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Pong 003
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// // pong issue #003 february 24, 1996 _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _\\ \\
// // pong is a subsidiary of dto productions. _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _\\
"actually, it's easy to detect acid rain." -- jason todd
> pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong > pong
> a nice, warm, hearty pile of squid
>> written by murmur
this is the third issue of pong. it's taken about a month longer than
it should have to get it written. why is this? well, probably because none
of those jackass telecom legends got off their lazy asses and wrote anything
for us this month (last month, even.) oh well, i suppose we love them
anyways.
we have a new address for correspondence. please send anything you
want my way; i'm at phuckelb@sun.iwu.edu. plus, lo and behold, we have an
official web site@! but doesn't everybody? hrm. well, tap into our page
at zinew0rld: http://www.pla-net.net/~jwapienn/zineworld/pong. easy.
we even have a p.o. box. any snail mail or DEMOS or ALBUMS you would
like to send us (yes, we'll review the latter for you) can be sent to:
pong * p.o. box 443 * normal, il 61761
pong #004, which should be out *roughly* on time, will in fact feature
more musical substance, in all likelihood. provided, of course, that
someone writes it.
even though i need to add a bunch of stuff to this issue still, this is
as long as the intro is going to be, because, well, yeah. go die or
something. well, maybe not, but, uhm, yeah.
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[ this is where a clever table of contents ascii would go
if someone had made me one. ]
>>> a nice, warm, hearty pile of squid
>>>> written by murmur
>>> table of contents for pong #003
>>>> written by murmur
>>> drugs should be legalized...
>>>> written by sweeney erect
>>> representative democracy, part two
>>>> written by murmur
>>> the metaphor of the decade
>>>> written by shadow tao
>>> pong man of the year
>>>> written by murmur
>>> for squirrels; an uninformed ramble
>>>> written by murmur
>>> review of Sister Machine Gun/Gravity Kills/Lick concert
>>>> written by Ogre De Latoya
>>> blue meanies, the conclusion
>>>> written by murmur
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> drugs should be legalized...
>> written by sweeney erect
Drugs should be legalized, beginning with steroids. Steroids are
marvelous drugs for everybody except the person taking them.
Who uses steroids? Athletes. You know, the guys who get all the
women, who if they go far enough in their careers also get scholarships,
bribes, multi-million dollar contracts and endorsements. Why do athletes
get all these things? For entertaining me (actually, for entertaining the
public in general, but I'm a solipsist.)
As long as these guys are getting all this cool stuff for entertaining
me, I want the best quality entertainment possible. The sort of
entertainment that can only be provided by steroid-enhanced athletes.
Can you imagine the size, power, and speed athletes could attain if
they began using steroids in high school or college and continued a rigorous
workout schedule right to their pro careers? Talk about your master race.
And another thing, steroids make tempers really really short. Who
wouldn't like to see more fights? We're talking about knock down, drag out
brawls here. Best of all, the referees won't be able to break them up.
Who's going to step between two steroid driven wackos? Maybe Peter McNeeley
if you paid him a million bucks and let him quit after the first punch.
Some might argue that these athletes could become a public menace,
prowling about in states of dangerous anger. I have considered this and
propose the perfect solution: incarceration. I'm not suggesting actually
*caging* athletes per se. Simply placing them under house arrest. They
could still live in the nicest places they could afford; they simply would
not be allowed to leave, generally speaking, except to go to games. The
women and alcohol would be brought to them and they could have any visitors
they want. What could be better?
And speaking of women, another advantage to the rest of us is that
steroids make your penis shrivel up. So, once all the athletes are safely
on steroids, we can always point out to women that although we may not have
huge rippling muscles, at least our masculinity is still intact.
The only problem I can see remaining is that of what to do with
athletes after they are past their prime. Obviously they should be allowed
to continue living in the nicest places they can afford, under
incarceration. If it reached a point where they have outlived their prime
and the savings, well, that can be treated in a future piece, euthanasia.
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> representative democracy, part two
>> written by murmur
excerpted from "the question of representative democracy" found in dto #1:
> pong
what is the purpose of a representative democracy, in a simple sense?
even simpler, what is the purpose of the representative? basically, he/she
represents his/her constituents by functioning at a higher level to get
things done for those constituents. a plurality of votes, in most cases, is
what elects a representative to his/her office.
without going into mindless detail, an interesting question that has
recently been posed once again stands out: should the representative vote
in such a way that it falls in line with the constituents wishes? a
majority of the constituents wishes? what if the representative disagrees?
what if the people are simply completely wrong?
