RKNet Blog... Thing

Because I love you all so dearly, gentle readers, I have put together another mixwit tape for your enjoyment. In this installement I share with you a variety of delightful mashups. What is a mashup, you may ask? Something akin to a remix, but in this case more focused on taking two (sometimes more) songs and melding them together in such a way that you’d never want to hear them any other way. Generally speaking, this mix is intended to at least get you chair dancing, if not full out dancing your ass off. Three from A plus D, three from Instamatic, three from DJ Lobsterdust.

1. A plus D - Love Will Tear You Apart (She Wants Revenge vs. Joy Division vs. Bauhaus)
• Not much to say about this one. Consider it an appetizer for what A plus D has to offer.
2. A plus D - Sexy Peek-A-Boo (I’m Bringing Siouxsie Back) Justin Timberlake vs. Siouxie & The Banshees
• Ordinarily I’d have nothing to do with Justin Timberlake. I really don’t go in for “pop” music. This changes things a lot. Trust me. Also, accordian.
3. A plus D - Don’t Stop Believin’ In Planet Rock (Journey vs. Afrika Bambaataa)
• Journey never had so much funk. Nor did they expect to have it. Yet… it feels so right.
4. Instamatic - Crazy Marvin (Gnarls Barkley vs. Marvin Gaye)
• That song you couldn’t get away from meets a soul master for a refreshing look at both.
5. Instamatic - Electric Loop (Judas Priest vs. Pendulum)
• Chosen mostly for the liberal Willy Wonka (original film thankyouverymuch) sampling, in all honesty. Fast-paced and fun.
6. Instamatic - Ghetto Tits 2006 (Benassi mix of Outkast vs. Peaches vs. Scissor Sisters)
• This is mostly Peaches, and therefore has liberal use of various sexually charged terms some folks consider foul. NSFW I guess. Probably my fav of the Instamatic remixes.
7. DJ Lobsterdust - SaySayism Allstar Jam
• When they call this an allstar jam they aren’t at all kidding. This is my favorite mashup of all time. Just listen. The transitions are masterful, the songs flow like an undeniable force of nature, and I pretty much guarantee you’ll smile at least a little.
8. DJ Lobsterdust - RightNowRightNow (Beastie Boys - Love Psychedelico)
• I think if the Beastie Boys had met Hot Chip, or hung out with the guys hacking their C64 to make chip tunes they might have made something like this on their own.
9. DJ Lobsterdust - Glass Octopus (The Beatles vs. Blondie)
• This may be the most approachable mashup for people who don’t really care for hip hop or techno or dance-oriented music. It’s Blondie’s Heart of Glass mixed with The Beatles’ Octopus’s Garden in a really fun, natural way. Still got a great beat for those who do enjoy a good excuse to dance.

That’s all for now! I hope you have as much fun with this as I have!
Image on the tape is art from P. Robertson’s Kings of Power 4 Billion %. Download it. Watch it. He’s great.

Last, but certainly not least, comes this heated admonishment.
For the record, I have not at this time cancelled the shoutcast.
Viva la musica.

G,

The SEOians may be upset about this horrid loss of a radio comrade. But at least they have their clever wit, sick twisted humor, their own ipods and LFO to get off on in the absence of this most beloved of all radio stations. What will I have to get off on? I am alone in a world of darkness. I am alone in a world of Ron Paul discussions and beef jerky farts. I have no high fangled, state of the art equipment such as Ipods and Walkmans. Think of me….the lone poor kid without a pot to piss or shit in.
I compare shoutcast[redacted] not to chocolate milk, but instead to Ether and Sour Mix…..what would you do G, without that beloved liquid filtering down your throat and making happy in your brain? Where would you be without the color changing straws?? I tell you where……alone in a world of darkness just as yours truly is.
I will take this moment of silence to remember the good ol’ days, when I was first free from client Care and liberated to enjoy such things as Google Talk, the bathroom when I wanted, tea, frolicking in the park, puppies, kittens, Blue Latitudes and of course sweet sweet tunes. Provided by our fearless General of Jams, our Sargent of Song, the Mastermind of Music and so on and so forth.

