Nerd News in Brief

In one of our daily bullshit sessions – our regularly scheduled bullshittery, if you will – Matt directed Church and me to this article.

For those too lazy to click, let me break it down: superheroes are among us.

Oh yeah.

Real. Life. Superheroes.

Now most of these cats aren’t packing the X-gene and I don’t imagine many of them have been bitten by a radioactive gopher or anything. By and large they seem to be training-/gadget-based heroes. Cut-rate Bruce Waynes.

But the important part is that they do good; not by brutalizing mugger (usually) but by volunteering their time and focusing on their civic duties. Sure the costumes may be a bit of a stretch, but I like to think of this as nerdy activism in its purist form.

• Cute and evil: Today’s edition of Geek Ink is brought to you by Matt, and it features Hello Kitty. And also Star Wars. At the same time!
• The Lasso of Truth: Do you have a problem that you just can’t solve on your own? Do you feel lost and in desperate need of some advice from a caring and responsible paragon of virtue. Then do what Church does; Ask Golden Age Wonder Woman!
• Technically that’s 12 eyes: This Sunday, January 20th, Cali geek garage rockers The Four Eyes will be playing at Thrillhouse Records Basement in San Francisco with Underground Railroad to Candy Land, Can of Beans, and The Blood Muffins. The show starts at 7:00 PM (and ends at or before 10:00PM), and the boys will be playing “second to last.” Show up and give ‘em some love.
• BBW BBQ: D-Form, the current King of the Crate Diggers, is offering remix kits from his group The Chubby Chasers’ 2007 release Mass Appeal. D says the Chasers would love to hear anyone who’s interested take a spin, and that if enough producers respond they might “make it a free mixtape style download from our site and everyone will get some love from that.” As nerds and plus-size ladies have a shared history, I’d love to see this project take off. So, get to mixin'.
• Even gayer: Also on the remix tip, my boy nYgel just dropped his remix of The Grammar Club’s “My Gayest Shirt.” In addition to all the nerdy goodness already inherent in the track, nYg also added a special verse by the Former Fat Boys. Dig it!
• Not a cover: Nerdcore MC Able-X has released a teaser track from his forthcoming album. It is funky. Quite funky. You should listen to it.
• Brat on the beat: Matt directed me to this amazing online reproduction of the original Roland TR-909. Yes, it’s fully functional. The machine that launched a thousand geeky techno artists is alive and well. And now it lives on the Internets.
• Not just trivia – International trivia!: Hearty congratulations go out to Harry and the Potters for what has to be Wrock’s oddest honor; they were just informed that the band is the answer to a question in the Swedish version of Trivial Pursuit. And with that, the nerd cred scale has been crushed to a fine powder.
• Feed the tree: In other Wrocking news, The Whomping Willows has posted a song-by-song breakdown of his new album. Take a gander and get a real artist’s-eye view of the project. Thanks to my bro Matt for pointing me toward this one!
• The gift that keeps on giving the whole year: Matt also hipped me to new info concerning this year’s installment of the Wizard Rock EP of the Month Club. Apparently the response was so great last year (the club generated $13,000 for the charity First Book through sales of these EPs) that the project is going to continue in 2008. If sixty bones for a dozen EPs sounds like a deal to you – and it definitely should – check out subscription information here.
• Too weird not to be true: An all-geek dating site? Yep, it exists. And Church found it. Sweet On Geeks is the place “where Gray Matters,” and, while it doesn’t do old domesticated bastards like us any good, you might be able to find the nerd of your dreams. Check it out, and let me know if it works.
• Future shock: Apparently, at this year’s MAGfest, future Glenn Case came back in time to prevent present-day Glenn and Shael from performing a substandard version of The Grammar Club’s “Bank Holiday.” I know that sounds a little suspect, but why would Glenn lie? I mean, somebody had to pull that fire alarm. For more on these sinister dealings, as well as a look at all of the many delightful occurrences at MAGfest VI, peep the following vid from the fine folks at PBC Productions.