Bowie's in space

Two questions. If David Bowie can die, what hope is there for the rest of us? And how can I find words to pay tribute to a guy who made at least 13 records and at least 200 songs that mean the world to me?
I'm thinking about the bands and solo artists who put out one great record after another in the 1970s that also mean a great deal to me (Bowie put out great stuff before and after the '70s, but the '70s were his most creatively explosive period) -- Neil Young, Stevie Wonder, Brian Eno, Joni Mitchell, CAN, Marvin Gaye, Roxy Music, Curtis Mayfield, Patti Smith, Alice Cooper, Blue Oyster Cult, Kraftwerk, Neu, Fela Kuti, Chic, Van Morrison, Faust, T. Rex, Big Star, Black Sabbath, Harry Nilsson, just to name a few (and I haven't even mentioned the great bands who only put out a few records or who were just getting started or who ran out of gas in the middle of the decade or who dominated the '60s and put out a few great records in the '70s or the people I'll be hitting myself for forgetting) -- and I'm astounded that I can hear and see all these people in Bowie's songs and sounds and looks as they bounce around, refract, distort, and filter through the carnival rides, lenses, funhouse mirrors, and processors in Bowie's one-of-a-kind head until they come out sounding like Bowie and only Bowie. He had all the contradictory elements you need to be a great artist: theatricality and sincerity, privacy and exhibitionism, originality and theft, human frailty and alien otherness, etc. I could keep going on about this but I'm starting to sound like a blabbering idiot. ("Starting to?" some of you are saying.)
I am so glad I got to see Bowie live on his last tour, especially considering that tour ended earlier than planned due to cancellations caused by Bowie's heart surgery, some nerve problems in his shoulder, and an accident that killed a member of the lighting crew. The tickets were a little out of our price range, but my wife and I said, "It's David Bowie!" and bought them anyway. Wikipedia tells me that show was April 27, 2004. Bowie was not a nostalgic artist, but the set list was primarily a greatest hits-style encapsulation of a career, with a band that consisted of a mix of Bowie veterans like Mike Garson and Earl Slick and younger session musicians like Gail Ann Dorsey and Sterling Campbell. Bowie was so good, and I'm not just saying that with the rose-tinted glasses of 12-year-old memories. He was one of the best singers and performers I've been lucky enough to see, and the show had the odd effect of humanizing him instead of turning him into even more of the alien superhero rock god I had mythologized. I was shocked and delighted at how many goofy, corny jokes Bowie told during the stage banter portion of the show, and how he would crack himself up with these silly jokes while his band rolled their eyes and grinned. I can't tell you how much I enjoyed seeing the joy he took in goofy puns and vaudeville-style old-fashioned jokes in between scorching everyone's faces off with some of the best rock songs ever written. I also loved seeing the pleasure and joy he took in watching his band perform, especially when bassist Gail Ann Dorsey took the Freddie Mercury parts on "Under Pressure." This guy loved musicians.
Just picking two of my favorite Bowie songs, "Station to Station" and "Teenage Wildlife." Holy fuck. There are undiscovered countries in those songs. You can go back to those songs over and over again and never exhaust them.
Even Bowie's death is inspiring. Here's a guy who finds out he's dying of cancer, so he makes an album with a group of younger jazz musicians he's never recorded with before, and he keeps his illness a secret even though the shit-rats at TMZ have at least three trash-parasites stationed in every famous person's underwear drawer. I'm glad I got to share 38 years on the often-disappointing planet of Earth with David Bowie, and I'm going to keep playing his wonderful, beautiful, scary, fantastic records until I'm a lifeless tube of meat.

2015: The Ride: The Drink: The Flavorless Paste aka My Year as a Human, My Favorite Music of the Year, and Some Shameless Self-Promo

Hey blog reader(s),
2015 is over, so I thought I'd take the opportunity on what Neil DeGrasse Tyson would consider an arbitrary date to overshare about me, present a list of my favorite records and live shows of the past year, and pimp my rock band.
I had a weird year that was better for me mentally than almost any year since I was nine years old (excepting 1997 and late 1999/early 2000, the two other post-fourth grade years where I wasn't hit with at least one bout of depression) but also touched by tragedy. My group of friends lost a wonderful person to cancer in May, a person who should have lived to be a hilarious old woman, and we all miss her and will continue to miss her for the rest of our go-cart ride around this globally-warmed fucked-up orb where Donald Trump still walks among us. I also lost a cousin to cancer that same month, but my father never told me so I just found out two weeks ago (not from him). In case you were wondering if my family was still a jacked-up mess, the Magic 8-Ball says it is decidedly so. In happier circle of life news, my sister had twins, a boy and girl, in September, and they're as cute as (or even cuter than) tiny people can possibly be, even though I think all humans should cool it on the having babies thing for at least 30 or 40 years because WE'RE DOOMED! WE'RE ALL DOOMED!!!!!!!! but I am excited to see them in person on a trip planned for the spring, and I'm psyched to have a niece and nephew at one fell swoop (maybe the fell swoop thing is not the best choice of phrase since it originated from birds of prey diving down for the kill).
I was amazed and thankful I spent a whole year without much depression (I had lots of melancholia and genuine sadness, but none of the full-on emptiness and lack of emotion and couch-stuck wasted days and wrung-out towel for a psyche that swallow up a few months of most years), and I attribute a lot of that to a years-in-the-making concerted effort to live in the present. Sounds obvious and platitudinous, but I think I'm mostly there now. I wasted too much time rehashing and being bitter about the past and thinking about getting through the present to get to some imagined better time in the future, and I mostly don't bother with that shit now. Fuck the past, the future doesn't exist, yeah I know these sound like bumper stickers but in practice this attitude really works for me sentence fragment the end. I also decided to devote less psychic real estate to my parents' problems and messes and all the messiness and weirdness of the last 13 years in my family's existence and focus on fixing my own problems and messes. And I decided to skip most parties this year except for a handful of important ones because large social gatherings make me nervous and antsy and self-conscious and weird and I never have much fun and no one's paying me to attend, so I treated myself right and went out when I felt like it and stayed home when I felt like it. My friends are cool. I think they understand. I still like all of them. I also quit Facebook, which is really working out great, even though I still log in on my wife's account, but I've been doing that less and less. I am happier not being on there as much. Also, listening to albums in their entirety away from a computer, reading more books, and watching less TV are all good decisions I made for myself this year. It's working, man. I think the key to life is don't do shit you don't wanna do if you don't have to do it. Do shit you wanna do if you can. Try not to screw anybody up when not doing and doing these things. I don't do new year's resolutions, but the next step on the be-less-messed-up train is an effort to slow down my boozing and get rid of my beer gut that taunts me in the mirror daily and be more healthy even though exercise is boring as fuck and completely stupid compared to things like rock and roll and delicious food.
Enough of this self-help bullshit, let's switch to music.

My favorite records of 2015 in a sort-of arbitrary order based on when I put them on the computer (which doesn't mean I didn't buy them because I did, sucker)
Ricked Wicky - I Sell the Circus
Sleater-Kinney - No Cities to Love
Jessica Pratt - On Your Own Love Again
Bjork - Vulnicura
Death Grips - Jenny Death
Built To Spill - Untethered Moon
Robert Pollard - Faulty Superheroes
Metz - II
Faith No More - Sol Invictus
Thee Oh Sees - Mutilator Defeated At Last
Damaged Bug - Cold Hot Plumbs
Mini Mansions - The Great Pretenders
Mint Mile - In Season & Ripe
Ricked Wicky - King Heavy Metal
Field Music - Music for Drifters
Destroyer - Poison Season
Yo La Tengo - Stuff Like That There
Ricked Wicky - Swimmer to a Liquid Armchair (3 records in a year, all good!) 
Battles - La Di Da Di
Le Butcherettes - A Raw Youth
Kurt Vile - B'lieve I'm Goin Down...
Big Grams - Big Grams EP
Eleanor Friedberger - "False Alphabet City" single
Circus Devils - Stomping Grounds
Protomartyr - The Agent Intellect
Express Rising - Fixed Rope
Le Butcherettes - Shave the Pride/We No Owe 7"
Erykah Badu - But You Caint Use My Phone
Oneida - Positions EP
Starflyer 59 & Mike Adams at His Honest Weight - Like a Baby/Tasteful Nudes split 7"

Records of 2015 I also enjoyed, just not as much as the above 
Zu - Cortar Todo
Trickfinger - Trickfinger
Wilco - Star Wars
Neil Young & Promise of the Real - The Monsanto Years
Rolo Tomassi - Grievances
Mac DeMarco - Another One (yeah, yeah, everyone hates him now, he's the latest indie scarlet letter, but I like the dirtbag low-rent Steely Dan vibe)
 

My favorite reissues, re-releases, compilations, box sets, and soundtracks of 2015 (again, it's heavily dominated by the Numero Group)
David Bowie - Five Years 1969-1973
Scharpling & Wurster - The Best of the Best Show
Universal Togetherness Band - Universal Togetherness Band
Various - Ultra-High Frequencies: The Chicago Party
The Notations - Still Here: 1967-1973
Various - Lows in the Mid Sixties Volume 54: Kosmic City Part 2
Various - Ork Records: Complete Singles
Various - Saved & Sanctified: Songs of the Jade Label
Bedhead - Live 1998
White Eyes - White Eyes
Melvins - The Bulls & The Bees/Electroretard
Arthur Russell - Corn
Universal Togetherness Band - My Sentiment/Missing You 7"
The Scientists - The Scientists
The Scientists - Blood Red River
Royal Jesters - English Oldies
Mark Lanegan - Houston: Publishing Demos 2002 
Various - Small Town Country, Vol. 1
Unwound - Empire
Unwound - Peel Sessions
The Edge of Daybreak - Eyes of Love
Elyse Weinberg - Greasepaint Smile
Various - Ork Records: New York, New York
The Feelies - The Boy with the Perpetual Nervousness/My Little Red Book 7"
Guided By Voices - Suitcase 4: Captain Kangaroo Won the War
Neil Young & The Bluenotes - Bluenote Cafe
Ty Segall - Ty Rex
The Shades - Santa Claus Is Coming to Town/Prancer's Got Some Red Spots 7"
Various - Entertainment soundtrack 
Ennio Morricone/Various - The Hateful Eight soundtrack 


