Oh the times, they are a changin'...

It's a trap!

Another One Bites the Dust

So after the fall of Indie 103.1 last month, another major station in the Greater LA Area has fallen. Today at 5 o'clock 97.1 Free FM changed formats from being the only FM talk station in Los Angeles, to being one of a plethora of Top 40 stations within the 2nd largest radio market in the US. I had been encouraged to listen to it many times before but hadn't until today. It was a refreshing change from the talk radio I am used to in the AM spectrum. There were a couple different hints dropped today on air as to why things fell apart at KLSX, but I think it could be another victim of the new PPM's distributed by Aribitron. But who knows, with Neilsen talking about getting back into the radio ratings and restoring the old diary system, maybe the return of FM talk radio in the LA market won't be so far away after all. The real interesting part though was how all of the DJ's interacted. I listened roughly from 7AM to 5PM with a large break between 1 and 445. In that time I listened through Adam Corolla, Frosty Heidi and Frank, Danny Bonuduci and Tom Leykis. Adam was a good listen, having long time friend Jimmy Kimmel call in and thank Jimmy for getting him started in the business. Frosty and the gang all talked about how this is just a hiatus. Danny stated that he bought a house in Philly so he can broadcast from a new station. Tom thanked his crew for the great run they had and said that his name would be somewhere in the news in the future. Regardless of what they said it was incredibly refreshing compared to the diatrabe that was relayed to me by the my fellow students who were interns at the station. Their story was one of how evil CBS was and how it was ruining LA's talk radio etc. etc. I guess its what those students still have to learn, that no matter what reformatting, you continue forward with your passion for radio and continue to look for that new place to call your home. Its a never ending journey.

If you couldn't tune in this last week to Globetrotter, it was a pretty good time. I got a lot of good airchecks out of it and hopefully with the last few runs of Globetrotter in weeks past, I will be able to make a good audition tape in the near future. Here is the playlist for this last week.

Globetrotter (World) with DJ Ustin 02.19.2009 03:00PM to 04:00PM

03:07PM Azzido Da Bass Featuring Johnny Blake “Lonely By Your Side (Featuring Jonny Blake) [Radio Cut]” from Lonely By Your Side The Best Mixes (MP3, Single, Rock, 2006) on Luscious Sounds

03:10PM Thievery Corporation “El Pueblo Unido” from Radio Retaliation (CD, Album, World, 2008) on ESL Music Inc.

03:14PM Bajofondo “Pulmón” from Mar Dulce (CD, Album, World, 2008) on Surco Records J.V.

03:16PM The Reg Project “Chill'In Sunset” from The Desert Lounge Volume Two (2008) on EMI Music Arabia

03:23PM HaDag Nachash “HaPeh HaPatuach” from Chomer M'komi (CD, Album, Hip Hop, 2004) on Levantini

03:27PM Raashan Ahmad “Weight” from The Push (2008) on Om Records

03:32PM Edo Maajka “Prikaze” from Croatian Hip-Hop Vol. 1 (CD, Comp, Hip Hop, 2008) on Menart

03:38PM Polka Dot Dot Dot “Little Finger” from Love Letter to New Zealand (CD, Album, Indie, 2009) on Bicycle Records

03:42PM Margot & the Nuclear So and So's “Broadripple Is Burning” from The Daytrotter Sessions (CD, EP, Rock, 2008) on Sony BMG

03:47PM Shugo Tokumaru “Parachute” from Exit (CD, Album, Indie, 2008) on Blues Interactions

03:52PM Two Guns “Locomotives” from Two Guns (MP3, Album, Rock, 2009) on TWO GUNS

On the television side of things over at LBCC, I got a chance to work the video switcher as Tech Director Thursday night and then after that got to run the show as director. It felt pretty smooth and hopefully in the upcoming weeks I'll get some more shots at directing and working some more of the control room equiptment. As for now, I have to edit some things for KLBC. Make sure you stay tuned in to KLBC throughout the week, as one listener said, "I don't know who is responsible for the files on our automation, but it f***ing rocks! It's way cool! I love it. It's never sounded better." Until then.

