Would it kill them to ask?

I always suspected that The Doors' Ray Manzarek was a weasel. Now I'm almost positive...



APRIL 24--The parents of Jim Morrison yesterday sued two of their son's former Doors bandmates, claiming that the musicians, now touring in a reformed version of the famous group, have "maliciously misappropriated" the name and logo of The Doors and are using Morrison's poetry and photos without permission...

The Smoking Gun: Doors Suit

"Don't make me angry. You wouldn't like me when I'm angry."

Apparently the movie is coming out soon...

Hulk

Silophone. Play sound into a silo.

That's right. Upload a .wav or .mp3 file (1 mb max) and it plays into an old silo in Montreal. You can listen to it via RealAudio.


From the web site:

Silophone makes use of the incredible acoustics of Silo #5 by introducing sounds, collected from around the world using various communication technologies, into a physical space to create an instrument which blurs the boundaries between music, architecture and net art. Sounds arrive inside Silo #5 by telephone or internet. They are then broadcast into the vast concrete grain storage chambers inside the Silo. They are transformed, reverberated, and coloured by the remarkable acoustics of the structure, yielding a stunningly beautiful echo. This sound is captured by microphones and rebroadcast back to its sender, to other listeners and to a sound installation outside the building. Anyone may contribute material of their own, filling the instrument with increasingly varied sounds.

Play the Silophone

Yes. Weirder and cooler than Teletubbies.

From last Sunday's issue of The Guardian (UK)

For those readers who are neither students, small children, the minders of small children, the unemployed or TV critics, the Boohbahs are five fat furry atoms of light with bulbous tummies, huge blinking eyes and heads that, tortoise-like, retract into their bodies. They sleep nestled like tealights in a modernist organic chandelier and at bedtime are whirled away across the world to the rainbow's end.


In their waking hours the Boohbahs dance and make funny noises and are occasionally interrupted by some grown-ups called 'Brother' and 'Sister' or 'Mr Man' and 'Mrs Lady'. My favourite non-Boohbah sequence involved 'Brother' and 'Sister' hunting for huge pearls inside giant iridescent oyster shells on a white sand beach under a clear blue sky. It was not only beautifully shot and hypnotic to watch but, screened in a different context, might easily be shortlisted for the Turner Prize.


The Observer | Review | Come and join us... (the full story)

Check out the web site for a taste of Boobah culture. SO strange.

Boohbah Zone

An astounding collection of, um, art.

Must be seen. Cannot be explained.

If you have time, dig around the site. It's worth it.

Paintings by Brandon Bird

From Tomato, one of my favorite design firms

I love these guys.

Our work on the [Jerry Seinfeld 'Comedian'] DVD follows on from the film titles and the Comedian Shrine website which were both created by us in 2002. The site [...] was designed in the style of a nerdy Jerry fanatic with very, very bad taste.

If you've never seen the movie trailer, be sure to watch it in the "Vids" section.

ComedianShrine - the unofficial site of comedian the movie

Make your own mini-Bollywood movie.

Nothing says Bollywood like Denmark and Coca-Cola products.

Choose a clip. Write some dialogue. Ta-da! (Thanks for the link, Chris!)

Fanta Shokata

It's a kitten. And it loves you. That's all.

For sheer goofiness, this has my top vote for today. (Be advised - this has sound that starts right away - if your speakers are turned up, your co-workers WILL think you're brain damaged.)

i love you kitten - b3ta

Bummer.

Jazz singer Nina Simone died today. Her versions of "Sinnerman," "My Baby Just Cares for Me" and "I Put a Spell on You" are some of my favorite songs of all time, so I'm quite sad...

CNN.com - Singer Nina Simone dead at 70 - Apr. 21, 2003

Zen-like inanity.

The alphabet. Product placement. Vignettes. Hard to explain, but fun.

carl steadman :: placing.com

Oh, to be in Wausau, now that spring is here.

APRIL 16--Meet Montell Howard. The 21-year-old Wisconsin man was just busted for assaulting the Easter Bunny. According to cops, Howard roughed up a man dressed as the friendly rabbit during a visit to a Wausau mall. The bunny, 29-year-old Travis Peterson, was greeting children when Howard allegedly jumped into his lap and and started smashing him in the head. The assailant then put the Easter Bunny in a headlock and punched the rabbit in the mouth, as young mallgoers watched aghast.

The Smoking Gun: Man Assaults Easter Bunny

Also via sharpeworld.com

Speaking of guitars...

The nanoguitar

sharpeworld.com

This site has been one of my very favorites awhile, but it's been on hiatus. It seems to be awake now, though, with linkity goodness like its (his? their?) new MP3 series, "People that sound like instruments and instruments that sound like people."


This week's MP3 spotlight:

driven by the idea that it would be nice to come up with a way to enable his "deaf and dumb" neighbors to speak through a guitar, pete drake, a 1960s nashville steel guitar player (responsible for introducing steel guitar into pop music via his recordings with bob dylan, elvis presley, and george harrison), spent five years developing a way to make his instrument talk. although he sold millions of records with his "talking steel guitar" invention (not to be confused with the vocoder, a speech synthesis device invented by bell labs in 1939), it wasn't until "frampton comes alive!" that the talking guitar finally became a household sound.



Check out the archive while you're there. Definitely worth every minute.



sharpeworld -- mp3 of the week

My sister's former employer.

