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There's weird, and then there's this article. Not sure which facet is most disturbing, but it's all quite entertaining. Arr, mateys!

There's some hilarious stuff on the internet right now. Here are some gems I found over the past week:

"Why did the Celtics shell out $15 million for Brian Scalabrine and another $7.5 million for Dan Dickau?

Here's my guess: They thought my column was slipping and decided that I needed some new material. Well, mission accomplished. After Wednesday night's opening win against the Knicks, my Dad called to happily rehash the game, and we went over everything -- Delonte looked great, Pierce played hard, so did Mark Blount, maybe we can make the playoffs, and so on -- until the following depressing exchange:

-- Dad: "Did you see Scalabrine? Some of those plays he made ... I mean, it was awkward to watch. I felt awkward."

-- Me: "I know. Apparently he's a really good teammate though."

-- Dad (sarcastic pause): "Oh, well that changes everything." "

(Thanks to Bill Simmons at www.sportsguy.net)

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"Only if you don't count Top Gun."

-- Val Kilmer, in response to the question "is this the first time you've played a gay character [before Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang, currently playing]?"

(thanks again to Bill Simmons)


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"[S]ince I have nothing else to add ... watching football last Sunday with my friends, I brought up the topic, "What touchdown dance would cause the biggest possible fine?"

You would think it would be Adam Carolla's idea for the "Touchdown Poop," which I described two years ago -- basically, the guy scores a touchdown, then squats like he's on the bowl, stays there for a couple of seconds, turns the pages of an imaginary newspaper and finally "pushes" the ball between his legs. We figured that if Randy Moss did that, he would get suspended for a game and fined like $150,000. Plus, Joe Buck might start crying on the air.

But I think this one would be worse: "The Delivery." What if Moss scored a TD and immediately fell to the ground on his back, with his legs up in the air like a pregnant woman, and two receivers stood on either side "cheering him on," and Randy pretended he was pushing, and finally the QB leaned over him and "pulled" the football from Randy's loins, then held the football to his shoulder like a baby for a few seconds before Moss stood up, gingerly grabbed the "baby," cut an imaginary umbilical cord, then spiked the ball as hard as he possibly could? I think that would be like a three-game suspension and a $500,000 fine, right? Plus, Buck would be more distraught than Walter Cronkite after JFK's assassination. Let's hope and pray that Randy reads ESPN.com. "

(one more time: Bill Simmons, ladies and gentlemen)

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Top 5 Guitarists (in reverse order of preference)

Andy Summers. I was going to put the lead guitarist for my "I'm Hip Band-of-the-Moment" current faves Bloc Party in this slot, but I obviously don't even respect him enough to look up his name for this article. Instead, I decided to replace him with the man who virtually invented the textured, ephemeral sound that I must regrettably admit helped spawn emo bands the world around: Police guitarist Andy Summers. Despite their best attempts to co-opt his floating, jazzy chords and angular leads, imitators never managed to match his subtlety and precision. Having said that, it's totally unsurprising to me that he didn't amount to much after the Police disbanded, as the alchemy created by that trio probably helped Summers reach heights he would (or could) not have attained on his own. I've always been enamored of the way he created these dreamy landscapes of sound with a few chords and a tastefully done overdub. I've never been stoned, but I'm pretty sure I'd want it to feel like "Walking on the Moon" sounds, if ever I were.

Favorite tracks: Walking on the Moon, Message in a Bottle, When the World Runs Down, Don't Stand So Close to Me

Keith Richards. Picking between him and Quine for the 3 and 4 spots was a tough decision for me. I tried to envision myself living without the songs that both made great, and obviously Richards has a lot more of those: Satisfaction, Brown Sugar, Start Me Up, Honky Tonk Women, Gimme Shelter, and the incendiary Can't You Hear Me Knocking?, to name but a few. But ultimately there's one song that Quine takes to another time and place altogether (see below), while Richards has always been content to live in some dirty, bluesy dreamland in the 1972 of his mind. And that's fine: fourth-best-loved is pretty damn good. I'm sure I don't need to go on about how cool Richards is, but the fact remains that you have to basically define cool to both be a rhythm guitarist and also famous. Even if you do play in the Stones.

