rickyleepotts …an opinionated realist

For most of us, listening to music is something we simply cannot live without. You remember the days of the portable cassette player and then moving to a new generation of portable CD players. Just in the last few years we have gone from carrying around CD players to carrying around iPods, iPhones, and a variety of other media players that will allow us to listen to our collection of albums and in most cases even the radio. But is AM/FM radio all that great anyway with all of those ads and off air time? Plus most of these stations play the same songs over and over again and it gets to the point that you cannot even drive to work without hearing the same song two or three times.

Thus enter the world of Internet radio. Now, through services like iTunes and Pandora, you can listen to radio stations from all over the world. iTunes offers stations from every corner of the planet while Pandora pulls tracks from an ever growing collection of songs. Pandora, coined the music genome project, can not only provide you with a list of stations to fit your specific genre, but based on a rating and skip system can tell you what you like and suggest tracks that you will also enjoy. And if a song appears that you do not like, simply clicking the thumbs down option (next to the album cover) and Pandora will not play that track anymore, nor songs like it. Pandora is truly a smart way to listen to the radio. (Funny how they consider themselves Internet radio when in reality it is not radio at all but rather a collection of predetermined tracks.)

Pandora is also convenient. With the website allowing you access anywhere that you have a browser as well as iPhone and Blackberry application options you can carry your Pandora account with you wherever you go. But Pandora is not the perfect solution to your music listening needs. There are advertisements every few songs that do nothing but annoy. There are even ads on the side of the window that take up half the screen when all you want to do is skip to the next tune. But be careful as you are only allowed six skips a day. So be cautious if you are tired of hearing Lady Gaga as you can only hope around a limited number of times.

There are some other issues like not being able to rate songs outside of your genre even. When you create your account you can select a genre from a predetermined list or even input an artist that you like the sound of. So, when I started, I put in Armin van Buuren. He is a high-energy techno DJ and I love listening to dance, trance, and house music. So, once I entered that Pandora made the House station “my” station. If I, for example, want to venture out and listen to some Top 40 music and want to like a song I am not able to since House is considered to be my default station. But, all of those things aside Pandora truly does put services like iTunes Radio and Slacker Radio to shame. The selection is just unbeatable.

But what if I want to have unlimited skips? What if I want to listen to more than forty hours a month? What if I want to turn on Pandora while having a dinner party and not be overwhelmed with advertisements? You are in luck as Pandora offers a paid subscription service. The rate is $36 a year (yeah, that is a value in my option) and you are welcomed with a handful of incredible options. I wanted to take an opportunity to share some of those with you here. Below is a list of some the more interesting and personally beneficial options when you actually pay for your Pandora service. This offer comes to you with a slightly different name, more for branding I would assume, and is known as Pandora One. You be the judge but if you are looking to have full control over your radio the only way to do it, through Pandora anyway, is to pony up the dough.

Bringing Pandora to your Desktop

One cool thing that the Pandora subscription offers is a desktop application that allows you to run your Pandora radio station outside of a web browser. If you are anything like me you are using four or five tabs at any given time, so why waste one on Pandora? This handy application allows you the view the album cover, rate the song as a like or dislike, and even skip to the next track and pause if you are wanting to take a break from the music for a little while. This application takes up a lot less space too. If you do not want to see the application just hide the sucker in your task bar and move on with your day.

Making Pandora Your Very Own

With your paid subscription get ready to get creative. With the default Pandora website you have no control over the look of your page. You get the default look and feel and the most excitement that will come from this is the ads that pop up non-stop every few tracks. So if you are dishing out the cash for the subscription you can have pretty much total control over your design. There are skins that you can download that allow you to personalize your media player. This is where Pandora gets personal.

Listing without Limits

With the way Pandora is currently setup, if you are not paying then you are limited to so many hours a month. Forty to be exact. So if you have a full time job and are allowed to listen to music while in the office (like I can) you will use that time in a couple of weeks, tops. Plus, I have Pandora on my iPhone. Because of that my account is linked to my phone and the hours are the same. So if I use the website for twenty hours and my phone for twenty then I have, according to Pandora, used my forty hours. They are linked and this proves to be a big issue when I am in the mood to listen to some radio. The paid subscription, however, has no time limits and you can listen all day every day for the entire month. For the entire year for that matter. Pay for the enjoyment of unlimited listening with Pandora.

