Kirby Puckett, (1960-2006)

"I was told I would never make it because I'm too short. Well, I'm still too short, but I've got 10 All-Star games, two World Series championships, and I'm a very happy and contented guy. It doesn't matter what your height is, it's what's in your heart."
-Kirby Puckett, Hall of Famer

Episode Six: The Academy Award Episode

Overall, I'm pretty happy with the Oscar's. I have to admit I didn't see a lot of the movies that were up for awards. I did see Crash and enjoyed it in a "sick-feeling-at-the-end" sort of way. So in honor of the biggest night for Hollywood, I will take a shot at correlating the top 6 awards to great album covers. Here we go...not my best outing, but everybody has to have their Hulk.

Best Picture, Crash

I think of Kathleen York as an actress. She played Congresswoman "Andy" Wyatt as well as Toby Zeigler's baby's mommy on the West Wing. She also was the masseuse on Curb Your Enthusiasm. She also had a role on the O.C. for a few episodes. Apparently she's also a songwriter and singer, publishing under the name of Bird York. She did a great job singing the song with flames of fire close behind her.

Best Director, Ang Lee

Willie Nelson? Ang Lee? This is a bit of a stretch, but Willie has a song on the soundtrack for Brokeback Mountain and it gave me an excuse to throw in a great old album cover by Willie. Can you believe that Ang Lee is directing Hulk 2? I though he'd have learned his lesson with the first Hulk movie.

Best Actor, Philip Seymour Hoffman

Hoffman plays Lester Bangs in Almost Famous. If you doubt his acting ability, just watch the deleted scenes for Punch Drunk Love titled Mattress Man. It's one scene, but it's worth the rental.

Best Actress, Reese Witherspoon

I love Reese Witherspoon. I always have. It's great to see her win this. Perhaps we'll get less Legally Blonde and Sweet Home Alabama and more Election or Walk the Line. In light of Jon Stewart's "Raise your hand if you weren't in Crash," quote, "Raise your hand if you didn't fall in love with Reese in Man in the Moon." In honor of her performance, Folsom Prison...

Best Supporting Actor, George Clooney

Great ol' timey music. Contrary to popular belief, George Clooney didn't sing on the soundtrack. But Doug Ross, Danny Ocean, Ulysses Everett Magill, Major Gates, Seth Gecko, Booker and even Bruce Wayne ain't too shabby.

Best Supporting Actress, Rachel Weisz

I think Rachel Weisz is pretty amazing. She's had some great roles and done really well with them. I didn't see Constant Gardener, but I'm sure I will. My applause was for her catalog of great performances. And speaking of great performances, Badly Drawn Boy put together a darn good set of songs for the About a Boy soundtrack (hint: Rachel Weisz was in About a Boy).

Episode Five: The Rick Rubin Factor

Remember when Aerosmith and Run DMC collaborated for "Walk This Way"? That was Rick Rubin's doing. Rubin started as a hip-hop producer but has since branched out. The following covers are albums he's produced. Great album covers not necessarily because of Rick Rubin, but great albums because of him. Rubin has made a living of bringing the best out of an artist by reducing them to the musician/artist that they started as. He helped redefine and revive Johnny Cash's career. He helped the Chili Peppers get loud by first getting quiet. His work on Tom Petty's Wildflowers album, The Black Crowes' Shake Your Money Maker, Weezer's Make Believe, and even on Jay-Z's Black Album have all been critically praised. You can look ahead to another Rubin produced Chili Peppers album, an album of unreleased Johnny Cash tracks, as well as producing Justin Timberlake's, Metallica's, and Kid Rock's next albums.

LL Cool J, Radio (1985)

The Beastie Boys, Licensed to Ill (1986)

Red Hot Chili Peppers, Blood Sugar Sex Magik (1991), Californication (1999), By The Way [Julian Schnabel] (2002)

Johhny Cash, American Recordings (1994), Unchained (1996), Solitary Man (2000), The Man Comes Around (2002)

Shakira, Oral Fixation Vol. 2 (2005)

Neil Diamond, 12 Songs (2005)

Episode Four: Controversy

The following are album covers that were changed due to their racy or controversial content.