- Justin

Day 55

So here we are, at the final day of Beardmas. Its been a fun ride with all of you. I thank you, to all the readers out there, you're encouragement and input along the way helped this come about. It was enjoyable. I hope to make Beardmas a bigger deal next year and maybe we can all get something going. As for the future of this blog, it will probably go towards keeping you up to speed on what is going on at KLBC.org with Globetrotter and the DJ Ustin Power Hour. So keep coming back and taking looks, who knows something interesting could be up. I shaved the beard this morning as per my grandmothers Christmas wish. It's weird to feel the wind on my face again, but I know this will make a lot of the ladies in my life happy. So as I said before, thank you all and make sure you stay tuned, who knows I just might end up going 100 Dollars for 100 Days, and then we will have so much more beard to watch grow and learn about. Have a wonderful New Year, and as many wrote in my middle school yearbooks, "Have a bad azz summer, you're the bomb don't ever change K.I.T."

Immediately after shaving the beard. I look like a child.

A Bag of Beard, a lucky Christmas gift for one little child today.

Day 54

So as we come together this December 24th we are reminded by all the hustle and bustle that Beardmas approaches tomorrow morning, where we celebrate the beloved beard and its place is global society. But I am sure you are all wondering how we got to this beloved world holiday. It took us a long time. It started off as Judeo Christian but soon similarities were seen throughout all world beliefs and it was clear that there had to be some bearded God up there looking down on us all and giving us the gift of Beard. Seeing as this is the day before the great shave of the 25th I have uploaded a few pictures of all angles of my beard and have brushed it out. I will take pictures like this again tomorrow morning before I set off to the razor. But for now, a history lesson.

As we go back through all the great religions and empires of the world we find beards throughout. Beards representing widsom, age, power and strength. In a sense it is out of the Judeo Christian history that we have Beardmas itself, the assurance of God to give the Israelites a bearded savior and we celebrate his birth today. But even before Old Testament there were stories of gods with beards who took care of their peoples, we will look at the east, the ancient and finally the western, in this 2nd to last post I will enlighten you with the story of Beardmas.

Long ago there was a god and it was the beginning, he was sitting around looking at himself in the mirror but realised that something was not good. He looked closer as he ran his hand across his smooth face and head and realised that he needed something more to do up his look. He put hair on his head and was very pleased, then he got the idea to adorn his whole body in hair, he gave himself even longer hair on the face and was very well pleased. Being so pleased he created a world where he would make four legged creatures covered in hair and seeing as it was not good enough to be his own it would be deemed fur. He reserved the fur for only the cutest of animals such as bunnys, bears, koalas and puppies. Yet he looked down at his creation and wasn't quite pleased he needed something more, something more in his image. He decided to create man. Now with man he gave the ability to grow all the hair that he had put on his own body, yet he made it so that he would only be matured and a man when all his hair had grown out. Man walked around hanging with the bears and bunnies and puppies but wanted more men, or more of something. God decided to create a woman and for the occasional woman he granted the ultimate beauty of being able to grow a beard herself. He said that they could have everything they wanted as so long as they didn't go near the tree of razors. He said that it would be foolish and that they would be punished severely. One day while walking through the garden picking various items from the tress of shampoo, moustache scissors, combs and conditioner, the woman passed the tree of razors. "Come closer!" a voice said from the tree. From the tree slithered out the snake Bic. When God created the garden he made this tree (The Tree of Razors) and made his most hated animal the snake, an animal that could never grow hair and rather was plagued by having smooth scales all over its body. It would never be able to grow the hair that was to represent, wisdom, age, beauty and strength. "What is that all over your legs and face?" The snake asked the woman. "It's hair, God has given it to me to keep my body warm and to show certain traits he has deemed desired" replied the woman. "Come touch my skin" said the snake. The woman went over and stroked the back of the snake, "It is so soft, so smooth to my touch." She smiled, she liked what she felt. "Did you know that you too can have this softness?" responded Bic the snake. "Simply pick a razor from the tree and drag it along your skin." The woman picked a Bic razor from the tree and drug it along her chin, legs and armpits. Afterword she asked, "Why does my sking slightly burn?" "It is razor burn" responded the snake. "It is a small side effect but it will go away soon, hurry take a razor to your Man friend, have him shave his face, it will be smooth to the touch, your lips will be able to feel his cheeks when you two kiss and you will be happy." She did as Bic told her and ran off.