Higher Quality Streaming

The audio quality coming from Pandora is pretty solid. You get what I consider almost CD quality sound from the service when you are taking the free route. But, if you decide to pay for your service, expect a much higher quality of sound to pierce your eardrums. With the paid subscription you will begin receiving 192k bits per second audio. To the normal individual that might not prove to be that big of a selling point, but to ears like mine I need to hear what the person producing this track heard. The better the sound quality the more enjoyment I can get out of a song.

No Advertising

The single best feature about the paid subscription to Pandora is that you get no ads. No more commercials every few tracks that fan inhibit your mood. No more huge banners popping out all over the screen. No more being bothered to rent your next DVD from Netflix or to watch the latest and greatest late night TV sow on NBC. Ads are a thing of the past when you pay for your service. This, to most, should be worth the $36. Please remember that this is $36 a year, not a month. You get 365 days of ad free listening power for a small price to pay.

Longer Timeout Periods

If you are using Pandora right now, for free, then you are well aware that you are to interact with the service every handful of tracks before it will ask you if you are still listening. You can be ten minutes into your day and then the music stops. You wonder why, open the tab, and see a message from Pandora asking you if you are still listening. You hit yes, and carry on with your day only to have to do the same thing in another half an hour or so. It gets annoying fast with the free service. But, if you pay for your service, you will not have up to five hours of idle time before you are required to interact with Pandora. So, enjoy your time sitting back with ad free unlimited skips music. It truly will make your listening experience that much better.

These are only a few things that make Pandora One that much better than the free version of the service. If you listen to the radio at work, and you favorite the stations on Pandora, it might be time to seriously consider some investment into their subscription services. The experience will be better just from the features that you will be able to take advantage of. So pull out your credit card, follow the on screen directions to activating your account, and get to dancing as you are on your way to higher quality unlimited skipping ad free music.

I came across a show the other day that grabbed my attention. It comes from the man that almost ate himself to death in the film Super Size Me, Morgan Spurlock. The show is titled 30 Days and Morgan puts himself in situations for thirty days that he would normally not find himself in. He does the research, he plans the topic, and then is filmed for the thirty days breaking down how his mind and body react to the living this life style for an entire month. The show is quite good and it allows the audience a chance to see life on the inside.

The episode that stood out to me most was the season finale of the second season. Morgan put himself in jail for thirty days. His girlfriend, of course, did not take this too lightly, but she knew he had to go for the sake of his show and for the sake of what makes Morgan, Morgan. So he was picked up at home and for an entire month was treated like a criminal. He would eat with these guys; he would sleep with these guys, get time in the “yard” with these guys, and even shower and use the restroom right alongside convicts.

At first it was a little scary for Morgan. I mean, going from being able to do whatever you want whenever you want to now being thrown behind bars is a major life change. From the moment he walked into the prison he was told that he would be treated just like all the other inmates. He would get no special treatment, no extra protection, and would not be pulled out of any fights or altercations if he found himself in one. Morgan was on the inside all alone.

The episode was actually quite educational. There is not a lot that you can see in forty-five minutes that takes place over a month’s time, but I felt they did a good job breaking it down and showing the highlights. You learn a lot during that time, however, and get to see how smart prisoners really are. For instance, the bathrooms in these cells are literally just sitting out in the middle for everyone to see. So if you have to use the restroom you are going to be showing off for the rest of the guys around you. But these prisoners have developed a technique to show when they are in fact on the John. When someone goes to the restroom they throw a sheet up to cover the cell. Then the inmate will write and place a note on the outside of the cell to let guards and cell mates know they are using the restroom. It is clever and it works.

Part of the reason for this system, however, is due to the fact that jails are overcrowded. The cells are meant for two inmates, at most, and all of them are housing three at a time. A pair of convicts will get a bunk bed while the other gets a thin mattress and is forced to sleep on the floor. Now, the prison that Morgan visited was not maximum security, where I feel things might be a little different, but the inmates were only allowed very few hours of daylight a week. They were kept inside and not given very much freedom at all. But tensions do run high around any prisons.

