Jackson Meets His #1 Hero

After my little bike ride today, I met up with Rachel and Jackson down on the Mall at the National Book Festival. This annual event always brings in outstanding guest authors, and this year was no exception.

But none of the New York Times best-sellers could compete with Elmo. Jackson is at that age where he is completely obsessed with the arguably annoying red monster from Sesame Street. There is something genius about Elmo, which I never realized until I had a kid. Jackson will often say, "Elmo Elmo Elmo" in a cult-follower-like fashion.

Today, he met the real Elmo, being played by Kevin Clash, who plays him on the Street, and watched him sing several classic tunes.

I missed this portion of the afternoon, but got there in time to see Jackson meet some of his other favorites, including Curious George and Clifford the Big Red Dog (pictured).

Tonight, Jackson was kind of sad before bedtime because he remembered Elmo leaving. Rachel had told him he left with his "dad" (Kevin Clash) because he had to be on TV tomorrow. Jackson kept saying, "Daddy Elmo" to her.

It was also great to see a reading by Mo Willems. His "pigeon" books, like Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus, are some of my favorites.

Celebrity Sighting Edition: Big Love's Bill Paxton

For some reason, I really know nothing about Bill Paxton. But he's the star of HBO's Big Love, the hit series about Mormon polygamy. It looks like an interesting show. I guess he's one of those people whose face you know more than his name. After all, he's been in tons of great movies, like Stripes, Apollo 13, Weird Science, Club Dread, and Titanic.

While not as thrilling as my recent sighting of Paul Rudd and Jack Nicholson, it was still fun to see Paxton and the Big love crew filming today outside the White House among the hunger strikers and other straggling protesters. It was a nice little break in the middle of my 50 state streets ride throughout D.C.

How Did I (Almost) Visit 50 States In One Day?!!

I didn't do anything as amazing as this video today, but I did ride in the D.C. WABA 50-states bike trek. Only made it through 36 of the 65 miles because I was with a slowish but fun crew (pictured left). We hit exactly half of the state streets, meaning 25 (see the route map below).

Highlights included when Lindsey steered us to almost missing the very first state street (California), spotting the House of Scientology on 19th Street NW, enjoying the city's many smells, and debating whether we were witnessing a drug deal or prostitution near New York Avenue and 4th Street NW. Luckily, we missed another turn and, as we rode back by the quarreling man and woman, the crack pipe they were smoking settled our argument!

We also got to see St. Elizabeth's Hospital in Anacostia, where infamous Ronald Reagan assassin John Hinckley has been held for nearly 30 years.

Speaking of Anacostia, I don't get over to this Southeastern portion of D.C. much, but it perhaps gets an unfair reputation. Sure, there are plenty of murders and crime is rampant, but there really are some lovely neighborhoods and parks and some friendly people. It was great to bike there for the first time (other than past rides in and around Anacostia Park) and really absorb the atmosphere.

Urban biking, to me, is the second best type to mountain riding. I can't wait for another ride following my cue sheet for the 25 states we missed out on, and also the 13 colony-street ride. Then I need to do the ride I thought of many years ago: riding to all of D.C.'s many fascinating statues and monuments.

Pop Culture Lunch Box Featured Today in USA Today's Pop Candy Blog

Very exciting news today for Pop Culture Lunch Box!

Pop-culture guru journalist Whitney Matheson just published a post featuring yours truly. What are my favorite movies, Web sites, books, etc.

Check it out here. Thanks, Whitney.

And to answer your question: Yes, of course Rachel and I have our tickets for Pavement in Central Park on September 21, 2010!

Rockin' in Love at the Theme Park Adventureland

Adventureland is one of the top indie comedies I've seen recently. It's directed in the Wet Hot American Summer style by the same person who directed Superbad and scores especially high marks from me for its tremendous soundtrack. The Cure, Lou Reed, and The Replacements are each used strongly, as are Whitesnake and Judas Priest.

While SNL stars Bill Hader and Kristen Wiig surprisingly have the weakest and least funny roles, Jesse Eisenberg (who was excellent in The Squid and the Whale) and Kristen Stewart are "cool and cute" as a couple with adolescent troubles at a theme park in 1987. Ryan Reynolds is also good as the bad-boy mechanic at the park who uses stories about once playing music with Lou Reed as a way to seduce a new crop of girls each summer.

And of all the Pittsburgh-based movies I've seen recently (for some reason), this one makes by far the best use of a Steelers' reference when a guy wearing a Jack Lambert jersey plays a game in the background.

