What Suicide Girls are putting on...and taking off... Leather can be as tough as old boots or soft to the touch. It can protect and reveal, be a fad or a fetish -- offering the promise and pleasure of skin on skin. (image) (image) (image) (image) (image) (image) (image) (image) (image) (image) (image)... more

What Suicide Girls are putting on...and taking off...

Leather can be as tough as old boots or soft to the touch. It can protect and reveal, be a fad or a fetish -- offering the promise and pleasure of skin on skin.
























Fashion Notes
Angelina Jolie was spotted wearing this Mike & Chris "Dylan" distressed lambskin leather zip-up hoodie ($780 from BlueHavenBoutique.com). * This "Angelika" vest, with asymmetrical zipper closure and more pockets than you'll know what to do with, is perfect if you go for a layered look ($224 from HaydenHarnett.com). * Urban Outfitter's Vintage Renewal team have sourced these leather skirts from all over the world, and taken a pair of scissors to them to make them suitably mini. Each skirt is one-of-a-kind, and a steal at just $58 (from UrbanOutfitters.com). * Absolute Corsets have a wide range of leather under and over bust restricters that can be worn as inner or outer wear ($300-$400 from AbsoluteCorsets.com). * And if you like the feel of skin next to your skin Leather Obsession have a slew of cowhide G-strings on sale ($17.95-$26.95 from LeatherObsession.com).


Did we miss your favorite leather shot? If so, upload it to our Leather Yourself Remix Album (the girls are also name-checked at this link).

Check back every other Saturday for more Dirty Laundry and let SuicideGirls show you the best way to (un)dress.

Prepare to have your asses blown off by tales of disturbing and horrible Asshole Fuckfacery. That’s right, it’s Asshole Fuckface day, which means I’m bringing a boatload of heinousness out of the darkness and dragging it into the light of day. Also, I’m going to write about it. more

Prepare to have your asses blown off by tales of disturbing and horrible Asshole Fuckfacery. That’s right, it’s Asshole Fuckface day, which means I’m bringing a boatload of heinousness out of the darkness and dragging it into the light of day. Also, I’m going to write about it. So, put on your thickest leather robe, because this is going to be ugly.

First up, a little Oklahoma Asshole Fuckfacery.

Paul Duran Jr. fucked up when he was sixteen years old. He was hanging out with an older guy, named Jessie James Dalton, who was twenty-five. Duran, Dalton and another teenager broke into a home and demanded money at gunpoint. During the robbery, Dalton shot and killed nineteen-year-old Billy Ray Wayne, who also had the most stereotypical hick name possible.

They were caught and Duran testified against Dalton in exchange for a 28-year sentence and a lesser charge of robbery with a firearm. The other teen did the same and Dalton received life in prison. That was 2002. Cut to six years later.

Last week the guards at Oklahoma State Penitentiary decided it would be an awesome idea to put Duran into a cell with Dalton. Totally did not work out.

That’s weird. I can’t believe they didn’t hug it out.

Super good question, and the word “fuck” should be tossed in there as well.

Dalton and Duran were listed as "separates" by the prison, which meant they were not supposed to be put in a cell together. Also, when the guard was putting Duran into the cell and he was screaming, “Oh my God, he’s going to kill me because I testified against him,” someone should have noticed.

What up, understatement? The Asshole Fuckface who put the soon to be dead guy in the cell with the big Asshole Fuckface has not been suspended. The DA will look into whether to file charges, then won’t, because it’s Oklahoma.

Next up, some super white guy Asshole Fuckfacery.

Lou Dobbs may be the stupidest Asshole Fuckface on the planet. Besides his constant lying and sensationalist “War on the Middle Class,” he is a delightful racist. Dobbs can look at any subject that has to do with ethnicity and immediately come up with the most ridiculous take. And that’s exactly what he did this week during a rant against St. Patrick’s Day.

Way to take a stand, Serpico. Yes, people celebrating their country of origin are so fucked up. It angers me to no end.

Yes. There are many. Just because you don’t know any Jewish people, doesn’t mean their holidays don’t exist. I don’t know where Lou grew up, or where he now lives, but you have to be one hell of a shockingly ignorant Asshole Fuckface to not know of any Jewish holidays.

Great name. It totally sounds Asian. You should be branded with the words White Guy on your forehead, so everyone will know before you open your mouth where you are coming from. And, yes, there are Asian holidays. Actually, Lou, “Asia” is not a country. So, there are many holidays celebrated by the many different Asians from the many different cultures in the many different countries in the Asia.

Independence Day, Presidents’ Day, Martin Luther King Day, Thanksgiving, Veterans Day, Memorial Day. Allowing you to have a TV show is like allowing daily mind rape.

Next up, more super white guy Asshole Fuckfacery.

When one is seeking a decent Asshole Fuckface to round out the Roundup, one can always look into the latest ramblings from the Pope. Benedict XVI is on a tour of Africa, and what better way to kick it off than to say something shockingly stupid?

I’m glad someone finally had the balls to say that condoms are not the best way to prevent AIDS and to follow up with a capper: Condoms make AIDS worse. Duh. If you have condoms, you’re going to fuck like a wild man, banging every ass, whether it be woman, monkey or antelope. And you’ll think you’re totally safe –- but you’re not. AIDS is crafty and can get all up inside a condom. The only way to really avoid AIDS is to not have sex. Or, you could kill yourself. That would really prevent AIDS. AIDS cannot get you if you are dead.

Finally, some disturbing Asshole Fuckfacery.

Michelle Owen is a twenty-four year old lass from Indiana. She had a bad night this week. Michelle got herself locked up for public intoxication, which was double bad because she is on parole for drunk diving. Michelle likes to party. Oh, my God does she like to party.

Naturally, Michelle wanted to take the attention off her and put it on someone else. So, she told the cops her ex-boyfriend may have been looking at kiddie porn on her computer and told them to search it. Apparently, she didn’t think about the fact that it was HER computer and there is no way to prove he was looking at the porn instead of her. But, again, she’s wasted, so the brain isn’t working all that well. Not well at all, because she forgot about a certain thing she did with a dog in front of a video camera.

Oops. I totally forgot about my doggie porn.

Um, yeah, the one with a dog. One can only hope this moment is on video, because it is epic.

Oh, then never mind. If you just had your dog lick your vagina, or you jerked it off, or you blew it when you were drunk, then it’s all-good. You can actually fuck and suck any animal you want if you are drunk. It’s a weird loophole they put into the bestiality laws.

Anyway, they never found that child porn.


FearTheReaper is a writer, actor and stand up comedian. Check back each Tuesday and Friday for more from FearTheReaper

In the late 1990s you couldn't turn on the radio with out hearing Orgy's cover of the New Order song 'Blue Monday." But what do you do when the electro-dance-pop hit that made you platinum, cross over rock stars just isn't quite electro enough? Well, if you're original Orgy... more

In the late 1990s you couldn't turn on the radio with out hearing Orgy's cover of the New Order song 'Blue Monday." But what do you do when the electro-dance-pop hit that made you platinum, cross over rock stars just isn't quite electro enough? Well, if you're original Orgy guitarists Ryan Shuck and Amir Derakh, you form Julien-K, a side project that isn't really a side project.

I met with Ryan and Amir at a recording studio deep within in LA's San Fernando Valley, where I interrupted their take-out sushi session with none other than Linkin Park's Chester Bennington.


Auren Suicide: So what exactly are you guys doing here?

Ryan Shuck: The easy way to put it is that we're recording Dead by Sunrise, Chester Bennington from Linkin Park's solo record. But in reality Dead by Sunrise is a band that we've all formed together and the meat of Dead by Sunrise was actually recorded as we were doing the Julien-K record. Both bands are the same. The one where Chester sings and writes is Dead By Sunrise, but when I sing, and Amir and I are the primary writers, it becomes Julien-K and it's more electro and much darker. Dead by Sunrise is a little more of a traditional rock band, it is heavier and more organic sounding. We're actually playing more instruments, whereas in Julien-K we do a lot more programming. There's a lot more Depeche Mode to Julien-K.