So as Morgan goes along he decides to make things even worse for himself. Not only is allowed a handful of visitations while he is in the pen, he decides to put himself in solitary confinement for seventy-two hours. This, from the way he described it, has to be one of the worst forms of punishment that a prisoner can go through. I have always thought that this would be the easy way out. You get your own room, three meals a day served to you right there, time to shower and work out all by yourself, and no worries about getting into arguments or fights with the other inmates. But, when Morgan said that the prisoner is not allowed any books while inside of solitary confinement, I quickly changed my mind. You see, if I was in prison (for whatever reason) and I had nothing to do but wait, I would read. I would read magazines and books and try to learn as much as I could when I was on the inside. I would also begin taking college courses, as they are offered in most prisons, and try to get as far as I could in my personal education as possible. But, if while in “the hole” as they like to call it, you cannot read I would not want to be anywhere near that.

Morgan explains how being locked up by yourself, even for seventy-two hours, can do a lot to a man. He began talking to himself and was just acting silly trying to find ways to pass the time. The human body can only sleep for so many hours a day and you could tell that boredom set in very early with his time in that holding cell. But I have a feeling the whole situation would be an issue. Being in jail, having to follow someone’s rules about when you eat and sleep, and not being able to make phone calls whenever I wanted, having no Internet access, and not being able to watch TV that you want. I would simply go insane after a few hours, let alone a few years. Just try to imagine living a life like that, never mind the fear of being disliked, for years at a time. There are guys that get five, ten, twenty or more years in prison. Is that justice? That depends on their crime. But I am not sure how I would handle a situation like that.

The show, if even only for an hour, put you in a pair of shoes you might not have understood before. I now know what it is like to be a convict behind bars. I know what a prisoner goes through, what kind of food they eat, and what sort of activities they can take advantage of. All things said and done I do not want to be in jail. It looks to be a pretty lonely place. But if it was not for Morgan Spurlock and his show 30 Days I might never know what it truly was like behind bars. This is just one episode in his collection of now two seasons and if this one shows anything for the future of this show, I can see this lasting for a long time. So check out 30 Days if you want to live your life in someone else’s shoes; if only for an hour at a time.

Currently I am not blessed with the financial freedoms to be able to afford cable television.  I get all of my TV viewing from online sources such as Hulu.  However, not too long ago you could find me any time of the day sitting on my bed watching the Nickelodeon classic SpongeBob SquarePants.  The show is about a witty sponge, whose name is Bob, and his daily musings with guys like Patrick the Starfish and Squidward Tentacles.  Any number of episodes involves SpongeBob and his day job as a chef at the Krusty Krab.  He deals with anything from a micromanaging boss to an array of awkward and demanding customers.  But the little sponge loves his job and, from the feeling I get from the show, would not trade it for the world.

But SpongeBob has a lot of history.  He is not just the star of a midday kid’s show on Nickelodeon but he is a legend in his own right.  I wanted to take this opportunity to discuss some of his history as he is often mistaken as a simple cartoon character.  Just as Bugs Bunny is more than an animated form of entertainment, SpongeBob SquarePants is an instant classic in not only our youth but also in adults alike.

When looking at where Mr. Bob came from, you can thank the one and only Jacques Cousteau.  He is known as the man behind the invention of SpongeBob. Well, sort of. After finding inspiration in Cousteau films, SpongeBob creator Stephen Hillenburg went to earn a higher degree and earned one in a natural resource planning with an emphasis in marine resources. He taught marine biology at the Orange County Marine Institute for several years before pursuing his second love.  He had always had an interest in animation. You wouldn’t think that marine biology and animation necessarily go together, but Hillenburg married his two careers and came up with the squishy yellow guy that made him famous. Hillenburg knows the combination is a strange one as he is known for saying, “When you set out to do a show about a sponge, you don’t expect the kind of appeal that he’s had.”

Did you know that SpongeBob was originally called SpongeBoy?  Bizarrely, the name was already copyrighted.  Of course it was not copyrighted as a fiction cartoon character under the sea but as a mop. I think it’s safe to assume that SpongeBoy hasn’t reached the household name status that SpongeBob SquarePants has. Hillenburg wanted to make sure that the word “Sponge” was retained in Mr. SquarePants’ name so children wouldn’t mistake him for a large chunk of cheese living under the sea.  And from the looks of it I can see why some people would mistake him for a chunk of cheddar.

