Mrs. Toad's Lettuce

The above picture shows how our veggie patch is doing, for those of you who give a flying fuck, which admittedly might not be many of you.  Sunday was spent lying about in the garden reading books, which was nice and relaxing after getting pished late into the night with Monster Island, These Single Spies and Kid Canaveral after the Henry’s gig on Saturday night.

This Saturday we will be collecting for the RNLI in Stockbridge, so if you want to help out please do get in touch as we will need all the people we can get our hands on.  We promise to feed you and ply you with booze, and it’s generally a really enjoyable day.

Tuesday 26th April 2011: Golden Grrrls, The Oates Field & Fuzzy Star at the Wee Red Bar.

Fuzzy pop reigns this week at The Gentle Invasion’s latest gig, with The Oates Field performing alongside two relatively longstanding Scottish bands I have to confess, rather shame-facedly, to never having heard of.  A bit of an internet poke-around later and it sounds like the whole lineup should be right up my street.  And, hopefully, yours.
WrldPeace by Golden Grrrls

Wednesday 27th April 2011: Pensioner, PAWS & Pinky Suavo at Sneaky Pete’s.

This is likely to be quite similar, in a sense, to the Gentle Invasion gig the night before, with the emphasis on rock rather than pop, but nevertheless blanketed in a haze of guitars.  It is also the Pensioner album launch – they have a new album out on Olive Grove Records.

PAWS – Miss American Bookworm

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Thursday 28th April 2011: Nan Turner & Enfant Bastard at the Collective Gallery.

WH666 presents another rather interesting lineup.  Nan Turner sings and plays drums in New York anti-folkers Schwervon, but listening to her MySpace page that doesn’t give you much idea what to expect from her music.  Also, Enfant Bastard has started adding more to his chiptune stuff which, if I am being honest, pushes it back much closer to the kind of thing I personally am into.  Come along, it’ll be a good ‘un, this.

Friday 29th April – Sunday 1st May 2011: The Grassmarket Festival (Facebook event).

The Grassmarket Festival is a street festival involving all the traders with shops on and around the Grassmarket, and will involved vintage clothing, tat stalls, book and records as well as lots of live music.
The lineup looks roughly like this:
Friday 29th: 6pm, The Last Battle; 7pm, Ballboy.
Saturday 30th: 5pm, Star Wheel Press; 6pm, The Gillyflowers; 7pm, Burnt Island.
Sunday 1st: 3pm, A Right Royal Open Couch Session (in Red Dog Music); 5pm, Edinburgh School for the Deaf; 6pm, Second Hand Marching Band; 7pm, TV21.

Burnt Island – A Supposedly Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again

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Edinburgh School for the Deaf – 11 Kinds of Loneliness

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The Second Hand Marching Band – Don’t!

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I feel like an unwashed pair of old socks.  Not so much for the boozing, which was surprisingly restrained actually.  I suppose, to be fair, there’s only so much bevvy you can pour down a gullet already creaking with frightening levels of food.  And so it proved – I have generally been so full this weekend that I haven’t ended up getting all that pissed.

Anyway, listings first, let’s be properly efficient about this.  I have my own shit to pimp, after all, and let’s not forget that cynical self-promotion is the prime focus of this site.  There are only a couple of things on this week… well, sorry, scratch that.  If you are looking for entertainment in Edinburgh on New Year’s Eve of all nights, and you need me to point you towards it, then your Fun-O-Meter is in serious need of calibration.  Or replacement.  Or both.

However, if you are looking for proper, actual fun, of a musical bent then your options are a lot thinner.  There might possibly be some decent bands playing the official Princes St. Gardens Hogmanay thingy (I haven’t checked), but between the crowds and the weather there is absolutely no fucking way in the universe you should be contemplating that.  Honestly.  This is not Approved Fun, people, it is Bad Fun, and should be avoided.  There are a couple of interesting things happening this week though:

Wednesday 29th December 2010: Scars, TV21, Ballboy & Kid Canaveral at the Picturehouse.

On the topic of Approved Fun, anything Kid Canaveral do is very much Approved Fun as far as I am concerned.  I don’t do a best live band thing on Song, by Toad – there are really only so many lists I can be arsed making – but they would have been there or thereabouts had I done so.  Scars are a different proposition altogether: they were part of a thriving Edinburgh scene which seemed to simmer along around the time of the Shop Assistants, Josef K and Fire Engines.  This is their first gig in many, many years.