I haven't listened to this all the way through yet because it was a free online-only release and it slipped my mind, but I liked what I heard way back in January
Death Grips - Fashion Week 

Favorite live shows (national)
Destroyer
Thee Oh Sees
Kraftwerk
The Waco Brothers

Favorite live shows (local) (I didn't get out much this year, my apologies to anyone I've forgotten)
Rhett and Dean
Boss Eye
The John-Pauls
Rabbit Fist
Abigail und Hansel
Mitch Fraizer & The Radiation
Jailbait

The band I play drums for, The Early Stages, put out our second 7-inch this year. We got a nice review from Byron Coley in Wire magazine, a pretty good review in Maximum Rocknroll, and some airplay on Jon Solomon's radio show on WPRB in New Jersey, the Expressway to Yr Skull podcast, and a few other podcasts and websites. Otherwise, zilch. I feel good about the music on this single, and I feel pretty good about my band, even though we can't get arrested in this town or most other places. You can buy/stream/hear this thing and our previous 7-inch at http://www.theearlystagesmusic.com/ and https://theearlystages.bandcamp.com/

 
 

Merry Xmas and Happy New Year from the Gurflakks

Hello family and friends,
Another year of challenges and blessings has come and gone. As we say goodbye to 2015 and how do you do to 2016, I've taken a few moments to reflect on the past year and share those reflections with you, our loved ones. It's hard to condense all the comings and goings and doings of one whole year into one little ol' typed letter, but here are some of the highlights from the last 365 days in the life of Marion, the kids, and the "Big Kahuna" AKA me (LOL).
In February, the whole bunch of us got in the van and went to McDonald's. Todd had three McFlurries. (Can you believe it?)
Cadence skinned her knee in the front yard imitating an episode of the Netflix original series Narcos. I think she learned her lesson about letting the professionals handle the stunts. :)
Randy burned off part of his right eyebrow working the grill at our annual May Day BBQ (some of you were there). He won't get near open flames anymore and sometimes wakes up screaming, but the boy still loves his hot dogs and grilled halibut.
Sheila sees a shadowy figure in her bedroom at night. She calls him The Shifter and says he's not quite human. He's told her terrifying prophecies about the future of humankind.
Gabe got a B+ in Geometry.
Jett got trapped in the wall in early March. He doesn't know how he got in there, and we can't figure out how to get him out. I don't know what he's been eating, but we can still hear him in there, pounding away, yelling. Boys will be boys.
Marion still does her crafts. She has her hands full with the kiddos while I put in my 45 hours a week at the bologna factory, but the weekends are her time to shine. I've enclosed a photo of her latest project, toilet seat covers with the faces of each of our presidents (except Obama).
I can get a 45% discount on one package of our company's processed meat products six times a year.
Sometimes I look in the mirror and my face has turned to glass. My hands. My chest. My whole body. Then, I look again and I'm flesh and blood.
The whole family has been enjoying Homeland, Pawn Stars, and that show with Rob Lowe and the kid from The Wonder Years. No spoilers! We're still catching up on the last few episodes.
Sadly, our family has experienced some loss this year. Our poodle, Mr. Cooper, ate some poisoned kale and passed on to the next world. We believe our neighbors' teenage son was responsible but cannot prove this in a court of law. Fortunately, our Siamese cat, Clams Casino, and our Scottish terrier, Rolando, are still in the peak of health.
As for me, I'm just glad to be living, loving, and gainfully employed in the good ol' U.S. of A. I hope 2015 treated you right.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you and yours!

Sincerely,
Ambrose, Marion, Todd, Cadence, Randy, Sheila, Gabe, Jett, Clams Casino, and Rolando Gurflakk

A thing that happened last month

On a weekday evening last month, I went to my neighborhood commercial art film theater (that, to be honest, mostly screens middlebrow visually bland horseshit about famous inspirational people, old folks getting their grooves back, old British folks getting their grooves back in India, feelgood neoliberal message movies for upper-class white people who are really pleased with themselves, movie-star Oscar-grubbing vanity projects, and a couple of genuinely good-to-great independent and foreign movies a month) to see a movie. My wife had a busy night, so I was flying solo and decided to get some candy at the concession stand, which we never, ever do. As I was waiting in the sort-of long line, I noticed a hubbub of some sort near the front with some very flustered-looking young employees exhibiting facial expressions I knew well from my own high school and college years in retail (the "can you believe I have to politely listen to this goddamn unreasonable human being to keep my job and can you believe how many fellow human beings are this goddamn unreasonable" look). The hubbub hadn't yet reached pandemonium status but was approaching a clamor. This is an unusual thing at a theater that mostly attracts rich old people wanting to see whatever chapter of exotic fucking marigold hotel we're at now or fellow thirty- and forty-somethings who like non-superhero movies. The guy at the concession counter was enraged, and his voice kept getting louder.
This theater chain has a policy that if you buy the enormous, expensive, enormous popcorn size and you manage to eat it in all its enormity, you can come back in the lobby for a free enormous refill during the screening. The angry man at the front was under the impression he could come back any time he wanted and get a free refill, including a quick drop-in after work without even purchasing a movie ticket, and his empty popcorn container had clearly seen many miles on this road we call life, considering it was dented in several places and covered in dirt. When he received the reasonable verdict that a refill was not going to happen on this particular date and time, Mr. Popcorn Tub 2015 went berserk. He told the awkward college-aged assistant manager that he was doing a terrible job, he berated every member of the staff in detail, he threatened to call 911 and the police department, he yelled a ton of stuff about "false and misleading advertising," and he closed with this beautiful sentence about enlisting the local TV news watchdogs in his crusade before angrily storming out: "I'm gonna call 7 On Your Side and put this place on blast!" ("Area Man and His Dirt-Covered Container Denied Free Refill in Obama's America, tonight at 10, right before 'The Big Bang Theory'")
The woman in line ahead of me turned to me and rolled her eyes. "Calm down, man," I said. "It's only popcorn." Then I thought about all the misery I've caused in my own life with my own quick, stupid temper. Then I bought some Twizzlers.

Everyone I grew up with is dead

I was very fond of my mom's brothers and their spouses and girlfriends and kids when I was growing up, and I used to have a lot of good childhood memories before social media ruined everything forever. There is a curious disconnect between their friendliness and warmth in person on the rare holidays when we're all in the same place, and the vitriolic, hate-filled spew they seem to spend every waking second of their free time vomiting forth on social media. Anyone who is slightly to the left of Ted Nugent is an idiot, a moron, a hater of freedom, a hater of the United States, weak, a sheep (they love calling people sheep even though they never post an original thought of their own, just memes and chain letters and propaganda videos), a loser, a coward, etc., etc., etc. They find transgender people hilarious. They make fun of Black Lives Matter. They back every police officer who shoots an unarmed black person or uses unnecessary force. They express anger and hostility toward the communities who stood up for themselves and protested this police brutality. (They loved Cliven Bundy, though.) They think everyone on food stamps is either lazy or a scam artist. They post the ugliest anti-Muslim propaganda and anti-Arab and anti-Middle East racist bullshit and think the entire Muslim religion is a terrorist call-to-arms. They thought the blowhard, pandering governors who said they weren't going to take in Syrian refugees (even though each one of these goons knows he has no authority to deny them) were great guys. They post memes with fabricated statistics, distortions, exaggerations, and lies, and when I was still dumb enough to respond with proof, they told me they didn't accept my sources because "all sources are biased." Shortly before I quit Facebook, they called my mother and I "fucking keyboard warriors" who should "move to Iraq if you love it so much" because my mother posted something on her own damn page about the overselling of ISIS by right wing media to stir up hatred, and I defended her when they all ganged up on her like the redneck creeps they unfortunately have become (always were?).
I quit Facebook, which helped considerably, but I still occasionally see their bullshit when I log on to my wife's account to see what she and our friends and my non-asshole relatives (mother, brother, sister) and the band I'm in are posting. It bums me out, man. It really, really bums me out. If they were just moderate conservatives who weren't doling out a near-constant stream of insults, misinformation, racism, and xenophobia, it wouldn't bother me. We don't have to agree. I have friends who are Republicans, libertarians, Communists, and anarchists, all schools of thought I could never subscribe to, but these people don't treat other people like garbage for having a different point of view.
To be fair, I hate liberal memes and preaching to the choir and liberal infighting about who cares more and how you're caring wrong and the way people are pounced on and destroyed for saying something ignorant or prejudiced in public or for not using the currently fashionable buzzword for a marginalized group. I hate all the white liberal self-congratulation and back-patting and bragging about enlightenment. I hate goddamn Facebook memes. I hated myself when I was on Facebook arguing with my relatives. I hate politics in general. Art and fun are my bags. But I hate the right wing social media shit-stirrer hate factory the most.
Whenever I think about the angry, hate-filled, macho, violent garbage my relatives perpetuate on social media, I get really down. Even if almost all of the shit they say about liberals and all the "information" they post is wildly inaccurate and a clear misrepresentation, I take it personally. It grinds me down to think they think so little of me. I hate how they've tarnished so many fond memories. I feel my own anger and hatred increasing in response to theirs, and I don't like that about myself. I don't know how people who had such a great, kind, open-minded mother and grandmother could spend so much time trying to make other people feel shitty. Why are a bunch of American white people with families and decent jobs and hobbies they love so bitter and hate-filled and angry and resentful and paranoid and suspicious of anyone who doesn't look, think, and act exactly like them? It seems to bother my brother and sister less than it bothers me, and I don't know how they so successfully let it go without dwelling on it. But I'm obsessed. Why are they doing this? Were they always like this? Would my grandparents and friends' grandparents act like this if social media had been a part of their daily routine? What happened to my relatives? What the hell happened to them? What happened to everybody?
Is anybody else dealing with this? How do you keep it from ruining your day? Do you just cut them loose from your life? Is Mark Zuckerberg one of history's greatest monsters, or did we do this to ourselves?
TGIF, motherfuckers.