[ . . . ]
i don't want to get too in depth, but think about that: would you
rather your president did the right thing or what the majority of the
population wanted? which is "constitutional"? what's the correct recourse?
i say right overrules majority. that's me. what about you? this is
an important question, especially when it comes time to vote, which many of
us already legally do and many more of us soon will. do you want a
man/woman that will abide by the people's wishes above all else, or that
will do what's "right" above all else, in such a situation?
> pong
there is a more basic question, of course, besides just that of the
nature of the representative democracy. in this day and age, do we even
*need* a representative democracy? the technology exists to theoretically
make the united states, canada, most westernized nations for that matter,
true direct democracies. forget "representatives"; the people represent
themselves. sure, we'd need someone in an official place of authority, like
a president. but a congress? who needs legislature? we have accu-vote.
obviously a direct democracy isn't going to work in its purest form.
without some body like congress set up to get things done as it is now,
there'd be pure mayhem if people tried to unilaterally vote on everything.
but what about national referendums? the capability truly does exist. but
it is a logical thing to pursue?
like hell it is. the reason congress is such a great vehicle of the
people is because these people are professional legislators. they really do
know what the fuck they're doing. yeah, corruption/lobbyists/etc. will
interfere. but can you imagine if corruption interferes with legislators
what it could do to ordinary citizens?
frankly, the people of the united states, as a whole, aren't too
terribly bright. and even if we were, we'd largely make shitty legislators.
there's no way we can become part-time politicians on the side worrying
about large pieces of critical legislation while we still have families and
careers and the like to deal with.
whether or not the system we have right now is the best is irrelevant
to the concept of what system we could have in the future is best. the way
the system is designed, and it's NOT designed particularly poorly, has
created a situation where any future system better not be a whole hell of a
lot different than the current system. we can't overhaul the government.
bureaucracy is rather difficult to disintegrate.
now, let's think back to that concept of representative democracy, and
once again ask ourselves, hey, should legislators vote strictly in line with
the wishes of their constituents, or shouldn't they? my opinion remains
unchanged. if we were sending legislators solely to vote in accordance,
specifically, with the wishes of their constituents, we may as well be
introducing referendum-government. no way. these people are professionals.
they have staffs and aides and do know a hell of a lot more about the issues
than we average citizens do. when a legislator arrives in washington, he
remembers his constituents and will assuredly vote largely in accordance
with their wishes, most of the time. but if he/she is strongly against,
say, the death penalty, even if every other constituent in his/her
constituency is pro-death penalty, he/she should vote what he/she feels is
right.
there's no way anyone can do what everyone wants, and the reason the
legislative system we have works is because it's run by true legislators,
actual people, and not directly run by uninformed citizens or anything like
that. be happy we've got such a damn fine system of government, and nightly
get down on your knees and say thank you, mister james madison, for this
here constitution.
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> the metaphor of the decade
>> written by shadow tao
the following is a message that shadow tao posted to aethelwulf's utopia
wherein he refers to the clique system of his high school as being similar
to feudal japan. it's really a fascinating metaphor whether or not you
understand anything he's talking about.
the people referred to in the beginning would be generally the clique
associated with the fine people who write the fine 'zine GRILL. if you
haven't read GRILL, you must be a loser.
anyways, here's what good ol' tao had to say, and it's quite brilliant.
> pong
now that i have had a chance to observe your social movements in
a little greater detail, i feel sufficiently acquainted to render
a half-assed, surface quality analysis.
the control in this observation is that kids in a relatively same
region act (in base, not socially) in relatively the same ways.
the true variable would be the size of the schools involved.
yours being large, mine being small.
Your clique dynamic seems to be that of the renaissance <sp> or
Victorian periods.
mine, as i told spirit, was a lot like feudal japan.
yours seems to be centered around overt actions, disagreements,
and alliances, never exposing themselves to the greater whole.