I might not be the biggest supporter of the leader in the White House, but he does enjoy some quality time with the Bob.  President Obama told TV Guide in 2007 that his favorite cartoon character is “SpongeBob SquarePants.”  He said this because SpongeBob is a show he watches with his daughters.  So regardless of whether his daughters are the actual fans of the hit TV show or he is truly an under the sea kind of guy, I must admit that I finally can agree with something that Obama has said.

Did you know that Mr. Bob lives in a pineapple?  In the theme song you can even hear them say, “Who lives in a pineapple under the sea?”  The answer is SpongeBob SquarePants.  So why does SpongeBob live in a pineapple? If you pay attention to the show, not only do nautical and sailing motifs come up on a regular basis, Polynesian references are often thrown into the mix as well (surely you’ve noticed Squidward’s Easter Island head home). Pineapples are used commonly in tropical decor, but the creator also imagines that SpongeBob would just like the way living in a pineapple would smell.  I truly enjoy a fresh pineapple from time to time and I can only imagine the scent that it would exude if I were to live in one.

There are other characters in the show that you should pay attention to.  SpongeBob’s neighbor, Squidward, is one of them.  He has a piss poor attitude about life and hates living next to Bob.  He is easily annoyed as well which does not help the fact that he also works with SpongeBob.  But if you’ve ever paid close attention, you have probably noticed that Squidward lacks the proper number of tentacles to be a squid or an octopus (the show has referred to him as both over the years so no one really know what he truly is supposed to be). The animators believed that giving Squidward more than six legs would just weigh him down too much visually, so they chose to go with inaccuracy over bad aesthetics. But that makes sense since SpongeBob is clearly a kitchen sponge, not a sea sponge. (Are you starting to see that I watch a little too much of this television show than I probably should?)

The last piece of SpongeBob trivia that I will leave you with is one that a lot of his fans are sold on.  There is a large population of followers out there that think SpongeBob is gay.  (Please ignore the fact that I drive a Smart car, that I enjoy wearing pink shirts and ties, and that I love techno music.) SpongeBob is not gay however much you keep telling yourself that. According to Entertainment Weekly, SpongeBob seems to have a loyal following in the gay community because of his “flamboyant and tolerant attitude.”  SpongeBob came under fire when two Christian activist groups singled him out for holding hands with his best friend, Patrick. Evangelist James Dobson claimed the video was a “pro-homosexual” video. “I always think of the characters as being somewhat asexual,” he said, adding, ”I do think that the attitude of the show is about tolerance. Everybody is different, and the show embraces that,” he says. ”No one is shut out.”

If you have not seen the show I highly encourage that you take a half an hour out of your day today and try to catch a rerun on Nickelodeon.  You will surely be able to find some time in your schedule once you see how funny this show is and how closely you can relate to it even though it is intended to be a show for children.  I watch it every chance I get, and I even have started thinking about collecting his memorabilia.  But with my Rickey Henderson, Tiger Woods, and beer cap collections, adding one more might be a little too much for me (and my girlfriend) to handle.  So get out there and catch some SquarePants the next chance you get.  I promise you will not be disappointed.

Hugh Jackman has been pretty busy over the last few months.  Just a few weeks ago the latest film from the X-Men series was released on DVD where Jackman plays the famed Marvel character Wolverine.  The film had some increased exposure before it was even released on DVD as it was leaked, in DVD quality nonetheless, to the general public and was downloaded over a million times before the film even hit theaters.  Skeptics say that it hurt ticket sales, but I would beg to differ.  Nothing compares to watching a film, especially one like this, in the theater.  The sound is better, the picture quality is better, and it provides a better experience overall.

Outside of the release of this film Jackman finds himself in another form of entertainment.  Daniel Craig and Hugh Jackman both star in the Broadway play titled, “A Steady Rain”.  During a recent preview of this performance Jackman stepped right out of character, stopping the play all together, to set a rude audience member straight.  During the middle of one of the scenes a cell phone rang causing Jackman to become upset enough to stop the acting and start the preaching.  Jackman was caught on camera, as the video can be seen online on various websites, and told the rude individual, “You want to get that?”  He then proceeds to tell the person, “Come on, just turn it off.”

