Quite Possibly, The Greatest TV Show Ever: Tim & Eric, I mean “Jim and Derrick,” are all Turbo Fueled up and are X-tremely in your face with their tats, trucker hats and mad piercings… “Hey G4 and Fuse, you can suck it! There’s a new graphics-heavy, stoner-hip-hop-skater-slacker tech culture show in town!” View this: Awesome Show!

Rick Rubin, Tupac, Floyd… All Overrated! I’ve never read Blender before, but after thoroughly enjoying this spot-on list, I might start. Good Stuff: The 33 Most Overrated People, Places, Trends and Other Junk in Rock.

Alec Baldwin is a Pretty Sad Guy: Despite being hilarious on 30 Rock, good ol’ Jack “Don’t ever make me talk to a woman that old again” Donaghy is not a happy camper in real life. That’s what a messy divorce, one bad phone call and more than a few movie bombs will do to a guy.

Still, you gotta love him and the GOPer with an actual soul Donaghy character. How can you not when he explains a tuxedo worn in the office by saying “It’s after six. What am I, a farmer?”. Read the New Yorker Article.

Build Your Own “Iron Man” Arc Reactor! Attention Philly nerds with tools and an undying love of Tony Stark: On Thursday, October 2nd, The Hacktory and Geekadelphia are teaming to throw an “Iron Man” viewing party at Indy Hall. You will also be schooled in the art of Arc Reactor building. Really. Details here.

PowerPoint Made Fun: Read at work in business stealth mode.

How Palin Will Beat the Press: Slate’s Jack Shafer has an idea:

Instead of letting Palin talk directly and frequently to the press, the McCain campaign will dress her in bunting and rush her from one controlled setting the next—small towns, firebases in Iraq and Afghanistan, “town halls,” important funerals, church conventions, and American Legion halls (essentially George W. Bush’s current itinerary). There she’ll play the role of Spiro Agnew to McCain’s Nixon, dismissing reporters’ tough questions as effete, impudent, sacrilegious, snobby, intrusive, unpatriotic, hostile, disrespectful, chauvinistic, “East Coast,” unfair, unbalanced, liberal, biased, trivial, hypothetical, elitist, and as partisan attempts to lasso her with a “gotcha.”

Guest: Nicole Brewer from CBS3 Philly! Interview: El Vez. Topics: Dated Olympics Talk, Stormtrooper Eating Habits, “Beauty Contests,” Geekadelphia, New Facebook, Philly Accents, Russ’s Africa Trip, Small Audiences, Todd’s Hair Update, Cologne, Polyphasic Sleep. Playlist: Bound Stems, Jukebox the Ghost, Spoonfork, El Vez, Johnny Foreigner.

Preview: Regarding Nicole Brewer’s “What’s Brewing” website, “You lucked out, what if your last name was Lipshitz?”

Play Now: http://www.usedwigs.com/pod/podcast51.mp3

Read: UsedWigs Video Interview Featured on CBS3 in Philly!

Subscribe: iTunes

Website: www.usedwigsradio.com (more photos and goodness)

Listen Right Now:

Sorry Firefox, There’s a New IE Hater in Town! Hey designers and developers, you thought checking your code for two browsers on two platforms was a pain? Let the CSS hacks begin!

Google Chrome hopes to be your new web browser and more importantly, the catchall utility to manage your web experience and your life. Do not resist!

There is a swell new cartoon that dumbs down everything, teaching you so much more than you ever wanted to know about web browsers.

Here’s a positive review:

“Google takes aim squarely at Microsoft with the release of its new Web browser, Chrome. And Microsoft should be very afraid: Chrome lives up to its hype by rethinking the Web browser in clever and convenient ways that make using the Web a more organic experience than you’d get with either Microsoft’s Internet Explorer 8 or Mozilla’s Firefox 3.” Read More>

Greg Giraldo at Helium: America’s favorite roaster (sorry Jeff Ross), Greg Giraldo will be at Helium in Philly this weekend.