While arguments do tend to turn one person or group against
another person of group, an action to turn the whole group openly
against one of it's members would have to be severe and
aggressive. socialization is very overt in a lot of ways, yet
blatant and bold in others. the uber-clique is omnipresent, yet
not considered or spoken of. even though in most eyes, the
members of the uber-clique have more 'status', the members of
your clique seem to shun it. the uber-clique seems to be the
proletariat. your clique would be the petit bourgeoisie. <sp>
*** COMMENCE METAPHOR OVERKILL ***
mine, my native environ, was another story. our school was
grouped into rigid friends structures/cliques. we would have
inter-clique wars, and aggression was open and rageful. the
daimyo, or ruling families, tended to be pretty, high-standing
girls. (the Pretty Girls)
sometimes, for special cliques, like the Smokers, and the
Jocks, the daimyo was populated by men, but that was the
exception, not the rule. we had a very limited range of movement,
socially. clique movement was looked down upon, and switching
cliques was often a dishonoring move. we had peasants, which
were made up of the lunchroom/special ed kids, who basically
submitted to the whims of the higher families. For a long time,
the Jocks and the Smokers were basically the 'en masse' shogunate
for a long time, but due to the lack of skill in new Jocks, and
the lack of inner-family movement in the Smokers, the Pretty
Girls took over the shogunate through feminine wiles and numbers.
our seiitaishogun was a girl in our class. she was deceptively
sweet, and could kiss you and disembowel you socially in
practically the same turn. For a long time, the class structure
was adhered to, well, until my friend Aaron and I formed the
Ronin, as it were. we, as the masterless 'samurai', moved
without restriction, eventually becoming 'characters of
questionable morals.' as an impromptu yakuza, we basically moved
in and out of the social hierarchy at will, only associating with
the shogunate at large through the petty daimyo, and only with
those that served our own ends. he, as oyabun, and i, as
enforcer, basically lived separate from the classes. after a
while, he became involved in the Jocks structure, taking a minor
position in the higher lords. he eventually found a girlfriend
in the lower house of cheerleaders, and they were happy for about
a year. i became oyabun, and with my new position as network
admin, i increased greatly the amount of shady dealings. Our
shogunate began to have large proxy fights, and our seiitaishogun
was out of town most of the time, dating high-ranking daimyo of
other schools. my friend aaron lost his position in the Jocks,
and lost his girlfriend when she moved to the higher cheerleader
house. he returned to the yakuza for a while, but eventually
decided to head into the merchants. the shogunate was finally
regained by some younger Jocks, but it was eventually lost to one
of the Jock's girlfriends, who had at one time been a Smoker, but
became a Pretty Girl due to her excessive breasts. as i left
high school, i left the yakuza in the charge of one of my more
adept lieutenants, my friend aaron was advancing in the
mercantilists, and the shogunate had wound up in the hands of the
lower house of cheerleaders. I also remember the Jocks and
Smokers were trading mates a lot, and the lines between them were
beginning to blur. Their never seemed to be a uber-clique at our
school, but the greater daimyos would gather at lunch to decide
the politics of the coming week, with the EXCEPTION of us,
but we had paid off the seiitaishoguns to protect our interests,
anyway.
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> pong man of the year
>> written by murmur
The 1995 pong man of the year is none other than Vermont's very own
Senator Patrick Leahy. Sen. Leahy, along with Sen. Feingold (Wisconsin),
Reps. Cox (California) and Wyden (now Sen. Wyden, Oregon) and many other
members of Congress plus their staffs and aides, have defended free speech
from a vantage few individuals could have; as the ones casting the actual
votes for or against the massive Telecommunications Act of 1996. The act,
if you're oblivious, was signed in to law on Thursday, February 8, and the
Communications Decency Act, a rider to the larger act, prohibits the
transmission of "indecent" material through any electronic means to anyone
under the age of 18 (as well as prohibiting the transmission of "obscene"
material to anyone.)
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has already filed suit in
Federal Court, claiming the CDA is unconstitutional. It rather blatantly
is, and we hope that the Supreme Court (or a lower court) will realize the
absurdity of the law against the backdrop of our First Amendment.
As the champion legislator against the CDA, Sen. Leahy is an easy
choice for pong man of the year.
Want more information about the CDA and the ACLU suit? Sure you do.
Web to http://www.aclu.org or http://www.cdt.org or http://www.eff.org for
more information (respectively, the sites of the ACLU, the Center for
Democracy and Technology, and the Electronic Frontier Foundation.) There
are many other relevant sites which can easily be located with any standard
search engine.
Oh no, they will not regulate our speech.
