Welcome to Moron Town

 

Welcome to Moron Town, where we manufacture the finest poo-poo and refined pee-pee in the world. Here in Moron Town, you get a square deal, because we're all out of other shapes, and to be quite honest, we don't know any others at this point. The Poo-Poo King dismantled the Department of Education, and now instead of learning mathematics and verbal skills, our kids work in the poop factory, shoveling shit into square boxes to distribute amongst ourselves.

We used to have a vibrant economy, mostly serviced based. We had schools and hotels and office buildings. There were public parks and paved roads and government services. But then we had an election, and the Poo-Poo King won on a platform of Bring the Poo-Poo Back Again. At one time in our history, Moron Town was a global leader in manure distribution. Many of our citizens worked in this field, but global trade agreements decimated our poo-poo industry. Our economy changed, and although we became much wealthier due to all the cheap goods we purchased from other countries, many people lost their jobs in the poo sector. There was a lot of resentment on the rural outskirts of Moron Town, and that resentment, along with fears of The Woke Mind-Virus, propelled the Poo-Poo King into office.

Unfortunately, the Poo-Poo King wasn't a very smart man. Despite running on a platform of Bring The Poo-Poo Back Again, many people were surprised when the Poo-Poo King put a tax on anything that wasn't poo-poo. Everything became much more expensive. All of a sudden, everybody became much poorer, not just because of the tariffs, but also because our non-poo-poo industries went out of business. Turns out that when you switch to a poo-poo based economy, anything that's not poop becomes really expensive. Our teachers, doctors, CEOs, service workers, and just about everybody else were soon shoveling shit in the poo-poo factory. Other countries heavily tariffed our poo-poo, so we started refining piss in an attempt to diversify, but nobody wants to buy our pee, and our poo-poo is unwanted as well. So now we sell poo-poo and pee-pee to ourselves, and everybody is dumb and poor as shit.

The Poo-Poo King doesn't care. He sits upon his throne of shit and pisses on anybody that approaches. The members of his political party (The GOP--Grand Old Poop Party) grovel on their knees and lap it up. They have poop in their brains and they can't stand up to the Poo-Poo King, because they slip on the piss. So we are stuck with our poo-poo based economy, despite everyone not really digging all the shit and piss.

I hear what you're saying. "Why did you guys vote for the Poo-Poo King, when Bring the Poo Back Again was such a stupid platform?" Well, buddy, this is Moron Town. We're all a bunch of morons. We do shit, and ask questions later. By the way, how are you enjoying your plate of poo-poo? Would you like some pee-pee with that? 

New Music: A Plea To Luck

 

What is this song? I wrote it in C but then transposed it to B Flat to better match my voice. Then I had a hell of a time singing the 3/4 part, so maybe I should have left it in C? I dunno. It's not really like anything I've ever done before, which is good. You gotta evolve as an artist. At least, that's what they tell me. I don't know who "they" is.

New Music: The Promise

 

It's the Royal Road, baby! Sure, J-Pop might have abused the hell out of this chord progression, but I haven't used it much! Took my new piano out for a spin. The guitars were all played on my cheap Fender acoustic; for the dueling solos, I ran them through Reason and distorted them. I like the concept of change. Change is good, because change is life. To resist change is to be destroyed. Change and adapt. I hath begun my career as a motivational speaker/life-coach. Perhaps I can do better than George Costanza.

Bad Poetry: The Transition

 

Do you want to move?

Do you want to pick through your belongings

Pack it all up

and start again down the street?

This house is my home

Where I had my children

Where we scrapped ice off the walls

And learned to have space.

When I sleep at night

I worry about leaving my past

And all the memories we made here.

But shouldn't we change?

If we fight against the current

We drown and sink beneath the surface

There is no way to add to a person

without embracing the difference

between the past and the present.

I know that nothing will ever stay the same

Life is not a picture

A painting

A screenshot

Or a photo.

 

Last night I had a dream

of a different woman and I

doing homework 

In another home

With another child.

What is this strange reality?

A different universe?

An omen?

Or a simple flight of fancy?