Jane's Addiction, Ritual De Lo Habitual (submitted by Schmetzger)

Ritual De Lo Habitual was released in 1990 to the mainstream with the white cover above featuring article 1 of the constitution. Other perhaps more progressive retailers stocked copies of both covers. The cover artwork on the original is by Perry Ferrell of Jane's Addiction and is based on the song "Three Days."

The Rolling Stones, Beggars Banquet

In 1968, the Rolling Stones were trying to put together a R&B influenced rock record unlike their previous album that delved into the psychedelic sounds of the late 60's. The album cover featuring men's room graffiti, was rejected by the record label. Initially the Stones withheld the album standing on the cover art principle, but finally relented and allowed the album to be released with the much tamer invitation cover. In 1984 when the album was remastered and re-released it was released with the original cover art.

Guns 'n Roses, Appetite for Destruction

The original cover artwork featured some graphic cartoons by Robert Williams. This album is listed at or near the top of a lot of "best album" lists. It's one of the highest selling albums of all time, however the sales had been slow the first year it was released. In 1987, the album was released with pretty good critical acclaim, but MTV (which is hard to believe now) refused to play any of the videos unless the album cover was changed. The band agreed and replaced the cover with a Grateful Deadesque cover. MTV still thought that it was too much. David Geffen begged and MTV eventually agreed that they would play the "Welcome to the Jungle" video, but only once and at 2am. Within 24 hours, the video was the #1 requested video. And the rest is history. "Sweet Child O' Mine" and "Paradise City" were also hit singles from the album.

No, I'm not going to include Ween's Chocolate & Cheese, despite three requests.

Episode Three: The Challenge

Episode Three of the album cover series is partly a nomination sent in, and partly my own. Third episodes are frequently when a large paradigm shift occurs in a series. So, in light of that...the Challenge.

Michael Jackson

Thriller vs. Off The Wall




Both were great albums. Anyone who questions that is either too young to remember or too jaded by who or what Michael Jackson has become. Off the Wall came out in 1979 and was produced by Quincy Jones. Quincy had finished being the Musical Director of The Wiz, in which MJ was the Scarecrow. Generally accepted as his first solo album because of his age and the influence on the previous Michael Jackson albums. Song you might know that were on Off the Wall are "Rock With You", "Don't Stop 'Til You Get Enough", and "Girlfriend" written by Paul McCartney. He followed up that album with 1982's Thriller. Thriller is the top selling album of all time, due to the number of hits on the album. "Beat It", "Thriller", "Billie Jean", "The Girl is Mine and Wanna Be Startin' Somethin'" were all big selling singles for Jackson. Again produced by Quincy Jones, Thriller spent 37 weeks at number one on Billboard. At it's peak it would sell a million copies a week. Originally titled Starlight, the title track was a late addition that changed the face of the music video industry forever.

Responses

I've had several responses to the album cover feature. Thank you to those who have sent them in, I will slowly work my way through them. I also receive lots of emails with questions from people who are apparently too afraid to post comments. You know who you are...
So in an effort to connect more with the lurkers of MKinMotion, I will answer a few of the questions.

Question One: What's next for MKinMotion?

MKinMotion: Well, it's a blog. There's not much to it. I'd like to take it on the road and go in motion, so I'm exploring some ideas about that. I'd like to continue to build a loyal following of people. If they keep coming, I'll keep posting.


Question Two: What is your blog for? What is your point?

MKinMotion: Good questions. I'd like to think that I shed a different perspective on things. Sometimes normal things that need a fresh perspective, sometimes random things that I think are interesting. It's kind of weird, but I picture someone reading every word I type. Seriously a mental image of people reading...so I try to make something worth reading. I want to write and this is good exercise.

Question Three: What is your inspiration? Is someone your muse?

