Hey there, welcome to the Phile for a Sunday. How are you? Are you hung over from your St. Patrick's Day party? People asked me if I celebrate St. Patrick's Day and I always give the same answer... nope. I'm not Irish.
In the month following the tragic shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas Highschool, Parkland survivors have been dragging trolls who claim the teens are actors pushing a political agenda. They've also called out Betsy Devos for her hypocrisy, criticized Melania Trump over Donald Trump Jr.'s cyberbullying, and organized the National School Walkout day in protest of draconian gun laws. It would reason to assume most adults, particularly in politics, would be impressed. However, that was not the case for the GOP Maine House candidate Leslie Gibson who mocked Parkland shooting survivors, calling student David Hogg a "bald faced liar" and claiming Emma Gonzalez was a "skinhead lesbian" who shouldn't impress you "unless you're a frothing at the mouth moonbat." While Gibson's house race was previously unchallenged, his nasty commentary inspired the Democrat Eryn Gylchrist to enter the race and oppose him. Shortly after she announced her plan to run, Gibson dropped out of the race. There is still justice in this world, sometimes. Naturally, both Parkland survivors and human beings with an ounce of empathy or intelligence everywhere are overjoyed at the news. If adults learn anything in 2018, it should be to NOT cross the teens.
Wow, seeing corporations actually facing consequences for doing dumb things is basically porn. Rihanna, whether she knew her power over the stock market or not, got justice when her Instagram story calling out Snapchat for making a "fun" poll about her domestic abuse cost the company hundreds of millions of dollars. She joins Kylie Jenner as a force affecting Snap Inc.'s shares. Let's back it up. The dick pic photo-sharing app put out a poll asking users if they would rather "slap Rihanna or punch Chris Brown." Ha ha ha?
CNBC reports that after RiRi posted her response, the company's shares dropped around five percent, which is approximately 800 million dollars. Rihanna fans are legion, and deleted the app in solidarity. Plus, there's nothing on Snapchat that Instagram doesn't do anyway. "This advertisement is disgusting and never should have appeared on our service. We are so sorry we made the terrible mistake of allowing it through our review process. We are investigating how that happened so that we can make sure it never happens again," a Snapchat spokesperson wrote to CNBC. Too late.
Donald Jr. and Vanessa Trump are definitely getting divorced. Also, the Trump Organization, which is led by Don Jr., was subpoenaed by Robert Mueller for documents. These two things, despite happening very close to one another time-wise, are totally separate, right? Well, maybe not. Because of the timing of the two announcements, some people are wondering if maybe Vanessa and Don Jr. are getting divorced so that he can give his financial assets to his wife, making sure that they won't be seized no matter what ends up happening with Mueller. Here's a conspiracy theory that seems like it could actually be true. According to a lawyer interviewed by Bill Palmer, it is not unheard of for people to divorce before potentially having their assets seized. Another interesting fact is that the story of Vanessa and Don Jr.'s divorce was run as an exclusive by Page Six, which is part of the "New York Post." And the "New York Post" is very Trump-friendly. So it seems as if they wanted that news out there. Just saying. But who knows. Maybe their marriage hadn't been going well for a while. After all, he seemed to spend a lot of time sleeping on the couch. People who read the Page Six report about their marriage being on the rocks were not surprised, and neither was retired model Melissa Stretton. Stetton shared a creepy (read: thirsty) Direct Message she received from Don Jr. in November 2011, a month after Vanessa gave birth to one of their five... five! children. She explains that she had tweeted a joke about pulling a muscle changing a tampon... haha, and the president's son wanted to address her in private, saying...
There's more! Here's context for "the bacon comment." Enjoy this ridiculously immature exchange with Don Jr., who was both extremely thirsty and hungry for bacon.
And...
I could only assume that by "channel," he meant "Chanel." And...
As the prophecy foretold, Don Jr. is likely now sleeping on the couch.
