Kyoto Grump Radio

[imomus]

He's in Kyoto dressed in a funny eyepatch and hat, but he's not laughing. In fact he's grumping about everything. And you lucky, lucky people can listen for an hour!

Why didn't a single British person take a bath for five hundred years? Why can't you pay in cafes with used underwear? Why does blue light make girls more beautiful? What's wrong with pointing your toes at the Buddha? Why has Oscar Niemeyer got a bit boring? What'll happen if Bush gets in for another term? And where should Momus send this tape, Al Jazeera or LiveJournal?

Kyoto Grump Radio (27.59 MB mono mp3 file, 60 minutes)

Comments

:)

[(Anonymous)]

this is wonderful, reminds me of statler and waldorf from the muppets... here's a place where more complaining can be done: http://www.complaintproject.org/
-roddy

The Complaint Project

[jainabee.livejournal.com]

I like that you can choose from a menu of "types of complaining" you would like to hear (or log). And the responses are so absurdly sincere!

Re: The Complaint Project

[imomus.livejournal.com]

Last updated May 25th. Has nobody really had any complaints since then?

Re: The Complaint Project

[jainabee.livejournal.com]

My guess is they're college students who've been on summer break. If they don't respond to my "whining" complaint soon, I'll give them something to complain about!!

Re: The Complaint Project

[(Anonymous)]

i know one of the people involved in it, and he's not a student, but an artist in oakland. don't know why they're not updating it. i agree, they'll really get something to complain about if they don't let us complain anymore!!!

Re: The Complaint Project

[jainabee.livejournal.com]

Oakland, eh? Then 'twill be even easier to exact my revenge. My complaints are not to be ignored!

[alionunderaw.livejournal.com]

I just love the patch!

[porandojin.livejournal.com]

you are new age, all newagers hate tobacco ;]

you seem to dislike gw bush very much, are you rally sure he's so evil? i mean, he semes just another american president, just a bit funny with his christian quotes and silly sentences he drops sometimes ... am sure america had such presidents before- nixon maybe? what's the difference? pepsi supports democrats, and coca-cola republicans ... anyway, i find this antibush hysteria a bit like 1968 maoists screaming us-ss, what was so hypocritical and actually not even stupid but evil ... war in iraq is of course terrible and just for israel's purposes /?/ but for years westerners didn't care for sudan, tibet, burma and places i'am not even aware of and now they are so human rights caring and everything ... now when america said A they should finish this iraq abortion somehow and not leave it the way it is, maybe ... anyway, i really dislike america, or maybe more- am not interested in it, but, why do people think one person can change anything in it? it just seems naive, but i don't know america much, so maybe it works like that- with a president everything changes below /sorry for my english, i'm not sure if it's even understandable/

[(Anonymous)]

I don’t think is about being evil or being good, every person has both sides. It s about how someone is using his/her power. Bush helped to create a word of black and white, good and evil. That applies to some basic human instinct – that is fear. I really think that words can create a new reality and I feel and fear that this is what had happed the last years. We had some long distance u.s.American friends for a visit a couple of month ago. They told me they are going to vote for bush and they got really angry and aggressive about that. They started to explain their point of view with heard and soul, but they soon got deeply offended by our hmm anti bush position. Their main point was the being threatened by what so ever fear. It sounded a bit naïve to me, but on the other hand that’s what I love about them.
Anyway, after that I thought oh my god, bush is going to be re-elected.
Anna

P.S. Wer A sagt muss nicht B sagen, er kann auch erkennen dass B falsch war. (gospodin Brecht)

W is for Warmonger

[xyzedd.livejournal.com]

Borrowing from certain philosophers we admire, Momus once sang, "Nobody is good/Nobody is evil." Nevertheless, Bush is definitely not "just another American president." He makes Nixon seem downright benign and even Reagan sound somewhat reasonable. (Believe me, I am regretfully old enough to remember them both.) For a person who claims to not be "interested in America," the earlier poster seems to be expending quite a lot of energy thinking about it. The fact remains, since America is now famously the "world's sole remaining superpower," we must all be interested and act on behalf of the lesser of any evils--or else suffer the consequences.

I write this as an American who is profoundly embarrassed for our country whenever I even think of "W" and who knows that even though Democrats aren't yet different enough from Republicans, even small differences today count for enormous changes in the future. If Bush is elected again (so to speak), I will consider this the beginning of the new Dark Ages which we've been teetering on the precipice of for the last four years.