TV Guide movie listings that may exist

[48] MOVIE - Comedy
"The Godfather." (1978) Spiritual guffaws abound in this sequel to "Oh, God" when God (George Burns) finally meets His biological father, an inanimate beam of light voiced by James Coco. John Denver returns, but is outshined by Burt Reynolds as Sen. Ptarmigan. (1 hr. 48 min.)

[58] MOVIE - Action
"Blade Runner." (2003) Wesley Snipes returns as Blade in the concluding installment of the popular vampire trilogy. This time around, Blade walks away from the world of vampires to pursue his dream of competing in a series of charity marathon fun runs, but have the vampires walked away from him? Paul Giamatti was nominated for a Golden Globe for his portrayal of Blade's racing coach, Clutch Merriweather. (2 hr. 21 min.)

[12] MOVIE - Horror-boxing-musical comedy
"The Rocky Horror Picture Show." (1977) In this offbeat crossover sequel to the Oscar-winning dramas "Rocky" and "The Last Picture Show," Rocky Balboa (Sylvester Stallone) agrees to fight glam rock-singing transvestite scientist Dr. Frank-N-Furter (Tim Curry) in an exhibition match in Archer City, Texas, in order to raise money to reopen the Royal Theater. Starring Meat Loaf in dual roles as ex-delivery boy Eddie and eccentric boxing promoter "Texas" Bob Sugarditch. (3 hr. 52 min.)

 [82] MOVIE - Basic mathematical errors
"Fast Five." (2011) Vin Diesel counts to five, but the count is too fast because he leaves out the number three. (4 sec.)  

Z

My friend Zulema died of cancer last night while a major thunderstorm brought flash floods, a tornado, and a mini-tornado (like a tornado, but cuter) to our adopted city of Austin, Texas, sending her off in style. She was only 39, she was awesome, and it sucks. My heart's aching for her, her boyfriend Darin, her family, and her many, many friends, but I'm also enjoying the celebration of her life that's been happening in and on various social media outlets (the same outlets that are too often filled to capacity with negativity, hostility, humblebrags, pointless political arguments, and cliched platitudes) and the love and community connecting every one of us who knew her. (I apologize for the hippyness of that statement, but I also don't apologize because I totally mean it.) I love seeing photos from the parts of her life that didn't intersect with mine, and I'm in awe of how much goodness she put into the world. I hope it's not just temporary, but I feel like this love and community is making me a less hard, less resentful, less closed-off person. I need to remember to keep those feelings around and appreciate the love and friendship I have right now. I take too much of it for granted and retreat into the private world in my head too often.
Enough about me and my problems, here are a few things I love (fuck the past tense) about Zulema and my way too brief time on this planet with her.
She had one of the great first-name/last-name combinations.
She loved Captain Beefheart AND Hall & Oates. Yeah!
She was sweet and kind, but also interesting and hilarious. Too often, that Venn diagram looks like two separate circles with a foot of space in between.
She was never one of those "hey, look at me" people. She was modest, humble, relaxed, comfortable with herself. No big ego stuff, no drama. She was always so present, so receptive to everyone around her. She never had to win over the room. She just said funny stuff quietly, naturally, in the course of conversation. As someone who's publicly made an ass out of himself on too many occasions, I always admired that about her.
She was incapable of taking a bad photograph. I only look passable in maybe one out of thirty photographs. She looked great in every one, even when she was sick.
She said one of the five or six funniest things I ever heard. Two summers ago, a group of us pooled our money and rented a beach house in Port Aransas, a small resort town on the Texas coast of the Gulf of Mexico. We spent that long weekend swimming in the Gulf, cooking and eating big delicious meals, drinking lots of beer and wine, and hanging out in the swimming pool and hot tub across the street at night. On one of those nights, after returning to the house, a few of us were sitting on the balcony, enjoying the breeze, and we got into this long, booze-fueled conversation about what would happen if our beach vacation turned into a Hotel California-style scenario in which we could enter but never leave. What happens if you were trapped in a beach town forever? We weighed the pros and cons in detail, and Zulema said one of the drawbacks to permanent beach life was that the beach town prostitutes were "too sandy." That's one of the most hilarious things I've ever heard, and it makes me laugh every time I think about it. I can't do that joke justice because so much of it depended on her word choice, her delivery, and her facial expressions, but if you don't think that's funny, even in my truncated, fuzzy memory version, you should be catapulted into a swamp.
She was just someone you felt good around. She made you feel better. She was so damn likable.
She got sick shortly after that Port Aransas trip, and I didn't see her for a while. My last conversation with her was four months ago at the grocery store. I was putting some kind of produce item into my cart, and someone tapped me on the shoulder and said, "You need to put that back." I turned around, and it was her. She looked great, healthy and happy. She'd beaten it for now, but only a week after our conversation, she'd find out that the cancer was back and that it had spread. That last conversation was a fun one. We talked about our shared love of Bob Odenkirk and the way he yelled "Goddammit" on "Mr. Show," and we talked about cat buttholes. My uncle married a Jewish woman (this seems like a weird digression, but wait for it) and converted to Judaism. He became way more obsessed with being Jewish than his Jewish-by-birth wife. I am the same way, but with cats. I was a dog lover from the jump, but since my wife and I got two cats three years ago, I am the cat-lovingest son of a bitch in town. Zulema was a cat lover, too, and we talked about our pets. She told me a story about an old cat of hers who unwittingly ate some hot chile peppers, which led to some joking about the eventual passing of those chile peppers and about cat buttholes in general. I'm so glad I ran into her that day. There's something ridiculous and completely endearing about cat buttholes being the subject of our final conversation.
I wasn't one of her closest friends, and I only got to hang out with her for a handful of years, but I thoroughly enjoyed her company, and I was lucky to know her. I miss her already.

My favorite music of 2014, or geezers > youngsters/my year playing music

I usually write about my favorite films of the year on my movie blog, but I've never tried to do a favorite music of the year post because I thought it would be too much work to figure out. This year, I realized that the Date Added button in my iTunes and a few music and indie-label web sites would make that process easy.
This year really hammered home what a 37-year-old American man and Robert Pollard fan I am, but come on, people. The cliche that most artists only do work worth listening to early in their careers is fashionable bullshit. The stereotype was once true when the Baby Boomers (those monstrously self-absorbed assholes who think the '60s were the only decade that ever happened (so self-absorbed they make the millennials look like St. Francis) who fucked up, and continue to fuck up, everything) made great music in the late '60s and early '70s and then proceeded to suck lazily for the next 40 years (insert many notable exceptions here), but it's not really true anymore (and wasn't true of the old jazz and blues guys who influenced them). The people of later generations learned from their mistakes. Also, those Boomer rock gods and goddesses became multimillionaires and even billionaires, and rich people can't make art once they learn they're rich. Money and superfame are worse than drug addiction at extinguishing the creative spark, in my armchair not-fact-checked opinion.
I am continually creatively juiced up by new music made by people my age and older, on both the international and local levels, and underwhelmed by a lot of the music made by the post-tween set (again, insert the many notable exceptions here). At the Fun Fun Fun Fest I attend every year in Austin, the old folks regularly play mindblowing sets while the hyped attractive youngsters flail and pose and play songs that sound like Don Henley making love to Hall & Oates in a convenience store bathroom (which actually sounds pretty fantastic on paper, come to think of it). I like not relating to the youth of today, and I don't feel bad about that. I am getting older and I would like to glean the wisdom from the artists hitting that patch of road ahead of me instead of chasing the eternal youth mirage. All that being said, damn does that precocious lil' guy Ty Segall float my boat. Good job, young man.

