Filed under: music, not hot | Tags: beyonce, jonas akerlund, lady gaga, music videos, shit
I will be blunt: Jonas Akerlund is an annoying sack of shit and he needs to fucking go away. He is homophobic and hates women and his attitudes towards race are shaky at best and his narrative style is jarring and pointless. He is the Seth MacFarlane of music videos and, therefore, an asshole.
I have been saying this for years, and over time the Swedish music video director has only managed to get more and more repulsive. I mention this now, of course, because he directed the nine-minute video for Lady Gaga’s “Telephone,” which premiered tonight and which the entire internet is buzzing about.
The video is admittedly not completely awful. Beyonce looks good, at least, and the choreography is kind of appealing. But it’s also not a good video at all. As with Akerlund’s video for “Paparazzi”, this clip is several minutes longer than the song it’s promoting but only tells a story that’s worthy of maybe four minutes total. For three long introductory minutes we see Gaga in prison; mainly this provides an excuse to tell bad lesbian jokes, a theme which continues throughout the video. (Prison guards are all lesbians, ha! Their method of finding sex online is a dating site called PlentyOfFish.com, ha ha! Oh, the hilarity! There’s even a vehicle called the Pussy Wagon, the textual tackiness of which hasn’t been seen since Madonna picked up the old lady at the Ol Kuntz Home in the “What It Feels Like For A Girl” video.) Halfway through, Beyonce shows up to bail Gaga out and what ensues is randomly glommed together from Thelma and Louise, every Quentin Tarantino movie ever made, and the gaudy “Paparazzi” clip, with which it shares a murder weapon.
Why is that not the title of a porn movie yet?
Anyway, even though Craigslist is the fucking worst, I placed another ad for models for the Super Secret Project That I Can’t Talk About Yet. (Responses were kinda hilarious the first time I tried, so…) And I just learned that now apparently the word “shoots” is verboten. As in, “I am arranging photo shoots for the week of…” Not allowed. At all.
Filed under: books, not hot, shameless self-promotion | Tags: me me me me me
See the guy in this video? The one typing in the cafe about Mr. Scragglebones? He’s totally reading a story that I wrote. Actually, it’s the story that I read last month at Sex Worker Literati, and it’s going to be appearing in this awesome new book of completely unerotic sex stories. That means that a) I’m actually going to be in a real published book (!!!) and b) I can now not-dishonestly say that an actor has portrayed me. (!!!!!!)
Meaghan O’Connell and Melissa Gira Grant, who are putting the book together, are financing it through Formspring, which is this neato fundraising platform for financing creative projects. And these ladies want your money! No, really, they do. There’s all kinds of pledge levels, and the more you give the more you get (Gchats! A story written just for you! Other things I can’t exactly remember right now!)
The concept’s already going over like hotcakes; it’s raised over $2,000 just today.
When a classy man’s to-do list includes a) masturbating and b) getting to the bank before it closes, he should really opt for dealing with the finances first.
That will prevent the gentleman from showing up to the bank disheveled, and will most certainly prevent him from getting as far as the ATM lobby before he realizes that there is a visible semen stain on his pants. Because no amount of trouser-hiking and coat-buttoning makes cummy Dockers any less awkward, especially when there are only four minutes left in the banking day.
Remember that.
Filed under: art, heterosexuals, hot, not hot | Tags: art, blowjobs, dirty poetry, hot pants penis collectors, japan, museums, news, olympics, photography, political portraits, rainbow parties, romans, shoes, star wars, strippers, tiger woods, urban legends, xtube
You know, if you hadn’t seen enough yet…
A profile of Japan’s oldest stripper.
Video of a really crazy-looking woman giving her husband a pullback blowjob. Straight people are fascinating sometimes.
I will sodomize you and face-fuck you. Jeez, Romans.
Ten urban legends that caused a moral panic. Hahaha, rainbow parties.
The art of the political portrait.
UK museums are closing after funding gets diverted to the Olympics. Fucking Olympics.
I spent last weekend surrounded by Star Wars crazed cousins, which reminded me of the new Adidas Star Wars collection.
[image: I don't know how I originally came across Czech photographer Jaroslav Kučera, but this photograph is completely delightful.]
Filed under: art, books, gay, magazines, music, not hot | Tags: best books of 2009, gay rags, george michael, hard print, harlequin, i want your sex, moustaches, publishing, social media, tumblr
My head’s a bit muddled right now after trying to squeeze 50 songs into a 4 hour radio show and also with finding decent photos to match all the artists. (Poor V Factory don’t seem to have a good shot among them, even by boyband standards. Which is too bad, because Love Struck is definitely the best boyband song to come out since at least 2002.)
