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100 weirdest Things in Alt-Rock: Part 10 Aug 02, 2023

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There’s a fine line between “wonderful” and “weird”...things that are “wonderful” tend to inspire you with awe...you feel warmth and light and awe and admiration...and you may suddenly find yourself believing in goodness and a higher power...

I saw a total solar eclipse once...that’s exactly how I felt...maybe you’ve had a similar experience...

But just a few centimeters from “wonderful” is how you feel when you run across something that’s genuinely “weird”...you might still feel awed—but you might also experience disbelief, confusion, disgust...and you may even feel a little throw-up at the back of your throat...

Or you might laugh...”Weird” fan be funny....or you might think that something “weird” is really, really cool...see, there’s good “weird” as well as bad... “wonderfully weird,” if you will...it’s all in the eye of the beholder...

Let’s see where this stuff fits in with you...its part ten of “100 weird things about new rock”...

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100 Weirdest Things in Alt-Rock: Part 9 Jul 26, 2023

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Money is a weird thing...when you don’t have it, it’s all you can think about...when you do have it, it’s the last thing on your mind...

It’s gotta be especially weird for successful musicians...99.9% of all rock performers come from very modest backgrounds...for years, they make sacrifices for their art, hoping and praying that one day, they won’t have to worry about where their next meal comes from or how they’re gonna manage to pay the rent....

But 99.99% of professional musicians will never hit the big time...they may make an okay living, but they’ll never be rich...

But what about that 1/100th of 1 per cent that do hit the big time?...for them, life changes a lot and it changes fast...suddenly, they’re able to do and have things that they never even dreamed of...

Some can handle it and ease into the über-rich lifestyle with elegance and grace...others–well, not so much...others still use their positions to do strange, excessive and occasionally destructive things...

And, not surprisingly, things on all sides of the ledger can get quite weird...

This is part 9 of “100 weird things about new rock”...it’s 10 tales of wealth, success and excess.

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100 Weirdest Things in Alt-Rock: Part 8 Jul 19, 2023

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The standard musical diet consists of three things: sex, drugs and rock’n’roll....all three of these stapes affect the same areas of the brain...

We’ve talked about this before, but here’s a quick refresher course in neuroscience...

In your head, you have the amygdala, the cerebellum and the nucleus accumbens...they’re involved in the process of creating and regulating dopamine, which is the hormone that makes you feel good...

These regions analyze what’s going on when you have an orgasm, take cocaine or listen to a great song...dopamine is released into the bloodstream, which is a signal to the rest of the body that says, “this is good! Let’s have more!”...

Needless to say, dopamine is a pretty addictive hormone...mix music and drugs and you’re heading down a slippery slope...as we’ve seen many times–including earlier this in this year–things can get very weird very quickly...

But musicians taking drugs is often a very solitary and personal thing...with sex, other people are involved...most of the time...but then again, we are talking about weirdness, aren’t we?

You might want get the kids and grandma to do something else for the next hour...this is “100 weird things about new rock, part 8"–and the topic what happens when new rock and alternative music mixes with weird sex...

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100 Weirdest Things in Alt-Rock: Part 7 Jul 12, 2023

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It is a fact of human nature that those given the power to make rules that govern the behavior the rest of us will devote their lives to making and enforcing those rules...

Most of the time, that’s a good thing...if you murder someone in cold blood and you’re caught, you’ll face justice...robbery is illegal...and so is owning a pig in France and calling it “napoleon”...

No, seriously...it’s against the law to name your pig “napoleon” if you live in France...in California, women may not operate an automobile while wearing a house coat...and in Canada, it’s apparently illegal to remove a bandage in public....who knew?...

Then there are all the weird lawsuits–like the dry cleaners who were sued for $54 million for losing a pair of pants...or the American politician who filed a suit against god for causing natural disasters and inspiring terrorists...

And then there are all the tiny legal nuances that either allow cases to proceed or have them dismissed on a technicality—hello, O.J. Simpson...

The world of rock is not immune to legal foibles...crimes, felonies, misdemeanors, weird lawsuits, legal charges, jail time–the works...

Which got me thinking: what are the weirdest intersections of the law and new rock of all time?...I came up with a list of ten....

This is “100 weird things about new rock, part 7: 10 stories from the legal files:...

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100 Weirdest Things in Alt-Rock: Part 6 Jul 05, 2023

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I think we take music for granted...as much as we love it; we also treat it like something disposable...

And I don’t if we can be blamed for it...I mean, there’s just so much music out there...there’s a never-ending supply...

We hear a song...we evaluate it–sometimes in less than 3 seconds–and then we either accept or reject the song...and if we accept it, we’ll listen to it only until something better comes along...

We seldom stop to think about all the effort–the time, the inspiration, the emotion, the skill, the technology, the money–that went into creating that one song...

While music can be written and created anywhere, you need a recording studio to preserve it, to put it into a form in which it can be duplicated and then distributed to the world so we–the fans–can finally get to hear it...

And recording studios can be weird places...confining windowless rooms where time seems to lose all meaning...yet the goal is to capture the energy of a live performance...