MKinMotion: Like I said I picture people reading, is that muse enough? But really, I've always liked to write. It never made much sense until my sophomore year of high school when I wrote a vignette and people actually liked it. I know my sophomore english teacher was one of the most disliked teachers at the school, she was hard on her students, but looking back she seemed to believe that we were all just doing the least that it took to get by. She encouraged excellence and I've never forgotten. I have no idea what ever happened to her, but I had sophomores come up to me every year ("That's what I love about these high school girls, man. I get older, they stay the same age.") telling me that my vignette was shared in class. I think it meant more to her that I would take a lesson seriously than it meant to me to have her love it. But I digress. I have lots of muses, but most of them are just memories now.

Music For The Day:
"Jolene" - Ray LaMontagne
"Boston" - Augustana
"Girl in the War" - Josh Ritter
"Like A Rolling Stone" - Drive-By Truckers
"Houses on the Hill" - Whiskeytown
"Young Hearts" - Commuter


Thanks for reading. Feel free to comment or email me at MKinMotion(at)gmail(dot)com and have your questions answered.

Another Year in Music

Some of you might remember my post on the significance of 1989 in music. That's not the end all be all of years. Another great year for music was 1968. A great year for Corvettes (pictured above) too. In 1968 Elvis came back; David Gilmour joined Pink Floyd when Syd Barrett (pictured below) committed himself; Led Zeppelin came to life; Simon, Garfunkel, Joplin, Fogerty and others campaign for Democratic presidential candidate Eugene McCarthy...the 1968 Democratic Convention in Chicago turned into rioting and violence (picture below); Buffalo Springfield split paving the way for Neil Young to do his own thing without guilt; John Lennon and his wife split paving the way for him to do his own thing without guilt. Albums released in 1968: Johnny Cash released his concert at Folsom Prison; The Doors released Waiting for the Sun; Simon & Garfunkel's Bookends; The Beatle's The Beatles (The White Album); Jimi Hendrix Electric Ladyland; Van Morrison's Astral Weeks; The Rolling Stone's Beggars Banquet. Also significant in 1968 were the births of: Lisa Loeb, Thom Yorke, Sarah McLachlan, Shawn Mullins, LL Cool J, Glen Phillips (Toad the Wet Sprocket), and of course icon Vanilla Ice. Sgt. Pepper won the Album of the Year Grammy; the song "Jackson" made so popular by Walk the Line won best country performance by a duo or group; Boris Karloff won for Children's Recording with his reading of How the Grinch Stole Christmas. Clearly yet another year that helped form not only my music collection, but shaped music today.

Episode Two

Episode Two:

U2's "The Joshua Tree."

Released on my birthday in 1987 (March 9, yep coming up), The Joshua Tree truly broke U2 onto the mainstream music scene. I won't focus too much on the album itself, seeing as I'm trying to focus on the covers. The photo was taken by Anton Corbijn, somewhat ironically in Death Valley, rather than the assumed Joshua Tree National Park. Anton does at least three things that were taught to my in every photography I've taken.

1. Don't center your subject.

2. Use your subject to block a major background feature if it draws the eye to your subject.

3. In a portrait, have your subject stare off into their own mortality. Bono's mortality is apparently somewhere different than the rest of the band.

Interesting you said that...

It's interesting that the Chindo mentioned having a few of his own. I meant to include an invitation in my Pilot Episode post about submitting your own favorite album covers. Please do. You can email me at MKinMotion(at)Gmail(dot)com with what album and why you love it. I'll do some research on it and put together a post with your name (err...pseudonym) with it. It will be fun. And yes, I do see a D.I.D. stream coming along anytime now. It's been a while since I've explored that topic.

I've become an addict. No not to myspace, although I am a little intrigued by it. I'm addicted to podcasts. Much like my fits of talk radio, I can listen to a podcast about anything. There is so much going on out in the world that you just don't see unless you either stumble upon it or you dig deep enough. I think the number one misconception about podcasts is that you need an iPod. Simply untrue. All you need is something to interact with the podcast and something to play the podcast. For me I use iTunes, because it does both...and makes it easy. Try it. I'll post some recommendations at some point.

Pilot Episode

I've decided to start a new feature: Great Album covers. Most of which are actual Albums or LPs or vinyl.