AS: Chester actually helped produce the Julien-K record, right?

RS: Absolutely. Julien-K and Dead by Sunrise are basically a creative collective, we're sort of a Warhol-style factory in that sense. We're a group of really good friends who've happened to luck out and sell millions of records. For the past couple of years the group, as a whole, has produced hours upon hours of music. Besides the bands, we've scored the music for the new Transformers video game, we've got music in movies like Underworld,we perform and we also DJ.

AS: So it's all the same group of people...

RS: Yeah, same group of people, but the two things people will identify us with will be Julien-K and Dead by Sunrise.

AS: Since you and Amir are the primary songwriters in Julien-K, versus Chester in Dead by Sunrise, is it safe to say that Julien-K is more near and dear to your heart?

Amir Derkah: [speaking up for the first time] No!

RS: No! Chester is an extraordinarily important person in our lives. He's one of our best friends. He's like a brother. And obviously we admire him as a singer and are blown away to be able to work with him. Although we do get to write and be a part of that process in Dead by Sunrise, it's still very much a part of his soul, he's the lyricist.

AD: We have our project with Julien-K where we get to explore and run the show the way we want. And of course he's in a huge band called Linkin Park but he's not the main controlling force in that band. So Dead by Sunrise comes from him initially, but we all collaborate and work on it together, although we try and keep the integrity of his idea, so it is, obviously, a little more him than Julien-K. Dead by Sunrise is Chester's Julien-K if that makes any sense.

AS: I totally get it.

RS: But they are certainly both very important to us. And to us, they are both so enmeshed in one another. I can't imagine not being able to play in both bands. It's sort of a weird thing. When I was in Orgy I remember thinking that I wouldn't want to dilute what we're doing by being in another band. But now I think this is the way to go. It is this huge cool project that has all these different facets.

AS: It's like a spider with all its different legs.

AD: How funny that you said that, we've actually been referring to it as a hydra of sorts -- you cut a head off and then more grow back. It's definitely what's been happening to us. A lot of things we've worked on, well, the heads got cut off. The heads got cut off but we just started spawning a bunch of different projects.

RS: The funny thing will be if we do Orgy next year.

AS: Oh?

RS: Then we'll be in three bands. We'll basically be sadists and totally fucked. We'll have to know 48 songs to play at any given time. Orgy is pretty easy for us because it's really engrained in our muscle memory. Julien-K is starting to get like that.

AD: [laughs] It will get to the point where we'll just have to determine which color eyeliner to wear in what project.

RS: [laughs] And maybe the nail polish color, too, depending on what we're doing!

AS: Ha! So has Orgy been inactive this whole time?

RS: Certainly. Julien-K was spawned out of the inactivity of Orgy. We morphed into Julien-K because we never stopped writing music. Amir and I were always the electro brothers in Orgy. We loved dark, passionate music. We were into stuff like Depeche Mode and Erasure. As we got bigger, Orgy moved into more of the rock realm, which is fine, but given our druthers we'd have been a dark, electronic band. And we just don't have anyone to modify us anymore.

AS: Right, you don't have anyone there to rein you in. I also love Depeche Mode.

RS: Totally. Lyrically, someone needs to bring honesty and passion back to music like this. That's why Depeche Mode is one of my favorites, too. It's not that we want to be like them, necessarily, but their songs have such lyrical depth. And it was pop. And it's so sexy.

It dripped. So as lyricists and as musicians that is something we really want to bring to the table. My favorite bands of all time have had those qualities. The songs were super pop, they withstood the test of time. When I say pop I don't mean Britney Spears. I just mean songs that you could possibly hear on the radio.

AS: Something that sticks in your head.

RS: Yes, yes! That's just something I hope will differentiate us from a lot of other bands. We're trying to go somewhere a little bit more daring, more uncomfortable...because expressing yourself and having some emotional content to your lyrics is uncomfortable.

AS: What was uncomfortable for you about making the new record?

RS: Singing was totally uncomfortable. But Chester and Amir really coached me into being able to be the lead singer. In Orgy I wrote vocals and I sang but I was not the lead singer. But besides that, some of the Julien-K songs that I wrote didn't even see the light of day because they were too personal. It's the flipside of Orgy. Orgy sang about personal stuff but we used fantasy to disguise it.

AS: Some of the Julien-K songs have been floating around in demo form for many years. Why is the record coming out now? Why is this the right time?

AD: There are a lot of reasons.

RS: Most of it wasn't of our choosing. We had a shit-load of legal problems that developed from a company that we started, which is an entire, huge, epic story that we couldn't even fit in this interview. It prevented us from releasing our record. But we also had a strategy of wanting to go out and play, with no record out. We played with Linkin Park, H.I.M., Evanecence, My Chemical Romance, Placebo, Mindless Self Indulgence...bands that are really bringin' it in the live arena. We wanted to go out there and prove that we could bring it just as well as those bands and that fans would like us with out having a single on the radio. We had to be good or it wouldn't have worked. If no one liked it, it would have been over, we were just not going to tour again.

AD: But people did like us.

AS: Tell me about the video for "Kick the Bass," your first single. I think there are two versions, a dirty one....

AD: There are actually three versions but the dirty version is really the main version. It depicts the whole idea of the song.

AS: So what's the song about?

RS: The song is about rock excess and my issues with excess in general. It's an absurd depiction of what people think that we do. There is truth in some of it and there is absurdity in it, too. We took ten years with Orgy and all the things that we've done and sort of rolled it into one song and video. The song is about feeling good in the spotlight. Whereas most people feel uncomfortable the minute people start paying attention to them, there's something wrong with us...

AS: ...because you thrive in that environment?

RS: Yes! We're narcissistic fucks. It's that demon in you that you can't turn off and you take too far.

AS: Does that feeling of wanting to be onstage and adored ever go away?

RS: No, it gets worse. Every time you get a taste of it you want to go back. I mean, don't get me wrong, you have to diversify and pay attention to the business side if you want to be doing this forever. We have restaurants and other businesses. But the little kid version of wanting to just go play...that never goes away.

AS: I read a review of your tapas restaurant, Lola Gaspar. I was salivating, it sounds delicious.

RS: Was it a good review or a bad one?

AS: It was a great one! Have there been bad ones?

RS: Well, there was one, but it made us more popular because people were so pissed off about what a douche bag the guy was! It's so ridiculous.

AS: No, that's not the one I read. The guy was describing some pickled carrots or something and it was just...yum.

RS: It's so cool it's a place in Orange County [California]. It's dark, we play cool music, it has black chandeliers. It looks like Brooklyn mixed with Barcelona. And it gets bangin' after 10:00 pm. People are hungry [laughs] no pun intended... for a place to go hang out that's in the style that we like...dark, cool. All the other businesses are closed but at 10:00 we're packed, every single night.

AS: Like Europe!

RS: Exactly. That's the entirely it. That's our whole interest in it. Its not that we're restaurateurs, we're really just opportunistic business owners, capitalist pigs. We just want to have places where we can go do the business that we want to do, when we want to do it, how we want to do it.

AD: We just wanted a place we could go hang out. We like to keep learning, too. It's a different type of business, its all very interesting to deal with.

AS: Are you guys foodies?

RS: Not particularly. We like food. We actually have a personal trainer that we work out with. We do it so we can party and eat the things that we want. We don't want to sit around and eat carrots and fucking rabbit food. We like to enjoy ourselves.

AS: You mentioned scoring the Transformers video game. Doing anything with Transformers has got to be every little boy's dream.

RS: Oh yes. In this business you really have to have a vision and you must be ready to do some things you wouldn't have imagined yourself doing. But thank God people want us to make music for things like vampires and Transformers. Thank God that we're just over-grown children, because robots are pretty cool.

AS: The music that we're doing in the game is very industrial and aggressive.

