April 28, 2014

Ten Funny Tweets Derek Re-Tweeted Last Week: Better Late Than Never Edition

Ha! The connection is working again! Now I just have to get this done before it crashes again. And so...

Once again, it's time for me to share some of the hilarious posts on Twitter from some of the weirdest folks out there. (This is a compliment. Seriously.) As always, if you find them amusing, by all means, go follow them. And if you aren't on Twitter, GO JOIN! You will laugh until your ass falls off. That may sound inconvenient, but it's totally worth it.

At any rate, here we go. In no particular order...
And, as an added bonus, here's an educational tweet. You know...to pretend you learned something...
And there you have it! Hope you have a great week!

All the best,
Derek and Bosco

April 27, 2014

Curse You, Interwebs!

Hello, dear reader. How are you? Myself, I could be better.

You see, due to a wonky internet connection, I find myself unable to post this week's Ten Funny Tweets. I'm currently writing this on my phone, which is not at all optimal for blogging.

Frankly, I'm a bit upset about the whole thing, but there's not much I can do at the moment.

At any rate, I'll make it up to you next Sunday, unless I can find someplace with free Wi-Fi tonight, which is unlikely.

So, until next weekend (most likely), take care!

All the best,
Derek and Bosco

April 20, 2014

Ten Funny Tweets (And THAT'S ALL) Derek Re-Tweeted Last Week (Late Evening Edition)

Okay, okay...I know I usually post these lists earlier in the day, but, as today is Easter, I decided to give myself a little leeway so I could gorge myself and perhaps pass out in a food coma. I'm pleased to announce that this is exactly what happened, so, er, Victory, I guess!

Anyway, it was another hilarious week on Twitter, but I've decided to scale back to the original limit of ten posts, because frankly, it's been getting out of hand. And, as silly as this may sound, I feel like adding more and more each week diminishes the list. (Because you just know all those funny Twitter folk are just living for the prestige of ending up on a list that is read by the dozen or so of you that actually take the time.)

And so, in no particular order...


Judge me all you want, but I think John Moe (@johnmoe), the host of Wits on Minnesota Public Radio, is one of the funniest human beings on Earth. And one of the funniest bits they do on the show is The Mad Men Show Sketch. This is why:







And finally, here's Tim Bartlett (@wbllostsoul), a truly funny human being who doesn't get nearly enough attention on Twitter.
There you have it! And, as always, if you're not on Twitter, join and find even more funny!

Stay tuned, as I will be posting a new Couchcast in the next few days!

All the best,
Derek and Bosco

April 16, 2014

Oh, Canada...

I like Canada. It's a country that has a lot of great things to offer, such as hockey, William Shatner, free health care, the Kids in the Hall and poutine. (And if you haven't tried poutine, you should probably take a good hard look at the life decisions that have led you to miss out on such a wonderful concoction.)

If this doesn't make your mouth water and your arteries scream in terror,
you are no son of mine.
I'm sure there's other great stuff there, but really, once you have a plate of poutine put in front of you, you enter a state of contentedness that, if a group of Canadians politely burst through your door and set you on fire, taking a moment to apologize for the inconvenience, you would still think they were pretty decent folks who sometimes talk a little funny.

I also like music. You see, I'm a musician. Liking music sort of comes with the territory. And living as close as I do to the U.S.-Canada border, I hear a lot of music from Canadian bands on the radio stations in Sarnia. In particular, I like to listen to K106.3, which plays a variety of rock music, including numerous Canadian acts, such as Big Sugar, the Tea Party and 54-40.


That's right, it wasn't Hootie. Or the accursed Blowfish. It was a Canadian dude named Neil Osborne. A few other songs from that band you might know are Baby Ran and One Gun. If they don't sound familiar, look them up. I'd be willing to bet you recognize at least one of them.

Anyway, being an outside observer, I've noticed some consistency in the ratio of good to not-so-good bands and musicians coming out of Canada, and although I'm not familiar with every band the Great White North has spawned, I know enough to see that, for every really good Canadian band/musician, there is an equal but opposite terrible band/musician. Allow me to offer a few examples.

(Author's Note: I realize some of you out there might disagree with me about whether this band is good or that band is bad, I should point out that I am a musician, so I know a thing or two about music. Also, it's my blog. If you disagree, feel free to comment, or, better still, go start your own blog and dedicate it to pointing out all the things on the internet that you disagree with. People actually get paid to do that, so you never know.)

Let's go old school first.

