Same Shore, Different Season

Depending on whether you take I-9 North or Garden State Parkway North, Seaside Heights, N.J., is either 58 or 63 miles from Staten Island, N.Y., according to mapquest.com.

I mention this because on last week’s “Jersey Shore” — I just watched it tonight because I just broke free from a “Dexter” marathon — the housemates moped about the departure of everyone’s BFF, Vinny, in a manner that made it seem like he moved across the globe.

Thing is he only went 90 minutes away, tops. Rumor has it one guido can see another guido fist pump from that distance, if they have the right amount of gel in their hair and at least one guidette in the club is DTF. Rumor also has it Pauly D’s blowout was the first visible from space, but I digress.

Vinny’s departure from the show amid anxiety issues, while likely a short-lived hiatus, provided some much-needed drama to a house low on surprises as Season 5 started. There are only so many times Snooki can fall down, Deena can expose her kooka and Snitchuation can be Snitchuation before it gets tiresome.

There are only so many times I can write about “Jersey Shore” before … nah, it will continue to be awesome. Cab’s here!

– So let me get this right … Pauly D smooshed a tattooed cougar Vinny would have liked in Vinny’s bed to honor him? Look up friendship in the dictionary and you will find a picture of Pauly D in the midst of coitus. Just don’t look now. The image is probably not safe for work.

– Funny Pauly D should label the woman a cougar. I would bet she was younger than him. He turned 31 on this episode, proving you are never too young to Whore Around The Shore.

– Um, speaking of whoring around the shore, Team Meatball drank three Red Headed Sluts, two Jager Bombs and half a Bacardi Breeze and got “wasteypants,” as Snooki would say. That drink count is only an estimate based on a complex formula using Snooki and Deena’s height, weight, and the number of times MTV blurred the area around their genitals this episode. Meatballs sure do know how to dance their panties off.

– Deena was a (not so) hot mess this week. She broke down over Vinny (“He was like my soul”) and opened up about why she gets along with gay men so well (basically, they don’t try to “do sex” with her when she’s blackout drunk). Her hair also morphed into a gigantic tangled vine of weaveness from dancing too hard. What are the odds Deena will go on the disabled list for a “dislocated kooka” at some point this season? 5 to 1? Better?

– “It should be against the law to come to my house at 4 o’clock in the morning and not give me birthday sex.” ~ Pauly D, future governor of Rhode Island.

– Did Eric Cartman hijack Snitchuation’s voice toward episode’s end when he pronounced care as cahhhh. I bet Cartman would like Snitchuation. They are both from the same tribe — diabolical yet not too smart.

– Plenty of face time for Snitchuation’s lackey/BFF “The Unit” and hippie squeeze/DTF buddy Paula. They are a couple of Rhodes Scholars. I hope they solve our oil dependency issue soon.

– Toward episode’s end, the cast reacted as if Snitchuation left the house for good. Yeah, right. But if he did, his hometown of Manalapan, N.J. is only 35 minutes max from Seaside Heights. Thanks, Mapquest!

This is not a real-life standardized test question. But, if it were, I would advise you to shade the bubble next to C.

One of the cool things about having a blog is strangers contact me to discuss items of mutual interest, like music or football. Occasionally, musical acts send me their work, seeking a write-up.

Floridian duo And The Giraffe are/were one of those groups. They sent me an email a while back about their EP, Something for Someone. More recently, they emailed me again with a link to their first video for their song “Underground Love.”

It is a soft-sung diddy that, by design, moves at a deliberate pace, while conjuring images of creeping fog and expressing desires to start anew, be it underground or atop the world. The video the band emailed me fleshes out the notion of giving love to receive love, amid attractive scenery and equally attractive twentysomethings.

Below is the video for “Underground Love”. Tell me what you think!

Charles Bradley

The calendar has turned, snow has fallen in Portland, and it is time for a belated list.

I am referring to my Favorite Songs of 2011 (Better Late Edition). Let’s pretend it’s December, and this list is being released at the same time everyone else in the world is releasing theirs. OK. Nevermind. It is too cold for pretend.

Below are the 40 songs I enjoyed the most in 2011, with one minor caveat. I limited myself to one song per artist. This kept the list from being 200 songs. It also forced me to make some tough choices with regards to several artists.