RS: That's what they wanted. They wanted machines. It's very mechanized and cold. Which, of course, is good for us. We're experts at creating very cold music. That's what Orgy was -- very icy. I mean, if we don't make music that works for robots, we might as well throw in the towel. [laughs] We're practically androids.



Julien-K's first album, Death to Analog is out April 7th. Pre-order ASAP and get a limited-edition bonus disc featuring remixes by She Wants Revenge and Paul Oakenfold, among others.

Too embarrassed to talk to your friends about your foot fetish? Not sure when to tell your partner about those, um, nasty genital warts? Need some Gotha Stewart home-ec advice for your next soiree? Not sure how to get your foot in the door of that fab new career you want? I got you covered. Miss Truth... more

Too embarrassed to talk to your friends about your foot fetish? Not sure when to tell your partner about those, um, nasty genital warts? Need some Gotha Stewart home-ec advice for your next soiree? Not sure how to get your foot in the door of that fab new career you want? I got you covered. Miss Truth Hurts is here to answer all of your love, life, sex, career, and relationship questions. Ask anything. I've been there/done that (except for the warts) and I've dished out advice to readers just like you through the pages of my advice book/lifestyle guide, Cherry Bomb: The Ultimate Guide to Becoming a Better Flirt, a Tougher Chick, and a Hotter Girlfriend, and to Living Life Like a Rock Star.

Send your questions, dilemmas, and conundrums to misstruthhurts@suicidegirls.com. Alternatively, SG members can send a message via the site to MissTruthHurts. We won't use your name, just the city you're writing from.


Q: I received a bottle of black vodka as a gift and heard there is a cool way to mix drinks with it, but every time I try my drinks look like a murky mess. Is there a trick to it?

-Cocktailing in Connecticut

A: I often serve black vodka to my guests. My favorite brand is from England and is called Blavod. There actually is a trick to mixing up cocktails so that they don't look come out all murky. Three tricks actually. 1. Keep the vodka at room temperature. Do not refrigerate it. It keeps it thicker and helps with the layering effect that makes for a cool looking cocktail. 2. You must pour the drink in this order: ice first, juice and/or mixer second, and then you pour in the black vodka very slowly so it almost drips into the glass. 3. Don't stir or shake the drink. If you do it this way, you will get the desired layered effect instead of a dirty looking mess of a drink. If you want a drink that looks half blood red and half black, try my Cherry Bomb Martini. It's 1 shot of pink lemonade, 1/2 shot of pomegranate juice, 1 shot of Blavod, and a cherry on top. It's quite an eye pleaser.


Q: I am looking for a good strapon to get my girlfriend to use on me, I am a male. I was wondering what is the best way to introduce the concept to her.

-Curious in New England

A: Ohh, you naughty boy. I love it! She can either be into it or absolutely appalled by it, so ease into the topic as slowly as you'd like her to ease into you when the time cums. If she's never been to your backend, you need to introduce her to it first in a less threatening way than presenting her with a 12-inch cock she's to strap on. Next time you guys are fooling around, you can take her hand and put it on your chocolate starfish. It's all about baby steps here. It's like taking out a bike on training wheels before you try for the big ol' 10-speed. Once she's game for that, introduce a butt plug for yourself and see if she gasps or if she's cool. Once she passes those tests, then shop for a strap on together and you'll be her Backdoor Sally in no time! A great buy is the Purple Penetrator Strap-On that Madonna was seen buying in London a few years ago.


Q: I find myself attracted to other men, but I'm a happily married woman. I don't want to cheat, but I'm not sure about swinging either. Any insight on this topic?

-Restless in Rhode Island

A: Yes! Actually Terri Nunn of Berlin ("Sex (I'm A...)") talked about this topic in my book Cherry Bomb, so I'll let her answer this one. Terri wrote, "There's no question you're going to be attracted to others during your main relationship. What works for me and my man is an agreement we have: If either one of us just can't stand it and we just have to have someone else we've met, then we can...once. We have to tell each other first and get the other's ok first too. This agreement has made us both feel like our marriage isn't a cage. Neither one of us has acted on it yet. In almost 10 years of togetherness, I've been close a couple of times but didn't follow through and don't regret it. I know this wouldn't work for everyone but it does for us. The important thing is making an agreement of some kind. If there isn't one, infidelity is more likely to happen. When a man cheated on me, the hardest part was the trust he betrayed. That old saying is true: Trust is hard to get and even harder to get back. Without trust, there's no relationship."



Q: What is the proper etiquette of Twitter?
-Tweeting in Tennessee

A: We asked SG's Twitter posse to help out with this question:

@phronk says:

And @ArmOfCrass would agree:

(Twitter CEO Evan Williams echoed this sentiment in SG's recent interview.)


@butterfest is another tweeter that advocates a general free-for-all:

And @lovehysteric keeps it brief when she says:

But @bairdduvessa would disagree:

Other 'guidelines' might include:

#1 from @clallseven

#2 from @Bobsuicide

#3 from @Reidsui

#4 from @inkedveggie

#5 from @jonincalgary

#6 from @kitchelfilms

#7 from @Bugzyblue

#8 from @SnapshotAbee

#9 from @atomicant

#10 from @immortalrevenge

Finally, here are our favorite 'What Not To Do's' on Twitter that people have actually done:

#1 Don't TWI -- tweet while intoxicated, on hallucinogenic drugs, or wired. You'll make a total fool out of yourself, and end up annoying people.

#2 Don't breast-feed and drive while tweeting.

#3 Don't tweet something like "I hate my boss!" Your boss is likely following you and it could have consequences.

#4 Don't think that everything you do is interesting. Eating cereal is not Twitter-worthy unless you're Michael Phelps and you say you're eating it because you're high. Oh, wait, that goes against rule # 1. Well, strictly speaking, there are no rules, so Tweet your little fingers off and follow us at @SuicideGirls.




Carrie Borzillo-Vrenna is Suicide Girls' sex, love, and life advice columnist. She is an entertainment journalist, rock wife, and author of Cherry Bomb: The Ultimate Guide to Becoming a Better Flirt, a Tougher Chick, and a Hotter Girlfriend, and to Living Life Like a Rock Star and Eyewitness Nirvana: The Day-by-Day Chronicle.

www.myspace.com/carrieborzillovrenna
www.carriebv.com

The NCAA championship is one huge score for sports junkies, but, despite all the concentrated basketball action, it apparently doesn't offer sufficient ecstasy for some. With 32 games over the first two days and 16 more on the third and fourth, the opening rounds offer ample vicarious stimulation. more

The NCAA championship is one huge score for sports junkies, but, despite all the concentrated basketball action, it apparently doesn't offer sufficient ecstasy for some. With 32 games over the first two days and 16 more on the third and fourth, the opening rounds offer ample vicarious stimulation. Yet, some push it too far by trying to win cash for guessing every winner.

Many attempt to collect $10,000 by besting the gazillions who participate in ESPN.com's selection contest, while others try to pinch a couple of bucks from buddies. It doesn't matter if the prize is huge or trifling:, the deed may seem innocent, but speculating about potential victors in the name of winning treasure sucks the joy out of an event that should be a blast in and of itself.

The worst thing about trying to predict basketball's future is that it wrecks the fun of the present. That's especially true when it comes to the tournament's cheapest thrills, namely early upsets. If Duke is down by three late in the second half against Southwest Devry State A&M, nonaligned fans should be cheering for the obscure college wholeheartedly. What they should absolutely not be doing is rationalizing that it'll be okay if the traditional juggernaut prevails since it will keep their choices pristine.

Even worse in that regard are college basketball fans who attended good college basketball colleges. If one's alma mater makes it to the conflict, it is one's supreme moral duty to believe they will win every damn game. Screw seeding or their record in the previous 10 matches; anyone who half-cheers for their side to lose because they only had them getting to the Sweet 16 in their office pool is a disloyally unreliable fiend who would steal your wife/girlfriend, rifle through your coat pockets the second you leave the room, and/or snitch on you to the cops/your boss.