I don't know

But maybe

it is okay

To move.

New Music: Solo Piano #1

 

Kind of proud of this little piano instrumental I wrote on my new keyboard. A piano is so much more powerful than a guitar when it comes to songwriting. It's so much easier to adjust chord shapes with an extra hand!

New Music: Rock 'n' Roll

 

It takes a decent amount of hubris to name your song "Rock 'n' Roll" but it's on par for the genre, am I right? An oldie that I rerecorded this week. Just some simple three chord rock with lyrics about chasing that youthful feeling.

You Dumb Fuckers Happy Now?

 

There was a lot of whining about the price of eggs during the 2024 Presidential election. Google's bullshit AI tells me that the average price of eggs in the US during January was 4.95, a 15 percent increase over the previous month. Of course, bird flu is to blame, but this is Trump's America, and facts don't matter, only feelings. Americans felt pessimistic about the post-Covid economic recovery, so they voted in an authoritarian with an inflationary agenda. This is because America is full of dumb fuckers. Last night, Trump announced that the delayed 25 percent tariffs on Mexico and Canada would finally go into effect. He also raised Chinese tariffs from 10 percent to 20 percent. Given that America is the largest economy in the world, and that we consume around a quarter of what the world produces while having only five percent of the world's population, this... isn't good. If Americans were dissatisfied with Biden's economy, I can't imagine they'll be happy with Trump's inflationary policies. Those tariffs will be paid by American consumers, who will either bite the bullet and go home with less money in their bank accounts, or reduce consumption, shrinking the economy. Tariffs are protective measures meant to jump-start domestic industry or protect a vulnerable part of the economy. It's not ideal that all of the world's microchips are made in Taiwan, but it takes a lot of time and money to build a chip fabricator--around three years, 10 billion dollars, and 6000 construction workers, according to Intel. So it makes no sense to put blanket tariffs on Chinese electronics (most electronics are assembled in China) when it takes an extraordinary amount of time and money to build your own chips. The consumer is just going to end up paying a lot more for electronics. This is Econ 101, but Trump seems to not understand this. My own personal theory is that the tax cut Congressional Republicans are preparing will be paid for by tariffs, and they're counting on Americans being dumb enough to not realize that they're footing the bill. One of the advantages Republicans have over Democrats is that they realize that the average voter is an idiot, so while I don't think consumers will ignore how the price of everything drastically increased immediately after Trump took office, it's a gamble that may pay off, considering how dumb everyone is, and how Trump was reelected despite running on a Destroy America agenda.

The big, dumb fucker in chief also announced last night that he was ending aid to Ukraine. This comes after Trump and Vice President Vance personally berated and insulted Ukrainian President Zelenskyy while television crews filmed last Friday. Vance accused Zelenskyy of disrespect and ingratitude, despite it being obvious to anyone watching that Vance and Trump were the rude assholes in the room. Former Ukraine supporting Republicans like closeted homosexual hypocrite Lindsay Graham seized the bait and threw Zelenskyy under the bus as their dear leader desired. With the abandonment of Ukraine, Trump signaled to the rest of the world that America will not honor its commitments to allies (Trump wants to get out of NATO) and will now support dictators like Vladimir Putin, despite the historical animosity between Russia and the US. Now America has always been full of shit when it comes to international conflicts--the Iraq war never found any weapons of mass destruction, Vietnam was a nonsensical bloodbath, and the Afghanistan war was all for naught --but we've never outright abandoned democracy and our post-World War 2 allies in favor of an oligarch like Putin. Then again, we've never had a shadow President like Elon Musk dissolving government agencies and illegally firing government employees while harvesting the personal info of Americans.

