E-Verse Radio

Very Funny and E-Verse Recommended: David Vanadia Talks about Body Hair and Manhood at AIGA Shift

David Vanadia Presentation AIGA Shift Event from AIGA Portland on Vimeo.
David Vanadia is a professional storyteller. I met him when we both attended the Art Institute together as video art majors (we both dropped out; I studied literature and he traveled the world actually telling stories). I have many fond memories of the outrageous (and [...]

Ernest Hilbert’s Top Two Hundred Best Songs of the Decade, Number 9

“Heads Will Roll” by the Yeah Yeah Yeahs
How does one solve the problem of modern rock? Where to go? It can’t get any quieter. Any more whispering and moaning and we’ll lock these people in their rooms. It can’t keep sifting the rusty box of punk and hard rock forever. So what do Karen O [...]

Remember the First Time Your Cat Encountered Snow? Simon’s Catin’s “Snow Business”

Ernest Hilbert’s Top Two Hundred Best Songs of the Decade, Number 10

“99 Problems” by Jay-Z mashed with the Beatles’ “Helter Skelter” by Danger Mouse: The original Jay-Z version is cool enough, of course, but Danger Mouse led the mashup revolution with the infamous Grey Album, an amalgam of Jay-Z’s Black Album and the legendary White Album by the Beatles. The results are decidedly mixed, but this [...]

Ernest Hilbert’s Top Two Hundred Best Songs of the Decade, Number 11

“The World is Full of Crashing Bores” by Morrissey: He came to prominence in the eighties, enjoyed a fruitful solo career through the nineties, and is still tickling us with his arch, prickly, mournful songs today. He still pulls his shirt off on stage and flings it to the audience, but I notice lately he [...]

Sea Slugs . . . and Other Slimy Stuff

You may think slugs are repellent. My wife contended with foot-long ones that would slither into her house in San Francisco on damp days (every day) and attempt to absorb the cat food by the door. When I was a boy, I actually found slugs beautiful in a strange way, and I’d sit and stare [...]

“Really Mean Streets”: If Martin Scorcese Directed Sesame Street

Ernest Hilbert’s Top Two Hundred Best Songs of the Decade, Number 12

“Squatterz” by Jakk Frost: You can’t buy these albums on iTunes or in stores (the few that still sell albums). I got my copies of his albums from a cab driver who got me home late at night from a party (and I was spiraling around the galaxy at that hour). I had seen the [...]

“A man’s got to take a lot of punishment to write a really funny book”: Ernest Hemingway Videos

Hemingway’s famous Nobel Prize acceptance speech

Patrick and Sean Hemingway on the controversial new edition of A Movable Feast

The Old Man and the Sea

Michael Palin’s Hemingway adventure in Cuba, courtesy of the BBC

Nigel Tuffnel, of Spinal Tap, Discusses Stonehenge with National Geographic

Really, Would it Kill You to Read a %*$(@&*# Book? . . . . the Rap! (Not Safe for Children or Those of Senstive Dispositions!)

Thanks to E-Verser Bill, famous lawman, for sending this in.

“Bad Romance” by Lady Gaga

Remember Live Aid? Maybe Hearing Aid, the metal one in the US? Well, how about Swedish Metal Aid . . . .

Have you ever seen so many mullets?

Ernest Hilbert’s Top Two Hundred Best Songs of the Decade, Number 13

“Despicable Heroes” by Arch Enemy: Who would imagine such a slender woman could produce such pit-of-hell horrific growls. She’s a Valkyrie! Angela Gossow sounds like a five hundred pound Grizzly Bear, and she puts on a high-energy show with her Swedish melodic death metal outfit. This is not for guys with square glasses and ironic [...]

Spinal Tap Before There Was Spinal Tap: Enter Black Death, 1977

For more information on this heavy metal band, which is still active, click here.

Whither the Sugar-Bomb Breakfast Cereals of Yesteryear?

My brother can always be counted on to know about the most obscure conspiracy theories out there and the grossest foods (though I liked a lot of these!). Have a look over an archive of long departed breakfast cereals and the commercial for Batman cereal. Just click on the box of Red Baron Redberry to [...]

