Gruhak: It's internet speak for "Rockin Out"

                Welcome once again to The Bones, loyal viewers!  Quick announcement:  We’ve officially broken a thousand hits!  Thanks guys.  Really.  That’s awesome sauce.  Keep on coming by and keep on sending out the links.  This is all you!

                I was mucking about on the interwebs today when I stumbled across something marvelous.  Not something cool.  Not something pretty good.  This shyte is flipping MARVELOUS and I don’t know why I haven’t heard of these guys before.  It’s a little band called Gruhak  and I know next to nothing about them.

                On the facebook, my friend told me that she had never ever heard a Led Zeppelin song.  This was a travesty that I felt must be righted, so I went straight on over to the youtubes and I did a quick search for some of the essentials.  (The Immigrant Song, Ramble On, Misty Mountain Hop and the like.)  On a search for the Immigrant Song I found these guys.  A cover of a Led Zeppelin song?  Yeah.  I’ve never heard one of THOSE.  (Rolls Eyes)  But I’m all about music and the picture looked like my buddies rocking out in their garage so I just had to click it.

                It’s not every day that I’m surprised like this.  (Like really pleasantly surprised.)  But this was one day where I would feel that glee.  The only thing that I can say is “solid.”  Not just a solid representation of the song, but a solid band.  I flipped through some other covers of theirs and you can just tell that either these guys had recorded about eighty billion takes of this, or they worked REALLY well together.  I’m choosing to believe the second part. 

                They do covers of other bands and I’m going to be honest, that singer is versatile.  If you ever happen to read these words, man:  I salute you.  I salute your guitarist too.  I salute you not only for your skill, but for your honesty about what you do.  Right on one of the videos I watched, I think it was one of the Led Zep ones, a viewer commented something to the lines of “Dude.  That solo was great.  Better than the original.  How did you do it?”  The guitarist replied with “I was feeling lazy that day, so it’s a dumbed down version of the original.”  Then he actually posted the chords in the response.  That is a freaking musician.  THAT is the kind of people that I like to see.  None of this big headed prickish snark that you get so often, just a guy that (I assume) enjoys what he does and is just having a good time with it.  Maybe I’m wrong, but in this case, I’ll be happy being wrong.

                I know I just picked out the guitarist and the singer, but the WHOLE freaking band is solid.  Great energy on their videos and either well rehearsed or very skillful.  Can it be both?  Maybe it can.  I especially love that in almost every video they’ve got cigs hanging out the corner of their mouth as they play.

                They have a website.  It’s at the bottom.  Go to their youtube channel first.  Tell me that that singer doesn’t capture that mouthful of gravel that Morrison sings with on those Doors covers.  And don’t be afraid to dig their original work too.  It’s not half bad.

                Fantasy will set you free,

                                -Costello 

Gruhak Youtube Channel:   http://www.youtube.com/user/Gruhak

Gruhak Band Page:  http://www.gruhak.com/

About as Important as a Bee on the Bumwax of a T-Rex

                So the other day at work, I was standing glazed eyed behind my cash register while an overly angry parent explained to me that she wanted to return a video game because it just “wasn’t as good as they thought it was going to be.”  I was there.  I swear I was.  But my brain was pretty much perusing exotic mushrooms in Wonderland.  This whole situation was just about as important to me as a bee on the bumwax of a T-Rex.  Bumwax.  That’s a fun word.  I don’t know what it means, or whether it’s real or not but I’m going to use it.

                “Sixty dollars.  I spent sixty dollars on this item that I have obviously used because I am talking about it in great detail.”

                Anyway, I have this skill.  It’s like magic.  I’m able to take the blibbering of anyone that comes up to that cash register to complain to me and just drown it out.  It’s like that annoying neighborhood dog that barks at anything that moves.  You know it’s doing it.  You know it’s really annoying.  And most importantly, you know that you want to kick it all the way into the stone age, but you just can’t thanks to those damn social norms. 

                “Then he just took out the gun and the alien died.  What kind of message are you trying to send by selling this?  That killing aliens is real?  I don’t want my son growing up thinking that an alien invasion could happen any-“

                So I stood there, while she barked away at me about I dunno bad graphics or something?  Eh.  Unimportant.  What was really important at the time was what kind of superpower I’d have if I was a super villain.  You see, most people think of what they’d have if they were a super-HERO.  No no no no no.  Let’s just close that road down and set up a detour to coolville.  See the villains get minions, badass costumes, and generally awesome powers.  But what would mine be?

                “No, I don’t want another game I just want my money back because I wanted to just play this game for free then bitch about it until-“

                I guess the best way to choose one would be to just like picture someone that I really didn’t like and figure out what the most satisfying way to dispatch them would be.

                “So after I beat the game, I put it back in again just to see if maybe I missed something-“

                While zombies rose out of the ground ready to devour this lady’s brains and then defile her corpse in the most comical way possible, my manager was coming to her rescue hopping onto her register to give this lady exactly what she wanted. 

                As the lady stormed off in a huff I said exactly what was on my mind.  “They would call me Doctor Styx!  Because of the river!”

                Happy Fourth of July everyone,

                                Costello