The Real Memphis Mike (don't settle for imitations)

Jack White...ever heard of The Flat Duo Jets? Your career started off ripping them off. Now you accuse The Black Keys of ripping YOU off? Really? Shut the front door! I first heard about you a dozen or so years ago. I thought you sucked then. I still do. At that time, Danny Auerbach opened for me a number of times. He was a great kid, and a great picker and singer. He was trying to do more rockabilly-ish stuff at the time...but blues was what he was best at. And how! I still have a bunch of home-made CDs he gave me at the time. I also remember him telling me about the little side project he was starting with a drummer. It sounded interesting. A lot more interesting than anything The White Stripes ever did. There's nothing new under the sun kid. Hasil Adkins was doing guitar/drum stuff in the 50s, as were cats like Dr. Ross. Like I said, nothing new. The best, most soul-shaking music I have ever heard was a guitar/drum duo...street musicians...playing in a park in Memph...

(Dear Lord...I'm turning into Andy Rooney! THANK YOU!) Did you ever wonder about those ads you see on websites? There's usually a lot of them on the right hand side of the page. Ever wonder why? It's valuable ad space!   But did you ever stop to think why? Take a look at these: Just a Facebook log in page...right? An Israeli Facebook log in. Notice the difference? English is read left to right. THIS is why the right side of the page has become pricier for advertisers and busier for the reader. At the end of each line, the reader will pause for just a split second...long enough to notice the mess on the right of the screen. Also, in reading/viewing a page, the right side peripheral vision is likely to spending more time subconsciously perceiving all of the ads and links there. Get ready for that plate of shrimp ! The kids that have been using that reference for 30 years are now the ad execs. They know what they're doing. They know that most of us igno...

Sticks and stones may break my bones but names will never hurt me.  We've all heard this. At what point did people forget about it? Yes...words can hurt feelings. But remember, they're YOUR feelings. Own them. If someone says something to you or about you that upsets you...don't blow your brains out over it. In so doing, you have completely empowered the person using the language that you don't like. In short, the more fuss you make about it, the more power you give that person and their words. Instead, try calmly explaining the fallacy of the word(s) intended to hurt you. If you can't do that...you need to work on yourself first. Learn to be comfortable in your own skin. Learn to not only love yourself...but LIKE yourself! Sometimes in life we have to educate people. If your response to that is "I'm no teacher!" then you're already failing as a human being. We all teach each other, every day. We teach our children, and those around us, by o...

It's RANT TIME!!!!!!!!! I haven't let loose on y'all in a while...you're due. Last night, Pittsburgh proved itself, once again, to be a complete fucking waste of time. Sure, we have the Steelers. We have the Penguins. We still have the Pirates (although, just why anyone cares, is beyond me). What we DON'T have is music lovers. Yeah...YOU HEARD ME! Do NOT tell me "Oh, I love music!". No. You don't. If you did, you would go out and support it once in a while.  Oh yeah, some of you go to see your friends' band(s) at the same venues every chance you get. That doesn't mean you love music. It means you love your friends...and that's fucking great! Really, it is! But it does NOT mean you love music. It means you like "safe". You go to the same shows and listen to the same tunes (most of which are heavily borrowed from the same bands you've listened to for 20+ years or more). If it hasn't been shoved down your throat, it s...

If you're a friend of mine, or at least privy to my Facebook page, you've probably noticed a ton of posts lately...videos by " Zufälligen Einbildungskraft ". If you've watched them, you've probably wondered just what the hell this stuff is. Well, I'll tell ya.... The jig is up. I'll come clean. Zufälligen Einbildungskraft is me. I'm sure a lot of you already guessed that...but for the two or three of you who haven't, that's what's up. So what does it mean? I'll start at the beginning. It all started about a week ago. A friend, who has long shared my love of interesting sights and sounds, had sent me some new music. It got me upset, in a way. The music wasn't "bad"...but it bored me. Music, in general, has become boring to me. It's all so damned predictable. I don't care what genre of music you enjoy...I can listen to the first three notes and know exactly where it's going. It makes me want to vomit. I...