HELP ME

I heard this song the other day at J. Crew and I'm going nutz trying to figure out what it is. It has a kind of early 80's, blue-eyed soul vibe. At first, I thought it was Dexys Midnight Runners but my research leads me to believe it's not. The part that sticks in my head is this little string riff. Totally British New Wave Motown kind of stuff.

I made an mp3 of what I can remember of the string part. It may be wildly inaccurate but please listen to it and see if you can help me.

HELP ME MP3

Maybe a question to ask yourself is: what songs do I know that sound a little bit like C'mon Eileen? Any???

WEEKEND Round-upzzz

BIG UPS to the man Steve Schroeder for finding another ghost shoes pic. I wanted to post it but for some reason I couldn't save it. (WTF?!?!?!) Anyway, check the comments for the link. In it, we have another space-croucher ready to do a moon-jump.



ALI G AND SHIT

You might remember our brief exploration of message boards from a few weeks back. In it, we learned about the amazing love/hate relationships high school lacrosse players have developed with Mike Jones. Tormented by what they regard as Jones' blatant homosexuality, they nonetheless cannot stop themselves from singing his name over and over again.

I thought message board soul-searching couldn't get any better than that...BUT IT HAS. I came across this message board while searching for info about the Borat movie.

It is the official message board of the "Stormfront White Nationalist Community." The thread kicks off with "England's Hammer" asking:

Did anyone see him doing his anti-Jewish country song on C4 earlier? It cracked me up.
And yes I know he's Jewish.

The ensuing conversation proves both how STUPID white supremacists are and how COMPLEX the comedy of Sascha Baron-Cohen is. Despite Baron-Cohen's Jew-ness, these clowns CAN'T HELP but find his show funny. They are especially amused by the classic scene of Borat playing "Throw the Jew Down the Well" in Tuscon, Arizona.

This raises some interesting questions:

Why do people like us (college-educated, liberal, Internet Vibes-readers) find it funny? Is it for a different reason than the White Supremacists?

My immediate reply is the same as Steve Zissou's: "Well, it's got to be."

OK, we like Borat's anti-semitism because it shows the inherent RETARDANZA of all racism by grafting it on to a backwoods Kazakh, right?? When he sings that song, we are cracking up because the song is OVER-THE-TOP and because Borat is JUST PLAIN FUNNY. Also, the fact that the audience starts singing along is FUNNY in a kind of WEIRD and SICK way.

So, why do these boneheads like it? Yes, Borat is JUST PLAIN FUNNY. We can all agree on that. Is that it though? Do they also recognize the OVER-THE-TOP funniness of the song? Maybe in a different way?

"Yes, I hate Jews, but the idea of throwing them down a well is both an inefficient means of extermination and a playful jab at the anachronisms of Central Asian village life."

Is that what's going on here???

"Legion" sees through the layers of irony, but STILL FINDS IT FUNNY:

I did find this funny last night however I'm not a fan of Borat or Ali G, at the end of the day he's just a Jew who's having a good laugh at us white people.

Later in the thread, some of the more "intellectual" white power internet nerds show up to let everyone know that Ali G/Borat is NOT FUNNY.

ANYWAY, what do you think? Does looking at White Supremacists looking at a Jew playing a Muslim pretending to be Black give you any new insights into life?

Also, is the idea of Vice Magazine style "post-racism" even possible?

FInAL

NB: INTERT VIBZ IS GOING TO SLOWLY COME BACK TO LIFE AS MY BRAIN REGENERATS.
Thanks to Steve for doing some detective work and finding 3 ghost-shoe pixx!


The pic above is my favorite. That kid is just chilling in the back but he's about to take off on an intergalactic voyage or something.


Internet Vibes is now the world's largest archive of ghost-shoe pixx! Everyone should follow Steve's example and help the collection grow. Maybe even try making your own pixx if you have NB's.