Let’s take a stroll down memory lane……ummmm Radio Show??? What happened to that dream? I could have been the Robin to your Howard Stern! We could have had naked broads catching things in their jugs for gift certificates to the mall. How dare you steal my dream? Member-J-2xxx is right, the revolution for shoutcast[redacted] has started and you will continue to receive our constant email bombardments until this situation has been righted!

So…..anyway…wanna play some Baby’s on Fire for me?

For those not in the know, the herpes references do have a legitimate precedent, namely the origin story of the band Godsmack’s name.
Erna stated in a 1999 interview that “I was making fun of somebody who had a cold sore on his lip and the next day I had one myself and somebody said, ‘It’s a godsmack.’ The name stuck. We were aware of the Alice in Chains song but didn’t really think much about it. It’s a cool song and the name had meaning for us”. ~via wikipedia

They’re right. I’ve been smacked in the face by herpes crisps one (5,000) too many times. Now, I lie, drenched in a puddle of mud, SULLen and covered in sloppy joe. [Crawling in my Skin.] Through the mess, I’m screaming for the relief that only Shoutcast can afford.

How will I drag myself through the moist, oozing slit that is Monday without a little Stevie Ray Vaughn to carry me along? How shall I adequately pay homage to the upcoming dreams of Ether-and-Sour that Friday afternoon promises, without a little chair-dance-party-inducing DP? Without you and your [shoutcast] box, how would I have ever discovered the joys of Party Fun Action Committee and Cocorosie?

Admittedly, I’m not always logged on, but the solace that Shoutcast’s presence affords is the only thing that keeps me from tearing the face off of the greyface drones who play 3 Doors Down and Nickelback on the community radio for all of our listening pleasure. Please G. Reconsider. If not for the morale of your fellow comrades, do it to prevent the spread of herpes in the workplace.

Hard on the heels of that mind blowing letter of protest came another. Let it never be said that direct reasoning and protest is useless.

Yknow, he’s got a point there. I was pretty quick to just fold on the whole issue, but the fact of the matter is, theres lives at steak* here. In a literal, and figurative sense.
There must be a way to keep it alive. Dont lose heart G. Our numbers may be small and even infrequent, but you provide unequaled sanctuary when its needed most. In the midst of the storm G! The Shit storm!
Think about it. Jesse’s inspiration has awakened a slumbering giant of ranting protest. Wait til all four of us get going! Between us we can inundate your inbox with thoughtfully nagging pokes and pleads until Dec. 22, 2012.
Dont think we cant do it.

Member-J-2xxx

*Where’m ah’ gonna get ma’ Steak or Chicken! Who’m ah’ gonna stick mah’ dick in?!

At this point you can imagine I’m feeling sort of guilty! Yet still somewhat resolute. There are things that must be done and there must be alternatives for these guys! Little did I know that this was not nearly the end, and J-2xxx’s threat was in no way a bluff.

I run a private, LAN shoutcast server for our office. Nothing terribly fancy, mind you, just a collection of my music and some of my co-workers’, mixed into a couple randomized playlists. I don’t have too many listeners although we’ve got upward of 100 people at the company these days. I recently made the decision to shut down for a variety of reasons, most of which were serious. I never realized what a row I would cause among my (rabidly) loyal listeners.

Below, for your viewing pleasure, is the first of several letters I received regarding my decision to retire as DJ. [some edits made for the assumption of privacy, and the separation of actual work life from this personal endeavor]

THIS IS A SERIOUS PROTEST. G, you can’t do this! You have created solace and safe-haven for those of us berated by PuddleofSmackLincolnBack. shoutcast[redacted] is the Batman of our Gotham City here at at Suite 260. Shoutcast is our only line of defense against the auditory pogroms waged by The Shark, HEB, and the mindless droning of ignorant half wits that shall remain nameless.