Episode One:

The Beatles - Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band

Featured on the cover are The Beatles (twice), Bob Dylan, Laurel and Hardy, Marilyn Monroe, Marlon Brando and many other icons of Pop Culture (as well as Stu Sutcliffe). The album won the Grammy for packaging (this year this Grammy was won by Aimee Mann). Ghandi, Jesus and Hitler were all removed before the final print. The album was released on June 1st, 1967 (June 2nd in the US) and was one of the first pop albums to have the lyrics printed on the cover (they're on the back).

Incidentally, I have this album cover framed and hanging on my wall, so it's appropriate to kick off the series with this one. Stay tuned for more.

Pythagorean Theory

It was great to hear some boys on Scrubs tonight. If you missed it, The Jayhawks were played. Blue from their album "Tomorrow the Green Grass." Arguably the step-parents of the genre we now know as Alt Country.

Not to be outdone, Fix You played, but you all have that album already, right?

Letting Go of Reason

I've been trying to come up with something compelling to share, and I can only come up with lots of little things I find interesting.

I'm not anal about very many things. One thing, though is music in iTunes. I'm so anal about track tags that it's not healthy any more. I'm taking a big step today and letting CDDB figure it out for me. It makes me feel a little strange, but then again, most of you don't know what I'm talking about.

This should be good. Or at least give some laughs.

Steve Buscemi is back to being a director.

Knight School is fascinating to me.

The inspiration that hit me while driving back from Chico last week hasn't past. I just haven't worked out how to put it out there.

That's it for now.

Don't Miss It

(Picture is from Humpys on Halloween 2004)

Portlanders, get your magic-marker out and mark May 11 and 12th on your calendar. On May 11, you'll want to be at the Rock Creek Tavern. On May 12th the White Eagle Saloon. The Whipsaws are coming to town! Alaskan Rock/Folk/Country at its best. They put on a great show. You can also check out their new CD at CDBaby or their MySpace page. I ordered it a while back and have never had a better experience with an online vendor. They are great. Incidentally, a lot of musicians I'm into have music and "blogs" on myspace. So, in order to be interactive with them, I had to join. That's right, I'm on myspace. I'm not sure I understand it, but I've had a few blasts from the past find me already. I've got a post (or an Article, as I sometimes refer to them) rattling around in my head that I'll take some time to write up later. Enjoy The Whipsaws, I know I do.

Highways

I drove to Chico today. A family friend needed a ride, so I drove her up there and dropped her off. I’ll go back up there on Thursday and pick her up. Not a bad drive at all. When making any trip, I prefer not to come back the same way I got there. So in this vein, I took a different route back. On my way up there, I drove 680 to 80 to 505 to 5 to 32 to Chico. I’m sure no one is as big of a geography geek as I am to actually trace my path, but I give the details nonetheless. On the way back I took 99 south to Sacramento (or Sacramentucky) and then 80 to 680. 99 was nice, I’d never done that stretch of it before. If you’re familiar at all with the US highway system, you may wonder what a 99 is doing on the West Coast.

For those of you who aren’t familiar with the US highway system, here’s a little lesson. President Eisenhower, influenced by both his almost envious admiration of the Autobahn in Germany and his experience of following the “Lincoln Highway” as a young man, passed the “Federal-Aid Highway Act” in 1956. This created, or (pardon the pun) paved the way for the national grid we now know and love. Sorry, Alaska, you’re the only state to not have any interstates…yes, Hawaii has interstates (Don’t ask me, I don’t make the rules). There are major interstate highways that run North-South and East-West across the country. If you are on the west coast you are familiar with I-5, perhaps I-90 in Seattle or I-10 in L.A. (Here in the Bay Area it’s all about the 80). North-South highways are odd numbers and East-West highways are evens. I-5 is the Western N-S highway going Canada to Mexico through Washington, Oregon, and California. I-95 is the Eastern N-S highway going from Canada to Miami. Incidentally, I’ve driven the 5 from the Mexican border to Canada…never all at once, but there isn’t a section I haven’t driven. I’ve driven on the 95 from Newburyport, Massachusetts into North Carolina. So, no matter where you are in the 48 states, near you should be either an Interstate ending with a 5 or a 0. So as I check my traffic log, lots of people will be familiar with the 5, the 10 (Los Angeles), the 95 (Hello, Boston visitors, whoever you are), the 90 (Ohio loves the Motion), the 40 (new daddy in ARK), the 75 (someone who bookmarked my blog from Atlanta [Marietta, specifically])… I know I’ve already said too much about highways. It’s fascinating to me, though.

