Sorry.  I’ll be flying the rest of the day.  I wanted to get more done, which I may do yet when I get back to the other side of the country.  Frustrating when you want to work but you’re taking care of last minute details.  See you soon.  Thanks for understanding.

Sundance favorite and Sony Pictures Classic movie The Wackness gets another teaser trailer and this one is just as bad as the first.  We’re told to not judge the movie by the lame trailers, but it’s kinda hard to do.  It’s evident that Sony Pictures Classic marketing department is terrible.  I think this movie is about the relationship between Ben Kingsly and Josh Peck and might have something to do with hip-hop and tagging, but I’m not positive.

Someone better help this movie out pronto if it really is as good as people are saying.

So if Leslie Feist got the iPod bump, which catapulted her into superduper stardom in 2007 (apparently she also got dual citzenship from Steve Jobs … man that guy has some pull) then what is the Colbert Bump going to do for her career in 2008? She might just become supreme dictator of the world!

Feist and Colbert talk sparkling outfits, “1 2 3 4,” her dual citzenship and indie rock in this enjoyable interview.

And here is her musical performance of “I Feel It All” off of The Reminder.

I can’t believe Stephen Colbert rocked the sparkly blue outfit she gave him.

Maybe this only interests me, or those of you who enjoy the works of author J.D. Salinger (Catcher in the Rye, Franny and Zooey). There’s an auction going on at Ebay right now where you can take home the above letter written by the author in 1981 to Janet Eagleson, whom the author carried on an affair with.

The bidding starts at $1,250 and the letter is estimated to be worth between $2,500-$3,000. So it’s not cheap but not expensive either.

However, the real news hear is that the author slags on of the greatest films ever in Raiders of the Lost Ark.

“…The sight of summer in full swing has put me off ever since I can remember. Oddly, I work nicely or at least normally amidst all the greening and flowering and burgeoning. But correspondence falls off, goes to pot…on top of everything, the woodshed crew…have been here…leaving me rattly and pale, but with a shelter of sorts for some twenty cords of wood. As ugly a structure as any I’ve seen, with lots of shitty little space-filling fancy scroll-y crosspieces, said to be ‘functional’. No doubt it will take an esthetic turn for the better with a couple of good hard winters. I took the morning bus into Boston…to do what I almost never do…went to see some particular pictures in a gallery. The Pissarro exhibit…Have seen no good movies, except The Last Metro…I got hooked into seeing Raiders of the Lost Ark, which might be excused for its unwitty, unfunny awful socko-ness if it had been put together by Harvard Lampoon seniors…Hope to see yez [sic] one of these limbo summer days…”

Boldness by us for emphasis. He closes the letter with the very emo-esque: “Have been in New York (I am the Man, I suffered, I was There.)”

Seriously though, how do you hate on Raiders? Everything I ever felt for the author is now gone. He is dead to me, even though I assumed he had been dead for the past thirty years.

Wouldn’t it be kind of cool though if J.D. Salinger had a movie blog and no one new it was him or it was one of those secrets that everyone knows about but no one will admit it? Especially the author in question. I don’t know why, but I like the image of him just writing for the simple pleasure of it alone in a house somewhere in the Vermont or New Hampshire woods.

Well, at least in high quality. Last night the viral marketing took fans on a scavenger hunt around various cities all to unlock the news that the new trailer will debut online this coming Sunday. Which means it’ll show in front of some movie this weekend. Iron Man perhaps? Seems unlikely, competing studios and all but we’ll wait and see.

Regardless, if you went on the scavenger hunt you were met with this image at Happy Trails. Not debuting a trailer for the people that participated in the scavenger hunt is a slap in the face to those dedicated fans out there.

Luckily the bootleg of the trailer, which played at New York’s Comic Con has made it online. The quality is awful, but the fan reaction is not!

It’s also popped up on YouTube if this video gets taken down check there.

Update: Seems that people who participated in this mayhem were treated to the trailer. Collider has a recount of the madness that took place in Los Angeles. Sounds like it was a fun, but chaotic time.

Maybe this is the greatest thing ever.  I don’t know for sure since the wheel, sliced bread and fire are all pretty great.  The Egyptians might even make the case for irrigation and I wouldn’t argue.  But Willie Nelson and Snoop Dogg rocking the mic in Amsterdam was bound to happen wasn’t it?  All three share a love for pot that no one else can touch.  [via]

More where that came from. MORE »

It’s just not official. Sorry for the yes she is, no she isn’t, but it seems that Amy Winehouse and producer Mark Ronson are working on a theme for the new Bond flick Quantum of Solace. It’s just that the song is more of an audition. Seems that producers like to have an open competition.

“They asked Amy, and I think Amy said that if she did it, she’d want to do it with me. So hopefully something will come of it,” Ronson told the BBC’s Music Week’s show. “The demo sounds like a James Bond theme, hopefully. But I don’t know if it’ll get used.”

He added: “I’m sure there are loads more really famous people that probably we’re competing with and we don’t know about. I’m not sure. But hopefully I’ll still be alive for at least 12 more Bond themes. If we don’t get this one maybe we’ll get another one.”

Interestingly enough, (according to Wikipedia so you know swallow with huge chunks of rock salt) there have been alternative themes for the majority of Bond movies. Blondie, Alice Cooper, The Pretenders, Saint Etienne, The Cardigans and The Pet Shop Boys have all recorded theme songs of their own over the years. That would make a dope compilation if someone could dig up old Mp3’s of lost Bond Theme songs. Who wouldn’t want to buy that.

I’d propose to throw another name into the ring. That of Sharon Jones. Her backing band The Dap Kings basically played all the music on Amy Winehouse’s Back to Black album, so while Winehouse got all the love for her “retro soul” sound it was an actual soul band that provided the goods. Sharon Jones is so much better than Winehouse. It’s like comparing Mike Jordan and Vince Carter.