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$$$$$$ $$$$$$
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$$$$$$$$ $!!!!$ $!!!!$ $iiiiii$ $!!!!!$ $!!!!!$
`"Y$$$$$ss$$$$$$ `"Y$$$ss$$$$$Y"' `"Y$$$$ss$$$$Y"'
[d2o] doomed to obscurity productions [d2o]
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> for squirrels; an uninformed ramble
>> written by murmur
if you've watched mtv dream time any time in the last month or so,
chances are you've seen the video for "mighty k.c." by the floridian band
for squirrels (from the album _example_ on 550 music.) chances are also
relatively good you know part of the brief history of the band (and had you
watched 120 minutes on february 4 you'd be reasonably well-informed.)
for those of you who don't know, for squirrels released their debut
album on 550 music (a sony imprint, if i recall) a few months ago. this was
in no way a heralded release, just another band out there. well, their tour
van, packed with the four members of the band, their road manager, and their
equipment, got into an accident. two members of the band and the road
manager were killed (the last musical fatality in a van wreck i can remember
is d. boon, minutemen front man, but that's almost entirely IRRELEVANT.)
the two remaining members of for squirrels decided to carry on anyways,
and a friend of theirs are their late bandmates joined the band so it could
continue. the unusual circumstances led to a rather odd silent auction
benefit (much memorabilia from famous bands like pearl jam are among the
items being auctioned off) to help pay for the costs of the members'
hospital bills, and for squirrels went ahead and shot a video consisting
largely of old videos and snapshots of the various members (and some too of
kurt cobain, "mighty k.c.")
well, the video is getting semblantly consistent airplay on mtv right
now, and suffice to say that _example_ is selling much better now than it
would have if not for the tragedy. rolling stone gave the album two stars,
saying it's an example of a band gaining notoriety simply on the basis of a
tragedy, but not because of their relative merits as a band. that, of
course, is a matter of opinion, but...
let's face reality. "mighty k.c." does not demonstrate the pinnacle of
genius. it's a nice song, it's pleasant to listen to, but it's not anything
that would strike anyone as profoundly wonderful from any casual listen.
this isn't the kind of band a label would be inclined to push; they're a
relatively quite, nice, tuneful little band, but there's nothing so
compelling about them that would put them in the same league as bush or the
goo goo dolls. they aren't clean musicians, and the recording quality isn't
the greatest. they're just another band.
they showed the video on 120 minutes while the band was there talking
to the large bald white man, matt pinfield (highly informative, and at times
downright baffling.) well, this time around, i listened to the song much
more closely. i paid attention to the video much more closely.
these are guys who've known each other for a long time and took their
student loan checks, pooled money together, and cut an album. it's hard to
get a real feeling of what people are like from a few short clips talking to
matt pinfield and from a single video, of course, but these guys seem like
the kind of guys you'd have wanted to go to a movie with, you'd trust your
girlfriend with.
frankly, this time, the video, the song, they sounded right. it's so
difficult to put a mood into words, but; for squirrels really seemed to have
the right mood. the song's lyrics very ironically can be applied to the
tragedy, which perhaps tends to lend the song more credibility than it would
ordinarily deserve, but; it's obvious that these were and are above all else
a sincere group of individuals. this song isn't complete pop-schtick; it's
a melodic rock song about something meaningful, if not to us, to them, and
that's always got the makings of a great song, sincerity.
for squirrels would never have gotten remotely popular if not for their
awful tragedy. any video they might have cut for "mighty k.c." was probably
destined to get one or two plays on 120 minutes and then never get played
again. but that's not what happened.
for anyone to condemn the band or their music solely on the grounds of
how it got to be popular is absurd. unfortunately, should they actually
start to generate tangible album sales, should they actually start to
attract people to their shows, i fear that's what will happen. cynical,
indignant minds will scorn for squirrels for taking a tragedy and trying to
make a buck off of it.
the attitudes that for squirrels gave off on 120 minutes, and have
given off with their video for "mighty k.c.", have convinced me beyond the
shadow of a doubt that they're sticking with it because it's the right thing
to do. what else are they going to do? these aren't first-rate musicians
that can go out and start doing side projects or create entirely new bands
after a tragedy (foo fighters, sweet 75?) for squirrels was a band, it was
guys who enjoyed being with each other and enjoyed playing together and had
a terrible thing happen to them, but rather then let the tragedy kill the
band, the band will continue, as a legacy to its late members.
i don't know what to expect from the rest of the album. chances are
"mighty k.c." is the best song on the album and everything else pales in
comparison. there's probably trite, meaningless lyrics and boring melodies
infesting the entire album, and it's something you'd listen to once and
never think of listening to again.
i'm going to go get myself a copy of _example_ today. i hope to see
for squirrels in illinois soon. i'll be there.
