Monthly Archives: September 2020

Tales From The Drop Box Episode 178 (2020-26) The Pandemic/BLM/Vote Trump Out/ Episodes

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I cannot recall a time in modern history when the need for Americans to vote was so great so to avoid a continuous and persistent attack mounted against democracy by a sitting President of the United States of America. How is that for an opening sentence, eh?

N.B. Skip the next paragraph if you don’t want to read about threats to democracy…

What makes the threat so great? An express reservation by the occupant of the office of president against the peaceful transition of power following an election. Simply unimaginable. (See Trump Won’t Commit To A Peaceful Transition of Power.) has forever changed America and has exposed the deep fissures in American culture. As evidenced by the unwavering support of a minority (42%) of the electorate the division is I fear permanent. How do you explain a significant minority of the electorate continuing to support a corrupt and morally bankrupt individual whose massive and repeated failures in handling the Coronavirus pandemic as well as his numerous repeated lies about the non-lethality of the virus that has resulted in the death of more than 204,000 people in this country and counting? I can’t. If you know the answer to this fundamental question about the psyche of a people, let me know because I am truly baffled. So, vote as if your life depends upon the outcome because, regardless of the side of the democracy fence you are viewing this election, your life I fear depends on the outcome.

If you skipped the above paragraph like I warned you, then you can relax knowing that you will have no politics to distract you from joy. Tales From The Drop Box Episode 178 is all about love. But I should inform you of this fact: Threats to the peaceful transition of power following an election are fuel for revolution.

Speaking of revolutions, in case you haven’t noticed, the music this year is great! So, take a dip in the music pool, I think you’ll find the water is fine…

Here is what you will find in Episode 178:

  1. SUN – “Higher Fire” (Brutal Pop)
  2. Close Talker – “Pace” (How Do We Stay Here?)
  3. Junkbunny – “Another Summer Song” (Down The Rabbit Hole EP)
  4. Silverbacks – “Dunkirk” (Fad)
  5. Black Pumas – “Fire” (Black Pumas)
  6. Giant Rooks – “Heat Up” (Rookery)
  7. As Sirens Fall – We Go Down Together” (L’appel Du Vide, Pt 1 EP)
  8. All Them Witches – “Enemy Of My Enemy” (Nothing As The Ideal)
  9. The Magic Gang – “What Have You Got To Lose?” (Death Of The Party)
  10. Honey Joy – “Finally Home” (II)
  11. Be Well – “Tiny Little Pieces” (The Weight and the Cost)
  12. Go For Gold – “Forget About It” (Color Me)
  13. The Haddenfields – “Bars on Mars” (EP-Idemic)
  14. The Dicks – “Hate The Police” (Hate the Police 7′)
  15. Echo 2 Locate – “Woodlark” (Misery & Fools Among The Best of Us)
Tales From The Drop Box Episode 178 (2020-26)

Enemy of my enemy never been a friend of me keep my name from awful truth . . . Mommy, mommy, mommy look at your son you might have loved me but now I got a gun . . .

KFR

Tales From The Drop Box Episode 177 (2020-25) The Pandemic/BLM/Vote Trump Out/ Episodes

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RIP RBG. Joan Ruth Bader Ginsburg was a force of nature with her intellectual insights as an American jurist who served as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1993 until her death. RBG was the Supreme Court’s conscience. She advocated for equal protection, was a champion for women’s rights and impassioned leader against gender discrimination. Throughout her career as a jurist she was strong advocate of individual rights. Significantly, she was a careful observer of the practical impact and consequences of the decisions she made. Ginsburg was only the second woman to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court, after Sandra Day O’Connor. During her tenure Ginsburg wrote notable majority opinions, including United States v. Virginia (1996), Olmstead v. L.C. (1999), and Friends of the Earth, Inc. v. Laidlaw Environmental Services, Inc. (2000) (read about her most significant opinions here).

