688/Metroplex Reunion Show Mix Preview

A special audio goodie just for Mostly Media readers… download a wicked mix of sounds from bands who once played the 688 Club and The Metroplex here. How many bands can you name?

Get those tee shirts, spikes and hairspray, and get ready to go… to Saturday’s 688/Metroplex Reunion Show at The Masquerade Music Park on North Ave. Atlanta, GA. Doors open at 6pm now. All info here. An interview with show presenters (and the clubs’ former owners) here. Parsley, sage, rosemary and good time yo ass off!

While listening, give it up for Mixmaster Mr. Tom Roche. On his blazin’ Avid.

UPDATE: The Stomp and Stammer cover story about the days of 688 infamy is out now – and here it is. Photos from reunion show now here.

It Might Be Spam If…

…you receive an email like this:

Dear ____________ ,

Recently I viewed your resume online, and I felt you would be an excellent candidate for an opening we are trying to fill based on your Industrial background. A brief job description about the Construction Laborer vacancy is included.

Construction Laborer

Competitive Salary

Applicants should have great communication and organizational skills.

Johnny Carson – Midnight Joker and Toker?

From a (mercifully short and to-the-point) AM1160 press release. Even moreso once I got a’holt of it. Mercifully short of “credibility” issues too:

Counter-culture comedy icons Cheech & Chong pay a visit to “The Pop Culture King” show at 8 p.m. Friday and again on Sunday at noon on AM 1690 (Atlanta) “The Voice of the Arts”. The station will also be airing portions of the interview throughout the week leading up to the show and the duo’s appearance at the Tabernacle on Sept. 26.

Host Jon Waterhouse spoke with Richard “Cheech” Marin and Tommy Chong about their beginning, blending music with comedy and stepping back onstage together after more than 25 years apart. Marin and Chong also chat about their cult following and some exposure they didn’t receive.

“We never did get on ‘The Tonight Show’ with Johnny Carson. That’s because we shared the same dealer, and Johnny didn’t want us to blow his cover,” jokes Chong.

CBS Newsman Bob Schieffer At The Atlanta Press Club

Bob Schieffer was giddy as a school boy. His kind, interesting and weathered face lit up like a Christmas tree when he spoke at the September 29th Atlanta Press Club’s Newsmaker Luncheon.

In between hosting Face The Nation and moderating Presidential debates, Schieffer swung by the APC to promote his new book, Bob Schieffer’s America. If the book is half as engaging as Schieffer was for his guests at the APC luncheon, then get out there and buy it.

Schieffer first mentioned how he was talked into forgoing retirement by the suits at CBS News, ensuring that he and his fifty-plus-year career as a news reporter would be around long enough to cover the historically-rich 2008 Presidential election.

Schieffer’s raw enthusiasm for the the work he’s been doing for over fifty years straight was cold water in a desert to journos in Atlanta (or gas to a station right now I could say) – a town as beaten and bruised by changes to the journalism industry as any on the planet.

Atlanta Gas Availability Info – Use Twitter

Best place for real-time gas availability updates in the metro Atlanta area remains Twitter. You can subscribe to the #atlgas hash tag for your news reader, and keep a real-time availability update right on your desktop or cell. Couldn’t be easier.

Too bad ATL MSM are too arrogantly ignorant about social media and crowd sourcing apps and tools to be able to inform their audience and readership about such kinds of consumer-friendly tips and tricks. Wasn’t like they hadn’t been warned. Pity.

While WXIA has cleaned-up it’s map act of gas availability some (all pins are now a neutral blue), it’s still cumbersome. Other TV stations and media are still linking only to that bulky gas price site, the one that gives no information about gas availability.

WABE informed their listenership today about the gas price site with some bizarrely lame aside of “if you are able to get online.” Like they have a listenership of only the elderly and severely disabled? Maybe they do… come to think about it.

But fer chrissake WABE, this is a gas shortage in a major metropolitan area, not a freakin’ natural disaster in Haiti! Who among the WABE listenership does not have “online availability” in some capacity? Other than some Luddite-weirdo types who might adore 6 hours of classical music a day, but I’m starting to diverge…

And this is what passes for “continuous coverage of the gas crisis” at Channel 46. No shit. Jeez Atlanta media… this is like handing out media maxi-pads when the sleek OBs are right on the other shelf.

Sunday 9/27 12:18pm UPDATE: AJC now sending all their (claimed) ga-zillions of eyeballs off the Cox Media Plantation (see title/link “Real Time: Where To Find Gas”) and over to Twitter Farm to give their “audience” what they want right now: those priceless real time gas availability updates. LMAO and cue the Peter, Paul and Mary.

CRASS APPEAL FOR YOUR EYEBALLS!!! Now that I’ve got ‘em here… please take a moment and click-on a cool video promo for the upcoming Oct. 4th 688/Metroplex reunion show. It’ll make you happy, I promise.

