The Houston Press Music Awards is around again. If you’ve seen at least one band this year, or prefer one venue over another, you should vote.
But, what’s up with Best Female Vocalist, anyhow? Who did I really vote for among the six five contestants?
Here’s an article against corporate infringement into the art car scene. It’s more invective because of it’s harsh title - which is just typical “journalism”. I heard a few discussions on this topic at the many events I was at. Mostly, the corporate cars don’t show for the quirky events and thus don’t effect the “counterculture vibe”. The parade is a media event, and I fully expect corporateness to show up for a 250,000 person crowd.
I heard one major complaint about the McDonald’s shoe visiting schools on Friday. It’s a reasonable complaint, though one not shared by all artists. The complaints about the Shoe’s stereo being too loud are much more common.
What humors me the most is the social elitism of the comments to the article on the Chron’s web site. (”It’s not art because I don’t like it.”)
Is commercialism driving off fun of the Art Car Parade?
A few say sponsors detract from the event’s counterculture vibes
By SARAH VIREN
Copyright 2007 Houston Chronicle
May 13, 2007, 9:57PMPatrick Stanley exhausted his supply of souvenir hard hats an hour before Houston’s Art Car Parade started Saturday. Each bore the name of the construction company he works for, SpawMaxwell, just like his art car, a 1958 Edsel Pacer.
On Meet the Press, Bob Novac whines about the liberal media making “the conservatives” uphappy with George W’s unconservativity.
The host says, “Bob Novac, with his syndicated column,… his own TV show,… and it’s the liberal media.”
I smiled.
-b
The whole lifestyle section in the Chronicle this morning is designated as a “Superbowl Free Zone”. I literally laughed out loud.
If you didn’t hear Wait, Wait this weekend, you missed the Dean Scream Buzzer and attempts at immitation and an attempt to parse the administration’s latest statement on weapons of mass desctruction - worth the price of admission itself.
Today’s front page story on Spirit arriving at Mars provide for a welcome afternoon chuckle.
After an entirely correct, and likely regurgitated explaination of the mission:
“Spirit is one of two $410 million U.S. robotic spacecraft on the way, equipped with cameras and instruments to search for evidence that cold, arid Mars may once have been wet and warm enough for some form of life.”
Emphasis mine.
Then later on in the article they discuss plunging through the thin atmosphere and ludicrously add:
“Spirit still will be moving at 1,000 mph, leaving a long contrail in its wake.”
For those unfamiliar with the atmospheric physics, a contrail (a condensation trail) is caused by airplanes (or anything else hurling through the atmosphere) causing high pressure on their leading edge which causes evaporated water vapor to be forced to condensate into tiny liquid water molecules, also well known for making clouds.
Apparently Mark Carreau didn’t get that far in high school science.
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