Here are some 2014 records I enjoyed a great deal in 2014, in the order I added them to my computer (don't kick me in the taint, btw, I bought most of them first on vinyl or CD b/c artists should be paid for their work (except for the jerks who get paid way too much)):

Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks - Wig Out at Jagbags
Bohren & Der Club of Gore - Piano Nights
Guided By Voices - Motivational Jumpsuit and Cool Planet (Cool Planet is better but Motivational Jumpsuit has my favorite GBV song of the whole reunion: "Alex and the Omegas")
Beck - Morning Phase 
Damaged Bug - Hubba Bubba
The Men - Tomorrow's Hits
Doug Gillard - Parade On
Sweet Apple - The Golden Age of Glitter
Vertical Scratchers - Daughter of Everything
King Buzzo - This Machine Kills Artists
Neil Young -  A Letter Home
J Mascis - Tied to a Star
The New Pornographers - Brill Bruisers
Ty Segall - Manipulator and $INGLE$ 2
Le Butcherettes - Cry Is for the Flies (minus the two minutes of Henry Rollins poetry that precedes one song)
Shellac - Dude Incredible
Circus Devils - Escape
Mark Lanegan Band - Phantom Radio
Melvins - Hold It In
Moonsicles - Creeper
Thurston Moore - The Best Day
Guano Padano - Americana
Eyehategod - Eyehategod
Sleaford Mods - Chubbed Up +
D'Angelo - Black Messiah

2014 albums with some great moments that I enjoyed to a lesser extent overall than the above
The Unsemble - The Unsemble
The Afghan Whigs - Do to the Beast
Mac DeMarco - Salad Days
Thee Oh Sees - Drop
Death Grips - Niggas on the Moon
Twilight - III: Beneath Trident's Tomb
John Frusciante - Enclosure
Teenage Guitar - More Lies from the Gooseberry Bush
Split Single - Fragmented World
Tweedy - Sukierae
Neil Young - Storytone (the solo disc is good, the orchestral disc is pretty cheesy)
tetema - Geocidal

Older albums and box sets reissued in 2014 and 2014 compilations of old stuff put together for the first time in 2014 that I had a lot of time for (2014 edition) (2014) (it's two-thirds Numero Group) (2014)
Josefus - Dead Man
Al Green - Let's Stay Together
Unwound - Rat Conspiracy and No Energy
Various - Warfaring Strangers: Darkscorch Canticles
Sandy Denny & The Strawbs - All Our Own Work
Various - Music of the Mountain Provinces
Ned Doheny - Separate Oceans
The Brothers & Sisters - Dylan's Gospel
Nikki Sudden -all the solo and Jacobites reissues and Kiss You Kidnapped Charabanc with Rowland S. Howard
Bulbous Creation - You Won't Remember Dying
Led Zeppelin - III
Various - Eccentric Soul: Capitol City Soul and Eccentric Soul: The Way Out Label
Sensational Saints - You Won't Believe It
Solaris - The Waves of the Evernow
Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young - CSNY 1974
The Montgomery Express - The Montgomery Movement
Various - Local Customs: Cavern Sound
Various - Country Funk Vol. 2: 1967-1974
Various - Night Walker: The Jack Nitzsche Story, Vol. 3
Bedhead - 1992-1998
Jordan de la Sierra - Gymnosphere: Song of the Rose

Local business:
My band The Early Stages released our first hard-copy meat-space vinyl single in 2014, which you can still purchase and/or stream (see the post just below this one to find out how). We proved to be slightly less unpopular in the rest of the world than we are locally as no local stations played any of the three songs at any point in the entire year, not even at 3 a.m. Our local cachet, never that high to begin with, continues to plummet. (Humblebrags ahead.) However, Jon Solomon of Comedy Minus One Records played us on his show on New Jersey radio station WPRB, and Maximum Rocknroll played us on their online radio show. We were also reviewed favorably in Maximum Rocknroll and Wire magazine. That Wire review, which, if I may braggadociously point out, is an international publication, netted us one whole sale. Who says analog is dead, right? Stop backing away from me.

Austin bands we played shows with this year who played sets I particularly enjoyed:
Moonsicles
James Arthur's Manhunt
The John Wesley Coleman Band
Pharaohs
Suspirians
The John Pauls
New China
Rabbit Fist
Woozy Helmet
Foot Patrol

Our local brushes with fame and semi-fame: We played with a Rush cover band (Central Texas' premier Rush cover band, I've been told), Angelo Moore from Fishbone, Lesley Rankine from Silverfish, Pigface, and Ruby and her brother who is Public Image Ltd's current bassist and who has also played with Elvis Costello and Spice Girls (to an audience of 12 people), and got a nice compliment from Babes in Toyland's drummer (who was one of the 12 people in the audience). Gerard Cosloy walked out of two of our shows clearly bored. Prince sat in with us and played "When Doves Cry" and "Uptown." (I made one of these up, but it's not easy to spot. If you think you've found the untrue anecdote, write it down on a postcard depicting a tropical beach scene and send it to Can-Smashing Robot Lie-Spotting Contest 2014/15, 666 Fake Address, Blair, NE, 69854. If you guessed the lie correctly, you will receive a crate of organic California prunes and my power of attorney.)

Happy new year, you princes of Maine, you kings of New England. Don't fill up on bread, and keep it street legal. 

Promotional content

Please forgive this self-promotional post, but I play in a band called The Early Stages, and we put out a 7-inch recently. Copies are still available, and you can buy one at this link. If you don't want to buy it, you can also stream it for zero dollars at the same link. Ted Nugent sucks.

A song for every year of my life #28: 2004

I haven't done one of these for almost a year. I usually unintentionally abandon every series I start on this blog, but here it is, back from the grave. I want to post more frequently here, even though the nonspecific journal-style blogs seem to be dying (I'm a sucker for any medium or piece of the culture that's slowly dying), and this old series came to mind today. I'm almost always thinking about music anyway, and music is the only healthy thing that makes me feel better when I have convinced myself I'm a piece of shit loser. I'm going through a bit of a phase (13 years and counting is still a phase, right?) where I feel like an unsuccessful, perpetually broke, missed-my-calling, unable-to-communicate-verbally-with-humans, sad, angry, bitter, jealous failure, but music stops those thoughts and is better than my other means of coping (alcohol, television, food, repressed rage). Movies and books are also amazing things, but I have to be in an okay place to really engage with them. Music is some kind of voodoo-salve, cosmic gloom squeegee that can turn the room purple if you play it loud enough and give it your full attention. It's the only thing that works unconditionally in a world that is mostly complete and utter bullshit. (Well, my wife and my cats are pretty great, too, but I take the good things in my life for granted because I have problems.)
How cruel that 2004 is my next stop. Looking at the big list of records released in 2004, I don't see much I care about. I'm sure there are tons of local, below-the-radar 2004 records waiting to melt my face off, but the ones I've heard don't have the juice, except for a big pile of records by people I've already written about in this series (I'm trying to do just one song per artist) and a smattering of others. One of those others is the only musical hero of mine who follows me on Instagram, Doug Gillard. Gillard has played guitar for a metric fuckload of quality bands including Guided By Voices (who broke up again today, goddamn it), Cobra Verde, My Dad Is Dead, Death of Samantha, Gem, Bill Fox, Nada Surf, and Lifeguards. The guy is a guitar wizard who is really good at playing hot guitar sounds on the guitar for guitar aficionados, but never at the expense of a song. He's also a damn fine songwriter, with three damn fine solo albums and a damn fine solo EP. Here is the song "(But) I See Something" from his 2004 album Salamander. This song has a lot to recommend it. It's subtle, pretty, and catchy, with a girl group/early Pretenders/indie pop/classic rock swirl of sounds joining together into a nice little whole, and I dig the old-school parenthetical in the title. I'm a man who enjoys parentheticals.


Alternate choice: Melvins/Lustmord - "The Bloated Pope"
I love the Melvins. They're still a vital band putting out great records and trying new things three decades into their career. They're like the metal Yo La Tengo. This song is from their unfairly neglected collaboration with electronic noise terrorist Lustmord, Pigs of the Roman Empire, that is better than most 2004 records, especially the boring ones by Arcade Fire, Eminem, Kanye West, U2, Green Day, Sufjan Stevens, et cetera and so on that were getting all the attention from the critics that year. I like this song because it kicks ass and sounds good, and also because Lustmord got his start by going to high-profile shows and just getting on stage before the opening band and performing until someone figured out he wasn't on the bill and kicked him off the stage, and finally because I was raised Catholic and forced to go to church as a kid even though I never bought into that organized religion malarkey so you can probably guess the song title warms my heart. Ted Nugent sucks.

Tragicomedy is meltdown plus time

Politics are stupid. I'm not mad at anybody anymore. We're all doing what we can with what we've got and none of us are ever going to understand each other and that's got to be okay.

Blog Post

Please enjoy this completely unrelated photo of President Taft before you read this blog post, compliments of the creative team behind Mr. Krauter, the half-robot, half-hologram, all-hunk who was programmed to write this crap. 
Wowzers. Haven't updated this thing in a while. Need to put all the shit in my life that's out of whack back in whack, blow the dust off the neglected parts and give them some sweet, sweet attention, and stop wasting time like I did on Sunday arguing about politics with my relatives on Facebook. Is there anything worse than arguing on Facebook? I don't even give a shit about politics. I only give a shit about art and sandwiches. I lose respect for myself every time I get ensnared in that bullshit. I used to get ensnared in it a lot, because my relatives write and forward a lot of crazy shit and I stay up late and enjoy the occasional drink and the combination of all that stuff became deadly. Now I either hide the posts or ignore them, and I feel a lot better about myself. But, Sunday, man. They were dogpiling on my mom like bullies and making a lot of generalizations about a large, disparate demographic, and that pisses me off. I jumped in, things got heated, and crazy, crazy things were typed by almost all. It's impossible to write an eloquent sentence in the Facebook argument. Everyone ends up looking like the world's biggest jackass. No one came out of that online battle royale looking like a champion. I can be a real loser sometimes. I'm pretty disgusted with myself for wasting my time on it. Still don't get what happened to my relatives. They went through the neocon meatgrinder and came out the other side in a shiny Limbaugh/Hannity/O'Reilly sausage casing. Facebook-forwarding footsoldiers in the dissemination-of-bullshit army. Best to just keep on keeping three or four states in between us and remember the past is dead. We had some good times in the pre-Facebook days, before the pod people bodysnatched them. We're not any good for each other in the present.
The idea of family is something that troubles me. I used to think I had a handle on what it meant, but now I feel like I was in a balloon that popped. Every member of my immediate family lives in a different city or town in four different states, I can't relate to my uncles and cousins anymore, all the cool old folks died, my parents split up and made some very bad post-divorce relationship decisions I don't support, and I have my own life here with my wife and wacky cats and rock band and unfulfilling day job and mild depression and impending middle age and list of regrets. My life is statistically half over, and I haven't figured out a damn thing about how I can be useful to myself or others. And that's the weird place I'm at tonight.