Tim & Eric Believe! Our favorite cult hero absurdists Tim & Eric are interviewed in the latest issue of The Believer.  (Yes, you’re correct, we interviewed them way back in ‘04 before they were matinee idols.)

Skate Rat Todd Performs a Front Side Grind! Todd Marrone will be at Spectrum Board Shop in Ardmore on September 5th introducing two brand new skateboard-related, t-shirt designs for his Ghosticorn Apparel clothing company. Also, The Formation Skateboard company will be unveiling a limited edition  Ghosticorn skateboard deck. Need more enticement? There will be over two dozen brand new paintings on display, ALL  created on recycled, shredded, skateboard decks. More info>

Awesome Underwater Photography: Enjoy The Life Aquatic with Bruce Mozert.

This Just in: The Weather Channel Has a Category Six Boner! Quick thought on the storms and the dummies who were trying to be part of the news instead of reporting it, “While I prayed for the safety of those in the storm’s path, I prayed harder for serious injury to befall that giant ass Geraldo Rivera.”

All Choked Up! From Chuck Palahniuk, the author of “Fight Club,” comes “CHOKE” the movie. It’s a “wickedly colorful dark comedy about mothers and sons, sexual compulsion and the sordid underbelly of colonial theme parks…” You had me at “colonial theme parks”! More>

If you dig really sweet songs and enjoy videos of the whimsical nature featuring a wooden lumberjack, this one’s for you.

Download Free MP3: “Restless”

More Langhorne Slim:

• Kemado Records
• MySpace
• UsedWigs Interview

Photos: Stunning imagery of Rage Against The Machine and the Iraq Veterans Against the War at the DNC.

Punk: If I wasn’t so lame, I’d book a flight to Chicago in October to attend Riot Fest and enjoy some killer bands: Lawrence Arms, All, Bosstones, Big Drill Car, Paint It Black… very impressive.

Web: Sorry kid, that’s enough porn for you this month… “Comcast to make monthly Internet use cap official”

Art: Todd recommends these 50 Incredible Film Posters From Poland

Crime Fighting: Two hours of sass, spunk and moxie could be coming our way if the Veronica Mars movie talk pans out.

Good Ink: Tough guys saving puppies.

Words: I’ll bet you some serious xu you didn’t know all of these… 10 Words That Will Help You Win at Scrabble.

Stumble Upon: The Art of Li Wei

Parenting: “Johnson & Johnson Introduces ‘Nothing But Tears’ Shampoo To Toughen Up Newborns”

Free MP3 Download: Spinto Band’s “Summer Grof” from Moonwink (out October 7th).

Have a good weekend. 

Jesse Malin has been a part of the New York alt-rock music scene for just about twenty years, beginning as a teenager with the hardcore band Heart Attack. In the 90’s, he gained widespread notoriety as front man for the glam-punk band D Generation. These days he has a fresh new sound and has just released his third solo album “Glitter in the Gutter” with contributions from Bruce Springsteen, Jakob Dylan, Josh Homme (Queens of the Stone Age), and of course his good friend Ryan Adams.

While supporting the new album, I had the pleasure of chatting with Jesse at Niagara, the East Village bar where he is a part owner. We sat in a cozy corner of the bar and spent an hour and a half discussing everything from the new album to New York City, including what his hopes are for the future and why he was wearing a back and neck brace.

The first question I’m going to ask, and I’m sure you’re sick of answering this question, relates to your collaboration with Bruce Springsteen on your new song “Broken Radio.” How did that come about, and what was it like to work with Bruce?

Well, when I made “The Fine Art of Self Destruction” I met Bruce at the Stone Pony, of all places, and he told me he really liked the cover that I had done of “Hungry Heart”. He hadn’t heard my solo record, but had read good things about it. Then I got a phone call from my manager saying “Bruce is gonna call you up at home, and he loves your record and he wants to talk to you about it”, and I was like “you’re joking!”

