It seems as if, like me, you’re somewhat more into chick singers. Gotta tell you though, two of the`best live performances I have`ever scene (with great CDs to match) were from Tom Russell and Fred Eaglesmith. I hate`labels cuz they leave out as much as they reveal, but these guys are usually called Americana, or sometimes country or alternative country.

What sets them apart is really unique vocals and phenomenal songwriting. If I had to compare them to someone famous it’d be Lyle Lovett.

I don’t know where you stand on Norman Rockwell — over-rated hack who was really just an illustrator versus genius who could tell an entire short story with a few deceptively simple strokes–but I fall on the genius side. These guys are the same way with their song lyrics.

Listen to “Alcohol and Pills” or “Water in the Fuel” by Eaglesmith. If you can find Russell’s “Gallo del Cielo” heck, you don’t just get a short story you get an epic tragedy.

Also: Locally, the guys that wrote that well were Jesus Presley (might be defunct), Fernando Viviconte (myspace) and 17 Reasons Why. 17RW was led by singer/songwriter Sattie Clark and won a nation-wide contest for best unsigned band a few years ago for their album The Dark Years. I think Sattie is still kicking it around Portland.

A friend’s son is currently steaming his way to Afghanistan (you remember: the place where we actually were fighting terrorists and making military progress until we pulled out most of our troops to send to Iraq).  He’s Marine Forces Recon and is being deployed as part of a ten-man Airborne jump team.

His mom seems (outwardly) stoic, but all I can do is flashback on news footage of crashed helicopters. Or on the tragic waste of a life in the Pat Tillman incident.  Not that he wasted his life, but that the  command structure was so cavalier in its own carelessness and incompetence that it essentially threw him away as if he were garbage. And then pissed on the grave by lying and covering up to his family.

Over 70 percent of the country want the troops home.  We elected a bunch of  new people in ‘06.  What more can we do to keep men like this from dying over there?  It’s not a rhetorical question:  what more must we do?  I don’t want this kid coming home in a bag so Bush can  look resolute.  What can we do?

I wrote my best letter to the editor EVER last week to the Gorgonian.  Turns out they wanted to publish it as the lead in a group, along with a picture AND I NEVER GOT THE MESSAGE.  Their email was languishing in my junk drawer with about a hundred porn solicitaions.

So here’s the letter I wrote, concerning the fate of foster child Gabriel Allred.  He was ordered to be removed from his foster family and sent to live with his biological grandmother in Mexico.

I May Be Moving to Germany

One of the things seemingly forgotten in the hoopla surrounding the attempted deportation (let’s call it what it is) of Gabriel Allred to Mexico by DHS is that the child is a U.S. citizen.  The biggest problem in the whole mess, and the one nobody wants to talk about, is that the policy which Children’s Services uses to make these decisions is–and always has been–fundamentally flawed.  The policy–like that of many other equivalent agencies in other states–is to “preserve the biological family.”  That’s like their Prime Directive.

Somehow, the assumption that that is somehow automatically in the child’s best interest goes unspoken and unchallenged; and, until it is challenged successfully, we will have an unending number of cases where children are ripped from the only homes they have ever known, or reunited with parents under whose “care” they are likely to die or be killed.  As they are bureaucrats and not starship captains, they will never break the rules because it was the right thing to do.  Following the policy is always the right thing to do, or it wouldn’t be the policy. Duh!

The equivalent metaphor, here, is if Oregon decided it was policy to send random people with last names starting in B back to countries where they have ancestors.  Suddenly, I find myself in Germany, where I know no one, do not speak the language, know nothing of the culture, but someone has been found there who shares my name.

It sounds so absurd on its face, that we want to deny that this is what is happening to Gabriel; but the whimsical cruelty and pure arbitrariness are exactly the same.  It is like so many other social policies:  the ones with no power have no say. Let the wheels of bureaucracy crush all in their path.

Gotta Give Them Their Props.