Only one is the real deal. Plus you don’t have to worry about Sharon Jones smoking crack during the recording sessions. Call that bonus number two.

Mp3: Sharon Jones and The Dap Kings - “100 Days, 100 Nights”
Mp3: Sharon Jones and The Dap Kings - “Humble Me”

Miller’s Brew Blog is drawing the ire from several competitors, including industry giant Anheuser-Busch. The blog, run by 37 year-old industry reporter James Arndorfer has gotten several scoops since the sites incarnation, even beating publicity firms from rival companies.

“Brew Blog is the latest and perhaps most unlikely front in Miller’s drive to rattle Anheuser. Mr. Arndorfer tracks the St. Louis company’s every move, from earnings reports to management changes. He relishes revealing details of its products before Anheuser does.

Though Mr. Arndorfer covers other brewers, he’s ‘fixated on A-B,’ says Harry Schuhmacher, editor of Beer Business Daily, an online newsletter. Mr. Arndorfer responds: ‘They’re the industry leader. And they’ve been making a lot of news.’”

And that’s fine if his blog wasn’t owned by a competing brewing company. There isn’t even a hint of propiety involved. Go easy on your own company and take shots at the competitor under the guise of “journalism.” Not exactly fair and balanced.

I’m willing to be if you asked Miller they would claim the Brew Blog is just that - a blog. Not a new media platform. But for anyone 35 and under, blog are mini-media companies. There are traditional media companies like the Wall Street Journal or The NY Times and new media like Daily Kos or Gawker Media. And though this may just seem like the rivalry between Miller and Bud upping the ante, the ramifications go much deeper.

Not so crazy about the blog is Mr. Schuhmacher, the editor and publisher of Beer Business Daily. Mr. Schuhmacher, who charges $440 a year for his publication, declines to say how many subscribers he has. “I tell Miller you’re subsidizing a free publication, and it hurts the trade press,” he says. “But they don’t care.”

Mr. Schuhmacher became angry when Miller bought ads to run alongside Google searches for the keywords “Harry Schuhmacher” and “Beer Business Daily” to drive visitors to Brew Blog. The brewer took the ads down after he complained.

Mr. Schuhmacher adds that he writes fewer positive pieces about Miller than he once did because he knows Brew Blog will always publish the same stories. On a recent evening, a Miller spokesman suggested he write about one of its newer brews, a lemonade-flavored wheat beer called Leinenkugel’s Summer Shandy.

“I said, ‘You know what, give it to Brew Blog,’” Mr. Schuhmacher says.

And that’s the real problem when other journalistic endeavors just give up.

Why mess with a good thing? The theme song for the Warner Brothers summer flick Speed Racer has dropped over the weekend on Myspace. And it’s as cringe inducing as the new Sex and the City theme song by Fergie. “Go Speed Racer Go” is performed by Ali Dee and the Deekompressors. And they took what was a groovy little tune and just bastardized it.

And yeah, you’re probably going to need drugs to enjoy the Wachowski Brothers movie. It looks like a live action anime cartoon. If you suffer from seizures then you may want to avoid this when it comes out on May 9.

As compiled by the UK’s Telegraph. They’re not too clear on what they consider a “cult book.” Often times it’s hard to differentiate these types of books from say, bestsellers or classics. Also, cult books vary significantly from cult movies. Cult movies tend to be trashy or bad in a way that makes them pleasurably good. But that isn’t the case with cult books. Cult books tend to change our lives in one way or another. They’re the type of books you go clamoring on to your friends about that they have to read it.

“In compiling our list, we were looking for the sort of book that people wear like a leather jacket or carry around like a totem. The book that rewires your head: that turns you on to psychedelics; makes you want to move to Greece; makes you a pacifist; gives you a way of thinking about yourself as a woman, or a voice in your head that makes it feel okay to be a teenager; conjures into being a character who becomes a permanent inhabitant of your mental flophouse.

We were able to agree, finally, on one thing: you know a cult book when you see one. And people have passionate feelings on both sides: our appeal for suggestions yielded enough for a list at least three times as long as this one,” they wrote.

Among the books they’ve included are: Slaughterhouse 5 by Kurt Vonnegut, Baby and Child Care by Doctor Spock, Catch-22 by Joseph Heller, The Beaty Myth by Naomi Wolf, A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole and many more.

It reads like a who’s who of important literature, so much so that many of these novels are considered classics and I would be hesitant to call them cult books. I guess, I wish there were more books on here that were unknowns instead of some obvious choices. Still, you could do worse than reading the books on this list, which works as a fantastic literary primer.

Full list after the jump. We’ve left the original authors’s notes because they indicate a personal attachment to the books, which is sometimes the best endorsement. MORE »

Growing up my sister was a very dedicated ballet dancer, even went to college for it.  It was one of the many things she excelled at.  Still, that didn’t change my appreciation or lack thereof for the type of athleticism, skill and dedication it takes to be a successful dancer.  Hell, getting dragged to her recitals every year all I would hope for was a few good numbers, maybe a great tune and something unexpected.

But I was never fortunate enough to get The Pixies.  Maybe only now, years removed from adolescence can I appreciate the video below.  And look back and understand the beauty of ballet and how my ennui as a child ruined what it was my sister was accomplishing.  Or maybe it’s just The Pixies are that wonderful.  Or maybe I secretly liked watching the ballerinas and that’s why I kept going back year after year, like a pervy 12 year-old Degas.  Regardless, more dance companies should make use of non-traditional music.  Well, non-traditional for ballet anyways.

[via]