Enjoy!

40. “Run Overdrive” by Civil Civic
39. “Second Chance” by Peter Bjorn and John
38. “House of Balloons” by The Weeknd
37. “Heartaches and Pain” by Charles Bradley
36. “Wilhelm Scream” by James Blake
35. “Weekend” by Smith Westerns
34. “Que Veux Tu?” by Yelle
33. “Under Cover of Darkness” by The Strokes
32. “St. Croix” by Family of the Year
31. “Abducted” by Cults
30. “Ritual Union” by Little Dragon
29. “Surgeon” by St. Vincent
28. “Still Sound” by Toro Y Moi
27. “For Love I Come” by Thundercat
26. “Kaputt” by Destroyer
25. “Bizness” by tUnE-yArDs
24. “Words I Never Said” by Lupe Fiasco
23. “Murder to Excellence” by Jay-Z/Kanye West
22. “I Don’t Want Love” by The Antlers
21. “There Will Be Tears” by Frank Ocean
20. “Who Knew?” by You Won’t
19. “Corner of the Sky” by Cut Copy
18. “Losers” by Belle Brigade
17. “Romance” by Wild Flag
16. “The Real Her” by Drake
15. “Whale Song” by Lemolo
14. “Native Speaker” by Braids
13. “Lonely Boy” by The Black Keys
12. “How Deep Is Your Love?” by The Rapture
11. “Blunt After Blunt” by Danny Brown
10. “Shake It Out” by Florence+The Machine
9. “A.D.H.D.” by Kendrick Lamar
8. “Someone Like You” by Adele
7. “Myma” by Girls
6. “Amor Fati” by Washed Out
5. “Midnight City” by M83
4. “Calgary” by Bon Iver
3. “Wait & See” by Holy Ghost!
2. “Killer Crane” by TV On The Radio
1. “Helplessness Blues” by Fleet Foxes

PS: What was your favorite song of 2011?

Vitamin C packed snow

I named this post PDX Snowpocalypse 2012 in jest. Portland received three inches of snow Tuesday — hardly a snowpocalypse, when compared to the 11 inches that fell in Washington’s state capital, Olympia.

Except to a bayou kid, like myself, it was a big event. I experienced a few pellets of snow two or three times living in south Louisiana, including once on Christmas. My grandparents in North Carolina lived near the mountains but it seldom snowed when I visited. Portland went snowless last winter, aside from a stray inch or two.

So, yes, Tuesday’s event was cause for excitement, even if earlier in the day I had cursed the prospect of snow. As it fell Tuesday night, the chalky streets of north Portland were eerily quiet. Japanese exchange students built a snowman a few blocks from my house. Street kids at a nearby bar hurled snowballs at a city transit bus. Anarchy, it was not.

Below are photos I took while wandering around with my roommate, Garret. He took the photo of me. All photos were taken using the Hipstamatic app on my iPhone.

Cajun Tomato Time!

Trees, looking all regal

GP at the wintry crossroads

Garret stares into the white distance

Slow down! It's snowing!

So many lines

Ghosttown

Still time!

Soon to disappear Snowman

The ironic thing about LSU and the Saints each wrapping their seasons in disappointing, yet wildly different fashions is not that I am still smarting from their losses days later. It is that they, in turn, sparked my highest page view count in the history of this blog. For that, I owe a large debt of gratitude to my friend, Jordy Pujol.

Here were the five most viewed posts for Jan. 8-15:

5. Lana Del Rey’s SNL Performance Painful To Watch

4. Alex Smith, A Bust? Not So Fast, Says Saints Defense

3. “Jersey Shore” Season 5 — Episode 1

2. LSU-Bama, Round Two: What The Hell Was That?

1. LSU Loss Brings Odd Sense Of Closure, Relief: A Fan’s Take

Lana Del Rey

I felt a tad bit pained tonight for Elizabeth Grant watching her shrink under the bright lights of Saturday Night Live. Her manufactured Lana Del Rey persona received boatloads of blogosphere hype in the past six months, leading to the coveted SNL appearance. And yet, there Grant was on the stage, exposed.

