Failed Pilot

DIG! The Movie

DIG! is the feature-length documentary shot over seven years about musicians Anton Newcombe, leader of the Brian Jonestown Massacre, and Courtney Taylor, head of the Dandy Warhols, star crossed friends and bitter rivals (1). From the moment they met, The Dandy Warhols and the Brian Jonestown Massacre quickly bonded over a desire to not conform to the tastes of the recording industry(2). Yet, the bands’ choices over how to express their creativity and originality in a profit-driven industry eventually put them at irreconcilable odds (3).
Culled from 1500 hours (4) of footage and narrated by Courtney Taylor (5), DIG! follows the underground giant Anton Newcombe, unearthing him to be an important (6) yet largely unnoticed artist of our time.
In 1996 Anton Newcombe and his band the Brian Jonestown Massacre - who in a decade independently released 11 albums, 3 recorded in one year (7)– are hell-bent on staging a revolution in the music industry (8). They are convinced their friends, the Dandy Warhols, will join them to create a united front. But Anton’s creative psychosis takes him to the most remote areas of the human mind to find his original art (9), and as a result, he destroys every opportunity for financial success.
While tracking the destructive path of the Brian Jonestown Massacre, DIG! also accompanies the more ‘well-adjusted’ Warhols through their leader Courtney Taylor, as they navigate the corporate sea, trying to maintain their creative edge while starring in mega-budget music videos and entertaining crowds in the tens of thousands (10).
DIG! is about both musicians’ love and obsession, gigs and recordings, arrests and death threats, uppers and downers - their choices between art and industry, which unfold with the passage of time (11).

1. And fucking idiots. We’re dealing with two guys who named their respective bands “The Brian Jonestown Massacre” and “The Dandy Warhols.” Right out of the gate, you’re dealing with total creative bankruptcy.
2. And a desire to make lifeless facsimiles of better bands.
3. A pop cultural footnote that no forward-thinking individual should give three shits about, much less make the subject of a fucking documentary.
4. You’ll never get those back.
5. I’ll repeat myself: You realize that Courtney Taylor-Taylor shaved his head into a Mohawk the day after Joe Strummer died, right? You realize that stupid rednecks do that kind of thing, right? It’s like Taylor-Taylor wants to be the American Jarvis Cocker but forgot that Cocker has talent and charisma and intelligence and would never shave his head into a fucking Mohawk the day after Joe Strummer died. Bringing Nick Rhodes in to produce your album won’t make you Duran Duran. You want to be Duran Duran, but as with every other band you want to be, THEY DID IT BETTER. I hope that the Dandy Warhols break up before Taylor-Taylor dies of a coke seizure with his face in the ass-crack of a passed-out supermodel. If not, the whole world will talk about him forever, and I don’t want that.
6. Give me a break. You get what you deserve if you idolize this semi-literate rip off artist. I’ll repeat myself again: They say there’s a fine line between genius and insanity, but this line unconquerably wide with Anton Newcombe, a man who believes being an asshole devoid of an original blood cell, prancing around with shakers and enacting some foppish, Brit-accented fantasy of American degradation is the ultimate picture of aloof and misunderstood brilliance.
7. Pick me up; I’m floored. Quantity does not equal quality.
8. Punch in cricket chirping sound effect here.
9. ARE YOU READING THIS??? REALLY, ARE YOU READING THIS?!?!?!?
10. And who no one will remember in four months.
11. Who wrote this? They need their ass stomped.

More Essays That I Will Not Write

“Of course you’re into metal now”

“Mountain Home, Arkansas is a bleak blister of economic despair, but I found a copy of The Standells “Try It” on LP in a “vintage store,” and that item will be promptly finding its way onto Ebay”

“Montgomery Gentry’s ‘You Do Your Thing’ video has to be seen to be believed”

“You’d have to know my neighbor, but upon sneaking a look into her backseat (she was parked next to me), Black Flag’s ‘Slip It In’ was perhaps the last CD I expected to see. I call ‘boyfriend’ or ‘older brother.’ No, I do not give her the credit”

Reviews of movies that I haven’t seen.

Garfield: The Movie

I was disappointed to read that Liz gives Odie to Jon. According to Garfield’s first run, etched forever in the bestselling 1980 debut collection Garfield At Large, Odie belongs to Lyman. As you can see, Lyman was a mustachioed drifter/friend to which Jon offered his couch after minimal begging. Plenty has been said about what Garfield looked like in the very first strip, so on we go to…

Bobby Jones: Stroke Of Genius

This 133 minute, PG-rated instant sleeper about the famous 1930’s golfer was written and directed by Rowdy Herrington, the same man who wrote and directed Road House.

