Blue. No, green!

It makes you feel very good, when you bring home that Monty Python and the Holy Grail DVD that a friend just gave back (btw, grazie) and hand it to your five-year-old niece who then proceeds to hold it high above her head as she jumps up and down the living room in joy.
And it makes you feel even better when you're told that over the past year, when asked what she had most liked about her previous visit to italy that same niece would answer "THE KILLER RABBIT!!!"

(her other uncle's comment: "the intelligence gene probably skips one generation every time."
-long pause-
"Oh, wait, i just insulted myself.")

Hey, kids! Comics!

Master Race, by Bernard Krigstein and Al Feldstein
(Via ComicsReporter)
Egberto Gismonti interviewed by Graham Reid, illustrated by Dylan Horrocks
(More Horrocks here)

Blue Beats and Strange Encounters

So i was riding my bike back from Monfalcone yesterday, and a beautiful vintage shiny red spider convertible going in the opposite direction caught my eye. I turned to look at it better, and realized that Gino Paoli was driving it. The popular singer-songwriter was born in Monfalcone and still has relatives there, so his presence actually makes lots of sense. He wrote and performed many songs now ubiquitous like Una Rotonda Sul Mare, which had a then-unknown sessionman named Gato Barbieri on sax, or La Gatta, which always makes me very, very sad for obvious reasons. He also lives with a bullet lodged next to his heart, ever since his then-companion tried to shoot him in the early sixties.
Another thing that makes him interesting to my eyes are the two tracks he recorded with ska-rocksteady revival supergroup Giuliano Palma And The Bluebeaters in 2000, which stayed in limbo for some time while his record company decided what to do with them (they were considered "too wierd" for a greatest hits release), and eventually emerged on the second printing of the Bluebeaters' debut album.
The tracks recorded at those sessions were the classic Che Cosa c'è, as suggested by Paoli, and Domani, a song bandleader Giuliano Palma proposed to cover and that Paoli himself had forgotten that he'd written!
I'm presenting this track today because it's my favourite of the two, mainly for the fantastically retro background vocals. Listen and agree.

Giuliano Palma And The Bluebeaters feat. Gino Paoli - Domani (320kps 8.64Mb mp3)



Seeing the guy brought back fond memories of the Bluebeaters, probably the best rocksteady combo in italy, who only perform very sporadically due to contrasting schedules with members' "official" bands (Casino Royale, Africa Unite, Fratelli di Soledad, Vallanzaska, Reggae National Tickets). A quick net search brought the good news: they're touring once again! Since i've always managed to barely miss them every time they've neared my whereabouts, i plan to catch them in Marcon on the 1st of may.
Which makes a great timetable for my next months: PFM performing their Fabrizio De Andrè tribute in trieste on the 1st of april, Bluebeaters 1st of may, Skatalites at the sunsplash on the 1st of july. A little bit of regularity is good every now and then.

Power Failures

A new electricity counter was unexpectedly installed at our place last saturday, when some shady-looking enel guys came, cut our electricity off for half an hour, changed counters and left without in any moment warning us of their intention.
Since then, the power has been going away about 10-15 times a day. I could use this as an excuse for not updating lately, but it's just too obvious that nothing but my own laziness is to be blamed. But please complain to the electricity company instead, anyway. And boycott them when playing monopoly.

Why not sneeze, Rrose Selavy?

RROSE SELAVY (Alias Marcel Duchamp). 1021. Photograph by Man Ray.
Art Direction by Marcel Duchamp. Silver Print. 5-7/8" x 3"-7/8"
Collection: Philadelphia Museum of Art.

This picture of Rrose Selavy is posted in tribute to Gnapppo who should have graduated yesterday or today, don't really remember, neither will he within half an hour from when the celebrations begin.
Welcome to unemployment, Gnap! i'll be joining you there soon, inshallah!

Pictures of walls

Pictures of walls is a site i've been browsing through all day, and i guess i should share it with you guys. Graffiti ranging between the genius and the hilarious, often both. Link found via Gorillaz.com, of all places.
This blog has been looking too white lately, i'll be posting more pictures these days also thanks to certain kind readers who send me cool stuff completely out of the blue. Yes, people actually read this. I'm just as surprised as you are.
Also, more mp3s. Soon. Eventually.

