Entertainment
Liner Notes
In what can only be called a
copywriters dream, the tree that was planted in memorial for GEORGE HARRISON has died from an
infestation of beetles. Across the nation
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In what can only be called a
copywriters dream, the tree that was planted in memorial for GEORGE HARRISON has died from an
infestation of beetles. Across the nation, from the least read blog to the
widest circulating newspaper, copywriters have not been able to control the
puns that can come out of a situation as ironic as the former BEATLES guitarist’s tree being devoured
by bark beetles. The tree was planted after the musician’s death in 2001, and
has survived and grown in the interim. But the beetles chewed through the
memories of Abbey Road and the White Album; and their destruction was
made even worse, some say, by the California droughts. “L.A. Gently Weeps . . .
” read Reuters. “Strawberry fields
may be forever, but . . . ” read USA
Today. The eyebrows of every smug local newscaster darted slyly upward as
they prepared to wow their audience with basic wordplay.
WIZ KHALIFA, JUICY J and TY DOLLA $IGN
collaborated on a track for the upcoming Teenage
Mutant Ninja Turtles film. After hearing the song, “Shell Shocked,” it is
without question the single best mutant turtle-specific rap since VANILLA ICE’s “Ninja Rap,” and is sure
to win the Oscar for Best Original Song. It features turtle and pizza based
references such as “You know I got your back just like a turtle shell” and the
apparent Drake reference that because the turtles are from the “gutter,” they “started
from the bottom.” What these gentlemen tried to capture was the true life of a
ninja turtle: The struggles, the triumphs, and the extra toppings. Here, for
example, they render perfectly the essence of turtledom: “Check my Rolex—it
says I’m the man of the hour. All this green in my pockets? You can call it
turtle power.” You can, indeed.
“WEIRD AL” YANKOVIC is a name that brings a smile the face of anyone who was ever 12 and
liked hearing the same songs they’d heard on the radio be about someone eating
food instead. My personal copy of 1999’s Running
with Scissors was so played out that I swear it started to change pitch and
speed. In mid-July, Yankovic started releasing new videos for new songs, one
after the other, for eight days. He parodied PHARELL’s “Happy” with a song about people being tacky, LORDE’s “Royals” with the many uses of
aluminum foil, ROBIN THICKE’s
“Blurred Lines” with a grammar rant, and various other songs in the styles of
different artists without being direct parodies.
He spoofed on “first world
problems,” school fight-songs, and people who name-drop constantly. His last
video was in the style of CROSBY, STILLS
& NASH (who themselves helped
Jimmy Fallon do a great parody of IGGY
AZALEA’s “Fancy”) and it spoofed corporate jargon. This album will be
Yankovic’s last in his insane, multi-decade recording contract. He plans, now,
to do more singles that can be timelier to the songs that they’re spoofing,
citing that once you have an album together of things you want to lampoon, often
your first ideas are now, by sheer passage of time, a bit played out. “Weird
Al” has a great chance now to embrace the internet age fully and start hitting
big with singles released or co-produced, as this album was, with comedy hubs
like Nerdist Industries or Funny or Die.
JACK WHITE’s
Third Man Records has been prolific and innovative in its field, releasing
strange new music and pressing it onto vinyl the likes of which has never been
seen before. Now, however, they’re looking to expand into another field: Book
publishing. Its first release, Language
Lessons: Volume 1, will have poetry, prose and two vinyl LPs to go along
with it. White continues to support small, local artists, musicians and poets
with this venture, using his fame and his bankroll to shine the light
elsewhere, even when he’s turning out records of his own every few years. Third
Man is quietly becoming a real heavy-hitter.
