Mad About Music Mondays - Sin City Sinners

Todd Kerns, Brent Muscat, Rob Cournoyer & Dr. Ellis
are the Sin City Sinners of Las Vegas, NV. 

Local music is a fickled thing. Many arguments go back and forth as to who's the best and why. Last year the Sin City Sinners placed second in the Las Vegas Review-Journal's annual Vegas' Best awards. Second to a band that not only doesn't make Las Vegas home, only one band member considers Las Vegas to be his home, they don't play any local shows with the exception of their annual stop-through on their nationwide tour. Well this year's poll comes out in two weeks and hopefully Vegas will get it right this time around. Without a doubt in our minds the Sin City Sinners are thee #1 band calling Las Vegas home. You may have noticed our players on both the right sidebar (go ahead and click play) as well as a rather large one at the bottom of each post and the homepage.

Streaming Sundays - Steal This Movie (2000)

It's been a long time (91 days) since we've last posted a Streaming Sunday feature-length film. Well folks, that's because we're trying to stray away from copyright infringement and the 'stealing' of other people's works. We're attempting to go legit and stir clear of the piracy plaguing the internet today. Alas, we're going the safer and more respectable route of finding those movies that are posted free on reputable sources and websites.

So funny enough, our first movie is appropriately entitled, "Steal This Movie!" starring Vincent D'Onofrio as Abbie Hoffman, the well-known 1960's social and political activists that rustled the feathers of local, state and federal governments with the Yippies. Janeane Garafalo guests stars as Abbie's second wife Anita in this great counter-culture biopic. Also note that Michael Cera appears as Abbie's son america. (His name is purposely spelled with a lower case 'a')

The film takes it name from the guidebook to social activism, Steal This Book written by Abbie Hoffman in 1971. However the film takes basis from on several books including To America With Love: Letters from the Underground written by both Anita and Abbie Hoffman. You may recall the flag shirt wearing gentlemen whom introduces Forrest Gump to speak at the Vietnam protests at the Lincoln Memorial. That gentleman is someone portraying Abbie Hoffman as he lead the Vietnam protests in Washington, D.C.

'Abbie Hoffman' appears in Forrest Gump

MikeD's Ten Instrumental Songs You May Have Never Heard

On Monday, Scooter posted his Top 10 Instrumental Songs. Using his criteria (listed below) I compiled my own list.

No themes from movies or television are allowed. (Love Theme, Peter Gunn theme, Guns of Navarone, TSOP)
Not a single word may be said during the whole song. (Reel Big Fish's 241, Tequila, Wipe Out, The Hustle, Daft Punk's Musique)
Lyrics may not exist for the song upon recording. (Jeff Beck's A Day in the Life, SRV's Little Wing, Sing Sing Sing)
No overly campy songs featured prevalently in media. (Dueling Banjos, Star Wars Cantina, The Entertainer, Soul Bossa Nova)
Cannot predominantly feature a solo as the majority of the song. (Moby Dick, Eruption, I Know You're Here)

Music is a powerful tool that I think helps exemplify many aspects of life, whether ones life experiences, hardships, celebrations, or misery. I've always had a interest in instrumental music though, even at a young age when I first bought my first Metallica album, actually cassette Master of Puppets in 1989, which features of course Orion, which Scooter mentioned in his post. (Which you can purchase on the left in it's amazing lo-fi sound.)
It's emotional impact ran deep even without words you get a keen sense of what kind of moods they were expressing throughout the passage. Since then I have greatly expanded my musical influences; whether it's traditional folk, classical, jazz, rock, metal, electronic or anything in between. I like music that takes me on a journey, something to ponder, or simply zone out to.

Words never meant much to me too often in music because I think of them as more personal to the artist, unless the subject is more historical. This is probably one reason why I got very into heavier death and black-metal as the vocals were used more as instruments of rage and fury.

This post is not intended to be a 'best of' by any means. This list was sort of thrown together from bands off the top of my head that I greatly enjoy. These also are not listed in any particular order. I could probably go on and list 50 more ranging from all different genres but I'll keep this short and to the point. Hope you may find something you enjoy. If you do, check out their albums or buy them HERE.

Weird Wednesday - Jimmy Pulls a Conan & the Chocolate Stanley Cup

Here are two completely different videos for your Weird Wednesday:

First we have Jimmy Fallon, host of Late Night with Jimmy Fallon, who slipped and fell last night while performing a stunt race with Chelsea Handler. Does that sound familiar? That's because six months ago the same thing happened to former Late Night host, (now former) Tonight Show host Conan O'Brien fell while racing Teri Hatcher and almost seriously injured himself, but only sustained a minor concussion. So here is the clip of Jimmy pulling a similar stunt with similar results ...

Tuesday Brewsday - Las Vegas Beer Festival "Brew's Best"

This Saturday at the MonteLago Village at Lake Las Vegas the Buckbean Brewing Company is producing a special beer festival of local Nevada breweries as well as notable breweries from the region. Buckbean Brewing Company, located in Reno, NV, is Nevada's longest operating bottler in Nevada. Granted it's only been two years that they've been operating their business but that doesn't discredit their claim. Also, it's important to note that while they do package and distribute their beer to other markets they don't in fact bottle, they can. That's right they can, and cans are the best way to have your beer reach your customers with the closest to tap quality brew. Cans are 100% protective against oxygen and light, the #1 enemy of quality beer, and provide you to carry your beer where it might be otherwise prohibited: beaches, campgrounds, concerts and more.

Mad About Music Monday - Top 10 Instrumental Songs

With only spotty write-ups lately we're hoping to slowly get the ball rolling by getting back into our regular spots at least on a semi-weekly basis. There may be more hiccups in our schedule on the horizon as we attempt to relocate the headquarters of Expect Odd Things to both a new state and its own domain. That said let's move on to today's order of business. We're back to talking music after taking three months off.

Today's entry is all about the best instrumental songs ever. We'll take a look at the top 10 instrumental songs in every genre of music. Want thrash metal, latin, jazz, 80's or oldies all in one place? Then this is the list for you. To set some criteria of how we figured out our top ten we followed these rules:

No themes from movies or television are allowed. (Love Theme, Peter Gunn theme, Guns of Navarone, TSOP)
Not a single word may be said during the whole song. (Reel Big Fish's 241, Tequila, Wipe Out, The Hustle, Daft Punk's Musique)
Lyrics may not exist for the song upon recording. (Jeff Beck's A Day in the Life, SRV's Little Wing, Sing Sing Sing)
No overly campy songs featured prevalently in media. (Dueling Banjos, Star Wars Cantina, The Entertainer, Soul Bossa Nova)
Cannot predominantly feature a solo as the majority of the song. (Moby Dick, Eruption, I Know You're Here)