Looks like our friend Clennan in Provincetown has a radio show on the local "wingnuts and bad music" community radio station WOMR Thursdays at midnight, streaming here. From what I know of him, I'd expect quite a bit of Casio, Noise, and Fagbeat.

Here are a couple mp3s from this is ska argentina to warm you up for this feauture...
Alton Ellis- I've Got a Date (alternate version
Doreen Shaffer- Nice Time
I met Selector Lucho from Upsetting Hi Fi soundsystem at a greasy fast food joint on Ave. Scalabrini Ortiz north of Palermo, Buenos Aires. We started talking by making fun of all the 16 year old straight-edge hardcore kids that were passing us on their way to a show around the corner. Meanwhile we were splitting Quilmes after Quilmes and taking about Jamaican records. Lucho brought me to a bar near-by and for a brief evening he initiated me into the rarified world of ex-skinhead rudeboy Argentine reggae DJs who have been collecting Jamaican records forever.
They say things like "soundsystem" and "in the dance", they call dubs "versions", the DJ is the "selector" and the singer is the "deejay" or "toaster". They think that things like Bounty Killer should never be called "dancehall" beacause dancehall is a style that existed only for about 6 years in the eighties with dejays like U-Roy and Half Pint. Basically they are living in a different era in a different culture on a diferent continent, and it's pretty awesome.
Lucho probably new more about riddims, studio one, and the golden era of ska, rocksteady, reggae, rub-a-dub, and dancehall, than anyone I know. He has appeared on the same stage as Lee Perry, Mad Professor, and Mikey Dread when they came to Argentina. He has thousands of Lps. In fact, he told me that when he dropped the 12" version of Mikey Dread toasting on the Clash's "Bankrobber" dub, Mikey couldn't believe it because even HE didn't have a copy of that.
Lucho and his friends we're some of the coolest most down to earth people I met in Buenos Aires. Maybe it was just because we could bond over music (not just reggae, but punk, power pop and 80s, all of which they knew tons about), but they seemed much more honest and cool that almost any of them portenos we met in other, trendier parts of the city.
If you are ever in Buenos Aires, check this is ska argentina for upcoming dances. They also have an Mp3 section, and for streaming radio check Butambaba, an Argentine site which has 5 channels and lots of info (en espanol, claro), or of course Rockers on 88.9 ERS from Emerson college in Boston, which has (usually) great Jamaican music from 4-8 every weekday.

Low-Budget has posted a promo mix for the Popoff Shack party at the Metro in Philly (download here). Some serious partytronix action on there- little bit of everything. 1 hr

Came across some flicks of graff by someone you may know. I don't think she's figured out how to rotate images, though (i helped her with this one).

SXSW REPORT... from Mendoza, Argentina

I may not be at South by Southwest right now, but I can write about it anyway! Isn't that what being an opinionated loudmouth is all about?
From the looks of the line-up, the festival is once again offering to the public both some of the best music the underground has to offer and some of the worst crap that agents and publicists can try to repackage for the "streets" (Jamie Cullum?!!).
One surprise is the wide assortment of hip hop both ig'nint and not as well as DJ features. I'm pretty sure that this brand of music was completely overlooked before this, certainly the "chopped´n´screwed" variety native to the festival´s home state of Texas was. But this year Houston rap is suddenly "art" and featured prominently. Who could have predicted that?
So, for those of us who are on different continents, or who are just indifferent (who wants want to wade through the mobs of drunken self-important indie rockers anyway?), there is the SXSW website, where quite a few of the more unknown artists have posted up Mp3z of their music. I'll save you the trouble of sloging through the hundreds of bands listed and re-up some of my picks of worthwhile listens. Click on the link to see a brief bio and option to stream or download.