Those who betray their hallowed seats of learning for silver pieces should know that it usually doesn't work, anyway. Forecasting something as notoriously volatile as college basketball relies slightly less on chance than scratch-off lottery tickets.

At the same time, some of the same assheads who bitch that every single pro athlete is overpaid and moan about nobody playing for the love of the game in turn only cheer for their teams so they can win a piddling sum from a sportsbook or phenomenally sleazy bookie. Wagering on a favorite squad is like putting money on a presidential challenger; pick your candidate because you're in policy agreement, not because you like the voting percentage spread.

It's too bad -- all types and levels of betting make all sports less pleasant -- but this sporting occasion is so gratifying that the need for greed should be temporarily put on hold. The best thing about refraining from gambling is that it takes the guesswork out of it. Games are nothing less than real-time drama, and playing sports psychic is like trying to surmise a possible ending to a play that's being written as it's acted out.

A bunch of accounting and political science majors who get free educations in exchange for athletic participation will determine what occurs for you. So sit and intake as many fixtures as possible, and base your happiness on the current moment, not how you think upcoming moments will unfold.

Your sports Zen-master has spoken!


Anthony Bialy is SG's no-jocks-required Sweaty Pursuits sports columnist. He follows sports religiously even though he's quite bad at them. He ran cross country and played rugby in college, and was horrid at both. He schedules his life around his favorite NHL team's games, and sadly lists his alma mater winning the NCAA basketball championship as his happiest moment. He likes other things besides sports, too, and requests a minute to think of them.

In Vassalboro, a rural community in Maine, there was a time when one gas station was your only food source within the town's borders. Hungry? You can have a donut. And coffee. That's still all you can find, but now you can look at boobs while you eat! I recently ducked into Grand View, a new... more

In Vassalboro, a rural community in Maine, there was a time when one gas station was your only food source within the town's borders. Hungry? You can have a donut. And coffee.

That's still all you can find, but now you can look at boobs while you eat! I recently ducked into Grand View, a new topless coffee shop in the middle of nowhere that's getting quite a lot of attention from locals and the national media alike.

The waiting line extended out into the parking lot. My companions and I made it to the serving area within a fair span. The floor probably seats around fifty or sixty people. We were greeted by—surprise!—a long-time acquaintance of mine. Our small party approved of his friendliness and his shapely man-boobs.

I was impressed to see a reasonable range of body types, with both ladies and gents working the floor. (In a recent interview, the owner stated his policy wasn't just to hire '10s'.) Our server, G., flexed and posed while I craned my neck this and that way to look past him. I hope his feelings weren't hurt.

The waitresses boasted a range of breast sizes from tiny to medium-large. All were cute, smiling, and accessibly attractive. One of the waitresses had her nipples pierced, but a trick of the light made the left barbell hard to see. I falsely called "Padiddle."

A strange phenomenon I've noticed: people seem to have transcendental expectations of Grand View. Are they looking for the finest Green Mountain Coffee experience of their lives? Do they expect to be allowed to motorboat the servers? I don't know, but reviews have ranged from disappointed to lukewarm. I found the place fun and laid back, just my style. Sure, the place serves gas station coffee and donuts, but it does so with big big smiles and big big personality and...you get my drift. I vote for a topless laundromat next. In my building. Now, please.

If you're in the area, if casual business brings anybody this far into the Maine woods, stop in and cool your heels at Grand View!

(image) Those wacky Japanese are at it again with their love of robot women. The National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology has created a cybernetic cute, code-named HRP-4C, with the goal of seeing her do her little turn on the catwalk, on the catwalk, on the catwalk, yeah. Step... more

Those wacky Japanese are at it again with their love of robot women.

The National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology has created a cybernetic cute, code-named HRP-4C, with the goal of seeing her do her little turn on the catwalk, on the catwalk, on the catwalk, yeah.

It would appear she (it?) is already on her (its?) way. Just like your stereotypical human supermodel, she's lost a fuckton of weight to gain a competitive edge. No clue if she glosses her teeth with Vaseline, though.

Due to HRP-4C's technological limitations (i.e. she will probably kill any model who stands in her way in a catty, yet precisely calculated fury), she will be kept in her own little section for a March 23rd fashion show in Tokyo.

Ohh, my. That sound you just heard? That quite, yet steady rumble? That, kids, is the sound of a million sex-starved otaku (and equally deprived Blade Runner fans) creaming their pants at the possibilities.

Japan has cornered the robotics market in recent years, with companies from Mitsubishi to Hello Kitty creator Sanrio taking part. We've seen receptionists, companions, and robots as "performance art."

I see this ending in fire. That's all we need is senior citizens manning psychotic Nurse-Bots. Didn't any of you learn from watching Roujin Z?

For now, it appears HRP-4C will be limited to a menial life as a greeter and curiosity before taking the fashion world by storm. Shuuji Kajita, from AIST's humanoid research group, reassures, however:

Step 2...robots invading America's Next Top Model? I don't know about you, but the thought of Tyra Banks getting vaporized by a backsassed 'bot would get me to tune in. I'm a fan of Dancing With the Stars, anyway.

AIST website (in English)

YouTube video of HRP-4C in action

thefreak wonders whatever happened to AIBO.

Michael Steele is the gift that keeps giving. For those of you who don’t know, Steele took over as Republican National Committee Chair a couple of months ago. At the time, I thought Steele would actually be one of the smartest choices the GOP could make. He is not as much of a religious lunatic... more

Michael Steele is the gift that keeps giving. For those of you who don’t know, Steele took over as Republican National Committee Chair a couple of months ago. At the time, I thought Steele would actually be one of the smartest choices the GOP could make. He is not as much of a religious lunatic as the others and wants to make the party more technologically savvy, so I assumed he would take the party in a smarter direction. Holy shit was I wrong. Michael Steele is a car crash falling on top of a train wreck, while being hit by an airplane. Steele has one big problem: His mouth.

The trouble started days after Steele took over. The first sign of a problem was the revelation that he is being investigated for some naughty campaign money nonsense. Nothing to worry about, unless of course you are concerned about your party chair being in jail.

Sweet. Nothing like having the FBI investigate your new party chair. Investigations always set a good tone. As of last week, the investigation was picking up steam.

Um. When I said, “consulting,” I meant “coffee.” So, let’s just move along.

Ordinarily, this would be some sort of red flag, but the Republicans probably see it as a sign of hope. The guy was committing campaign fraud, which is a resume builder for the GOP. If only Michael had stopped there, it would have been perfect. But fortunately for us, he has been enjoying as much time in front of the cameras and microphones as possible. Just a couple weeks into the job, Steele explained what kind of changes the GOP needed to make.

There goes the one-armed midget vote. Not exactly an eloquent pitch, and it actually sounds, you know, stupid. Not that I don’t think the conservative suburban hip-hop vote is huge. It obviously is, though not as big as the conservative urban hip-hop vote. That shit is crazy large. Sure, his statement was not that big of a deal, but it was a sign of things to come. It was the sign of a man who is a bit too loose with what comes out of his dumb hole.

Steele followed up his midget/hip-hop moment with some hilarious comments about Bobby Jindal’s ethnic background during an interview with Curtis Sliwa broadcast on ABC Radio:

Ha ha! Weeeee. Do you get it? Jindal is Indian – and successful. That means he’s a slumdog millionaire! All successful people from India are slum dogs. Come on, join us in making the dumbest and most racist connections possible! Of course this comment didn’t upset too many Republicans, but it certainly did add to the general discomfort level with their new chair. And he was just getting started.

Next he compared being a Republican to being an alcoholic, which is an interesting choice for the head of the GOP.

Guess what? Quite a few Republicans didn’t like the leader of the party comparing them with alcoholics, mostly because he’s right. Being in a 12-step program means one has to take responsibility for one’s actions and that is an idea that enrages Republicans. But that was nothing compared to what Steele had in store for the GOP.

