Last weekend, the five knifes (Sharp Like Knives) packed themselves into a rented minivan and headed off to Sydney Cape Breton for the annual ECUA NoCases, counterpart event to the ECMA Showcases. It was our first NoCase show, and our first time playing in Sydney, the birthplace of two out of five knifes. (Adam and Mark are certified Capers, so it was especially exciting to play there.)

The weekend overall was awesome. The all-ages show that we played was intense. On the second floor of a tiny Gaelic Cultural Center, we played really really loud, and the kids there went nuts dancing. This Editor is not exaggerating when I say that there were moments when I genuinely feared that the floor could not possibly support us, it was shaking that much! And our last-minute bar show at the Maple Leaf was really fun. You can check out a bunch of pictures from the weekend over at the Photoblog.

Special thanks to Nancy and her family for putting me and many others up for the nights, and to Mariah and Rosa for the spur-of-the-moment five hour drive home at 3:30am. No thanks to my body for requiring more than two hours sleep to function properly. Greedy sleep-loving body.

Optimuscrime likes music. We love it. We like to share our music, with each other, and occasionally with our readers. We also, like so many other pretentious nerds, appreciate a good musical debate. Lukas and I in particular have been developing a strong and firey repartee over the course of our friendship, now in its tenth year.

We'll argue over just about anything. Popsicles - fused or seperated? Peanut butter on bagels - open or closed-faced? White jeans - yes or no? And of course, music comes up more than occasionally. This brings us to the current fiasco. A single track, emailed from one Optimuscrime editor to another, (and may I say that I originally thought it had been sent as a joke.. that's how bad this song is.) unwittingly resulted in a torrent of emails back and forth.

The track in question can be obtained for scrutiny here.

The emails:

From Me:
dude,
that song is a fucking monstrocity!
the makers should be shot.
thanks for sending.
love paul.

From Luke:
If by monstrocity you mean rockstravaganza, you're entirely right.
Don't front, you know its awesome.

From Me:
if by rockstravaganza, you mean a musical travesty, then i'm with you.
you shock me. i'm shocked.

From Lukas:
If by musical travesty you mean genre-eclipsing masterwork, I agree entirely.

From Me:
if by genre-eclipsing masterwork, you mean audial crucifixtion, then i
think we're on the same page.
good buddy

From Lukas:
Sure, sure. I totally agree. If what you meant by 'audial crucifixtion' was 'apocalypse of sheer awesomeness'.
Luke
Ps this is boring

From Me:
right. right.
now, when you say 'apocalypse of sheer awesomeness', i can only assume
that you mean a 'calculated and unholy musical infanticide'
P-Dizzle.
PS: This is the most exciting thing I've done all day.

From Lukas:
Did you say 'calculated and unholy musical infanticide'? Gosh, because I heard 'the second coming of christ distilled into a lil jon song'.
Luke
Ps I feel sorry for you, homie

--------------

Readers: I urge you to weigh in. Musical travesty, or genre-eclipsing masterwork? And before you answer, let me impress upon you one crucial thought:

You DO NOT FUCK WITH THE CURE!!! Got it?

"This is Paul from Team Willow."

Optimuscrime Toronto would have you believe that Elliot, Team Willow's loveable little furball has lost his touch. They'd like you to believe that he no longer is in control of his own body, that his cuteness has somehow been... decreased. They couldn't be more wrong. Yes, the little guy made a mistake. A sizeable mistake. But are we going to hold that against him for the rest of his life? Are we going to allow one small slipup to cloud our minds, and close our eyes to the bottomless bag of cuteness that is Elliot J. Willow? Hardly.

If Toronto wants a cute on cute battle, then Toronto better be fucking ready. They've got a kitten in a sink. That's great. It's cute, it's fresh, it's current. I like it a lot. But does it beat kitten in a frying pan? [see above] I highly doubt it. Before Toronto goes shooting off about Elliot not having what it takes, they may like to take a look at a few important facts:

A. In the stripey tail department, Elliot seems to have the upperhand.
B. We're not saying Dora's not cute, but where's her red bandana?
C. Sink vs. Frying Pan. It's an age-old question, with an age-old answer: Frying Pan.
D. Facial Hair. Readers may want to take a close look at Elliot's chin. Beard? Check.

Curmudgeonly? We beg to differ! Fact is, the little guy's never been cuter! Fact is, if anything, he's on a skytrain to Cute fucking Headquarters for the annual Cute Summit. He's presenting! So if Toronto is looking for a Cute-a-thon, then they're on! Elliot's like the kitten version of perpetual motion, he just keeps building steam!

And so, to up the stakes just a tad, we present to you, loyal readers: Kitten in a vest!

Readers, your humble editor has just spent the last 48 hours periodically arguing on an internet message board with someone who may be as young as 15 years old, about what exactly 'punk rock' is. I even quoted Refused. Sigh.

What has become of me?

The internet has become my terrible, terrible mistress. I want a divorce.