A Hawk and a Hacksaw
Apathy
Atmosphere (some of these are total no-brainers)
Awol One (another case in point)
Baroness (!!)(Are literally going to blow some hipsters asses out.. much worse than those Texas wet burritos)
busdriver (do I really only like rap?)
Brian Jonestown Massacre (I know this isn't NME, but... it's a good song.)
Caural (only because he's Etta's boy)
Cephalic Carnage
Deadboy and the Elephantmen
Dengue Fever (60's Khmer Style, Mothrafuckas!)
FACEDOWNINSHIT...wait, yes you read that right...FACEDOWNINSHIT. (Had to write it twice for all you haters who couldn't believe your eyes. Listen to the song. Dudes need a major label contract. Relapse can't contain them)
Gerbils
The Gossip
Jean Grae
Holy Fuck
(Danny Black's) Healthy White Baby (just cause they are Genevieve's boys).
Helmet (fucking Helmet?)
Ross Hogg (Hollerboard represent)
Jedi Mind Tricks
Lady Sovereign
ladytron
Lucero (just becuase they cover "Kiss the Bottle" by Jawbreaker)
Magnolia Electric Company (maybe Vice was right in describing it as "at best a passable imitation of 'Harvest Moon' era Crazy Horse", but this is the guy who wrote "Farewell Transmition", so I got to think that great things can come out of him)
Municipal Waste
The Plimsouls (The PLIMSOULS?!)
Spankrock
Stinking Lizaveta (ok... now I do want to be there.)
Tarantula A.D.
TTC(pour les filles, TTC, connard!!)
Visionaries (2MEX)
Weedeater
XIU XIU (I don't like this stuff, but.. make up your own mind)
Zombi (fucking rule!)

Remember, this is only the artists that presented Mp3s- some of the best acts at SXSW did not like--
Tilly and the Wall and Jason Forrest (who are playing the same show!), Kid 606 and friends, 2MEX, Ramblin´Jack Elliot, Roky Erikson (?? isn't he dead?), Spoon, Immortal Technique, Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings, Jucifer, k-os, Nebula, Devin the Dude, DMBQ (still playing after the death of their drummer Chino?), Drop the Lime, Drunk Horse, Eagles of Death Metal, Echo and the Bunnymen, Grand Buffet, Hellacopters, The Go Team, Black Heart Procession, Blockhead, Circle, Cut Chemist, etc.

So what did all this sifting teach me? Well, it taught me that I have something against singer-songwriters, especially those that have their name in the title like "The James Lohannan Project". This immediately tells me that this will be earnest old-sad-bastard music that you might hear on your radio alarm clock first thing in the morning on NPR and might make you not want to get out of bed, but rather stay home and kill yourself.
And sorry, but I also hold a grudge against the nondescript American (or British) ROCK band who just plays "rock and roll", like "three chords and a dream" and tours around and drinks beer and sounds like the Beatles or the Kinks (but not as good). And has a stupid name. Its like "hey, man the name doesn't matter, it's all about just playin' like you mean it". The only problem is that you are boring and sound like everything else. And your name puts a stinky cloud over your whole aura. In fact, there were so many bad band names on the this list I feel I must elaborate.
Did they really run out of ideas for band names? I thought it was bad in the alternative rock era with atrocities like "Deep Blue Something" and "Sponge", but things have gotten worse. Emo, bad poetry, and new-wavey Art School leanings have brought out the worst in rock nomenclature. So here we go.

