mondojohnson

I have learned via gawker.com and TMZ that Axl Rose remains a touchy überpriss all these years after Appetite for Destruction rocked our worlds.

At a recent Guns ‘n Roses show in Canada, Axl (or his people) instructed security personnel to forbid audience members from wearing Slash-related gear. Fans were told to remove offending baseball caps, and to turn their Slash t-shirts inside out. TMZ reported that a few conscientious metalheads called “bullshit” and went home.

The witty folks at gawker.com managed to sum up my feelings exactly:

I don’t know, but Slash was an essential component of Axl Rose, and until they reunite, nobody’s going to give a shit about Guns N’ Roses, and Slash is already doing quite fine on his own, so Axl Rose: suck an egg. TEAM SLASH. Related: Paradise City is still the best song EVAH. Eveh? EVAH!

Related to Gawker’s “Related” item: In my salad days, on the brink of rock stardom, I was privileged to hang out backstage at the Giants Stadium concert at which much of the Paradise City video was filmed. GNR were just exploding — they were the opener at an amazing triple bill with Deep Purple and Aerosmith. I witnessed one of Axl’s legendary hissy fits first-hand; the newbie rockstar had to be whisked away like a Chinese emperor.

Me in my salad days.

Slash, on the other hand, hung around like a regular earthling. He chilled out next to me on a side-stage scaffolding to watch Deep Purple, still dripping with sweat from the GNR set. He was focused intently on the music, and he never once pulled any rockstar attitude. He was more interested in rocking out to a great band than in basking in the considerable ass-kissery that was swirling around. He treated me like just another musician.

TEAM SLASH, indeed. I’ve made it my slogan for the website this week.

Related articles by Zemanta

• Slash turned down millions to reunite with Guns N’ Roses (guardian.co.uk)
• Let’s Make Fun of Axl Rose Some More (metalsucks.net)

As if Friday’s Victor-rific episode of Dollhouse wasn’t hot enough, we learned in the second episode’s credits that Enver Gjokaj has a twin brother, who played Victor’s doppelganger in a brief nightmare sequence. Victor is brutally battling himself — at first I thought it had been done with very meticulous CGI, but the credits revealed that one Demir Gjokaj played opposite Enver.

I did a bit of research and learned that the other Gjokaj brother is a real estate analyst, and seems to have some righteous politics. I wonder if he’s as talented as his bro in the acting department?

In any case, it warms my heart that nature saw fit to make two copies of that handsome strand of DNA. The world has become hotter by 100%.

[Watch the Dollhouse episode "Attic" on Hulu]

It seems entirely plausible to me that whoever decided to stop Shah Rukh Khan for interrogation just wanted to strip search him.

One of my all-time favorite science and math writers, Simon Singh, was handed an unbelievably idiotic ruling in a libel case in the UK. The case was brought over Singh’s use of the term “bogus” in a piece about chiropractic, the idiotic pseudoscience of back-cracking as a cure-all. “Bogus”, a term favored by my weed-smokin’ cohort in high school — later popularized by Bill & Ted — seems to me a rather tame epithet to throw at chiroquackery. But the back-crackers themselves, and apparently the judge, felt otherwise.

According to Jack of Kent’s Blog, Singh is pondering whether or not to appeal, and will announce his decision Monday, May 18th at 6:30pm GMT, at “the Penderels Oak, the usual meeting place of London Skeptics in the Pub.” He will be joined by other speakers and supporters.

Wish I could be there. Readers of this site know that I’m a fan of both Singh and freethinking… I will watch from this side of the Atlantic with great interest!

Dollhouse always had a tough road to hoe, as it occupied the time slot directly adjacent to the brilliant Terminator: the Sarah Connor Chronicles. TSCG not only advanced the “Terminator” mythology into compelling new territory — it also decisively severed its association with sad old Governor Schwarzenegger. The complexity and intelligence of the writing set the bar extremely high for whatever show would follow… such was the task set for Dollhouse.

For those who don’t know: Dollhouse is based on the urban legend that there is an elite brothel that houses stunning young men and women, all of whom have been “wiped” clean of identity and memories, so that they function something like blank discs (“dolls”). Various personas can be uploaded into the dolls, so that the client can have highly customized fantasies. The dolls are not just for sexual pleasure: they can be programmed with esoteric knowledge and physical skills as well, so occasionally a client will hire one to be a stealth ninja backup singer for Beyonce, etc. A highly potent premise, eh?

Tonight’s episode has made me an official fan. It reached deeper into the implications of the technology, philosophically and scientifically (and sexually, but it had that right from episode one). The client, in this story, was a wealthy middle-aged heiress who regularly made total brain scans of herself — so that if she were murdered, she could be “revived” through a doll and finger her killer. The writers ran with it: watching one’s own funeral, the religious ideas raised, and of course the Oedipal wrecks (thanks Woody Allen).

These are the things we have to consider as we get closer to a mechanistic theory of consciousness, and as machines get smarter. “Downloading” one’s mental state seems more and more plausible as science advances (TSCC touches on this to great effect as well)… the questions raised in the Dollhouse are real. They’re just posed in a fantastic, over-the-top setting (which makes for top-notch sci-fi in my book).

P.S. — The show is filled with doll-worthy beauties, I must say. Top of my list is Enver Gjokaj, who is not only überhot but also very talented, jumping from persona to persona quite convincingly.