RBG’s death ends the delicate balance on the Supreme Court between the strict constructionist/conservatives and the centrist/liberals. As a corrupt, highly politicized administration is in power and a Senate controlled by Trump sycophants and bootlickers, until at least November 3, the selection of the next associate justice to serve on the Court is a generational pick that could advance the objectives of extreme variants of conservative philosophy, misnamed as populism/Trumpism. To be clear, the Court has always been political, but the Court until recently followed tradition and the fact that the judicial views of the constitution do not widely vary i.e. all are somewhat construed through a lens of constitutional interpretation rather than overt effect on domestic politics. A purely political pick of an unqualified individual could free the Court from the Constitution and change the Court’s Constitutional role as a co-equal branch of government and neutral arbiter between the Executive branch and the Legislative branch. I fear that the Court will evolve into a tool of the President, subsumed by the Executive branch, and serve at the lap of the fundamentally corrupt and dishonest current holder of the office. This is how dictatorships arise. Vote on November 3.

Here is what you will find in Episode 177:

  1. Dehd – “Flying” (Flower Of Devotion)
  2. Alex The Astronaut – “Happy Song” (The Theory Of Absolutely Nothing)
  3. Clt Drp – “Where The Boys Are” (Without The Eyes)
  4. Amyl & The Sniffers – “Gacked On Anger” (Amyl & The Sniffers)
  5. Answering Machine – “Bad Luck” (Bad Luck)
  6. Abbey Glover – “The Breakup Song” (Everybody Leaves)
  7. Honeychain – “Pocket Full Of Good Luck” (Pocket Full Of Good Luck)
  8. Hey, Chels – “Take Me Anywhere” (Hey Chels)
  9. Bloxx – “Changes” (Lie Out Loud)
  10. Belako – “All Nerve” (Plastic Drama)
  11. Otoboke Beaver – “Akimahenka” (Okoshiyasu!!)
  12. Say Sue Me – “One Week” (We’ve Sobered Up)
  13. L.A. Witch – “Fire Starter” (Play With Fire)
  14. Batmobile – “Kiss Me Now (1987 Demos)
  15. L.A. Machina – “Not Another Teenage Head” (Welcome To The Machina)
Tales From the Drop Box Episode 177 (2020-25)

I’m working off my ass every single day for the minimum wage . . . I want to be where the boys are. Is that sexist? I want to be where the boys are I fucking earned it…

KFR

Tales From The Drop Box Episode 176 (2020-24) The Pandemic/BLM/Vote Trump Out/ Episodes

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So, I’m dealing with a little fire issue. I’m sitting in my bunker which is slowly filling with smoke. The bunker is situated about 1/2 mile from the Bobcat fire on the edge of Monrovia in Los Angeles. The fire has been burning for just over 1 week and is about 6 percent contained. The air, to say the least, is unhealthful. The smoke is triggering in no small part some of the anxiety I have about the general state of affairs in this world.

NB: There is a brief anti-Trump rant that is going to follow. I’m a little angry, so I’m giving fair warning – skip the next paragraph. After that it is all sunshine and rainbows…really!

It has almost been a week since Bob Woodward released tapes of Trump indicating that in early February 2020 that he knew that COVID-19 was 5X more deadly than the annual influenza virus, but still chose to lie to the American people about it’s lethality, transmissibility, and everything else about the virus in, what he now says after the tape recordings release, an effort to “keep the American people calm.” What a load of horseshit. Trump’s lies have cost American lives and once he is removed from office, his negligence, which is criminal, should be tried. He will be convicted and should be executed. Trump, it turns out, is the world’s greatest mass murderer. Okay, I feel a little better getting that out. Less stressed.

So, sunshine and rainbows! This week’s episode of Tales from the Drop Box, Episode 176, is filled with sunshine and rainbows in the form of a pretty indie pop filled episode. Not sure how that happened, but I’m in need of some positive given the fires, politics, climate change, COVID-19 etc. At least this has been an awesome year for new music!

