Look At Them, They Formed a Band

I don't know how many people out there beat me to the discovery of the British pop-punk band Art Brut, but I am jealous of all of you. I was recently introduced to the group by my brother, and I freaking loved them immediately. They have a very fun, upbeat sound along with some of the purely funniest and most enjoyable lyrics I have ever heard. At one point, in the middle of their first major single, "Formed a Band," the singer declares "Yes, this is my real singing voice/It is not irony/It is not rock'n'roll." He also penned a song about his love of "DC Comics and Chocolate Milkshake," saying, "Some things will always be great/Like DC Comics and chocolate milkshake/Even though I'm twenty-eight." Art Brut is ironic, but not to the point of cynicism, a la far too many in the hipster scene. They are definitely worth checking out, even if just for the latest album title ("Art Brut vs. Satan").

Secondary Blog

I just started a new blog, philosophyforstupidpeople.blogspot.com, which is going to focus on- you guessed it- philosophy, but also theology, in modern culture. It's going to be a little more serious, and probably have posts a lot longer than this one.

Just Saw "Star Trek"

And I was very disappointed that, at the end, when Kirk first walks in to the ship in his captain's uniform, that they didn't replace the original actor with William Shatner. It would have made things so much better. Just the slightest bit of Shatnerian awkwardness would have made this a nigh-perfect film. Although Simon Pegg made it close.

A Couple of Quick Thoughts

First: I am very surprised by the result of Pacquiao-Hatton. I thought Manny would win, but I assumed it would be a unanimous decision type of scenario, with Hatton being beaten by Pacquiao's speed more than anything else. I really did not anticipate a knockout, especially not in the early rounds. It seems like one of two things has been happening recently: a.) Pac-Man is picking his fights very well, finding guys who are still very much in the public eye but are subtly declining (well, not so subtle in De La Hoya's case); or, more likely, b.) he is just a freak. I think it's interesting the way Pacquiao has moved up weight classes so easily and smoothly. Part of that, in my opinion, is the fact that he was more than likely actually undernourished as a young man, when he won the 112 pound title as a teenager. It's very possible that he is able to put on so much weight without losing anything simply because the full potential of his frame was never tapped at a young age. In any case, he is definitely on top of the world right now- who knows, maybe by next year he'll weigh in at around 210 and take down Witali Klitschko.


And, second, I just discovered the show "Kings" for pretty cheap on iTunes ($10 for six hours worth of the show). It seems to me that all the shows I find interesting lately are either in severe decline (Family Guy, The Simpsons) or canceled or very likely to be canceled (Firefly, The Black Donnellys, now Kings). The premise alone is good enough to merit watching it- a retelling of the Saul-David-Jonathan story in a modern setting- but it's really incredible. Ian McShane (the dad from Hot Rod and one of the guys from Deadwood) is the king, Silas, and is great in the role. But Kings is currently getting a sub-1.0 Nielsen rating and the second half of the first season was delayed until summer, which means that I'll be rewatching the first five episodes for over a month- hooray. I really hope this one makes it, because it's my favorite new show on TV.