It takes a special kind of dirtbag to scam money that's supposed to go to wounded military veterans and James Linville is that kind of guy. The 44-year-old man of Clark County, Kentucky is under arrest for orchestrating a scam that robbed more than 1,000 people out of $150,000 under the guise that the money would be going to veterans. "The acts of these fraudsters have eroded the trust and goodwill of those who want to contribute to legitimate fundraising organizations, including those that support our veterans," U.S. Attorney Josh Minkler said in a statement to CNN. "Our American veterans have dutifully served this country through many wars and deserve better than to be deprived of donations from giving donors." Lineville and his 3 crookster pals have been indicted on 227 counts of wire fraud, mail fraud, and conspiracy. Joanie Watson and Thomas Johnson were also arrested, along with Lineville's ex-girlfriend Amy Lou Bennett, who was arrested Wednesday at a Kentucky trailer park. They could get up to 20 years in prison. His phony charity was meant to look like the Wounded Warrior Project. The Wounded Warrior Project is a multi-million dollar charity that's been around since 2003 and features national advertisements with country musician Trace Adkins. James Linville's scam was meant to deceive charitable donors and went under the name of Wounded Warrior Foundation, Inc. James Linville, The scam artists used flyers promising assistance to the families of veterans, financial aid for state VFWs and calling cards for "those who defend our freedom." No money was ever given to any veterans or veteran support groups, says law enforcement. The group also claimed that it was an IRS Approved 501(c)(3) charity, though no evidence of that has been found. "This organization... this fake organization... was asking people for food donations, for hotel rooms for veterans, for donations from different businesses that would be raffled or organized off for this, what people thought was a legitimate organization," Clark County Sheriff Jamey Noel told CNN James Linville dared law enforcement to try and lock him up. Linville has been arrested before for charges ranging from drugs and check fraud to domestic battery. When investigators began digging into his phony charity three years ago, he started calling the Clark County Sheriff's Office and leaving angry voicemails. Linville called Detective Donnie Bowyer's answering machine some 30 times, daring the police to try and arrest him. "I'll make a mockery of your court. I'm a sovereign citizen, motherfucker. American born sovereign citizen," he can be heard saying on one of the messages. Your fucking state laws don't apply to me in any way," Linville told the detective on another voicemail. "I will make a mockery of your fucking court. And I'll destroy the sheriff's department." The voicemails of course only added to the case being built against him. People are pissed off about the James Linville scam. Those who donated money to the group haven't gotten their money back and the six bank accounts used by Linville to run the scam have been drained. Dan Cristiani was one of the victims who was scammed by the con artists and donated over a $1,000, believing that the money was going to help ex-military in honor of his late father who was a recipient of two Purple Heart awards. "I felt like I was taken advantage of," the 69-year-old told CNN. "We have not seen a case like this using veterans names and quite honestly that's what made this case so appealing," said special agent in charge, Richard Ferretti. "It's not the largest dollar amount of fraud loss, but it's the most hurtful that we've seen here.
When scientists sent a robotic camera down into the Kavachi... a very active underwater volcano in the Soloman Islands... there was no way they could have prepared for what they found inside: sharks. More specifically, a Pacific sleeper shark, hammerhead sharks, and silky sharks (plus some bonus marine life) living happily inside a dangerous, acidic, super-heated environment. The reaction of the scientific team, according to University of Rhode Island PhD student Brennan Phillips, was shock. They were “freaking out,” basically, but after they had time to adjust, questions abounded... mostly having to do with exactly how these animals were surviving (and thriving) inside. “Divers who have gotten close to the outer edge of the volcano have had to back away because of how hot it is or because they were getting mild skin burns from the acid water,” Phillips said. “These large animals are living in what you have to assume is much hotter and much more acidic water, and they’re just hanging out. It makes you question what type of extreme environment these animals are adapted to. What sort of changes have they undergone? Are there only certain animals that can withstand it? We still have more questions than answers, but for now, there’s something beautiful about animals who have found a way to live happily where no human could possibly get to them. Isn’t there?
So, if I had a time machine I would go back in time to 1972 and see my dad and the original line up of Foghat on one of their first tours...
Did you ever read those Sweet Valley Kids books growing up? I didn't because they were for girls, but there's one I wish I did read...
Hmmm... Some stores offer some really cool rewards cards... like Apple's for instance...
I'd use that one. Here's another teacher showing what she'd rather be armed with instead of weapons...
I saw this poster the other day...
And it reminded me of something... and then it hit me...
See? Am I crazy? And now for some sad news...
