Published on Wednesday, 30 July 2008 .
So do you remember Republican Senator Ted “Series of Tubes” Stevens of Alaska, who, in addition to advocating for the infamous Bridge to Nowhere, was famous for the following rant against network neutrality:
I just the other day got, an internet was sent by my staff at 10 o’clock in the morning on Friday and I just got it yesterday. Why?
Because it got tangled up with all these things going on the internet commercially…
They want to deliver vast amounts of information over the internet. And again, the internet is not something you just dump something on. It’s not a truck.
It’s a series of tubes.
And if you don’t understand those tubes can be filled and if they are filled, when you put your message in, it gets in line and its going to be delayed by anyone that puts into that tube enormous amounts of material, enormous amounts of material.
Yeah, so while he is aware that the internet is “not a truck”, he isn’t aware of what constitutes a felony. He also had a “series of tubes” on the brain, as that’s exactly one of the “undisclosed” gift he received from the VECO Corporation. A little Keith Olbermann for your watching pleasure:
I am still recovering a bit from my trip to Portland, so I was a bit lethargic putting this week’s show together. While Portland should be a two-hour flight, I had to alter my initial return plan and, as a result, flew from Portland to Eugene to San Francisco to Santa Barbara - so it took over five hours to get home on Sunday. This isn’t factoring in that I really didn’t get loads of sleep during my trip, so the sum of my trip subtracted from this show.
For those keeping track, I’ve used “factor”, “sum”, and “subtracted” in a sentence describing a radio show. Fortunately, the music is really, really great, so, ignoring my boring segues, it is very much worth a listen.
Standard Podcast [58:28m]:
Play Now |
Play in Popup
Black Before Red | Underneath Gold | Belgrave to Kings Circle
Cobra Killer + Kapajkos | High is the Pine | Das Mandolinenorchester
The Cramps | The Creature From The Black Leather Lagoon | Stay Sick!
DePhazz | Shadow Of A Lie| Days Of Twang
Desert Sessions | Take me to your leader | Vol. 5 & 6
Enon | Grain Of Assault | Lost Marbles And Exploded Evidence
Golden Shoulders | Daughters | Kin
Le Loup | Planes Like Vultures. | The Throne Of The Third Heaven Of The Nations’ Millennium General Assembly
The Main Drag | How We’d Look on Paper | Yours as Fast as Mine
Metric | The List | Old World Underground, Where Are You Now?
Mugison | Murr Murr | Mugimama Is This Monkey Music?
Say Hi To Your Mom | Laundry | Discosadness
Southern Culture On The Skids | Firefly | Dirt Track Date
Tubeway Army | We Have a Technical | Replicas
Tom Lehrer | S-N (Snore, Sneeze, And Sniff) | The Remains Of Tom Lehrer
Last night, I got back from Portland, Oregon, where I was attending an über-lefty radio conference. I know what you are thinking - an über-lefty radio conference in Portland can only mean one thing - lots and lots of hippies. And yeah, I had to hear, from more than one person, about the “greatness” of The Grateful Dead - a band of which I am not so fond, to say the least1. To paraphrase Nigel in This Is Spinal Tap,”It’s like, how much more hippie could this be? And the answer is none. None more hippie. ”
Still, I had never visited Portland before, and, aside from a 13 hour drive through Oregon about 15 years ago, I haven’t really seen much of the state. But this time, I walked all over the city. Powell’s Books - the largest bookstore I’ve ever seen (check out the PDF map which doesn’t really do justice) - is incredible. There was a also a trip to the Bagdad Theater to see the second showcase of 2008 of the Rock and Roll Camp for Girls - which was really, really cool. I ate some extremely delicious Ethiopian food at the Queen of Sheba restaurant. And, finally, took a tour of the fine community radio station (and gracious host of the conference I was attending) known as 90.7 KBOO-FM.
I saw more of Portland in four days than I see of Santa Barbara on a regular basis - and I even facilitated a workshop on audio streaming and webcasting - because the person scheduled to do it no-showed I am so well respected. Anyway, Portland was great fun, and I highly recommend a visit.
1Q: What does a Grateful Dead fan say when he runs out of pot? A: “Jeez, this band sucks!”
This week, I am traveling to Portland, Oregon for a radio conference. Just thought I’d share. And hey, there is a theme this week! Can you figure it out? I bet you can!
Incidentally, after a recent upgrade of the software that runs this site, a few minor things broke - one of which is the player that allows you to listen to the show through the website. Hopefully, that will be restored by next week. Edit: Hey - I managed to get it working with a little hack! It’s almost like I know what I am doing!
Standard Podcast [58:03m]:
Play Now |
Play in Popup
The Ruts | Babylon’s Burning | Something That I Said - The Best of the Ruts
Good Face For Radio | Burn Down this Town | Good Face For Radio
Michael Franti & Spearhead | Yell Fire! | Yell Fire!
Pere Ubu | Fire | Cloudland
Stars | Set Yourself On Fire | Set Yourself On Fire
Screaming Lord Sutch | Smoke And Fire | Smoke And Fire
Roky Erickson & The Aliens | Stand For The Fire Demon | I Have Always Been Here Before—The Roky Erickson Anthology
Mike Doughty | Firetruck | Smofe + Smang: Live in Minneapolis
The Futureheads | Burnt | News and Tributes
Lord Invader | Out The Fire | Calypso In New York
Shanghai 5 | Better On Fire | Under A Tent, Under The Full Moon…
Stan Ridgway | Ring Of Fire | Songs That Made This Country Great
The Lounge-O-Leers | Light My Fire | Meet the Lounge-O-Leers
Dictators | Burn, Baby, Burn!! | D.F.F.D.
Meat Puppets | Lake of Fire | Too High To Die
Tom Lehrer | Oedipus Rex | An Evening (Wasted) With…
I am very, very tired. Here’s the playlist for this week. Mah!
Oh, and now that the power outages have stopped, I’ll be able to add last week’s show to the podcast cue. Yippee!
Standard Podcast [58:48m]:
Play Now |
Play in Popup
Artist | Name | Album
Space | Dark Clouds | Spiders
BOAT | (I’m A) Donkey For Your Love | Let’s Drag Our Feet
Beirut | Nantes | The Flying Club Cup
Black Before Red | A Passengers guide to getting by | Belgrave to Kings Circle
Good Face For Radio | Evil Twin | Good Face For Radio
Angst | Blue head red Eyes | Angst
The Dollyrots | Out of L.A. | Because I’m Awesome
Architecture In Helsinki | Maybe You Can Owe Me | In Case We Die
Sea Ray | Sister Gone | Stars at Noon
The Slip | Airplane/Primitive | Eisenhower
Tom Waits | Dead And Lovely | Real Gone
The Von Bondies | Cass & Henry | Lack of Communication
Astronautalis | Oceanwalk | You And Yer Good Ideas
Tom Lehrer | George Murphy | That Was The Year That Was