Postscript: I posted this last night, felt weird about posting it, and then deleted it, then felt weird about deleting it, so here it is again, with some changes. Nobody even reads this shit anyway, so why censor myself?

Sitcom Catchphrase Quiz Party

I was walking down the street behind a sitcom writer a fortnight ago, and a document fell out of his pocket. I picked it up and kept it forever. This document was a quiz for prospective writing staff hires testing their catchphrase chops. I now present this document to you:

WHICH CATCHPHRASE IS BEST?
You will be presented with several hilarious and comical situations. Underneath the situations are four catchphrases that can be said by one of the totally outrageous main characters. Pick which one is the best. If you get them all right, we may interview you for a position on one of our madcap situation comedies like "The Slappies," "The Theory of Relativity," or "Single Robot Dad." Good luck, and as we say in show business, break a leg!!

1. The boss is coming over for dinner in three minutes and you are all out of Chianti! What catchphrase best sums up the situation?

A. You've GOTTA be kiddin' me!
B. It's not even Monday!
C. I must have slapped a baby in my past life!
D. This world we live in would seem cold, empty, and cruel if it wasn't so pointless!

2. You've accidentally arranged dates with two sexy ladies on the same night ... at the same restaurant! What catchphrase best sums up the situation?

A. Holy guacamole! (bites knuckle)
B. I can't believe I did it again! Goodnight, America!
C. Who do I think I am? Mick Jagger? (shrugs shoulders and grins toward camera)
D. My continuing objectification of women reveals a deep flaw in my character!

3. You walk into your swinging single neighbor's duplex and see an unsavory sexual act (tastefully presented offscreen). What catchphrase best sums up the situation?

A. That DEFINITELY ain't kosher!
B. Give me a time machine, somebody! I need to erase the last two minutes of my life!
C. Now that's the OPPOSITE of Viagra!
D. I will scoop out my eyeballs with a spoon and dance upon them until they are as flat as the terra firma on which we stand to ensure a revolting sight such as this will never again impress itself upon my soul!

4. Due to an administrative mishap, 200 extra pizzas have been delivered to the pizza party boy band benefit concert sock hop! What catchphrase best sums up the situation?

A. I said I could eat a lot of pizza, but THIS is riDICulous!!
B. I need a Caribbean vacation!
C. Cut me some slack!
D. There are starving children in this world who will never taste even one bite of pizza in their short, miserable lives, while here at Beach Party High, the streets are paved with hundreds of surplus pizza pies!

5. You and your loose cannon best friend, Jock Blingo, are handcuffed together for an entire weekend when he loses the key! What catchphrase best sums up the situation?

A. You've done it again, Blingo!
B. And it was such a pleasant morning!
C. I am not laughing out loud THIS time!
D. Our friendship is thin, superficial, and no longer of use to me!

The Dr. Mystery guide to "Miami Vice" for gentlemen and gentlewomen of leisure (Part 5: Season 5): The Final Chapter

The epic saga is finally at an end. I have exhausted the supply of Miami Vice episodes, leaving only a Miami Vice-sized hole in my heart. There were many highs, many lows, many ups, many downs, and many inexplicably strange lines of dialogue. For the past year and change, Miami Vice has been the wind beneath my wings, my surrogate father, a weirdly inappropriate uncle, and that guy who tried to sell me weed from his frat house fire escape that one weekend in 1996. But that's all over now. I'm on my own, the only set of footprints on the beach, a lone wolf, a shy bad boy with a heart of gold and no one to look out for me but me. I knew this day would come, but a man can never quite prepare for the day when he has to pack up, move on, and leave his 1980s television show behind. Thanks for taking this journey with me. (wipes away fake tear, chugs flask of leftover Zima)
To be honest, this season was a bit of a chore to plow through. The first two seasons were hilariously awesome, the third season showed some strain but was still 2/3 hilariously awesome, and the fourth season was terrible but in hilariously awesome ways, but the fifth season was pretty tired and worn out. Most Miami Vice fans consider the fourth season the worst, but its over-the-top ridiculousness (alien abductions, serial killers with multiple personalities, a snuff film made by an "erotic performance artist," contraband bull semen, samurai swordfights, ill-fated marriages to pop stars, cryogenically frozen reggae superstars named Robillard Nevin, a boat explosion that gives Crockett amnesia and makes him think he's an evil drug lord) was so, so amusing to me. The fifth season is my pick for the worst. Don Johnson and Philip Michael Thomas are clearly bored with the show and sleepwalk through their performances, the show's distinctive visual style and color palette are replaced by blandly generic '80s network TV blocking and framing and bland cinematography, the rest of the cast is barely on any of the episodes, Jan Hammer's electro-synth music is replaced by Tim Truman's noodly hair-metal blues guitar licks, Crockett's houseboat is only seen once, and his pet alligator Elvis is never even mentioned. The show tanked in the ratings, and the network kept moving it around to different nights. Three episodes weren't even aired until the summer reruns, and a fourth wasn't aired at all because the network got cold feet about its subject matter. The show was tired, the audience was tired, the actors were bored. It was time for the Old Yeller treatment. That being said, there were still plenty of ridiculously bizarre lines of dialogue, interesting guest stars, and moments of entertainment.
Miami Vice began in the most 1980s year of the '80s, 1984, and ended in 1989. It wouldn't have made sense in the '90s. It couldn't have transitioned to a '90s aesthetic. You don't want Crockett and Tubbs investigating grunge- and new jack swing-related cases. It just wouldn't have worked. Here's the final Dr. Mystery recap.

"Hostile Takeover"
Guest stars: Jon Polito is a crazed drug lord named El Gato. Mr. Max Headroom himself, Matt Frewer, is a shady underworld type with connections to several drug lords. Mickey Rourke's ex-wife and a current yoga teacher Debra Feuer is the widow of a drug lord with the hots for Crockett. Victor Argo is not a drug lord but he is a South American comandante. Joe Santos is an ill-fated drug lord. Anthony Crivello is the son of the ill-fated drug lord. His character's name is Miguel. My notes about the episode contain this phrase: "Miguel? -- crazy, crazy hair."
Out-of-context quote: "Nice groceries. Roll over, Beethoven."
This episode picks up where the Season 4 cliffhanger left off. If you remember, Crockett thinks he's a mercenary drug lord because he got amnesia during a boat explosion. It could happen to anyone. My notes tell me that El Gato wears a chain that is a giant gold eagle, and that this episode features the return of Tubbs' awful Jamaican accent.

"Redemption in Blood"
Guest stars: Jon Polito, Matt Frewer, Debra Feuer, and Victor Argo return from the previous episode.
Out-of-context quote: "I am El Gato! You have not died in vain, amigo. El Gato will take your strength. El Gato is a player."
Bonus quote: "What are you boys waiting for? A Christmas bonus?"
Another bonus quote: ""Yesterday he threatened to kill me." "So?"
Polito knows how ridiculous his character is and wisely adds another 12 glazed hams to his already scenery-chewing performance in "Hostile Takeover." From my notes: "Polito is a cross between Pacino's Scarface and Rip Taylor ... & Cheech." Also from my notes: "(Crockett) should have stayed as his (drug lord) persona. Sexy girlfriend, money, slightly better hairdo, sweet jukebox, pet panther." Yes, Evil Crockett owned a panther that roamed freely in one of the rooms of his mercenary drug lord pad.

"Heart of Night"
Guest stars: Bob Gunton is a drug dealer. Rosalind Chao takes over for Joan Chen as Castillo's long-lost former wife. James Saito is Chao's current husband. Michael Lombard is Saito's boss.
Out-of-context quote: "What was he carrying?" "Strange toy birds."
Bonus quote: "You're gonna look like a serious freak and for what?"

"Bad Timing"
Guest stars: Melissa Leo is a bartender Crockett meets while on vacation recuperating from his amnesia and amnesia-related villainy. Pruitt Taylor Vince, Gary Farmer, and William O'Leary are murderous escaped prisoners. Stephanie Roth is Crockett's psychiatrist. Jermaine Stewart, late one-hit-wonder ("You Don't Have to Take Your Clothes Off"), appears as himself.
Out-of-context quote: "I hope you got something to drink and the treasure map."
In a plausible scenario, Jermaine Stewart performs his brand of effeminate dance-pop to a captive audience of murderous prisoners. They hate his music so much, they start a prison riot, and our trio of killers escapes.

"Borrasca"
Guest stars: Juan Fernandez is a counterrevolutionary who is good at killing and good at being a target for assassination. Brion James is a mercenary intelligence agent for hire.
Out-of-context quote: "Some street punk in New York tried to touch me there once. You know what I did? Had to carve a new face for that sucka!"
Bonus quote: "I let you live, peasant. Thank the Virgin."
Normal quote given a hilarious line reading: "What the hell is happening?"