VIBES SCIENCE:
I just watched Quadrophenia, the 1979 film loosely based on a Who concept album about Mods. Mod culture is a vibe so near yet so far.


yes, that is sting

I think I have a decent understanding of the Mod phenomenon but it's hard to fully grasp it as an American since there was no parallel movement in the good old USA (thus I cannot subconsciously receive latent vibe transmissions from my immediate environment). In fact, a lot of Mod culture has to do with British perceptions and interpretations of American culture. How can I look at myself as "The Other"? Again, I need to decolonize my mind, will try to do it over winter break.

Recently, the idea of "Mod" has been semi-transformed into a sort of cosmopolitan hippie vibe (ie Austin Powers). In fact, there's a bar called Mod in the 80's on Amsterdam that's all hippie-dippie, psych-chic. As far as I can tell this is all wrong.

OG Mods were late 50's/60's, R&B-obsessed, sharp-dressers. In fact, Quadrophenia takes place in 1964 way before any of that Swingin' London stuff.



The central event of Quadrophenia is the infamous Mods vs. Rockers Riot in Brighton. The rockers are a group "primarily defined in opposition to Mods." They are seen as a British version of "greasers."

I have a hard time completely wrapping my brain around the whole Mods vs. Rockers conflict. Aesthetically, their differences are clear: Mods wear suits and keep it clean, Rockers wear leather and keep it dirty. The philosophical and cultural differences are harder to grasp. Both groups seem working-class, anti-authoritarian, prone to violence, into partying and being crazy.

There's a scene where a Mod and a Rocker are taking baths in adjacent stalls at some sort of public bathroom. The Rocker starts singing Gene Vincent and the Mod gets really pissed off. The Rocker won't shut up, so the Mod starts singing "You Really Got Me" by the Kinks. This is the conflict??? Early 60's Kinks vs. late 50's rock n' roll??

Don't get me wrong, I can see the difference between Ray Davies and Gene Vincent. It just doesn't seem like a big difference. I think this may be an instance of post-vibe conflation in which the trivial differences so important to one generation fade away in the next generation's historical perception.

If I met a dude today who was really into early Kinks, I'd probably assume he also liked Gene Vincent. The same would not hold true for a Village Green Preservation Society kind of dude.

Anyway, I love Fred Perry.



RAY WINSTONE:



Quadrophenia features a young Ray Winstone as a Rocker. Winstone would go on to be known for his roles as bad-ass British gangsters (see "Sexy Beast"). Anyway, I imdb'd him and was amazed to see his upcoming roles:

He's going to play BEOWULF in a big-budget version of BEOWULF directed by Robert Zemeckis. Crispin Glover is playing Grendel. WTFF????? THIS IS GONNA BE AWESOME.

As if that wasn't enough, Winstone is signed up to play WILLIAM BLAKE in "JERUSALEM."

English majors are gonna SOOTE their SHOURES when they hear about this.

what's the frequency, kenneth?

Almost done with finals. Writing all these papers really paralyzes my brain. We've all been to that dark place in the heart of December, right?

I've been going deep on the internet during my "study breaks." especially on thefacebook.com which now lets you post pictures; this shit is really next level.

anyway, i came across these pictures while browsing. one picture is of my cousin Asher. I have no idea who the other people are ("RANDOM") although I did some Blade Runner photo-analysis and determined that they are dancing in the Lerner Party Space.





You can imagine how I felt to see these pictures almost back2back. I was already struck by the picture with asher and then, to see the same NB-effect in some crazy columbia picturez...are you there god, it's me ezra??

i kept browsing facebook pictures looking for at least one more picture of ghostly New Balances but couldn't find any.

please contact me if you have any pictures with this effect. i'm going to limit it to grey new balances, but maybe i'll open it up later.

looking at those pictures at the same time really gives me a strange feeling in my gut. is this what the davinci code is about???

WORLD PREMIERE

CHECK OUT THE VAMPIRE WEEKEND TRAILER!


This picture is from the earliest version of Vampire Weekend which was essentially a photoshoot with toothpicks.


Is this an effective trailer? Does it make you want to see the film?