Next, Steele decided to go mano a mano with Rush Limbaugh – for three whole days. While appearing on the D.L. Hughley Show, Steele let loose on the fat, three-time divorced, multi-millionaire, drug addict (see YouTube clip).

Uh oh, don’t go there. Don’t do it…

Oh, noes! Once a Republican criticizes Rush, you can start a countdown for the moment he will apologize and say, “that’s not what I meant.” For Steele, it took three days. Rush took to the airwaves and attacked Steele, which caused Steele to reach out to every media outlet he could to apologize.

Right, when you said, “ugly,” you meant “sexy,” and when you said “incendiary,” you meant, “smells like vanilla.” Easy mistake to make. At this point, Steele shut down his blog, which is a weird way to get the party on par with the Democrats online, but Steele had no choice because of all the angry Republican comments. And Steele had yet to drop the big shoe.

Last week, Steele took a dagger and plunged it into his own heart.

Dude. You are the leader of the Republican Party. I so shouldn’t have to remind you of that. I mean, didn't you notice you are the leader of crazy, religious lunatics?

Not surprisingly, many Republicans were a bit upset by the comments. Sometimes Republican ignorance of shit they should know comes to bite them in the ass. In this case they should have perhaps taken into account what I wrote about Steele and his efforts to revive the Republican Leadership Council in 2003.

Wow. Just think if all those Republican idiots had read my column. They probably wouldn’t have voted for Steele in the first place. Too bad reading isn’t big on their “to do” list. Oh, and they voted for him because he's black.

Of course, Steele apologized for his abortion comments and said he didn’t mean it and abortion is super bad, etc. But it appears to be too late. The RNC looks set to hold a no-confidence vote on March 31st, just three months after he took over the party. And three months in, Steele has still not hired senior staff, which concerns many in the party.

So, not only is he a loud mouth idiot, but he also isn’t running the place well. He’s all dumb talk and no action. That’s impressive, even for a Republican. I honestly thought Steele would be the Republican's best pick. Turns out they couldn’t have found a worse chair. Time to go back to the old, white racist barrel and pull out a winner. In the meantime, the chair of the Republican National Committee has decided the best thing to do is to stop talking to the press.

FAIL.


FearTheReaper is a writer, actor and stand up comedian. Check back each Tuesday and Friday for more from FearTheReaper

Whether it’s just a big tax write-off, some sort of heavy metal promotion campaign or part of a much grander scheme, I could care less why car-manufacturer Scion and Vice Magazine decided to fly out thirty bands to Atlanta, Georgia for a free festival last February. I hear a lot of noise about corporate... more

Whether it’s just a big tax write-off, some sort of heavy metal promotion campaign or part of a much grander scheme, I could care less why car-manufacturer Scion and Vice Magazine decided to fly out thirty bands to Atlanta, Georgia for a free festival last February. I hear a lot of noise about corporate companies infiltrating the underground scene (come on now, B9), but whoever can throw around that kind of cash and spends it on names like Mastodon, High On Fire, Boris, Converge, Neurosis, and Baroness is pretty okay in my book. We can talk about politics some other time, though.

After mingling with a horde of gorgeous SuicideGirls in Las Vegas for a week to shoot an upcoming DVD, I traveled down south to witness the destruction that was about to go down at Scion Rock Fest. California ragers Trash Talk were set to play a warehouse show in the ATL the night I arrived, so after the chaos that went on there and a stop at a sketchy liquor store the party was definitely on in room 1918 at the Renaissance.

Upon arrival at the Masquerade the next day, the queue outside was insane. Thousands of metalheads had been waiting outside the venue all morning to get into the fest that had everyone talking for the past couple of months. While Trash Talk set up their gear at the Heaven stage (the other two indoor rooms being Purgatory and Hell), I decide to go outside and check out Kylesa. While I dig their records, the Savannah-based sludge metal band isn’t doing it for me today, just as the sound does nothing for Laura’s vocals. However, some of the tracks off their upcoming release Static Tensions are still haunting me in the best way possible.

Back in Heaven, it’s not the first and won’t be the last time I’ll see blood spilled at a Trash Talk show. Even though their line-up this weekend is incomplete (singer Lee is MIA due to a fractured kneecap), the Sacramento hardcore band is solid and as violent as one can only hope for. They are without a doubt the black sheep among this array of doom, sludge and stoner metal, but a fifteen-minute set is all they need to convince their largely unfamiliar audience. I hurry to catch the last song or two of Torche, who have been growing on me for a while now and seem to get better every time I see them on stage. The song Healer is as catchy as a stoner band can get.

One of the bands I have been dying to see today is Baroness, fronted by John Baizley (known for his iconic artwork gracing record sleeves and T-shirts of bands like Cursed, Daughters, Darkest Hour, and Pig Destroyer). The four-piece is sounding heavier and more colossal than ever, I don’t know if their riffs could get any more epic. I kind of want their amps to go to eleven. The same goes for Boris, which is enough reason for the Japanese experimental rock trio to have reached cult-status over the years. Named after a Melvins song, Boris is absolutely one of the most impressive live bands to play at the Masquerade today. Their droning sound is downright hypnotic, largely attributed to guitarist Wata, who by the way is without contest the cutest girl here.

Although I don’t get to see much of Richmond grind thrashers Pig Destroyer, they shred harder than I remembered and sound about as evil as last Summer’s Carcass reunion. Not so diabolical but worshiped by stoners worldwide for the past decade, High On Fire proves to still be unparalleled. Matt Pike (previously of the hugely influential stoner/doom formation Sleep) has an unreal throat that seems to have been created for the sole purpose of fronting this fucking epic band.



Opening with one of my favorite (and most recognizable) songs, Plagues, Boston hardcore band Converge is in excellent shape tonight. With crushing riffs, bone-chilling vocals and ear-shattering percussion, their setlist has been perfected to shut up even the most critical of Converge fans by including Concubine and The Broken Vow, as well as earlier work such as Locust Reign. Creating a sound that has been imitated by many but mastered by few, Converge have yet to fail me.



After witnessing the blood and sweat shed in Heaven, I join the masses outside to a darker and colder space where Neurosis are set to perform. Being the second to last band, they take the main stage to assault my senses with a wall of sound for a solid 90 minutes. The six-headed Oakland outfit effortlessly integrates doom metal with industrial influences to create a truly unique and macabre ambiance. Formed in 1985(!), Neurosis has continually raised the bar in its genre and tonight proves to be no exception.

There is no denying that Mastodon has become one of metal’s leading American heavy metal bands since the release of their 2002 debut Remission, and the Grammy nomination wasn’t a coincidence either. While the Atlanta natives aren’t typically my metallic cup of tea, they conjure an intensity that cuts through flesh and bone and the majority of their peers can only dream of. With three records under their belt and a highly anticipated LP due on March 24, Mastodon is in good company when Neurosis guitarist and vocalist Scott Kelly joins the band to perform Crystal Skull. After nearly two hours of pure fucking metal, Scion Rock fest has officially come to an end and blown my mind from start to finish.

I was very pleasantly surprised to see R. Elisabeth Cornwell’s articles The Evolution of Religion and Why Women Are Bound to Religion: An Evolutionary Perspective in these pages recently. Could Suicide Girls become a journal of serious discourse on religious matters? Incredible. And to think there... more

I was very pleasantly surprised to see R. Elisabeth Cornwell’s articles The Evolution of Religion and Why Women Are Bound to Religion: An Evolutionary Perspective in these pages recently. Could Suicide Girls become a journal of serious discourse on religious matters? Incredible. And to think there are a bunch of “Buddhists” out there who say I shouldn’t be writing here.