If you read Neil Gaiman or Terry Pratchett of Douglas Adams you are probably already watching Pushing Daisies. If you are a fan of Tim Burton’s movies, you really should be watching. ABC’s Pushing Daisies is one of the best shows going on television. It’s a sweet natured story, created by Bryan Fuller – a man with a history of creating similar shows such as Wonderfalls and Dead Like Me.

A quick recap:

Ned is The Piemaker, a character who had a strange, Oliver Twist, Dickensian childhood, although the setting is neither in England nor the Victorian era. He has the ability to touch people and bring them back to life for up to one minute, after which he touches them again and they are gone forever.

Charlotte “Chuck” Charles was the unattainable object of Ned’s childhood affection. She was a mermaid—oddly enough, not a real mermaid, just a member of a famous family of synchronized swimmers. When she dies as an adult (in the pilot episode), Ned is able to revive her and keep her alive, but if he ever touches her again she’s dead for good.

Olive Snook is the Piemaker’s assistant, who had her eyes on Ned, and consequently has a prickly relationship with Chuck.

And Emerson Cod (don’t you love these names!) is a private detective. Ned decides he should use his powers to wake corpses, ask how they died, and perhaps solve their murders. Emerson helps in these investigations.

The stories are cute, and given a nice little twist by a Fractured Fairy Tales type narrator, but what makes this unlike anything you’ve seen on television is the production design. Although everything in the world except Ned is normal (at least in the sense of not supernatural), the look of the houses, stores, schools, town is right out of the village in Big Fish, maybe with a little Pee Wee’s Playhouse thrown in.

In the look of the show, I would have to include the casting. Lee Pace manages to make Ned seem constantly mournful, perhaps regretting all the missed affection from his childhood. Anna Friel as Chuck has an almost preternatural whimsical appeal, which makes you understand why Ned would want to keep her around even if he can never touch her. She couldn’t be cuter if she was a basket of puppies. Kristin Chenoweth is very funny, because she is small and cute, but her character Olive is a little annoying.

And special kudos to the props. Among which I would have to include Kristin’s breasts. This is not because I am a breast-obsessed uncouth male dickhead. For one thing, I am an ass man, thank you very much. But for such a small woman (4′11”), she has these incredibly round, full, and yes, jiggly breasts. In the show, they seem to have a life of their own which is why I am including them as a prop.

But the number one prop—again stretching the definition a bit—is the hilarious make up effects on the various maimed, mutilated, burned, etc. corpses. They aren’t funny in the over-the-top-horror way of, for example, the zombies in Roberto Rodriguez’s Planet of Terror. They are outright, laugh-out-loud funny. Exaggerated tire treads on a victim who was run over, horsehoe prints on the face of one who was trampled, you gotta see ‘em to believe ‘em. And then you’ll be hooked.

In short (I know, too late) props for the props of this whimsical, hyper-real fairy tale.

Pushing Daisies airs Wednesday at 8 p.m. on ABC. If you missed any of the episodes you can catch up at ABC.com

Tim Kring, et al., continue to deliver as they promised.

If you haven’t come back to Heroes yet, boy are you missing out.  Things are happening, people. Getting a little clearer.  Suresh, Bob, HRG:  good or evil?  You might be surprised.

A little less Claire, and a little more Elle.  Uh, that’s Elle, the Executioner.  (And Bob’s daughter.)  Hiro is back in the present, and learns that, even if he could save his father, it is probably best not to “play God.”  Isaac’s paintings are still coming true, but in unexpected ways.

And, in much the same way that a decent reason for watching Bionic Woman is as a lead in to Life, a good case could be made for watching Chuck since it’s the lead in for Heroes.  Despite its abysmal ratings, this has turned out to be a pretty funny and cute show without ever getting cutesy.  Big kudos have to go to the charm of the cast, Zachary Levi as Chuck, Joshua Gomez as best friend and fellow nerd Morgan, Yvonne Strahovski as Sara, the CIA agent who is supposed to protect Chuck, and particularly Adam Baldwin as the overzealous NSA agent who competes and sometimes cooperates with Sara.