By the way, I haven't even listened to Momus's latest radio piece yet. But last week I did some more disorienteering of my own and disappeared into the wilderness while I finally listened to the "Osaka hour." I was amused to discover, upon rechecking that entry, that the "rubber tears" the bartender was wearing and which Momus found so fetching were actually "rabbit ears." So much for British and Australian accents to confuse a dumb American, but I still think rubber tears are more original.

[gillen.livejournal.com]

Why didn't a single British person take a bath for five hundred years?

I don't know, but I think you've just answered why he was single. ;)

[w-e-quimby.livejournal.com]

bwahaha

[imomus.livejournal.com]

Some corrections to the radio piece: Superdeluxe was designed by Namaiki, although my grouch here is against Klein Dytham. Sony just bought MGM, not WEA. And when I mention 'the 20th century', I mean the 21st.

[hunchentoot.livejournal.com]

Dear The Rest of the World,

As an American, I pledge to give my all to deliver the state of Michigan to John Kerry.

Here's to a one-term-Bush,
Joe

[imomus.livejournal.com]

Thank you. I think each vote against Bush will have about a thousand non-American non-votes hovering around it like anxious ghosts.

[neurasthenic.livejournal.com]

Your voice is having an appealing sort of paternal effect on me.

"horribly efficient choruses" - that's wonderful.

cheers!

Played you on my radio show tonight. I'm sure you would've much preferred a more recent selection than "Platinum" (is that too a song with a horribly efficient chorus?) but I still find it, and Enlightenment, lovely.

[imomus.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the play, Robyn!

I read some of your poetry and it strikes me as strong:

We spoke, but of what, I somewhat forget
remembering most, the color of your hair,
and the world like salt smoke.

[neurasthenic.livejournal.com]

Ah, thanks! That means a lot actually...that poem in particular along with a few others was fueled by the sort of imaginative free reign Dylan Thomas uses. I love poems like "Then Was My Neophyte" which make some sort of irrational, enrapturing sense:

http://plagiarist.com/poetry/1143/

[sarmoung.livejournal.com]

I've yet to listen to you in grumpy mode, but that photograph is inspired. Happy Days are here again?

[imomus.livejournal.com]

I actually saw Billie Whitelaw in Beckett's own production of that at the Royal Court!

[(Anonymous)]

I was sitting outside in the middle of the night listening to all your shows on my iPod, looking up into the sky... And a star shoot comes along. Mer tack?

great!

[(Anonymous)]

Best one yet. Grumpy, happy, it's all informative and fun.

Tim
http://www.travelersdiagram.com/

Re: Another complaint

[(Anonymous)]

My, that is beautiful.

[arcana07.livejournal.com]

Correction: During the Clinton administration, there was a TRADE surplus, i.e. America was exporting more than it was importing. During the Bush administration, that was turned around in that the trade surprlus became a trade deficit, which only means that the industrializing countries of the world (e.g. India and China) became powerhouses during that time period and produced more than America could produce, and America's economy became more intellectually-driven. The US Government has always worked with a budget deficit; it's the one government in the country that doesn't have to balance its budget. One can argue that the Clinton administration saw a more gradual rise in the budget deficit, but the Clinton administration also signaled a close in the kind of politics that would involve the smaller government necessary to have that much less of a negative budgetary impact. Unfortunately (speaking as somewhat of a libertarian here), I don't believe we'll get in a smaller government type into the White House for several more years to come. It'll be spend spend spend spend spend.

Also: I think environment is partial geopolitical destiny (but am not an Earth Liberation Front wacko -- I'm much more a Sierra Club type) and am ashamed that the Bush administration didn't take the opportunity to offer up a valid alternative to Kyoto to show that it too took the environment seriously. Bush must have privately done so; his Crawford ranch operates purely outside the power grid via renewable energy sources and is environmentally friendly. But to not extend that to a public show of "hey, we take the environment seriously too" was a major misstep. I also know how easy it is to get into the recycling habit, and indeed my hometown was recently ranked as one of Men's Health magazine's Top 3 Best Recycling Towns in the U.S. I just think Kyoto spells total disaster for capitalism (which is the economic system I believe in), am relieved the U.S. didn't ratify it, and think we should have been first to offer up a viable alternative that would ensure better earth stewardship without completely decimating the U.S. economy.