Friday Fives – the 5 bestest-est of everything edition

If you could only listen to 5 musicians for the rest of your life, who would they be?

Bob Dylan, James Taylor, Grateful Dead, Pearl Jam, Guns & Roses

 If you could only read 5 books for the rest of your life, who would they be?

Alice in Wonderland.  Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas, Tropic of Cancer, anything by Hemingway, and Desolation Angels.  Google them.  Buy them.  Love them.

If you could only have 5 childhood memories to recall for the rest of your life, who would they be?

I had nothing but an amazing childhood and the world’s greatest parents.  There isn’t a single regret in the amazing way our parents loved and took care of us.  To pick only 5 moments would denigrate the decades they invested in us.  I am lucky enough to still have my mom around, and she is my favorite person in the whole world.  Don’t tell my wife I said that.

 If you could only eat 5 things for the rest of your life, who would they be?

Pad Thai, Carne Asada, Gyro sammich, sesame chicken, and coffee

If you could only have five words to describe the world what would they be?

Beautiful, selfish, magical, self-destructive

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Friday Fives – quit yer job

If you could quit your job and pursue your hobby full-time with financial security, what hobby would you pursue?

Writing.  I enjoy all writing.  Obviously, I prefer the kind of writing where I can inject my opinions, perspective, and humor.  However, I think I would even enjoy mindless drivel like writing for People magazine.  I mean, as a full time job?  Yeah, writing is great.  I do it anyway… why not get paid?

If you enjoy my writing, and I truly hope you do… here is some more.  There is this site we are on right now, of course – IamCorrect.com.  I also have a site that is just my music writing.  Quite pleased with myself, that url is Maybe I am Wrong.com  Get it?  On social and popular culture issues, I pretty much am confident that I am Correct.  Music, though, is subjective… so why be a dick about it?  I also used to write for Blogcritics, and have done a good little bit writing for various guitar magazines.

Oh, there is also my newest endeavor – Remember the 27.  This is a website specifically dedicated to looking at the phenom of rock stars dying at 27.  I assume you have heard of it… a freaky disproportionate amount of rock stars die at age 27.  It goes back to the 60s, with Brian Jones, PigPen, Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Jim Morrison, Shannon Hoon, Bradley Nowell, Kurt Cobain, Amy Winehouse… and on and on.  Oh… how about this, the original 27 club member – bluesman extraordinare >   Robert Johnson

What’s a hobby others have taken up that just baffles you?

Golf.  I am neither for it, nor against it.  I just don’t get it.

What was your’s father’s hobby? Is it relevant now?

Running.  No.  In fact, one of my favorite HST books (and the last long form book he ever wrote) is about running.  At the time, 1980, it was a hip new odd trend.  So… Rolling Stone sent Hunter to Hawaii too look at this phenomenon.  Side note – this very book is where I took my pen name, Lono, from.

What is your mother’s hobby? Is it relevant now?

tennis.  Yeah, still being played.  That sport is not lost on me, I think it’s terrific.  In fact, in case you are curious just exactly how incredibly Caucasian I am… when I was young… mom sent me to tennis camp at the nearby country club.  I don’t thinks that was so much to teach me strength and sportsmanship… but just to get me the hell out of the house during summer.   Well played, mother.  Well played.

What do you imagine your favorite superhero or celebrity’s favorite hobby is?  

Eddie Vedder?  I think we can safely assume he spends more time than he cares to admit googling me.

 

Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas – a perfect review > and epitath for Hunter S Thompson

I love this movie, the Johnny Depp one.  The film is perfect.  I think it captures Hunter and that era of his life perfectly.  Johnny Depp goes so deep into Hunter’s persona it’s a wonder he ever made it out.  I can tell you how I think he did it, too.  Not just the craft of acting, he lived with Hunter.  That is no small feat.  Even Bill Murray didn’t actually move in with Hunter.  Hunter and Depp became close friends during this process, and remained life long friends.  The connection was deeper than love of drugs and nonsense and art and great writing and blowing shit up.  They are both from Kentucky.  I own the 2 disc ‘Criterion Collection’ set, which I highly recommend.  It is FULL of hours of featurettes and old Hunter movies.  It’s where we learned about Hunter’s absurd funerary request, which Johnny Depp handsomely and famously paid 5 million dollars to make happen.

You know… the one about shooting his ashes out of a Gonzo fist cannon into space after he commits suicide.  The footage is from when Hunter is in his 30’s, but 30 years later… he up and went and killed himself… almost as promised.

Let’s talk about the movie for a second.  Being a lit grad, and a HUGE fan of Hunter’s writing.  I should tell you the movie does the book no justice.  Wrong.  I mean, you absolutely must read the book… but the movie is fantastic.  I think it’s perfect, and could not have done better.  Heck, even Hunter himself does a cameo.  Probably not as an artistic endorsement so much as to score the per diem, and to keep an eye on the process.  Legend goes, he was kicked off his own set for being a wasted pain in the ass.  Pretty easy to believe, so I shall.

But this isn’t about that.  This is about the movie, and the synopsis I read about it on Rotten Tomatoes.  Of course, the movie was slammed by critics.  Who cares what the critics think of a movie?  Honestly, I NEVER look at that.  I want to know what people thought about it.  Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas has an epic discrepancy between the two, perhaps one of the biggest on all of Rotten Tomatoes.  Critics gave it at 49%, where fans gave it an 89%.  I would argue few people know Hunter’s writing and social impact like me.  Hunter is a BIG part of why I moved to Denver, CO… to be closer to him.  But this isn’t about that.  No sir, this is a quick hit on the review the ‘critics’ left of the movie.

Critics Consensus: Visually creative, but also aimless, repetitive, and devoid of character development.

This is almost too perfect. Those words above are meant to be a slam. There is no character development.  It’s a long movie… and our protagonist never grows?  He never learns?  He never changes his way?  No sir, he does not.  Hunter Thompson defined… nay… deified… that critique.  He never grew up.  He never sold out.  He never played ball.  He continued to live his life like a rich petulant 22 year old who got kicked out of the Air Force in a pretty damn funny story.  Kicked out for what, you ask?  Well… for behaving like a petulant 12 year old who got kicked out of school for savaging a mailbox in a pretty damn funny story.  Like… for behaving like a petulant 27 year old who got fired by Time magazine  for savagely attacking a candy machine (… in a pretty damn funny story).

No.  Hunter never grew up, and certainly never learned from his lessons.  He was, by all accounts, a terrible person.  As an artist and a writer and hipster deity… the man was a genius.  Take that review, and put it no on his movie.  No sir, take that review and put it on his headstone.

RIP Hunter, you twisted bastard!