Also, if you didn’t catch it on Monday, people are all abuzz about the appearance of Slusho in Heroes.  Actually, the cast was drinking it in funny behind the scenes type of shots, however, Elle was drinking it in the episode last night.

Slusho, for the  people scratching their heads, was a  slushy drink used by JJ Abrams first in Alias and then subsequently in other properties of his like Mission Impossible III and recently in the promos for the monster flick Cloverfield.  Is there a connection other than good buddy Greg Grunberg?  We shall see.

I wholeheartedly and freely admit to having a thing for “so-called” children’s literature. Loved and still might at any time re-read The Black Cauldron books, The Chronicles of Narnia, Harry Potter, E.B. White, Huckleberry Finn or Prince and the Pauper, Rikki Tikki Tavi, The Little Prince, the list goes on.

So, could someone please explain to me the appeal of Oxford professor Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials trilogy? We have a star-studded, effects-laden movie coming up which may or may not be good on its own. But I just didn’t get the series as a whole. Yeah, it created its own, kind of interesting, semi-parallel world. But somehow I missed the point.  What’s the appeal on a non-story level?

Is it anti-Catholic? Anti-religion? Pro-religion in some Narnian way I don’t perceive? If it’s just another LOTR-style, good vs. evil, apocalyptic story, I thought the sides weren’t very clear.

Am I the only one in the dark on this one?

I’m Baaaaaack

I have been gone from the hallowed halls of oysterdom for a while. Waiting—in vain, as it turned out—for the outpouring of reaction from the oysterites, asking, “Where has he gone? We are bereft without Big Rob’s wisdom and guidance!”

I’d like to be able to claim I have been in a disgust-induced coma, due to the fact that Big Tobacco was so easily able to buy your vote for a mere $12 million. That would be as untrue as their ad campaign, though. Truth is, I was Actually ill for awhile. But watching and waiting, always thinking. And now, I’m ready to spew forth. Get back!

If You Gave Up on Heroes, Come Back, All Is Forgiven

All of your complaints about this season’s Heroes were legitimate. Even show creator Tim Kring acknowledged the mistakes.

The last episode went a long, long way toward setting things right. We find out the beginning of Maya’s story. We find out what happened to Peter and Nathan after the explosion in New York, how Peter lost his memory, and why Elle is so intense on nailing him (so to speak).

We find out what happened to D.L. and how Niki ends up working for the Company. We get yet more contradictory information about the Company (good or evil?) as one of its founders, Adam, appears to be a prisoner of the Company yet helps Peter escape and heals Nathan.

We get more Kristin Bell. (Can there be enough?)

In summary, we no longer are being presented with more and more questions and characters or slow moving plots without getting at least some answers along the way.

I Brought It to You Oysterites First

If you took my recommendation, and have been watching Back to You, well done. If you have not yet got around to watching an episode, yesterday would have been a good time to start. This has all the earmarks of those classic Frasier episodes which were pure farce—meaning side-splittingly hilarious—yet never lost sight of why we care for the characters, and why they care for each other.

Chuck (Kelsey Grammer) was still unhappy that Kelly (Patricia Heaton) had not told their daughter Gracie that he is her father. Now it is Gracie’s eleventh birthday, and Kelly has it all planned out. Of course, Chuck, along with the rest of the top-notch cast, managed to be there, and there was something about a crazed raccoon.  Worth every second.  And please don’t bemoan the sitcom until you give this show a chance.  It’s not reinventing the wheel, but it certainly is funny.

Bionic Woman Still Looks Strong

Much has been made about all the behind the scenes shake-ups in the writing/producing crew behind Bionic Woman. I have to say, it has not evidenced itself in what shows up on the air (at least so far).

The show has been pretty consistent, carrying on with its basic themes: Jamie’s discomfort at being treated like a project instead of a person; her personal conflicts in having to lie to her little sister, Becca, her desire to be a good “mom” to Becca vs, Becca’s tendency to be the “rebellious teen”; her continuing learning curve regarding her abilities and limitations.