So he called, and we talked about the record for about an hour. He asked me to do some shows with him down in Asbury, which was holiday benefit shows for the local children’s community. I asked “what Christmas songs are we gonna play?” and he said “we’re gonna play your songs with my band, and I’m gonna play my songs”, and I was like “WHAT!?”

That went on for about three or four days, and it was just an amazing experience. The guy is so passionate; he learned all these songs of mine. It was pretty wild having him as my sideman…as my Keith Richards! So, we stayed in touch over the years as I made the second record…and I would see him if he played or had rehearsals, and he’d call once in a while or I’d bump into him at his gigs and he always asked “what are you listening to lately?”

Read the rest

“Right Turn, Clyde!” I usually forget everything I read at night by the time I wipe the morning sleepies from my eyes, but here’s a little tidbit on primate intelligence that stuck with me:

“There is a saying among primate keepers that if you give a screwdriver to a chimp, it will throw it at someone. If you give a screwdriver to a gorilla, it will scratch itself. But if you give a screwdriver to an orangutan, it will let itself out of its cage.” - Christine Kenneally, The First Word: The Search for the Origins of Language.

(You probably already knew this, being a huge fan of  the world’s greatest orangutan documentary, like me.)

Continuing this thought… based on today’s wretched TV ads, if you a give a screwdriver to a middle-age white dad, he will immediately jam it in a plugged-in toaster and electrocute himself in hilarious fashion. Don’t worry though, he will be tended to by his much smarter wife (tsk! tsk!) and shown how to properly use the tool by his precocious 4-year-old child using a “Daddy, you’re such a dumb-ass!” tone. Ugh.

Office Über Alles: Videogum reports on The German Version Of The Office.

Philly Radio Gets Worse? Yes, It’s Actually Possible: The following might sound like satire, but sadly it is not. WYSP, always in a neck-and-neck race with WMMR for the planet’s shittiest radio station, is adding even more GnR, Metallica and Ozzy:

“Now billed as “94YSP The Rock You Grew Up With From the ’70s, ’80s and ’90s,” the station will play more from such artists as AC/DC, Def Leppard, Guns N Roses, Ozzie Osbourne, Pink Floyd, Van Halen and Aerosmith. The station will continue to play more recent artists such as Nirvana and Pearl Jam.”

Don’t worry, they’ll still spin some new stuff:

“WYSP management said the new format was not traditional classic rock, in an oldies sense. The station planned to play new material by Metallica and AC/DC.”

The other day I actaully heard a deejay on one of the stations get fake pumped up for a Billy Idol two-fer quickly followed by an AC/DC give-away promotion weekend thingamagig. Remember kids, no matter how bad your job is, you will never leave work with a sould more crushed than that poor guy.  {via Inquirer}

Screw Michael Phelps: Pop Candy reports “America has won the World Air Guitar Championships.”

Got a Beef with Adobe? If you’re a designer, I bet you do! So join the crowded club and post some of your own Adobe-related problems and gripes (and kudos if you have some) like these:

• “Stop creating new features and make your software fast, stable and straightforward.”
• “Lower your prices.”
• “Please make a lightweight version of the PDF reader”

The site has the attention of Adobe, so your venting should make a difference. Until then, I will continue to bang my mouse repeatedly and curse Dreamweaver CS3 with very very salty language for the whole offiice to enjoy.

What The Geeks Are Watching: Hippie Purchases Smart Car, Gets Chased By Ninjas On Rollerskates

It’s no secret the UsedWigs staff is a bunch of cranky older gents who don’t get out of the house enough, so we wisely decided to bring in some fresh blood. Please welcome Amy Grimm to the team with a big old cyber group hug!

Amy will be our “NYC Music Correspondent” (like that fancy title!). Who is Amy? Well, “most evenings she can be found at rock clubs or fine restaurants throughout Manhattan and Brooklyn, chatting with the east coast’s rock Illuminati.” Read Amy’s Staff Bio.

Amy has kicked things off in fine fashion with a splendid interview with New York rock icon, Jesse Malin (D Generation, Heart Attack). Read now>