My memory may not be what it was, but I DO remember the go-go boots, Colleen.

The Grooviest Motel in Wisconsin

For more enjoyment, check out the rest of the site. It's fab.

J. Lilek's Institute of Official Cheer


Correction: My sis just informed me that the Gobbler uniform was "a pink V-neck dress with the ruffled bottom pulled up in a turkey tail in the back. Worn with fishnet stockings and platform shoes." My mistake. Oh, and god bless the 70s.

I love Ikea.

Their furniture, their prices, their ads, their video interface... [happy sigh.]

unb�ring tv

And creators of what may be one of the funniest commercials ever:

Tidy Up

Just in time for Easter

A bible cartoon.

Wibsite Flannelgraph cartoons

Well...I guess if Jesse Ventura can get into office...



Masked Wrestler Wins Japan Assembly Seat

TOKYO (Reuters) - Who is that masked man? One of Japan's newest politicians.



A professional wrestler who fought his way to victory in local assembly elections under his ring name and wearing his trademark mask has vowed the mask will not leave his face even after he enters the staid halls of Japanese politics.



"This is my face," the wrestler -- known as "The Great Sasuke" -- was quoted by the Nikkan Sports newspaper as saying of his black and white full-face mask with bright scarlet streaks and golden wings by the eye holes.



"I won support from voters with this face, and to take it off would be breaking promises," the 33-year-old wrestler, whose real name is Masanori Murakawa, said of his victory in conservative Iwate prefecture, some 460 km (290 miles) north of Tokyo.


Read the whole story (scroll down if you can't see it right away)

Ouch!

From a press release about "The Great American Parade," by retired University of Wisconsin professor Robert Burrows:


The book, mocked at length by a Washington Post writer in a February interview with the author, is a political satire on economic themes [...] The reviewer, Gene Weingarten, unabashedly declared Burrow's novel to be a "wretchedly terrible product that shames the American publishing industry."



While Burrows describes his book as a "novel of ideas," the Post reviewer -- citing the elaborate and formal dialogue -- was prompted to ask the author, "Have you ever heard real human beings speak?" But the review was not entirely negative. "Your book is printed on very white, shiny paper," Weingarten remarked as he concluded the interview.


"Worst Novel in the World" wins readers

Nufonia must fall.

From the press release:

Nufonia Must Fall is a romantic tragedy in graphic novel form, by one of the world's most renowned DJs. Inspired both by silent films and comic books, this unique work has been published by ECW Press in conjunction with Ninja Tune. In Kid Koala's words, "It's about this robot who's trying to write love songs to get the attention of this girl. But he's a robot so he can't sing, and so it's kinda hard to write love songs. But there's adventure. There's some action. There's some drama. There are some sweet moments. There are some scary moments. . . it's all there."


It's beautiful. Check it out:

The commercial.

The book.

Schadenfreude at its best.

Possibly one of the funniest sites ever. Real memos from real companies. Who knows how they get them, but thank god they do. How to handle live turkeys invading your workspace. How to piss off your co-workers by putting their Star Wars figurines in compromising positions. Oh, and this one, about a breach in "professionality" at Circuit City:



To: Web Team

cc: MIS/Manager/CircuitCity

Date: 08/15/2001 12:31 PM



Subject: Professionality at work



Team,

Today there was another rubber band shooting occurrence. I want to remind you all that this is not acceptable behavior at work. Since I don't know who's shooting the rubber bands, I am going to put a copy of this e-mail into each of your personnel files. Since this is not acceptable behavior, if it continues, it will result in penalty.

- Rick

Internalmemos.com

Think of 'em as Beanie Babies on acid.

I can't figure out for the life of me why American stores haven't picked up on these types of toys yet. They're cute, hip, kind of twisted, and there are a million geeks out there who'd happily hand over chunks of their paychecks for them. If you check these out, I can pretty much guarantee you'll spend at least 10 minutes looking at other toys on the site.

Podolly

Cat (Crazy Children #17)

I'm a Friendster addict.

My friend Tina invited me to be part of Friendster, a free online "networking" community. It's kind of like personal ads, except not so creepy because you only view people that are your friends or friends of friends. And it's not just for dating. You can look for friends, activity partners or you can just sign up to help out your friends by introducing your friends to theirs. The best part is, you can read really sweet, funny testimonials written by your friends about how fabulous you are.

It's in the beta testing phase right now (which is probably why it's free), but it's already amazing. In a little over 24 hours, I now have a community of 145 people across the country in my Friendster network. And it's growing by the hour. It's worth signing up just to see how quickly your network grows...



Friendster site

Alive with Pleasure

One my my co-workers sent this along. A perfect mockumentary (a la "Best in Show") for design & marketing folks.



Alive With Pleasure site

High tea. With chopsticks.

I love England. I love Korea. So, of course, I'd be right at home on the space station.



NASA Space Station Picture of the Day

Trivia from mytypewriter.com:

A recent survey of the top 1,000 living English-language authors finds that more than 80 percent own manual typewriters averaging 43 years in age and three broken functions, with a per-unit resale value of $4.75 and slipping. Yet in a questionnaire about their response if brigands should invade their homes and demand either their beat-up old manual typewriters or their spouses on pain of death, a whopping 96 percent wrote ''Spouse.''

Sometimes it's amazing what an artistic person can do with a web site.

I'm creeped out by bugs, and I still think this is amazing...



mytinygarden.com