The Smush Newsletter, May 9th, 2002, Vol 2.1 Contact: lemonhead@goombas.org Back issues available at http://smush.goombas.org/news.asp Table of Contents: 1. Intro ............. 17 2. New Smush Music ... 26 3. Employment ........ 64 4. Classics .......... 143 5. If You Want More .. 162 INTRO ----- Welcome to the jungle, and it's alright by me! As you can tell, we've given up on the weekly format of the newsletter, and have instead reverted to sending out a newsletter whenever there's actual news. I hope you prefer this scheduling method; it's certainly easier on us! NEW SMUSH MUSIC --------------- phd - lemonhead - http://smush.goombas.org/search.asp?name=phd lemonhead wrote this song from his jail cell after he was arrested for murder. They let him go on a technicality: the other guy just got a few bruises, he didn't actually die. slo - lemonhead - http://smush.goombas.org/search.asp?name=slo lemonhead wrote this, but since he can't play an instrument, he had to coax R.F. into performing it. no easy task, as R.F. is well aware of the fact that his mobility has been severely limited by rigor mortis. NEQ - lemonhead - http://smush.goombas.org/search.asp?name=neq this song starts out with a hand crafted acid techno riff of the future, when acid techno riffs are all done in 3/4 time. it cuts between this and a drum and bass loop, where, due to a deliberate bug in our proprietary sequencing software, the drum and bass module were both being fed the same data. dancing about these two sections are two piano riffs, either of which have a fifty percent chance of putting you into a smush-loving trance, but taken together have a seventy five percent chance. ump - R.F. - http://smush.goombas.org/search.asp?name=ump hey ump, that guy's playing a violin with no rosin. how about a warning? but i don't want to watch out i don't get killed? sli - lemonhead - http://smush.goombas.org/search.asp?name=sli our meat-and-potatoes workhorse, the casio mt-68, which has been the backbone of many a smush song for over a year now, has started acting up since we opened it up and started making random connections. when you first turn it on, it sounds normal, but it quickly proceeds through stages of degeneration, starting with a light distortion and ending up with pitched noise. we had to restart it several times to keep it in the sweet spot of light distortion while recording the ubercatchy piano riff that repeats throughout this song. EMPLOYMENT ---------- Rubbahead and I have been working hard to make ends meet since the demise of our downtown studio-home hybrid in late 2001, we've been straining hard to make ends meet. Our new apartment had a crack in the wall with a twenty dollar bill sticking out and that kept us in Top Ramen for a month or so, but after that ... one of us had to get a job. Our charm and wit quickly landed us a job doing tech support for an internet company whom we will not name. Unfortunately, we quickly found that working is life in hell, and working in tech support is even more so, like the place they send people who killed their parents with axes instead of people who were just Jewish. We had read tech support stories about stupid users before, when people would forward them to us, but we'd both always thought they were elitist and overly critical of people who just wanted a helping hand ... but when we got tech support jobs ourselves, boy did we get a shock! Most users are IDIOTS! Take this exchange for instance: Moron: "I can't connect to the internet." Rubbahead: "Are you on dial-up or DSL?" Moron: "Dial-up." Rubbahead: "Can you check your network configuration for me?" Moron: "Ok... where do go to I do that?" Can you believe this? Wait, it gets worse! Rubbahead: "[sigh] ... go to your desktop ... to do that, you hit windows-d ... " Moron: "Windows-d?" Rubbahead: "Yeah, you hold down the windows key and then hit d." Moron: "Umm..." Rubbahead: "Then you let go of the windows key." Moron: "I don't think I have a windows key." Rubbahead: "Hm? You must have one of those old-fashioned keyboards." Moron: "I don't know... I just got it a couple months ago." Rubbahead: "Whatever. Just close all your applications ... Done that?" Moron: "All of them?" Rubbahead: "Yeah." Moron: "Can I save this email first?" Why's he writing email if his connection is down? What a dunderhead! Rubbahead: "Yes. Yes, you can save it. Are you at your desktop yet?" Moron: "Hold on ... yes." Rubbahead: "Right-click on my computer." Moron: "Your computer? Uh, wouldn't you have to do that?" Rubbahead: "No, there's an icon, labeled 'My Computer'." Moron: "Mm, I don't see it... Rubbahead: "Keep looking. Is caps lock on?" Moron: "No ... I still don't see it." Rubbahead: "Um, maybe you need to create it. Make a folder called 'My Computer'." Moron: "Ok." Rubbahead: "Now right-click on it." Moron: "I don't understand what you mean by 'right-click'." Rubbahead: "Press the mouse button on the right of your mouse!" Moron: "Uh, there's just one button on my mouse." Rubbahead: "Huh? You broke the other one, or what?" Moron: "No... well, I sure hope not. It looks fine!" It turned out he was using a "Macintosh" computer, whatever that is. What an idiot! Since they don't allow us to bring our musical instruments into the office, we've learned to play the touch tone phones at the office, and have quickly become phone virtuosos... unfortunately, Rubbahead's love of heavy metal has come back to haunt him, because power chords are played with the 9 and 1 keys (try it out yourself!). So far, whenever the emergency vehicles have showed up we've been able to smooth-talk our way out of the blame by passing it on to clients and coworkers, but pretty soon they're gonna realize that it's us. We'll keep you posted on how the job is going; also on how the new smush album which is all touch tone phone sounds is coming along! CLASSICS -------- MAR - lemonhead - http://smush.goombas.org/search.asp?name=MAR Marcel Bougewozzy plays slide guitar in this latin pop piece. His dog backs him up with some traditional mexican synth lines. Rubbahead plays the speculum. FST - lemonhead - http://smush.goombas.org/search.asp?name=FST I saw a huge ant just a few minutes ago. It must've been 3 inches long. I tried to hit it with a shoe, but there was no corpse when I picked it up, and I have no idea where it went. I know it's not an acid flashback because I've never taken acid. I hope it didn't crawl into my shoe because I have to go to work in a few hours. FNK - lemonhead - http://smush.goombas.org/search.asp?name=FNK Computer-performed funk wah-wah guitar combined with the classic sensibilities of Scandinavian gabber. Rubbahead plays the dental dams.