Of course the producers of the play refused to comment on the actions of Jackman.  The interruption came at a time during the play where Jackman’s character, ironically a policeman, is seen remembering events of the past.  (I am not sure how a scene where someone is simply remembering thoughts from the past can be called intense, but then again I have not seen the play so I cannot comment.)

The funny thing about all of this is that after the interruption, and before the play started up again, a voice came over the loud speakers telling the audience members to turn off their cell phones.  This was too little too late in my opinion.  They did finish the rest of the play without any further interruptions.

I think that Jackman might have gone a little over the top on this one.  Sure, when you go to a play or a movie, or anything in public for that matter, it is just courteous to turn off your cell phone or put it on vibrate.  I personally always have my cell phone on vibrate.  I am not sure I have even heard the ringer on my phone; as it is always on vibrate.  And yes, I understand that people can forget to turn it off or to vibrate, but is it really worth stopping the play, therefore hurting the experience for everyone else (regardless of approval) to tell one person to shut off his or her phone?

I do get upset, for instance, when I go to the movies and someone is talking, or sending a text on their phone illuminating the entire theater.  But I do not make an effort to tell that individual to put it away.  He paid just as much to see the movie as I did so I have no jurisdiction over his actions.  However, in this case, Jackman is the star (or Daniel Craig if you are a fan of his work more than Jackman’s) and he has the say on what happens on his stage and in this case even off stage.  I imagine that if you were on the set of a movie filming the next action thriller blockbuster with any given actor and a cell phone went off you might get the same reaction from the director or actors on set.  Look at the tangent that Christian Bale recently had for someone just walking through the back of his set.

“A Steady Rain” is a dramatic play that is about the relationship between two policemen.  The play opens this week but only for a limited engagement through December. 6^th, 2009.  Jackman has some experience on Broadway as a matter of fact.  Jackman won a Tony Award in 2004 for his performance as Peter Allen in the musical “The Boy from Oz.” However, for Craig, having done nothing since the latest James Bond flick is making his Broadway debut.  I am curious to see how this goes for these two super-star on screen actors.  If I ever do make it out to see the play I will make sure that I need to keep my phone off, that’s for sure.

If you have not already seen the video you have probably heard about what Kanye West did last night during the acceptance speech of Taylor Swift’s video of the year award on the Video Music Awards presented by MTV.  Taylor Swift won the female video of the year and was as shocked as anyone at the decision.  In the video, which you can find all over YouTube (maybe) and various news websites (take your pick) you will see her surprised face as soon as they announce her name.  I am not sure why she is so surprised as she continues to climb the charts.  I do not understand that at all.  I am not a huge fan of female voices to begin with, but her voice just makes me want to cut myself when I hear it through the airwaves.  Granted, I am a hypocrite as I have all over her albums (can I still call them albums) but that does not mean I have to like her voice.  She does not write hardly any of her own lyrics and she is too young to be that good at playing the guitar.

Before you all hang me for saying I do not like Taylor Swift I would like for you to give me a list of at least three of her songs that you know all of the lyrics to.  Exactly, you can’t.  To protect myself from further hatred, and to retain some readers while doing it, I will give my respect for how she, or her management, has handled her sudden success.  Just because I do not like it does not mean it does not have potential and talent.  There I said it.  Now can we carry on?

So last night while Taylor was giving her fighting back tears acceptance speech as Kanye walks right up, says excuse me (how nice of him) and yanks the microphone right out of her hand.  He then goes on to talk about how Beyonce had a video of a lifetime and making claim that she should be the one holding that trophy, not Taylor.  He goes on to repeat himself a few times and then apologizes to Taylor, and hands her back the microphone.  He gives her permission to finish her speech.  She was not allowed to finish and was escorted off the stage.

On the surface, this appears to be a publicity stunt for Mr. Fish Sticks himself.  He just released a new album that got a lot of critics up in arms for the computerized overtones that saturate the album.  But at the same time he did not get a lot of feedback and it only sat on the charts for a few weeks; the top of the charts anyway.  And as much as folks try to debunk the fact that I thought it was a publicity stunt, no one will ever admit it even if it was.