The Good: Bachman-Turner Overdrive

Everyone knows Bachman-Turner Overdrive, or BTO, as their fans call them. If the name isn't familiar, they will definitely recognize this song, "Takin' Care of Business", which I think is federally mandated to be used in every single movie ever that requires the characters to clean up an old building or construct something in order to raise money for, I don't know, a children's orphanage or some damn thing:


Catchy, isn't it? You may also recognize the song "You Ain't Seen Nothing Yet". I'm not linking it here, though, because, frankly, I don't need another brain worm today, now that I have that one stuck in my head. So...

The Bad: The Guess Who

Before finding the hook that would launch a thousand montages, Randy Bachman was a member of another band that felt the need to tell the listening public that women from the U.S. are, in fact, stalker-y skanks.


Now, I'm sure that they weren't saying all American women are dangerous psychopaths. For all I know, they weren't even trying to expose the mental illness of even one woman. It was probably some sort of veiled reference to the Vietnam war or some silly thing like that. (Hence, the line "I don't need your war machines.")

But when I listen to the lyrics, all I can picture in my head is a terrified Randy Bachman hiding behind his sofa and weeping while his doorbell rings over and over again and a drunk woman with running mascara and too much eye shadow pounds on his heavily barricaded front door, screaming, "RAAAAAANDY!!! LET ME IN, HONEY!!! I'LL MAKE YOU SOME POPCORN SHRIMP!!!"

Terrifying. Maybe they made a good point. I'll have to think about that one for a bit. I'll get back to you on it.

Moving along...

The Good: Barenaked Ladies

I want to say right up front that I love this band. They have such a wide variety of styles that they play, from rock to folk to country to straight ahead pop, it's hard to pick a favorite. I can't think of a single song of theirs that I wouldn't enjoy hearing at any given time. Go ahead. Pick a song. I'll listen to it until I'm blue in the ears.

See? They're fun!
The band currently consists of Ed Robertson (guitar and vocals), Kevin Hearn (keyboards, guitar, accordian, vocals and catering, I think), Jim Creegan (bass and vocals) and Tyler Stewart (drums, percussion and vocals). Up until 2009, Steven Page was the band's lead singer, but he left to pursue other avenues, releasing an album called Page One and starring in a television show called The Illegal Eater. You may recognize these guys from their first major single here in the U.S., "The Old Apartment", or, more likely, from this song:


See? Like BTO, these guys know how to jam a hook in your brain and make it stick. Just by searching YouTube, I got the fast "Chickety-China, the Chinese Chicken" bit running through my head and I had to sing it out loud, much to the apparent concern of Bosco, who I'm sure believes I've lost my mind. The same thing happens when I watch The Big Bang Theory, for which they wrote the theme.

Dammit. Now I have to sing that song...Back in a second...

The Bad: Justin Bieber

It seems a little too easy to pick on Bieber, especially considering his recent forays into felonious territory, but he is just terrible. Really, really terrible.

I think that's him on the left. Seriously, fuck that guy.
I was going to try to find a video of one of his songs to link here, but that would have meant I would have to at least listen to a tiny portion of it, and since I've heard roughly one whole minute of one of his songs, I figured that was enough and decided to link to a song from Kevin Smith and Ralph Garman's Hollywood Babble-On podcast, which is infinitely more entertaining and rewarding.


I don't know about you, but that pretty much sums it all up for me.

The Good: Rush

This one may be a little tough for me to write. You see, I'm not a huge fan of Rush. I mean, I get the music, and I know that, for the most part, they are an incredibly talented band. Alex Lifeson is a creative and interesting guitarist, and Neil Peart is quite possibly one of the greatest drummers that ever lived. It should also be pointed out that Peart writes most, if not all, of the lyrics for the band, so there's that.

No, the one that I have a problem with is Geddy Lee. First, there's his bass. It's just too loud and twangy for my taste. It overrides the other instruments. Dial it back, Geddy. You're the front man. There's no reason to dominate all the music, too.

He also has a soul patch. The guy is, like, 70, and he has a soul patch.
My next problem with Mr. Lee is his voice. I just don't like the way he sounds. Sure, he has a unique voice, but it's also incredibly annoying. It's like having a cheese grater rubbed against my ears.

That said, they're still a solid and talented band. And there's a reason why John Moe, the host of Wits, calls them "everybody's older brother's favorite band." That reason is the musicianship, which is demonstrated here, on an instrumental piece called "YYZ":


Incidentally, the opening notes are Morse Code for the title of the song.