**** out of ***** stars

Still Seeking Good Opinions on Why We Don't Like Our Government Anymore

So what does David Frum, a neocon who lets terrorists like the American Enterprise Institute and Bill Kristol (who once left a message for me on my dad's answering machine when I was writing a newspaper article about him) help edit his book, have to say about the cultural significance of a decade?

Other than a wonky title (How We Got Here: The 70s: The Decade That Brought You Modern Life -- For Better or Worse), the former economic speechwriter for George W. Bush finds that, no matter how good Americans have it, they still feel "less content, less secure, less proud of their country than they did 40 years ago, when Jim Crow still ruled the South, Soviet bombers were aimed at Manhattan, a heart attack meant certain death, and $20,000 a year was a handsome wage."

In 1972, Senator Edwin Muskie destroyed his hopes by crying on the stump after an editorial attack against his wife. "Today, those tears would float Muskie into the White House." He claims that the typical American male has mutated from what Tom Hanks looked like as a soldier in Saving Private Ryan to what that movie's director, Steven Spielberg, looks like in his wimpy t-shirt and ball cap. And this is a bad thing? I suppose Frum wishes about 100 percent of us could be off at war right now "manning up."

Frum says this "mutation" really happened in the 1970s. Despite public perceptions of the era, most people in the late 1960s had short hair and were not promiscuous. This happened in the 70s: "a time of unease and despair. The murder of athletes at the 1972 Olympic games. Desert emirates cutting off America's oil. Military humiliation in Indochina. Criminals taking control of America's streets. Marriages collapsing. Drugs for sale in every high school ..."

This created, Frum uncontroversially argues, "the most total social transformation the United States has lived through since the coming of industrialism." The country became "more dynamic, more competitive, more tolerant; less deferential, less self-confident, less united; more socially equal, less economically equal; more expressive, more risk-averse, more sexual; less literate, less polite, less reticent."

Frum starts digging into the details of his thesis by examining the shift from when, in 1958, "57 percent of Americans trusted the government in Washington to do the 'right thing' most of the time." Indeed, how far we've come. All the way to teabagging for change.

These shifts are surely interesting areas to examine, but I'm guessing from the slow start to this snoozer that Frum and his crew are not the right people to shed any intellectual light. Oh, how I miss my smart Georgetown political science professors.

Gearing Up for My SE Asia Trip

OK, I'm leaving in a few weeks with the family for Thailand, Laos, and Cambodia. I'll post lots of photos and stories during that time, especially since I just downloaded this fancy iPhone app that allows me to blog on the go without lugging around a laptop. (It's called Blog Post.) The tough part will be avoiding the dreaded iPhone typos. Will have to zealously edit and double-edit myself.

Anyway, I'm looking for good suggestions of books to read about those three countries. The Beach, a movie I especially liked, has already been recommended by a couple of people. Let me know what else I should read to prepare for the trip. I'm particularly interested in historical fiction.

My judgement has not been good so far (other than Lonely Planet and Fodor's). I just read the first few chapters of A Broad Abroad in Thailand by Dodie Cross. She is a bitter and cynical woman who gets married to her hippie, pony-tailed boyfriend in order to spend two years with him when his job reassigns him from the U.S. to Thailand. She later discovers that he's a sex addict who gets moody if she doesn't have sex with him at least once a day. She then leaves him and goes on to complain about how awful the country is, as she hauls around her 10 or so designer suitcases.

I'm pretty sure my travel posts won't be nearly as negative, hateful, or poorly written as this book. At least I hope not.

The Raspberries Could Never "Go All the Way"

John Lennon, Keith Moon, and Kurt Cobain were all big fans. But why did The Raspberries never sustain a big career? And how have they still not really gotten their due as forefathers of Big Star, Wings, Superchunk, and Promise Ring-like power pop?

That is the question veteran rock journalist Greg Prato attempts to answer in his essay on the band, which appears in his new anthology of articles, called No Schlock ... Just Rock!, that have appeared throughout the years in fan mags like Classic Rock, Guitarist, and Record Collector.

"Few songs from the early 70s summarized the 'power pop' style as splendidly as 'Go All the Way.' Three-and-a-half minutes of pure pop bliss, the song merged the best bits of early Beatles and The Who," Prato writes.

He goes on to list all the possible reasons for the lack of interest in the band behind that truly great tune, including:

-- The song and title itself were "too dirty."

-- The band was from the nowhereland (at least in sunny power pop terms) of Cleveland.

-- Well-crafted pop songs were leaving the radio during this period in favor of the "self-indulgent stuff" like Traffic and Cream.

