Pheaturing Chris Devotion From The Elvis Suicide

Hello, lotto losers, to a Wednesday entry of the Phile. Remember, you're not just losers. You're mega-losers! If it makes you feel any better, the odds of winning were 176 million to 1... about the same odds the Supreme Court will pass Obamacare. In a minute I will show you what the first thing I would've bought if I won. There were three winning lotto tickets. I guess we're not sure who the three winners are yet. But when they do come forward, two things happen immediately. You get a call from the IRS asking for half. Then you get a call from your friends and relatives asking for the other half. That was so much money that the JetBlue pilot could afford to go nuts on his own private plane.  Betty White has a new show on NBC called "Off Their Rockers" where senior citizens prank young people. It's kind of like what we're doing to them with Social Security.  Well, congratulations to Kentucky. They won the NCAA championship 67-59 over Kansas, very nice. Did you see the news after the game? People in Kentucky flipping over cars, they were burning couches. That was all on the same front lawn. The Wildcats, what a team, the Kentucky Wildcats. Listen to this. This is how good they are. Four of the starters are freshmen. Four guys. And they're going right to the NBA . Who says Obama isn't creating jobs?  Here's your tax dollars at work. This is what makes people furious. The head of the GSA, a woman named Martha Johnson, has resigned after they found out she spent over $830,000 on a four-day government conference in Las Vegas. And the president is furious. Not President Obama, the president of China. It's his money. It's his money she spent.  Up in Sacramento a man jumped on the hood of a police car that was moving. Started screaming his name. He was wearing a puffy winter jacket, a sombrero, one boxing glove. Police say the guy was in a total state of delirium. They didn't arrest him. Turns out just a JetBlue pilot on break. He was just on break. Two JetBlue jokes in one monolgue, kids.  Mitt Romney is trying to get female voters and Rick Santorum said, "What? Women can vote? Are you kidding me?"  Okay, wanna know what I would buy first if I won all that lottery money? I saw it on Monday at a comic book shop and want it so bad. It only costs $250.00. It would cost more to have it surgically removed from my ass if I did get it and bring it home. My wife wouldn't be happy. Here it is. This is real. 

Yep, a Captain Britain statue. Only $250.  So, last year I showed you what happened to the Easter Bunny on Easter, right? If you don't remember, here is what happened. They even made an inspirational poster about it.

Well, this year there's good news... there's a new Easter Bunny. Here is what he looks like, kids.

Not so bad looking, is he?  Okay, here's a new pheature on the Phile, kids. Check it out. I hope you understand it, because I hardly do.

Well, apparently yesterday President Obama.. this has nothing to do with that picture above by the way. We're on a new subject. Yesterday Obama answered back to the GOP's who were bad mouthing the whole health care thing. Or something like that. I missed out on it thanks to a long day at work, so I thought I would invite a good friend of the Phile to the explain what th President said and what happened. So please welcome again to the Phile, Executive Director of the Democratic National Committee, Patrick Gaspard.

Me: Hello, Patrick, welcome back to the Phile. So, what did the President say?

Patrick: Hello, Jason. Our President had a few choice words for the radical Republican budget championed by Rep. Paul Ryan. He called it "so far to the right it makes the Contract with America look like the New Deal."

Me: What exactly was he meaning? Health care?

Patrick: From Medicare to Social Security, health care to education, the GOP is ready to cut to the bone some of our most basic government services. While not asking for a dime more from the wealthiest Americans.

Me: What else did the President say?

Patrick: President Obama called it what it is: "A Trojan horse... Disguised as deficit reduction plans, it is really an attempt to impose a radical vision on our country."

Me: Is this just Paul Ryan's budget?

Patrick: No, it's also Mitt Romney's platform.

Me: Patrick, what are something's that would happen to Americans with the budget the GOP is backing? What wilol happen to Medicare?

Patrick: They'd throw it out the window, and give seniors a voucher that would amount to the second-cheapest health care plan in their community. 

Me: Education?

Patrick: This plan would lay off thousands of teachers nationwide, and drastically cut financial aid, actually making college more expensive than it currently is. 

Me: Anything else? 

Patrick: Investments in clean energy... Cut by a fifth.

Me: Man, the President must be pissed.

Patrick: In the President's words: "Gutting the very things we need to grow an economy that's built to last, education and training, research and development... it's a prescription for decline."

Me: Okay, Patrick, so what are they fighting to protect? Anything?

Patrick: Four billion annually in taxpayer-funded subsidies for giant oil companies that don't need it; increases in defense spending completely beyond what the Pentagon even asked for; and even more tax breaks to millionaires and billionaires.

Me: Break it down for people like me, sir.

Patrick: This budget isn't for the 98% of Americans making under $250,000 a year.

Me: Well, who is it for? 

Patrick: It's laden with special interest kickbacks and protections to keep the status quo going for those on top. Yesterday, the President said he's going to fight against this budget until the other side starts listening. It's our job to back him up.

