Author: jbenton

For dedicated Apple fanboys like myself, there’s little better than a Macworld keynote — the once-a-year event when Steve Jobs climbs on stage and unveils the latest Apple goodies. But even we can appreciate this compilation of screwups from past keynotes. The OpenGL bit by Phil Schiller — he’s the guy who looks like the third-base coach at AAA Shreveport — is particularly choice.

An interview with Whit Stillman. It’s a shame he’s disappeared from the scene; he’s produced nothing since The Last Days of Disco, which started my (not particularly long-lasting) obsession with Kate Beckinsale.
Strangely, reading that interview gives me two contradictory feelings: “Whit Stillman seems like a pretty cool, reasonable guy” and “Whit Stillman is probably secretly crazy — you can just tell.”

While I’m focused on French ’60s pop: A full page of France Gall videos. Some great songs there, plus several supremely creepy Serge Gainsbourg appearances. More contemporary francophiles may recognize “Laisse Tomber Les Filles” from the cover version by April March.

Along the lines of my post on ’60s French girl acts: Cresoxipropanediol en Capsules, a 1966 song by actress Ginette Garcin.
Lyrics here, and in franglais. And no, I have no idea what cresoxipropanediol is, but I imagine it’s something a la the Stones’ Mother’s Little Helper.
I found this through Volume 10 of the “Girls in the Garage” series (previously written about here). The compiler of that all-French volume was DJ Mimi la Twisteuse, who used to host a French-pop radio show in Quebec. The show has passed on, sadly, but she hosts a monthly dance party in Toronto called Zoi Zoi.
More info on that and more cool ’60s French pop over here. And a bonus three-hour DJ set by Mimi over here. One highlight: About 1:48 in, Jean-Pierre Ferland, the Quebecois John Lennon, singing his classic “God Is An American.”

More trouble for foreign desks at regional newspapers. The Boston Globe, the Baltimore Sun, and Newsday — all proud newspapers with strong legacies of foreign correspondence — are all cutting back.
The Globe just shut down its Baghdad bureau, which was until recently staffed by a fellow Yale Herald alum. Newsday looks ready to shut down Johannesburg and Beijing, maybe ready to get out of Iraq, and recently closed its Mexico operation. The Sun, with probably the proudest history of them all, has already closed Beijing and London and may be thinking more.
(And, of course, my own employer has shut down its Bangkok, Havana, and Panama bureaus in the past few years.)
It’s a damn shame, but it’s becoming apparent that the foreign news game is going to be played by an ever smaller number of news organizations. In the newspaper world, you’ve got the NYT, the Post, the WSJ, and the L.A. Times who all have significant networks of foreign bureaus. And that’s about it. Everyone in that second tier — the Tribune, the DMN, the other papers mentioned above — are getting out of the business. (Knight Ridder has been something of an exception, although that could change at any moment.)
I mean, how can it be a good thing journalistically to have two fewer American bureaus in Beijing? Precisely at the historical moment when China is becoming America’s chief rival in a dozen ways?

A warning to the heterosexual men in the audience: You are about to view the cutest girl in human history.*
France Gall, live on the Eurovision Song Contest, 1965.
Eurovision is a strange bird, a 50-year-old televised competition in which European nations come up with their best song and singer and compete against one another. It’s like “American Idol,” but if it were Italy versus Norway instead of Justin Guarini versus Kelly Clarkson. (I first heard of it via a Monty Python sketch in my youth.)
Anyway, France Gall was a 17-year-old French singer who somehow ended up representing Luxembourg. Her song was “Poupee de cire, poupée de son,” which isn’t as dirty as it sounds, despite the fact it was written by notorious French lecher and ugly dude Serge Gainsbourg. (Serge would later write a hit titled “Les Sucettes” for Gall, which she sang innocently until she realized all its talk of “lollipops” was, in truth, about fellatio.)
Man, in that video, she is cute. Is it the occasional bite of the lower lip? Is it the slight self-consciousness? Is it the joyfully dorky headbop at the end of every verse? Is it the fact that she really can’t sing at all? Or is it just the driving, ’60s orch-pop music behind her? (That instrumental break is pretty great — terrific rolling drums.)
Some other fine France Gall images from the interwebs: with strange wooden Viking doll; the brunette; greatest hits; nice scarf.
And, just because any mention of Serge Gainsbourg requires repeating this story: When Serge told Whitney Houston on live television he wanted to fuck her.
* By “cutest girl in human history,” of course, I mean “with the exception of all women I’ve ever dated or will ever date.” Hi, past and future honeys! You’re all much cuter than silly old Frenchie!
Bonus: Video of Serge Gainsbourg singing “Le Poinconneur des Lilas,” probably circa late 1957. Not sure I get the chicken-pox motif, but a good reminder of why French pop from that era was so great. Also, a good reminder that Serge Gainsbourg was the ugliest dude to ever schtupp hotties like Brigitte Bardot and Jane Birkin.

Best juggler evah.
There was a time, in the late ’60s, when the Beatles were considering adding a juggler to their act — in particular, one who could accompany the pop-symphonic second side of Abbey Road. The idea was to find a replacement for Paul, who’d been killed tragically in a car accident.
Sadly, it never worked out (damn you, Yoko!), but here is video proof of how it might have looked.

Pointless soft-drink/chemical-reaction videos of the day:
Diet Pepsi + Mentos = Crazy ceilinglicious.
Pepsi + dry ice = Crazy explolicious.
Plus: Never trust a man in a Honda Civic.

Sad news: Jay Dee, a.k.a. J Dilla, is dead at 32. He had a rare blood disease and lupus. His latest album, the very good Donuts, was just released last week.
I got to know about him via Jaylib, his collab with Madlib. “Champion Sound” is aces, and “McNasty Filth,” while lyrically lowbrow (Jay Dee could make beats, but the man was not much as a rapper) kicked major dancefloor ass. But he’s worked with just about everybody in the Hip-Hop-Liked-By-Grad-Student-White-Boys subgenre (A Tribe Called Quest, De La Soul, Slum Village, The Roots, Common, etc.)
Hear some more of his stuff on his Myspace page. (Try “Two Can Win” [bouncy hip-hop that would fit on a “Blueprint”-era Jay-Z disc], “Anti-American Graffiti” [smooth psych for backpackers], and “Don’t Cry” [updated Marvin Gaye soul] to get an idea of his range.)

Now that’s a bunny.