The Terminal

I think that this is the sequel to Philadelphia.

…. and now, a belated moment of silence for Lou Rawls, who passed last Thursday (June 10th, 2004) at the age of 73.

More Automotive Nonsense

The Pontiac Fiero

If you’re going to dress like the 80’s, you should drive like the 80’s - preferrably in something that might burn you to a crisp. Accessorize to the fullest. You’re not the real deal until you drive a comic “it’s not irony” irony car. Here’s a Fiero rundown that exceeds anything I will write on the subject. Excluded are the dangers posed by the Fiero: Easy decapitation, plastic body panels as death trap coating, and the car’s propensity for spontaneous combustion. I prefer not to sit on top of engines, and with the Fiero GT, you sat about four inches from GM’s 2.8 Liter rod-throwing garbage disposal. Set the world on fire, and have that Klaus Nomi-style arm band melted into your skin.

People undeserving of a nickname…..

The Fixture

This barstool barnacle gets louder, older, more out of touch, and uglier by the second. Usually at every single party or show, personal taste notwithstanding…there might not even be any. Feels as though he or she (occurs cross-gender) is in some sort of “i’ve-been-sitting-around-this-town-not-doing-shit-with-myself-longer-than-you” competition. Will absorb whatever agenda suits the immediate need, whether it be Rave, Rockabilly, Garage, Alt-Country, and will exhalt mainstream culture to be reactionary. Will not, however, backstep into punk or hardcore (will talk about days of yore, though) Suffers from public co-dependence, thus never, ever, stays home. Has been in 2,685 bands, and has 2,685 boring stories to show for it, but focuses hard on #1,782. Doesn’t own a TV, and will make sure that you know this. Nickname will be monosyllabic. Female version also identifiable by the more traditional “barfly.” Has tried to take you home at least once. Always eager to spin yarns about very, very serious drug addictions from the past.

The Aging Gutter Punk

Shares many characteristics with the above. This one usually goes by a real first name followed or preceded by an endearing identifier.

The Sports Superfan

At a Superbowl party some years back, I was introduced to a man that went by the name “Coach.” He was not a real coach…of anything.

An Underappreciated Horror Movie

Cujo (1983)

Should have been doing productive, forward-moving things with my life when I got sucked into this one…start to finish. One of my favorite King adaptations (The Dead Zone is top of the list), this one has nuances that you’d never see in contemporary horror. A good 35 minutes passes before the first kill, during which a marital affair culminates between Dee Wallace Stone’s character and the “town stud.” Only in the late 70’s/early-80’s would the “town stud” be a 38-year-old, bearded, nautically tattooed, floor-sleeping, handyman/tennis pro who lives in a ragged bungalow, walks around clad only in tight jeans, and drives a beat-up sports car. A lost film archetype. Today, this character exists largely inside the walls of the local halfway house. Also during the film’s slow build is the gradual unraveling of the dog, as Cujo increasingly reacts badly to loud noises and forceful petting. And now that decapitation is a big buzzword, points to Cujo for the prescient severing-by-way-of-dog-jaw kill sequence. And why does Dee Wallace’s character drive a broken down Pinto, while her husband tools around in a Jag E-Type? Cujo’s owner is played by Ed Lauter - the poor man’s Terry O’Quinn (The Stepfather, Pin), who in turn is the poor man’s Craig T. Nelson (”Coach”). Rarely do they work in three’s.

…..but enough about me, what do think about me me me me me me me me me me me me?

ITEM: Henry Owings, compiler, editor, and main name on The Overrated Book: The Only Book You’ll Ever Need, will be promoting said tome on Tom Scharpling’s Best Show On WFMU. When? Tomorrow night! That’s Tuesday night!!! I wrote several essays in the damned thing, which is now trickling into bookstores around the universe. Get it; then recommend my hilarious thoughts to other people! Every other running dog in the book is famous…they can fend for themselves…with their agents, applesauce, and other whatnots.

Stop talking so much and figure out how to listen!

ITEM: Here’s a very straightforward and friendly mini-feature that I wrote on Matt Besser’s upcoming (also tomorrow night) Memphis appearance. Live nearby? Go!

P-p-p-p-p-peace!