So in exchange for my long ramble about interstates, I recommend a great book. William Least Heat-Moon wrote Blue Highways: A Journey into America on a special trip in 1978 (published in 1982). He jumps right to my attention in the first page when he writes, “A man who couldn’t make things go right could at least go.” With a series of events in his life converging, he sets out across America to perhaps escape from home, or perhaps to find it. Instead of using the Interstate highways listed above to get around the U.S., he uses the “blue highways” more minor interstates or state routes. I haven’t thought of this book for years, but today I thought of it passing through a part of California, most of you either have never been or can’t even picture. I need to read it again to get some more details back in my head. Here are a few quotes from the book.

"At any particular moment in a man's life, he can say that everything he has done and not done, that has been done and not been done to him, has brought him to that moment. If he's being installed as Chieftain or receiving a Nobel Prize, that's a fulfilling notion. But if he's in a sleeping bag at ten thousand feet in a snowstorm, parked in the middle of a highway and waiting to freeze to death, the idea can make him feel calamitously stupid."

"Other than to amuse himself, why should a man pretend to know where he's going or understand what he sees?"

"Boredom lies only with the traveler's limited perception and his failure to explore deeply enough. After a while, I found my perception limited."

“I can't say, over the miles, that I had learned what I had wanted to know because I hadn't known what I wanted to know. But I did learn what I didn't know I wanted to know."

"Instead of insight, maybe all a man gets is strength to wander for a while. Maybe the only gift is a chance to inquire, to know nothing for certain. An inheritance of wonder and nothing more."

So two things from this. First, buy this book. Second, I’d love to take “MK in Motion” truly into motion and travel the U.S. blogging and logging little places that the average travel show or hip travel magazine doesn’t go. As William Least Heat-Moon does, count the calendars on the wall of a diner to know if you’re in the right place. Meet people, see places, and bring you all along as I do it. So, that’s my thought today. I’m not going to jump on the road tomorrow to head out across the states…I’ve got to be in Chico on Thursday, after all, but with the right budget and plan, I could really see myself doing it. Different friends could join me for different pieces of the trip. I could visit people who check in to MK in Motion and see their “home.” I started this wanting to write a little essay or article about home, but I will save that for another time. Below are links to find Blue Highways.

Amazon
Barnes and Noble
Title Wave (some love for the ANC; $3.50 used)
Powell’s (P-Land)

Dizz Knee Land

Off to Anaheim this morning. Will be spending a couple of days in the "Happiest Place on Earth."

More INXS

Here are video files from the INXS private concert. Just the songs not the conversations in between.

1. Mystify
2. Need You Tonight
3. Never Tear Us Apart
4. Pretty Vegas

If you can't access these, let me know.

apparent lack of purpose, cause, or order

The title is the definition of the word random. Soon you will figure out why I've chosen the title.

I went to San Francisco today and on the way back on BART, I saw a guy wearing an Art Shell jersey...I don't own any jerseys, but if someone held a gun to my head and forced me to, here's the list.

If I were forced to wear a throwback jersey, I would have a hard time deciding between:

John Elway (#7) (in the "Orange Crush" of my childhood)

Neil Lomax (#15) (Portland guy, always been underrated, but one of my favorites)

Will Clark (#22) (Amazing baseball player)

Mike Greenwell (#39) (Greenwell played his entire career for the Red Sox, and came in second in the MVP voting to Jose Canseco in 1988)

George Brett (#5) (Hard working player who said that in his final at bat, he'd like to ground out to short, but run as hard as he can to first base [incidentally, he doubled in his final at bat])

Stan Musial (#6) (Great Cardinal hitter)


Drazen Petrovic (#44) (In a Portland jersey, of course)

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (#33) (In 4th grade I did my biography report on Kareem. My teacher asked when I was done how tall Kareem is. I answered 7 feet 2 inches, but then I added that he might be a little taller now. My 4th grade mind assumed that since I'd grown over the last few years, Kareem must've too.)