Me: What can myself and my readers do, Patrick?

Patrick: Send a strong message to Ryan and the Republicans pushing this budget. Reject it outright today!

Me: Thanks, patrick, once again for coming on the Phile and explaining it all. Speak to you soon, sir.

Patrick: Thanks, Jason. 

Okay, the 15th artist to be pheatured in the Peverett Phile Art Gallery is comic book artist Jeremy Dale, and this is one of his pieces.

Jeremy will be a guest on the Phile this Monday. 

Okay, today's guest is the lead singer and guitarist for the British band The Elvis Suicide. Please welcome to the Phile... Chris Devotion.

Me: Hello, Chris, how are you? Welcome to the Phile.

Chris: Hi, we are all kinds of good. Thanks.

Me: So, you guys are from Scotland, right? I interviewed another band from Scotland called the Orchids years ago. Have you heard of them?

Chris: Yeah, I think there was an 80's indie band called the Orchids, but I haven't heard them. I take it I should check them out?

Me: Yeah, that's the same Orchids. You should check them out. So, I have to ask you... Costello or Presley?

Chris: Wow, that's like Sophie's choice! I can't choose. I have to cheat and say both. I know that's a cop out but there is a fence here and I plan on sitting on it.

Me: Where did that name The Elvis Suicide come from? Do you think Elvis committed suicide?

Chris: There was a kid I knew when I was younger called Elvis who was not quite right in the head, he once told us he tried to commit suicide. He paused for a minute and with all seriousness said, "It didn't work." After that if you did something that was not going to work my friends and I would say this is going to be "like an Elvis Suicide". As for Mr Presley, with his fastidious eating regime and love of abstinence, suicide is as good an explanation as any.

Me: How long have you been playing together and where did you meet?

Chris: Myself and and McGarvey who plays bass were in a band previously, I sacked the other members because we were at a festival and they didn't go and see the Pixies. Obviously you can't be in a band with people like that. So we started a new band seven years ago with two friends who couldn't hack playing fast rock and roll so they had to leave due to hand injuries (essentially we broke them), I scoured the globe...well, Glasgow... to find replacements and basically stole the other members from bands that didn't deserve to have them.

Me: I downloaded your double-A single from iTunes and love you guys but your songs are so short. Any chance your new music will be longer?

Chris: No. Short, sweet and always leaving you wanting more. But thanks for the sale, we are getting ever closer to our dream of solid gold guitars.

Me: Are you working on a follow up EP or full-length album?

Chris: It's a wee mini-album called "Sweethearts". Seven songs recorded in approx 15 hours after we worked out a gambling system that gave the band a little bit of extra cash. It should be out May but I don't have a finalised date yet.

Me: So, who else is in the band, and you tell the readers of the Phile your nicknames.

Chris: Our fellow travellers are The Rough Monk on guitar and vocals and The Ladies Choice on drums. And what do you mean by nicknames?

Me: Um... okay. Anyway, you remind me of Social Distortion in their early years. Have you heard of them? What do you think of them if you did?

Chris: Again I heard of them but to my shame never heard any records. It's weird, we seem to get a wide range of bands we are told we sound like, some I have never listened to until the comparison comes up. For example the cool New Jersey band Titus Andronicus thought we sounded like The Misfits. In reviews we have been likened to The Clash, Pixies, The Stooges, Franz Ferdinand, White Stripes, The Hives, The Fall, Supersuckers, The Birthday Party and even Dog's D'amour, another band I have never heard. While they are all rock bands they pretty much cover all the alternative rock spectrum.

Me: So, what bands do you listen to? 

Chris: I am big fan of Dylan, the Magnetic Fields and Springsteen, but the band as a whole can agree on The Clash, Pixies, Hank Williams, Queens of The Stone Age and everybodys favourite gay scandanavian death-punks Turbonegro.

Me: Chris, do you have a website you wanna plug? Or anything you wanna tall the readers of the Phile?

Chris: A new web site is under construction at theelvissuicide.com to coincide with the release of "Sweethearts" if you go to that address it takes you to our Myspace at the moment. As we are shamelessly whoring ourselves we are also on Facebook/Bebo and Last FM.

Me: Thanks for doing this interview and you are welcome anytime you want. Just let me know.

Chris: Thanks again, it was my pleasure.

Hmmm, I guess the CD comes out on May 18th. I hope to have Chris back when it comes out. That about does it for this entry. Thanks to Patrick Gaspard as always and of course Chris Devotion. The Phile will be back on Monday as Sunday is Easter with artist Jeremy Dale. Then next Wednesday it's British musician John Pippus. On Sunday it's Alumni John Bentley, the bass player for one of my favorite bands... Squeeze! I cannot wait. So, spread the word, not the turd. Don't let snakes and alligators bite you. Bye, love you, bye. Have a good Easter and a good Friday. LOL.