I believe in Elvis Costello again.

I believe in Elvis Costello again, albeit because of a recording made during the prime of his career.  I love E.C. up to a certain point...let's say the Punch the Clock LP.  Then after that, nothing until Brutal Youth.  Parts of Blood and Chocolate, I guess to go before that, and bits of Spike afterward, and maybe barely a song here and there after that.

It's always struck me as odd how artists like Costello who can be some damned brilliant feel like they have to pursue these outright boring ideas and follow every whim that takes them farther away from what originally made them so great.  Elvis could easily crank out another Trust if not a My Aim Is True or This Year's Model.  I don't mean be punky and all, but fer chrissakes at least energetic and interesting.

Anyway, I dunno how I missed its release last year, but while I was browsing through iTunes last night, I saw that the entire Hollywood High show had been released.  Having been a fan of the three track EP culled from the show and released with the original LP pressings of Armed Forces (and later appended to the excellent Ryko reissue of the album), this purchase was a no-brainer.  The Attractions during their peak?  Hell yes, I want to hear 20 tracks of that, please.

I listened to Live at Hollywood High last night and wasn't disappointed with my ten dollar purchase.  It reminded me of why I love Elvis Costello and made me yearn for him to do something electrifying once again.  I know this probably won't ever come to pass.  The Juliet Letters was more of a warning shot that things were going to eventually go awry more than Almost Blue ever was.  And then of course there was the detours with Bacharach, etc.  I even saw the guy live a few years ago and the fucking show was mired thanks to his inclusion of Emmylou Harris.  Jesus.

But whatever.  This album is amazing and I dig it.  Thank you, El, for being amazing long ago.  Maybe it's time to start tooting again.

What do you do when your kid likes "Temporary Secretary"?

Look, I'm glad my six-year-old son loves music and has allowed me to influence his taste with all the stuff I dig. We'll always have the iPod on shuffle in the car and his ears will perk up every now and then and he'll get all excited about a song. Sometimes I'll think of a tune I think he may really enjoy and I'll play it for him.

Past hits have included the 12" mix of Thomas Dolby's "Hyperactive!", "I Am the Walrus" by The Beatles, "Fashion Zombies!" by The Aquabats, "Wannabe" by the Spice Girls, "Autobahn" by Kraftwerk, "Guns on the Roof" by The Clash, "Victoria" by The Kinks, and so on and so forth.

Then there's "Temporary Secretary."

For those of you who don't know, this is a Paul McCartney tune originally released on his McCartney II album back in 1980, along with a 12" single release of the song in the UK. It's annoying as hell with its disjointed main synth riff, instantly putting one's ears on edge. I remember hearing it for the first time back in my high school days thinking it was just horrid. But as I got older, I found that same annoyance to be funny as well.

Too bad, then, that I decided to put it on the iPod and have it come up on shuffle the other week in the car with the kiddo in tow. I quickly hit the "next" button, but not before he could shout "What is THAT song? Go back! I wanna hear it!"

I hadn't heard it in a while, so I played it, savoring its shittiness. I thought that would be the end of it and that he'd forget all about it. But that wasn't the case.

Every time we get in the car now, he says, "Play 'Temporary Secretary'!"

I asked him why he liked it so much. He said, "Because it sounds crazy and the guy does funny voices on it!"

I then decided to play him The Beatles' "You Know My Name (Look Up the Number)" since it had the exact same things in it, but was much better to my ears.

I got zero response. What the hell? I first heard that tune when I was five or so and fell in love with The Beatles instantly. But oh, no, let's hear that frigging "Temporary Secretary" again!

I've yet to successfully get him into Trout Mask Replica, but I figure it's only a matter of time.

Bonus podcast episode!

It's Double XP Weekend, which means extra podcast grooves as well. So, just like the last post, head on over to the Camel Ike podcast page for all the details.

Another podcast episode is up!

We're not on life support. We're still here. Or at least, I am. In the meantime, check out the new podcast episode over there at the official Camel Ike podcast page.

Another podcast episode is ALIVE!

Totally forgot to mention that there is a lovely new episode of Camel Ike a Rock E.T. for you to listen to and download, or either/or. So dig it, kids. DIG IT.

The greatest Kinks album of all!

The Kinks have been rightly revered in rock history as one of those Important bands you should get into if you're a Serious Rock Fan.  Though the band's career has followed the pattern of a sine wave, you can't argue with their legacy.  There were the early, ragged distorto-hits like "You Really Got Me," which then gave way to Ray Davies' constant studies of the Everyman and Hipster ("Dead End Street"; "Dedicated Follower of Fashion).  The band found superstardom in the early '70s with "Lola," then commenced on releasing decent stuff and absolute crap, with the occasional still-rockin' hit single, and even managed to make some kids think they were an '80s one-hit wonder ("Come Dancing").  Through it all, the band has managed to remain...if not vital or interesting at all times, Ray Davies has refused to go away.  More power to him, even if he decides to have his old chestnuts sung by choirs these days.

Now we can sit here and discuss the Kinks' greatest LP and bat about the usual titles such as Something Else or Arthur or Face to Face, etc.  But I declare that the greatest album the Kinks ever released was the fantastic double LP compilation The Kink Kronikles.  Sure, it doesn't have those early hits such as "All Day and All of the Night," but kicking off with the stomping "Victoria" from Arthur, the thing never lets up.  It takes in album tracks ("Shangri-La"; "Holiday in Waikiki"), big hits ("Lola"; "Apeman"), and absolute treats that were previously not captured on the LP format ("Berkeley Mews").