I was driving in my car after picking up "Sticky Fingers," currently my favorite Stones album, and wondering as "Wild Horses" ended if the songs were going to lean more towards Wild Horses/Brown Sugar-quality, or more towards "Sway," which is fine but hardly classic. Then Can't You Hear Me Knocking comes on, with a sound so vicious and dirty and venomous you think Satan himself is playing electric tuned to open G over your stereo. Took me awhile to realize it wasn't Satan, but the Jesus of cool: Keith Richards. No human being should be able to come up with a guitar lead like that. To be honest, I'm not sure it's ever been proven that Keith is human. Whatever he is, it was made to play guitar.

Favorite tracks: Can't You Hear Me Knocking, Honky Tonk Women, Rocks Off, Brown Sugar, It's Only Rock and Roll (But I Like It)

Robert Quine. Full disclosure: I have never heard a Richard Hell and the Voidoids song, although I imagine I’d dig it pretty much the same as I dig my Marquee Moon album, by Television. Not coincidentally, Robert Quine and Richard Lloyd (who played in Television) both played lead guitar on more than a few Matthew Sweet songs, and it is Quine’s effort on the 1991 track “Girlfriend” that pretty much single-handedly vaults him to this position in my Guitar Pantheon.

Previously mentioned here, “Girlfriend” was the title track of the first CD I ever owned, and a song that I think encapsulates and epitomizes all the best things power-pop music has to offer, including everything the Beatles ever did, and McCartney’s best shit with Wings (which I thought was better pop-wise than anything the Beatles did from a certain standpoint, but whatever) and the Beach Boys, and T Rex and especially the Kinks. A lot of credit for this has to go to Quine, who plays so powerfully on this song that if I had one guitar-related wish it would be to be able to play lead on “Girlfriend” perfectly. Even as I write this I have dug out that original and battered copy of Girlfriend to burn to my Mac’s hard drive, and I know that Track 3 will be the first that I play once it’s on there.

Anyway I won’t even try to describe RQ’s playing on this track in the hopes that, after all this hyperbole, you will be sufficiently curious to go buy “Girlfriend” on iTunes, at least, and bend an ear towards the song that wound up serving as intro music for Paul and Laura Kowalski at their wedding reception. I cannot help but turn it up, every time.

Jimmy Page. Dazed and Confused, Whole Lotta Love, Heartbreaker, Ramble On, Immigrant Song, Bron-Y-Aur Stomp, Black Dog, Stairway, The Rain Song, Over the Hills and Far Away, Dancing Days, D’Yer Mak’er, The Ocean, Hot Dog. That’s 14 songs that Jimmy Page MADE with his guitar playing, and 14 songs that everybody who enjoys hard rock should pretty much be able to name off the top of their head. With the possible exception of Hot Dog, which is fine, but I have a soft spot for it. I think he was at his skeleton-crushing best on II, which contrasted the hillbilly blues funk of songs like “Ramble On” with the decimating power and ultimate air-guitar source material of “Heartbreaker” and “Whole Lotta Love.” “Whole Lotta Love” especially gives me the tingles every time coming out of the instrumental, when Page just obliterates you with an unusually precise and religiously awesome solo. He missed a lot of notes, but I’ll take Page over Hendrix any day of the week.

Slash. This is a pretty peculiar choice, I guess, if you don’t know me, but those that do understand that GNR was a seminal band for myself and many young lads coming of age in the late ‘80s/early ‘90s. Although he never had technique to match the masters like SRV, Hendrix and the like, and although he never really played as low-down dirty as guys like Page and Richards, for me he was the perfect mix of shredding, subtlety, pomp and sublime beauty. Think I’m wrong? This is the same guy who played those impossibly fast fills during virtually the entire running length of Appetite for Destruction, who gave “Patience” the gravity and crispness it needed to be played as the first song at my wedding reception, and who made the entire Use Your Illusion experience not only listenable but fun and, at times, genuinely moving. And then there was his tone! I know I’ve already used up my one guitar wish, and I don’t even play electric except on rare occasions, but it would be pretty sweet to pirate Slash’s GNR tone for a little while. Because ultimately this is a guitarist whose solos I find myself constantly rewinding GNR songs to hear again and again. I think he is criminally underrated, except here, where he claims his rightful throne of Guitar Majesty. As it should be.

Favorite tracks: November Rain, Night Train, My Michelle, Sweet Child O Mine, Patience, Live and Let Die, Paradise City

Fun Fact about this list: only (1) of the guitarists represented, Robert Quine, is not English. I find that amazing.