Romance publisher Harlequin’s been pissing people off left and right with their recently-announced self-publishing imprint. Basically, the idea was that if you send a manuscript to Harlequin and they reject it, they’ll sending you a nice letter telling you that they can still publish it with the Harlequin name, but only if you pay them and not the other way around. They’ve decided to shift their plans, though, after romance, mystery, and sci-fi writers’ groups all condemned the idea.
Also re: books, The Guardian asked an insane number of writers to name their favorite novels of the year, thus sending my to-read list into an out-of-control spiral.
House Of Vader made me laugh with his post about George Michael’s I Want Your Sex video. Also with this link. (Just the other night some friends and I were talking about what it is that makes people think singing along is impressive when you only know about 10% of the words. If you see this, DJCire1, fill us in.)
WizardElite on trimming the social media fat. The writer over there decided to ditch Tumblr, which is one of my favorites; I actually wouldn’t mind eliminating a couple of pointless social networks myself, although I’d probably get rid of LinkedIn first because, really, what’s the point?
Speaking of Tumblr, functional tumblelogs are few and far between, but Hard Print‘s a good one to follow if you’re into hipster-ish arty gay print rags.
And if arty men are your thing, you may be interested in a 2010 calendar that some RISD students recently put out, featuring men of RISD and their moustaches. It’s a nice idea and fairly well executed, although some of the photos are a little predictable. (I like Mr. September, though.) For some reason whoever’s behind the project also bought the domain sexconfident.com, which led me to think that this might be part of something bigger and more exciting. I think I was mistaken, though.
Filed under: art, books, Italians, magazines, music, not hot | Tags: art, bad sex in fiction, balls, catholics, cuba, electricity, ellie goulding, helvetica, italy, lady gaga, levi johnston, murder, patrick kennedy, penis size, records, sperm
I had my annual Fakesgiving (alternative vegetarian Thanksgiving potluck) party last night, so there were shouty drunkards in my apartment until 4 this morning. Then I had to take down the Queercraft show. So sorry this is brief.
Catholic Bishop Thomas Tobin has apparently banned Patrick Kennedy from receiving communion because the congressional rep (my district–woot!) is pro-choice. The congressman is the son of Ted Kennedy.
Brenda, the transsexual prostitute frequented by Italian governor Piero Marrazzo before his political downfall last month, burned to death in a mysterious fire early this week. Police are treating the case as a murder.
Cuban health care now covers free penis implants.
This is not how I would have spelled out the lyrics to Bad Romance at all.
Art Vinyl is looking for your favorite LP art of the year. Seeing this list reminded me that it’s been a full year now since I’ve had a functioning turntable.
Over at Carnal Nation this week, I learned a lot about my balls, thanks to Scientific American. I also learned how my laptop is probably killing my sperm and looked, briefly, into the shortlist for this year’s Bad Sex in Fiction prize.
Oh, and yawn.
[video: Ellie Goulding's Under The Sheets, which is pretty much my favorite song of right now. I love how it works the whole Bat For Lashes/Florence craze for kooky Englishwomen but also manages to be poppy enough to dance to.]
Filed under: gay, magazines, not hot | Tags: levi johnston, nonsense, playgirl, teen pregnancy, the gays
It’s eternally amazing how far mainstream gay media goes to convince us that certain people are sexy. Any man under 30, if he is white and even slightly newsworthy, inevitably becomes the subject of horny adoration from blogs and magazines. It’s not always unjustified; I won’t say I’m immune to Ben Cohen-mania, though most Americans (myself included) have never once seen a rugby game. But the same is true even when the allegedly studly subject is Bad For The Gays. Or frankly very plain-looking. Gay blogs will even, once in a while, overcome their youth fixation to write about an older man, though those articles overuse the term “silver fox” and usually they’re just about ugly and irritating Anderson Cooper, anyway.
So I’m not surprised that gay media has so obsessively chronicled Levi Johnston’s Playgirl appearance. Despite the fact that men have been exposing themselves in the magazine since the seventies, it’s always more exciting when the flaccid and heavily Photoshopped penis belongs to someone you’ve heard of before. That’s fine.