Those who do not religiously follow Internet music web sites like Pitchfork and Stereogum probably tuned into SNL tonight oblivious to Lana Del Rey. SNL booked her because it provided the long-running franchise a rare chance to generate buzz and serve as a tastemaker to the mass viewing public.

Del Rey has received a mix of positive and negative press. Much of the negative press centers around authenticity — Grant had a previous stint on a major label as a wannabe pop starlet. Her lips and name are fake. Who is really behind her music?

Her debut album Born To Die is scheduled to drop later this month. Call tonight’s musical guest appearance a calculated risk on the part of both SNL and Interscope, Del Rey’s current label. Some risks pay off, some don’t. This one bombed.

Del Rey performed two songs, “Video Games” and “Blue Jeans,” from her forthcoming debut album. I used the word performed in the loosest possible sense. A wooden board could have displayed more spark and vitality than she did. Her lack of stage presence would have been excused if her voice were captivating.

Her voice recalled a mumbling, stumbling, bumbling karaoke interpretation by someone not quite sure how they should deliver the song they picked. Forget pitch. She was everywhere but the strike zone on “Video Games.” She sounded arguably better on “Blue Jeans,” although her voice dropped so low during the first verse it made me wonder if she had grown a pair. Think of Nico channeling Stephin Merritt of The Magnetic Fields.

The Twittersphere ripped Del Rey a new one following her first performance, and then again following her second. Not surprising; she was dreadful.

You have to wonder how much this will impact her first week sales. Most of the people who tuned in would not have known about her album otherwise. I am betting most of those people will not give it a second thought now. Like I said earlier, those are the risks.

SNL, for its trouble, got some buzz. Unfortunately, it was for the wrong reasons. Then again, what did they expect? She has performed in front of a live audience a dozen to two dozen times, maybe, as Lana Del Rey? (That’s just a guess.)

As for Lana Del Rey, her stage name is a known commodity now … known as in, did you  see the pretty girl who looked like a deer in the headlights on national TV? I wonder what Elizabeth Grant the person would say about all this, if you stripped the magazine-selling facade away.

The Saints managed to pull off a feat this afternoon in San Francisco that I did not think any team could. They managed to make Alex Smith, noted draft bust of the San Francisco 49ers, look like a competent NFL quarterback in a playoff game.

The Saints allowed Smith and the 49ers to move the ball 13 plays for 165 yards on their final two drives, each of which culminated in touchdowns. The final scoring play — a Smith to Vernon Davis 14-yard TD pass with nine seconds left — sent the Niners to the NFC Championship Game.

It is one thing to lose to a better team. It is another to beat yourself. The Saints beat themselves, with five turnovers and porous defense, and that burns me to no end.

The fact the Saints season came to a close in San Francisco — a place where the Saints lost throughout my childhood — only makes the loss ache more. I repeat: The Black and Gold were the better team; they just did not play like it today.

Still, I believed … I believed when Jimmy Graham scored on a miraculous 66-yard catch-and-run with under two minutes remaining that the Saints were destined to reach the NFC Championship Game.

I mean, yeah they left plenty of time on the clock, but neither Montana nor Young were roaming the sidelines waiting to break Saints fans’ hearts. I felt confident.

Silly me. This was not the Alex Smith of yesteryear. This was Alex Smith, Saints conqueror on this bastard of a Saturday in the year of the Mayan Apocalypse.

The former No. 1 overall pick from Utah had 299 passing yards and three TDs plus a 28-yard TD run that gave the Niners the lead with just over two minutes remaining. (Anyone else feel like shedding a tear while reading his stat line? I know I am not alone among Saints fans.)

Smith and the Niners coaching staff found a weakness — hell, anybody could have found the weakness. The Saints starting safeties, Roman Harper and Malcolm Jenkins, cannot play the ball in the air. We all knew it going into this week. We did not figure the Niners, more specifically Smith, would be able to exploit the deficiency.

Niners tight end Vernon Davis shined a light on just how bad the Saints’ safety situation is/was, snagging seven catches for 180 yards and two scores. The Saints’ safeties could not contain him, particularly when the game depended on it. See: Davis’ catch two plays before his game-winner that moved the ball into the Saints red zone.

I will give Harper credit. His blitzing abilities played a role in two sacks Saturday.