Ballboy – All the Records on the Radio are Shite

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Friday 31st December 2010: Song, by Toad New Year’s House Gig, with Jonnie Common, Neil Pennycook and Jamie Scott.

The grumbling and whingeing about large parties in the centre of town is the primary reason Mrs. Toad and I decided bollocks, why not have a gig in the house. Last year was the first one, and we enjoyed ourselves so much we have decided to make it a tradition, this year being graced by three gentlemen who are as likely to leave you scratching your heads as bawling your eyes out.  But in a good way, promise!  We’ll be getting a keg of Copper Cascade from Stewart’s and, if the weather’s at least passable, might well wander into Inverleith Park to watch the fireworks.  If we can be arsed. There’s a ticket link below too, because it would really help out if you bought your tickets in advance, just so’s we know how full the place is likely to be.

Sold out now, sorry.

So, splendid – hope to see you there.  And to leave you this week I have this little gem, as the selected highlight from all our lazy weekend of watching appalling films and doing, well, basically bugger all else.  Quite how people in the eighties thought this was macho I have no idea.  But it is a whole new world of buttock-clenchingly, teeth-grindingly, face-contortingly cringeworthy awesome.

I am not cold in the sense that the temperature is all that low, more in the sense that I have been just a little too chilly for a few hours now and it is really starting to get me down.  Moan moan.  Song, by Eeyore etc etc.

Anyhow, Cellar 35 in Aberdeen was excellent last night – what a top wee space.  It is basically just a scruffy basement, but they’ve got a couple of carpets down and sofas and the atmosphere is really, really nice.  It helps a great deal that the staff were brilliant and helpful, but in general I thought it was a great place to put a small gig on.  John from the Kiosque tells me that it doesn’t get used all that much, which is a shame, as anything acoustic would really work well there.

They’re getting a new PA system too, which means they’ll be able to handle bigger bands soon, and apparently the new owners are making a big push to put more gigs on there – honestly, I would wholeheartedly recommend it.  It’s an ideal space and Jamie and Emma were absolutely great – and of course a big thank you to everyone who came along, and to Amber Wilson for playing and The Last Battle for stepping in at the last minute to complete the bill.

It’s basically December after this weekend isn’t it?  The time of the office Christmas Party.  I can picture myself sat here on my own with a Marks & Spencer’s individual Christmas dinner and a sad little party hat on; the only person at my own office party.  I suppose that’s not really fair though is it, because all the bands should really be there, and Dylan and Fee of course, and Wee Matthew and Andy who does the website stuff and Mrs. Toad as the Grand Matriarch.

I may sleep off Yusuf’s three album launch gigs on Sunday, but next weekend we will probably go and get ourselves a Christmas tree and so on and so forth – holly, all the usual shit.  For some reason my usual grinchery has vanished this year and I am really looking forward to Christmas.  I am looking forward to the tree, and I am even looking forward to my parents coming to visit, even if they are rather inevitably going to end up tutting at me on the Weekend of Doom when our label party is followed by eagleowl’s and then Kid Canaveral’s and then the hospital, all in the space of three days.

What’s got into me for Christ’s sake, this is most un-Toadlike, particularly after my birthday humbugging (Humbuggery?  It really has to be humbuggery doesn’t it.).  As long as I avoid the shops and the telly, which has been all too easy since ours was nicked, I think this should be an ace December.

Oh, and while we’re on the subject of seasonal pish, here is the latest in FOUND’s Free Music Friday series: a remix of Au Revoir Simone’s Fallen Snow.

1. How would you rate the ambient temperature in your office/classroom/lab/bedsit?
2. What’s worse, a freezing cold toilet seat making contact with your arse, or car seats that get so hot in the sunshine that your legs stick to them if you are foolish enough to sit down in shorts?
3. Anyone started thinking about their end-of-year best of lists yet?
4. Having a good meal anytime this weekend?
5. Is there a particular ‘making time to sit down and listen to music’ time coming up this weekend?  And what will you listen to?

These songs all come from a compilation made for me by my pal JC from The Vinyl Villain to mark the occasion of the launch of Song, by Toad Records, some six months before we ever actually released anything, back in July 2008.

