Braved the Pride weekend traffic and headed over to the city today to get our collective hairs cut. Our wonderful, uh, "stylist," had moved to a chic new, uh, "salon," in a yuppie area of town, and needless to say we were a tad nervous at the outcome. In the end, it was an embarrasing place to be, but her work is worth it, so we'll keep going back. Middle aged yuppie ladies thumbed through Better Homes & Gardens while they waited for guys named Chad to pamper them and kiss their ass. I "read" Rolling Stone as we waited, and you know what I found out? That Sum 41 band that I stared at horrified on WWF-TV (formerly known as MTV) are Canadian. That's right, now it all makes perfect sense.

After we ate lunch I headed down to the record store and picked up some more Bruce albums. The upshot of reading about musicians, especially those who have had a long and prolific career, is that you can follow the book with their albums. I picked up The River on vinyl, with a great montage of black and whites from the time period. I also got The Wild, the Innocent, and the E Street Shuffle and Plugged (live) used on CD. Miss Rodeo America picked out some goodies as well, including the new Unwound record that has been talked about so much recently.

However, the cream of my new arrivals crop is this little gem by Grandaddy called The Windfall Varietal. This collection of previously-unreleased (for the most part) songs is great addition to their discography, with some great alternate versions of songs as well as a completely wild cover of The Beach Boys' "Fun, Fun, Fun."

My loot should keep me satiated, at least for now.

Last night we saw Smog play a wonderful, wonderful set over in SF. The crowd was scenester-tastic and rude, talking through the entire set by a corner full of coked out ex-dot commers who had nothing better to do than chat, loudly. The band he had was awesome, guitar, fiddle, and jazz drums all smacking together to form a perfect mix of dynamics and tenderness. Yummy.

Today is the first day of summer, but it feels like it has been going on for over a week now. Hot everyday, hot car everyday, hot house every evening when we come home. It's become necessity, really, to cool off with a Pabst Blue Ribbon every night. It's just, mechanics.

MP3 of the week: I made a minidisc of Palace/Bonnie 'Prince Billy/Will Oldham stuff for a friend last week. You see, he thinks all things Oldham are merely "OK," whereas I think he's heard some of the wrong stuff. So I helped out, like any friend would do. I closed off the set with Come in Come in, Jump in Jump In, a twangy duet with Tiffany White-Pounders who I think sounds extraordinarily like Dolly Parton. Super sweet and calming, a nice way to end a 74-minute Oldham marathon.

Speaking of MP3s, the fellow over at instantenemy has some great ones up. Good rock/punk/kraut stuff that I dig on daily. I'm into the Hellacopters stuff, rather out of character for an indie darling such as myself.

Tour planning of Amscray is going rather well. Our first confirmed show is in Dubuque, Iowa on September 9th. I have no idea where Dubuque is, or why it's good to play there, but I'm excited nonetheless.

Tuesday night we went to the Oakland v. Seattle baseball game. Seattle has a couple players, one of whom, Ichiro Suzuki, has reached near rockstar proportions in Japan. He's the biggest star from the Japanese leagues to come to the US, and he's been wildy successful. There were a ton of Japanese fans in the stands, holding up signs in Japanese and cheering loudly whenever he came to the plate. I felt proud to see the excitement, and pondered what it must feel like to see such an outpouring of support from Japanese and Japanese Americans all across the states. The multi-culturism in the game is its biggest asset.

After the game we took the train into downtown and walked to Radio a slightly-hip, but altogether enjoyable bar experience and drank alot of Pabst and chatted about music and sports and FPs. I had a fucking great time. So much so, that I have to cuss about it. Fuck yes.

Ishiro! Hai. Ok.