Unfortunately, he could not blitz Davis.

As for Jenkins, he is a decent player, but not good enough to make meaningful plays in meaningful games in January, I’m afraid. He is still only a third-year pro. Maybe he will improve.

My gut tells me the Saints need an upgrade at one of the safety positions, if not both.

Lest we forget: The Saints offense did its defensive counterparts no favors by committing five turnovers. Whether those miscues stopped scoring drives, gave the Niners excellent starting field position, or just made it difficult for the Saints defense to catch a breather, each turnover diminished the team’s chance of winning.

And yet … they should have won on the road in the playoffs against a 13-3 team, despite a minus four turnover margin and no hope of running the football once Pierre Thomas left the game in the first quarter.

Saints fans could see the safety issue from a mile away. That they had no one to effectively run the football in a playoff game — even if to keep the defense honest — was shocking. Who would have thought after they drafted Mark Ingram in the first round of the 2011 NFL draft they would be handing the ball to Chris Ivory in a playoff game again this season? Not me.

The Niners rush defense was the NFL’s best this season, allowing 3.5 yards per carry. Even with Thomas, they would have been a tough wall to crack. Without him, they were damn near inpenetrable.

How else do you explain having 66 pass plays — 63 passes and three sacks — versus 14 runs? Rarely do NFL teams win when they abandon one facet of their offense entirely. The Saints bucked the trend going 13-3 in the regular season with a largely one-dimensional offense that resulted in quarterback Drew Brees’ record-setting 5,476-yard season.

The Saints almost did it again Saturday, thanks to the heroics of Brees, Graham, Darren Sproles, and a handful of other playmakers. Almost did it. Moral victories do not exist in the NFL playoffs though. This one stings.

Alex Smith? Really?

The pride of Hell Paso

A decade after it first caused me to curse under my breath in reverence, At the Drive-In’s performance of “One Armed Scissor” on Late Night With Conan O’Brien remains the standard for which I judge all other late night TV musical performances.

AtD-I’s Conan blitzkrieg left me gasping for air and then gasping for words. It still does. This performance served as a rock’n'roll revelation for people, like me, who never got the opportunity to watch AtD-I live during their first incarnation. What I would have given to have seen them live ….

Scratch that thought. That’s old news. The news?

At the Drive-In reunited this week 11 years after calling it quits following the release of their final album, Relationship of Command. Cue Heavenly post-hardcore angels shouting, moshing and doing whatever else post-hardcore angels do. AtD-I are are on the Coachella bill and hopefully will add other shows soon. C’mon guys … Portland is lovely in the springtime!

Back to the Conan performance for a moment … I have watched about as many AtD-I clips as I could find online and this one continues to stand out. Maybe it’s how tight they sound, the impeccable video work, or the batshit insane performance by Cedric Bixler. Nah, nevermind. Bixler went insane in all the other videos I watched.

Bixler circa AtD-I days was a one-man whirlwind. He was Iggy Pop if Iggy Pop had grown a ‘fro, put on a T-shirt, and danced a frantic salsa with an invisible partner.

Bixler jumped off the wall, off the drum kit, and off his proverbial rocker in the Conan appearance. Not to be outdone, fellow ‘fro Omar Rodriguez spun his guitar around like a top before jumping over an amp to exit the stage once the band’s performance was done.

It all begged the question, “Did that just happen?”

I sorta feel the same about their reunion. I have to remind myself it’s really happening.

Holy shit. I can’t wait to see At the Drive-In. My 17-year-old self would be so jealous.

PS: This is the video I gushed over:

The dust has settled.

A malevolent whirlwind of images and media spin and emotions has mercifully come to a stop. We, as battle-tested Tiger fans, survey the damage. Crimson confetti adorns the once hallowed ground of the Mercedes-Benz Superdome. Bama fans, in their callow, unsophisticated glory, taunt us with cries of “ROLL TIDE!!!,” but we hear and feel nothing. There is only sadness, only regret, only a modicum of pride still wheezing and panting and insecurely hissing, “congrats on the season split!”

We are a beaten people.