The Ukrainians – Batya (Bigmouth Strikes Again)

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The Delgados – California Uber Alles

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The Monochrome Set – Jetset Junta (Remix)

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Ballboy – All the Records on the Radio are Shite

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The Lilac Time – The Girl Who Waves at Trains

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Well this week I shall mostly be entertaining my parents, who are taking the opportunity to inspect Toad Hall as a suitable place for the raising of yet-to-be-considered grandchildren.

There may yet be some opportunity for a spot of truancy however, as I am DJing at the Charity Baw on Saturday.  I wish I actually had the right accent to say that properly, but with my accent saying things like “baws”, or the far better “yer maw’s got baws and yer da’ likes it” just sounds stupid unfortunately.  It’s the biggest chore of living in a foreign country: you pick up the slang, but not the accent, and end up making a tit of yourself all the bloody time.

The only consolation is that it has happened to my brother as well, and he now uses American slang whilst sounding like he works for the BBC, which is hilarious!

Saturday 17th July 2010: Charity Baw at the Roxy, with King Creosote, Ballboy, FOUND, Three Blind Wolves and more…

The lineup’s great, but I know for a fact that at least one of the people DJing at this event is an idiot, but Kenny from King Creosote and Gav from OnTheFly will probably play some good tunes at least.  I haven’t actually seen King Creosote for ages now, and the upstairs room at the Roxy is about as atmospheric a place as I can imagine to break that duck.

King Creosote – Twin Tub Twin

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Sunday 18th July 2010: Endor, Gdansk & Lady North at Sneaky Pete’s.

Endor have a new album in the works, and Gdansk have always been good, so I recommend this.  This should be a night of good, old-fashioned guitary indie music

Gdansk – Kicking a Television

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Well in all the chatter about the Beeb this week I was strongly considering ignoring it completely in this podcast and giving everyone a welcome break from the wailing and gnashing of teeth… but naah, that was never going to happen, was it.

So there’s a lot of railing against the Beeb and the threat to 6Music and yaddah yaddah you know the script don’t you.  Sadly, and somewhat ironically, we spend so much time talking about the state of the Beeb and the loss their support of small bands will represent, that we actually forgot to talk much about the small bands we ourselves put on the bloody podcast.

Toadcast #111 – The Beebcast

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01. Ballboy – All the Records on the Radio are Shite (03.21)
02. Love is All – Bigger Bolder (13.02)
03. Fredrik – Vinterbarn (15.53)
04. Exrays – Everything Goes (27.16)
05. Phil Ochs – Automation Song (34.33)
06. Ghostkeeper – By Morning (37.26)
07. The Light Footwork – Carlsbad Irrigation Project (47.54)
08. Mondrian – Rise and Fall of a Golden Boy Seen by a Porn Star Using No Sextoy (50.21)
09. The Leaf Library – Losing Places (ISAN Remix) (63.00)

[Mrs. Toad has very kindly contributed this Friday's Fives, as I am busy being mounted like a five-dollar hooker at Proper Job.  Enjoy.]

I am in the middle of a secondment at Proper Job which basically means that instead of rushing around trying to get new clients or speak to existing ones about what is going on in the world of stocks and shares, I am undertaking company analysis and have time on my hands to contemplate the mysteries of the future.

So at the moment, I am mulling what cars will be like in 2030 and how many of them will be on the roads. This is usually predicted using an S-Curve function which predicts growth of consumption goods accelerating from matching income growth at low levels at twice the rate of income growth for a certain range of income finally slowing again to match income growth at higher levels giving an S shaped graph. According to this, there will be 2 billion cars on the road in 2030 (there are about 800 million now). Scary stuff. However, population density is also rising (only 46% of New Yorkers own a car whereas 92% of Americans do) and car sharing (ZipCar/City Car club) is also on the rise. So how the hell am I supposed to come up with an even half sensible estimate? Even Volkswagen don’t seem to think we will all own our own cars.

Of course, the point is that you can’t get it right, you just have to make a reasonable estimate and assign a probability to it based on current evidence. Despite the shelves and shelves of strategy books in airports worldwide, there is a great deal of serendipity involved in most business successes. The guys at Google for instance, didn’t start out to be in the advertising business but ending up there is why their company is worth $135bn. There is also the occasional trying to be too clever moment. If I said to you that buying a share of 100 dodgy mortgages packaged together and sliced up is as safe as lending to a blue chip company like IBM, you’d laugh in my face but that’s what all the physics graduates and math whizzes at places like Lehman Bros really believed. Business is hard especially, when mistakes mean that you could go down the pan or get taken out. Its easy to err too far on the side of caution and become defensive and oppressive rather than innovative (yeah, that’s you Microsoft).