Stephen Hawking
January 8th, 1942 — March 13th, 2018
Say what you want about that crazy wheelchair and weird robot voice... this guy got ALL the chicks.
If you spot the Mindphuck let me know. Okay, so, back in the early mid-90s I was a big Shania Twain fan. I had a HUGE crush on her and everything. Well, Shania finally has a brand new album out called "Now," this is what it looks like.
Hashtag ShaniaOnPhile, people, and maybe she will be. By the way, I tried this years ago to get Kelly Clarkson on the Phile and nothing came of it. Maybe Shania will though. So, Shania, if you're out there, I'd love to have you on the Phile. Well? Spread he word, people.
So, do you know what's the best? No? I'll tell you...
The more sulfur-rich your diet is, the more terrible your farts will smell. Some foods contain more sulfur than others, which is why eating things like beans, cabbage, cheese, soda, and eggs can cause gas that will peel the paint off the walls!
On Friday, the FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe was fired by Attorney General Jeff Sessions just hours before he was planning to retire with benefits. According to Sessions, McCabe made an "an unauthorized disclosure to the news media and lacked candor... including under oath... on multiple occasions." The grounds for firing referenced the FBI's previous investigation into Hillary Clinton's use of a private email server while serving as Secretary of State. If anything, the revelations of this previous investigation helped Trump win the election. However, that hasn't stopped the president from showing his relief that yet another FBI official is out of a job during Mueller's Russia probe.
Yesterday, both Trump and his lawyer John Dowd expressed not only joy over McCabe's firing, but a hope that this would halt Mueller's investigation. "I pray that Acting Attorney General Rosenstein will follow the brilliant and courageous example of the FBI Office of Professional Responsibility and Attorney General Jeff Sessions and bring an end to alleged Russia Collusion investigation manufactured by McCabe’s boss James Comey based upon a fraudulent and corrupt Dossier," Dowd wrote in a statement to the Daily Beast. Trump's tweets yesterday adamantly denied a collusion with Russia, despite the fact the McCabe's firing had nothing to do with that investigation on paper. Rather than sleeping in, going to church, or literally doing anything pleasant with his last weekend day, early this morning Trump launched into another tirade about McCabe's firing. This time, Trump focused on McCabe's potentially indicting memos. A close source told that Mueller has memos written by McCabe documenting his conversations with President Donald Trump. Obviously, this hit a nerve with the president. Given the fact that McCabe was a Deputy Director of the FBI, it's reasonable to assume he could've easily taken memos without Trump realizing it. And yet, Trump's insistence on nicknames like "lying James Comey" and "Fake Memos" speaks to a defensiveness that suggests culpability in itself.
The 77th book to be phratured in the Phile's Book Club is...
David will be the guest on the Phile next Monday.
And now for some...
Phact 1. When Halle Berry won a Worst Actor Razzie award for her role in Catwoman, she showed up in person to collect the award. She spoke while holding her Academy Award from Monster’s Ball in one hand and the Razzie in the other.
Phact 2. China creates so much synthetic diamonds that are identical to real diamonds that prices of diamonds are being driven down and De Beers has created a university to study how to identify “natural” and “man-made” diamonds because no experts can tell the difference.
Phact 3. In 1985, a drug smuggler jettisoned 40 kilograms (76 pounds) of cocaine from his airplane over Georgia’s Chattahoochee National Forest. A black bear (later dubbed Pablo EskoBear) found and ate all of the cocaine and died of an inconceivably massive overdose.
Phact 4. WALL-E (the Pixar film,) is dedicated to Justin Wright. Justin was 12 when he had a heart transplant and his Make-A-Wish was to visit Pixar. He survived the transplant and later became an animator at Pixar. He died of a massive heart attack 3 months before its release.
Phact 5. The oldest D20 dice was uncovered in Egypt and dates back around 30 B.C.
Today's guests are two members of the band All Good Things whose CD "Machines" is available on iTunes. Please welcome to the Phile... Liz Hooper and Dan Murphy.
Me: Hey, kids, how are you doing? Welcome to the Phile.
Liz: Hey.
Dan: Thanks. How's to going?
Me: Okay, I guess. So, how did this band get together? It's a new band but you all have been around for a while, am I right?
