Night Stalker

Did anyone see the new Night Stalker premiere last night?

The original Night Stalker with Darren McGavin will always have a special place in my heart, but I'm willing to give the new one a shot (even after Stuart Townshend sucked balls in Queen of the Damned.) I was at the show last night and I forgot to tape it, but I'd be interested in hearing your thoughts.

Harvest Fest

Harvest Fest is tomorrow and it's one of Madison's more unique events.

It's a Badger home game at 11am, so that means State Street will be flooded with fans looking to get wasted after the game right around 3 o'clock and that's right when the marijuana legalization parade is set to begin. Stoners and jockos finally coming together and joining forces to get wasted.

Bust out your hackey sacks and let's go Red!

Bleeeeyah!

Mike just earned his

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Awesome interview...

...in Time magazine today with Joss Whedon and Neil Gaiman together.

And yeah it's just as cool as you think it is.

My personal favorite quote from NG about the movie industry:
"It really is this thing of executives loving the smell of their own urine and urinating on things. And then more execs come in, and they urinate. And then the next round. By the end, they have this thing which just smells like pee, and nobody likes it."

Giant Squid...

...captured on film finally! That's too awesome for words. I saw an excellent exhibit on them at the Smithsonian last summer (that's still not my fave Smithsonian museum, though, I like the one with Fonzie's jacket and Archie Bunker's chair the best.)

Cryptozoologists have another reason to celebrate. Now, they don't have to just use the 70-year old coelacanth story as proof that their vocation has some kind of legitimacy.

MPMF Drummer Cam!

As promised, here is the DrummerCam from our showcase at Neon's for Midpoint Music Festival in Cincinnati. I think this is one of my favorites thus far... Thanks to everyone for going buck wild at the show!

Just got caught...

...in the middle of a ball-scratch.

I'm kind of embarrassed, but kind of proud at the same time.

We're home safe!

It was a quick roll through Chicago and we're back in Madison.

However, Don Adams of Get Smart is dead. That was one of my favorite shows. I even enjoyed The Nude Bomb and would you believe I even liked the mid-90's Fox revival?

He was also in a show in the 80's called Check It Out that was syndicated (back when there were a bunch of syndicated sit-coms that would play on weekend afternoons.) I thought its mean-spiritedness was actually a little ahead of its time (Married... With Children was still two years away by that point.)

Anyway, we'll miss you Don.

Back in Business!

Repairs are done and we're back on the road... YEEEHAW!

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Wow. This sucks!

Changed the alternator and truck is still not working. Looks like we are stranded in Hobart, Indiana!

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Uh oh

Truck is dead. We think it's the alternator... getting towed to Auto Zone to attempt repair.

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I LOVE CINCINNATI! The show

I LOVE CINCINNATI! The show at Midpoint was the most fun ever... Thanks x10000000 to everyone here for making this weekend so wonderful. ROCK!

Demo Derby

Panelists are tearing apart songs and i am sitting behind a guy with the biggest hair in the world!

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OnASun

Woot, another Wisconsin band here at Midpoint!

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5 years ago when I

5 years ago when I met Sebastian Bach, the pix didn't turn out either. I guess I'm destined never to get a good pic w/ the guys from Skid Row. :-

Your Park Avenue leads to...

Your Park Avenue leads to... I just met Snake from Skid Row. Tried to take a pic, but couldn't work my fonecam.

The truck just stalled in

The truck just stalled in an intersection in the middle of the pouring rain! The acoustic show last night was great. We need to meet a mechanic.

Sean Michael Dargan at Midpoint

yay, we found another Madison band already. And they are doing a fine job of entertaining the crowd here at Arnold's!

VZWPIX.COM

On the Road Again!

Rolling in the truck to save on gas $ this weekend. We are stuck in traffic in Gary IN & it is a sweaty good time!

VZWPIX.COM

At Gunther Murphy's

... In Chicago watching a band called Musical Outfit.

VZWPIX.COM

Hanging out in Chicago Tonight

We're about to leave for Chicago on our way to the Midpoint Music Festival in Cincinnati for our shows on Thursday and Saturday. We'll probably stop by the open mic at Gunther Murphy's because they have a good deal on beers and it's a fun bar.

Anyways, if you're in town, stop by and say hi.

We'll be blogging more of our adventures in WKRP-land.

Not That We're a Culture of Victimization or Anything...

An "ugly" woman sues Extreme Makeover for cancelling her makeover. Wow.

I'm embarassed to be human today.

Miramar Tonight!

Looking forward to our show in Milwaukee tonight. I really dig the Miramar Theatre, it always has such a cool vibe. The last thing I saw there was Todd Robbins' Carnival Knowledge which is one of America's last touring sideshows and it was awesome. It's a show as well as a lesson in American history and we had a killer time there for my sister's birthday last September.

We'll be up first around 9 o'clock, so make sure to come down, have a drink at the Mirabar and listen to Sunspot "in the round" for the first time ever. Metallica did it on their last tour (and the Black album tour if I remember correctly) tonight we're gonna try, except no rotating stage...uhhh... so someone's gonna get a good view of our backsides. The best "seats" in the house.

I'm fucking lame.

Road Mania Episode 14

This episode features the following highlights:

Ring side seats for Jello wrestling
Reviews of shows in Eau Claire, La Crosse, Madison, St. Cloud
Ass tongues (?!)

and the following music:

Creation.Imitation... by This is the End (Madison, WI)
Wings, Blah, Blah, Blah by The Jaggernauts (Eau Claire, WI)
Pretend by Sunspot (Madison, WI) hehehehehe

Enjoy the show!

And yes, Dino, your episode is up next.... :)

Photos from Wausau

Here is a link to some photos I took last weekend. There are some van images, pics of Coolhand kicking ass, our friends at the Scott Street... None of us on stage, but trust me, it's probably better that way!