Which makes it all the more galling that a non profit entity such as the BBC has apparently confused “value for money” with “bums on seats” in its recent strategic review, leading to the closure of 6 Music, the watering down of local content, and the downsizing of their successful website. The questions in the review also point to them considering reducing some of the innovative projects that they have undertaken such as pushing DAB and developing iPlayer. iPlayer is in large part why people like Murdoch(s) have it in for them, Sky and Virgin Media cannot make money if they cannot control content provision. By pushing people online to a familiar and trusted brand, the BBC has hastened their demise.

This has already been linked to but I would urge you all to take some time to respond to the BBC’s strategic review in full because its clear that fear of Tory/Murdoch harpies is pushing them in an all together more stolid direction than we have seen in the last ten years and that would be a great shame.

1. What do you think cars will be like in 20 years time?
2. Best piece of bullshit bingo you have heard?
3. Company/brand or product you most admire?
4. Company/brand or product you detest?
5. Your soothsayer like prediction for the world in 2030?

Ballboy – All the Records on the Radio are Shite

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Depeche Mode – Everything Counts

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Phil Ochs – Automation Song

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The Clash – Complete Control

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The Men They Couldn’t Hang – Company Town

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I was fascinated to hear this record, an electronic spoken-word collaboration between Ballboy’s Gordon MacIntyre and Maja Mångård, (who is Swedish, and might just be his wife, but I’m not certain) but I would say that it is really only partially successful. Some of it really is good, and some just doesn’t quite click for me, but it’s definitely an interesting record.

This album feels a little like an extension of the instincts which drove McIntyre to write I Hate Scotland during his Ballboy days – a rambling, contemplative monologue set to music.  I don’t know enough about Ballboy’s back catalogue to make any kind of statement like that definitively, but it certainly feels like a large step in a similar direction.

The lyrics are absolutely key to music like this, and these remind me very, very strongly of Belle & Sebastian.  Beautifulgirlsunnyledges could easily be one of theirs, although don’t take that as a disparagement of the song, which is really lovely.  This kind of unrestrained stream of consciousness is present on most songs: McIntyre just seems to set a thought loose in his brain letting it flit around, just to see where it will go.  At times he veers towards deeper thoughts, but most of the more profound musings are lightened either by very dry humour or by gentle whimsy.  He’s not fannying around at all, just making sure we know he isn’t taking himself too seriously or trying to solve all the world’s problems in a three-minute pop song.

Lyrically and musically, er, whilst I like an awful lot of this, it can veer towards being just a little bit soft from time to time.  The electronics have just a little too much tweeness and niceness in them, compared to the glitch and skitter which I tend to prefer.  And the lyrics can, slightly in the way of the recent MJ Hibbett & the Validators album, seem just a little middle-aged from time to time.  What I mean by that is, I guess, just a little more inwardly focussed and domestic than I might personally expect.  This is no surprise, because Gordon is more veteran than tyro, nor is it any shame exactly, it’s just something which prevents me connecting with the lyrical content from time to time.

So for all there’s a lot here which I really like, there’s also a fair bit which I don’t quite connect with.  It’s a really interesting album though, and I am always impressed by people who push in radically different directions after making music of a certain type for a long time.

Money Can’t Buy Music – Beautifulgirlsunnyledges

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Money Can’t Buy Music – We Will All Asphyxiate

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Website | More mp3s | Buy direct from the band

Sping.  SPRING.  Hurry the FUCK UP for Christ’s sake before we all go fucking mental.  Good grief what a long drawn out wait it has been.  Some sunshine would be nice.  A cup of tea in the garden would be nice.  Actually, even the chance to go outside of a weekend and rescue the garden from the tangle of weeds and fallen leaves it has become over the winter would be nice.  Obviously there’d have to be coke and whores afterwards, just to keep up the rock ‘n’ roll pretensions, but for now a nice cuppa and a Rich Tea biscuit in the back garden, with dirty hands and earth under our fingernails, would be very welcome indeed.