WHITE ANIMAL'S TOP 23 WORST BAND NAMES AT SXSW

23. Dashboard Confessional
22. Coach Said Not To(If he "Said Not To" name your band that, he was a pretty right-on dude. Maybe if you had listened to him, you wouldn't have gotten kicked off the team, and had to learn to play bass.)
21. Red Jumpsuit Apparatus (no ideas, guys?)
20. A Cursive Memory
19. Dot kom (rappers are not excluded)
18. Man Man (in fact, most bands from Philly have awful names)
17. The End of Fashion
16. The Foxymorons (they're probably nice guys, but...)
15. The Glass Family (I love JD Saliger, too but.. how precious can you get?)
14. GoGoGo Airheart
13. Kris Kristofferson (just kidding! seriously, Kris, dont hurt me)
12. The Guggenheim Grotto
11. Hurts to Purr (I mean, thats sad and all, but it doesn't make me want to listen. Do you forever want to be known as the band who's name translates to "My Pussy Hurts"?)
10. The Jai-Alai Savant
9. The King Of France (HA! There is no king of France. You Idiots! They have a prime minister or a dictator or something.)
8. They Shoot Horses Don't They (no, that was a crappy 70s movie... does this have something to do with Kristofferson?)
7. Leather Uppers (if they really were gay, they'd be called Leather Poppers, but they're not. They´re wannagays)
6. Sistas in the Pit (Im pretty sure theyre not joking)
5. The Number Twelve Looks Like You (are from Kearney, NJ. They should stay there)
4. Quien es, Boom! (only people who´ve never been to France would fetishise their lanuage)
3. The Boy Least Likely To
2. Sailboats Are White (Dude are you shitting me?)
1. Swollen Members (I just hate them anyway.. maybe i am biased)

There is a another trend I've noticed in this list. Bands seem to have come around to the fact that IRON MAIDEN and BLACK SABBATH were kind of the end-all be-all of naming your band. So, we have a slew of dagger-sharp, skull-scary band names which can't possibly really describe the bands which they grace. So we have:

WHITE ANIMAL's TOP 10 TOUGH BAND NAMES (which the band couldn't be be tough enough to enhabit)
10. Metal Hearts
9. The Sword
8. Bible of the Devil
7. Black Furies
6. Crystal Skulls
5. The Deaths
4. Die! Die! Die!
3. Midnite Snake
2. Skullening
1. Bad Wizard

OK, and now you're wondering, what are WHITE ANIMAL's top picks for BEST band names at SXSW? Why don't you get a life? Why don't I?

WHITE ANIMAL's TOP 5 BAND NAMES(of bands I've never heard of)

5. Sasquatch
4. Genghis Tron
3. Genitallica
2 Tight Phantomz
1. Goblin Cock

The other day Genevieve was telling me about Art Bell , her favorite syndicated radio wingnut who she used to listen to late at night on long road trips in the midwest while he vindicated the beliefs and perhaps encouraged the delusions of his probably insane callers. They would phone-in with comments like "NASA put microphones in my teeth because I know about the chupacabra!", and he would calmly reply "Ah, yes, the chupacabra. Of course they don't want people to know that it is really a reverse engineered alien clone made from an alien which crash landed in Puerto Rico."*
After she'd told me all about her man Art, I hipped her to my favorite radio freak-Grandpa Al Lewis , (yes, the guy from The Munsters, you fool) who was the reining king of radical left wing nutters on WBAI, Brooklyn free radio. That night I Googled his name on a whim, to see what was up with Grandpa Al. It turned out he had died a month ago before.

The tribute page for Grandpa Al (notice I don't use the quotation marks- he insisted on it as his real name) from the staff of WBAI is sometimes touching, sometimes hilarious. The first fond remembrance starts

"Yes, I do credit him (he insisted that we do) for my reading of William Shirer's The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, and I feel that I have a better understanding of just what is happening in these United States at this present time."

What a sentimental eulogy! But Grandpa Al wouldn't have it any other way. He was an avowed New York Jewish leftist freak. He would advocate rioting in the streets, violence against police, and the overthrow of the government. He was like my Dad with a microphone. Jay Lawrence, who introduced me to Al, had a favorite story that Al would tell constantly about his time as a de facto bodyguard for W.E.B. Dubois in the height of the Civil Right conflicts-

"I had to make sure that nobody messed with William Edward Burghardt DuBois. So, as we say in them old westerns, you know, we goin’ round up a posse, somebody’s gotta ride shotgun. Well, Al Lewis rode shotgun. And I always said, man, any mother's son put his foot on that running board knows he's the running board. I want to know if he could swallow the 45 that go right in his mouth. That's it."
(from an interview with Amy Goodman on Democracy Now!)