The podcast is coming soon. I promise!

WAMI Tonight

It's the first WAMI meeting of the season is tonight. I always wonder why nobody else from Madison makes the super short drive (less than 70 miles on I-94) to Milwaukee for meetings. I think the networking is valuable, even if don't meet that many bands in our genre, it's cool to see like-minded musicians who have the right idea going forward. I don't think our formula is that different than anyone else's, no matter what the genre. Write good songs. Rock out. Get paid. Party. Repeat.

Even though, there's a lot more pop artists gunning for the Dawson's Creek /O.C. audience in Milwaukee than in Madison. I think I only know one band here that's going really for the Top 40 crowd, but there's a lot in Milwaukee. I wonder why that is. And people at WAMI meetings don't usually moan about how the music scene "sucks". I think the music scene sucks everywhere, yo, that's why you have to make your own. There's very few genres that you can just plug yourself into. You make your own crowd and don't depend on anyone or anything else. Always.

It's not just your job to kick ass. It's your job to let everyone know how much ass you kick. Everybody's a rockstar in the basement and that's cool. But if you want to have great shows, you need to do some kind of promotion to make it happen. It seems like most bands in Madison think it's someone else's job.

Anyway, I better make some fliers for our Friday 9/16 rock show at The Miramar on the East Side of Milwaukee so we can hand them out tonight. It's gonna be a good party.

Help Close To Home

Here's what I mean about people needing to look and see what needs cleaning in their backyard. Looks like the Sauk County homeless shelter is closing.

First of all, how do you end up homeless in Sauk County? I doubt there's a lot of transients (but I still find transients more terrifying than pitiful.) What I bet is that it's a lot of families and teenagers running from abusive homes. There really might be nowhere for these people to go unless they make it to Dane County or Stevens Point. Which is really hard if you lack a car. I mean, it's kind of the middle of nowhere. 500 people have stayed there since the beginning of the year. I'd probably think of that area as a place with no homeless at all. I was wrong.

While most of our national resources and attention goes to hurricane victims (and of course they need and deserve as much help as we all can give), maybe we should have a benefit for the people who are up shit creek only twenty miles away.

Wausau DrummerCam!

Just a glimpse of some of the fun at Scott Street on Saturday. Wait a sec.... What the heck is our guitar player doing in the crowd?!

Stay tuned for more pics and the Podcast from Saturday!

Charity Navigator

I know a lot of people who are contributing money and time for Katrina victims, but here's a cool site that helps you make sure your money is going to the right place. Take a look at Charity Navigator, a site that independently evaluates charities and where your donations end up.

Virgin Birth?

Here's a cool story about scientists in the UK working on creating a human parthenogenesis (reproduction without sex.) The main idea of this was to cultivate stem cells in a less controversial way (ie, without fertilizing eggs.)

Just the idea that we're approaching the technical knowledge that we can alter the ways that life is created is fascinating to me and completely amazing. We're on the threshold of an ability that humans only attributed to gods. Even if we question the morality, it's nice to enjoy the pride in achievement. Plus, Frankenstein's the balls.

I'm still drunk. Holy shit.

I'm still drunk. Holy shit. We're driving back ti Madison right now. Thank you Dino, Coolhand, and Scott Street!

Welcome to the 21st Century

You can now order a ringtone of Sunspot's "Summer Day" for your mobile phone!

Mention in Mix Magazine

It's just a teeny mention, but it's cool that Mix printed a little blurb about us recording for the Raw-Tracks.com site.

I'm back from Dallas, I didn't have much time to hang out or party unfortunately. But I did see a lot of refugees from Hurricane Katrina that were sent to the Dallas Convention Centers. These people really have nothing left, I'd say give if you can. But don't forget there's people right in our backyard that need help every day. Just because CNN doesn't have a special about them, doesn't mean they're any less important.

Drummer Cam @ The Red Carpet in St. Cloud!

Thanks to yet another awesome crowd (especially Nikki, the blow-up doll) for making our trip to St. Cloud a blast!

Mike in the Big D

I'm out to Dallas until Thursday. I don't know if I'll have a lot of time, but if any of our Tejas friends wants to get together, shoot me an email and hopefully we can hang out.

St. Cloud Show Tonight

We just scored a show tonight (Saturday) up in St. Cloud, Minnesota at this sweet fuckin' joint called Red Carpet. Just randomly, I decide to take a look at the site of the other act on the bill to see if they suck or not and lo and behold, Catchpenny, who we're playing with, has a guy that I used to work with in college at the Division of Information Technology at the University of Wisconsin.

That's a cool coincidence. Meeting a guy I haven't seen in several years in the middle of Minnesota.

Okay, okay, I can see that you care. Eat me.

Christmas CD for Salvation Army

Just a heads-up. The website for Ringin' A Bell, a benefit CD for the Dane County Salvation Army just went up this past week. We'll have a holiday tune on there. There are some cool local acts and businesses helping out with the disc as well. Stop by the site to check it out.

Speaking of contributing, I'm sure there will be a lot of benefits and opportunities to give now in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. It's an opportune time to call your Red Cross and give some blood. It's easy, fast, and you get free cookies.

Annex Drummer Cam!

Wow... Thanks everybody for truly making last night a party. You RULE!!!

Awesome Time Last Night

I just wanted to give a deepfelt thanks to everyone for making last night such an excellent show. It was great seeing so many friends make it out on a Wednesday. We'll have some pictures up from last night's show and this last weekend's events very soon.

Reason For Leaving put on a really fun set (absolutely nice guys and talented), the bartenders were very cool and the free beer lasted until almost the end of our set, nice job on making short work of it, yo!

You are the balls.