The next day while strolling through this creation, God was on his way to the Man and Womans house to catch up and see how they had been. When he got close to the door though he noticed a sheep over in the corner of their lawn. It had been completely sheerd, void of all the hair and wool that covered its body. "WHAT HAVE THEY DONE WITH YOU!?" he cried. As he kicked in the door to their house he saw them there, the woman sitting with clean shaved legs, "WHERE IS HE!?" She timidly pointed to the bathroom. God kicked down that door as well inside the bathroom Man stood there with a shaved chest, face and was fast at work...well "Manscaping" as they call it. God was so furious with the people he destroyed all civilization that he had created and banished them from his beloved garden.

Years later...

Our story now takes a turn to Southern Asia or as it is now called India. Throughout India people were going about their buisness growing long beards and hair and all together loving life. Yet God had left Earth, he had become far too disappointed with what people had done with their body hair and decided that he would come back later on. With no direct contact with god, the people of Southern Asia relied on their religion of Hinduism to explain where their beards had come from and what they meant. Their beliefs centered around their trinity of Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva. Brahma of which they gave and epic beard, a beard so epic he had to have 4 heads, to house his beard on 4 different faces.

This is a car ornament with the image of Brahma on it, Brahma continues to inspire the world today, through the many Hindus that still practice and the millions of Brazillians that continue to get wasted at the beach drinking Brahma beer.

A favorite of Brazillians one and all.

Now one of the more famous stories from Hinduism is the Ramayana in which Rama travels afar to fight Ravana for his wife Sita. Rama heard one day of a challege that Sita was having that any man who could string Shiva's bow could take her hand in marriage. Rama decided to go out and try the challenge. Men from near and far came to try but no one could string the bow of Shiva. However when Rama came up he not only strung the bow but broke it in half while pulling it back to show how increidbly ripped his lats were. When Sita saw those lats she knew she had to have them. They were married, but upon Rama's arrival back home he was banished from his homeland by his evil step mother. While in exile Sita was stolen by Ravana. Now Ravana, not only is clearly evil from this action, but also had the evil moustache. One of our most despised enemies in the Holy Church of Beard. Not only did have have the satche though, somewhere along the way he picked up the 10x multiplier.

Thats right, this guy had 10 of those nasty staches, one each one of his 10 heads. So replused at the sight of so many staches, Rama immediately started firing off all kinds of arrows into the heads of Ravana, yet to his dispair everytime he shot a head off, another would grow back in its place. Getting the hint that there was TOO much evil in those staches and that they were so powerful that they could reproduce heads, he decided to go for the money shot. An arrow straight to the heart put him down and Sita was saved by her love Rama. (Years and years later Bon Jovi would resound with Ravana's final words in his address to Sita. It goes as follows: Shot to the heart, and your to blame, darling you give love a bad name.) Though Rama himself did not wear a beard, he had Brahma on his side. An assuring sign that Gods return could be imminent.

At the same time there were two peoples coming to their golden age. The Egyptians were hard at work, building the pyramids and enslaving the jews. The Jews on the other hand were hard at work building the pyramids and waiting for a sign, a sign that God would give them a bearded savior. Now the Egyptians were all about their bearded gods, but not only were they bearded they were half man half animal such as Osiris and The Sphinx.

So maybe Osiris isn't so much of a half man half animal, unless he is part ooze monster or something, look at that disgusting green skin.
Now the Sphinx is more like it, there is a half man half animal if I have ever seen it. Too bad some beard fearers at some point in time knocked the beard clean off this masterpiece.