HERE’S AN AD:

LIKED WHAT YOU SAW ABOVE? NEED ONLINE VIDEO PROMOTIONS FOR YOUR COMPANY’S UPCOMING NEEDS/EVENT?

Contact WaySouth Media, Inc.: gdaughters at waysouthmedia dot com.

We’ll set you up online-right at WaySouth Media!

Lack of Social Media Awareness and Tools Has Local TV News Failing Consumers In A Crisis

A complete failure to keep up with technological advances and the needs of the citizenry via social media tools and citizen journalism applications is making Atlanta TV stations look like media dino imbeciles… at a time when they could be serving the community in a real-time way.

Bless their heart, WXIA is trying to let people know, via a map on TV and on their website, WHERE available gas is in the city, but when I checked it, the citizens’ posts located under the map appear to have been last updated yesterday. And not everyone looking at the site might not know to click-on the green or red arrows to see when info at that particular arrow/place was last updated.

Besides, when you do click on a green arrow for a particular station, you see that it/the info was, in some cases, last updated 20 hours ago! Or was presented/updated to show NO gas about 2-hours ago, yet the arrow remains green in color. (For “Go” presumably.) But hey, bad information is better than NO information? In this particular case, I think not.

Stop The Classical Madness At WABE!

I can’t take it any more… 6 hours of classical music programming a day at WABE = 6 too many. Apparently I’m not the only one. So I started a Facebook Group called 6 Hours A Day = 6 Too Many! Please join the group if you’re on Facebook. And let’s let WABE know, by Fall Pledge Drive time too, that we’re very unhappy out here on the receiving end of the airwaves with being held hostage to 6 hours of tedious classical programming a day… especially when we could be hearing some news and talk and other more timely and progressive PUBLIC programming.

Not a dime out of me over there at WABE until things change around that media plantation!

Contact info for WABE is here:
740 Bismark Rd NE
Atlanta, GA 30324
(678) 686-0321

NOTE: Anyone who would like to donate a far better graphic/logo to 6 Hours = 6 Too Many! campaign, please do so! Send to spaceygracey at bellsouth dot net, and I’ll get it up on the Facebook Group page right away.

WordPress IPhone App Test Post

I am posting this entry from my iPhone. Pretty cool, eh? Must now figure out how to add a picture and/or video.

Just figured out how to add a photo from the phone. No video though – the iPhone’s great, uh, hinderance. For a video person at least. Have a perfect creme brulee kinda day! Tap, tap.

Georgia – Obama’s Phantom Swing State?

Despite news from places such as the douchbags windbags at The Georgia Gang that Obama has “pulled out” of Georgia like he was some kinda dubious date, the Obama campaign has not given up on Georgia. In fact, the reality is anything but.

more about “Georgia – Obama’s Phantom Swing State?“, posted with vodpod

A Speech On Life By David Foster Wallace

Because here’s something else that’s true. In the day-to-day trenches of adult life, there is no such thing as atheism. There is no such thing as not worshipping. Everybody worships. The only choice we get is what to worship. And an outstanding reason for choosing some sort of god or spiritual-type thing to worship – be it JC or Allah, be it Yahweh or the Wiccan mother-goddess or the Four Noble Truths or some infrangible set of ethical principles – is that pretty much anything else you worship will eat you alive. If you worship money and things – if they are where you tap real meaning in life – then you will never have enough. Never feel you have enough. It’s the truth. Worship your own body and beauty and sexual allure and you will always feel ugly, and when time and age start showing, you will die a million deaths before they finally plant you.

Facebook & Twitter Have Got Me Now

As I’m morphing to a Facebook/Twitter online existence, today’s blog post is a video on Facebook. Find me and my endless wonders there if you dare. Blogs are unattractive and uncoordinated. Like the 24-hour news cycle… soooo last century.

Get To Know Sarah Palin’s Parish Life

Shoot, they ain’t got no snake handlin’? What weanies.

more about “Get To Know Sarah Palin’s Church!“, posted with vodpod

Vomit, Barf, Gag, Hurl, Doo-Doo Coming From AM-1160

How to really waste a perfectly good morning. Not to mention brain cells:

Newstalk 1160 “The Talk of the Town” is proud to announce three great additions to our lineup: Laura Ingraham, Bill O’Reilly, and Dennis Miller. Starting Tuesday, listeners can tune in to hear Ingraham 9am-12noon, O’Reilly 3pm-5pm, and Miller 5pm-7pm.

When asked (writing this press release rather) about the change in programming Vice President and General Manager, Jeff Davis replied, “We feel that along with Mancow, Dr. Laura, and Lou Dobbs, the addition of these three heavyweights gives us one of the strongest lineups in America, let alone Atlanta.”

Full press release here. Joe Weber should have just baked cupcakes for a living, but as there’s no end to the ridiculously laughable features of the male ego, he now feels compelled to pollute the airwaves with toxic lipflapper waste. Pity.

Back In The Day

Atlanta music & club scene… circa early 80′s. Click photo for slide show.