Even better, this is perhaps the greatest "best-of" collection ever released as well.  Anyone with even a passing interest in the Kinks should listen to this and become bowled over by just how good Ray Davies was in his prime.  Stuff like "Did You See His Name?" and "Sunny Afternoon" are classic snapshots of '60s UK history.  Then you also get favorites like "Waterloo Sunset" and "Days" that still manage to shatter the hell out of 98% of contemporary sweet tunes of these times.  And who could argue with the absolute rock of "King Kong" or better-than-the-Beatles "Polly"?  It's all here.

It introduced me to the Something Else, Village Green Preservation Society, and Arthur albums.  And honestly, after hearing those albums, great as they are, none of them stacked up to the pure listening satisfaction that The Kink Kronikles offers.  So yeah.  Go buy this and dig into it and wallow around in the rich, brainy goodness of Ray Davies.  It made me want to write songs like his.  I completely failed.

Reuniting with an old friend.

Do that to me one more time.

I've always loved video games. The first video game system I ever played was a goofy Coleco Pong game that my dad bought for us back in the '70s. It ran on six C cell batteries, was in black and white and was one solidly-molded toy with the controller knobs built-in. I played that thing to death, even bothering to learn how to play for both players when I had no one to play with me. Yep, I became my own A.I.

So through the years the gaming continued. Next up was the Atari 2600, then a Commodore VIC-20, replaced with the great old Commodore 64, then the Nintendo Entertainment System, the Super Nintendo, the Sony PlayStation and PlayStation 2, and finally the Microsoft Xbox 360. Oh, there was also a GameBoy Advance and a GameCube briefly in there as well.

I was a diehard PlayStation fan for years, but when the original PlayStation 3 debuted at a price of six-hundred smackers, I jumped the ship and started courting Microsoft. And that was pretty much it. You could never convince me to go back to Sony or Nintendo. I didn't care for Nintendo's 64 system, or the GameCube that much, and I wasn't being wowed by Sony's song and dance anymore. So for the past four years, it's been nothing but the 360.

We used to hang out a lot.

A couple years back, my ex-wife gad managed to snag a Nintendo Wii for herself and our kid. This was still when Wiis were hard to get. She thought he'd have a lot of fun with it, but that didn't wind up being the case. I had given him my old PS2, and he loved playing on the 360 as well, that the Wii just didn't have any appeal, and my ex wasn't bowled over by it, either. So I helped her sell the thing on Craigslist and life went on.

That is, until recently, when I kept telling my kid how great the old NES and SNES was and the fantastically fun games that there were on those systems. I scoured eBay and almost bought an NES and then an SNES, but I never got around to it. In the past, I had gone through a nostalgic Atari phase and had bought an old 2600 and a ton of games in one big lot and then was instantly bored by it after five minutes, so I had fears that the same thing might happen again. Maybe the memories were better than the actual experiences.

Tax time rolled around and I filed early this year and got back a nice little bit. Last year, I had to pay a few hundred, so I was happy to actually get some money to play with this time. But what to use it on? And then I started thinking about the Wii. Maybe enough years had passed where they had a good collection of games to try. I had been getting my kid into some simpler games on the Xbox (he's good at the tougher ones, but I was getting nostalgic), and also playing stuff like "Viva Pinata" and really enjoying it.

So I researched the Wii and the games that were now available and figured I'd give it another shot. I love my "Call of Duty" and "Rock Band" and "Gears of War" and all those other things the Xbox has done right, but lately I was feeling like maybe it was a good time to revisit a gaming world which is more about whimsy and having fun and less about brutal competition and blowing everything up. That's not a dig at what the 360 offers; I love all that stuff, but I also remember loving the games I grew up with and all those previous experiences that kept me gaming to this day.

So yesterday I went and bought myself a black Wii and some games, extra controllers, some Nintendo points, and some goofy sports accessories that my son said he would like because his one friend had all those things on his Wii. I set the system up, created my Mii that looks like me and started looking around the Virtual Console. I snagged "Super Mario Bros.," "Donkey Kong Country," and the original "Punch-Out!" Then I added a few more points and bought some other games. This was great! All the classics I wanted, plus a bunch of new games that also turned out to be plenty of fun.

Good times roll.

I was thrilled. My gut feeling that enough time had probably passed for Nintendo to firmly establish the Wii, rather than it just being the toy no one could get their hands on for a while turned out to be correct. It goes real well with the 360, too. I know the limitations of the Wii, so for it I will get games pretty much made for it. All my "Call of Duty" and zombie blasting needs can be covered with the 360, as well as "Rock Band." Christ, I've already spent enough on that, that there's no way I'd get it for two systems, and besides I heard it's kinda gimped on the Wii, anyway.

But it's nice to be back in this fold of fun gaming and silliness. I feel less tense playing the Wii. I really enjoy "Wii Sports Resort" and the Frisbee game where you through your disc to a dog who brings it back. And yeah, that little bit of exercise I'm going to be getting swinging the hell out of the controllers is gonna make me buff, ladies. Awwww yeah.