Dan: Sure. I moved from Montana to L.A. with my band back in the day and I just met Andrew and Liz through mutual friends who were a bunch of L.A. musicians and stated writing with them. It wasn't exactly All Good Things, but we worked together for a couple of years and came up with the idea of coming up with some epic, heavy, driving, rock band that I always wanted to start, so we kind of talked for awhile and it became a real thing.
Me: When did you first start to write for All Good Things?
Dan: About three years ago, and it's kind of developed into a thing. A couple of years later we released a few records and we just put out a full length. It's been fun, it's been a good few years.
Me: Are you guys gonna be touring or do you want to tour?
Dan: It's going to get to that point.
Me: You started off making music for video games and not thinking of touring before, right?
Liz: We've been playing together for ages and we've been working on different projects or whatever. When we started making this music we're massive hockey fans so we wanted to write music the same kind of music you listen to when yo go see a hockey game or whatever. So, we've made this music and it started getting kicked up and used in movies and WWE games so we just had this organic following, So, we never expected to be able to tour, just making music for fun because we loved it.
Dan: To be honest it was always like a dream of mine, she said we were all hockey fans, so I think it was a huge part of it. For me I wanted to write some anthemic heavy cool rock stuff that will give you pumped at the game or if you're watching a game or you're trying to go to and work out, or you're sweating it out. It's just cool pump up music. we all had a mutual idea and it all came together to become All Good Things.
Me: So, you all have see projects or main projects besides All Good Things. Is that difficult to fit everything in?
Dan: Oh, I think that the thing with making music and playing live and being in a DIY is always kinda difficult but we've been doing so many things with different bands over the years. There's been so many bands we've been in between the five of us it's like we're all used to juggling the different genres. I've got a few different bands myself. Liz has done the same kinda things herself. It's been years and years of juggling of digging in and trying to make it work, so I don't know. It's always a struggle but nothing I can complain about.
Liz: Dan's very modest too. Dan and I have been writing together for the last couple of years, and we've been writing for other artists as well. We've managed to get a bunch of cuts on different artists' records. so I think diversifying... we gotta write, we gotta play, we gotta get out there and tour, we gotta YouTube, we gotta do everything, we have to be a lot more active, I think of you're active there's a chance to make more money from the music industry.
Dan: Also we've been able to get a little more active recently because now the band has a little more exposure we're able to finally do a music video and do more than we have in the past so hopefully we're going to take it to the next level or the next year or two.
Liz: I'm totally hoping to tour this year and get on with festivals and stuff so that is kinda our main drive at the moment, is trying to connect, work out where all our fans are and play some shows.
Me: Okay, so, as a new band starting out would you rather have a YouTube hit, a Spotify hit, or picked up by an EA Sports game? Which one would be better?
Liz: All of them. Hahaha.
Dan: I think my personal answer would be an EA Sports game, I think that would be where the money's at. I just had to say that. Honestly, I'm a big Spotify fan. I know it's changed the whole world, the music industry has ben so different because of to, but honestly Spotify has exposed me to so many different artists with recommended artists. Once you get going on there they'll use the crazy Spotify algorithms will start to recommend your band that people wouldn't hear you otherwise so I'm a big Spotify supporter. I think they're great. We had a lot of good support on Spotify. I've got a million streams on there and I know it's definitely exposed us to a lot of new fans. I'm grateful for thew whole Spotify movement, I think it's been good.
Me: So, what has been the overall feedback of this project?
Liz: I guess we've been pretty lucky at the moment because we are independent, doing profit share with a little label. Even though we're still an up and coming band we're doing okay.
Dan: It's less about money and more about getting pumped seeing us being streamed around the world is just neat. For me a lot of different bands I've been in only United States and whatnot, but with this band it seems to be overseas a lot of it. A lot of it is strong in Europe, it's just a wide variety of fans is really cool to see.
Liz: It's crazy, Jason, having people reach out to us from tiny little places like Georgia, Russia.
Dan: It's been fun meeting all these people.
Me: So, with all you people in the band from different places did you all meet in a studio? How was this album out together?
Liz: We actually did the whole album at Emerald City Studios which is in L.A. The album was produced mostly by Andrew who is the guitarist...