Now as you see in the back ground, the pyramids, something the Jews were hard at work under some heavy slave drivers, the Egyptians. So the Egyptians are hanging back praising Rah and Osiris when all the sudden the Pharaoh gets the great idea to go ahead and kill all the baby Jews. Enter Moses, this little Admiral got himself a basket made of reeds and sails straight to the source itself, the princess. He is made some kind of kingdom official and goes about being pretty sweet, but one day he is out and about in the wilderness and the bush straight bursts into flames. Guess who's back, thats right its God and he wants Moses not only to grow a sweet beard but to get his people out of Egypt so that they can have the pleasure of wandering the desert for 40 years and being eaten by asps. This of course is only because they decide not to listen to anything Moses tells them to do. But we are getting ahead of ourselves. Before all of the wandering God had a choice to make, he ordered Moses to grow a beard and then go talk to the pharaoh about letting his people go. Moses had no clue how he could grow a sweet beard in so little time but some how he came out like this.When God got around to looking for Moses again, he saw this beard and he was very well pleased, it reminded himself of him in his younger days, back when he made that garden for man and woman to grow their beards in. He then deemed the Jews the people of God, had their leader not been able to out grow the pharaoh, who knows what history would have looked like. To punish the Pharaoh for his wussy little gotee, God laid the smackdown, including turning all their water to blood, locusts, darkness and finally death to all firstborns of houses that didn't have beard hair glued above their doorways. The Egyptians didn't make it, before you knew it the Jews were out of there and in the desert. After Moses died there were many prophets, all of which had beards, people like Isaiah and Ezekiel...

Isaiah

His inverse Ezekiel.

Yet and by far the sweetest prophet of them all was Elijah. He was awesome for a couple of reasons, first off he was totally shaggy and just rugged, out in the desert surviving like Bear Grylls at a Boy Scout Camp, AKA easily. But when he grew his beard, it was so incredible and so in the image of God, God himself had to give Elijah a free pass, he dropped the giant golden staircase down and let him walk into heaven. Just like that.Clearly there is no question why. But Elijah told of a day, where the people would be redeemed for their razor using ways. There would be another, a savior of sorts, and he would make it so that all men could be seen as beard wearers in the eye of God.

Thats right guys, its Jesus, in the flesh himself, go ahead and see for yourself. Jesus born December 25th, was the one that Elijah had promised us all. He was born of the Bearded Virgin Mary in a little cave dwelling kind of thing because the local Econo Lodge, Super 8 AND KOA Campgrounds were all booked up with Christmas reservations. He was born with a full beard and was deemed the promised one by 3 kings with beards from the east, a whole flock of bearded shepheards with tons of sheeps covered in wool, some other furry creatures milling about and don't forget his bearded mamasan who just birthed that Holiest of Holys. He was the promised one, he got 12 disciples, all of whom decided to grow beards in honor of him. He went around Jerusalem doing miracles and healings, but this was the time of the Roman Empire and Romans didn't take well to someone out bearding the likes of Jupiter and Mars. So they held a trial in which he was sentenced to shave, he refused and was then sentenced to be crucified. After he was taken down from the cross the Romans shaved him and laid him in a tomb, but low and behold.
Much like before when God had booted down the Man's door in the garden, Jesus deliverd a massive roundhouse and in all his glory kicked out the door of his tomb and blasted the Roman guards on their asses. When he stepped out they were dumb founded not at the fact that he was dead in that tomb earlier in the weekend, but rather that he had his beard, and it was in full force, with such a glow that it blinded them. Jesus stuck around for a little while after that, doing a few miracles and making sure things were set up so that all would not be judged by what the grew on their face. Now this is the story of Beardmas, the promised Beard coming down and freeing those who cannot grow so that they don't get slammed down to an eternity of snake skin smooth cheeks. But after a while on Earth, Elijah wanted to have a sweet beard party up in the stratosphere so Jesus had to bounce, but he left us a good ole' friend to watch over us.