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> review of Sister Machine Gun/Gravity Kills/Lick concert
>> written by Ogre De Latoya
[ Sister Machine Gun and Gravity Kills with opener Lick played the Bone
Student Center Ballroom at Illinois State University on February 2.
Sister Machine Gun and Gravity Kills are both on WaxTrax!/TVT Records and
so far as we know Lick is "unsigned". Sister Machine Gun and Gravity
Kills both appeared on the _Mortal Kombat_ soundtrack. ]
Well, it was a FRIGID (-50 degrees with windchill!) February day. The
sky was bleak, the wind was howling, and the droves gathered at Bone Student
Center's Ballroom for a concert. Actually, droves is the wrong word as there
were not that many people there. I knew about half of the ones who did show
up, so that made the show a little more enjoyable for me.
First up was Lick. Lick is basically L7 with a sequencer. Lick kinda
sucked. The guitarist had some energy, and the bassist jerked and twitched
like he was a robot with a bad power connection, but other than that Lick was
not impressive. The funniest part of Lick was the guy who manned the
electronic equipment. He sat with a pair of drum sticks, and beat on some
MIDI pads. Unfortunately the pads made NO DISCERNIBLE NOISE! He just sat
there, beating at his noiseless pads. Oh well.
Next was Gravity Kills. They were, IMHO, the best band of the night.
The lead singer looked like the singer from Sponge, but he was still cool.
The guitarist had a very normal look to him, and he played in a very
controlled, technical fashion. The coolest member of the group was the
synth player. He had this HUGE keyboard that was mounted on a moving-
twisting-movable apparatus. At one point he stood on the struts of the
thing, and twisted the keyboard so that it faced the audience. Very neat.
Gravity Kills sounded a bit like Die Krupps to me, with crunching guitar,
yelled vox, and bleeping, pulsing synths.
Last was the headliner Sister Machine Gun. They were cool, but kind of
a let down after Gravity Kills. The best part of their show was when the
lead singer finished singing Old McDonald when some of my rambunctious
acquaintances yelled the first half during a break between songs. SMG
sounds a lot like your average Cyber-Thrash band, with hard guitars, and
angsty vox. Great for the average NIN fan, but I wanted more. Maybe X
Marks the Pedwalk will come to town soon...
[ Ogre De Latoya can be reached by email at sbaker@dave-world.net and he
says, "Feel free to E-mail me with questions/comments/hateful prose
or whatever." ]
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> blue meanies, the conclusion
>> written by murmur
[ note: if you have not read pong #2, featuring our interview with the blue
meanies, this will make NO SENSE AT ALL to you. ]
sure enough, we did indeed see the blue meanies again, on december 21
at the lafayette club in bloomington, illinois, with nil8 opening. they did
another fantastic show, but this here is just a brief follow-up to last
issue's interview.
billy informed me that everything he supposedly say during the first
part of the interview was actually the work of their producer, jeff (this
would including requesting southern culture on the skids.) We gave them a
"lovely" print out of pong #2 and a tape of the interview (including the
off-air portions) as a christmas gift of sorts and i got a copy of the
latest 7" (a three-song live recording from the metro in chicago, if i
recall.) the band members seemed genuinely thrilled (in itself a mild
surprise, but that's okay) and they thanked us for what billy called their
"best interview ever."
there's not a whole lot more to say, except if the blue meanies do come
around to your neck of the woods, you better go. they have tremendous
energy on stage and are an absolutely exceptional live band.
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pong issue #003 february 24, 1996
pong is a subsidiary of dto productions.
write to: pong * p.o. box 443 * normal, il 61761
pong wholeheartedly welcomes correspondences, critiques, and submissions
please send all correspondence to: phuckelb@sun.iwu.edu
call ihop, the official bbs of pong and goat-spiel and an official dto site.
ihop: (309) 556-2579,,,,,#11,#11,#11
m y h e a r t i s m a d e o f g r a v y .
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