Dan: Andrew is a phenomenal producer. I've been working with Andrew and Liz on bunch of projects over the years like I said but they're both super talented producers. Andrew especially. He's a real great guitarist and he's got a real good ear. Andrew did most of the production on this, Liz did too, but I think he crushed it.
Me: Is your music available just in iTunes, guys?
Dan: We're not printing physical albums right now. You can pick up a physical CD from Amazon but we're kinda focus on the digital and streaming of everything. You have any input on that, Liz?
Liz: Ah, yeah, we're kinda making it up as we go. We're just so excited that people like this music and people are digging it. We started out with making music and it started to pop up in different places. They started asking if they could use it in different TV shows and people started asking us where could they but this. So, we sort of been rolling with it as it goes. We have a girl who is our publicist and she's been fantastic really helping us out with getting that reach across the ocean, opening the European territories and everything. Connected us with wonderful people like you.
Dan: There's also kinda cool YouTubers and stuff who helped us spreading the word organically sharing it on Facebook and YouTube, even Twitch and stuff like that just to get the band exposure. We're definitely grateful to all the people who spread our stuff around.
Me: I can't believe you have Phil X in the band, who is in the documentary film Hired Gun and is currently with Bon Jovi. How has that been working with him and how did you get to work with him?
Liz: We've been fighting for Phil for a number of years. It's funny, we seem to attract Canadians for some reason which is really weird. It's probably the hockey. So, about ten or eleven years ago we met Randy who is our drummer of All Good Things, and Randy is session heavy in Canada and he's been in some awesome rock bands back in the day and he and Phil have been tight for ages. So we met Phil about five or six years ago and we've been working with him on different projects. Where we started messing about with this All Good Things project we were like dude, you got to come in and play some stuff. It was just so much fun because he just brings such a crazy energy to guitars and everything. And he's got a beautiful voice as well. Whenever he's in town he comes in and we play together, we write together, we hang out, so whenever we can catch him when he's off tour from Bon Jovi is when we'll grab him. We're so excited for him to be out with Bon Jovi its awesome.
Me: Maybe he could do some double duty and you guys can open for Bon Jovi. Have you guys thought of that?
Liz: I don't know how Jon would feel with All Good Things opening for Bon Jovi but it's a good idea.
Me: I noticed on iTunes there's some "Battle Rock" CDs... what is "Battle Rock"?
Liz: When we started out just writing songs we were writing songs, just messing around, recording them and we started having people approach us like people from WWE, people from trailer houses, and videos and stuff, and they just loved the music and wanted to use it for licensing. So we were like fantastic, that's such a great way to get it out to people and a great way to make some money and get the music moving forward. We started working with this company called Extreme Music who basically collect music from artists all over the world and get the music on TV shows, video games and music and all that kinda stuff. They wanted to put together all the All Good Things tracks and release them under the title "Battle Rock" for people out there looking for music like that. So, that's where the title "Battle Rock" comes from.
Dan: "Battle Rock" was the beginning of the band. We were just trying to work out the ideas of writing cool epic heavy stuff and we didn't hope it'll become a real touring band. We were just testing the waters, and like Liz said we just wrote a bunch of songs, people started liking us, we wanted to get them out with exposure on TV and whatever we could get so that just became "Battle Rock" which is All Good Things, it was just branded as Battle Rock. Once the band got comfortable we were like let's just release All Good Things records and do the real band thing and start touring. That was the baby band, that was the beginning.
Me: So, what's the deal with the gas masks on the "Machines" album cover?
Liz: It's just creepy. Haha.
Me: True. Well, thanks for being on the Phile, you two. Please come back when you can. Mention your website and I wish you continued success.
Liz: Thank you, Jason. Allgoodthings.la.
Dan: Thanks, Jason. Maybe we'll be on the road opening for Bon Jovi, we just have to twist his arm.
That about does it for this entry of the Phile. Thanks to Liz and Dan for a great interview. The Phile will be back tomorrow with the legendary Gary Lewis. Spread the word, not the turd. Don't let snakes and alligators bite you. Bye, love you, bye.
Not if it pleases me. No, you can't stop me, not if it pleases me. - Graham Parker
No comments:
Post a Comment