"Line of Fire"
Guest stars: Barry Primus is an FBI agent. Justin Lazard is a heavy metal-loving witness to a crime who Crockett and Tubbs have to protect until he can testify. Aasif Mandviwala is a doorman.
Out-of-context quote: "They tell me you guys were Vice. I figure, hey, man, that's rippin'. Vice dudes know what's happenin', right?'
Bonus quote: "I hear Miami's a pretty moshin' scene. Insane clubs, huh?"
Another bonus quote: "That was a bonehead play, junior."
Yet another bonus quote: "They shot my boombox. I'm outta here, Crockett."
Sonny Crockett, rock critic: "This speed metal crap is just warmed-over Hendrix riffs played twice as fast and half as well."
I have several things to point out about this episode. Every time Lazard turns on a television, Ministry's "Stigmata" video is playing. Lazard sneaks away from police protection to attend a concert by Rugged Edge, a real local Miami band that combined hardcore punk with hair metal guitar solos. Crockett tries to turn Lazard away from metal by playing him Derek & The Dominos and telling him that metal won't be around in 20 years. Crockett gets into a shootout with a helicopter and EXPLODES it. Crockett and Tubbs visit Lazard in the hospital and bring albums by Anthrax, Megadeth, and Crumbsuckers.

"Asian Cut"
Guest stars: David Schramm is a professor of Asian studies. Russell Horton is a photographer. Julian Brams is a prostitute. Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa is a crazy nut who loves knives.
Out-of-context quote:  "You don't mind if we talk while my latest acquisition is being mounted?"

"Hard Knocks"
Guest stars: Richard Jenkins is a mobster in charge of collecting gambling debts. Victor Slezak is a sports agent with gambling and mob ties.
Out-of-context quote: "You run a fine organization, Chi-Chi."

"Fruit of the Poison Tree"
Guest stars: Amanda Plummer is a lawyer from a powerful family of lawyers. Paulie Walnuts himself, Tony Sirico, is a gangster. Stephen McHattie is another lawyer. Edgar Allen Poe IV (apparently, he's a distant nephew of the writer) is listed in the credits as "Junkie."
Out-of-context quote: "The man said he didn't have any sauerkraut."
Bonus quote: "You look terrific wet."

"To Have and to Hold"
Guest stars: Miguel Ferrer is the very intense son of a drug lord. Elpidia Carillo is the widow of a drug lord who gets in a little too deep with Tubbs ... between the sheets. Oh, snap. Belinda Montgomery is back as Crockett's ex-wife.
Out-of-context quote: "Wish I'd known you were into the classics. Last two pictures I checked in on, a moth ate a guy's head and a worm slimed Cleveland."
Bonus quote: "You're a very tender lady."
Another bonus quote: "Dr. Tubbs?"

"Miami Squeeze"
Guest stars: Rita Moreno is a hardball congresswoman whose son gets in trouble with drug dealers. Paul Provenza is a drug dealer. Robert Joy is a posh British drug lord with an unhealthy attachment to his pet dog.
Out-of-context quote: "Our transportation plan seems to have gone awry. Most unsatisfactory."

"Jack of All Trades"
Guest stars: John Santucci is a small-time gangster who is owed a debt by Crockett's cousin. Fame's Jesse Borrego is a big-time drug lord with the most ridiculous outfits I've ever seen on television or in life. You need to go to Netflix right now and stream this episode just to see the sleeves on this guy's shirts. From my notes: "It's like Seinfeld's puffy shirt if it was only sleeves or he's wearing two of Steven Tyler's mic stands on each arm."
Out-of-context quote: "I think you're wack. This is stinko."
Bonus quote: "We don't really have time to tally up all the bonehead plays you've made."
Another quote: "Call Dan Quayle. He'll vouch for me."
For some reason, this episode has a bizarre musical score that relies heavily on a capella and fits the scenes about as well as the glove in the OJ trial fit OJ.

"The Cell Within"
Guest stars: John P. Ryan is a criminal Tubbs busted years ago, and he's now a published author and reformed friend of Tubbs. Or is he? L.M. Kit Carson, screenwriter of Paris, Texas and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2, is a documentary filmmaker making a movie about Ryan. Richard Gant is a former professional boxer who is now Ryan's bodyguard.
Out-of-context quote: "Maybe he got lucky last night with some literary chick."
This episode would have fit right in with the fan fic-style insanity of Season 4. Ryan kidnaps Tubbs and locks him in the simulated prison in the basement of his mansion, complete with working electric chair, because Tubbs refuses to assist his vigilante crusade to kidnap, jail, and execute prisoners at his own home.

"The Lost Madonna"
Guest stars: Michael Chiklis is a detective and art enthusiast responsible for investigating stolen art. Ned Eisenberg is a drug dealer and thief. Elizabeth Berridge is an art lover and the wife of a drug lord.
Out-of-context quote:  "My work is beyond syntax."
Bonus quote: "The latest exploratory probe into neo-Dadaism."
Another quote: "The painter here is engaged in an aesthetic mysticism."
And another quote: "Dig the prof."
Tubbs goes undercover here as a renegade art professor who is selling stolen art. He convinces because he slicks his hair back. A shirtless musclehead guy with a long ponytail is an angry, inarticulate yet famous sculptor.

"Over the Line"
Guest stars: No one I know (except Martin Ferrero as Izzy).
Out-of-context quote:  "We know that Dr. Dinky tipped Tommy T, but who tipped Dr. D?"
Bonus quote: "Certain reptilian fluids."

"Victims of Circumstance"
Guest stars: William Hickey is a Nazi war criminal. Karen Black is his crazy daughter. John Leguizamo is the younger brother of two murdered drug dealers. Paul Guilfoyle is a crazy white supremacist. Xander Berkeley is a homicide detective.
Out-of-context quote: "The liberal cabal controls the media."

"Freefall: Part 1"
Guest stars: Ian McShane is the dictator of a fictional Latin American country on the verge of revolution. Robert Beltran is his aide-de-camp. Elpidia Carillo is a political activist nun who is Crockett and Tubbs' contact while they are in Latin America. Greg Germann is a lowlife punk.
Out-of-context quote: "Social life in the '80s. Isn't it a kick?"

"Freefall: Part 2"
Guest stars: See above. They're all back.
Out-of-context quote: "You don't just catch fish, you achieve a oneness with them, but I sense that you're not here for pescatorial pleasures."

The Lost Episodes
The next three episodes never aired until summer reruns because the network kept moving the show to different days and times and preempting it for special programming because of low ratings in its last season.

"World of Trouble"
Guest stars: Dennis Farina is back as Al Lombard, the gangster with a heart of gold. Vincent Schiavelli is a scientist who has created HAVOC, a stun gun for vehicles that disables them while they are in motion. Luca Bercovici is an arms dealer with a yacht. Ned Eisenberg is a gangster who wants to kill Lombard. Julian Brams is Lombard's daughter-in-law.
Out-of-context quote: "Wait a minute. This weapon shoots lightning bolts and you say it isn't dangerous?"
Bonus quote: "I never liked your hair."

"Miracle Man"
Guest stars: Jose Perez is a mentally ill ex-drug addict who thinks he's a crime fighting superhero named Miracle Man. Zach Grenier is a tabloid TV reporter.
Out-of-context quote: "I need a place to kick back where the forces of evil can't reach me while I make my plans."

"Leap of Faith"
Guest stars: Keith Gordon is a psychotic college professor, drug maker, and leader of a drug cult. Jennifer Rubin is one of his students and followers who starts having doubts. Laura San Giacomo is an investigator and computer expert. Justin Lazard is back.
Out-of-context quote: "I don't give a damn if you were assigned by Dan Quayle."
Bonus quote: "Me, I'm into surfboards and bikinis. I'm from Long Beach, California."
This episode is hilariously bad and was meant to be the launching pad for a spinoff series about the Young Crimes Unit. Crockett and Tubbs are in the first few minutes of this episode, but after that, it's a whole different show. Justin Lazard, whom you may remember as the heavy metal-loving informant from "Line of Fire," joins up with two other young undercover cops, a Southern boy from Arkansas and a surfer dude from California, as well as computer whiz Laura San Giacomo, and their boss, the old man of the group, Kiel Martin, to work undercover in the young world of young crimes concerning the young. Lazard butts heads with the other two young undercover cops at first. He works alone and he hates California surfer dudes so much, but they soon earn the grudging respect of each other and become best friends forever. In their first case, they're undercover at a club where the live entertainment is one guy lip-syncing to "Sweet Child O' Mine" for a crowd consisting of hair metal rocker dudes, punks with mohawks and safety pins in their leather vests, and asshole Wolf of Wall Street types snorting coke and wearing professional office attire. Needless to say, this spinoff never became a show because this episode was not aired during the regular season and also it was fucking terrible. But hilariously fucking terrible.

This last lost episode was approved by the network, shot, and completed, but NBC decided at the last minute that its depiction of the rape of a young girl was too controversial and pulled the plug. It was never aired until syndicated reruns in the 1990s, making it the only Miami Vice episode not shown in the 1980s.

"Too Much, Too Late"
Guest stars: Pam Grier is back as a New York detective and Tubbs' ex. C.C.H. Pounder is a coke addict and old friend of Pam's. John Toles-Bey is her sadistic drug dealer. Malinda Williams is her pre-teen daughter.
Out-of-context quote: "Esto es un tango, and also a little financial advice."
Bonus quote: "Hey, I am talkin' life's highway."

That's it.  
 

Great moments in journalism

From an ABC News article about the new Burger King burger, the Big King:

"Despite the familiar ingredients all the way down to the third bun, Burger King tells ABC News it doesn’t taste like the Big Mac because of the way the burger is prepared — it’s fire-grilled. The Big King is also 40 calories less than its rival.
Brooklyn resident Ty Bills, who eats from both burger chains, sought out the 'Big King' on the first day it launched. After the first few bites he smiled and nodded.
'It's very juicy,' he said. 'The sauce is different. I don't know what's in the sauce, but the sauce is good,' he added between bites."