You can’t argue with Cornwell’s thesis in her latest piece that women have generally been extremely poorly treated by religion and yet continue nonetheless to propagate the very beliefs responsible for their often sorry position in society. You hear a lot of talk about primitive matriarchal religions that treated women well. But most of those religions are so ancient and so thoroughly dead that what we can say about them is mainly conjecture. The powerful patriarchal religions of the modern world have mostly treated women like shit.

Except for Buddhism.

You knew I’d say that, didn’t you? But it happens to be true. Historically Buddhism has been much better to women than any of the other major religions*. To be sure, there are examples of times when certain Buddhists have treated women just as badly as any other religion. But in doing so these Buddhists have gone against the explicit directions of the founder of their faith.

Buddha’s first order of monks was an all-boys club with a big “No Girls Allowed” sign on the door. But there was a group of women, including Buddha’s step-mom (his mom had died giving birth to him and he was raised by an aunt) and the wife he ditched when he first went on his quest for the truth**, who hung out with the monks, listened to Buddha’s lectures and practiced the meditation he taught. One day Buddha’s step-mom went to Buddha on behalf of these women and asked that they be admitted to the order. Buddha said, “Forget it.”

But a little while later, Buddha’s right hand man Ananda asked Buddha, “Are women less intelligent than men?” Buddha said no, women were just as intelligent as men. Ananda said, “Are women less capable of reaching enlightenment than men?” Buddha said no, women were just as capable as men of reaching enlightenment. Having thus backed him into a corner Ananda went for the kill and asked, “Then why don’t you admit them into the order?”

Buddha had to admit that his initial decision had been wrong. So he opened the order to women. But he was a realist. He knew India in his time was a male-dominated society and would look very much askance at a religious order that admitted women. Plenty of people were already bitching at him for a lot of the radical stuff he’d done. So he made up a list of rules women had to follow that were much stricter than the ones men had to observe and he separated the boys from the girls into different monasteries. He also predicted the order would eventually fail because of this decision. He was wrong there.

Once Buddha was dead, though, less sexually liberated men took control of the order. After a while some male monks developed a stupidly superior attitude that led a lot of them to take ridiculous vows such as that they would never touch a woman or speak to one, some even vowed never to so much as look at a woman. The founder of the Buddhist order in which I was ordained, Dogen Zenji, called bullshit on that.

Dogen wrote a piece called “Prostrating to The Attainment of the Marrow” (Raihai Tokuzui in Japanese). You can read it in volume one of his masterwork, Shobogenzo.

Dogen says, “nowadays (nowadays, in this case, being the year 1240) extremely stupid people look at women without having corrected the prejudice that women are objects of sexual greed. Disciples of the Buddha must not be like this. If whatever may become the object of sexual greed is to be hated, do not all men deserve to be hated too? As regards the causes and conditions of becoming tainted, a man can be the object, a woman can be the object, what is neither man nor woman can be the object, and dreams and fantasies, flowers in space, can also be the object. There have been impure acts done with a reflection on water as an object, and there have been impure acts done with the sun in the sky as an object.”

I can vouch for that last bit. I used to work in a group home for mentally handicapped adults. We had one guy there who had a thing for shoes. You didn’t dare take yours off when he was around lest you find a sticky present inside when you put them back on! Dogen says, “if we hate whatever might become the object of sexual greed, all men and women will hate each other, and we will never have any chance to attain salvation.”

I always think of this when I hear people talking about the supposedly great virtue in the way some religions force women to cover their bodies lest men become sexually greedy. If we follow that logic then an oil magnate who owns a flashy Cadillac ought to drive around with it covered in a burlap sack to keep those who can’t afford such cars from suffering the sin of envy. We’ve all got our own specific objects of greed and it’s up to us to deal with that ourselves. It’s not up to other people to shield us from temptation.

Dogen goes on to say, “Even in China, there was a stupid monk who made the following vow: ‘Through every life, in every age, I shall never look at a woman.’ Upon what morality is this vow based? What wrong is there in a woman? What virtue is there in a man? Among bad people there are men who are bad people. Among good people there are women who are good people.”

He cites numerous famous female Buddhist masters whose understanding far surpassed most men, saying that a guy who took a vow like this would never get a chance to learn from them. He then derides the then-current Japanese custom of not allowing women to visit certain temples.

To get back to what Cornwell wrote, in her article on women and religion she says, “In order for women to abandon religion and its securities, there needs to be something tangible to replace the support that it offers.” This is truer than I think even she realizes.

One of the greatest marks of Buddha as a real man of genius was that he didn’t throw the baby out with the bathwater. He realized religion and spirituality were pretty fucked up. But he also understood the very important role they play in human society. As Cornwell points out in her article on the evolution of religion, religion serves a need much, much deeper than anything the intellect can ever hope to reach.

This is why atheism, as rational and sensible as it is, will never be an adequate substitute for religion. It’s like trying to substitute actual eating with a superbly argued essay on food. It’s an intellect-based solution for a problem that has nothing at all to do with the intellect.

Buddhism did away with deities and belief systems, but did not do away with ritual and practice. Buddhist temples, though they aren’t strictly speaking “religious temples,”*** look like religious temples and the things you do in Buddhist temples seem like the same things you do in religious temples. You chant, you prostrate yourself in front of statues, there are people in funny clothes inside, there are rules to be followed, there is a community of fellow adherents, and all the rest. Thus the deep need we all feel to belong to that kind of an institution is satisfied. Yet there is no pretense that some big guy with a beard who lives up in the sky will smite you if you fail to do these things or reward you if you get all the steps just right. It’s all up to you.

I know I sound like a shill for Buddhism here. But I’m not really interested in converting anyone. If you can find another philosophy that does all these things, by all means go for it. Or if Buddhism’s just not for you, that’s fine too. No skin off my ass either way.

Although technically I am a Buddhist monk, I’m also a bit of a reluctant Buddhist. I’m a Buddhist because I have to admit that Buddhism really is the best thing on offer. I tried the rest and went with the best. But I don’t really self-identify as “a Buddhist” unless I’m specifically called upon to do so (such as when I’m asked to write a column about Buddhism for a pin-up website).

Still, I think in its attitude towards women and in its immensely practical attitude towards religion itself, Buddhism hasn’t been bested yet. Maybe someday. But not yet.



*Actually I don’t consider Buddhism to be a religion at all. But for the purposes of this article I’m treating it as one. It’s not a religion in the sense that it doesn’t have a deity and it isn’t based on spirituality. It is a religion in terms of its age, its function in society and its number of adherents. This subject is much too deep to get into in a footnote, though!

**Yes it's true, Buddha left his wife. But he didn't exactly dump her in a roach infested tenement with four screaming babies. Buddha was a prince at the time and knew his wife would be very well cared for when he was gone. There was a tradition in India of householders leaving home on spiritual quests and there were, and still are, customs and legal regulations in place to deal with such cases. And please note that later on his wife too entered the Buddhist order. Again, this is way too big for a footnote!

***See first footnote.

For further reading check out this page on the history of women in Buddhism.

Brad Warner is the author of Hardcore Zen and Sit Down and Shut Up! and his latest, Zen Wrapped in Karma Dipped in Chocolate. He maintains a blog about Buddhist stuff and a MySpace page too. If you're in Southern California and you want to try some Zazen for yourself, he has a group that meets every Saturday in Santa Monica.

To see where Brad will be speaking next take a look here!

Buy the new CD by his band Zero Defex at CD Baby now!

Drummer to the stars, Josh Freese, is selling himself to sell his new album, Since 1972. Inspired by the value-added packages offered by his buddy Trent Reznor for the last Nine Inch Nails release, Freese has come up with his own gift-with-purchase plan -- only his is a whole lot wackier. Those that are... more

Drummer to the stars, Josh Freese, is selling himself to sell his new album, Since 1972. Inspired by the value-added packages offered by his buddy Trent Reznor for the last Nine Inch Nails release, Freese has come up with his own gift-with-purchase plan -- only his is a whole lot wackier.