They did seem to drop the “evil prototype” story kind of precipitously, hence the lack of Katie Sackoff for all you Portlanders, but I have faith she will return in interesting ways.

And, as a bonus, BW is the lead in for what remains as one of the best written and acted new series, Life. Brownshirt alert: Olivia, a recurring character on the show, who is theoretically supposed to marry Crewes’ dad, is played by Christine Hendricks – Mal’s “wife” from Firefly. She amusingly turns Charlie’s friend Ted (Adam Arkin) into a gibbering pile of mush merely by her presence.

Mmmmm…. Pretty

There must be something in the ink at Advertising Age magazine. How else to explain such disparate agencies coming up with simultaneous campaigns which each use cool, sexy, hypnotic female vocals in the songs for their TV commercials?

If you’re like me, when you hear a cool song, and don’t know who recorded it, you will drive yourself CRAZY trying to find out.

The first ad wasn’t too difficult. It was Feist, doing “1-2-3-4″ in the Apple iPod commercial. Insanity partially averted. Amazing how this one ad catapulted this Canadian pop singer from relative obscurity (she was already immensely popular amongst music bloggers and those in the know) into a household name. She’s on Letterman getting her friends to sing backup, she’s selling out large concert hall venues, etc.

Next, there was the Liberty Mutual Insurance commercial. This was the “Responsibility” ad. I eventually discovered the song was by a band called Hem, off of their self-released CD, “Rabbit Songs.” The song is “Half Acre” although one blogger seems to think it is a different Hem song.

Most difficult was a very addictive song for–of all things–the Oregon Humane Society. Their TV ad to “End Petlessness” has a song by Portland singer/songwriter, Laura Gibson. The song is called “Hands in Pocket,” play the YouTube commercial, below; click on it to get related links including a full length video of Gibson singing the song at the Doug Fir Lounge.

[Jim here: not to step on Big Rob's toes or anything but I'd like to chime in with my own female singing commercial which drives me crazy. It's the Old Navy commercial and the song is "The Way I Am" by Ingrid Michaelson. She looks like Lisa Loeb's younger sister. She's got the whole sexy glasses/sexy singer thing going on. I want her to marry me.]

I would like to say, “Sanity completely restored” but I’m more honest with myself than that.

Mp3: Feist – “1-2-3-4″
Mp3: Hem – “Half Acre”
Mp3: Laura Gibson – “Hands in Pockets”
Mp3: Ingrid Michaelson – “The Way I Am”

Thanks to EW we’ve got a list of the “25 Awesome Action Heroes.” And we say shame on them for that makes things easy. It’s easy to rundown the usual suspects like John McClane, Ripley, Indiana Jones, The Bride, The Terminator, etc. etc.

If you feel like looking at that list then we say all the power to you. But we have an Important Question for the Ages and I think it requires a definitive answer.

Who is the absolute worst action star actor ever?

Seriously… think of it. There are some great ones, especially given the plentitude of one-hit wonders.

Don “The Dragon” Wilson? Jeff Speakman? Sylvester Stallone? Michel Dudikoff? Steven Seagal (somehow he mad EW’s list)? Arnold Schwarzenegger (again how is he on EW’s list)? Jean-Claude Van Damme? Chuck Norris? Victor Mature? Cynthia Rothrock? Brian Bosworth?

Tough choices, all. And I’m sure we’re forgetting some. But I’m sure there must be one that stands out for you as especially cringe-inducing. It’s only a little over a year until the election, people! Let’s start warming up our debate skills. Who do you think must have been an immigrant from the land of Catatonia? Who made you wish you could see the movie without the sound? Which performance convinced you that the lead actor must have had some good sharp photos of the director with an underage girl?

Cast your vote in the comment section below; chop, chop. (Get it? It means hurry up, but we’re talking about chop-sockey films, and I – oh, never mind.) We’ll compile them, come up with a definitive top 10 and include video evidence for your pleasure.  

And by worst we mean the action heroes everybody secretly gets a kick out of watching.