Are You Serious?

I could have titled this post "Say it ain't so, Joe."

Two members of NFL history were visibly absent from yesterday's superbowl festivities.

As the rest of the Superbowl MVP's made their walk down the aisle, you couldn't help but think of Superbowl XIII, XIV, XVI, XIX, XXIV.

Jake Scott, the safety and MVP of Superbowl VII was in Australia on vacation. But Terry Bradshaw and Joe Montana weren't there. They both say that they had prior commitments with their families, but that's not what the NFL says. Both retired players have appearance fees. The other 31 MVPs made the appearance for $1000 in spending money on top of their flight, hotel, rental car, superbowl ticket and banquets of food. Montana reportedly demanded a $100,000 appearance fee. $100,000!!! As if being a part of history, representing one of the greatest teams in NFL history, getting your picture taken with the greatest QB ever (John Elway) wasn't enough. I wonder if Notre Dame had to pay that to get him to stand on the sidelines when they got beat by USC. Terry Bradshaw has denied the report that he argued over money, but something kept him away. Lynn Swann made it. Bart Starr made it. Doug Williams made it. Terry, your team was playing for the Superbowl and you weren't there. Was it to keep the bald quarterback karma under control for the Steelers?

F You

This is a 30 MB file, so it will take some time and patience to view, regardless of your connection speed. Sorry Citrix users in AK, no sound for you.
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Redemption

Much to say about Coldplay. I had a conversation with Schmetzger in Portland when I was there in December about Coldplay live. He was pretty critical of their live performance. My only experience was Austin, so as you can read below in the post describing my Austin experience I was having my doubts too. What was missing in Austin was a connection to the crowd and better control over the sound. The sound in Austin was clear, just not loud enough to grab you. Well...

They redeemed themselves with me. BIG TIME. But first a couple of other things.

I sold my extra ticket to a woman for face value. A deal from what I understand. I posted on Craigslist and she was apparently in San Jose on business and wanted to see Coldplay. We exchanged ticket for cash in the lobby of her hotel. The interesting thing was that the ticket was for the seat next to me (I didn't mention this to her at any point). She never showed up. At least she didn't sit next to me. But the cash covered a t-shirt, parking and a sub at Quiznos. I didn't mind at all that she didn't show. Cash doesn't bounce.

Fiona Apple may have broken a few of the key rules of being an opening act.

1. She started early. By the atomic clock of my cell and the clock on the side of the arena, she started her set at 7:51.
2. She played for too long. While opening bands usually play their 5-7 songs and then run off the stage, members of the stage crew ran out as one of her songs drew to a close and grabbed instruments from the band and told her it was time to go.
3. She questioned what she was thinking when she wrote a song. The song, "Criminal," by the way.
4. She gained at least one new fan. Me.

Fiona was phenomenal. I'll save a proper review for another post. I'll also save my revelation about opening acts for another post.

What Schmetzger and I had discussed in December was that a lot of Coldplay's songs just didn't seem like live songs. Great album tracks, great driving music, but not big live music numbers. Perhaps Chris, Guy, Will and Jon were listening, because it was a completely different set list than Austin, which compared with Schmetzger's experience was pretty similar.

They started off with Square One, went right into Politik, Yellow, and Speed of Sound. While I was catching my breath from having my ass kicked by those four songs, they rattled through some songs that might not seem obvious. They inserted "How You See The World" into the set which is a song from "Help: A Day in the Life" a great track live, and a surprise to me. They did their Johnny Cash thing with "'Til Kingdom Come" and "Ring of Fire." They closed the set with "Fix You", which should be (Castpost willing) imbedded in this post or the next post. There will be some more thoughts I share from the show later, but for now, enjoy the clip.