What do Sammy Haggar, Christina Agulera, Glen Campbell and Stacy Q have in common? Competition of course.
That is if you are referring to the 1st annual Rock and Roll Trivia Party hosted in Williamsburg this weekend.
2 elite teams, chosen for their broad musical knowledge and reputation for fierce competative spirit were pitched against each other in head to head trivia combat Produced and hosted by Aparna Mohan and Benjamin Cameron. Each "Band" of 5 competitors tested their knowledge in categories ranging from 70s AM Radio Hits, Famous Duets, Rock On TV, One Hit Wonders and Pop Princessess to Has Beens, Movie Soundtracks, Stage Names and Notable Covers.
The Bands (Tom Pettycoat Junction and Divine Tragedy) were made up of individuals from publishing, photography, public relations, music production, and politics. Each person in their turn showed us their best dance moves, sang the refrains of Brittany, and caused general havoc as rockers are expected to do! In the end only one band could overcome the obstacles and penalties thrown at them from thier hosts. Only one band could live through spontaneously combusting drummers, ego wars between members, and drug overdoses to come out as a winner. That Team was the Divine Tragedy. Despite thier drunken haze they were able to eek out a win over their strong competitors the Tom Pettycoat Junction in this trivial Battle of the Bands.
Congratulations to both teams.
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In other news my good friends Rob and Jane from cockeyed.com were flown in to the MTV studios from Sacramento for 24 hours of Foo Fighters on MTV 2 to prepare an all Foo Fighters Episode of How Much is inside the Foo Fighters!
I love it when random local talent gets noticed, flown to NY and gets to spend 2 sleepless days playing games with famous people. Check back with cockeyed.com for updates on what happened there.
Yesterday, I had issues with culture. Today, all of my energy has been transferred into a complete and total hatred for TAXIS!
That's right, those yellow cars that always seem to be in abundance when you don't need them, but never want to pick you up when you've got somewhere to be in 10 minutes because as usual you didn't heed your father's advice to always leave early, so that you never have to be in a hurry.
What has sparked my ire this time? Well I'm sure that you'd be mad too if you were happily speeding along on your bike, carefully watching traffic when the taxi next to you decided that he needed to defy physics by attempting to make 2 or more objects occupy the same space at the same time (i.e. merge into you and send you careening to the ground). Yep, that's right, I'm earning my stripes as a New York cyclist. Today for the first time, I introduced myself to the asphalt. It wasn't as nice to me as I was to it.
The beauty of it all, is that as I picked myself up and dusted myself off, after having left a 5 foot long stripe of isotopic's outer layers on the road, the cabbie immediately leaned out of his window as he quickly accellerated away, looked back at me and screamed "BE CAREFUL!"
Oh, sure. I'll try to do that!
Well, I am more or less in one piece. I finished my errands, thanked the universe for leaving my bike more or less unharmed, came home and sat safely on my roof in the glorious spring sun for a little while.
I took a few things with me out of this experience.
1. Yellow paint on my handlebar where I scraped and dented his rear quarter fender panel.
2. The vibrant feeling of being alive that only comes from high impact situations.
3. The realization that you really should have some band-aids around the house, just in case (another thing that I didn't listen to dear old dad about).
So much to say, and such little time to say it.
I am having difficulty finding an intelligent, and example-supported argument for my issue of the day.
I was going to write about generosity, but after reading a few headlines, decided that it was more pertinent to write about desecration. I've been trying to ignore the Koran flushing stories that have been saturating the news over the last couple of weeks, but I've finally given in and read about it.
Personal Perspective:
I am as baffled in reading these accounts as I usually am when I read about it's obvious correlation, flag burning. Why do you care? If your devotion to an idea is so incredibly deep, it should not be shaken by another person's lack of devotion to that idea, or even their repugnance to it. Having devotion and belief do not result in shouting matches, anger, protests and violence. The result of a strong foundation is peace. You know that what you believe cannot be destroyed by the destruction of a mass produced symbol of that belief. Let it go.
But, we're all human, and when we disagree we tend to get a little pissy with each other. Especially when we're insecure about something. You're insecure about whether you've lived the life that will lead you to paradise, someone else is insecure about whether or not whether or not they are going to hell for buying too many ipods and cheating on their spouse. The end result of insecurity is violence, anger, shouting matches and protests I suppose.
From a political perspective:
I can understand why this is a fire that needs to be put out, but probably never will be. People are at war with thier idea of our idea of them. We are disrespectful, arrogant and corrupt. Our actions are in direct violation of their beliefs in many cases, and stories like this only go to prove the point of the so called "muslim extremists." This batch of stories has served to keep people angry at us for yet another insensitivity to their way of life, and in the long run we cannot afford to have a nearly worldwide anger at "our" behavior smouldering. Eventually Rome will be fighting a battle on too many fronts.
It is interesting to me that we are inherently a hipocritical nation. We have, in our own tumultuous way, embraced all different manner of beliefs. As a result of this there will always be a redneck willing to prove our ignorance and insensitivity to other cultures, a fat tourist who wants to eat McDonalds in the Forbidden City, a loud Skater Kid who plays with the remains in the Parisian catacombs, and millions of us to sit back and do nothing about it, because we are sure that we will never be heard in the din and apparent chaos of the melting pot furnaces.
Sorry, no links, you've read it, just plain old opinion.