he would claim that this made him a black activist akin to the Panthers or Black Guerilla Family.
Al was a freak of another sort as well- a regular at porn conventions in Las Vegas. He was a dirty old man, memorably caught in the act of hitting on female Daily Show correspondent Beth Littleford while she was covering a sleazy beauty pageant that he was one of the judges of. This side of his public persona isn't mentioned on the BAI page. I would be interested how his colleagues, or indeed Al himself could reconcile his revolutionary ideals with the billion dollar porn industry. Perhaps he thought of himself as a perfect mix of Abby Hoffman and Screw magazine founder Al Goldstein.
Not that any of this is meant to demean him. I wish that more celebrities had the balls to be as outspoken as Al Lewis. If Alec Baldwin would just come out and say "Go out and throw a bomb at a cop!" instead of appearing in psuedo-subversive tripe like Fun With Dick and Jane, I would like him a whole lot more.
So, please pour out a little and find out more about your boy Grandpa Al Lewis.

*I didn't just get this idea from nowhere, it's based on a widely held and whispered about belief in P.R.- that the US Government has a secret bunker under El Yunque, the revered and feared jungle in the center of the island where locals refuse to go after dark. Any Puerto Rican will tell you never to go off the path in El Yunque and never to stay overnight. The realistic and practical will say that there might be fugitive rapist degenerates hiding out in there. The mystical might talk about El Yunque's holy significance in the pantheon of Santeria, how it shouldn't be disturbed lest Chango might send some snakes after your ass or something. The superstitious will tell you simply that there are "G-G-Ghosts!" about. And a surprising amount of people will tell you about strange late night noises heard by locals. Noises coming from inside the mountain. And mysterious lights appearing to rise up out of and return to the dense jungle at the heart of El Yunque. The more credible of these types will suggest that maybe the Air Force has some prototype aircraft lab down there. A special breed of Boriquas, though, will tell you about the UFOs that the government has there, and aliens which they are experimenting on, some of which escaped and created the Chupacabra (thats "Goatsucker" for the uninitiated) story which has become famous throughout the world. Like everybody didn't know that already.