688 Club/Metroplex Reunion Show 10-4-08

Steve May, Atlanta’s 688 Club owner and Paul Cornwell, Metroplex Club owner, talk about (click on above video) their upcoming 688/Metroplex reunion show at the Masquerade Music Park on October 4, 2008. Tons of bands that once played the infamous environs of those two punk/new wave clubs (both no longer with us) will be reuniting for this once-in-a-lifetime event.

Yes, it’s been a long time since the astonishing, groundbreaking 80′s Atlanta music scene, so it’s about time for a quickie flashback! Tickets are $25 in advance; $30 at the door. More information is at: www.atlantamusicmuseum.com

Song in video “Restless Youth” used with permission from the Swimming Pool Q’s.

Didn’t We Almost Have It All?

Dear Lordy: Please let us not have to sing that awful swan song come November. InsiderAdvantage’s Matt Towery has some hard new numbers and anaylsis about Obama’s slip (via the Palin bounce) in the youth-y stats. And he wags a finger right at Caroline Kennedy for (possibly) screwing everything up.

September 12, 2008 — The hidden story of the last week has been the shift in many states and nationwide among the youngest of voters, those ages 18-to-29, from a solid entrenchment in the Obama camp to a significant drift toward a newly revived John McCain effort, all courtesy of Gov. Sarah Palin.

Our survey approach keeps young respondents from being interviewed by young interviewers, thus avoiding the inevitable pressure a youthful poll respondent might feel to “fit in” and claim to be a supporter of Obama. As a result, younger voters, while still favoring Obama, have moved to the McCain column in not insubstantial numbers. Exit polls showed that among this group of voters, John Kerry carried their vote by roughly a 55 percent to 45 percent margin. But that was close enough to allow Bush to win the 2004 election by a fairly comfortable margin.

This takes me back to what I wrote in the past and continue to believe today: Hillary Clinton, for all of her alleged negatives, could have delivered Barack Obama the kind of “superstar” ticket he needed in order to win the presidency. But Caroline Kennedy and the East Coast Democratic Establishment, once again, could not see past their insular worldview that New England is representative of America as a whole. From Dukakis to Kerry to Biden, the Democratic Party continues to go back to the same throwback region of America to find its top standard bearers.

Full story here. Caroline the Wicked Witch of America? Who’d have though?

Here’s The Part Where Dems F Everything Up. Unless…

Queen Arianna is dead-on to call for Obama to release his “righteous rage” on America. It’s the campaign’s only hope before it heads into a Kerry-esque gutter. From today’s Huffington Post:

Given Obama’s sense of moral obligation and social responsibility, and his “audacity of hope,” I felt “the man and the moment may be made for each other.”

Now, as the crises facing our country intensify, and the campaign McCain is running becomes sleazier and more trivial, it’s time for Obama to unleash his inner Atticus — or at least the key element of Finch that Obama seems reluctant to embrace: righteous rage.

Full column here. Help us righteous rage. You’re our only hope. Help us righteous rage. You’re our only hope. Help us righteous rage. You’re our only hope. Help us righteous rage. You’re our only hope. You get the point…

Latest Polling – Obama “Implodes” in Georgia

Oops. From the latest IA/PP poll:

September 11, 2008 — A new InsiderAdvantage / Poll Position survey of likely registered voters in Georgia indicates a steep decline for the Barack Obama campaign and likely explains why the candidate is moving resources out of Georgia and into other states.

The poll of 506 registered likely voters, weighted for age, race, and gender, was conducted Wednesday evening. It has a margin of error of +/- 4%

Q. If the election were held today, would you vote for:

John McCain: 56%
Barack Obama: 38%
Other: 2%
Undecided: 4%

InsiderAdvantage’s Matt Towery: “This is a huge slide from what had been, in our prior surveys, a relatively close race. The reason is simple—Obama lost serious ground in virtually every demographic.

Full story/analysis here.

I Couldn’t Agree More

 

Bernie Marcus’ Media Message Just Strange

There’s a not-so-fine line between a compelling media op and crass exploitation of people in misery. And yeah, we mostly call it “local TV news.” But today we can add promoting one’s cause and enterprise to the mix, and call it Just Plain Weirdness In Bernie’s Fish Tank. From a press release from the Sheperd Spinal Center:

Several military veterans currently in rehabilitation for spinal cord or brain injuries at Shepherd Center will take a break from therapy to swim with thousands of fish, including whale sharks, at the Georgia Aquarium on Tuesday, Sept. 9.

The vets will be joined during the swim by Bernie Marcus, founder of The Home Depot and the benefactor of the Georgia Aquarium. Marcus is a leading proponent for helping injured soldiers receive the medical care they need following their tours of duty in Iraq or Afghanistan.

The swim begins at 10:30 a.m. (TODAY) and lasts for 30 minutes. Members of the media are welcome to film or photograph veterans as they prepare to enter the water and as they swim.

Full press release here. God help PR and rich people. Sometimes they sure don’t know what they do.