Ch-ch-check It Out

My good lord, is it actually time for a new Beastie Boys record? I didn't know that hell had frozen over.

Now don't get me wrong, I'll probably buy the damn thing (OK, probably definitely), but I'm still kinda pissed at artists who just feel like they can take 6 freakin' years off to scratch their collective asses. It's not hard people. Yes, I know you put out a DVD, it was a good DVD. But come on. Hello Nasty just wasn't that good, and that was the last we heard from you (not counting "Alive" off the boxed set). I realize you're off freeing Tibet or something but even Trent can be bothered to get off his duff and release an album every five years.

Why can't more artists be like Weezer? I'm not the biggest Weezer fan in the world, but anyone whose record company has to physically restrain them from releasing more than one record a year gets my vote. Hell, they should all aspire to be as cool as Guided By Voices. If Bjork released music at the rate Robert Pollard did, wouldn't the world be a better place? I mean, wouldn't it?

In any event, I noticed that in my absence former TCJ editor in chief Milo George has set up his very own sniper nest on the World Wide Webiverse. I'd say welcome aboard and blah blah blah happy bunnies and stuff blah blah blah but I never really went in for the whole blogoverse peace love and unity thing. See, the way I see it, everyone else is just so full of love and mutual appreciation that the injection of a Milo George into the blogoverse was almost a natural prerogative. If he hadn't done it, someone else would have. People need people to piss on their parades. Especially if you're reading this: you're probably someone who believes in the magical fairy elves of "community" and "brotherhood". Well, screw that, or go back and reference my infamous "Kill All Hippies" post of a couple months back. Fact is, I was half joking when I wrote that, but only half. People are just stupid and there's no getting around that.

But if you send me free stuff I'll be your best friend. Seriously. Or if you buy something really expensive through my Amazon.com button. I will get down on my knees and swear to God that Skate Man is the greatest achievement in the history of the four-color funnies if you buy one of these.

Makes you think, eh Larry?

Anyhoo.

Seems people are still talking about The Filth. But some of these people are missing the point. If you're getting hung up on the lack of female characters, or the preponderance of juvenile, downright offensive imagery, you need to take a step back and look at what Morrison was trying to accomplish. Everything that happens on the surface of the story is totally and completely meaningless. The point of The Filth is that there is exactly one character in the entire book who isn't just a small part in a series of dizzyingly complicated and dehumanizing patterns and systems. Just about every other character is a fake personality, co-opted and replicated by the Powers That Be as the occasion arises. I wouldn't get too upset about any misogynistic undercurrent here, because the real worrisome subcontext is the totality of the misanthropic worldview Morrison is illustrating. People, men and women alike, are basically bags of stinking, lustful meat - this is the cancerous, fascistic ideal that Greg Feely exists to combat. Women are degraded and dehumanized in The Filth, but so are men, children, dolphins and even chimpanzees. See, the whole thing is basically a big ol' middle finger aimed square at the structuralist school of literary theory. It's all in the semiotics.

So, that'll be it for today. Tune in tomorrow as I compare Scurvy Dogs to Maus.