Filed under: art, gay, heterosexuals, hookers, Italian-Americans, music, not hot, people from rhode island, personal, porn, this very blog, tv | Tags: courtney love, curation, dlist, dlisted, donna hughes, george michael, goteblud, human trafficking, ireland, joe gage, kristin hersh, magdalene laundries, manhunt, medjugorje, megan andelloux, melissa girla grant, new york art book fair, portland, rhode island, role models, sam adams, wooster collective
My Firefox window of “stuff I keep meaning to post about” has 67 tabs open right now, some dating back to August. So consider this a bonus news day/info purge:
GlobalComment’s sickening report on the Magdalene slaves is very distressing indeed. Wayward (or not even so wayward) Irish girls were enslaved by the Catholic Church to work without pay in laundries as recently as 1994, and the Irish government refuses to apologize. Last week Ireland’s Minister of Education issued a brief statement, referring to the girls who worked in the laundries as “employees.” The “employees” are understandably upset.
Portland mayor Sam Adams is safe from a recall stemming from his alleged affair with an intern. But now there’s maybe another recall, although probably not. Let it go, people. Let it go. (I am glad to have learned the phrase “shit or shinola” from the article, though.)
Manhunt bought DList. I think that’s probably good, ultimately, since Manhunt has way bigger ad sales and could probably keep the site running a little more smoothly. On the other hand, it would be disappointing if DList became less art-faggy and especially if the music parts of the site were taken down; I’ve actually discovered a bunch of cool new bands by surfing pictures of hipster boys. But if it just turns into a cruising site I’ll be kinda annoyed. (more…)
Filed under: art, books, gay, heterosexuals, hookers, hot, magazines, music, Norwegians, not hot, people from rhode island | Tags: ben roethlisberger, books, breakfast at tiffany's, dark skies, david bazan, don carcieri, drinking, guns, holly golightly, jonathan lethem, miquel brown, nick hornby, prostitution, sandusky, sex ed, sex toys, soldiers, sondre lerche, teenagers, the thing, uruguay, utah, van jones, you know my name
I’ve been a little swamped this week; I’m still adjusting to real pro blogging, plus I’m trying to deal with an art show I’m curating, a couple of other writing projects, and the Mixtapes For Hookers two-year birthday party, which is (OMG) two weeks from tonight.
So, here’s some links and stuff to stories I’ve been reading/thinking about/getting distracted by.
BlogHer on sex and money.
The Guardian on Audrey Hepburn, Marilyn Monroe, and Holly Golightly’s sordid reputation; none of the several Breakfast at Tiffany’s pieces I’ve read lately have mentioned how completely racist Truman Capote’s original novella is, so I’m guessing the new West End production doesn’t climax with a group of dark-skinned children coming out of the bushes and hurling stones like savages from darkest Africa, or whatever the hell happens in the book.
News reports from amusement park mecca Sandusky, Ohio, say that the flourishing sex trade there is “inseperably linked” to the drug trade.
Rhode Island’s governor is defending his decision to speak at a fundraiser for an anti-gay Massachusetts group.
Salt Lake City high school senior Emma Waitzman is attempting to reform her school’s sex ed curriculum.
The Jonathan Lethem-designed new issue of experimental publication The Thing is out this week, and I want it I want it I want it.
OH MY GOD YOU GUYS AMERICAN SOLDIERS LIKE OVERSEAS HOOKERS.
Dreamy Sondre Lerche has a new video, which is mainly notable because it’s Sondre Lerche and he’s a dreamsicle. But both the song and the video are a little lackluster, I think. Still, I might head up to Boston to see him at the Paradise on Sunday because he’s amazing live, and the last time he played at the Paradise (on my birthday, no less) it was one of the greatest shows ever.
The lawyer for the woman accusing Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger of rape is now asking for a list of every woman he’s ever had sex with.
Nick Hornby likes mp3 blogs. I still like Nick Hornby, no matter how wildly uncool people keep insisting he is.
The Fleshlight-Liberator combo is endlessly hilarious to me, if only because it makes me think only of the facial expressions of its users.
Mixing and mastering notes for the new David Bazan album, which I still have yet to hear.
Uruguay allows same-sex adoption.
Potential police ramificiations of a fake gun vending machine set up outside a London school cause British video artist to change his mind.
John Crace at the Guardian on teen bloggers.
Was Van Jones brought down by a plot to stop climate legislation?
Dark Skies Awareness. Though I know nothing–literally nothing–about astronomy, I’m all for this.
Books about drinking. I hated Miss Lonelyhearts and never finished Big Sur (though I liked it; it’s just one of those books I started and then lost, or something.) But The Long Goodbye is pretty awesome!
You can map the popularity of your first name state by state and year by year. Mine peaked in Massachusetts in 1984, which isn’t surprising since I was born in Rhode Island in 1981.
[video: Miquel Brown, So Many Men, So Little Time, a song that has been very dear to me lately.]