-- The song was too much of a "concept," starting like The Who's "Won't Get Fooled Again," hitting the verse like The Beach Boys' "Don't Worry Baby" with Paul McCartney on vocals, sounding like The Left Banke on the chorus, and ending again with The Who.

-- The follow-up album's cover photo featured the boys taking bad advice from management by dressing in matching white suits straight out of Saturday Night Fever.

-- Speaking of managers, "the group was handled by a revolving door of shady" ones.

-- Capitol Records organized a series of interviews for the band, and one was for 16 Magazine, which positioned them as teeny-boppers, an unsavory predicament to all of their 17-and-older fans whose little sisters now liked them so much.

The Raspberries split in 1975, but much of their music is well preserved on the excellent greatest hits collections. "Go All the Way" also appeared in the rock movie Almost Famous.

Prato's a good journalist. In each essay, he asks one probing question and tries to dig into it, rather than attempting to cover each subject's career trajectory. I'm looking forward to enjoying his essays on Rush, Cheap Trick, Steely Dan, Ratt, The Beatles, Kiss, Judas Priest, Def Leppard, Meat Puppets, Bad Brains, The Cars, Mudhoney, Radio Birdman, Sonic Youth, and dozens others, along with his full-length T. Rex biography.

Flaming Lips: Day 3 at Pitchfork Music Festival

The final day at Chicago's Pitchfork music fest this year appeared to be all about the carnivalesque magic of The Flaming Lips. While I (somewhat controversially) think their best music is far behind them, their live show continues to be among the best in the biz.

Thanks again for my friend Francis Chung offering up his professional rock photogs to my blog. His work, including these pictures, are regularly featured at Pitchfork's authoritative indie-rock Web site. Also see my posts about his work at the festival on Day 1 and Day 2.

Now, to get you really talking, here is my ranking of The Flaming Lips' official releases. As you can see, I'm a big fan of their mid-period, psych-pop stuff, and I would add that the top 5 here are must-own classics. The rest are more for the die-hards:

12. Christmas on Mars, 2008
11. Telepathic Surgery, 1989
10. Zaireeka, 1997
09. At War With the Mystics, 2006
08. In a Priest Driven Ambulance, 1990
07. Hear It Is, 1986
06. Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots, 2002
05. The Soft Bulletin, 1999
04. Clouds Taste Metallic, 1995
03. Oh My Gawd!!!, 1987
02. Transmissions From the Satellite Heart, 1993
01. Hit To Death on the Future Head, 1992

Where will the soon-to-be-released Embryonic fall in the list? And how would you rank the Lips's albums?

John Lennon's Mysteriousness Stemmed from Family Relations

This is the eighth installment in a series about a book I'm reading called Stories Done, which is a great collection of tales of excess from counter-culture leaders.

Plenty has been speculated about why John Lennon was the way he was. And the author of this book, Mikal Gilmore (pictured below), who gained fame (or infamy) this past month with his cover story in Rolling Stone about the ugly breakup of The Beatles, adds to the mystery with this essay.

John's father was absent at sea most of the time, liked to drink, and never really had much of a relationship with his son. His mother, who died while walking down the street in 1958 from being hit by a car driven by a drunk off-duty policemen, was impulsive and rebellious.

Alfred Lennon told John, age 5, to choose between his mother and father when the two were divorcing. At first he chose Alfred but switched to Julia when he saw how much pain she was in because of his decision. "The truth is, Lennon had inherited more of his mother's spirit than he understood. He lived intensely in the moment ... but when those moments had passed, he liked to move on."

Gilmore's thesis is that Lennon wanted to move on through most of the last years of The Beatles. When he met Yoko Ono, it inspired "a new adventurism" for Lennon, who once admitted he used Yoko to gain the strength to realize "there is another side to life."

Lennon's bed-ins and lie-ins for peace were intended to try and "change his own heart as much as anybody else's." He added, "It's the most violent people who go for peace. But I sincerely believe in love and peace. I'm a violent man who has learned not to be violent and regrets his violence." I take this to mean that a lot of the global pop overthrow created by The Beatles was in fact violent mass manipulation and caused many negative side effects, in Lennon's mind, along with all the positive effects their music had on society.

After a series of personal battles to stay in his adopted New York City throughout the 1970s, including efforts by the Southern racist Senator Strom Thurmond to deport Lennon before he could publicly protest Nixon's reelection efforts, he had Sean Lennon and settled down to a whole different kind of life. John always attempted to be the father to Sean that he lacked growing up and that he wasn't to his first child Julian during The Beatles' heyday. The result was two great and very domestic and utopian albums at the close of his life, Double Fantasy and Milk and Honey.