Here is what you will find in Episode 176:

  1. Ängie – “Two Together” (Not Pushing Daisies)
  2. The Happy Fits – “Go Dumb” (What Could Be Better)
  3. The All-American Rejects – “Damn Girl” (Reject Faves)
  4. Broken Hands – “Run Away” (Split In Two)
  5. The Front Bottoms – “Camouflage” (In Sickness & In Flames)
  6. The Milwaukees – “Our Blues” (The Calling)
  7. Rainout – “Bleach” (Rainout)
  8. Rezurex – “House On Haunted Hill” (Skeletons)
  9. Sea Girls – “Transplant” (Open Up Your Head)
  10. The Telescopes – “Sadness Pale” (Altered Perception)
  11. Grayscale – “Baby Blue (Reworked)” (Live From The Barber Shop Studios)
  12. Anna Burch – “Can’t Sleep” (If You’re Dreaming)
  13. Illuminati Hotties – “b yr own b” (Free I.H. – This Is Not The one You’ve Been Waiting For)
  14. 45 Grave – “Evil” (Sleep In Safety)
  15. Hazy Sour Cherry – “Little Run” (Tour De Tokyo)
Tales From The Drop Box Episode 176 (2020-24)

Blind me with all your lies, you’re evil I can look into your lies, you’re evil . . . and to think I was having a mental breakdown the same time you were painting your walls

KFR

Tales From The Drop Box Episode 175 (2020-23) The Pandemic/BLM/Vote Trump Out/ Episodes

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Well, this is Day 2 of an expected 10 day heatwave roiling through Los Angeles. Yesterday was 112 degrees outside the bunker and today is expected to be 114 degrees. These will both break local records for the area in September. I’d probably care about climate change a little more if I could actually focus on it as an issue. However, given the undeniable importance of the upcoming election and with the inescapable conclusion that America’s problems now lie naked before the world, climate change does not seem that pressing of an issue.

If Trump is elected on November 3 (or shortly thereafter) there is little hope that American democracy, as we knew it before 2016, will survive another four years of the predicable chaos another Trump term will bring. The political divisions are simply too great to not expect a violent response from both the left and the right. Daily, new allegations and evidence of Trump’s scumbaggery arise. For example, this week’s headline Trump: Americans Who Died in War Are ‘Losers’ and ‘Suckers’ is yet another example of his vileness and yet there are still many Americans who believe this story, like every other story where Trump demonstrates his gross moral failings, is Fake News. It should be noted that many elements of the story were confirmed by Fox News – Trumps own Fake News network. It doesn’t matter. When evangelical Christians are willing to support Trump over Biden, you know the world is upside down. Follow your heart not your mind, because if you are still thinking of voting for Trump – you’ve lost your mind.

I know I shouldn’t care, but I am worried and I do care about the state of affairs for my children and their children. Americans are not better off under Trump. American’s are dying (over 1000 per day at last count) from Trump’s gross incompetence in handling the COVID-19 crisis. The predictable economic fallout from that failure is seeping throughout the national economy.

So, register to vote and vote. In California, it is very easy as it is online: California Online Voter Registration. Do me a favor, will ya? Register to vote where you live as you listen to Episode 175 of Tales From The Drop Box. I never thought I’d make it this far. If you don’t vote, America won’t make it much farther and the joke about this podcast being recorded in a bunker will no longer be a joke – it will be real.

Here is what you will find in Episode 175:

  1. Deer Park Avenue – “Hurts So Good” (Conscious Mess)
  2. Alex Cameron – “Far From Born Again (Demo)” (Miami Memories)
  3. Biffy Clyro – “Worst Type of Best Possible” (A Celebration of Endings)
  4. Batboner – “Chrysalis” (Batboner)
  5. Garrison – “Let’s Fight” (TV Or The Atom Bomb)
  6. Black Marble – “In Manchester” (I Must Be living Twice EP)
  7. The Fallaways – “Alive” (Sunset Ave)
  8. Alice Bag – “Spark” (Sister Dynamite)
  9. Runaway Nuns – “Antenna” (Spit)
  10. Vintage Crop – “Everyday Heroes” (Serve To Serve Again)
  11. Dens – “Learn” (Taming Tongues)
  12. Cable Ties – “Hope” (Far Enough)
  13. Acceptance – “Wildfires” (Wildfires)
  14. Superdrag – “Sucked Out” (Regretfully Yours)
  15. Janet Devlin – “Big Wide World” (Confessional)
Tales From The Drop Box Episode 175 (2020-23)

Sun is rising, in the city on a rooftop, feeling dizzy don’t look down, cause you’re ready now . . . Look around could it bring somebody down if I never made a sound again? In your eyes you’ve already spread my thighs . . .

KFR