I missed this episode of Ze Frank the first time through but caught it on his current “Best Of” series.

It struck a chord. Your mileage may vary.

One of my friends travels back and forth from coast to coast fairly regularly. He noticed some graffiti on both coasts stating “6op1libra.com” and brought it to my attention.

Well, it appears that we have an Alternate Reality Game afoot that no one is talking about. When I first caught it it was at about 250 or so hits, today it’s at 950. So far we have plenty of Bible references (Doubting Thomas adorns the front page currently), a link to some genome information, a Lewis Carroll reference, and a lot of mysterious blustering (”You are not expected to find it”).

Anyone know who’s behind this? Doesn’t appear to be Halo. Lost maybe? Or something completely different?

Ay. I caught the Tigers game from yesterday (June 14) on “Squeeze Play” - shown at night, Fox Sports Detroit cuts the game down to all the outs, hits, and big plays.

Craig Monroe struck out five times. I don’t know how much they talked about it on the live broadcast, but that’s a pretty amazing feat - it’s happened less than 50 times in MLB history.

… did Tim Allen just mispronounce “Ypsi” on my TV? On a “Michigan Tourism” promo? It appears that
he did.

“Ypsi,” short for Ypsilanti, is pronounced “Ip-see.” Allen, in full “I am a Michigander” glory completely butchers it as “Yip-see.”

True that Ypsi isn’t exactly a tourist spot, but that’s a pretty dismal blunder.

Earlier this season the Tigers were in first place by like a billion games. My wife  got a reeeeeaal bad feeling around when Polanco got hurt.

“They’re not going to make it. It’s going to be the Twins and the Sox in the playoffs,” she said.

Now, to put this in a little perspective, we had just lived in Denver for six years. And we adopted the Rockies for a few seasons when watching Tigers games was tough. We paid to get Michigan football on tv when we had to, and we even paid to watch the Lions with NFL Sunday Ticket, but I couldn’t justify paying to get the MLB package.

Anyhow, as I’m sure you all know, the Rockies suck ass. But baseball is fun to watch, and we had a lot of opportunities to see them in person. So, we watched them suck.

Enduring 6 seasons of Rockies baseball has darkened my wife’s sports fan optimism.

Her prophecy came close to coming true. Too close.

So now, with the Tigers one game away from the AL title … everyone seems to think the Tigers have already won. They only need to win one out of four games. SI’s Tom Verducci even has the nerve to call this postseason boring as the Tigers “can do no wrong.”
The Tigers would never drop four in a row when it matters … would they?

Oh crap.

They rocked my face off.

The Intersection is tiny. Makes the Fillmore Denver look massive. Not exactly delicate acoustics … it was a loud, rocking, wall-of-sound affair. Umphrey’s didn’t hold back.

The show was awesome. They filled that space with loud, fast jams. I don’t think I’ve been at a louder concert in my life. Maybe it was because the venue is so small I was closer to the massive speakers.

They rocked it out. Full show review later.

They posted the setlist on their official site at the end of the show. It was up when I got home (20 minute drive). That’s pretty damn cool.

Cool cover of the night: Smashing Pumpkins’s “Cherub Rock.”

After the Detroit Tigers choked AGAIN last night … they proceeded to announce that DH Dmitri Young has been unconditionally released.

GM Dave Dombrowski told the press that the release was “strictly performance related,” a fishy quote to be sure.

By his own admission, Dmitri Young has been battling drug and alcohol problems this season. He also plead no contest to a domestic violence charge this summer.

After a stint in rehab, the switch-hitting Young came back to the Tigers and provided a little power from the left side, something that was sorely needed. Everything seemed fine … and then WHAM … he’s cut.

Something must have happened. The Tigers could certainly use at least the THREAT of a monster lefty home run threat here in the stretch. What starter gets cut in September from a team in the pennant race? From what we know, it makes no sense.

Something’s being kept from the public. To me, it sure sounds like there was evidence that he’s been using again. If that’s true, I hope he gets help and gets his life in order. He’s a well liked player among players and fans alike. It’s a sad day in Detroit.

Thanks for everything Dmitri, good luck.

Umphrey’s McGee is playing Intersection in Grand Rapids tomorrow. It’s my first chance to see them live and I’m psyched.

I first discovered Umphrey’s when I heard “In the Kitchen” on the very first nugs.net nugscast from 03-03-2005. The track was from Bonnaroo 2004 and I liked it so much I sought out and found the entire show, which is now legendary. You can still download that nugscast here.

Umphrey’s McGee has a great website where you can download podcasts that feature some live tracks from their shows. They only leave up the last five podcasts so I strongly suggest you hurry to Umphrey’s McGee’s site and grab the last five.

The Umphrey’s tune I absolutely cannot get out of my head is from their podcast #25. It’s the “Jimmy Stewart” that starts at 4:16.

It’s even more impressive when you know what a “Jimmy Stewart” is … it’s what they call their improvisational songs (for reason’s I’ll go into in a later post). That song was improvised on stage. Unreal.

They’re fantastic talents and I’ll give my impressions after the show.

Also looks like a local band that I”ve never heard of … “Covert Operations” … will be opening. I’ll check them out as well.

Today’s RocketBoom introduced me to a new site: American Microphone.

This is the first in a series of my “Recommended Viewing” picks.

The site features interviews by Robert Millis. RocketBoom recognized that this is really good stuff. So much so, RocketBoom sampled heavily from American Microphone’s first interview with 1st Lt. Paul Rieckhoff, founder of Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America.

If you want the Cliff’s Notes version of the interview, check out the RocketBoom video. It does a fine job. But I wanted to point out the brilliant work by Robert Millis. American Microphone simply does everything right. This goes beyond politics … the site design is fantastic. I can tell that a lot of thought was given to presentation. And I like it.

Just moved back to Grand Rapids, Michigan. I grew up here. It was a pretty quiet city when I left, but that was quite a while ago. Surely times have changed … ? Maybe I’ll catch some live music downtown this weekend. A quick look on Citysearch should show me where to go:

Hm. Looks like I could be in for a long summer.

Can anyone help? Where do you go for live music in G.R.?