Those that are willing to pay a little more than the base price for Josh's new solo album are offered a plethora of incentives. At the $50 price point you get a five-minute "Thank You" call from Josh, who promises you can "yack it up" about whatever you want. Since Josh has worked with some of the biggest and/or coolest names in the business -- he's a member of The Vandals, Devo, and the on-hiatus A Perfect Circle, and has played with NIN, Sting, and Guns N' Roses -- there's a lot of ground to be covered in that brief call.

As you rise higher in price, the bizarreness of the stuff on offer increases. Items on menu (which can be viewed at JoshFreese.com) include a trip with Josh to a sensory deprivation tank followed by a steak and all-you-can-eat shrimp dinner at Sizzler -- for an investment of $500. A visit to the Hollywood Wax Museum or lunch at Spearmint Rhino with Josh and a member of either The Vandals or Devo (your choice) will set you back $2,500.

For $20,000 Josh will write and record two songs about you that he will then make available via iTunes (you can even sing backup). And, for a $75k, you get a signed CD and Josh in your band for a month. Not got a band? No problem. Other options in this super limited edition of one include having Josh as your personal assistant / cabana boy for a couple of weeks.

Of course behind all of this silliness, Josh has a very serious intent; to get a little more attention for his second solo album than he got for his first (which was released in 2000). And his crackpot scheme, which also involves crazy golfing and a nefarious trip to Tijuana and calls on the services of many of Josh's celebrity buddies such as Twiggy (NIN and Marilyn Manson), Stone Gossard (Pearl Jam) and Maynard James Keenan (Tool), is working. The UK's mighty Guardian has written about Josh and his multi-tiered promotional plan, as have NPR, The Boston Herald and numerous other newspapers and websites. The cost of the album may just be $7, but the attention Josh is getting for it is priceless.


Nicole Powers: Obviously with the new record, one of the talking points is your rather interesting marketing plan. What gave you the idea for that?

Josh Fresse: A couple of things. One is, I was on tour and I saw what Trent Reznor did. But he did his in a very classy and kind of realistic way. The things that he did were very quality and not a joke, and he sold all of his stuff right away because it all made sense. I know that Radiohead did a similar thing, and I've heard that U2's selling a similar thing, but mine is completely wacked-out and over-the-top and exaggerated and fun. I think it's a lot more fun and funny than those groups that I just mentioned.

What really gave me the idea, a friend of mine, we were talking about my last record that I put out on Kung Fu Records, which is The Vandals record label, about eight years ago. We were laughing, he looked at the SoundScans and he said, "Last week you sold one copy, and the week before you sold two copies." It's been out for almost ten years right. And I said, I should personally call all those people and thank them shouldn't I? And I go, "That should be a thing, you buy my record, and then for an extra 50 bucks we talk on the phone for a while." Then my friend and I, we just started brainstorming for a while. He was like, "Yeah, you should do their laundry or come wash their car." And I'm like "Yeah."

I'm kind of a jokester, I'm kind of wacky at heart anyways. And I'm putting the record out on my own. I paid for it myself, I'm putting it out myself, I spent way too much money making, mixing and releasing it, and so I thought, what's something I could do, some sort of marketing thing that would grab people's attention to let them know that I have an album coming out?

Between you and me, I don't expect the expensive ones to sell. If it happens, I'm ready to make good on them. I already have a bunch of plans for doing all that stuff. Any names that are mentioned in there, whether it's Maynard James Keenan or Mark Mothersbaugh or any of the guys in The Vandals, Stone Gossard from Pearl Jam, I asked them all first before I included the names.

NP: I was going to ask if all the names were volunteers.

JF: Well, I have a bunch of rock star friends, but I only asked a few, I only asked a few that I'm really good pals with that I knew would be into it.

NP: Is there anyone you wanna out for not playing ball?

JF: No. No one shot me down. Even like guys like Maynard and Mark from Devo, I thought, they're my good friends but publicly they're so quiet and weird that they might not want to be involved, even though I know they love me to death. But what I told them is, hey, if someone buys this expensive thing, if it happened, it would only happen once. They're involved with the limited edition of one packages right? So it's not going to be every week, me calling you and going, "Hey we've got to go miniature golfing again." It would happen once -- if that.

The only one that's got multiple duties is Stone from Pearl Jam, he would have to write three letters. There's a limited edition of three $5,000 packages, and one of the things is that Stone will write you a letter telling you about his favorite song from my record. So yeah, he would only have to write three letters. He's way into it you know. I saw those guys recently, the Pearl Jam guys, they were in the middle of recording a record so I went down to visit them, and they we're freaking out about it. Eddie Vedder couldn't stop talking about it, he was so into it.

NP: You offer a massage as part of a couple of the packages. Are you any good?

JF: I'm pretty good. I've got some strong drummer hands. One of the guys, do you know the Alkaline Trio? I was with Matt Skiba, the singer, last night, and he's going, "Oh man that massage thing. What if you get like some hot girl? Is your girlfriend be pissed off?" And I was like, "Trust me, it's going to be some ugly drummer guy who buys that package. It's not going to be a hot girl." You can only be so lucky right? It's all strictly business at that point.

NP: Another of the packages involves a trip to Disneyland's super exclusive Club 33. How did you get membership to that? I understand you've got family connections?

JF: I have yes. I've got many connections to Disneyland, the main one is my father's worked there since I was four. I was born down in Florida when he was working for Disney World, conducting the band, and then he got moved to Disneyland in Orange County when I was a year old. He hires all the musicians out there.

The Vandals, the band I've played in since I was a teenager, were all really big Disneyland fans [legend has it they discovered the young Josh while he was playing in a Top 40 cover band on the Tomorrowland Terrance Stage there]. Through my dad, I hooked up [Vandal's bassist] Joe Escalante with a Club 33 membership. It's really hard to get it. It costs a lot of money to do, but you can't just go do it if you have a lot of money, there's a long, long waiting list. Joe's got to pay all this money every year. It costs a lot of money but the perks are pretty amazing for a Disneyland fan. So I called Joe and I said, "Hey, can I take someone to Club 33 for lunch, if they buy this thing for $10,000."

NP: Also, you seem to be getting rid of rather a lot of items out of your wardrobe. Do you have closet issues?

JF: Do I have closet issues? Like trapped in the closet like R. Kelley?

NP: No. In a lot of the packages you offer the pick of any of the items from your closet.

JF: You know what, I've got a ton of clothes. Everyday I walk into my closet and I've got a shitload of clothes that I never wear. I end up wearing the same shit everyday anyways, and I take stuff to Goodwill and Buffalo Exchange -- like every week I'm giving stuff away.

NP: You see, I knew you were a man with closet issues. Where do you get all these clothes from? Are you a fashion whore?

JF: You know I've gone through spurts of that. Then I get a bunch of clothes for free too from companies and stuff. I'll go down and raid someone's warehouse, and before you know it you're leaving with all this shit. It's funny, the more successful you are, the more money you make, the more free shit you get, which is weird. I could have really used all this free stuff when I was broke. I'm not spending money on clothes right now like I used to. I used to spend a lot, and between that and free shit, and also being a kind of a packrat -- I've always got some sentimental reason to hang onto something, and I'm trying to get over that.

NP: One of the more bizarre items that you offer, is to be someone's cabana boy. Do you harbor any cabana boy fantasies?

JF: Not really, I just thought that was a funny phrase to throw out. I don't know how people interpreted that. I'm not saying I'm going to be your sex slave.

NP: It does bring up images of scenes from 1970s porno films.

JF: [laughs] Also, that's part of the $75,000 package which no one will probably ever buy, even though friends of mine are laughing...That's just basically a fruitcake way of saying personal assistant -- I'll do what ever you want for a while -- within reason.

NP: The thing about the $75,000 package, no disrespect to Robin from NIN, or his lovely wife, but her raw lasagna that's included is the least appetizing thing on your entire menu. That would be the one thing that might hold me back from dropping 75K. Can you perhaps talk up the raw lasagna a little?