The Dr. Mystery guide to "Miami Vice" for gentlemen and gentlewomen of leisure (Part 4: Season 4)

When I began this odyssey, this quest, to watch every episode of Miami Vice and report my findings here on the blog (probably one of the greatest quests of the modern era, but I'll leave that for the historians to sort out), I went down some crazy rabbit holes of rabid Vice fandom. There are many disputes, debates, and differences of opinion among the online fanatics, but most of them can agree on one thing: that Season 4 is the worst season of the series. This is the season where the train went off the tracks, where sharks were jumped, where actors began openly criticizing the quality of the scripts. Miami Vice is commonly regarded today as lovable kitsch and nostalgic '80s goofiness, but I will go to bat for the first three seasons being a damn good show. Miami Vice really looked like nothing else on television at the time and was a unique blend of '30s and '40s film noir shadows-and-light formalism, '70s-style cop show action/thriller, '80s music video and neon-and-pastel flash, and shot-on-location documentary-style Miami local color. Most television up to this point had looked very stagy and flat, but Miami Vice had a cinematic look and style that jumped off the screen.
Season 4, on the other hand, dials down some of the stylistic formalism that made the show ahead of its time and dials up some of the silliest, most ridiculous episodes in television history. The ratings dropped, and the show went from being a huge hit to a minor one. I can see why this season turned off a lot of the fanboys, but as a time capsule and a piece of mostly unintentional hilarity and absurdity, it's pretty entertaining in hindsight. A handful of episodes have some serious pacing problems and listless acting, never a problem on this show before, and I can see the writers, producers, and actors struggling to find new places to take the series. Even so, there's something really, really weird about this season. It plays out not like another season of the show, but like filmed Miami Vice fan fiction written by slightly unhinged superfans. Most episodes seem like alternate reality Vice. In honor of this bizarre development, I have added a new category to my episode-by-episode wrapup. In addition to guest stars and out-of-context quotes, I've included the fan-fiction element.
General fan-fiction element for the entire season: The women detectives on the show, Gina and Trudy, used to wear long, flowing, billowy dresses, which was strange enough office wear for detectives. This season, they sexed it up about 92 percent by wearing tight, short skirts. Trudy also has a nameplate on her desk reading "Big Booty Trudy." That can't be regulation nameplate.

"Contempt of Court"
Guest stars: Stanley Tucci is a mob boss. Philip Baker Hall is a federal judge. Meg Foster is a U.S. attorney.
Out-of-context quote: "Common decency demands that we dismiss this indictment, which is a stew of rancid meat that makes me want to retch and vomit." (knocks all papers off desk in anger)
Fan fiction element: Though the plot of this one is pretty standard Miami Vice boilerplate, the acting is so volcanically over the top that I imagine the director's instructions were, "Act like people are watching your performance on a television that is on the opposite end of a football field." Tucci's mob boss regularly cracks wise in court, even ordering cannoli and veal cutlets from the courtroom. It's like an SNL Miami Vice skit turned actual episode.

"Amen... Send Money"
Guest stars: Brian Dennehy is a televangelist named Reverend Bill Bob Proverb who preaches that God rewards the greedy and loves material wealth. Anita Morris is Bill Bob's wife who has some illegal hobbies. James Tolkan is another televangelist. Ben Stiller is a sleazy guy named Fast Eddie who sells religious paraphernalia.
Out-of-context quote: "I love this Italian silk $750 piece of matter we call a jacket."
Bonus quote: "I've been to jail. Jail sucks."
Fan fiction element: The televangelist's studio looks like a cross between some Scientology bullshit, Morton Downey Jr.'s show, and a portal to hell. The preacher character is such an exaggerated piece of satire that it makes no sense on a cop show.

"Death and the Lady"
Guest stars: Paul Guilfoyle is an "erotic performance artist" who has directed a porno that's also a fake snuff film ... or is it? Kelly Lynch is a stripper who appeared in the snuff film ... or did she? Penelope Ann Miller is the sister of a woman who appeared in the film ... or is she? Yeah, she is. Miguel Ferrer is a district attorney.
Out-of-context quote: "Mr. Crockett, you're fixated on dead people. Are you a necrophiliac?"
Fan fiction element: Guilfoyle's performance artist character is, in a season trend, wildly over the top. We also have the is-it-or-isn't-it element of the snuff film, possible twins who are possibly just one person pretending to be twins, and a murder victim who may be still alive, or dead but not murdered. This is a really weird episode.

"The Big Thaw"
This episode is commonly considered one of the worst, but I happened to find it very amusing.
Guest stars: Bill Raymond is the head of a cryogenics lab. Alfred Molina is an attorney.
Out-of-context quote: "There's a big difference between making instant coffee and trying to bring a Rastafarian back from the dead."
Bonus quote: "He looks stoned." "He is. Stone cold frozen."
Fan fiction element: This episode is about a legal battle over the cryogenically frozen corpse of a Jamaican reggae singer named Robillard Nevin, who was frozen after he died from Fugu poisoning upon eating incorrectly prepared blowfish while on tour. Enough said.

"Child's Play"
Guest stars: Ving Rhames is a career criminal mixed up in some bad stuff. Danitra Vance is his girlfriend ... with a secret. Isaac Hayes is a gunrunner named Holiday. Belinda Montgomery is Crockett's ex-wife.
Out-of-context quote: "Man, it's like holding two volleyballs underwater. Can't be done for long."
Fan fiction element: Other than reintroducing a few characters from the first season, not much in the way of fan fiction elements here. This one's actually a pretty effective piece of crime drama that has more in common with the earlier seasons.

"God's Work"
Guest stars: Film director Alfonso Arau is a crime lord. Esai Morales is his closeted gay son who wants to turn the family business legit.
Out-of-context quote: "I think this guy took a wrong turn at the cheese and wine shop."
Bonus quote: "That's original. I love originality. But in Homicide, they don't give a damn."
Fan fiction element: Again, this one's mostly straight-ahead drama, but there's a lot of speechifying here about raising money to fight AIDS and treat AIDS patients.

"Missing Hours"
This episode enjoys a reputation as the absolute worst one in the entire series, but its off-the-charts absurdity and ridiculousness make it well worth seeing.
Guest stars: James Brown is a James Brown-like soul music superstar famous for singing James Brown songs named Lou DeLong who is also a government agent, a man who was abducted by aliens, and/or an actual alien. Chris Rock is a precocious young go-getter in the Central Records department who is also a UFO conspiracy theory buff. Charlie Barnett returns as The Noogman.
Out-of-context quote: "Why don't I reorient your intergalactic desirability?"
Bonus quote: "One thousand bucks and two dozen one-pound peanut butter jars in his shopping bag." "Creamy ... or crunchy?"
Double bonus quote: "Two men with weird eyes and purple auras. That's all she can remember right now."
Fan fiction element: Are you kidding? Trudy is abducted by aliens, one of whom may or may not be James Brown. Alien abductees somehow feel the need to buy multiple jars of peanut butter, travel to an empty house boat, and stare into the face of James Brown, which then disappears and turns into blue sky and clouds. Chris Rock's character is treated like an old series regular, even though he never appears on another episode. Chris Rock also reads about aliens on the pre-Internet computer message board groups. Sci-fi writer Thomas M. Disch wrote this episode. Peanut butter?

"Like a Hurricane"
Guest stars: '80s pop star Sheena Easton is '80s pop star Caitlin Davies. Xander Berkeley is a sleazy band manager who's running a payola scam. Tony Hendra is a music executive who's into some shady criminal underworld stuff. Teller (of Penn & Teller) is Hendra's very chatty and very sleazy attorney. Yeah, you get to hear Teller speak. The MCs of Rap play themselves performing in a nightclub. Yeah, The MCs of Rap. Also on the bill but unfortunately cut out of the episode were opening acts The Rockers of Rock and The Jazzmen of Jazz.
Out-of-context quote: "What the hell is that?" "'Rubber Love' by The Blowguns."
Bonus quote: "The drummer OD'ed on reds, the guitar player joined a cult, but the bass player got a lawyer and sued."
Fan fiction element: Crockett is forced to act as protection for Caitlin (Sheena Easton) when her life is threatened. As a working stiff detective, he hates this pop star celebrity. As a pop star celebrity, she hates the surly detective. However, as we learned in the 1990s from the live action human on rapping cartoon cat bestiality of Paula Abdul and MC Skat Kat's "Opposites Attract," opposites attract. Crocket and Caitlin soon fall in love and get married. They also enjoy an oddly violent makeout session soundtracked by a flute solo. Don't worry about Crockett's cover getting blown. Sure, he's an undercover vice cop pretending to be a middleman for drug lords and gunrunners and pimps and he's marrying a famous pop star, but, as Crockett puts it, "she likes her privacy, so it's not gonna jeopardize my cover." Caitlin's big comeback single is a cover of "I Got You, Babe." Though it's a duet, she sings it alone, unless you count the children's choir on the last verse. Last but not least, three words: exploding demo tape!

"The Rising Sun of Death"
Guest stars: Sheena Easton is back. R. Lee Ermey is a corrupt homicide sergeant. James Hong is a Yakuza higher-up.
Out-of-context quote: "They just jerked a floater out of the bay."
Bonus quote: "Latin machismo."
Double bonus quote: "Look in the yellow pages under full-body tattoos."
Fan fiction element: This is basically a one-hour generic yakuza and samurai movie with small supporting roles from the regular cast. There's a big samurai swordfight in the rain with lots of talk about codes and honor and seppuku. There is also a strip club scene where the strippers are dancing to "Last Night I Dreamt That Somebody Loved Me" by The Smiths. I haven't been to a strip club in years and have never been a strip club regular, but I'm willing to bet this song, one of the most melancholy Smiths ballads, has never been played in any strip club at any point in our nation's history.

