2008 being a leap year, we will have one more shopping day before Christmas. If you’re not spending that day spending, I suggest educating yourself a bit on the origins of Christmas: you know, baby Jesus, three wise me, Pagan Rituals that early Christians adopted to make Christianity seem more appealing to would-be converts. Oh, and powerful hallucinogenic drugs and human sacrifice.

God Bless Tradition.

[disclosure: I am not actually in this band, but P Brown works for Synthesis.]

Quaint as it may be, I sincerely hope that Chico’s notoriety as a party school that canceled Halloween will one day be supplanted by its true nature. No, not as the 10th best Small Art Town in America, but as Christmas Rock Town USA. In anticipation of the 3rd installment of Gorgeous Armada’s Christmas Musical, Sleigh: Sleigh II Again (Midnight, Friday and Saturday at the Chico Cabaret) Gorgeous Armada presents: Old Yeller and the 12 Days of Christmas!

drinking

[disclosure: I am in this band. I am totally self-promoting. Deal.]

In anticipation of the premiere of soon-to-be Christmas Classic, Sleigh: Sleigh II Again, The Gorgeous Armada invited a few Chico Christmas bands into their Handsome Devils Yacht Club Recording Studio to put down a few tracks. Enjoy this live video of The Yule Logs doing their rendition of “Hey Jake, It’s Christmas.”

Sleigh: Sleight II Again, live at the Chico Cabaret, Friday and Saturday, December 21st and 22nd at Midnight! Advance tickets on sale at Diamond W and Underground.

Pro: Getting to play fun music for 2nd and 3rd graders.
Con: Feeling like I am failing life by showing up to an elementary school stoned

Con: having to get up at 4 AM to play a morning news gig
Pro: getting your band photo taken with local news celebrity Rob Blair and crew

The Yule Logs are here. Hide your Egg Nog.

Not that I don’t appreciate my job - getting free CDs sent to my desk daily daily isn’t exactly like facing black lung while coal mining - but I have to take offense when something comes across my desk that is just utterly wretched, and which basically makes me want to execute my eardrums with a dull pencil. You see, some bumblefuck PR firm keeps sending me every goddamned pitiful recording that Toby Keith feels inclined to release. Seriously, Toby wants to roll tape on him scratching his nuts, and they do it, and send it straight to me. The most recent addition is his Classic Christmas album fucking double disc… It’s not enough that Toby Keith has to go around churching up outlaw country like some Brawny Man caricature, but now he’s gotta go and desecrate Christmas songs with even more shittiness than with which he writes his own songs (”I Wanna Talk About Me!). No sooner did I let the lump of vomit recede back toward my stomach in a slick, acid-y stream then did I receive yet another Toby release, this one complete with a cover photo of a much less affable Toby with the title “Get My Drink On.”


I guess this is some kind of single (I’ll never know because I refuse to listen to it) for an upcoming album, correct me if I’m wrong…though I won’t care. Ingenious timing though. I implore you, Toby Keith, to first stop sucking dick, and then secondly to decide whether or not you’re a Patriot Rocker or a fucking Christian, right-wing poster boy. Because you can’t be both. PS: I hate you.

In related news, on the same day I received both of these shitty ass CDs, my friend Zach rolls up to the office listening to The Promise Ring’s Very Emergency, which I proceed to steal from him and listen to in its entirety. I’m pretty sure it’s one of the best albums of all time. Today, they saved my life. Thanks, The Promise Ring…