JF: You know, I'm sure we could talk them into cooking something else, or not cooking something else. We could just make a turkey sandwich, or throw it in the microwave, that'll work.

NP: So we now know what you would do for the sake of your music, but is there anything you wouldn't do?

JF: Oh yeah, of course, you'd be surprised. I mean, friends of mine have been calling me, emailing me, texting me, making jokes. How much for this? How much for that? Actually, one of the guys from NOFX, who will remain nameless, he texted me the other day and he said, "Would you give me a handjob for $100,000?" I said I would be so emotionally scarred from that, it would have to be a lot more. I ended up not settling on a price.

But you know I'm not going to do that. I don't want to become Steve-O either, like a jackass, "I'll do anything." The list is just a list to tell people I've got a record coming out. This isn't going to become what I do for a living. It was a prank that wasn't a prank, a publicity stunt but all completely legit.

NP: Do you worry that this will take away from the music?

JF: You know what? I don't even care to be totally honest. I made this record and I'm proud of it. And these days, say that I was touring my ass off, that everyone knew the band and I had a big record deal, people still aren't selling records. I want to put my record out and have it be available, and have more people know about it because of this.

It's funny, I got asked to do this streaming thing of my record, 'cause I had interviews this week, and I don't even know if they've heard it. I don't even know if you've heard it.

NP: I've absolutely heard it. I've got the whole album. It's a fun album. Obviously, when you've got songs like "I Wanna Cheat On My Girlfriend"...

JF: Well you know what's funny, my record I put out in 2000, everything was funny and wacky. This record, with the exception of that song, which is funny and not funny actually, that's the only song which can be [viewed] as wacky. It's not a joke album. This record's actually pretty serious. I mean it's a fun record, but they're not all silly songs -- except that one -- which is very dark and serious too. [laughs]

NP: But the pace of it, for the most part, is very upbeat, and it has a quirky sound, which is very you.

JF: Yes, of course

NP: So the way you promoted it expresses what's contained in the music on some level. But then there is that thing that you touched on earlier; it doesn't matter how big of an artist you are, to some extent now being an artist isn't enough, you also have to be some kind of commercial whore. Even the biggest bands are teaming up with sponsors.

JF: Sure, yeah, it's kind of true, but it's not just that. I see that what I'm doing, by even coming up with that price scheme and making good on it, in the end, when I have to go to lunch with someone at the Cheesecake Factory or have to write a song about someone or give someone a massage, all these things are going to be filmed and posted on YouTube, and maybe made into some sort of documentary or something. So for me, I see it not so much as whoring myself out, but becoming even more of an artist and more of a creative person doing something different.

NP: Is YouTube part of your artist's palette now?

JF: For sure. Yeah that's something that I learned on my laptop on tour about a year and a half ago or something, when I did a lot of touring with Nine Inch Nails overseas. Between being jetlagged all the time, being up at crazy hours, not being able to sleep, and trying to find something to do in the middle of the night I learned how to do that.

Actually, Jeordie White [Twiggy], that was playing bass with Nails, he kind of learned how to do it and taught me. Then I just took the ball and ran with it. I love doing it, it's a fun, creative exercise, and the fact that you can do that stuff in your living room and post it for the world, whether they care or not they get to see it, is really cool...This isn't just for fun. This is an outlet for me, as a person, as an artist. It's important to me. I really get off on doing that shit and posting that shit. It's part of what makes me who I am.

NP: I would imagine it's necessary for you to have that immediate outlet for your creativity, because, on the flip side, I know that you played with Sting and recorded a bunch of tracks back in 2005 that haven't been released.

JF: Right.

NP: And then you did the Guns N' Roses thing, you co-wrote the title track for Chinese Democracy, and that didn't come out for nearly a decade.

JF: Yeah.

NP: So to be able to deal with that, all of this creativity that's getting held back, you must enjoy being able to throw something straight out there.

JF: It's great. Definitely, I definitely like that, for sure. And it's something you haven't been able to do up until now, and so it's exciting. It's exciting and it's scary in the way people in the music industry are still trying to figure out how the hell we're going to start selling records again and be able to make money. Because technology and the internet, it's exciting but it's also hindered a lot of people, a lot of bands. It works both ways. There's great things you can do, and then it just comes down to the whole thing of people being able to steal your music whenever they want. It's a drag. I've seen it affect big time artists and I've seen it affect the little bitty bands that are starting out. It's just kind of a confusing, weird time.

NP: You left Nine Inch Nails to spend more time with your family. How's that going?

JF: It's going great. It's going really good. I mean, I miss playing with Nine Inch Nails because I loved doing it...I was watching how it was affecting my oldest boy, because I'd just been on tour a lot. When he was born I was playing in Perfect Circle, and then I was going in and out of town with A Perfect Circle, The Vandals, Sting, and then in '05, when he was about fours-years old, I started touring a lot with Nine Inch Nails, and it got to be too much. I haven't retired from touring though. There'll be a time when I tour a lot again.

I'm going to Austin next week with Devo to play SXSW, and then Devo is going to England in May to play a couple of shows. I just couldn't continue the first part of '09 with the schedule that Trent looked like he was going to keep through to the summer time this year, I just had to bow out. It was just because of the effect on my family, and I didn't want to regret that down the road. I do miss it, and I'm sad that I'm not going to be there for the tour with Jane's Addiction, I'm the biggest Jane's Addiction fan. So when I found out they were doing that tour, I was ultimately, sad and pissed off and bummed out that I was missing it.

NP: Devo have a new album due out in the fall. Have you been involved in the recording of that?

JF: Yeah. I was there yesterday. We're in the middle of working on it right now. We're trying to hurry up and finish it and have it all ready to do a tour later on this year.

NP: How do the new Devo tracks compare to the music we know and love?

JF: What's funny about me playing with Devo is that I'm the biggest Devo fan. I'm the only guy in the band who's not an original member, even though I've been their drummer for thirteen years. But I started as a Devo fan, and this record, it's like let's do what people want to hear. People don't want to hear Devo not being Devo. It hasn't been easy but it's getting done and it's great stuff. There was a batch of fifteen or sixteen demos last year, and we ditched most of them. We just picked four or five of them and thought there's almost half a record, let's continue to write some more songs. So that's what we're trying to do, just play quality control and make sure we can do something that makes sense that people will want to hear.

NP: I also hear there's been some movement on the Perfect Circle front. I think Maynard said in an interview that he and Billy Howerdel had started writing again.

JF: I had lunch with Billy about two weeks ago and we were talking about how it'd be great to do some Perfect Circle shows. It's been five years this year, we finished up in the spring of 2004. I don't know how soon we'd make a record but I know a lot of people would like to see Perfect Circle play some shows. I hear it all the time from people. And me personally, I would like to. We'll see what happens. It's a matter of everyone being on the same page at the same time.

NP: You've played with so many absolutely amazing people, what's your unfulfilled dream gig? What band would you put down $75K for to be a member of for a month?

JF: Oh god. The people I'm a really big fan of? One guy I've played with once, I did one show with them but I'm the biggest fan of them and would like to do more work with them, is Frank Black, I'm a big Frank Black and Pixies fan. Other than doing more work with him, two of my favorite bands, and they're such polar opposites, I would love to work with either the Butthole Surfers or Steely Dan. I mean my biggest heroes are Devo and The Replacements, and I've played with [Paul] Westerberg for years and played with Devo for years. It's kind of like what do I do now? Who do I want to play with?

NP: I guess now's the time to concentrate on Josh Freese.

JF: Exactly, and continue doing stuff with the bands that I love that I've been in for years on a less time-committal basis, like The Vandals and Devo. The Vandals are playing in a couple of weeks with Bad Religion -- that'll be fun. I don't make a living doing it, but it'll be fun.



Since 1972 and the deluxe packages will go on sale exclusively at JoshFreese.com on March 24th. The album will be available on wider release online and in stores on April 14th.