Santa

Now the more religious, such as Greek Orthodox Priests, Orothdox Jews, Muslims, and Sheikh's will tell you that Beardmas revolves around the creation of the beard yadda yadda Elijah....Savior saves bears blah blah. But lets be honest, the true story of Beardmas revolves around one thing, men like us Beardateers, getting old, putting on fat man suits, going out, breaking into houses and eating cookies. What more could a man want. Jesus left Santa as an example to all, as to what we should do with our retirement. Sure we could spend it at Pebble Beach playing golf, or flying helicopters, but who doesn't love an old man with a beard. Whether he is drinking a beer on his porch and bitching about the neighbor kids, hunting yetis in the Himalayas, enjoying the bearded benefits of pirating or being viking. A beard is a good look and what better look than being on a jolly fat old man. Let Santa be a inspiration to us all and let the spirit of Beardmas live in you this year. Grow a beard, eat some cookies and cruise in a sled. Ain't nothing better. Happy Beardmas to you one and all.

Day 53

First let me apologize for this late entry, picture taken yesterday, but this illness has put me down like a pound puppy who has been in his cage too long. Luckily for me since I awoke this morning I have been feeling much better. But with this entry being for the 53 Day of Beardmas we need to talk about something very very important the phenomenon of the "Bearded Lady". Now we can't all grow beards, some of our aspiring beardateers throughout the course of this blog and have learned such. But sometimes, when children are born during a werewolf heavy full moon, a woman can come across with the curse. Bearded ladies have been around since the beginning of time, but more recently were discovered in the United States via "Freak Shows' in which often times the bearded ladies themselves would in fact be fake. But there are some true ladies of the beard,Such as bearded lady Madame Olga. Born Jane Barnell in North Carolina in 1871, she was born to probably some of the most ethnically hairy people. A Russian/Jewish father and an Irish/Indian mother. When she came out of the womb she already had a 5 o'clock shadow and by the age of two a full on beard. Now fearing that she would be too powerful to take care of because of her awesome length (she put the other little boys on the playground to shame with her epic chin curtain) her mother gave her away to a traveling freakshow at the age of 4. The circus took her back to Europe to travel but she became sick with Typhoid, expecting her to die the circus left her in the cold somewhere in Europe. Yet she curled up in her beard and kept warm, surviving and making it back to the good ole USA. She is probably best known for starring in the 1932 film Freaks. In her words though the film was, "an insult to all freaks everywhere." Over the times though there have not only been true blue bearded ladies but also men who have appeared as them and people who have gone through sex changed to get that coveted and in season bearded lady look.

Jennifer Miller (Real Bearded Lady) in a sparkly purple dress, a beautiful dress for all ladies of all facial hair lengths.

Delina Rossa (Real Bearded Lady), bearded lady from France. She's giving Lincoln a run for his money with this beard, she could keep it a less hobo shag though.

Madame Clofullia (Real Bearded Lady), looking like a sultan with that sweet sweet beard.


Which of course brings us to the fakes, I found a few pictures of fakes but this one takes the cake. Mr. T in the Freaks remake as the bearded lady. Usually I'm a fan of Mr. T but Mr. T in a goofy ass pink sweater like that is a no go. Simply put: Deal Breaker. That thing has to be like an XXL the man has biceps like tree trunks. He isn't even wearing his chains or his indian feather earrings. For Shame. Post for this Beardmas Eve, later today. Until then.

Day 52

Beards are no remedy for the sick.

Day 51

So begins the final four days, its kind of sad, I'm going to be missing this beard, i've grown so accustomed to it. But this doesn't meant I can't start getting recruits for the next Beardmas, and I'm recruiting them young.This little guy is Charlie, he is an aspiring Beard-A-Teer. We decided to hit up the local In & Out to discuss the finer points of beard growing. Though he has a long time to go before he sprouts his first whiskers, he was very interested in the techniques I used to grow and document my own beard. Other big topics of conversation included the his food, the firetruck that drove by, what color my car is and a detailed break down on the song Wheels on the Bus. Clearly his favorite verse when the horn goes beep beep beep! Also he was very concerned about the pigeon walking around our table. But most of all he was incredibly concerened about when he can start growing his own beard.