PopCopy! Dave Chappelle

Chappelle’s Show

Rocking Out in the Car Park (Watch This One with the Sound Up)

Ernest Hilbert’s Top Two Hundred Best Songs of the Decade, Number 14

14.    “Where Do You Go To (My Lovely)” by Peter Sarstedt: Originally on the soundtrack for Hotel Chevalier, a short film Wes Anderson added before festival screenings of The Darjeeling Limited. For me the story in the song has taken on a life of its own. Frankly, it’s more cinematic and appealing than the movie. [...]

Ernest Hilbert’s Top Two Hundred Best Songs of the Decade, Number 15

“Fuck The People” by The Kills: You can surely understand this sentiment, particularly when you’re at the post office just before Christmas. This power duo, Alison Mosshart with guitarist Jamie Hince, is cool, moody, sexy, angry, noirish, punk, and, again, [...]

Ernest Hilbert’s Top Two Hundred Best Songs of the Decade, Number 16

16.    “I Love the Unknown” by Clem Snide: Eef Barzelay (love that name), the animating force behind the alt-rock/alt-country band Clem Snide, really nailed it with this fine song. It is comic, yearning, and wise. You know what he’s talking about when he sings “they asked him, / ‘hey, where’s this bus going?’ / and [...]

nternet Archaeologists Find Ruins Of ‘Friendster’ Civilization

Internet Archaeologists Find Ruins Of ‘Friendster’ Civilization

Ernest Hilbert’s Top Two Hundred Best Songs of the Decade, Number 17

“In The New Year” by The Walkmen: This five-piece Philadelphia/New York outfit loves the sound of vintage instruments, and so do I. This is a song that really snuck up on me over the past year. Although I haven’t managed to catch one of their shows yet, they’re definitely on my list. The chorus of [...]

Ernest Hilbert’s Top Two Hundred Best Songs of the Decade, Number 19

19. “Rehab” by Amy Winehouse: Again, some might think “oh, Ernie, how mainstream,” but I just love this song no matter how many times I hear it. Its self-destructive triumphalism can’t be beat. Rehab? She says “no, no, no” and means it. Her train-wreck of a personal life became rich fodder for tabloids and blogs, but [...]

No One Likes a Showoff: Check this guy out!

Ernest Hilbert’s Top Two Hundred Best Songs of the Decade, Number 20

20. “She’s a Rejector” by Of Montreal: I’ve found that Of Montreal is a band no one has a half-way opinion on. If you know who they are, or have seen their outrageous, pageant-like live shows, you either love ‘em or hate ‘em. I love ‘em. All the New Yorker-ish pretentiousness about semiotics and aesthetic synthesis [...]

Ernest Hilbert’s Top Two Hundred Best Songs of the Decade, Number 23

23. “The Poor House” by The Boxmasters: OK, strange to include a song from Billy Bob Thornton’s band, which has been called capable but little more than competent, but this a perfect song for the recession-era end of the decade. A loveable loser, that fixture of country music, sings earnestly: “I’m working on a plan to [...]

Ernest Hilbert’s Top Two Hundred Best Songs of the Decade, Number 21

21. “Strange Overtones” by David Byrne and Brian Eno: Uber-producer Eno brings out the nonchalant nerdiness of Byrne, who simultaneously dates himself—self-consciously of course—and gives us something that sounds very new. The beat is splendid, one of the best I’ve heard in a long time, and Byrne’s vacant, languid, somehow sad delivery is pitch-perfect.

1. “Blood And [...]

E-Verse Assistant Producer Kara’s Top Ten Movies of the Decade!

10. All the Real Girls (2003)

9. American Psycho (2000)

8. Squid and the Whale (2005)

7. Royal Tenenbaums (2001)

6. Amelie (2001)

5. There Will Be Blood (2007)

4. The Notebook (2004)

3. Half Nelson (2006)

2. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)

1. The Hangover (2009)

Ernest Hilbert’s Top Two Hundred Best Songs of the Decade, Number 22

22. “The Great Salt Lake” by Band of Horses: A good friend of mine is a music producer in Seattle, where he runs a record label. I usually see him at Christmas when he’s back in Philadelphia to visit family. The year before Band of Horses broke, he told me to start listening. They’ve been compared [...]