Our Glorious Leader, Les Miles, harbinger of chagrin, waxes philosophical from the mountaintop. Jarrett Lee could not sustain the pass rush, he says. We disagree and accuse him of high treachery, but in the end we forgive him like always. He is the innocent fool, blessed and cursed to win in unprecedented numbers while simultaneously being denounced by most of his followers.

His gameplans confuse and infuriate us, yet we accept them because of the legendary Luck of the Hatter. We remember Arizona State ’05, Notre Dame ’07, Florida ’07, Arkansas ’09, Tennessee ’10, Florida ’10, Alabama ’10, and Alabama ’11 (Part 1). This diminishes the sting of Georgia ’05, Kentucky ’07, Ole Miss ’09, and Alabama ’11 (Part 2).

With the images of the BCS National Championship burned into the backs of our eyelids in 1080p High Definition, we surprisingly breathe a collective sigh of relief. Bama fans won’t get it. Florida fans couldn’t understand it. Ole Miss fans wish they had a similar problem. We are relieved to be rid of a unique situation that has divided and conquered a fanbase.

Here’s where it gets weird.

A program and its fans have never been more excited to lose two senior quarterbacks. It’s not a question of which you’d prefer or which is the better player.

Individually, Jordan Jefferson and Jarrett Lee have drawn both praise and ire from even the most casual LSU fans. Tiger fans simply could not handle the dichotomy. When one was performing well, the other could be doing better. When one was bad, the other was our offense’s savior. There was no way to tell who would be better for the team, because both sides had such great arguments.

Here’s the kicker…….

The fans who backed Jefferson really didn’t care for Jefferson’s play all that much, and the same could be said for advocates of Lee. After all, the players were absolutely meaningless.

This wasn’t about Jefferson and Lee. This was about ‘run vs. pass’ and ‘ball control vs. gunslinging’. This was about ‘swag vs. patient humility’. And yes, this was definitely about ‘black vs. white’. This whole grand parody of a quarterback controversy was really a battle of philosophies. The idea of Jordan Jefferson vs. the idea of Jarrett Lee.

For the record, both sides lost.

With the fires out and the ‘For Sale’ signs removed from Miles’s yard, we can now look forward to next year. The good kind of quarterback controversy is brewing between heralded JuCo transfer Zach Mettenberger and incoming freshman phenom Gunner Kiel. They will battle in the offseason and the better player will win the starting job. The team will be unified and win a national championship. Life will be good.

Still, Jefferson and Lee will always hold a special spot in the hearts of Tiger fans.

Jefferson will be the bad guy to many, due to a preseason battery arrest that cost him the first four games of the 2011 season. He was granted forgiveness and an unearned starting spot, only for karma to gut-punch him in the national championship.

To other LSU fans, Jefferson will be remembered as the better option: the run-pass threat who kept defenses on their toes and the guy who came off the bench to save us in the first Bama game.

Lee, meanwhile, will be the quarterback who efficiently marched us to 8-0 before unfairly losing his job to Jefferson. He may also be remembered as the guy who threw two devastating picks in the first Bama game, only to cheer heartily from the bench while Jefferson led the come-from-behind victory. (Ed. Note: He will also be remembered for the seven pick-sixes he threw as a freshman. I am still trying to forget them.)

There was no “win” with these guys. There was no “better option.” They were two concepts that represented different things to different people. The symbolism was overwhelming while the on-field performance was not.

Next year, let’s hope that Mettenberger or Kiel wins the spot outright. That way, win or lose, we can all say, “This was our quarterback. This was our guy.”

PS: For more on the national title game I encourage you to read this piece I wrote titled LSU-Bama, Round Two: What The Hell Was That?

Jeff is coming to Portland! Hooray!

Jeff,
Thank you! You answered my request to visit Portland. Maybe you read The Cajun Tomato, maybe you don’t. My money’s on “don’t.” Either way I am so excited!!!!

No, seriously. I had a hard time containing my joy today when I learned you were playing two shows here in Portland. I spent a solid hour doing an ecstatic, pants on fire dance in my mind … at least, I hope it was all in my mind. That could have been awkward.

I adore your music. Want proof? Check out No. 1 on my favorite albums of the 1990s list.

Did I mention I was EXCITED?!?!? OK. I’ll stop before I hyperventilate.

Hope to see you soon,
Ray aka “One-Headed Boy”