One other neat thing I recently discovered about the band is this: Geddy Lee no longer uses amplifiers. He plugs his bass directly into the soundboard (presumably to make it easier to override everyone else onstage), and now uses what would normally be the area where his amps go as a place to put unusual gimmicks, like washing machines filled with t-shirts, which he throws to the crowd throughout the show. Fun!

The Bad: Kim Mitchell

This could have been an easy spot to take a shot at the band everybody loves to hate, Nickelback. However, as I've already picked one easy target for this post, I've decided to go with the deep cut that is Canadian rock guitarist Kim Mitchell.

Pictured: Nickelback. NOT Kim Mitchell.
They just look so punchable...Almost too punchable.
I get it, Canada. Kim Mitchell is quite a talented guitarist. But I just don't understand how he managed to gain the popularity he has, considering the laughably cliched songs he writes, such as "Go For A Soda":


If you don't think those lyrics are corny enough, look up "Rock And Roll Duty". Like "Go For A Soda", it has great guitar riffs, but is instantly ruined the moment the singer (Mitchell himself, I believe) opens his mouth and begins spewing lyrics like the following:

My Rock 'N Roll heartaches end up in song
Sometimes i get it right sometimes I'm wrong
And my love of Rock N Roll makes me a one-night-stand
Sometimes I'm enriched sometimes I'm tanned
I'm just doing my Rock N Roll duty

It gets worse from there. These lyrics remind me of the German band Autograph, a band that hit it big with "Turn Up The Radio", a song so filled with rock and roll cliches that it should have been issued with leather pants and a bandanna to hang around your neck when you listened to it.

The one thing that even remotely redeems Mitchell is that he really is a talented guitarist. I also recently discovered that he contributed a guitar solo for the song "Wind Me Up" by Barenaked Ladies. But that doesn't excuse the lyrics. That's all I'm saying.

Kim Mitchell (right) may look like Moby and Peter Frampton's love child,
but at least he doesn't have a goddamn soul patch. Suck it, Geddy.
There are plenty of other examples I could offer, both good (Alanis Morrisette, Bruce Cockburn, any of the Wainwright family) and bad (Sebastion Bach, Celine Dion, Gino Vannelli), not to mention some just plain "What the hell?":


Therefore, I encourage you to seek out some of the interesting and unusual musical fare that Canada has to offer. There's plenty of it out there.

And, again, try poutine. You'll thank me, right after your triple bypass surgery.

All the best,
Derek and Bosco

April 13, 2014

Extra Super-Duper Bonus Tweet

Okay...I know I just posted a bunch of tweets, but I saw this one a few minutes ago, and I had to share it, especially for you musicians out there.

That response is absolute genius!

All the best,
Derek and Bosco

Twenty...Ah, Hell...A BUNCH Of Funny Tweets Derek Re-Tweeted Last Week

Hey, kids! It's time for another steaming pile of the funniest tweets I've seen on Twitter in the last week! As I write this, I have no idea how many I'll be throwing at you, but I have promised myself that the cap is going to be twenty. Not a single tweet more.

Unless I find one that really makes me laugh. Or two. Three, at most. Okay, five. But no more than six.

Anyway, as always, if you dig the funny, follow these fine folks. And if you're not on Twitter, you should know that I'm quietly judging you. So is Bosco.

And now, in no particular order...

And finally...

And there you have it! Bosco and I hope you have an awesome week!
All the best, Derek and Bosco

April 6, 2014

Ten Fifteen Twenty Funny Tweets Derek Re-Tweeted Last Week

It's that time again, kids!

Once more, It is my pleasure to show you just what kind of awesomely funny stuff you are missing out on by not being a part of Twitter. Go there. Join. Follow these funny people. (And, you know, I myself am not against the idea of accepting sympathy followers to help stroke my ego.)

As you can see, I've had to expand it again because they just keep putting more and more of the funny out there. It's totally worth it.

Before I start, though, I want to apologize to those of you who have been stopping by, looking for new content, only to find that I have, once again, failed to write anything funny this week. I suck. I have been trying to come up with something to amuse you, but, alas, I keep coming up blank. Sorry about that.

But that's just another reason why I like doing these particular posts: Funnier people than me do all the work, and I reap the rewards! And so, without further ado, here it is!

In no particular order...
And on that note, have yourselves an AWESOME week! And stay tuned. I've got TWO new podcasts coming very, very soon!

All the best,
Derek and Bosco