I haven't touched on Trump's deportation agenda or his illegal executive orders or the coming fight over the budget and whether or not the President has the right to do whatever he wants with Treasury funds (he doesn't). None of this matters because although the signs are there, most Americans haven't noticed a difference yet. Ignorance is bliss, right? If you're plugged into the right wing grifter echo chamber, maybe you even think things are getting better. I'm here to tell you, you big, dumb fucking idiot, that things aren't okay, and you're going to notice the effects of Donald Trump's destruction of the American government and economy sooner rather than later. There is a price for ignorance, and there is a price for moral apathy, and there is a price for being fat and lazy and stupid. Fiction couldn't conjure a better physical representation of all of America's faults than Donald Trump. Now that we finally have a President that represents the worst of us, will we get what we deserve? Because if you take away freedom and democracy and civil rights and hope for the future, you're left with greed, gluttony, consumerism, and sloth. The latter isn't much to build a country on, is it?

Wake up, you dumb fucks. You wanted to fuck over the rest of us and drink our liberal tears, but in the process, you're getting fucked and you're fucking things up for your own children and anyone else that might care about the future. Stupidity is a privilege you've been afforded until now, but I'm taking it away for the good of the public. In the words of Dean Wormer from Animal House "Fat, drunk, and stupid is no way to go through life, son."

Here's some Rage, because that's why I'm feeling lately.

 

God of War: Ragnarok: Addendum

 

This is a ridiculously good-looking game.

I've realized that my initial review of God of War: Ragnarok was a little too negative after having played it for an additional sixteen or so hours. Despite being an iterative sequel, it does do a lot to expand the basic gameplay, at least after thirty hours or so. You get a new weapon, the Draupnir Spear, which adds a lot to your arsenal, and a huge new optional area opens up in Vandeheim called the Crater, which is full of quests. This area is not only the best in the game, it pretty much is the game. I think I've spent well over ten hours hunting dragons and tangling with other beasties in the Crater, and the option to free-roam while still enjoying story-based questing really makes Ragnarok enjoyable. As for the spear, Kratos now has three weapons, all with two runic-based heavy attacks and specific combos, along with his sword hilt ability and his shield, giving the player a plethora of options for any combat situation. The exploding spears are a nice ranged option, and the ability to build up might by repeated spear strikes makes the Draupnir my default weapon most of the time. I'd also like to compliment Santa Monica on Ragnarok's visuals, which are stellar. I mashed the screenshot key over and over again while taking advantage of the photo mode. Now, after fifty hours in, my opinion of Ragnarok has changed. It might be a safe sequel, but it's really fun and well-designed, and anyone searching for a strong single-player odyssey won't be disappointed.

 

New Music: The Sack of Troy

The winter freeze is upon us, and so it's been a big month for musical creativity. The Sack of Troy is a elegy for Hector and all of those who fight reluctantly. Had a lot of fun with the guitars on this one. I used my T57 Tube Screamer with the strat. Initially I had this song at 210 bpm, but I had to slow the drums down to 195 bpm because I couldn't get the bass part right. The lyrics are below.

Give my sons all the coins that I’ve earned

Give my wife my books that I want burned

On the shores they’ve gathered armies

Long of lance and short of heartbeats

You can’t hide yourself any longer

They have swords that have your number

You can’t hide yourself any longer

They have swords that have your number

From the walls I see the blood bath

Children scream the names of fallen

“This one’s armor will go to you,”

“This one’s memories will fall to you,”

You can’t hide yourself any longer

They have swords that have your number

You can’t hide yourself any longer

They have swords that have your number

Around my walls Achilles chased me

Eyes of fire and heart of stone

I did face him though it killed me

He wouldn’t give away my body

You can’t hide yourself any longer

They have swords that have your number

You can’t hide yourself any longer

They have swords that have your number

Names preserved in poet’s lines

Echoed across the seas of time

“Do you remember why we fell

into a churning mass of knives?

Do you remember why we died?”

They can’t hide themselves any longer

We have swords that have their number

They can’t hide themselves any longer

We have swords that have their number

New Music: Lucretia

 

An old instrumental dating back to my Texas days. The original used a Digitech Whammy pedal for the rhythm chord progression; on this recording, I used a Pitchfork set to fifths.I don't remember where I heard the story of Lucretia, but it was a myth that made an impression on me. 

New Music: I Got The End Of Days In Me

 

Wrote and recorded this last night in a frenzy. One positive to the dissolution of my country is that I've been very creative! Went for a 60's feel, with the guitars and Iggy Pop beat.