First off, before I even talk about why I think this was a good thing for Kanye’s career, I want to talk about how funny this was.  The look on Taylor’s face when he grabbed that microphone was both shock and surprise and I am not sure she even realized what he is doing until it was all over.  She is young, very young actually, and could possibly pull the “I had no idea what was going on” card if she wants.  I am interested to see how her camp reacts to this.  Kanye’s people have already claimed he has officially apologized to her for making an ass of himself (I have heard him called so many names today it would make your head spin) on national television.

But that right there is why this was genius.  Sure, he got the chance to perform on the VMAs, but that was not enough.  Kanye is a man that craves attention and is one that will do just about anything to get it.  If he makes an ass of himself, sure, but he is all over national television doing so and you know people will be talking about it at the water cooler the next morning.  And that leads me to my next point.

I will again have doubters with this, some might even call it an attempt to get fifteen minutes of fame, but that is all he needs.  He does not need months or years of exposure because of this because he has already, within a few short hours of this even happening, become a trending topic on Twitter.  The video was taken (for the time being) down from YouTube due to what they call copyright infractions.  (That is a lot of crap if you ask me.  It was on MTV.  What copyright are you breaking in posting something that anyone and his or her brother can watch.  What is to say these folks did not tape it on their VCR and post it for everyone that missed it to see?)

Kanye not only grabbed the social media crowd with it being all over Twitter and Facebook (and my blog) but he also got national media coverage from folks like MSN, The New York Times, and CNN.  It is either a slow news day or his actions were worth talking about as it was, for the most of the day, the number one news story on CNN.  I am excited to see how guys like Letterman and Bill O’Reilly take this and turn it into a headline.

So needless to say, Kanye got some attention whether it was meant to be harmful or not.  But here is my case as to why I felt this was a smart thing to do.  (Could he have handled it differently?  Sure.  Could or should he have waited until she was finished speaking before he made his voice heard?  Sure.  But did he have a right to be upset?  Yes, absolutely he did.)

Kanye not only got some media coverage and some online content being generated about him but he also got his opinion across for being such a hard working man in show business.  Kanye is not just a singer but he is a performer.  He is an entertainer.  I highly doubt he has ever written a single line of lyrics or played an instrument outside of a microphone, but he knows how to sell tickets.  I had the chance of seeing him perform a few years ago, before he was considered “big” and was just a stage-by-stage rapper, and even when no one knew his name he was good.

He is a very talented individual.  He is so talented that you might even see an Eminem style coming from him next.  If he releases a comedy album next I would not be surprised at all.  He has done the hardcore rap scene, and it worked.  He then went to a more at home radio friendly rap, and it worked.  He then went to an electro-pop sound that has you dancing and wondering if that is actually Kanye or his laptop singing.  It worked.

To give Beyonce some credit, she had a great video up against Taylor Swift.  If you have to ask then stop reading and use this new little tool called Google to find out what video I am speaking of.  (You might even find Justin Timberlake trying to copy her sweet dance moves.)  The video, in most circles, was better.  But does that excuse Kanye?  No, of course not.  But I will stand by the fact that he was doing this as a publicity stunt and as a way to put a foot down for hard working musicians.  (Not saying that Taylor is not hard working.  But Beyonce has more than just a pretty face going for her.  Just saying.)

The last thing that you are going to hear about this is that people are going to say it was a racial thing.  Kanye is not a racist.  He might actually be the whitest black guy that I know.  I mean, I don’t know him personally, but if I did I would text him and give him a high five for his actions last night.  He would never put himself in the position to be called a racist and would never allow folks to look at him in that light.  Just listen to his lyrics and you will know he is not a racist.

So to all of the people out there that are mad at Kanye for what he has done, get over it.  There is nothing you being upset will change.  He has a voice, and the freedom of speech, to make his thought process known.  I will agree that he could have handled it differently.  But the point of this entire fifteen minutes of fame is that he is getting attention in both blogs and 140 character status updates.  So in the eyes of Kanye West he wins whether he is holding a moon man or not.