(note to you-know-who: please send me that horse photo. You know which one.)

A splendid time is guaranteed for all!

The place to be tonight is London: Elio e le Storie Tese are playing their first ever UK gig at the Royal Garden Hotel's Lancaster Suite, for the International Live Music Conference, presumably to an audience of drunk studio execs. Poor Christian Meyer: he starts playing at 22:00 and then has to be in Verona tomorrow afternoon for a duo show with Ellade Bandini. Something tells me he won't be hanging around for the aftershow.
Also tonight, Lemon Jelly are playing at the Brixton Academy, and again tomorrow at the Forum. Then in a couple of weeks they'll be doing Shibuya - Tokyo, those lucky bastards.
The future is being written in London tonight. But i, as always, am ahead of my time: i already left the bloody place over a week ago!

Archaeological confusion

So i was researching about Genghis Khan a little (Some people might believe i have a fixation about despotic tyrants, i for one care less for them. No more than the average chilean expatriate, at least), and came across this four-year-old piece of news:

August 17, 2001 Posted: 9:56 AM EDT (1356 GMT)

ULAN BATOR, Mongolia -- An American-Mongolian expedition
believes it may have uncovered the burial ground of
legendary conqueror Genghis Khan.

The New York Times reports the expedition has uncovered
a walled burial ground some 200 miles northeast of the
Mongolian capital, Ulan Bator.

According to legend, all those in attendance at the
funeral of Genghis Khan in 1227 were killed to preserve
the secrecy of the tomb site.

The site has remained a mystery ever since.

My first thoughts upon reading this were: Oh no! now they're going to have to kill those poor archaeologists!

Nuggets of wisdom

Wise man say: if at party somebody starts playing early madonna hits on the HiFi system, and the other people are so drunk they dance to them and perhaps even enjoy them, it is time to leave that party.

Oh! The hip talk these hip youngsters speak!

Online conversation with Gnapppo, this morning. (loosely translated and adapted from something like italian)

Gnapppo: I have a confession to make, you may not like it.
Evaristo: Well spit it out, son!
Gnap: Back at high school I used to hate Country House, by Blur
Eva: hahahaha
gn: because I'd watch the video on mtv every morning
gn: and then I had to go to school
e: the Damien Hirst video with the frolicking females?
gn: Guess so!
gn: does it have Damon Albaniarn in a bahtub?
e: Correct, and with a spoof of the Bohemian Rhapsody video in the acappella part
e: i loved that video myself. It also helped me win the rest of my class at school towards blur in the blur/oasis dispute, mainly thanks to the "girls in blur videos have better boobs" dogma.
gn: hahaha
gn: cazzo, that's right:
gn: we had the blur/oasis dispute
gn: our cousins had the spandau ballet/duran duran dispute
e: haha true (spandau wins, despite cuccurullo)
gn: our grandfathers had Luigi Russolo/Pierre Schaeffer
e: HAHAHAHAHAHA!
e: fyi, this whole conversation is gonna be translated and smacked on my blog
gn: hahahahaha=)

Well, i found it funny. Or maybe it's just one of those "you had to be there" moments.

Things to do in london for fun and leisure

1. Go to the british museum, stand completely motionless next to the peruvian shamanic carnival exhibit until someone takes a picture of you. In my case, it was a brazilian tourist, after he flashed i said "thanks!" and shook his hand. He just bubbled "uhuhuh".
2. Stand in front of Oxford Street's Apple store, take a picture of every person who buys an ipod as they walk out.

Thing i would've loved to do but wasn't really possible: replacing all the LOOK LEFT and LOOK RIGHT signs with ones saying LOOK BEHIND YOU.

...SLOWLY.

First things first

Yes, i'm back. But the first thing i have to do is point everyone to this video: John Cleese's eulogy for Graham Chapman, and the funeral service's conclusion. Never before have i seen such a touching display of vulgarity.
If all funerals were like this, people would be dying every day.
Oh, wait, they already do.
Well, whatever.