Prick Tunes: Levon Helm "A Train Robbery"

Continuing on through Levon Helm Tribute Week, today we've got Levon Helm and band playing "A Train Robbery" from an April 11, 2009 appearance on Late Night with Conan O'Brien. "A Train Robbery" can be found on his album Electric Dirt.

Tube Steak: Conan on Cage

Just for those who are concerned, I do have a bunch of entries in the works right now. I've fallen a bit behind, as tends to happen this time of year, as I invariably spend my writing time on pre-season fantasy baseball content for Sports Grumblings. I assure you entries are on the way. Specifically, a post on The Mechanic that is partially completed, along with some Reading Rainbow entries and a few more Man on Films. But on to the show...

I'd like to thank blog regular, Big Hatt (the writer over at The Stoney Film Critic), for bringing this to my attention:

I've spent a lot of time writing about Nicolas Cage here. It is well-established how I feel about the man. Check the Nicolas Cage tag if you need to.

That being said, it feels like the Nic Cage Threat Level that Conan did was a little off the mark.

For the lowest level of threat, I'm all right with Con Air. Many people have asserted that it is the best film of the 1990s. While there are certainly other Cage vehicles to turn to, I can abide by Con Air for the purposes of the sketch.

If only the first one was just about Johnny Blaze...

When they move to the second level is where they lose me. Honeymoon in Vegas? Really? Something is slightly amiss, and they elect to go for this. It's not particularly memorable. Really, its placement here just isn't that funny.

The biggest misstep though is the third level: Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans. For starters, this was probably the best movie to come out that year. It may be the best Nic Cage movie ever, and that is saying something.

Step Four is Face/Off. I guess. I'm not going to take the time to argue this one.

The final step, predictably, is the Neil LaBute directed Wicker Man remake that is sitting on my Blu-ray shelf right next to The Thin Red Line: The Criterion Collection. The bees scene is great, to be sure. You know what's crazier, though, when he's running around in the bear suit attacking all those women.

Now there are all kinds of ways this could be improved. You could reverse the scale so all is well for Wicker Man and then insinuate that Leaving Las Vegas or Adaptation is the bad threat level. Also, no love for The Vampire's Kiss? His freakouts in that absolutely make this clip:

There is just so much here that at the very least makes for a funnier sketch.

Let me make it clear, though. I do not advocate making fun of Nicolas Cage at all. My fandom is in earnest.

Drive Angry is coming soon (trailer embedded again for your viewing pleasure)...

Diversions: A Note from Your Prick

All right. I really did not want to have to do this. I'm not a big fan of having to do this as a commenter on other sites, but as a result of the often R-rated nature of this blog, I have had to change the comments sections a bit.

Where before there was no need for word verification to post a comment, now there is. I was simply getting too many spam comments. I wish this weren't the case, but when you are one of the top Google results for searches for "Soapy Cock Shots"* and you've got "Prick" in the name of the blog and you liberally toss around the word "fuck" and you have multiple posts tagged with the descriptor "Defecation Sweeping the Nation" and, well, you write a lot of things that end up getting hits that normal well-adjusted bloggers simply do not have to deal with.

*At the time of this post's writing, this blog was the fifth result on Google when a search for "soapy cock shots" was done. I'm sure this post changed that, for better or worse. At the very least, you soapy cock shot purveryors must surely be disappointed. My apologies, fans of lathered up dicks. I can surely point you in the direction of a certain Steve Guttenberg star-vehicle called Can't Stop the Music that will absolutely sate your appetite.


So, my apologies. I assure you that I want you to comment. I really wish you would comment more here. I know more of you read this blog than comment on it. I certainly do not think myself so interesting as to warrant your input/feedback/related story on every post I write, but please, readership, comment.

Now this post has been little more than an explanation for a minor blog change, and for that I am sorry. To make amends, I would like to provide you with a bit of a treat in the way of a video.

And this:

And in three parts, the first time the word "condom" was used on network television:



You are welcome.