellick created a scene at the betting counter and Sarah distracted a guard watching the door to the track offices, Linc used the distraction and its result of pulling the head of security away from his desk to slip down to the track area and rig the gate of a horse owned by the card holder to stick at the start of its race. When the gate malfunctioned, the enraged card holder stormed into the office of the head of security to demand an explanation. That’s where Michael and Mahone had snuck in to plant team tech dork Roland’s wireless hard drive capable of copying anything in its vicinity. As the card holder stood at the desk ranting, the card was copied. News then came in that something suspicious had been found on the starting gate and all involved parties went to check it out. Mahone volunteered to sneak back in, retrieve Roland’s device and complete the plan, but Sarah was unable to distract the guard long enough for Mahone to get back out. Another member of security spotted Mahone, an altercation ensued and Mahone ended up punching the guard and being hauled off to jail - with the device in his possession. The rest of the team retreated back to the warehouse to figure out their next move. That led to a call to their boss, Homeland Security agent Don Self. Self went to work helping Mahone, but the best he could do - after threatening the cop at the desk at the local precinct - was getting Mahone’s belongings released, which meant getting the phone back. Mahone was left in prison, his fingerprints in the system, which meant the cops would soon realize that he was not, in fact, Frank Zwan, but Alex Mahone, a wanted man who was supposed to be in a maximum security prison. But Self had problems of his own, namely the Company coming after him because he had been investigating “The General” Jonathan Krantz, the leader of the Company. Their first move was sending one of their men into Self’s office posing as a tech guy working on Self’s computer, but when Self walked in on him, the man was booted out before he was able to get past the sophisticated firewall protecting Self’s machine. The second step was sending scary hitman Wyatt to find Self in the dark parking garage (and really, what other kind of parking garage is there?) and deliver a strong verbal warning to respect the General’s privacy. Someone whose privacy wasn’t respected was T-Bag, still posing as Cole Pfeiffer at GATE Industries. When one of his superiors continues poking around, he finds that T-Bag/Cole’s sales record is a web of lies, misinformation and falsification. He calls T-Bag out on it, forcing T-Bag to abandon his quest to use James Whistler’s bird watching book to recover whatever its cryptic contents contain clues about within the GATE building. Instead, T-Bag wipes down his office for prints, grabs his things and flees. He’s doing the same at the apartment he’s been living in as Cole Pfeiffer when he’s ambushed and assaulted by Gretchen, former company thug and villain in Season 3 who spent the first few episodes of this season being tortured and interrogated by the Company. She escaped last week and this week, went to visit her sister, who is also raising Gretchen’s daughter as her own and has been since the child was an infant. Gretchen tries to apologize for not being able to be around more and for her clandestine lifestyle, but in the end she ends up grabbing a gun and leaving, vowing revenge on the Company. The episode ends with Wyatt finding Mahone at the police station, finding out where he is being taken for his court appearance and showing up there. But before the arraignment can take place, Michael and crew have hatched a plan to help Mahone after initially leaning toward moving on without him. Instead, Sarah poses as his new attorney, which allows her to take possession of his file, removing that hurdle. Then, Michael and Linc used some electrical equipment they’ve begged for, borrowed and stolen to blow up the generator for the courthouse. As the power goes out, Mahone is able to flee and get away with the rest of the group. Wyatt gives chases and gives a mock gunshot gesture to Mahone as he leaves, sending a clear message: I’m going to kill you. Back at the warehouse, Mahone calls and talks to the man who killed his son, promising that they will meet again and when they do, “I’ll show you how personal this can get.” A pretty solid episode overall, nothing really groundbreaking and no new nosebleed problems for Michael, who apparently has them due to some sort of condition that has plagued him since childhood, as was revealed in last week’s episode. But until next week’s show……
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