Concert Review: George Clinton And The P-Funk All-Stars @ the Newport Music Hall, Columbus, Ohio (6/30/96)

There are many things I enjoy and appreciate about my time at Bowling Green State University, but one the best was the free stuff. Not tuition, or books, or food; stuff that would been useful. What I'm talking about is entertainment. How did we get free entertainment? Glad you asked.

One way was the campus movie theater, which showed advanced screenings of movies. Basically, you signed up in an office ahead of time, and if you got their early enough, you'd get on the list. When the movie was over, there was usually a comment card to fill out. Over the the years, I saw movies such as Grosse Point Blank, While You Were Sleeping, PCU and a few other this way.

Another way was via the campus radio station I worked at, WFAL AM 680. Working in the music department, we had access to piles of free promo cds, most of which never got played on the air. We also sponsored concerts and other events, so when the Violet Femmes, Wally Pleasant or Ani DiFranco came to campus, we promoted it and got free tickets. We also sponsored movies, like the premier of Trainspotting and an anime festival. But the really good gets were the concert tickets outside Bowling Green.

Concert Review: The Darkness at Promowest Pavilion, Columbus, Ohio (6.14.04)

For a brief, glorious moment, The Darkness were a lot of fun. Actually, it was more like a year. In Summer 2003, the band released their debut album Permission To Land. Over the top Freddie Mercury-ish vocals with massive glam metal guitar riffage? It was Buckcherry with a sense of humor, or Steel Dragon with a sense of taste, one of those out-of-nowhere, completely uncool-its-cool popular culture happenings that seem preposterous in retrospect, but at the time was a lot of fun.

I played the hell out of that debut album, learned various riffs on guitar, and generally enjoyed something so out of sync with the times, which was dominated by Arcade Fire, Modest Mouse, The Killers, Franz Ferdinand, Kanye West and a lot of other very good, but also very serious, music. The Darkness were not serious, and it's good to have a balance, or at least that's what I've learned over the years. If all you do is listen to a very narrow sect of sounds, you're going to either burnout, or becoming boringly repetitive.

The Light Brigade

The Light Brigade by Kameron Hurley
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This is everything thought-provoking, page-turning science fiction should and can be. I tore through this book in a just a couple days, way faster than I normally read, because I couldn't stop. A well-crafted blend of Starship Troopers/The Expanse/Edge Of Tomorrow with Kameron Hurley's unique spin. This absolutely works as a book, but I would love to see it on a screen, big or small, for its visual and visceral thrills.

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