Tag Archives: podcast

Usual Rubbish

Prepping for the big one.

Remind me to tell Marvin (my personal robot assistant) not to leave the lights on all night. We’ve got the environment to consider. If we don’t care about mother earth, who the hell will? Besides … they freaking keep me up.

No, not THAT strange ... Oh, yes, my friends. Even here at the Cheney Hammer Mill we are preparing for the impending holiday season. Not without some trepidation, of course. Lord knows this time of year puts people into a kind of feeding frenzy, hyperactive shopping fever, whatever. They lose their reason. They get impatient and even nasty. It’s a rough world out there, man. So why would we add our madness to the pile? No reason. Just looking for a way to keep busy.

So, what are we planning? Nothing much. Another podcast episode. Couple of new recordings. A bag of crisps. Some flashing lights. I don’t know, what do YOU think we should do? We only know how to do one (or two) things. One of them is, well, play strange music. Not Anthony Braxton strange, but strange none the less. Okay, well … as you know, we did a Christmas album once, like …. fifteen years ago. It was called 2000 Years To Christmas. And we’ve written, recorded, and released other Christmas themed songs since then, including a few last year.

This year, we’ve got a few more. All we have to do is get off of our sorry asses and record them. Then write, record, and post a holiday pageant of sorts. Can’t say what the dimensions of said pageant would be, but it should probably be a big one. Should be song and dance numbers. Special guests should drop by unexpectedly, then perform carefully prepared duets with us. Perhaps wearing ridiculous getups and other worldly charm bracelets. They might even bring choruses of singers with them to join in! And presents!

Or maybe not. This is beginning to sound expensive. Which reminds me … did Marvin leave the water on in the mud room? We’re not made of money, you know!

Usual Rubbish

Roasted.

Mother of pearl. Is that the time? I thought the sun was getting kind of bright in here. Pull the blinds. No blinds? Arrgh. Hang another sheet over the window.

Noodles?Rolled out of bed a little tardy today. Who can blame me? After a gut-full of grub, a man’s thoughts turn to hibernation. Big Green doesn’t ordinarily celebrate major holidays, but we did relent this year and enjoy a modest Thanksgiving feast, prepared by the steady hand of our confidant Anti-Lincoln, who has elected to stay at the abandoned Cheney Hammer Mill while he considers his next steps. (I think he’s contemplating some brand of global domination, but no details yet. Can’t rush a genius!)

Some of you may recall that Lincoln’s favorite dish was Chicken Fricasee. Well, that obviously meant something to Anti-matter Lincoln, if only in the sense that he wanted to run in the exact opposite direction with his holiday meal plan. What’s the opposite of Chicken Fricasee, you may ask? In anti-Lincoln’s twisted mind, it’s dry noodles with tamari sauce sprinkled lightly over them. I think he dropped a couple of mint leaves in there, but that may have been an accident – we keep the tamari right behind the mint leaves. Coincidence? I don’t think so!

So bloody hell, you never saw a band tear into a plate of noodles like we did last night. And when I say “plate”, I mean one modest plate. Two forks on every noodle. Pretty feisty little dinner, but at least we were together. Stupid togetherness! I think only Marvin (my personal robot assistant) got his fill at our holiday table. And that’s only because he takes his nourishment via two leads from a dry cell under his chair. Note to self: I’ve got to get him another cell for Christmas this year.

No “Black Friday” shopping for us, friends. After that singular repast, we will just stick close to the mill for a couple of days and do a little work on our annual Christmas podcast. I’d tell you what we’re planning, but that would be telling. (It would also require us having planned something, which we most certainly have not.)

Usual Rubbish

Inside the November podcast.

That was close. No, not the comet – that didn’t end up being close at all. I mean the November podcast. We almost didn’t post before Thanksgiving week, and that would have been a tragedy beyond measure. (Well, beyond my measure, anyway. Not real good at reading the old tragedy yardstick.)

Really big show (or shoe). Anyhow, now that Earth is out of danger (at least from external forces) we can take a few minutes to dissect this month’s episode of THIS IS BIG GREEN, our podcast and the only avenue we have left for artistic expression. (Cue the violins.) So let’s pop open the hood and see what’s inside, shall we? Here goes …

Ned Trek XXI: Old Maple Glory. Our episodes of the space horse-opera Ned Trek are loosely based on installments of classic Star Trek, as you probably know, except that the ship is named the Free Enterprise and it is commanded by Willard Mitt Romney and his talking dressage horse, Mr. Ned. This episode follows The Omega Glory, roughly speaking, with cousin Rick Perry as the renegade commodore who takes over a primitive, divided planet. The precious resource in contention is syrup. Lots of fist fights.

New Songs. Strewn carelessly throughout the Ned Trek episode are rough drafts of new Big Green songs that loosely describe the emotional currents of the program. Most of these have a sixties rock vibe about them; two are positively psychedelic, particularly the Nixon robot song, “Yorba Linda Mybalinda”. Ned’s song “Nobody Ride” is kind of trippy as well. Doc sticks with the sixties rock milieu with “Doc’s Flapjacks”, and Rick Perry does a celebrity comeback number called “Sugar Shack.” Willard Mitt Romney chimes in with “Super Sugar Christ”, a snappy little swing number. Spotlight on Richard Pearle for “Motherlode”, another ode to unbridled greed. We’ve even included a College pep song for Rick Perry entitled “Hi-Yi-Yi-Yi-Yi,” sung a capella.

Old Song. For good measure, we tossed in a replay of our number from last year, “Don’t Tell Rick!” – our frantic plea to the listener of Cowboy Scat: Songs in the Key of Rick not to blow us in to Governor Perry.

Random Conversation. Our “Put the phone down” segment includes some very impromptu singing, a dissection of the 2014 mid-term election, and other random rants.

So hey … give it a listen, then give us a shout. We always read our email. (Explains a lot.)