Big in Seychelles

True Panther is blowing up in Seychelles ! Six unique visits to the blog from an island with a 1,000 person population in the last week. It's vacation time!

Czechsans

One of the few triumphant discoveries that I made while living in Prague a few years ago was the existence of Czechsans. Aparently about a hundred years ago droves of wayward Moravians (the kind Southerners of the Czech Republic) moved to Texas to start their American lives. A lot of them didn't think Texas was very awesome so they went back to Moravia, but not without taking their 10 gallon hats, cowboy boots, and country music. What remains of this circular migration is the best alternate culture ever. All the oompa oompa of czech polka with the twang and healtfelt cowboy songs of Texas. Cowboy culture is INTERNATIONAL
One night I fell asleep on the night tram and was pickpocketed for all of the monetarily worthless personal possessions in my pockets. I walked in the snow cursing everything I saw and my friend Evan recommended we leave the city. We ended up in Roznov, the Moravian Czechsan capital. It was a liberating and magical experience. When we came back to the city our Czech friends told us all about the rich Czechsan history, its musical heritage, and its greatest champion-- Pavel Bobek. Pavel, currently is one of the most famous voices of the Czech Republic- a fame borne almost entirely out of covering American country western songs. He has since expanded into a few new genres, but country still dominates his oeuvre. Also, it's my understanding that the English translation of "Bobek" is something like "little poopie" which adds a whole new dimension to this guy that I have yet to understand. Anyways, here are three of his greatest hits that have brought me endless amounts of inspiration and joy and will do the same for you when you hear them.
Pavel Bobek- Sunday Morning Coming Down
Pavel Bobek- Oh, Ruby
Pavel Bobek- My Hometown

CRASH

is this the most amazing drudge report link EVER ?

ALBINO SPIRIT BEAR

ALBINOSPIRITBEARAEBTIRIPSONIBLALBINOSPIRITBEAR
AEBTIRIPSONIBLA ALBINOSPIRITBEARAEBTIRIPSONIBL
ALBINOSPIRITBEARAEBTIRIPSONIBLALBINOSPIRITBEAR
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BINOSPIRITBEARAEBTIRIPSONIBLALBINOSPIRITBEARAE
BTIRIPSONIBLA ALBINOSPIRITBEARAEBTIRIPSONIBLAL
BINOSPIRITBEARAEBTIRIPSONIBLALBINOSPIRITBEARAE
BTIRIPSONIBLALBINOSPIRITBEARAEBTIRIPSONIBLALBI
NOSPIRITBEARAEBTIRIPSONIBLALBINOSPIRITBEARAEBT
IRIPSONIBLA ALBINOSPIRITBEARAEBTIRIPSONIBLALBI
NOSPIRITBEARAEBTIRIPSONIBLALBINOSPIRITBEARAEBT
IRIPSONIBLALBINOSPIRITBEARAEBTIRIPSONIBLALBINO
SPIRITBEARAEBTIRIPSONIBLALBINOSPIRITBEARAEBTIR
IPSONIBLA ALBINOSPIRITBEARAEBTIRIPSONIBLALBINO
SPIRITBEARAEBTIRIPSONIBLALBINOSPIRITBEARAEBTIR
IPSONIBLALBINOSPIRITBEARAEBTIRIPSONIBLALBINOSP
IRITBEARAEBTIRIPSONIBLA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Furniture Music

For those of you who have accidentally drilled a little Trois Gymnopedics hole in your inner world soundtrack head UBU Web put up some pretty special and (as far as I know) rare Satie selections. Vexations is a one page minimal jingle meant to be played repeatedly EIGHT HUNDRED AND FORTY TIMES! John Cage performed the piece all the way in 1963 in 18 hours. I am not nor am I capable of being Michael Gallope so I am not able to provide you with any scuba gear reflections or elaborations of interest EXCEPTFOR --- how come in all of the google image search results for satie he is either a) angry little french dwarf or b) jolly wino santa claus? Who is doing the image control over there??? Where is the middle ground?
ANYWAYZZZ CHECHZ IT OUT
and
Here's a good primer on the man that made John Tesh possible.

Strip Mall Seizures

Hey, at one point we intended to make this blog kind of a resource for local music coming from here. All of us have sort of retreated into our respective hobbit holes so we aren't too "hip" on all the newest stuff. But we are about to release an awesome record by a band that lives here, originally from San Diego, called the Strip Mall Seizures. They have a lot of songs already all over the internets already but here is one off of the album that I don't think is anywhere. I kind of want to write a mini-essay///critical analysis of why we are so pumped to put this out but I'll save it up a bit. Look out for that shizz in like a month!
Strip Mall Seizures.mp3
also, check out their web-identities HERE and HERE

You've got ringworm

When I was 16 I drank a fifth of Kessler's whiskey and went to see Bob Dylan and Van Morrison. I kept screaming "one more for the DEan DAAAAAWG" and annoyed all of my friends. I was a bitter little guy who was somewhere he didn't want to be. When I saw Van Morrison I briefly stopped rolling in the grass and insulting Lucinda Williams fans to gaze at the sheer intensity of Van Morrison's angry cynical little smart-ass face on the enormous Shoreline Amphitheater projection screen---it was a beautiful thing and I felt hypnotized.

This is a 1967 recording that Van Morrison did to get out of contractual obligations with his old label. He sat down on a stool and did 31 songs straight in one go. I feel like you can almost hear his face beginning its 30+ year journey into the "scruncheduplittleballofhate" zone that I saw that day. For some unfathomable reason, these songs have never been released but they are incredible.
Van Morrison- You've got Ringworm
The rest are here

Spoils of War

I've been feeling Nathaniel Davis' early 70's psych/prog mixes really hard lately. Less prog more psych psych folk psych with some pssshkekeeuyuu in between compliments of the man himself. Different tracks from around the world, including some righteous Spanish and Chilean groups. Thank you Nathaniel Davis for transforming my labor pit into an ambient workspace!
They're here