In other words, there’s a lot that can happen between the time a songwriter feels that creative flash and we finally get to hear the end result...and yes, it can get very, very weird along the way...

This is part 6 of “100 weird things about new rock”...I call this episode “studio stories”...

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100 Weirdest Things in Alt-Rock: Part 5 Jun 28, 2023

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Some things just go together naturally...

A nice sauterne is a fine companion to foie gras that is served with fruit compote...or, if that’s too rich, strawberry jam works well in a sandwich with peanut butter...

And, as even the most casual observer knows that rock music often comes with side order of drugs...

In case you haven’t noticed, rock and drugs often have some kind of symbiotic relationship...

I mean, the self-appointed moralists who want to sanitize life for the rest of us kinda have a point...the world of rock’n’roll is filled with stories of druggy excess and the kind of misery only drugs can offer...

A lot of lives have been ruined or ended by that dangerous combination of rock music and drugs...and more often than not, things can get really weird...really weird...

I have ten stories where rock and drugs have intersected with very strange results...

It’s part five of “100 weird things about new rock”...

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100 Weirdest Things in Alt-Rock: Part 4 Jun 21, 2023

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From the outside, being in a famous touring rock band seems like a glamourous thing...you travel the world, playing for thousands of adoring fans night after night with your gang of buddies...

Oh, the gloriousness of it all...the private jets!...the media exposure!...the excitement!...the perks!...the sites!...the sex!...the drugs!...your every whim catered to by people whose job is to, well, cater to your every whim...

And that really is the reality–for maybe the top 1/10 of one per cent of groups in the world...for other 99.9%, going on the road is a trying ordeal that can get pretty uncomfortable real fast...

I mean, think about it...for the entire time you’re on tour, you’re living in a bubble, going where you’re told to go, doing what you’re told to do and living out of suitcases for months on end...

You can wake up in the van or the bus one morning after the gig and quite literally have no idea what country you’re in, let alone what city...

Then there’s the bad food, the interviews with the same stupid questions all the time, annoying fans, the late nights, too much alcohol, too many drugs and not enough sleep...

The only thing that makes it all worthwhile is the fact you get to play every night...but even that gets old after a while...all you want to do is go home, do the laundry and finally be left alone for a while...

With that kind of working environment, life on the road can get pretty weird...how weird?...let us count the ways...

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Introducing... Deadman's Curse: Slumach's Gold Jun 17, 2023

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This historical, true crime podcast hosted by Kru Williams from History Television's hit original series Deadman’s Curse: The Legend of the Lost Gold investigates the curse and legend surrounding the lost gold mine of Pitt Lake.

On their quest they're joined by members of the Stó:lō and Katzie First Nations, historians and cultural experts of diverse backgrounds, as they sort fact from fiction and give Slumach a voice from the other side of the veil.

You'll hear about how an Indigenous prospector, accused of murder set a curse on anyone who searched for his hidden gold just before he was hanged. Over a century later, a prospector, a mountaineer, a truth-seeker and a way-shower band together to walk the same paths of those who went looking for Slumach’s cursed gold and never returned find how a single bullet was the catalyst for a 150-year-old mystery.

Click here to find it on your favourite podcast app.

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100 Weirdest Things in Alt-Rock: Part 3 Jun 14, 2023

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If you’re listening to this show, you are a music fan...any arguments?...probably not...

“fan” is short for “fanatic”–a person who is extremely passionate and enthusiastic about something...could be sports, could be movies, could be music...and fans tend to be reasonably uncritical about the objects of their affection...

But all “fanaticism”–and we’re using the proper dictionary terms here–is not the same...we can go from being a casual fan of something to being a devotee...but then “fan” gives away to the negative connotations of “fanatic,” all the way up to “zealot” and “militant”...this is where things get unbalanced, obsessive and dangerous...

If you’re a public figure—say, a famous musician–your whole goal is to attract fans...your whole life is about finding people who really, really like what you do....

The problem is, however, that with the good come the weirdo’s...and this is where things can get very, very strange...

This is part three of “100 weird things about new rock”...ten tales of fans, stalkers and the downright crazy...

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100 Weirdest Things in Alt-Rock: Part 2 Jun 07, 2023

Show notes

There’s an old saying that goes “he who dies with the least regrets wins”...

Good words to live by because by the time we shuffle off this mortal coil, all of us are going to have done and said things that we wish we hadn’t...and chances are, we hope that no one finds out about this stuff...

It’s the skeletons in the closet–pieces of our past that we try not to show (or even try to hide) from other people...

But in the era of tabloid celebrity, paparazzi, Facebook, MySpace, twitter, Wikipedia, blogs, tmz.com, the smoking gun and Pérez Hilton, it’s getting harder and harder to keep the bad stuff buried...it has a way of being exhumed...

You know the kind of stuff I’m talking about...the rumour that Hitler’s paternal grandparent was Jewish...the alien autopsies at area 51....Angelina Jolie’s allegedly history of bisexuality [pause]...uh, sorry...where was I?...

Anyway, all of this got me thinking: what are some of great secrets from the world of new rock and alternative music that today’s performers would rather we not discuss?...

This is part two of “100 weird things about new rock”...

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