For those of you craving a spot of news, apparently Bob Dylan’s new studio album is being released in mid-April, which is rather jolly, I have to say.  I have no great expectations for it to be a heartbreaking work of staggering genius, but so what.  It might be a bloody good listen anyway.

Secondly, here’s a wee video of Broken Records (who?) recording their debut album, which will be released, erm, quite soon.  June 1st, it seems.

Monday 16th March 2009: Finley Quaye at Henry’s Cellar Bar.

You know, I never knew that Finley Quaye was an Edinburgh artist.  I actually rather liked Maverick A Strike, although I must confess to having largely neglected his stuff since.  I am busy tonight but just out of curiosity this looks like a rather interesting gig, if just to find out what he’s been up to all this time.
Finley Quaye – Even After All

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Thursday 19th March 2009: Limbo & Canongate Books present Irregular, at the Voodoo Rooms.

To say that this is an ambitious project sounds a little condescending, but in a sense I suppose it is.  This is going to be a combination of music and spoken word, with readings from recent Canongate publications mixed with live music from the likes of Black Diamond Express.  I have no idea how they intend to put it together or whether or not they can pull it off, but it sounds fucking fascination, frankly, and I shall be there for sure.

Friday 20th March 2009: Sleepingdog, Esperi & The Kays Lavelle at the Wee Red Bar.

There will be no mosh pit at the Wee Red on Friday, but Sleepingdog generate a kind of hypnotic loveliness which should bring a fascination of its own.  Essentially, it seems, a vehicle for Belgian lassie Chantal Acda, they’ve just released an album called Polar Life, a rather appropriate name, given the music, which I assume will be available at the show and from the sounds of the MySpace page should be rather good.
Sleepingdog – The Prophets

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Saturday 21st March 2009: Ballboy at the Wee Red Bar.

Ballboy are the Edinburgh indie-pop stars who never quite hit the escape velocity needed to break out of the city into the wider music-listening consciousness.  This is a bit of a shame because they’ve got some really brilliant songs.  Now there’s a new album as well, called I Worked on the Ships, which I have yet to hear but if their previous stuff is anything to go by should be a really enjoyable listen.
Ballboy – I’ve Got Pictures of You in Your Underwear

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Saturday 21st March 2009: Tunng at the Picturehouse.

Me?  Publicising a gig at the Picturehouse?  I thought I was trying to be alternative.  Ah well, people have been trying to get me to properly listen to Tunng for ages, most notably Ruth from the Bowery, so I thought that a live performance would be a bloody good way to start.  I’m rather looking forward to this actually – a bit of bleepery, a bit of slightly arcane folk music – splendid!
Tunng – Tale From Black

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Ho hum, what’s going on this week then? Well I am having a fairly dry one, that’s for sure. Last week descended into complete mayhem, largely musical, and by Sunday morning I wasn’t sure whether it was Thursday’s, Friday’s or Saturday’s hangover I was so desperate to sleep off.

Friday night was the return of the Mr. & Mrs. Toad late night booze-and-tunesathon. It was loud, and went on until five in the morning, and I still managed to drag my sorry carcass out of bed to go to football training at ten the next day. Christ I had the cold sweats though.

There are really only a couple of gigs I’d be in a rush to get to this week:

Thursday 17th July 2008: Come On Gang, Plaaydoh & Be a Familiar at the (shit) Ark.
This is a Broken Friend Records night, who released the Jesus H. Foxx single. I am a little dubious about Plaaydoh and Be a Familiar, but they both have some decent aspects that you notice during a cursory MySpace listen. Come On Gang, on the other hand, are pretty good and have a new single out so this has the makings of a good fun night about it.
Come On Gang – Spinning Room

Thursday 17th July 2008: Grace Emilys, Punch and the Apostles & Reformation play Limbo at the Voodoo Rooms.
It’s been a while since I plugged a Limbo gig, which feels a bit mean because their lineups are good, it’s just that I’ve not quite been as grabbed by some of the recent lineups as I might have been, but that just happens I suppose. Well continuing their knack for spotting the finest of Scottish indie pop, this three-band lineup looks rather promising. I know nothing of any of the bands in question, but a quick MySpace listen sounds promising to me. Definitely worth going along to.
Grace Emilys – Down in Mexico