"Love at First Sight"
Guest stars: Sheena Easton is back. Iman is a woman using a video dating service. She's got some secrets. Annabelle Gurwitch is a wisecracking prostitute. Lori Petty is an enthusiast of S&M who is using the same dating service as Iman. Christopher McCann is an FBI agent.
Out-of-context quote: "Somebody's not too fond of male genitalia."
Bonus quote: "A woman's eyes can tell you a thousand stories about her. Does she dig Mantovani or Manilow? Is she high for Club Med Guadeloupe or Club Med Martinique?"
Fan fiction element: This is actually a pretty scary, exciting, and suspenseful episode. Crockett goes undercover at a video dating service to bust a prostitution ring, but the focus of the investigation shifts when several men using the service are murdered. Crockett fits the killer's type, so he becomes the bait. The killer has a split personality, each one a different gender. Don Johnson directed this episode, and it's an effective piece of horror.

"A Rock and a Hard Place"
Guest stars: Sheena Easton and Tony Hendra are back.
Out-of-context quote: "This Fremont and Wiggins, they're a couple of tubesteaks."
Bonus quote: "Your reputation sucks."
Fan fiction element: Crockett goes to LA with Caitlin, who is doing a press junket for her new album and appearing on the cover of Rolling Stone, even though he's an undercover cop. The paparazzi go crazy over him when they think he's his undercover persona, and a scandal hits the press: pop star marries drug dealer, killer, pimp, and gunrunner.

"The Cows of October"
Guest stars: Harry Shearer is an overzealous, bumbling FBI agent. Gerrit Graham is a Texas businessman, and like all Texans, he wears a huge cowboy hat and speaks in a broadly fake Southern accent.
Out-of-context quote: "Obviously, you two have a little to learn about the chess-like interaction of international intrigue."
Bonus quote: "Our side just won a major battle in the cold war of animal husbandry."
Double bonus quote: "You're a credit to the free-enterprising vertebraes of this planet."
Fan fiction element: Several of the previous episodes have put the basic series template into an entirely different genre: satire, mystery, science fiction, backstage show business drama, samurai movie, horror. This one mixes the western with the screwball comedy and is about the international smuggling of bull semen, particularly one virile bull named Gargantua. The soundtrack is drawn from the scores of several classic westerns. Again, this is not very good, but it's incredibly entertaining.

"Vote of Confidence"
Guest star: Larry Pine is a gubernatorial candidate busted with a prostitute, which is only the first piece in a vast government conspiracy.
Out-of-context quote: "It's a little early in the morning for coffee."
Bonus quote: "That booger Pearl Harbored me."
Fan fiction element: This one starts as a satire of political campaigns before turning into a missing person whodunit.

"Baseballs of Death"
This is a rare old-school, solid episode, directed by character actor Bill Duke, who also directed the underrated '90s crime thriller Deep Cover.
Guest stars: Tony Plana is a bad dude. Please don't fuck with him. Lisa Marie and Michael Des Barres are con artists running a lucrative scam. Lisa Marie pretends to be a prostitute, using her womanly charms to lure rich businessmen. Des Barres takes their photos, and the pair blackmail the rich old philanderers. Mark Metcalf is a DEA agent with the trademark Metcalf intensity. Oliver Platt is a weapons smuggler named Speed Stiles.
Out-of-context quote: "Your mother can't satisfy your needs anymore. I can."
Bonus quote: "Is this for your gun club or are you planning to invade Uruguay?"
Double bonus quote: "Good morgen!" "Anything since last night?" "Couple of dogs fell in love and started a family about six hours ago."
Triple bonus quote: "I guess Guerrero was home makin' chile rellenos through all this."
Fan fiction element: Other than a spectacular speedboat explosion, nothing too bizarre here.

"Indian Wars"
Guest stars: Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young drummer Joe Lala is a drug dealer. Joseph Turkel and his amazingly square, amazingly huge eyeglasses are a major drug smuggler.
Out-of-context quote: "I cannot be responsible for the peccadilloes of my associates."
Fan fiction element: This episode focuses on drug smuggling on the Native American tribal reservation of the Miccosukees, which gives the series the opportunity to feature lots of big speeches about the white man vs. the Indian, old ways vs. modernization, income from allowing drug dealers to use their land vs. going clean but losing all the money, youth vs. the elderly, idealism vs. business, etc. Plus, one character is a schizophrenic with his own vigilante army, and Tubbs goes undercover on the reservation as a doctoral student working on his thesis "Oppression in the Land of the Free." He convinces as a doctoral student because he puts on glasses.

"Honor Among Thieves?"
Holy shit, this episode is crazy.
Guest star: Dylan Baker is a homicide detective.
Out-of-context quote: "That's real heat, when they start arresting your horses."
Bonus quote: "Someday, you and me are gonna dance." "Strike up the band, baby."
Fan fiction element: A serial killer with a huge doll collection thinks his dolls can talk to him. They tell him to rape and kill young girls. The killer speaks in a high, squeaky voice whenever he's doing the voice of the dolls. He kills the girls by injecting them with an overdose of very pure cocaine. He then rubs cocaine all over the bodies and dumps them in a public place and rests a doll on top of the corpse. Crockett is undercover at a major drug dealer's compound, pretending to be a lawyer advising the dealer how to launder his drug money to make it look legal. The killer's use of cocaine is putting too much heat on the drug trade, so this dealer puts out feelers to catch the guy themselves. When they catch him, the dealer invites every other major Miami drug dealer to a kangaroo court on a nightclub dance floor. The club is closed for the night. Thinking Crockett's a lawyer, the dealer makes Crockett defend the killer. If Crockett can convince the assorted dealers the killer is too insane to know right from wrong, they'll turn him over to the cops. If Crockett can't convince them, they will torture and murder the guy. If you think that synopsis is crazy, wait until you see the concluding scene.

"Hell Hath No Fury"
Guest stars: Don Harvey is a convicted rapist recently released from prison. John Michael Higgins is the sleazy host of a Geraldo and Maury-style talk show. John Finn is a survivalist gun nut hit man for hire.
Out-of-context quote: "That's what rules are for, so you don't have to think."
Fan fiction element: We get both a satire of sleazeball talk shows and a ripped-from-the-headlines subplot about hired hitmen in the Soldier of Fortune classifieds. Also, Trudy is good friends with the rape victim as well as the arresting officer of her rapist, and the episode pretends like this has been an ongoing story even though this is the first and last we'll see of it.

"Badge of Dishonor"
Guest stars: Reni Santoni is lieutenant of a special ops drug unit. Barbra Streisand has a bizarrely brief cameo as a pedestrian walking down the street, so brief I didn't even notice it.
Out-of-context quote: "Great, couple of bad apples set back minority recruiting another 400 years!"
Fan fiction element: Weird Barbra Streisand cameo. Actor Julio Oscar Mechoso, who was a regular on the first season as a member of the vice team before the network decided to phase out the character, plays a drug dealer in the opening scene.

"Blood and Roses"
Guest stars: Stanley Tucci and Meg Foster are back from the first episode of the season. Michael Wincott is a sleazy guy with underworld connections. Frank Stallone is one of Stanley Tucci's goons.
Out-of-context quote: "Definitely not al dente."
Bonus quote: "Bottle of Dom P., two straws."
Fan fiction element: This episode has the exact same plot as an episode from the first season, and it's one that makes me feel gross and unpleasant. Why do it again? Gina is undercover and she's forced to have sex with a guy who creeps her out to avoid blowing her cover. She breaks down and is consoled by Trudy. At the end of both episodes, she kills the guy in a shootout and then stares deep into Crockett's eyes to let him know silently what went down. Freeze frame. Credits. Such a weird plot to repeat out of all the storylines from the past three years.

"A Bullett for Crockett"
Guest star: Fame's Jesse Borrego is a drug smuggler.
Out-of-context quote: "I never should have let him take Loco Mendez alone."
Bonus quote: "She's beyond the moral laws of this or any other world."
Fan fiction element: This is a fucking clipshow. Crockett is shot by the girlfriend of the dealer he's just shot. He's in a coma in the hospital, which happens to be the most dimly lit hospital in North America, which gives each character the opportunity to visit him and flash back to a scene from a previous episode. "In the Air Tonight" is brought back from the very first episode of the show to score the opening scene. Crockett's shooting will never come up again, and he's completely recovered by the next episode, even though he was in a coma with a bullet lodged in his spine. Fucking clipshows.

"Deliver Us From Evil"
Guest stars: Sheena Easton is back. Guy Boyd is back from Season 3.
Out-of-context quote: "This guy knows the difference between Baccarat and Lalique."
Bonus quote: "Did I ask for a lukewarm beer, Julia?"
Fan fiction element: This episode brings two completely separate storylines from earlier episodes together. We also get to see Sheena Easton perform "Follow My Rainbow" in its entirety, which is exactly the kind of song you imagine it is from the title. Also, several people in the audience give her bouquets of flowers after she performs. I thought this only happened to opera singers and theater actors and directors on Broadway.

"Mirror Image"
Guest stars: Antonio Fargas is a drug lord. Chris Cooper is a dirty detective. Julia Roberts is a drug lord's assistant. Brent Jennings is a vice sergeant.
Out-of-context quote: "Vice? I love vice."
Fan fiction element: Crockett gets a head injury during a boat explosion and wakes up with amnesia, which makes him think he's his undercover persona, so he turns evil. There is a weird Lynchian dream sequence. The episode ends on a cliffhanger.

One more season to go.

Crockett and Tubbs pose with Tubbs' bird, Pepito, star of the short-lived spinoff series Johnny Pepito, Tropical Bird Detective