Here's a great quote from Ian McCulloch, lead singer of Echo and the Bunnymen. (Yes, uneducated lovers of bad music, them again!)

"You've got to hand it to Paul Weller. He's come up with two of the most crap names ever *. Three if you count Paul Weller, which is a crap name for a singer."
Despite the fact that I happen to like Paul Weller, this IS a hilarious quote.

Today I received a bit of junk email from Pro-Life Catholics. If you are reading this blog you willl be aware that an email from Hitler would, to me, be only slightly more unwelcome. I don't understand how these people got my name! Did they buy a list from Planned Parenthood or The National Organization for Women? I find such a scenario hard to believe. Are some of my bleeding heart liberal brethren in fact traitors working for the opposition, lured by the promise of shorter waiting periods for gun purchasing (It's just for protection! Remember when Daddy got mugged outside H and H Bagels?) and the assurance that, once every low-income housing project on 97th Street has been knocked down, there will be an abundance of new park-view co-ops available?

Perhaps.

A more plausible explaination may be that there are undercover agents of the right planted in left wing organizations.

This would certainly explain the whole James Carville/Mary Matalin relationship. Their "marriage" is a sham - it's in fact a special assignment from George Bush Senior.

"Mary, I want you to use all your feminine wiles to trap that Cajun Commie bastard. There's gotta be something we can use. Does he have a pair of of Stars and Stripes boxers? That's practically flag burning! But Mary for God's sake, let's try to get him wearing them in TEXAS ok? Georgie junior just got a law through down there...it's lethal injection for that now! What? Carvillle's not black you say? Damn, he may get off on the Aryan-With-Fancy-Jew-Lawyer clause...."

Just a theory.

*(these being The Jam and The Style Council)

It's time for another Sopranos critique. This week saw a less direct, subler approach to things, with the action centered mostly around Bobby Bacala's kitchen, where Janice and JoJo Palmice engaged in a battle for the oblivious widower, using, instead of guns, the mob woman's favorite (emotionally) loaded weapon - food.

Other memorable scenes involved animals. A strung-out Adrianna and her pocket-size dog sit pitifully on the edge of her bed as they contemplate life in the Winess Protection Program. And in the last scene, Tony sits comforting Ralph's sick racehorse when an errant sheep wanders into the stable.

Non-human species seem to be a favorite motif of the Sopranos' writers. Serious viewers will no doubt remember the DUCKS that once took up residence in Tony's pool, and the importance of FISH to the story of FBI informant (or RAT) Sal "Big PUSSY" Bonpensiero. Is the Sopranos in fact less a story of the New Jersey Mob, more an Orwellian cautionary tale about the dangers of Capitalism? Answers on a postcard please. No phone calls. The first 10 correct entries will receive free passes to a screening of The Tuxedo, starring Jackie Chan and Jennifer Love Hewitt.

Let's talk post-punk music shall we? Friends of mine are well aware that the words "Dark Side of the Moon" mean nothing to me. I came of musical age in the glorious early 1980's; bands like Bauhaus, Siouxsie and The Banshees, The Cure, The Smiths, and in turn their influences - The Ramones, The New York Dolls and of course The Velvet Underground - are, in my world, what really matters.

So I'd like to bring up the oft-overlooked subject of the greatest of all bands, Liverpool's finest. That's right, I'm talking about Echo and the Bunnymen. "Oh they're that band that did that Doors cover for the Lost Boys soundtrack, right?" I hear you say. While admitedly this is true, it's hardly representative of the Bunnymen's body of work and its subsequent influence on a host of artists ranging from the obvious Jesus and Mary Chain to the you-have-to-dig-deeper-to-find-it Pavement. Just ask Courtney Love or Anthony Keidis and you will hear the same thing: "The Bunnymen are one my most important influences."

What is it about the Bunnymen that makes them so great? It could be Ian McCulloch's Sinatra-on-'shrooms croon, Will Seargeant's trademark guitar jangle (note to The Edge: you are busted) or their fearless lyrics which speak of life, death, love, drugs, sailors, and monkeys. Or it could be all of these things.

Judge for yourself. Check out the Bunnymen's best albums: Crocodiles, Heaven Up Here, Porcupine and the magnificent Ocean Rain, billed in its own release ad back in 1984 as "The Greatest Album of All Time." Hard to argue with that.

So someone - they know who they are - has asked me to create a post on the Greatest Book Ever Written, namely The Dirt, by Vince Neil, Nikki Sixx, Tommy Lee and Mick Mars. For those of you who have been living in a cave outside Kabul for the last twenty years, these Four Horsemen make up seminal '80's "hair" band Motley Crue. If you have seen VH1's Behind The Music look at the group, you will doubtless be familiar with the phrase "I woke up, and the needle was still in my arm." I now advise everyone to stop whatever you are doing and go buy this book. It will change your life.

From a Sunset Strip hovel that would make Sid's room at the Chelsea Hotel seem like an acceptable venue for heart surgery, our heroes rapidly progress to LA mansions, cars and a stream of blondes (and sometimes their mothers too), using so much hairspray that the hole in the ozone above Santa Monica reportedly doubles in size. Then things start to turn bleak as Nikki succeeds in outdoing an Warhol-era Lou Reed in skag consumption, Mick displays symptoms of a bizarre neurological disease that renders him statue-like, Vince's love of fast cars comes to a bad end, and - perhaps most tragic of all - Tommy cuts his hair and forms a nu-metal band.

To be sure, it's a cautionary tale, yet there are moments of laughter, even joy, along the way. For those of you still on that Hammer of the Gods trip, prepare yourself to Shout at the Devil.

So, another post, this one about the Soporanos. Did anyone see it this past Sunday? I'd just like to comment on the sheer depth and layered complexity of the writing. Who, while enjoying the donut-enhanced father-daughter bonding of Tony and Meadow at her Ivy League college, did not think back wistfully to their own youth? Who did not feel a tug at their heartstrings as Johnny Sack told his wife that, despite her simultaneous hidden candy bar stash and protests that the atkins diet is "hard", he still loved her? And who, while watching the tension-laden tarantella between Furio and Carmella, did not squirm ever-so-slightly at the knowledge that the former will surely end up being sold as sausage meat at Satriale's? Pure genius. I advise you all to catch the catch the rerun if at all possible.

OK!

So I know many of you out there have been eagerly awaiting the debut of fruitandnut. Well the wait is over.

Wow. Right now I feel rather like the proverbial deer in the headlights, having lost my usual ability to ramble furiously about what's on my mind. So instead, I will warm up with a shout out to my associate at odge.blogspot.com, who turned me on not only to this whole blog thing, but also to a whole host of other things which now have a place on my list of most brilliant things ever. A few examples are Harry Potter, diet orange soda and The Dandy Warhols. Thank you odge.