Taking away shoutcast[redacted] is like the Communist Party of India cutting off medical aid to the People’s Liberation Guerrilla Army. Without the Shoutcast you are leaving us unarmed and behind enemy lines. Take right now for instance, instead of listening to Lynyrd Skynyrd’s “Gimme 3 steps” for the 32,453,165,684,652nd time this week I can turn to the trusted shoutcast[redacted] for a much needed diddy by The Pillows. I have but a Dreamsicle’s chance in the Mojave of being able to make it through any given day of work without the delicious tunes provided the company radio. G, you must understand that you are the Coenraad Johannes van Houten behind the chocolate milk of our listening pleasure.

Albeit a motto belonging to a disturbingly misled organization that is funded by pure evil, “no man left behind” seems to be a phrase befitting this situation. In other words, whether there are only 3 listeners or not, those 3 listeners rely on you heavily. Without you there is no us. You provide a lifeline in a dreary wasteland occupied by slow moving cyborgs that enjoy Papa Roach, the Eagles, Michael McDonald (not for humor either!), Kid Rock, Fleetwood Mac and P.O.D. I would rather eat my own bloody vomit than go through a 9-5er without the physical and mental crutch that is the shoutcast[redacted].
I hope your heart stumbles upon my humble (yet eloquent) soliloquies and they help to sway your decision,
Helpless in [redacted],
Jesse [redacted]

With a plea that strong I seriously began to reconsider my decision.

I’ve heard of at least a few people who are finding themselves more and more depressed lately. There are times where I’m tempted to lump myself in with that group as well, although for the most part I’m doing my damnedest to keep a relatively positive disposition despite mounting fears about my irresponsibility catching up to me.

As it turns out, I and my compatriots are far from the only ones who feel this way. Via The Sherman Foundation, I found an article at Ananova entitled Blue Monday. It addresses the phenomena of winter blues, particularly that post-Christmas slump a lot of people seem to fall into.

Just a short blurb of an article, but it cites a few villans of positivity that tend to crop up right around now:

• bad weather - That one is a big 10-4. Winter finally showed up around here, and I have to say the cold snap and the nearly snapping my neck walking to work on ice doesn’t do much for MY mood.
• mounting debt - You bet your arse this one’s creeping up with increasing urgency for yours truly here. My holidays were at least somewhat expensive, and without a “nest egg” to speak of, making rent is stressful as hell.
• failed resolutions - I didn’t have any specific “New Year’s Resolutions” but I was definitely poised for reform of my habits until all the ice hit. It seems sort of obscene to drive to the gym, drive home, then walk to work… when the gym is in the same building as my office. If they hadn’t taken away my parking space, it wouldn’t be an issue. I was feeling a little more positive about the whole thing before the prospect of walking to work became a dangerous one.

So yeah, I can see what they’re getting at with that.

The solution proposed in the article is “volunteer”. Well, that’s nice and all, but that won’t shore up the hole in my bank account, now will it? I’m all for doing for others, but dammit, you have to do for yourself first. If you can’t help yourself, what business do you have helping others?

Still, I have to look at all this from a positive persective. Being broke is encouraging me to start cooking again. It’s going to get me to follow through on setting some things straight. It’s going to motivate the hell out of me. Hopefully I can take all this negative propulsion and adjust it, setting a trajectory that will slingshot me back to home using the moon’s gravitational pull. Or something.

randomkitty
adj. getting ready to purchase something.
“Kid, you’re so randomkitty - love my arcade game!”

06/10/07 -
Author’s Note About This Post: What the fuck was I thinking? That doesn’t make any sense at all. I’m hoping I was drunk. Seeing as I wrote that at almost 2am, that would be my guess. My sincerest apologies for poorly defining my own site. Perhaps I’ll try again in the future with more success.