Was on vacation in the Bahamas, checkin’ out Catherine Zeta Jones on the beach. She and Michael have a place there, you know. Are you believing any of this? Would you believe on the beach in Cabo? Crabbing in Newport? Would you believe…I got sand in my shorts after tripping at a construction site?

We have a new category, although I hesitate to be too much about the hot women all the time. (Did I just say that? Is it even possible to be too much about the hot women? Assuming, you know, no stalking or anything like that.) New category is…

This Week’s “Woman-to-Kill-or-Die-For.” This is from a great scene in 1985’s Gotcha, where a character uses it in reference to Linda Fiorentino. Twenty-two years later, I have to say she would still qualify for the category, but she is not this week’s winner.

The winner is Donna Feldman. Not Agent 99 from Get Smart, but an incredibly exotic and sultry- looking model/actress, in spite of the vanilla name. Check out her pics on DonnaFeldman dot net; you won’t be disappointed. And 99 was Barbara Feldon, what the hell’s the matter with you?

Can you tell which hot chick she is in this JT video?

RESOLVED:

–> Underestimated as an actress. She can play sweet and naïve (Stuck on You), tough and dangerous (Once Upon a Time in Mexico) bitchy—in kind of a good, sexy way (Ghost Rider), smart but vulnerable (Hitch) and super sexy (Training Day).

–> Please note her film credentials include both comedy and drama and action and comic books.

–> When’s the last time you heard of an actress—any actress—who doesn’t own a scale?

–> She does work out with a trainer, but is hardly obsessive about her appearance. She decided not to remove her mole although she used to get a lot of flack for it in school. She claims to have three sizes of jeans and likes herself best in the largest (“more womanly”) pair.

–> She’s smokin’ hot.

–> She was named Cosmo’s Fun and Fearless Female of the Year.

–> Claims to be the world’s greatest spooner.

–> Has skin that seems to glow from the inside.

–> Have we mentioned she’s smokin’ hot?

–> Doesn’t want to release her own CD. We can’t overstate the importance of this one. Isn’t it refreshing to find an entertainer not really wanting to branch out and hyphenate?

–> Uninterested in fame, more interested in career longevity as evidenced by her various roles so far.

--> A face beautiful enough that Revlon, apparently not satisfied with the likes of Cindy Crawford and Halle Berry, came knocking on her door.

–> “Mommy, how come when she looks at me that way, I get a tickly feeling in my tummy?”

–> Has been known to refer to her cleavage as “the girls.”

–> Has that jackpot combination of great lips and perfect smile (Angelina Jolie, Julia Roberts, Nathalie Portman, Eva Longoria) that means a guaranteed Hollywood career.

Eva Mendes’s new film is We Own the Night with Mark Wahlberg and Joaquin Phoenix. It opens nationwide today.

End of debate.

(Though certainly not the end of the discussion. Ladies feel free to chime in with your very own “End of the Debate.” Drop us a line, send in your thoughts and we’ll publish them and include ya’ll on the never ending discussion. So who’s your perfect man?)

Are you confused as to how to vote on Measures 49 and 50 as an Oregon state voter? I have a foolproof method. Figure out which side is being promoted by big money. The “No” people in this case are Big Development and Big Tobacco, respectively. They can be fairly relied upon to lie and distort to protect their corporate interests.

Ergo, a “Yes” vote on each is in order. Measure 49 is regarding the use of property for development. Measure 50 concerns a tax on cigarettes.

Still concerned about “property rights” in the case of 49? Here is an idea. Property rights: good. Property rights above all: not so good. If you want to know what you get when your state and county allow completely unrestricted development, take a close look at California and Florida.

Say goodbye to environmental concerns, community planning, public beaches and family farms and orchards. I grew up 20 miles from Santa Clara County in the Bay Area, which was home to some of the finest orchards in the nation. In the space of about fifteen years, development had ballooned so quickly that there was not a single commercial orchard left in the entire county, and commuter traffic was more congested than even San Francisco.

Don’t let them spend you into confusion. Vote “Yes.” To quote Sledge, “Trust me, I know what I’m doing.”