A guy who was staying at Chacra de Cielo, the organic farm we stayed at in El Bolson showed us his copy of the book The Rebel Sell: Why the Culture can't be Jammed. He assured us that the book "cant be bought in the States" as if the NWO Lizard People Illuminati (see here) were trying to suppress it, but actually what the book proposes is quite apposite to all that conspiracy stuff. In fact, what the authors suggest is that there is no Conspiracy (capital C), and never was. There is no "system" and no "spectacle".
Joseph Heath and Andrew Potter are young Canadian academics who have been though the modern activist scene and come out with some bad tastes and original ideas. For them, the main flaw in modern revolutionary thought began when it's focus changed from "helping the common man" to "freeing the common man from his mental slavery". This change of ideals became even more convoluted, they suggest, when it then became "before you can free others' minds, you first must free your own." This shift is relatively new development, and didn't really take hold until the 60's.
According to the book, this was the decade that the whole democratic progressive activist movement was really subverted by people who confused hedonism for revolution, sexiness for political clout, fashion for progress. While real strides were being made on a grass roots political level for human and civil rights, posers who were more concerned with looking the part and getting laid were claiming their great victory. Then, they write "...(contrary to rumor) the hippies did not sell out. Hippie ideology and yuppie ideology are one and the same. There simply never was any tension between the countercultural ideas that informed the '60s rebellion and the ideological requirements of the capitalist system."
They go on to say that the "counterculture" is a hoax that's been played out ever since. Sure, the "revolution" wised up and turned it's back on the hippies, but because none us of us, punks and anarchists etc., ever questioned the fundamental "us vs. them" paradigm we haven't moved forward. We are still suckers for the sexy image of the martyred revolutionary, and we still think of ourselves as fighting against a "system" that is somehow "brainwashing" everyone into being complacent. Sure punks hate hippies, but how far have we really come from Pink Floyd's "Break down the wall!" to Youth of Today's "Break Down the Walls!"?
The book's main target is the new "counterculture"- Naomi Klein, Micheal Moore, the "culture-jamming" trend spearheaded by Adbusters magazine and the antiglobalisation protest movement. Each of these are approached directly, but the theme is that they are all based on a single fallacy- that everyone is brainwashed by "the spectacle" and all it will take is some creative publicity stunt to wake them up.
Once you start thinking about things in these terms, it's hard to stop. Yesterday, as usual, the anarchists and socialists and commies were having a huge rally around the 9 de Julio and Plaza de Mayo, pounding drums, yelling slogans, waving banners. Genevieve was walking home near all this when a young "revolutionary" took a fat stack of flyers that he was supposed to be distributing and threw them up behind him. Unfortunately he was standing in a crowd of people and Genevieve was standing right behind him and caught the whole stack in her face. Then he walked off without apologizing. When she got home and described the carelessness and cluelessness of this kid and his stupid Rasta hat, I thought about The Rebel Sell.
The idea of this undoubtedly middle class suburban kid, littering the world with pamphlets which he may not even understand, and hurting someone in the process makes my blood boil. Is his self-righteous revolutionary ejaculation more important than another person walking down the street without getting literally hit in the face with his adopted ideology? Maybe it's because she was obviously "brainwashed by the system" and needed to be woken up out of her complacency. This must have been obvious to him because she was just walking by and not on the other side banging a gong and waving a red flag. But, of course, if everyone was over on the other side of the street, there wouldn't be anything to get worked up about anymore. If everyone was on the other side, that's the side that wouldn't seem as appealing to little revolutionaries anymore.
Just the fact this young firebrand would wear a Rasta hat (and lets make the safe bet he had Che patch on his person somewhere) shows that he has no problem with advertising an ideology that he couldn't possibly fully understand. Let us remember that liking Bob Marley and being a fire-and-brimstone Battyman-hating Rasta are NOT the same thing, and that thinking the Zapatistas look cool in their anarcho-ninja outfits is not the same as understanding Mao.
As you can tell, I thought The Rebel Sell was inspired and thought provoking, but I also found it somewhat infuriating. The tone is consistently arrogant and often didactic on subjects that scholars have been discussing for years. In the first chapter alone they blast through Frued, Marx, the hippies, situationism, punk, hip hop, workers struggle, autosugestion in advertising, even the movies American Beauty and Pleasantville.
All this slapdash coverage laced with snide commentary is bound to stumble, and it often does spectacularly. About the role of alcohol as a state sponsored stupefacient they say that the government "has fought against alcohol again and again" citing prohibition, and that "the claims made about LSD in the sixties are the same made about absinthe in the 20s". What prohibition, a social movement of the early twentieth century, or absinthe, a NARCOTIC (not just a form of alcohol) has to do with modern alcohol consumption I have no idea. And on the idea of Marihuana as a mind-expanding substance they simply say that no pothead could help with any revolution because "anyone who has ever spoken with a stoned person knows they are they most boring people in the world to talk with." Funny? Yes. But incredibly dismissive. I guess Terrence McKenna wasted his whole life work looking into this and we should just move on?
Another problem with the book is that it is so clearly aware of it's itended audience that it often seems insular. I understand that Heath and Potter are trying to reach the same college-age readers that lapped up No Logo and Adbusters, but they shouldn't exclude others. For example, they patiently take you though the theories of Frued and how they are regarded today, then turn around and drop references to "The infamous rave scene in the Matrix 2" totally unexplained. Sorry guys, but not all of us consider The Matrix trilogy to be a great cultural milestone (i.e. we're not all baked Canadians).
Overall the book is quite hilarious and quite worth reading. The best are it's respective trashings of American Beauty (it's the pot smoking counterculture vs. the sexually repressed gun toting facists all over again!), Easy Rider (self-indulgent white potheads liken themselves to black civil rights activists by being martyred in the deep south!), and Alanis Morrisette (she sings "thank you, India" as if the whole subcontinent will wave back and say "You're welcome, Alanis!"). These are worth the price of admission alone. I just hope those Evil American Imperialists will let this WMD over the border from the land of freedom and liberty to the North... (order here).