Friday 18th July 2008: Ballboy at Cabaret Voltaire.
One of the somewhat underestimated pillars of Edinburgh’s indie landscape, Gordon MacIntyre writes warm, witty songs, delivers them with genuine charm and throws a cracking tune on top of pretty much each one. They can be sad and wistful melancholia or bouncy indie pop and it appears there’s a new album in the fairly immediate offing, so it’ll be interesting to hear what they’re been up to of late.
Ballboy – Dumper Truck Racing

Saturday 19th July: Meursault, Boyfriend/Girlfriend & Davie Lawson at the Wee Red Bar.
Trampoline has grown up! Graduating from sproradic weekdays, Euan now has a regular monthly Saturday night slot for his excellent gig nights. He’s shite at marketing too, so hopefully the new slot will result in more people coming to these shows. As to this first bill, well I don’t know Davie Lawson at all, I’ve seen B/G once before and rather enjoyed them and I think Meursault are fucking brilliant. So not a bad start to his new life as a gig circuit high-roller.
Boyfriend/Girlfriend – The Greatest High

Gosh it’s multi-post bonanza of obsessive lunacy on Song, by Toad today. I know this is far too many posts for a sane human being, but honestly the news today is bringin’ the crazy and there’s no way I could let it pass without a round of applause.

Item No1: Paris & the Mystery Meat
Everyone’s favourite talentless whore has been released and gave an interview to CNN in which she described her meals in the Big House as containing “mystery meat”, which she then rather perplexingly described as “really scary”. Seriously. Anyone here remember the last time Ms. Hilton had any sort of difficulty wolfing down mystery meat with all the glassy-eyed enthusiasm of a sedated Alzheimer’s patient? No, me neither. At least true to form she’s still talking about god, albeit in slightly different context than usual, playing that time-honoured Get Out Of Jail Free Card that the American public never seem to tire of falling for.

Rufus Wainright – Old Whore’s Diet

Item No2: Tom Cruise: Verrückt und Verboten!
Or, bonkers and banned, as we’d (vaguely) have it in English. Apparently he has been banned from filming his latest movie in Germany – allegedly about Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg’s failed 1944 assassination attempt on Hitler – because they think he’s just a bit too mad. If they’re worried about his inability to accurately portray sensitive historical material then fuck me, how are they not attempting to extradite Mel Gibson for public tarring and feathering? Honestly, I’ll be gutted if they ban Scientology. Scientology is easily the coolest religion in the world – a great big fuck you to people who believe in the preposterous things that infest every religion. Walking on water? Resurrection? Virgin birth? Chicken feed! That’s primary school make-believe, that is. Try great big fucking flying spaceships and alien beings and volcanoes, you pussies! It really makes the other religions look like they just weren’t really trying when they came up with their creation myths.

Also, it’s like a great big finger of deranged lunacy that points helpfully at every single one of its hilariously credulous followers reminding us all to point and laugh every time they raise their heads above the parapet. Fucking idiots.

Ballboy – Essential Wear For Future Trips to Space

Item No3: Best Oddly Not Good Enough
Real Madrid, having won precisely bollocks all of any import for five years have finally won the league title in Spain. Fabio Capello, the man who guided them to this momentous triumph, has needless to say, been sacked immediately. Now, they didn’t win it in style, and Barca may have imploded spectacularly to clear the way, but sacked? Scolded, maybe. Told to do better, perhaps. But the first title in five years and he’s sacked – are these people on drugs? Well, high on their own galactic levels of vanity perhaps…

Midlake – Excited But Not Enough From back when they sounded just like Radiohead.

Item No4: Beware the Ghost Ducks
Yes, seriously. 30,000 rubber duckies were washed overboard when a particularly enthusiastic storm hit their container ship in the middle of the Pacific back in 1992. Due to the vagaries of global oceanic currents they circled, as a group, around the North Pacific for years until a misadventure with Arctic pack ice spat them out, bleached a deathly white, into the Atlantic early in the new millennium. After flirting with America’s Eastern Seaboard they are now caught in the Gulf Stream which should bring them en masse to the shores of Ireland, Cornwall and the Southwest later this year. Christ, you’d think you were mad, wouldn’t you. A 30,000-strong fleet of ghostly rubber duckies approaching your shores – it’d be terrifying!

Crash Test Dummies – How Does a Duck Know?

Makes all that boring shit about people dying in Iraq by the thousands and the increasingly militant stance of the Russian government and the slippery avoidance of any sort of accountability by Dick Cheney seem like no more than the hum of a distant bee, doesn’t it.