I don’t know if it’s because I spent too many years watching Letterman, but I seem to have developed an unhealthy attachment to Top Whatever lists. I know that they’re nearly always completely subjective; I think that might be part of their charm. And of course nothing is more subjective than trying to make a “Top” list of beautiful women. Eye of the beholder, and all that. So, naturally, I’ve decided to get the party started in hopes of getting all you other oysterites stirred up at my obvious omissions and errors.

Plus, it’s just fun looking at beautiful women.

BUT, a list merely of beautiful women is too easy. A couple months ago, MSN tried a list of the most beautiful women over 35. In this day and age, 35 sets the bar pretty low, yet they still ended up with a lame list. I, therefore, present the Top Ten Hottest Celebs Over 40.

Just to reduce the first wave of howls to a minimum, I should let you know that I decided ahead of time, no Pamela Anderson (for those of you into pneumatic blondes) or Halle Berry (for those of you into perfection). They’re only just past 40, and I didn’t want to cherry pick among all the 40-plus-a-few-months and 41-year-olds.

10. Michelle Yeoh, 45

A former Miss Malaysia, she has also been a Bond girl, and is a current world-wide female action star. (Like David Carradine, she started as a dancer, and uses dance moves to simulate the martial arts in her fight scenes.) She has co-starred with Jackie Chan, and is one of the few women actresses he will allow to do her own stunts. (And, like Chan she has had numerous stunt-related injuries, one of which put her in the hospital for three weeks.)

I have a philosophy: No matter how hot a Lindsay Lohan, Jessica Alba or Scarlet Johannson may be, women are almost always more attractive than girls. Michelle exemplified this to perfection in two good films; Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and Memoirs of a Geisha. In both films, her character’s vulnerability, inner pain, and life experience gave her beauty a certain weight—a gravitas, if you will—which was completely lacking in her stunning, yet callow, co-star, the gorgeous Zhang Ziyi.

9. Diane Sawyer, 62.

She has that Nordic blonde ice-queen kind of look going on. She has the intelligence, elegance and—dare I say—breeding one might expect of a Wellesley grad, yet manages to project a warmth and compassion not always found in the world of talking heads. She dated a fictional character in Something’s Gotta Give, and is married to director Mike Nichols, and is the best reason to watch TV early in the morning since Cory Everson hosted Body Shaping on ESPN in the ’80s.

8. Jane Seymour, 56.

Loved her as a Bond girl, even though they gave her great lines like, ”Oh, James!” and, “It was in the cards!” She next became queen of the TV movie and played such iconic beauties as Bathsheba and a Dallas Cowboys Cheerleader. Cover her up in leather and a cowboy hat (Dr. Quinn): still gorgeous. Has twins—twins!–at age 44, couple of months later: extra weight gone, still gorgeous. Now on Dancing: aw, you guessed it. In spite of The Reaper, I don’t actually believe that people make deals with the devil, but if Jane looks this good in ten years, I may have to reconsider.

7. Sigourney Weaver, 58.

Tall and lithe, with a sculpted face, and a great smile. As Ripley in the Alien films, arguably blazed the trail for Xena, Buffy, The Fifth Element, Kill Bill and Alias. Showed a real flair for comedy in Ghostbusters and, especially, GalaxyQuest. You can see she still has got it, as she reprises Ripley in those endless Direct TV commercials.

6. Michelle Pfeiffer, 49.

She’s an American, blonde version of Sophia Loren: she got better looking as she got older. In Scarface, she was beautiful, but seemed kind of doll-like and unreachable. (Partly the character, I do realize.) In Ladyhawke, better looking. Witches of Eastwick, even better looking. Dangerous Liaisons and The Fabulous Baker Boys, just better and better. She was 42 in What Lies Beneath, 49 in Stardust.

For a woman who has never really considered herself beautiful (she once said, ”I look like a duck”), she has managed to get pulses racing for nearly 30 years. In the immortal words of Groucho, “Lord, love a duck.”

5-1 after the jump. And yup it’s worth it. MORE »